In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of forgiveness and encourages the congregation to forgive others. He shares a personal story about a dilapidated chicken coop he encountered and felt compelled to help. The preacher also discusses the need for the church to be vigilant and proclaim the coming of the Lord. He highlights a prophetic alarm in the Bible that warns of demonic spirits and the urgency for a message of holiness in the church. The sermon concludes with a message of encouragement from the Holy Spirit.

This message is one of the Times Square Pulpit series. It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times Square Church in Manhattan, New York City. Other tapes are available by writing to World Challenge PO Box 260, Lindale, Texas 75771 or calling 214-963-8626. None of these messages are copyrighted and you are welcome to make copies for free distribution to your friends. Take me back to Isaiah 56. I couldn't see the message. The Lord kept whispering to my heart, David, the message for Sunday night is right there. I would read it, re-read it, and I couldn't find it. I'd try to go to other scriptures in my regular daily reading and the Lord said, back to Isaiah 56. I'd go back and I still didn't see it. All week long, about Friday this week, suddenly the Lord said, I'm going to show it to you. It's been there. You haven't seen it yet. And the Holy Spirit spoke this word, rejection. Look for rejection and I'm going to give you a message because there are literally multitudes of people, Christians, who are living under a feeling or sense of having been rejected, a feeling of fruitlessness, not being much used to God, not having any fruitful ministry, so to speak, and feeling rejected and not much used to the kingdom of God. And the Holy Spirit began to open this to my heart. If I've heard the Spirit correctly, there are many, many people in this building tonight who have lived under a burden or a feeling of having been rejected. It goes all the way back to your childhood. I'm not a psychologist, I'm not going to try to psychoanalyze you from the pulpit. I don't recommend that to anybody. But I am going to go into the word of God with you tonight and hope that God will dig out the roots. Some of you have not been able yet to come into the fullness of Christ. You're never going to find your place in the body until you deal with these roots that have wrapped themselves around your spiritual life and God wants to set you free. Now, when I speak the word rejection tonight, I wonder if it's striking a chord in your heart. Maybe some of you heard about the message and it came for that very reason. You say, that's me for sure, Brother David. I've been rejected most of my life. I've never seemed to fit in anywhere. I've never felt like I've accomplished much in my life. I've always felt a little different, not attractive, awkward, a little dumb. Not very good at anything. Or I've been too fat, been too skinny. Well, I'm going to talk about my skinniness when I was a young boy growing up and how it affected my life. You see, if you're overweight, you think that nobody skinny could ever have a problem. And I told people, I can eat meat and never gain a pound in all my life. That was a problem. They said, you poor child. I wish I had that problem. I wouldn't wish it on anybody, not when you're growing up with it. But I've met mature Christians who've walked with God for years and they're still hurting. After all these years, they still feel the rejection because somebody in their past, it could have been a mother or a father, said such unloving things. I've heard parents say to their children, maybe you've had it said to you when you were growing up, your mother won't say anything. You don't do anything right. Do I hear an amen there? You know, I was in a home one time and I saw a father take a 7-year-old boy and he did wrongly. He had a gas stove and all of a sudden took his finger and put his finger in the fire. I'll tell you, it's the grace of God that kept me from blowing up. I corrected him right on the spot. He said, a boy's not going to learn anything unless he learns. Some of you have grown up with a father who never cared. You saw him maybe beat up your mother. Now this doesn't apply to everybody. If you ask my children, in fact, I grew up in the kind of home that I believe that Brennan and I provided for our children, a loving atmosphere. I've always been a friend to my children. They're friends of mine. We grew up and there's love and there's tenderness. So I don't think Greg here tonight could relate to that. But some of you relate to what I'm saying about you grew up, your parents put a trip on you, and you're still suffering from it. I had someone tell me just today, the father was dying and the children were all grown, and the father was about to die, it was terminal, and they met because the family was called together, and she met one of her brothers at the airport. You know what he said? I would like to hear, just before he dies, I'd like to hear dad say one time to me, I love you. Just one time say, I love you. Some of you are related to what I'm saying because you grew up that way. There are others that are here tonight that you're suffering rejection from divorce. From a husband or wife, a mate, who's made you feel so unneeded, unattractive, unworthy. You know, I've met here in New York City, in this church, at least three women who have had serious operations that have deformed their body, mastectomies for example, and when the husband found out that the body was going to be deformed after the operation, he just took off. Making her feel not only unattractive, unneedy, and saying, what's wrong with me? There are some of you sitting here right now, you know what it's like, I'm thinking of a woman now who told me just recently, her husband, she had the divorce because he's running away now, and she said, I want to know how long has this been going on since we've been married? He said, from the very beginning. He was cheating on her from the very beginning, and of course, I don't think I can relate to that. I have a happy marriage, I'm in love with my wife and Gwen's in love with me, and it's getting better and sweeter. I can't even conceive of the word. I don't know what that hurt is, I don't know what that rejection is. I can't even sit in my study and try to conjure up the feelings of how you feel. I've had them say to me, divorce is like dying. It's like dying. You never get over it. You replay, I talked to a real man of God recently, he's divorced twice, he's married the third time. Divorced two times in sin, married now as a Christian with a lovely wife. He told me the other day, David, he said, I have to plead the blood all the time, I'm replaying the rejection, I'm replaying the hurt all the time. I have to battle it when I stand in the presence of the Lord. My present wife has suffered because of these memories that I can't seem to get out of my mind at times. Of course, we've already been in the process of healing him. I don't know what your rejection is, the source of it. Why don't you go to Isaiah 56 and let's dig in and see what God is saying. Now, this 56th chapter, we're going to talk about rejection, but first let me tell you that the chapter starts with a trumpet blast. Let me read verse 1. Thus saith the Lord, keep your judgment and do justice, for my salvation is near to come, and my righteousness to be revealed. Now look at me, please. That's a trumpet sound. That says Jesus is coming. The Lord is coming. Now, this is not simply a message to Israel of the flesh. Oh no, it's more than that. It's messianic, first of all, because Jesus is the righteousness of God revealed, isn't he? He is the Messiah, he's the full righteousness of God, and he did come. The Redeemer came to Zion. But old Isaiah was looking down the corridor of history, and he saw the very day in which you and I live. And he was saying, there's a time coming, the very end, when the full revelation of Jesus comes to the world. He goes on to tell us what kind of people, he said, when it's near. Lay hold of both evils. Look at the next verse. Blessed is the man that doeth this, the son of man that layeth hold of it, that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and keeping his hand from doing any evil. Now, when it talks about the sabbath in the Old Testament, though it speaks of the physical keeping of the sabbath, there's a greater spiritual meaning in it for you and I. It means keeping to the faithfulness of God. It's an outward expression of the inward work of the Holy Ghost of purity. In other words, if you have a pure heart, it's going to show in your actions. You and I keep sabbath by walking what we are having God do in our hearts. It's an outward expression of the inner work of grace. We're keeping sabbath right now. We're here in God's house. In other words, you walk in covenant with me. You walk in obedience to me, because the end is near. That's what Isaiah is saying. The end is near. This righteousness is about to be revealed. So lay hold of this thing. Lay hold of righteousness. Lay hold of the covenant. Lay hold of obedience. Now, if that's the case, if that's what the prophet is preaching, what should the watchmen and the shepherds be preaching? What should the prophets today, the last day prophets, what should the watchmen, what should the preachers in America and around the world be preaching right now if Isaiah saw the end and Isaiah said, walk in holiness before God. Walk in righteousness before the Lord. What should we be preaching? If the bridegroom's coming, the shepherds should be watchdogs, shepherdogs, barking. Wide awake saying, behold the bridegroom's coming. Isaiah saw it. I see it. Wake up. Behold the bridegroom's coming. Go out to meet him. Look at verse, look at verse, I'll tell you what. The prophet saw, I want you to go to verse 9 and just hold it right there for a minute, but I have to set this up for you. Listen, listen. The prophet sees a tragic thing happening in the last day. He warns that the coming of the Lord is near. And he said, in view of that, there should be such a message of holiness going forth. In the church. Then he sees something so tragic. And he has a prophetic alarm goes off in verse 9. It's a prophetic alarm. Look at it. Verse 9. All you beasts of the field. Who are these beasts of the field? Demonic spirits. All the principalities and powers of hell. Come to devour or destroy all you beasts in the forest. His watchmen are blind. They're all ignorant. They're all dumb dogs. I didn't preach that. Isaiah said it. You blind saint. Go down to Paterson Square Church. A preacher stood there standing there and called up a preacher. Dumb dogs. Isaiah preached it. They are all, all of them he said, all the blind watchmen are dumb dogs. I'm going to name some of them in just a minute. They cannot bark. They're sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber. Yeah, they are greedy dogs which can never have enough. They are shepherds that cannot understand. They all look to their own way. Every one for his own gain from his own quarter. Come, you say, I will fetch wine and we will fill ourselves with spoon drink and tomorrow shall be as this day and much more abundant. They were preaching abundance and prosperity. It's all there. Don't get mad at me. It's all there. Get mad at Isaiah if you are mad at anybody. And I want you to know that they're called his watchmen. Look at verse 10. Whose watchmen? His watchmen are blind. Ezekiel is even stronger in his rebuke. He said, I'm reading from Ezekiel 34. Don't turn there, but I'm reading from 35th chapter of Ezekiel. By the way, if you want to hear the most thundering, blistering message against blind, dumb shepherds, you ought to read Ezekiel 34 when you go home. It's shocking. If I preach like that, I don't think I'd ever live it down. But look, I'll just read a portion. Long to the shepherds. My sheep had been scattered because they were without shepherds. My flock became meat or prey to every beast of the field. That's every demon power. Because there was no shepherd, neither did my shepherds search for the flock. But the shepherds fed themselves and not my flock. So I, even I, will search out for my sheep and I'll seek them out. God's going to do it even without those dumb, dumb shepherds. You say, what is the Lord saying? Isaiah is saying, it's not just rhetoric. He's saying, come on all you demon forces. Go ahead and devour because there's no one to challenge you. Now, the watchmen are blind, they're lazy, they're fast asleep. The shepherds are too wrapped up in their own welfare. They give you no opposition. In fact, our shepherds are going, open the gate for the devil. I'll tell you one of them is Bishop Moore right here in New York, the Episcopal Bishop. Have you seen, have you heard? I don't have television, but I just read that he's finished a whole series of television and radio commercials for abortionists. And he said on his commercial, I mean, he was sneering when he said it, you could hear it in his voice. He said, only a small, small amount of people are against poor choice. He was advocating, he's the number one salesman now on radio and television for the poor choice abortionists, abortion on demand. Preacher of the gospel, a shepherd, fast asleep. Isaiah said, dumb dog, shepherds, fast asleep. Can you conceive of ministers of the gospel being in the forefront of this? Another bishop, Bishop Spong over in New Jersey, right across the river. He doesn't even believe the Bible is, in every word of God, he believes it's full of mistakes. He's one of the top advocates for gay rights. I wonder if he even believes in Jesus Christ. I don't mind if you send him my tape. Hold it, please. I'm not being facetious. They consider preaching like this shrill rhetoric anyhow. And it doesn't, because the Bible says they're blind, they don't even know that they're blind. They don't even know that they're in error. I don't believe any preacher of the gospel knows he's in error if he's preaching it, until he gets to the cross, he repents, and then God gives him discernment. Oh, but it's not only in the Episcopal movement. Now, thank God, not all Episcopal priests or bishops are like that. But you see, it's in the charismatic movement as well, in Pentecostals, Evangelicals, Shepherds, just this building, because they refuse to sound the trumpet. They say, I don't want any gloom, I don't want any doom in my church. In fact, they feel it's their duty as Shepherds to protect themselves from this kind of preaching. And they will not sound the alarm. They preach nothing but the goodness of God. It's fun serving Jesus. Well, it is fun if you've repented. It is joy once you have settled the account with the Lord. You can tell when the church is in the Spirit or not. You can tell when the pastor's in the Spirit or not. If all you hear, if all you hear is it's fun serving Jesus, you never hear a word of repute, you never hear a word of holiness, you never hear about separation from the world, you don't hear anything about the wrath and the severity of God, never a message on hell, you might hear one on heaven. But oh, God is so good. God is such fun. Paul said, Behold the goodness and the severity of God. On them which fail severity, the church eat goodness. If you continue in His goodness, otherwise you shall also be cut off. We preach it both ways. We preach the goodness of God, we preach the severity of God. I'm not saying we have it all. But we're a long way from understanding this church doesn't have all the truth. None of the pastors have all the truth. But God's going to raise up in these last days shepherds after His own heart, He said. They'll preach as Jesus did. Hallelujah. And if they're going to preach like Isaiah did, they're going to preach repentance, walking in His righteousness. They're going to say, as Isaiah did, the Lord's holiness is being revealed. Lay hold of it. Lay down your iniquities. Now, while the wicked shepherds, these blind watchmen are chasing their own dreams, the Bible said the Lord Himself is going to come and start gathering the outcasts. Look at verse 8. The Lord God which gathereth the outcasts of Israel saith, Yea, will I gather others to Him beside those who are gathered unto Him. Look at me preach. I believe we're seeing the last great endeavoring. And it's not coming through somebody's ministry now. All the ministries that said, I'm the only one, all the ministries that said, I'm the one, or my ministry's the one, they're all going down. God says, no. You're not going to get your eyes on shepherds. You're not going to get your eyes on watchmen. I'm going to gather them. I personally am going to gather my sheep. I'm going to be their shepherd. You know where the rest of them are? They're all having a party. They're saying in verse 12, come, he said, we will fetch wine. That's an intoxication of any kind. Intoxicated with self. Intoxicated with prosperity. And verse 12, come, saith he, we will fetch wine. They're going to have a party. We will fill ourselves with strong drink. And tomorrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant. And no judgment coming. And no doom coming. That's good. America's going to be stronger and better than ever. That's what they say. And you see why they're there partying. They're saying prosperity and peace. The Lord said, while they're sleeping and partying, I'm going out and I'm going to gather myself the outcasts. Do you know we're being gathered together by the Lord? This church didn't gather you together. And no preacher gathered you together. You're here tonight by the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is drawing you. Among these outcasts, he mentions two classes of people. First of all, he mentions the strangers and eunuchs. So we're going to talk about strangers and then eunuchs. All right, look at verse 3. Neither let the son of the stranger that adjoined himself to the Lord speak, saying, The Lord hath utterly separated me from his people. Now, if you want to see rejection, take a look at it. I've been utterly separated from his people. Neither let the eunuch say, Behold, I'm a dry tree. Now, that verse has just exploded my mind. I haven't seen it, but I want to share it with you right now. Now, look at me, please. We'll talk about strangers, first of all. You see, in oriental times, it was customary. In fact, in the Jewish society, Jewish community, if anyone married a non-Hebrew, he or she was considered a stranger, a male by this woman or any of the Canaanite women. If you had a maid that was Gentile or a servant that was Gentile, they were strangers. The stranger was one who was not of the household of Israel. Anyone who was not of the true household and birthright of Israel was considered a stranger. They were not included in the covenants until a period of time. Some of them had to wait three years, some seven years. And I don't want to get into all that. That's another message. But you see, we still have those strangers in God's house today. And the stranger in our midst today in the church is any believer who knows that he's joined to the Lord. Listen close now. He's joined to the Lord, but he feels cut off from the body of Christ. He feels like he's different and she's different. The Lord, here's what they say. They may not say so many words, but here's how they feel. The Lord has completely cut me off from His people. Verse 3. Now, this feeling of rejection can come because of race, color, family or national background. Right now, because of the revolution in Haiti, a lot of people who are Haitians don't like to admit they're Haitians, for example. Because of poverty. Right now, there's a lot of drugs coming from Colombia and a lot of people don't want to admit, I'm from Colombia, because they feel that they would be made to feel a stranger cut off from the body. It could be because of a past life of sin that you've had. Maybe you've developed AIDS or a virus. Or divorce. Or it may be the kind of work that you do. You may be in theater right now, for example. God is dealing with you on how to handle that. And you feel left out of the body. Or you may be a maid who scrubs floors and you feel another part of the body. Rejected because of what you do. You know, I helped in Texas. When we lived in Texas, not far from our headquarters was a little shack, a little chicken coop, in fact. And that chicken coop had a family with four children, living in one room. No bathroom, no kitchen, nothing. And I promise you, when I walked in there, the dirt and the filth and the lice and everything was an instinct all over the ceilings, everything. The ceiling leaked, the two windows had no glass in them whatsoever. Four children attended the local public school. And time and time, the Lord dealt with me. You can't live in your nice comfortable home and walk by there every day, and they live in that. So I stopped in one day. And I said, I'd like to buy this place. He said, well, what would I do? I said, I found a little farm ten miles from here. And it was because I had met the little 12-year-old daughter there. She was a good artist. But you see what had happened every time I walked in. I overheard a bit of it. The father was lining up his kids and instructing them, because it was my second visit. And in essence what he said, remember you're poor white trash. You'll always be poor white trash. And when this man comes, you say, yes, sir, or no, sir, and that's all. And I tell you, when I walked in, I felt humiliated by that attitude of that man. And I remember the girl saying, I can't bring anybody home, Mr. Wilkson, none of my friends. I can't bring them into this little shack. She said, I'm so ashamed. And yet she had such talent. She was ashamed to go to school. She lived in, she had rags. I said, look, sir, the place wasn't worth $2,000, including the five acres that it sat on. I said, I'll tell you what, I have, we went and bought the farm. I think it cost $25,000. I said, here is a $25,000 farm, and we will give you, we will trade titles. You give me your five acres and the shack. And he said, let me think about it. I found out, he went around and wanted to, he was investigating whether I had discovered oil on the property. When he was assured there was no oil around there anywhere, he agreed to go. I did it for the sake of the children. And of course we got to bulldoze and bulldoze it down. Because it was just a piece of filth. And I thought of those kids growing up and the feeling of rejection. All their lifetime feeling like pro-white trash. And having a father saying, you cow, cow to him. And what rejection that's built up in those kids, I'm sure. I grew up very self-conscious in a different way. I was so skinny, in fact that was my nickname, skinny. Along with milky and a whole bunch of other things I don't want to mention here tonight. I'll tell you what. My elbows, I've got the sharpest, skinniest elbows God ever gave a human being. And when my hair is not half over my ears, they look like rotten cauliflowers, I'll tell you. And back in those days, you got real close haircuts. Because usually you went to somebody in the church, you couldn't afford it. They called them, you know, stick a bow in your head and trim around the bow. Skinny elbows, ear sticking straight out. And I'll tell you what was hardest was gym class. In those days, the fellas and girls, they would go to their separate lockers and they'd all come in the gym. The girls and the boys that had gym class. And all of the football players would be flexing their muscles. And they were always tossed out the gym floor, flexing their muscles. Here I came. They called me Screech and Deacon, that's one of them. Screech and Boy, but the number one was skinny. I remember football players once putting me up and holding me up as an example. I'll tell you what, we were never allowed. We were never allowed to go to even a football game. You see, I grew up feeling so strange. So different. Now, holding me up to shame was because they would have me dancing and I was not allowed to dance. And I didn't want to dance. And they'd pick me up and want to take me out. Actually two came and wanted to take me out to the dance floor. I grew up with this sense. Even today, I hide my elbows. You'll hardly ever see me in a short sleeve shirt. That's stuck there. Maybe after this message I'll get a short sleeve shirt and it'll deliver me from that. Oh now, don't clap your hand. What'd you grow up with? Every time you looked in the mirror, what'd you say? Big nose, big ears, buck teeth, too fat, too skinny. Nobody likes themselves. I'll tell you what, I grew up with something else. I had another problem. I attended a Pentecostal church. My dad, a Pentecostal. Now, in those days, I didn't even know what a charismatic was. See, that's a nice uptown word. We were Holy Lords. There were no charismatic. We didn't talk in grosselating. We talked in tongues. And I'll tell you what, if you thought there was shop, here you should have been in my dad's church. Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania. And down under, they had an elevated train right over top of the old building. I don't think you've seen more than 150 people in that little old garage. Church. Renovated from a garage. And I'll tell you what, every time that train would come over three or four times in service, shake the building. And they always have to stop in Middle Prefecture and sing choruses. And if it was a freight train, five minutes of choruses. And we had a lady in our church that when the blessing hit her, she sounded like a fire whistle. And she would take off. Woo! In those days, being at Pentecostal was like having a disease. And I'll tell you what, sometimes at my dad's church, I got the thing. I'm so glad my school friends don't see me, they don't come here. Until one day I was informed. A student group in the school, hotshot kids, were going to, as a part of some study program, were going to visit all the churches in town. They're going to start at our church. And that thing, I panicked. I thought, oh, I've got to get to Dad. I said, Dad, I've got some friends coming. I said, please don't let Sister Fire take off. If she starts doing her fire whistle, I'll never live it down. I wanted a nice Presbyterian meeting. My dad looked at me in so many words, said, I'm going to let the Holy Ghost have His way. And I'll tell you what, if you're ashamed of attending this church, and you're ashamed of the rejoicing, if you're ashamed of it, that it bothers you, and you're getting a psycho from it, or you're getting a hang-up about it, and you invite one of your uptown friends and you bring him down here, don't expect something quiet. That's the night everything's going to come loose. That's what happened that night. Everything that could happen, happened. I was sitting in the back, sliding down in my seat. Afraid to even look, because there they were in the back, across the other side. The train rumbled, and we sang. And I saw Sister Fire starting to wind up. I said, don't let it happen. She got up. Loudest whistle you ever heard. I thought, how do I go to school now and face it? I tell you now, I had something, there was something in me. I felt different because I was Pentecostal. I felt rejected. I felt like a second-class Christian. I was mocked and ridiculed. But you know, I went to school the next day, and one of those fellows that was there came up and said, I don't remember the exact words, but what he said, My church is dead. I wish we had some life in our church. But you see, this feeling of being different, I don't seem to fit in. I'm not really accepted. I'm black. I'm Puerto Rican. I'm Korean. I'm not good at expressing myself. So many, many things, living with this sense of not fitting in. And some people say, well, maybe if I go to a smaller church, if I get just a few people around me, I can be accepted. Look, if you don't even like yourself, how are two or three going to like you? That's not going to solve anything. The problem's not having too many people around you. It's not a problem of attending a large church. The problem is in you. It's in us. That's the last of my confessions here tonight. You see, there's another class of believers introduced here by Isaiah, and it's called the eunuch. Now, the eunuchs were incapacitated, unable to have children, and to the Jew, being childless or barren was a sign of God's disapproval. In fact, if you had a man child, girls didn't count. I'll tell you, girls didn't count. It was having a son. I am blessed. I've got six grandsons. I've been trying to tell that to Gwendolyn. She said, just one granddaughter. And I rejoiced in the very thought of that. Greg and his wife were expecting. His wife is expecting. But you see, your reproach was rolled away when you had a man child. The reproach was rolled away. Look at all the women in the church. They said, the Lord has removed my reproach. Because they wouldn't have a child. You see, a eunuch was emasculated, and he could not have a child. Now, Jesus said that some are eunuchs because they were born that way from their mother's womb. Some are made eunuchs by men. This includes Daniel, three Hebrew children. It's supposed, and very rightly so, since they were in the court of the prince of the eunuchs, that they were made eunuchs by men when they were taken captive in Babylon. So, some are made eunuchs by men. And the Bible says others have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. Now, all cannot receive this thing, Jesus said, saving they to whom it is given. I believe Paul was a eunuch. Now, not in the physical term, but in the spiritual term. A eunuch is one who is totally devoted to the Lord Jesus Christ. Totally given everything to the service of God. And, in other words, all his children are spiritual children. He has no physical children. And Paul the apostle, I believe, is a prime example of what I'm trying to point out here. But you see, we have a number of people, spiritual eunuchs. And we have some in this church today. I suppose there would be many, many here tonight that would have to consider them a eunuch, because you have chosen to make Jesus your life. You may be divorced, you may be single. In fact, I believe you can be married and still be a spiritual eunuch. In other words, you have so given yourself to the Lord. It's not that you neglect your marital duties, but your whole life is given to the service of the Lord Jesus Christ. You want to be used by God, in other words. But the eunuch, who knows he's joined to the Lord, in fact, very clearly it makes it these are joined to the Lord, you know what they're saying? Look at verse 3 again. Neither let the eunuch say, Behold, I am a dry tree. Are you still here? Alright. Who is this dry tree we're talking about? It's the Christian who really loves the Lord, just consumed with the Lord and says, Oh God, I want to be used. But it's a feeling of God not using me. God dealt with it this morning. I'm really not being used. There's no place for me. And it's a feeling of spiritual inadequacies. Now, some people have that in the physical world, but especially now in the spiritual world. They see others singing in the choir, or witnessing, or doing something for the Lord, and they look at their other Christian friends and say, They look so spiritual, so clever. God sees me using them, what's wrong with me? I pray, I love the Lord. In fact, there are many pastors losing a lot of sleep trying to invent a scheme to make programs for people who say, I want to be used. I want God. In fact, we have hundreds of people who come to us now saying, I want God to use me. God set me free. I've repented. I'm on fire for the Lord. I want to be used of God. But it's the sense, I'm a dry tree. I've got no fruit. And I'm eating the soil for it. Oh, I wonder how many I'm talking to here tonight that that's beginning to touch a spiritual nerve in you. I'm not being used by God. When I stand before the Lord, I don't know if I have anything. I don't have many spiritual talents. I'm not good at witnessing. I can't go out in the streets. I can't sing. I don't have a voice. I want God to use me. You can't walk with God without having that urge in you. I want my life to count. You know, I'll tell you something. If it's any comfort to anybody here, do you know that we as pastors get that feeling once in a while, I'm not doing much for God? I used to come home from mass crusades, preach to thousands, and spend two weeks on the road every night preaching to thousands. And I remember one time, just finished writing a book, just came home from a crusade, and I had two weeks off. Two weeks after, I'm coming in, and quite okay, I used to do it a lot, not much anymore, occasionally. And I'd come in and say, Honey, I'm just not, I feel like I'm not doing anything for God. She said, Well, you just wrote a book. You just preached to thousands. I said, What do you mean? You're sending newsletters all over the world. I don't know. I can't help it. I just don't feel I'm reaching my potential. I don't feel like I'm really being used like I want to be used. Sometimes I feel so dry. That dry tree, that spiritual eunuch that's given to the service of the Lord, and yet not being able to express it. How many of you have that kind of a volcano in you right now? Even while I'm talking. So, God, I want to be used, but I'm a dry tree. You feel like doing more, but you don't have the outlet for it. I've talked to Brother Bob the other day, and he said that if I shared those feelings, there have been times that I have felt in my life, even though I know I'm in the center of his world, and I love what I'm doing, there are times I feel like I'm just not. You know what I'm talking about? I'm just not being used like I want to be used. There's so much more. People are dying, and there's such a world out there, and I just can't seem to reach it. I fast, and I pray, and I don't know how to reach it. Oh, I agonize over that. I think of four million Jews in New York City, and I agonize over it, and spend hours on my face. Oh, God, how is it done? You know, the problem is, you can just say, well, I'm going to just go out and do it, and you can invent something and go out, and you'll sweat and get in debt. Then you'll have a compounded problem. Then you'll have to worry about paying the bills for a ministry God never put on you anyhow, because it wasn't His. But I've got a word for you tonight, and I don't know if I'm going to be able to get this out tonight. I want to get it, and I'm not going to preach much longer, but I believe the Holy Ghost has a great word of encouragement. First of all, there's a loving warning. He says, listen to it, don't let the son of the stranger that had joined himself to the Lord speak, saying, the Lord has utterly separated me from His people. He says, don't talk like that anymore. Don't say I'm rejected. Don't say I'm cut off. Listen, I want to tell you what, that sense of rejection you have comes from a root of bitterness. And until that root of bitterness is dealt with, you can have people pray for you, try to cast off devils and everything else, but you've got to deal with that root of bitterness. Until that root of bitterness is pulled out of you against a father, a mother, or somebody who said something about you or to you that hurt you. I want to tell you what, every cutting word that people speak to you, if you're really walking with Jesus, every cutting word is a spike and now you're to the cross. And the only reason God allows these things to come to your ears is because He knows that you're still not dead to Him. How can you hurt a dead person? How can you hurt a dead man or a dead woman? And that's what this gospel is all about. Paul said, I bribed daily. It doesn't matter what anybody says. I don't care who says it. I don't care... Bob said it this morning, I don't care if a pastor says something contrary to me or looks at me the wrong way. He's just not looking at you the wrong way. I used to get something in my eye and somebody says, you're looking at me wrong. Ninety percent of what you hear from people is not meant to hurt you anyhow. If somebody had a bad breakfast or didn't get much sleep, and you're still worried about it and they forgot it already. They don't even know what you're talking about. Here you are fretting. You're... It's because you're black. It's because you're Puerto Rican. Not in this church it's not. Not with these pastors it's not. I have nothing to do with that. It's because I'm poor. We have people here that are homeless that are in the service tonight. I'm telling you what, people are going to say things. They're going to hurt you. And that's going to happen until Jesus comes. There's not going to be a society where you're immune to all of these things. People are going to hurt you. Wait. Why did he get quiet all of a sudden? Just now. You know what he says? Don't speak in a manner that I'm cut off. I'm rejected. Neither let the eunuch say, behold I'm a drive-thru. Don't say I'm useless. Don't say that anymore. Don't talk like that. That's enough of that talk. That's what he says. That's the loving rebuke. Now, having given you the loving rebuke, let me give you the loving encouragement from the Lord now. Ah, let's get into verse 4. This is powerful. For thus saith the Lord unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths and choose the things that please me and take hold of my covenant. Even unto them will I give in my house within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off. Also the sons of the stranger, all those who feel rejected, that join themselves to the Lord to serve Him and to love the name of the Lord, to be His servants. Everyone that keepeth the sabbath and including it and taking hold of my covenant. Even them will I bring to my holy mountain will make them joyful in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and sacrifices shall be accepted upon my altar for my house to be called a house of prayer for all people. Now, let me tell you what I believe that means. God's building Himself in these last days. He's building Himself a house. He's building a house of prayer and that means a house of intimacy. A house of people who don't care what anybody in the world says because Jesus Christ has become everything to them. They're not looking to what man says or does. They have their eyes on Jesus. They belong to this house of prayer. This house includes Chinamen, Mongolians, Haitians, all over the world. It has nothing to do with the denomination. It has nothing to do with the ministry. It's beyond all of these concepts. The Lord says, Oh, forget all those dumb dog shepherds in their sleep. Let them sleep. Let them party. I'm moving on to the holy remnant of our caste. And I'm going to do something. I'm going to take all those who live with rejection. I'm going to take all those dry trees and I myself will gather them together in one body. And I'm going to give them a new name. And I'll tell you what that new name is in just a moment. Now, I'll tell you what. I've got four children and I've got two sons, two Wilkerson boys who carry on the name Wilkerson. And I've got two grandsons that are named Wilkerson. So I know through my son and through my grandsons I have a name. My grandfather passed with my dad to me, to Greg, and then to his son or daughter. No, son. Somewhere along the way he's going to get a son. Gary's got two of them right now. So through Gary's two sons, I know what he's talking about. I've got something better than that which is on a natural plane. I've got something better than having a name go on. I'm going to make you apart. I'm going to give you a new name. And you know what that name is? Christ Body. Christ Body. I'm bringing you to the head. I am the head. And I'm going to bring you into something. If you want to be brought into this, I am building me something. I'm going to gather everything up. I'm going to gather everything up into Jesus, my son. That's what the Father's saying. I'm building a house for my son. He's the head and you're the body. And in Jesus there's no rejection. There is no rejection in Him. We are accepted, Paul said, in the Beloved. We're accepted in the Beloved. It should be when you come to this house, no pastor. We don't have to dream up some kind of... You know how desperate I was to see God create unity in life? I was thinking, well, the thing I'm going to do, we'll go down to the Marriott. We'll rent the great big hall. And we'll cater. And we'll all get together for four hours. And we'll introduce everybody. We'll get together and hug one another. We'll have unity. Side one, you may now turn the tape over to side two. That doesn't produce anything, usually. It's nice, it's lovely, but all you need is Alka-Seltzer. And that's what happens. You see, we're trying to create something in the realm of flesh. All the time. God says, no, this is a spiritual thing I want to do. And what He's saying, if you'll come to my altar, He said, I have a place within my walls that's within His body. And when you step inside by faith and say, Lord Jesus, I'm going to cling to You. You're my everything. I don't have to be accepted by the pastors. I don't have to be accepted by anybody but You. And when I'm accepted by You, and I'm in Your house, I can reach out and accept anybody because I'm accepted now. There's no more rejection in me because He's received me. Bring in Christ and be the solution to all of our rejections. All of our sense of fruitlessness. From now on, you don't have to produce anything for me, Jesus said. You just cling to me. You cling to me. You love me. You communicate. You talk to me. And as you talk to me, you walk with me, you cling to me, I'll tell you what to do. I'll show you where to go. And what Jesus said, if you'll join to me, you'll join to every other person in the body of Christ, all around the world, from Russia, Mongolia, China, you talk about a fellowship, you talk about unity, we are bound to Jesus. He's in heaven. Do you know that even in heaven, He's a man just like me right now? Well, tell you what, He doesn't look any better than I do, and I'm not being facetious. They said there's no beauty that we should desire here. He wouldn't come in here like an Adonis. He'd come in here like an ordinary man. He may be stooped from His burdens. I don't know. He would be, He is now, His body is, His physical body would be 33 years, He appears probably to be a 33 year old man. And even in heaven right now, He is a man. He has maintained His humanity, though He still has, now that He's in the glory, He's still maintained His manhood. He's a man in heaven who relates to everything we feel, everything we do. And if you can sit here right now and say, that's where I want to be. He's the head of this organization. We don't have to go to Springfield, Missouri, Kansas City, or anywhere else. We are connected to glory. We're connected to heaven. Hallelujah! He said, I'm going to bring you in and I'm going to accept your burnt offerings and sacrifice. I'm going to bring you to my holder. I'm going to give up everything to my Son. And I'm going to give it to Him. I'll tell you what, before I close right now, I'm going to close in just a moment. The Lord made something in my heart about bitterness. You cannot, you cannot live for Christ with this sense of rejection. I'm telling you now, I've been led by the Holy Ghost to come against that tonight in His authority. I'm telling you what, if God has any plans for you, it's all in Christ. If God has any plans for you whatsoever, He's going to allow things said and done and errors shot at you until all the hot air is gone out of your balloon. He's going to bring you down to the place where you want to die and when you die, it doesn't hurt you anymore. Amen. They ask us pastors, how can you pastor a large church in the middle of Manhattan? Oh, it's easy. You go home and die every night. You get up every morning and you die to all the problems. You die to everything. The Lord says, your church, you take care of it. You handle it. You handle it. We do what we have to do but only directed by the Holy Ghost? I tell you what, I've had people say things to me that inside I'm churning and God just says, look, you're connected to me. You said things just like that yourself until you learned some lessons. Just reach out and love and forgive. Don't let it bother you. Some of you people don't even know how to say that. Don't let it bother me. You don't even know how to say, you don't even know how to roll it off on Jesus anymore. You go home and you live it, relive it. You should have what you said. You should have what you said and you live it and relive it until you've got a worm eating you up inside your belly. A bitterness that it takes roots. You know what Paul said? Looking diligently, lest any man fell of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness spring up and trouble you and thereby many be defiled. If you've got a root of bitterness in you tonight that's caused you a sense of rejection, then you're defiling many. You're defiling your husband, your wife, your family. You're defiling everything you touch. If you're in the ministry of any kind, that makes you absolutely out of the flow of the Holy Spirit. It makes you a defiler of mankind. That's how important it is. That's why I deal with this. God helped me all the time. I will not allow bitterness. I will not allow that sense of rejection. I talked about these elbows and that. That's not a big thing. Really not a big thing. The real issues are spiritual. They're deep spiritual and they've been started by physical things. I come against that tonight in the name of the Lord and God's promised me tonight He's going to pluck out roots of bitterness. He's going to deal with the sense of rejection and we're going to have dozens of people walk out here tonight and say, I've laid it down. I don't care anymore. I'm not going to relive those things. I don't care. Who puts it on me? No one's going to put a trip on me. I'm taking it to the Lamb of God. Hallelujah. Will you stand with me, please? Will you stand? Well, if it's getting to it, it has to be the Holy Ghost because I can't do it. But I know if I know my Lord at all, and I believe I do, God's put His finger and said, Look, if you're going to walk with me into joy, He's going to bring you into a house of joy, a house of prayer, a house of communion. Will you lay that down tonight? You'll say, Lord, pluck that up by the roots. You're going to have to forgive somebody perhaps and I mean truly, once and for all lay it down and let forgiveness flow and do its work. It could be for a father, mother, a husband or wife who divorced you. You still carry. You have a battle with that thing. God's saying lay it down. I can't use you to your full potential. I can't make you a green tree full of fruit until you get rid of that. The Lord says, Don't say I'm cut off anymore. Don't say I'm not a part of the body. That's a terrible thing to have to acknowledge. I'm not a part of the body because it's not true. If you love Jesus, you're a part of His body. And that's all that should matter. We're a part of His body. Do you have a grudge? I know that few of you have a grudge against this church. Some of you may have a grudge against a pastor or two or three. You may have a grudge against somebody else in this body. It doesn't hurt the person you're grudging. It hurts you. The Lord says get it up. Lay it down. Tell you what, you don't even have to go around blowing a trumpet about. You just do it. They'll know the difference. Everybody will know the difference. The joy of the Lord will start flowing. Who rejected you? Who put this script on you? Alright, think about it. Forgive that person tonight. That person who said, Jesus, tonight I'm not walking out of here with this burden I've carried. I've carried it long enough. God's promised me tonight. I know He's promised me He's going to set people free. I'm in for a time in eternity. God's going to just lift your burden and roll it off of you. If you have been touched by the Holy Spirit, I want you to get out of your seat and come here and lay it down. Up in the balcony, just go to any of the stairs and come down the sides. Wherever you're at, say, you were talking about me tonight. You were talking about me and I want God to heal me tonight. You may be away from the Lord. You may be a sinner. You may be a backslider. You need to come right now and say, Jesus, I want it settled tonight. If you're going to come up here, don't expect me to do it or any pastor to do it. You're like the Holy Ghost. Pull those roots out right now, that bitterness. Lord, pluck it out of you. Wherever you're at, up in the balcony, here on the main floor. For you. For you. And for you. Jesus, for you. Jesus, for you. I call your name. For you. For you. Jesus, for you. Jesus, for you. Hallelujah. Oh, Jesus, I want you to take away this burden tonight from the hearts of those who are standing here. Would you just lift up your hands to him and receive his love and forgiveness right now? Would you say, Lord, I forgive? Say it right now. Lord, I forgive. I forgive all those who have hurt me. Remove the grudges. Remove the bitterness. Remove all the roots. Take them away. I lay it down. Forgive me, Jesus. I want you to touch me. Take away this feeling of rejection and hurt. Fill me, Jesus, with yourself. Alright, right now while you stand here, let Jesus come and just fill your heart. Let him come right now. Tell him you love him right now. I love you, but I want you to fill my heart with your love. Lord, let there be a flow of forgiveness tonight. A flow of forgiveness right through this body. Some of you that didn't come forward, you need to say the same thing. Lord, tonight, I lay it down. I don't want to walk out of here the way I came in. Change me. Change me tonight. You better stand here right now. Look up to the Lord. Just lift your hands to him. Tell him what's in your heart. Come on, talk to him right now. Lift your hands. That's it. I remember pulling hands. Lift your hands. Lift up to Jesus. Say, Lord, settle this for me right now. Jesus, settle this tonight. Jesus, I don't want to take this back with me. Take it out of me. I lay it down. Get serious with God right now. Get serious with God. Get serious with God. Lord, I get desperately serious with you tonight. Take it away. Bring healing, Lord. Now, while your hands are raised, I want to pray a prayer right now, and I'm going to come against that in the authority of the name of the Lord Jesus. Father, we take your absolute authority and commitment over this feeling and this spirit of rejection, this sense of being useless, strange, different. Lord, all the walls are down in Jesus. We're all one in Christ. Help us to see that. Now, open up our eyes to see that we're one in Jesus. We don't need anything else. We're one in Christ. Take away the strangeness. Take away the rejection. All the feelings of rejection. Heal them tonight. Heal these spirits, Father, in the name of Jesus. Come, Jesus, would you pray for this healing with me? Lord, we pray for this healing tonight. That a wave of healing would sweep over these who stand here. Lord, just let that Holy Ghost come and heal. Heal tonight all these who wounded. Heal all the wounded spirits. Heal the wounded spirits. You can put your hands down. How many of you that are up here have come forward for the first time in this church? Raise your hand, please. Your first time, you're here. You that have come for the first time, we'd like to minister to you one-on-one. You don't join anything? We just want to pray with you. We want to spend a little time with you. Will you come this way, right down to our prayer room, right behind the curtain and downstairs. Just go this way. Make your way right through the crowd. Everyone, for the first time, have your hand raised. Please go this way. The ushers are there. They'll show you right where to go, please. Let these through that are coming through. God bless you. We're delighted to have you tonight. We want Jesus to minister life to you tonight. Amen. Let these through, please, that are coming through. God bless you. All those that are here for the first time, please come right through. We need all of our counselors. We're probably going to need five or six in the crowd that are counselors. We need you to come down right to your place. All first-timers. All first-timers. The rest of you, better come forward. Listen. Can you hear me all right? Can you hear me? I can't make it happen, but I'm asking God, while you're standing here in the presence of the conviction of the Holy Spirit, that something is happening. It's a work of the Holy Spirit. I can't explain. You don't have to be screaming at God. You don't even have to have tears rolling down your cheeks. All you have to have is a heart that's open. A heart. Is your heart open? I feel like the Lord had me say this to you also. You have to truly, honestly forgive. You cannot walk away from where you stand right now carrying anything in your heart. You've got to be able to look anybody in the eye. You'll be able to say to anybody, you can't hurt me. I'm not mad at you anymore. I'm not mad at you. Hallelujah. I don't know if anybody on the face of the earth that I'm mad at or angry about, except the devil. Do you know there's a joy in that? If you don't, I have to say it. There's some of you, if you don't get that victory right now, that's why I'm lingering for just a minute. If you don't get the victory right now, it's going to get so difficult. You're just going to add your burden if you walk out of here. If you just bow your head, I'm going to ask God right now to open up your heart completely to Him. I'm going to ask for a transaction of the Holy Spirit right now to happen. Holy Spirit, open up every heart of everyone standing here. Somebody's having to forgive someone they're hurting very deep. Somebody's having to forget a childhood. Somebody's having to forget a bad marriage. Somebody's having to forget having been walked on and trampled. Somebody's going to have to forgive being abused. Abused, physically, spiritually. But some are going to have to forgive tormentors. Have to forgive those, Lord, who have said hurting, biting, terrible things. Been accused. Been hurt. Wounded. Lord, we've got to get our eyes off our wounds. We've got to get our eyes on your wounds, not ours. And, Lord, see the victory that you have created for us. Now, Lord, bring a spirit of forgiveness. Talk out every wound of bitterness. I'm asking you right now, if you've got a single wound of bitterness, lay it down. Lay it down right now. Lay it down. Jesus, take it. Will you take that step of faith right now and lay that down? May I ask how many of you that are standing here have to forgive somebody? Will you raise your hand? How many have to forgive somebody? Alright. Are you doing it? Have you done it? Have you done it, brother? Oh, what a change. What a change. Hallelujah. Let's just thank him right now for his faithfulness. Lord, we thank you for your faithfulness. Oh, thank you, Lord, for your faithfulness. Let's do it. We'll let you return to your seats. Return to your seats. Thank you. This is the conclusion of the tape.