In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the message of God's grace and how it brings freedom to believers. He encourages the congregation to not only receive God's grace for themselves but also to extend it to others. The preacher shares a story about a man who was converted and highlights the importance of understanding that new believers are like newborn babies in their faith. He also mentions the power of prayer and gives examples of individuals like Hudson Taylor and George Mueller who saw God answer their financial needs. The sermon concludes with a reminder that grace is not an excuse for sin but rather a transformative force that enables believers to live in the lordship of Christ.

I think we ought to welcome George tonight, in Jesus' name. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to share with you. OM is known for its maps of the world. Now we carry our own globes. And we hope that you're trying to increase in terms of your vision for the world in which we live. God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son. And whosoever, whatever country, whatever race, whatever nationality, believes in Him should never perish but have everlasting life. And I hope even as we sort of look at this, I'll put it over here on this overhead once in a while, and will help us just grasp some of the things that are on the heart of the Lord Jesus. I've just returned from Brazil just a week ago, a land as big as the United States, a land of maybe 25 million believers, a land of enormous poverty and enormous wealth. Great Amazon, the great rainforests, phenomenal churches of 10,000 and 20,000 people gathering, praising God. It was a very mega-motivating time. Yet, like every land, there are many, many needs. I'm traveling with a team, my friend Ken Stan Jones, so I hope you can meet afterward, and Andrew Bronson, who set up the book table there in the back. And together with the books, I'm going to mention just a few of them, we have this special Unreached People's Map. It's a map that's got as much information as a book. Originally produced in Norway, almost impossible to get in a bookshop. You can get one tonight, and it presents the unreached people of the world, people where the church does not yet exist or barely exists. Seems incredible, doesn't it? 2,000 years since Pentecost. And I'm sure that you'll find this map just such a terrific tool to use. Maybe some of you come from different churches, you ought to at least have one of these somewhere in your church Sunday school room or somewhere. So that's our Unreached People's Map. I think I'm going to put it up here. You can look at that as well. Again, we're reminded of Acts 1.8, one of my favorite verses. You shall receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost part of the earth. They're the words of Jesus Christ. It's not some slogan of a mission society. They're the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's amazing in these many celebrations we have in Britain, and I've been at a lot of them, how seldom world missions is mentioned. And that's not the main thing or the only thing on my heart tonight, but certainly in the light of the world situation, it's good to think out of what others are going through. The Kurds, thousands of them have died since you last gathered here in the mountains of Turkey. We have a relief work among them, just very small. Governments, I believe in answer to prayer, governments have mobilized in connection with the Kurds. They now have enough food and clothing, but getting it distributed is quite a problem. How many of you have been praying regularly for the Kurdish crisis? Raise your hand. I would have thought everyone. You see it on TV, you see it in the newspaper. But some of us, especially young Christians, it takes time to learn how to respond spiritually to world crises. It takes time to learn how to get out of your own little world, which you're battling sometimes for spiritual survival, and become a global thinker, a global Christian, and to pray. So do take a look at our literature display. There's a book there about Lagos, the Lagos story. How many of you have prayed for the ship ministry of OM, Doulos or Lagos? Raise your hands. Again, we've got a few. Barry Goldring broke my arm to get me here. I trust that was the Holy Spirit. Worked on Lagos in the early days. In fact, I talked to my dad from the church office, Barry, and he remembers you. My dad just had a serious operation. He's 85. He's also an electrician. And he and Barry worked together 20 years ago on Lagos. There's a story on Lagos. Get a copy tonight. Anybody who gets this book can choose any one of the smaller books, one or two pound sterling books, as a gift with this book tonight, Lagos story. I'm in the midst of reading a very powerful book about failure, about living with broken dreams. Let me read what it says on the back of this. Our dreams, aspirations, and visions are often God-given. Through them, he wants to develop us, develop and use our unique gifts. Those dreams can become mixed with pride, selfishness, immaturity, and sin. They need to be purified, refined, and refashioned. Isn't that brilliant? Our dreams are often broken and unfulfilled through our sins and choices of others. When this happens, God does not want us to abandon our dreams, but to allow him lovingly to refine our unrealistic dreams, restore our broken dreams, realize our delayed dreams, and redesign our shattered dreams. The author of one of the greatest books I've ever read, Rebuilding Your Broken World, has given us a new book, Living With Your Dreams. It's dynamite. I'm in the middle of it. It's ministering to me. Even stronger, perhaps, than that book, Living With Your Dreams, is The Grace Awakening, probably the most significant book I've read in this decade. Charles Swindoll deals with legalism, judgmentalism, Phariseeism, spiritual arrogance, extremism, lack of grace, lack of love. I'm going through it the second time. Should I say it's going through me? This is the book I want to feature the most tonight. If you get this book and read it, and don't get challenged and encouraged and stirred and helped, you write to me. Get my address at the table. I'll apologize and send you two free books. Ten free books with my apology. And you will experience a grace awakening. I've given away, actually, about 4,000 copies of this book to Christian leaders around the world. I've had more letters in a short period of time as a result of that than any book I've ever distributed. The first few chapters are a bit theological, maybe a little slow for some of you. But as you get toward the center of the book, especially that chapter on marriage, you're going to be jumping. Grace Awakening. We've got a lot of other great books. We've got some books that aren't so great, but people buy them. My own books, maybe because they hear me speak and want to try to figure out what I'm trying to say. So they buy one of my books. And that's an encouragement. Sometimes after reading the book, they sit down and write to me. Are any of you going on Love Europe this summer? Anybody? We're looking for more recruits for Love Europe. We're short. I guess we didn't get the vision to Slough. I think after 29 years in Britain, this is the first time I've ever been in your town. Or is this a village? I came through fast. I couldn't notice. I want to say, however, I've been flying over your town for 29 years. And I'm certainly glad to finally have an opportunity to be with you here on the ground. Love Europe. My friend Andrew was on Love Europe. We'll be going on it this summer. Do we have some leaflets about Love Europe there? See him. Get that leaflet. It's not too late. Eastern Europe. Muslim Europe. Britain. Urban Europe. We need some workers this summer. I know what you're saying. You don't have any money. We've all read about Slough. Famous place. Nobody's got a job. And that can be serious. But God knows how to supply finance. The story of Operation Mobilization is a story of ordinary people who are generally broke seeing God answer prayer for finance. The God of Hudson Taylor. The God of George Mueller. The God of C.T. Studd who said, Let's not live within the sound of church or chapel bell but run a rescue shop within a yard of hell. He's a God who hears and answers prayer. I'm going to need some water. Not because I think there's going to be a fire. Do it right here. I was actually preaching in a big Methodist church in Cornwall and the building did start to burn down. But fortunately it was in another part of the building where I wasn't preaching. And we went on with the ministry. The fire department came and put out the fire. And we were so excited about what the Lord was doing. We didn't even know what happened until the meeting was over. But that's more for my vocal cords. I want you to turn to the first epistle of John. Because of my vocal cords, I've got to try to give one of the more verber calm messages. I'm known for getting excited. I'm greatly burdened. I'm envisaged, envisioned. I have a lot of my heart. And I tend to get excited and then raise my voice. There's no need to raise your voice. I was preaching very loud once in an Anglican church in Cambridge. A lady sent me a note afterwards. She said, It was a wonderful message. Thank you very much. There's no need to shout. We Anglicans are not deaf. I'm very linked with the Anglicans and some of them do behave as if they're deaf. But I don't actually want to shout. First epistle of John. I want to try to whet your appetite for this epistle that's meant so much to me. I find that not many people have studied it. My burden isn't just to get you to study it. It's to get you to live out these great dynamic life-changing principles of God's Word. God's Word is sharp. It cuts into the very subconscious. And it impacts us. And it helps transform our minds. And it helps make us strong. There are actually hundreds of thousands of Christians now in Britain who have experienced renewal. They've experienced some kind of blessing from the Holy Spirit. And they're into celebration and worship and praise. This is not something new. The renewal movement started in Britain almost the same time that O.M. was born. In the late fifties. In fact, one man felt that O.M. should be the missionary arm of what he called the underground movement of the Holy Spirit. Around 1962, to be accurate. We were already too above the ground to go underground. But certainly there was a parallel between the ministry of O.M. and the renewal that hit Britain 29, 30 years ago. A little before that, of course. Different churches, different denominations. But it spread more inter-denominationally around that time. It's not a new thing. I feel it's wonderful. It's just wonderful when people get, as somebody said, zapped by the Holy Spirit. I've been zapped by the Holy Spirit. Many times. But I think we need to understand that no matter what great experience we have with the Holy Spirit, it is not a substitute for denying self, taking up the cross every day and following Jesus. So, we have people who had a great experience with the Holy Spirit at one point, but today they're backslidden. Some aren't even Christians anymore. You say, how can that be? Well, go do some research if you want. We need both. I'll never forget. The great Dr. Lloyd-Jones visited the ship Doulos. And by the way, we do need your prayers for our ship ministry. We don't have near enough supporters and prayer partners. When we lost our ship, there was a great interest for a while, and that's dropped again. Now that we have Lagos II. We really need workers on the ships. We need prayer partners. Two ships, 500 people. It's a serious business. Spiritual battleships. Financial support has dropped, and fortunately the book sales have increased. Book sales in Hong Kong alone were 60,000 pounds sterling. I say that just so you can get an idea of the size of the ministry. So that when you hear we're looking for 150,000 pounds sterling to convert the electrical system on Doulos, you'll understand this is a huge ministry. It's just like a separate mission society. But it's all part of Operation Mobilization. Some of our best prayer partners are with the Lord. We need new prayer partners. We need people to put their signature on one of our prayer coupons and say, yes, I'll pray. I'll be involved. But when Dr. Lloyd-Jones visited Doulos in London, and the ship was there in the docks of London around 1977-78, he gave a powerful message. You can get it from our tape library. I don't think we have it here tonight. The need to have the balance. The Word, good doctrine, and the Spirit. The work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. And even as I take this meeting, share in this meeting tonight, I long for both. I long for a work of the Holy Spirit. Especially in connection with Acts 1-8. Because that's one of the important functions of the Holy Spirit. But I also long for a revelation of God from His Word. And that we may understand more about God and about His Word. I'm going to go over some basic material from 1 John. And then in a sense, we're going to land the plane, the aircraft, on two or three verses and somehow they will really go laser beaming right into our subconscious. Start at chapter 1. 1 John, not the Gospel of John, chapter 1, verse 5. This then is the message which we've heard of Him and declare unto you. That God is light, in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin. That is the beautiful, powerful, ongoing position of the believer. The blood of Jesus Christ cleansing from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves. And the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us. My little children, and this really is the key verse on my heart tonight in this first chapter. My little children, it's actually the first verse of the second chapter. My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. If any man sin, we have an advocate or a lawyer with a father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins. And not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. I've been speaking a lot lately on the subject of grace. I've been re-reading this book, The Grace Awakening. Last weekend I was in a church in Gillingham, down in the midway. Nice place to visit. Quite different from this area. And I gave three or four messages on the subject of the Grace Awakening and the Lordship of Christ. Some feel that the message of grace and the message of the Lordship of Christ is really not compatible. I tried to show. This series will eventually be released on a cassette album. It will probably go all over the world. But I tried to point out that these things are not in opposition. The reality of the Lordship of Christ, which God wants every believer to know, is only possible through the work of God's grace in our hearts. These things are not in opposition. But grace is not easy believism. It's not some excuse for living and continuing in sin. We have clear word about that in the book of Romans. Should we continue in sin, that grace may abound. What a verse. It's heavy. We need a grace awakening. We also need to make sure that we are growing in our experience of Christ's Lordship. I think learning what it is to have Christ as Lord of my life is an ongoing process. My friend Ken Stan Jones, who came out of the business world, now a minister, preacher, he was speaking to us at our prayer meeting on Tuesday night and he referred to us as those who had forsaken all. I haven't had a chance to have a chat with him about that. I can assure you in Operation Mobilization, we are still learning what it is to forsake all. That was a strong part of our message in the early days. It still is. Luke 14.33 Except you forsake all that you have, you can't be my disciple. But we discovered that after we thought we had forsaken all, that some things in our lives have not been forsaken. Like subtle forms of pride. Like evangelical ego tripping. Have you ever had any of that kind of holiday? Evangelical ego tripping. It's free. And it ultimately costs you a lot. Even in terms of material things. We discovered outlandish streaks of materialism sometimes among people who had thought they had forsaken all. Principles. Powerful principles that are so strong in Scripture are life principles that we have to work on all of our life. We don't arrive. That's why even those who were out there on the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit was outpoured in such a special way, we find them gathering again in Acts 4.31 and it says, while they were praying, the place was shaken. They were filled with the Holy Spirit, went forth and spoke the Word of God with fullness. D.L. Moody used to talk about the need to be filled again and again and again with the Holy Spirit. Once a dear lady looked him in the eye and said, Mr. Moody, why do you keep saying we have to be filled again and again? And old Moody looked at her and he said, Madam, because I leak. I can relate to that. I can relate to that. We have here in 1 John some principles about the Spirit-filled life and about revival that we all need to grasp and understand. We see in verse 5 the greatness of God, the holiness of God. God is light. In Him is no darkness. He's perfect. And then we see the call for us to live a holy life, to live in the light, walking in the light. You remember that great book, Calvary Road? I'm embarrassed that I don't have it on my book table right now. I usually do. I have some similar books. But Calvary Road is a book about walking in the light. It's a great classic. Go to your Christian bookshop. They need your encouragement. Go to your Christian bookshop and ask them for Calvary Road. They'll have a copy. They'll order it for you. Roy Heston's had a stroke. He can't preach anymore, but his books preach. His book really has its roots back in the East African revival. East African revival is one of the greatest revivals I've ever read about. It's 30, 40 years old. It's, you know, it's had its ups and downs. But it's amazing what God did there in East Africa. Through a work of the Holy Spirit, people began to live in the light. They began to confess sin. They began to admit that they were deceived. Look at verse 8. We can deceive ourselves. We say we have no sin. We think we've arrived. We think we've forsaken all. We think we're the Lord's servants. We think we know the Lordship of Christ through the fullness of the Spirit. So we've arrived. What does the Bible say? We're self-deceived. Self-deceived. We need to constantly... I believe this is one of the reasons meetings like this are important. And I commend you here in your city or town for having this kind of United Church meeting. To have ministers here from different churches. Don't take that for granted. I'll tell you, there's many a town in Britain the ministers are never together. They don't even pray together. In some places, they're not even talking together. It's worse in the United States, actually. In many other countries. Denominationalism is still big. I'm not anti-denomination. I believe God has used different denominations in different ways, different periods of history. Many of them were born at different periods of history. And we're seeing renewal in existing denominations. We're seeing more Bible-believing men pastoring and preaching. We've even got some kind of evangelical, moderate, charismatic, unique, special character with my first name trying to captain the old Anglican ship. So that's exciting. Pray for him. I've already written him. Did I write him a letter? I meant to write him a letter. Maybe I forgot. I heard that he at least knows what Operation Mobilization is. That's always encouraging. My little children, these things write unto you that ye sin not. We're into chapter 2. But if any man sin, he have an advocate. We're the Father. Isn't that powerful? Have any of you been discouraged lately because you haven't been having more victory in a particular area? Have you ever heard of destructive idealism? How many have ever had a message on destructive idealism? No one. Only I preach on that. I have a message on destructive prayer life, destructive Bible study, destructive witnessing. Any good thing can turn sour, especially when there's not enough grace. Any good thing. We were a very extreme movement when we were born. God was merciful. We made a lot of mistakes. I made a lot of mistakes and might as well hit the target. God was merciful. And we learn the message of God's grace. Not only how to receive God's grace so that we know we're forgiven, we're cleansed, we're free. We're free. But how to extend that grace to others, to let them be the person God wants them to be and not try to maneuver them into being like us. Tremendous freedom in Jesus Christ. Sometimes legalism takes over. So many rules, so many regulations. One of my favorite stories about a man who played a lot of golf. Lived on the golf course, so to speak. Then he got converted. Now, let's understand this, my friends. When people get converted, they're just new babes. Any of you converted in less than three years, raise your hand. A few. It's encouraging. We need more. Wouldn't it be wonderful if in a year from now, we ask how many of you have been converted in less than three years? Half the people. Well, if it happened, you wouldn't even fit in here. Why would we fill all the balconies? One of the toughest things for God's people to do is to stay flexible and adaptable and filled with enough grace so that they can keep relating to the unconverted. This man came to Jesus, but he didn't know there were 35 regulations in the average church about this and that, especially what you can do on Sunday and wear a hat and this and all these things. He was just a baby Christian. He thought he was really doing great. He got up extra early in the morning to get his golf out of the way so he could go to church. He thought he was doing great. Guess who he met after a week or two? Mr. Legalist, Mr. Judgemental, who discovered that this man had been on the golf course on the Lord's Day. So he exhorted him, Don't you know that it is forbidden in the word of God to play golf on the Lord's Day? You can imagine this poor character going from Genesis to Revelation looking for that verse about golf. We can laugh, but in fact we know many a young babe who made a decision in a Billy Graham meeting as I once did, many a person who made a commitment in a great celebration rally later was turned off or hurt or confused by some kind of legalism or judgementalism, even though that Christian, and I don't want to be harsh on that Christian, forgive me, I don't mean that, well-meaning Christian without a grasp of the grace of God, spiritual growth, the fact that it takes time for people to become strong in God. So if you're still growing, you're still failing, you're still struggling, you still have doubts, join the club. It's called Sinners Anonymous. We're sinners all of our life. Our goal is holiness. Our goal is more and more spiritual maturity. Our goal is that Jesus might be Lord of our time, our talents, our energy. But why do we have 1 John 2, verse 1, if it's all supposed to happen after we raise our hand in a meeting or go forward or get the spring harvest experience or the Keswick experience. I had one fellow and had 25 major crisis experiences before he was 22 years of age and was still living a double life in a high degree of impurity. Came to me for counseling. Said he wanted to go to India. I said, look, is that really what's on your heart right now? And he said, well, truthfully, it isn't. What's on my heart is the fact that I've been living a double life for years even as a Bible college student. And he opened his heart for the first time and began to share all this double life, all the impurity, all the porno, all the London nightclub stuff while he was going to Bible college. And through sharing that, through what Roy Hischen calls walking in the light, God began to set him free. Do you have anybody, anywhere that you walk in the light with? Naturally, in some of these things, it would be in confidence. So many people today, they keep it all in. They keep it all in. Nobody knows them. Skeletons in the closet, double life, spiritual schizophrenia. Call it whatever you want. It's not God's way. You say, well, if I shared some of my problems with somebody, I might ultimately lose my reputation. I mean, I'm known in my church for being a pretty religious chap. I tell you, I'd rather lose my reputation and keep my sanity. Did you hear that? I'd rather lose my reputation and keep my sanity. And I believe a lot of people are coming unglued mentally and emotionally because they got so much repressed and they're not talking about it. They're not experiencing real fellowship. They don't know some of these great principles in these books by David Siemens, which are really just principles from the Sermon on the Mount, how to take off the mask, how to walk in the light, how to confess your sin, how to experience the ongoing cleansing of the blood of Jesus Christ. This isn't something you only have on Friday night. This is seven days a week. This covers you 24 hours a day. It's called by one of the other great revival men out of Africa's family, Vogue, Personal Revival. Personal Revival. The privilege of every believer through Jesus Christ. Yes, these are great words of Scripture. Jumping on to chapter 3 because of the time, though there's a lot more I would love to say about chapter 2, especially this whole area of love, the whole challenge of chapter 2 is about love. He that loveth his brother, verse 10, abideth in the light. There's no occasion of stumbling in him. And then we get on to the 15th verse where it starts talking about our relationship to the world. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Strong, strong material. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life is not of the Father. It's not of the Father. It's of the world. The world passeth away, the lust of it. He that doeth the will of God abideth forever. These are strong verses. These are verses that sometimes when people read, indicate that salvation is almost by maintaining and persevering in the Christian life. Whereas we know from the message of grace and the balance of Scripture that salvation is through what the Lord Jesus Christ did on the cross on our behalf. But when we experience that salvation and true conversion in the new birth, then things begin to happen. And these things that we're reading about become a reality. They become quicker in some people perhaps than others. I remember it finally years ago. Layne Adams came to minister. Brilliant man of God. Presbyterian minister. Worked for Billy Graham. He wrote a book called Why is it taking so long to get better? Brilliant. Some of these books are similar to that. Why is it taking so long to get better? Have you ever wondered that in your Christian life? I'm still wondering it. I was converted 36 years ago at a Billy Graham meeting. He was 36 years of age. How many of you are into maths? How old is Billy Graham? Brilliant. Sign him up. Pray for Billy as he comes to Scotland. At 72 years of age, maintaining the schedule that he's maintaining. I tell you, it's no Sunday school story. He needs the anointing and the power of the Holy Spirit. I went to a meeting in which Billy Graham was speaking when I was only just 16. A lady had put me on her prayer list. Some of you know my testimony. It's been written up a little bit. This lady put me on her prayer list and prayed not only that I'd be converted but that I would become a missionary. I didn't have a chance. There wasn't even any discussion. And then Billy Graham came to New York City. She had sent me a Gospel of John which the Lord used in my life to prepare me for this meeting. It was there I heard the Gospel. It was there I believed on Jesus Christ and was saved by His grace. But the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, indwelled me at that time. And so these changes started to take place. And it wasn't very long before I was crying out that Jesus would be Lord of all the practical areas of my life. I'm still learning about that. I'm still failing. It's not easy for a yank to come and live in England. You know that, don't you? In some churches, all I do is give one sentence. They're on me. American accent. Especially when I try to sell some books. Oh, no! American accent, salesman. Turn him off. How did he get in here? Check with the vicar. What's going on here? I was preaching in one of the biggest Anglican churches in Kent. And I was just trying to cover up for my accent. I've been here 29 years but I never learned a language. There's so many different accents in different parts of the country. I got all confused and decided to just stick with my own. But I was trying to just, you know, do a little PR work and mention my accent. Ask that the people not allow it to hinder them from receiving the message from the word. And a man at the door looked me in the eye and he said, I hated your accent but I love your message. I thought, thank you, Jesus. God uses all kinds of people. I know it's hard for some of you to grasp this who've been watching a lot of yank television but Jesus can save Americans. He can change their lives. We're not all television evangelists headed for jail because we're living a double life. Just try to be a little optimistic. I know this is the nation of cynics but try to be a little more optimistic. Try to believe the best. The Bible is true. The Holy Spirit, no respecter of persons. He invaded me 36 years ago. It's been changing me ever since. But I still have my struggles. Because I have a big mouth. You know what I discovered about England? There's more big mouths around England than anybody wants to admit. It's a big cover-up. Big cover-up. What is a big mouth? Simply a person who speaks first and thinks later. Any of you have that difficulty? I don't ask you. I'll check with your wife. That's who I want to talk to. We're committed to holiness. We're committed to live a life fullness of the Holy Spirit under the Lordship of Jesus. But it is a lifetime continuous learning process. That's why Jesus said again and again if any man come after me let him deny self take up the cross daily and follow me. Now sometimes we go to these great Christian meetings and we hear some of these amazing speakers and they seem to be incredibly gifted at making us all feel miserable. Sort of an evangelical purgatory. And we walk out of the meeting feeling crushed. We're not witnessing enough. We're not praying enough. We're not giving enough money to missions. We're not loving our unfriendly neighbor. We're not... And we go out of these big meetings. Have you ever had the experience of really feeling down? Or we hear some glowing testimony of some spiritual superstar who's doing this and experiencing that and all the gifts and all the fruit and moving mountains and delivering people from demons and we just feel smaller and smaller and wonder Lord how long am I going to be a spiritual mouse? When is something going to happen in my life? Let me say something and I believe the Holy Spirit is put on my heart. I believe many of you are being used more of God than you realize. People don't generally come to Friday night celebrations who are sort of just rebels against God or just come some kind of spiritual wimps if you know the word. People usually come to this kind of meeting who have a little more hunger than the average evangelical fish. And I praise God for it. Where in the world do we see in His word we're supposed to go to church just once a week? Where can you find one scripture that we're only allowed to go to one particular brand of church? We can't mingle. This could be dangerous. We're mingling here with people of other denominations and other groups. We may get stained. We get people with a twisted view of separation especially comes from the states that we must separate ourselves from other Christians. If they've got some funny little thing some little doctor some doctrinal peculiarity or they don't quite behave like us we need to separate ourselves from other Christians. Millions of Christians actually in America turned against Billy Graham because he wouldn't go along with this secondary separation. Not many in this country are into that. Ian Paisley is the main leader of it over here. It doesn't affect things too much here in Slough. But it's incredible to see God's people turning against each other all over the world. There's a new book out called The Witch Hunt. The Witch Hunt. It's brilliant. It's pointing out the danger of us as Christians becoming witch hunted. We're always seeing a little bit of heresy in the man down the road. We don't have any. Our doctrine is totally pure. A little heresy in the man down the road something he mumbled in the meeting three weeks ago. Deadly. We need a grace awakening. We need to be bigger hearted. We need to let love cover some of the differences. Who's perfect? Where do we find the perfect Christian in the British Isles? We're all learning. We're all growing. We're all experiencing God's grace. We're all learning how to make Christ Lord. I'm fighting. I had to refight in my twenties things that I thought I really had nailed down spiritually in my teenage years. I had to fight similar battles in a new context in my thirties. Now I'm 52. I just became a grandfather. Some of these same things I'm fighting them all over again in a different context different circumstances. I tell you life is one big Mount Everest assault. You're not going to make it there on the weekend. You're going to have to climb after days and weeks you'll discover you're only at base camp. You're only at base camp. And then God will begin to show you the summits that he wants you to go up. Turning over to chapter three the two verses that I especially wanted to sort of focus on I realize the time has gone by very quickly is 1 John 3 16 and 17 and perhaps 18 dynamite By this perceive we the love of God because he laid down his life for us. We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. Now whosoever hath this world's good and sees his brethren hath need shutteth up his compassion from him. How dwelleth the love of God in him. My little children that's an interesting little phrase isn't it? My little children let us not love in word neither in tongue but in deed and in truth. And by this we know that we are of the truth and shall assure our hearts before him for if our heart condemn us God is greater than our heart. Isn't that an amazing verse? You talk about grace. If our heart condemn us God is greater than our heart. God is greater than our conscience. Don't think that everything your conscience is pricked about is necessarily from God. Part of the input into our conscience is from our culture. It's legalistic. It may be extreme. Your conscience cannot be a total guide. I had to learn to deal with things in my conscience that I felt were wrong which were not wrong. It was just some things that I had picked up along the way out of the legalistic dustbin that you can find in many places. It's a glorious thing. To begin to be able to discern the difference between that which is truly worldly and that which is just part of our culture. You may like it. You may not like it. Incredibly important. If we're going to have people who are really free and are really growing in sanctification. What a powerful verse. If our heart condemn us not, verse 21, then have we confidence toward God. Whatever we ask we receive of Him because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight. And this is His commandment that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another as He gave us commandments. He that keepeth His commandments dwelleth in Him and He in Him. By this we know that He abideth in us by the Spirit whom He hath given us. Several burdens I want to bring to you before I close in prayer. Bear with me. Concerning the world in which we live. Number one, of course, is the hundreds of millions who go out into eternity. Hundreds of millions who go out into eternity without a knowledge of Jesus Christ. How can we say that we're pursuing Christ and loving God and not have a burden for souls? Not have a burden for people? The Apostle Paul said for the space of three years night and day with tears. Night and day with tears he spoke forth the message. Is not lukewarmness the greatest sin in the church of Jesus Christ? We get people that say abortion is the most wicked thing going on. Others say the drug thing is the most wicked thing going on. Others say injustice in high places is the wicked thing going on. Others say this. Others say that. I believe in some ways lukewarmness is the greater sin because if we were not lukewarm, if we were on the cutting edge of prayer, if we knew how to move mountains as God's Word teaches us, then a lot of these things could be prevented or at least to some degree. I want to ask you, is there any lukewarmness that has crept into your life? I am not talking about basic emotional struggles. I am not talking about losing your initial fervor. The initial fervor you may have had as a young Christian, that does not mean you necessarily lost your first love. First love is something close to the word will more than the emotion, though the emotion will be there. I want to read something from H.A. Hodge's book on Unseen Warfare. Speaking about the first initial fervor we have as a young Christian, he said, this fervor especially is characteristic of beginners and it's drying up should be welcomed as a sign we're getting beyond the first stage of our spiritual life. That's powerful. To try to retain it or to long for its return in the midst of dryness is to refuse to grow up. It is to refuse to cross. He goes on to say, by our steady adherence to God when the affections are dried up, nothing is left but the naked will clinging blindly to Him. The soul is purged of self-regard and trained in pure love. I want to pray for myself, Oh God, don't let me ever lose that pure love. It's linked with obedience. It's linked with vision. It's linked with getting out of our self and thinking about the other person, the other situation. It's revolutionary and yet we see in 1 John, if we are God's people, if we have God's heart, we're going to be giving. What are you doing to reach the lost? As you give financially to your own church, as you give to world missions and finance is incredibly important in the teaching of the New Testament. Do you have that joy? The Bible says it's more blessed to give than receive. The joy of knowing that you are giving and I myself like to be very careful about my giving, that you're giving is rescuing the perishing and caring for the dying. May the Lord increase our love, our passion for souls, for people. May we take one of these maps of the world. May we consider the hundred million Muslims of India where the church doesn't yet exist. Maybe get involved with a movement like Operation Mobilization or another evangelistic agency that has as its priority reaching the unreached people of the world. I could keep you here all night talking about that vision. Some of you are probably afraid of that. But my second burden are those that are dying without food. The Bible talks a lot about the poor. It talks a lot about injustice. You might as well throw away ten percent of the entire Old Testament, twenty percent if you're not going to have a concern, a message, a conviction concerning the poor, concerning justice, concerning all these things that are taking place in our society from the abortion issue to the pornographic issue to the lack of giving and spending for famine relief. I become very involved in the African famine in terms of trying to mobilize people to pray, mobilize people to give. When we try to mobilize people to give for a famine, we don't want to just mobilize believers because we feel they should be giving most of their money to things that the unconverted will not give to. But we can pray, we can influence government, we can influence people of power, we can distribute literature, we can get involved in lobbying. There's different things. God will lead different people in different ways. I'm praying about sending every single senator and man in the House of Representatives to the whole United States literature in the next month. I've been praying about it in the car traveling here. I've got the method now how it can be done. This book that I send will probably, the first book, be quite low profile just to see if I can get a linking, second or third book. Then after that maybe a phone call. Do you think a member of Parliament pays any attention when he gets a letter from an ordinary person like you? I'll tell you, he does. And we ought to put the pen to paper every once in a while concerning some of the things that are happening in government. It doesn't take that long. A little less television, a little less chitchat, and I'm not against fellowship, and a little more time doing something for the sake of justice and of course those of us who know God's spirit and know God's word above all else, world evangelism. You say, is it possible to do both? Our gospel comes with two hands. In one hand we hold bread, in the other hand we hold the word of God. We've got to have a two-handed gospel. Sometimes in Operation Mobilization we've made the mistake in years gone by of always having only a one-handed gospel. We thought other people got the other hand. We didn't know how to always do both. We were always seemingly lacking money. We were always overwhelmed with a million, so we wanted to evangelize. We praised God that eventually led us to relief work among Afghans and among Mozambique people. We're up there in the mountains among the Kurds. He led us into an educational ministry with our two ships, which is a very important kind of ministry, often underplayed. There's not time to go into detail. If you're interested, I'll send you a paper of a message I recently shared on this subject. The devil likes to deceive us. The devil wants you to believe there's not really much you can do, especially as you're getting older, right? Some of you look like you're getting around my age. Nothing really much you can do. Life's passed you by. Suddenly you're being introduced as a grandfather. You're not quite sure how to handle this. People start referring to you as over the hill. I wouldn't want to tell you how my daughter describes me. Real ministry of encouragement she's got. It's nonsense. Many of the men who are actually leading the world today are over 70. Most of the top generals who were there in the desert and won the war were in their fifties. In many ways, you're as young as you think. When you write a letter to John Major as I did some time ago, do you think he knows how old you are? He's not got mental telepathy. I had quite a nice letter back from 10 Downing Street. I used to send Maggie letters as well. Invited her and asked her if her husband could play golf for me. She didn't even answer that question. It's amazing how anybody can have an influence with people of enormous authority and importance, humanly speaking, through prayer, through literature, through a letter, a phone call, through word of mouth, mobilizing, energizing, facilitating, using literature. It's exciting. You think, oh, well, this fellow's only interested in these people up in Whitehall. No. One of the groups I send books to as much as anybody else are people in prison. How many of you pray for those who are in prison? We're sort of commanded to do this in the New Testament. Raise your hand. You pray for those in prison. A few of you. Others are wanting to be humble. You're keeping your hand down lest you boast about your ministry. I mean, I want to believe the best. 50,000 men and women in prison right now. 50,000. Some of them don't belong there. Others out of prison belong in. The prison system in Britain, and I've been in some of our prisons, should break our hearts, and we should be writing people about it. Brothers and sisters, the Bible is calling us to spiritual revolution that affects every level of society. And I discover this with many young people. We've had 52,000 trained in OM, working in almost every nation, in almost every church denomination, mission society, in the world of any size. We've discovered God uses different people in different ways. And we've discovered that God's grace is sufficient. We can do much more. We can learn how to use our time more effectively. We can learn how to use our money more effectively. We can learn how to find money through prayer and work, selling things, intrapreneurship, sanctified imagination. We can release finance for world missions. That little group that set up Wellington's missionary auctions have now given over three million pounds for world missions. Isn't that exciting? It's not that far from here. How's your sanctified imagination? How are your sanctified imagination juices? Are they flowing, getting some ideas and things you might do the next week to make an impact on the world, the nation? You know what's exciting? The Bible says even the widow's might is dynamite in the hands of the living God. He's not calling us just to go to meetings. He's not calling us just to be involved in a church as vital and as important as that is, and it's all together. He is calling us to be spiritual revolutionaries, praying, going, giving, getting involved in these countries, so that the next time someone comes to a meeting and says, have you been praying for the Afghans, 80% of the hands will go up. Have you been praying for the situation in Cambodia, most hands will go up. Have you been crying to God for the ongoing crisis in South Africa that could explode any minute and take 100,000 souls in bloodshed that will baffle even the imagination? How could we read and hear about Bangladesh and not be broken as we see 150,000 souls swept into eternity? Don't worry if a few doubts come to your mind when you hear and see this. Great faith is often in the midst of doubt. So we examine what the other possibilities are and go back to God's word. Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me. That one verse, if we believed it, concerning the men who walked right down the street in front of us, in front of our churches, much less those across the world, would completely change our lives. It happened to me when I was 16. I've never had a day, never had a day, when you haven't felt something, however small, the urgency of the spirit concerning the world in which we live. Let's have an Acts 431. Let's be filled again with the Holy Spirit tonight and go forth from here to do God's will and to speak His word with fullness. Let us pray. I'd like to give a very simple invitation, mainly for believers. There may be someone that doesn't know Jesus tonight. There'd be counselors happy to talk to you after the meeting. But I want to give a simple invitation, an opportunity of an outward expression of an inward transaction. I believe God has prepared many of you for this meeting. I believe some of you have been wrestling with some real issues. And God has spoken to you tonight about a more wholehearted commitment to world evangelism, to missions, to Jesus. It may start right across the road from your house. It may start with some letters to MPs. It may start with greater financial support of world missions. God, listen, will lead different people in different ways. It's not for me to tell you the details. But some of you, there's been a spirit laser beam stabbed to your heart. And you want to pray a prayer of commitment, something like Romans 12, where it says, I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto Him. And if you'll pray that prayer of commitment, I'd like you to do it. In your own words, present your body. Confess any sin, lukewarmness, fear that's gripped your heart in the area of evangelism. Fear about the future. Fear about the employment problem. The Bible says God's not given us the spirit of fear, but of love and of power and a sound mind. Would you claim that from the Lord's word tonight? Would you walk in the light or make a determination to walk in the light? If God has spoken to you, and you're in the process through your own prayers of making a deeper commitment to Christ, to His word and to His kingdom, serious, serious commitment, grace awakening, the Lordship of Christ, then I want you just to quietly where you are, just to stand up as an outward expression of an inward transaction. There may only be a few. There may be many. I believe the Spirit of God has prepared some of you for just an outward step of faith. I'm not going to call you forward. I'm going to have you stand where you are and pray a prayer of consecration, of commitment, of spirit infilling for you, whoever you are. God bless you. Just remain standing. And you, my dear sister, my dear brother, Christian leader, young person, it's a simple call to steps of faith, greater commitment, greater acknowledgement of His grace and of His Lordship. You say, well, I did this a couple of years ago. To do something like this once or twice a year is not unusual. We are human. We need these milestones of our spiritual pilgrimage to take steps of faith, and that's what we're calling for tonight. God bless you. In the balcony. In the back. Anyone else? In the name of Jesus, be filled. Be encouraged. Experience, be experiencing greater forgiveness, greater grace. There are all kinds of needs represented. We know you can make this kind of commitment remaining seated. Fine. But some will be helped by this small outward expression of this inward transaction in your own heart. Anyone else? God bless you. Over here, my dear friend, dear brother. In the name of Jesus. In the name of Jesus. Be strengthened. Be filled. Be healed. He is able. He is able. Anyone else? Just in the quiet. It's not necessarily emotion. You may not be feeling a lot, or you may be feeling great freedom, great sense of the Spirit flowing through you. Fine. We're all different. Some things that we think are exclusively spiritual are, in fact, somewhat linked with our own emotion and our own temperament. But God, he is able. He is greater than all of it. He is greater than all of it. Anyone else? God is speaking to some of you about missionary service. That hasn't been the main focus of my message. But as the Spirit of God sets you free and you get this world vision, he is going to guide some of you to give a couple of years and maybe a lifetime overseas. Don't run away from it. Don't be a Jonah. It's not worth it. It's not worth it. Seek his face about getting involved. Those refugees, the poor, the un-evangelized. Anyone else? I want to take a step of faith. Make it known right now. God bless you. Praise the Lord. Let's have this prayer of commitment. I want to ask those who are standing to make also a commitment to just give me, if you would, no compulsion, your name and address and two prayer requests about your situation. I can't do this in my meetings all the time anymore. I have too many. But I feel burdened for tonight to pray specifically for you as you just, on any piece of paper, your name and address and two prayer requests and then later on I might send you a reminder about this step of faith and some literature that will help you. I will not add you to any list, any computer, the OM prayer list. That's separate. You have to request it. Lord, you see those standing before you. You see others that are praying in their own seats about particular issues. And we ask, Lord, as it was in Acts 431, fill us afresh with your Holy Spirit right now. Set people free from judgmentalism, from extremism, from a lack of understanding concerning your grace, concerning your Lordship. Forgive us for neglecting your word. Forgive us for too much time in trivia, not enough time in the great cause of spiritual revolution and world evangelism. Help us to move forward with this two-handed gospel to make the impact we need to make in the world in which we live. To demonstrate your life, your love, your grace through your church. Bless those who are ministers and Christian leaders here. Fill them especially with your Holy Spirit and the Spirit of discernment, wisdom, grace, and understanding for difficult problems and situations on many, many levels. They may know your grace is sufficient. Your strength is made perfect in weakness. We look to you as we acknowledge your Lordship on all these things in our lives through Jesus Christ. Amen. Let's all stand and sing, He is Lord. He is Lord. He is risen from the dead. He is Lord. Every knee shall bow every tongue confess. He is Lord. He is Lord.