In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of studying Acts 26 and Isaiah 40 in order to understand the role of a preacher and the concept of God. He encourages preachers to turn people from darkness to light and lead them to forgiveness of sins and an inheritance in God. The preacher also mentions the significance of Richard Baxter, a historical figure who transformed a town through his preaching and devotion. Lastly, the preacher reflects on the role of prophets and mentions that some people compare Jesus to Jeremiah.

Let's go to chapter 64, please. I've said before, I'll say it many times, I guess, I think every preacher should read Acts 26 on his knees every week, where Paul outlines what the preacher is there for, to turn people from darkness to light, the power of Satan to God, they may have forgiveness of sins, and an inheritance amongst them that are sanctified by faith that is in me. And then when you've digested that, go to the 40th chapter of Isaiah, and get the concept of God that this amazing man has. You'll never get depressed. Now some people have worn the page out, the corner of the page, Romans 8, 28, that's all they know. What does it say here, in Isaiah 4? Verse 13 says, "...who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, or being his counsellor, taught him, with whom took he counsel, who instructed him, and taught him in the path of knowledge, and showed to him the way of understanding." Verse 17, verse, sorry, 15, "...behold, all the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and a small dust in the balance." Verse 17, "...all nations before him are as nothing. They are counted to him less than nothing and vanity." Now verse 18, do you question, to whom will he liken me, or what likeness will he give me, says the Lord? Then 22, "...it is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth." In another picture, verse 26 is more astounding. "...lift up your eyes on high." Who has created these things? He's talking about the stars, the sun, the moon. Who has created these things? "...that bringeth out the greatness of his might, that he is strong in power." Oh, I skipped one thing that's important. "...he bringeth out their host by number." I heard a statement again on TV this week, that what we thought there was one Milky Way, a way back somewhere in infinity. You see, the scientists don't believe in eternity, but they believe in infinity. The smart boys just now are deciding what position to give Jesus in history. He's already decided where to put them in prophecy. No uncertainty about that in any shape or form. Oh, I've forgotten how many trillion stars they said there were the other day. I enjoy a scientist saying that, he thinks it's baffling. And then the next thing they say, they've invented a new chip for, what do you call them, computer? It's as big as your fingernail and you can store 250,000 statements on a chip. Well, God doesn't need fingernails, but he knows the name of everybody that lives inside them. Isaac Watts has a hymn in which he says, He made the stars, those heavenly flames. He counts their numbers, calls their names. His wisdom's vast and knows no bound, a deep where all our thoughts are drowned. What is a creature's skill or force? The sprightly man, the warlike horse, the piercing wit, the active limb, all are too mean delights for him, but saints are lovely in his sight. I don't think God enjoys the sun and the moon and the stars. They can't respond. He enjoys the man that's been digging ditches down the road all day, but he had a heart in tune with God all the time when he was praying. You know, the salvation of America does not rest on the White House. I don't care who gets in, only one care I do. The salvation of America does not depend on the White House, it depends on God's house. And before God does anything, he'll clean up the church. When he was on earth, he cleaned up the temple. If he comes again, he'll clean up the pulpit. Judgment must begin at the house of God. Judgment must begin with the preachers. I think the most awesome task in the world tonight is not to be the president of the United States or the king of an empire, but to be a man who stands between a living God and a dying people. Somebody quoted to me again the words of Richard Baxter in 1500. Richard Baxter went to Kidderminster. My precious wife and I used to drive through that town. There's an oversized statue, I suppose, about 15 feet high. There he is with a book in his hand. When he went into that town, there was not one family that had devotions. And when he died, there wasn't one family that didn't have them. They had to put five galleries up. Wouldn't that be something? Five galleries to accommodate the crowd every Lord's Day. And he said the secret was that he was, he says, I preached as if to never preach again, and as a dying man to dying men. I reminded the crowd last week, crowd, all you thousands there. The greatest soul winner in England, maybe ever, was neither Whitfield nor Wesley. It was Spurgeon. When he was still only 22 years of age, he preached to 3,000 people every Sunday morning, 3,000 every Sunday night. A newspaper critic says more people are healed when he prays. He never had the healing line. He never sold worn-out handkerchiefs and dusters that he blessed. More people are healed through Spurgeon's praying than all the hospitals in London. He led tens of thousands of people to Christ. Listen to this, you evangelist fellows. And he never made an altar call. He said, God has troubled you this morning about your soul's salvation. And he said the same at night, I'll be in my office tomorrow morning at six, and I'll deal with you. And there was a procession, and he stayed three hours every Sunday morning, pardon me, Monday morning, and three hours every Monday night, dealing with people. When he finished, Dr. A. D. Dixon went. He was a gradual orator, maybe, than Spurgeon. And the first day he was there, he shocked the congregation by making an appeal, will you come forward and accept Christ? A newspaper reporter wrote, asked him afterwards, why did you, Mr. Spurgeon, never ever in 20 years made an altar call and eat thousands of people genuinely born again? They left the world of flesh and the devil and the filthy language. They became new men with new hearts and new hopes and new spirits and new wills. People don't get saved like that anymore. They come to the altar and weep a few tears, crocodile tears, and live like crocodiles the rest of the week, biting and devouring each other. Well, the newspaper man said, Mr. Dixon, I don't think Spurgeon would have enjoyed, sorry, don't think Spurgeon would have enjoyed your altar call last night. He never made them. Oh, he said, I believe in striking while the iron is hot. The newspaper man, bless him, said to Dr. Dixon, you know what Spurgeon would have said? If the iron was hot with the Holy Ghost at 8 o'clock on Sunday night, it'd still be as hot next morning at 8 o'clock. I believe in that kind of salvation. If we don't get that preaching back, you may as well sell America out. We've got to get some hellfire preachers. We won't find them in the cemeteries, but we'll find them somewhere. I mean seminaries. But God's going to find them. I mentioned last week that the most amazing move of the Spirit of God was in about 17, what, 34? Through that gravel-voiced, sour-looking man by the name of Jonathan Edwards. Do you know the New England revival began as a cut out of an ordinary meeting? It wasn't staged. There weren't converted film stars and broken down footballers on the platform. No choirs, no singing. There was a consistency about the man that preached. And people said, yes, he read with a candle in one hand, and he had bad eyesight, didn't have good glasses, so he had to skip over his notes. His daughter said, you complain of my daddy being severe, but you should live in the house with him and hear him weeping. I'd like to send a notice to all the deacons of every church in America. If your preacher doesn't weep over the congregation, weep over your preacher. Jeremiah, I said last week, was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He goes on to say later in the book, I'll weep over your sins in secret. We used to live in a town nine miles out of Manchester, England. There was a block of stone half the size of this wall here, on one side of a doorway, a great big arch, another big lump of stone that side. And it says this Salvation Army Corps, as they called it, was opened in 19, I think it was 1910, William Booth died in 1912. Because they had a revival, they built the largest Salvation Army Hall outside of London, in a small industrial town. There were two girls there by the name of Jackson, the Jackson sisters. Well, they went the usual Salvation Army way, you know, gave out food, gave out all clothes, gave out furniture. In fact, it used to be a skit, a skit, you go to the Salvation Army for soup, soap and salvation. And they tried everything, and nothing worked. They were desperate, they were bearing no fruit, so they sent a letter to William Booth. He was half Jew and half Gentile. And he didn't want to waste words on the telegram, so he sent two words back to the young ladies, try tears. They did, and revolution came, spiritual revolution. They packed that auditorium that seats over 2,000 to the rafters, every Lord's Day. They had prayer meetings every Saturday. I would not be a member of a church that doesn't have a prayer meeting Saturday night. Saturday night from 9 o'clock till midnight. Or Friday night 9 o'clock till midnight. You do it, it will revolutionize your church. They tried tears, brokenness, and God in infinite mercy came. Now let's get to this chapter again, I keep trying. I suppose the most thankless task in the world is to be a prophet of God. When God is angry with a nation, it has no prophets. I don't know a prophet in America today. Somebody sent a brochure out with my picture on it and said, Leonard Raven is another Jeremiah. I never said that, I wouldn't sanction a foolish thing like that. I'm not fit to lose his shoes, never mind be a prophet like Jeremiah. But you remember again in the 16th chapter of Matthew, verse 16, that Jesus said, ask the people, who do the people say that I am? Some say thou art Elijah, some say you're Elijah, some say that you're John Baptist, risen from the dead. But some say thou art Jeremiah. What's the point of contact? Because Jeremiah was a man of tears, because Jesus was a man of tears. Oh yes, he whipped the people when he went into the temple, but wait a minute, read a few verses back, he wept before he whipped. And if you're going to whip them, weep over them. That makes all the difference in the world. Do you think he looked at that temple as you look at it, and want to take a picture? No, the camera's not thinking of that. Do you think he looked at it with human eyes? Don't you think he remembered the time though, this was Herod's temple, the old one had gone. Don't you think he looked there and saw Jeremiah preaching, and Isaiah preaching, and all the prophets? And this stupid people don't know he's the last, he's the prophet of prophets, as much as he's the king of kings and lord of lords. And this is God's last call. I think you might take that scripture and change it, where it says, Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets. Why don't we say, America, America, this is your last chance. I say to America what I say to you, God doesn't owe you a single thing. The reason you're a dwarf spiritually is we won't eat the word of God, you won't wait on him, you won't hear his voice, and you won't obey him. The secret of revival is obedience. But you can't obey what you don't know. I don't remember that Isaiah talks about his tears, anyhow. I'm trying to recall the statement, I didn't memorize it, but anyhow. The essence of it was, it's by an old Jewish scholar in America, that became a Christian, and he said, No man who has ever seen the blazing light of God's glory will ever backslide. You just didn't do it. You'd be afraid of missing eternal glory. Well, let me go a bit further and read the text. Isaiah 64 and verse 4. All that thou wouldst rend the heavens. It's an admission we can't do it. The Catholics will say, Gabriel, will you rend the heavens? Or Michael the Archangel, will you rend the heavens? No, no, no, no. They have no power. This is the man who knows the living God. This is the man who has seen God sitting on the circle of the earth. He writes about him as the one who inhabits eternity. Go back into previous chapter 63 and look at verse 15. Look down from heaven and behold from the habitation of thy holiness and of thy glory. All that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains may flow at thy presence. Now that's a reference, of course, one translation of it, that the mountains may quake. Do you remember the holy mountain when they didn't go near to it because the glory of God was there and they didn't even stand near it? And he says, come again in that majesty, come in that glory again. But the mountains might flow down at thy presence when the melting fire burneth, and the fire again causeth the name, causeth the waters to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, and that the nations may tremble at thy presence. He likes that word. Do you remember what he says earlier about preachers? To this man will I look, to him that trembleth. He doesn't mean your knees not together like the first time you stood in a pulpit and never found your knees so friendly. He's not talking about that, he's talking about an inward trembling. To handle the word of the eternal God, to stand as a communication between the living God and the dying people. Again, I ask you in God's name, is Jesus Christ risen? Does he stand in the midst where two or three are gathered together? Well, if the living Christ is in the midst, how in God's name can he have a dead meeting? It's impossible. If the meeting's dead, he isn't there. We're going through motions, we're going through actions. He's asked that the mountains may flow at thy presence. Look at verse 3. When thou didst terrible things which we look not for, thou camest down, the mountains flowed at thy presence. For since the beginning of the world, men have not heard or perceived by the ear, neither have I seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for them that wait for him. Do you know what the Hebrew says? They're those who soak themselves in God. Those who saturate themselves with his holiness, with his majesty. Let me ask you, when in your fellowship did you ever tiptoe out of the sanctuary without saying a word? Because glory of God had been there so much. You go to the average church in Dallas this weekend and you can't get off the steps without saying, well, do you think the Cowboys will win today? Oh no, it's World Series. Christians are worried about World Series, but they're not taking the world seriously. I asked you last week, when in God's name are we going to get serious about being serious? See, the prophet doesn't see the world as a politician sees him, or the industrialist, or the educationalist. The true prophet of God sees the world as God sees it. In verse 6 he says, we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousness are as filthy rags. You know, people say that to say, oh, I'm just a saved sinner. That's like saying you're a married bachelor. That's like saying you're an honest thief, or a pure harlot. You can't be a saved sinner. You're either saved or you're a sinner. He came, thou shalt call his name Jesus, he shall save his people from their sins. He saves us from sins, that we've committed, and from committing a thousand more that would meet us at the judgment. You know, we're living a day when we're more afraid of holiness than we are of sinfulness. We accommodate ourselves to iniquity, not only in the world, but in the fellowships round about. I agree. Look back a minute, chapter 59, number 16, would you do that? Hmm. The chapter begins, Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save, neither his ear heavy that it cannot hear. But your iniquities and your sins have separated you from God. You can't see his face, he's hidden his face from you. I went to a little college in England, just 35 men there. Samuel Chadwick was the wonderful principal, and he loved and said over and over, Our people don't know the 80th psalm. O thou that dwellest between the cherubim. Our people don't know where God is, so how can they call on him? He dwells between the cherubim, shine forth. Let's find it a minute and read it. Three times in the psalm he says the same thing. Go to verse 2, Psalm 80, verse 2. Turn us again, O God, and cause thy face. Not we'll turn ourselves, it's going to take omnipotence. Turn us again, O God, cause thy face to shine upon us and we will be saved. O Lord God of hosts, how long will thou be angry against the prayer of thy people? Verse 7, Turn us again, O God of hosts, cause thy face to shine upon us and be saved. The last verse, 19. Turn us again, O Lord God of hosts, cause thy face to shine upon us and we shall be saved. We say, you know, dispensation, we say this is the dispensation of the Holy Ghost. I looked in an old edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica that I have. There were three pages on the Holy Spirit. There were 33 on the papacy. Wesley has a hymn in which he says, Stay thou insulted spirit, stay. I believe almost every church in America insults the Holy Ghost every Sunday. Jonathan Edwards said, We got together, we preachers, and I guess you would mean shepherd, remember there are a vast number of intellectuals. Jonathan Edwards, I believe, was the greatest brain America ever had or ever will have. He went to university at seven. At 13 years of age he was voted the, what do you call him, valedictorian. A little later he became, when Yale, was it Yale, it was Yale, he became president. Then he had a very bad time after that. But he said, We have made up our minds, we preachers, listen to it. Excuse me, I keep saying that, listen to it, I know you're listening with both ears. Some of you with your eyes too. Thank you. We made up our minds, we would never pluck any unripe fruit. The curse of American evangelism, we're plucking unripe fruit. We're asking people to be saved, they don't know they're lost. The preacher hasn't much power in his own life, so he can't say what power he can be reached by this man. Do you know why we don't have revival? Because we're content to live without it, number one. And the second thing is, the price is too high. And the third thing, we couldn't handle it if it came. Usually, you don't put a newborn baby in a refrigerator, do you? What's the good of God getting thousands of people saved and putting them, you know, a fine old Baptist preacher, Vance Havner, I like old Vance. He wrote the foreword to my last book, he did a good job. That's a good book. But anyhow, he said, some people down where we live got refrigerators. He said, we've got them all over our town, they've got steeples on them. Well, that's about it, isn't it? Go back, please, into chapter 63. We'll come to the other in a minute for sure. He's talking about Israel and he says in verse 9, in all their afflictions, he was afflicted. He was with them through the wilderness, he was with them in every step of the way. In all their afflictions he was afflicted and the angel of his presence saved them. That's verse 9. In his love and in his pity he redeemed them. Listen, he redeemed them, he bared them up, he carried them. Did you hear it? He saved them, he redeemed them, he bared them up, he carried them. And verse 10, but they rebelled. What a dirty crowd. They yelled like mad to get out of Egypt. And when they got out, they said, can't you take us back? We're missing the onions and the garlic. I'm going to emphasize that again. You preach, you fellows preach on it. Please. The angel of his presence saved them, he redeemed them, he bared them up, he carried them. As in David, but they rebelled and vexed the Holy Spirit. Therefore, he turned to be their enemy. I'm not scared of Russia. Why should I be? Show me one scripture where God tells me to be afraid of my enemies. You can't show me one. I don't believe number one enemy of America is Russia. Number one enemy of America is God. I'm scared to death that, to use that phrase, that God one of these days will cut us off and walk out from us like he walked out of Russia in 1917. We're blessed, we're overloaded. You're going to a store, you don't know which kind of bread to get. There's ten kinds of brown bread and whole wheat bread. More sausages, you could link them from New York to California, nearly. This brand, that brand, the other brand. Forty kinds of cheeses, good night, we've got everything. In a world that's starved, are we grateful? You see, this man makes a statement that not many people like. I think it's at the end of the 58th chapter. This is linked in with revival. I don't care what you say. I say it, and so it's right. Because it's my conviction. Isaiah 58 and verse 13, If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, I say that because all our football matches on the Sabbath, so God got ahead of us. Take thy foot from thy Sabbath from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable, and shalt honor him not doing thine own things, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words. Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord. You know, you're having trouble in your family, maybe the trouble is you're breaking the Sabbath. Oh, well, there's not much in breaking the Sabbath. Well, your neighbor thinks there isn't much in committing adultery either. You choose to break the Sabbath, you're as guilty as he is. You don't like your other neighbor, he steals, but he only steals about once a year. And the Lord says, keep my day. Ten commandments, only one of them has remember in it. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. God is always taking Israel back and says, remember thou was the bondsman in Egypt, remember this, remember that. We've got awful short memories. How many times have you made a vow to God and broken it? I've heard of so many women when they were having a baby delivered and they thought they were going to die and they made vows to God and two months after found they hadn't kept any of them. A year after found they hadn't kept any of them. We were saved in an accident, we were delivered from this or the other. And we forget, we've short memories. You know, we don't have a holy God, we have a utility God. He's there to answer your prayers, send you money, send you gifts. God pities. Yes. Verse 6 in 64. This isn't a sermon, obviously, it's just commenting on things that are burning in my heart. We are all as an unclean thing and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. But listen, wait a minute, why don't we go to John and John says, he that doeth righteous is righteous even as he is righteous. He didn't come to break a few filthy stinking habits in my life and change my cursing lips to blessing lips. He came to do more than that. I believe, again, the greatest miracle in the world is that God can take an unholy man out of an unholy world, make that unholy man holy, put him back in an unholy world and keep him holy. That takes all the blood of the cross and all the power of the Holy Ghost and your will in total submission to God. A world famous preacher was in my office not long ago. I said, tell me this, you cross the world, you've been through many cities in America. Can you give me the names of ten holy men that you know? No, I can't. Well, think about the holy preacher. I can't. You know, holiness is not a luxury, it's a necessity. One of the most astounding verses I never preached on is where God says we can be, in Hebrews, what, 12 or 13, we can be partakers of his holiness. And then two verses after is the most shattering verse, it says, without holiness no man shall see the Lord. How many people do we die at burial of black slidden? And we say some nice holy words over them. Some people put what they call holy water. They die black slidden. Without holiness, no. Is the sanctification in the sepulcher? Does some miracle take place between there and the resurrection? No servant, you're right. As a tree falls, so it lies. Let's go to verse 7 in 64. There is none that stirreth up himself, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee. For thou hast hid thy face from us, and hast consumed us because of our iniquities. My definition of a prophet is that prophets are God's emergency men for crisis hours. We don't need a prophet in America. We need a prophet in every pulpit. Elijah says, gather all the people of Israel. He was a prophet. There were less people in Israel than there are in Chicago today. Less people in Israel than there are in New York City. That poor doomed damned city down there called Mexico City. Where the priests have run it. I thought about those poor people trapped there for days. I couldn't sleep some nights. Not only trapped because a man has a big, what do you call it, block of stone over his legs, or his arms are pinned down, he can't move. Do you know what it is? Despair wasn't physically, it was spiritual. Because he'd been tortured as a Catholic, he must die either holding the crucifix or kiss it, and the priest must pronounce his last rites to him. And the poor man's in a place as black as hell, and he's suffering pain, and there's no cross to kiss, and there's no priest to talk to him. Well, I ask you, how will those priests escape the damnation of hell? They won't. The biggest fraud the devil ever imposed on mankind is the Roman Church. We're not laboring for wages that, down here, if we do, we're idiots. I've been praying and groaning one night, and I said to Martha, I woke up, I said, are you awake dear? Yes. I said, do you know what? I said, a man that chooses to be a preacher is an idiot. They should give him a certificate. Or let him have a pin in his lapel. I'm crazy. If you've chosen to be a preacher, you're crazy. But if God has chosen, you don't let go of it. If the deacons get as mad as the devil, let them get mad. It's the greatest honor in the world to be able to declare the whole counsel of God. But isn't it a shocking thing? Oh, let me go back a minute here. You know, people have said so often, you see, in the Old Testament they didn't know the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was with them, but he wasn't in them. Forget it. What does it say in this 63rd chapter in verse 10? They'd rebel and vex the Holy Spirit. Therefore, he was turned to be their enemy. You know, one of these days we're going to discover the Holy Ghost is gone. And he'll go out of mercy and leave us alone. We'll preach the same. We'll gesticulate the same. We'll shout the same. And the meeting will be as flat as the floor. And God will do that in order to drive us back to the place where we realize there's nothing in our flesh, nothing in our theology, nothing in our doctrine, nothing in our terminology. It must be the Holy Ghost. He wrote the book. He inspires it. He interprets it. OK, verse 10 in 63. But they rebelled and vexed his Holy Spirit. Therefore, he turned to be their enemy. And he fought against them. God now, instead of what was delivered them out of the hand of Pharaoh, he brought water out of the rock, he sent manna from heaven, he gave them quails, and now he turns and becomes their enemy. Brother, listen. If God is your enemy, you've no friends anywhere. It doesn't matter how rich you are, how famous you are, how big your church is, how big your denomination is, whether you have a TV program. If God goes out, brother, you're sunk. Verse 11, Then he remembered the days of old, Moses, and his people, saying, Where is he that brought them up out of the sea with the shepherd of his flock? Where is he that put his Holy Spirit within him? The Holy Ghost was in Moses. That's clear enough, isn't it? He's called a prophet. Do you think a prophet was ever void of the Holy Ghost? Now we're in 64. Verse 7, There is none that calleth upon my name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee, for thou hast hid thy face from us, and hast consumed us because of our iniquities. You know what, people? There'll be people in hell fire screaming the name of their pastor forever and ever because he had a Holy Ghost fire. Why did Isaiah have this concept of God? Because he saw the Lord high and lifted up. What did he do? He fell at his feet. What did he pray? Help me, I need power to preach. No, he didn't. He said two statements, I'm undone and I'm unclean. And if you can get people to the altar and get them to confess in brokenness, I'm undone, I'm unclean, you can get somewhere. If they only want God to forgive their lousy sins and make them a little nicer to live with, forget them, I wouldn't even bother with them. God's business is to make us holy. When Saul had an evil spirit, he did evil things. Jesus says when a man has an unclean spirit, he does unclean things. On that basis, a man with a Holy Spirit does holy things. If you have the Holy Ghost, you'll live a holy life. If you have a holy life, you'll be easy to live with. If you have a holy life, nobody on earth or in hell can offend you. Once you get a clean heart, a sanctified heart, I like to call it, it won't make a hill of beans who likes you or dislikes you. Psalm 119 verse 156 to 65 says, Great peace have they which love thy Lord, and nothing shall offend them. I've got one or two friends I know who were never offended. Well, why do we get so offended? Because somebody hurts our pretty little ego or something? I love that verse of Jesus, he says, The prince of this world, he admits that, the prince of this world and findeth nothing in me. Well, that's where I want to live. Because the devil's smart, but I'll tell you what he can't do, he can't hit nothing. And the only thing you retaliate is there's something in you. There's some pride and somebody hurts it. Some bitterness and somebody touches it. And immediately you spring out like a lion, a tiger jumping out of a ditch. Great peace have they which love thy Lord, and nothing. You know, it's a great joy in having nothing, do you know what it is? You can't lose anything. Isn't that profound? If you've no opinion of yourself, nobody can rub your nose into dust. Wasn't it Luther said, Either is low, need fear no fall. You sit on the floor, you can't fall anywhere, can you? If you've written yourself off, you don't want to be of any reputation, doesn't matter what people say about you. A great joy in having nothing, you can't lose anything. I remember somebody walked up to a friend of mine and said, You know, I don't like your preaching. He said, Shake hands. He said, Why? He said, I don't like it either. So the poor guy didn't know what to do. He's embarrassed. He thought he'd defend himself. He said, But I don't like it. It should be a hundred percent better than it is. If you've no pride, nobody can get worried. Touch it. But there's a great embarrassment in having nothing. A friend of mine came at midnight and I had nothing to say before him. That's why the church is today. She's nothing to give this world. Let's come down here to a shocking chapter, pardon the verse here, in Isaiah 64 and verse 10. Well, I've heard preachers again say, You know, Isaiah doesn't have to. Are you going to try and persuade me you'll waste your time if you spend two years doing it? Are you going to tell me that a man whose people have known the holiness of God and deserted it, the protection of God, he's been a wall of fire and now he's moved out? Are you going to tell me this man had dry eyes when he said, Oh, that thou would surrender heavens. It's the same oath said in the same tone that Jeremiah says in chapter 9, Oh, that thy head were waters. It's the same oath that broke the heart of Jesus and he looked on Jerusalem and he says, Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem. You can't learn it by elocution. Okay, verse 10 in 64. Thy holy cities are a wilderness. Zion, the chief part of Jerusalem. Zion is what? A wilderness. Jerusalem, a desolation. Our holy and beautiful house where our fathers praised thee is burned with fire and all our pleasant things are laid in ruins. You're going to tell me he said that without tears? I won't believe you. I won't believe Gabriel if he told me. A man doesn't look over desolation and waste. He doesn't see the mounting condemnation that's going to come against his people without grief, without tears. I was looking at that. Let me see if I can find it here. In Jeremiah. No, in Lamentations. Lamentations chapter 1. You know, the old Methodist used to sing a hymn. Blessed are the men of broken heart who mourn for sin with inward smile. Not mourning for their own sin, necessarily. Mourning for the sin of the nation. Now, if this isn't a broken man, tell me whether it is one. Lamentations 1 and verse 20. He says, Behold, O Lord, for I am in distress. He's distressed about what? Himself? No, his people. My bowels are troubled. My heart is turned within me. I've grievously rebelled, or we have grievously rebelled. And therefore the sword bereaveth. Look in chapter 2 and verse 11. This isn't some hot flush this man has when he's in a meeting and he suddenly feels, Oh, I've been rather naughty. I haven't been good. I haven't read my Bible enough. I haven't given enough permissions. Forget it. That's sheer rotten emotion that preachers work on. Tell me, if you will, after this, or send me a post. Do you know a man that lives in this situation? In verse 11 of Lamentations 2. Mine eyes fail with tears. My bowels are troubled. My liver is poured out for the destruction of the daughter of my people. Because the children and sucklings swoon in the streets. Verse 11 says, All that pass by clap their hands at thee, and they hiss and wag their heads at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, This city is the city that men call the perfection of beauty and the joy of the whole earth. It was a very embodiment of God's holiness. I think again, when Jesus stood there at the temple, he was thinking back to the time when Solomon had built that temple. And when they prepared an altar, when they prepared the sacrifice, and the glory of God came, and all the priests backed out. They couldn't minister for the glory of God. Ever been in a meeting like that? Do you want to be in a meeting like that? Do you want to get your church to pray that someday the preacher will go and he didn't say a word? John Knox, the great reformer, when he preached in St. Giles Cathedral in Scotland, I stood outside of it and looked at it there in Edinburgh. He went through it one day and he went through the whole performance, about 3,000 people in the sanctuary. The choir sang, somebody else sang, somebody read a scripture and so forth, and he stood up, raised his hand, and he said, God be with you till the next Lord's Day. I have no message. Do you know if a preacher has the guts to say that, he'd have dug up some old whiskery sermon, wouldn't he? Some note he has in the back of his Bible he's preached a thousand times. He dares to say, I have no message. And people remember that as much as when he was at his peak as an orator. Go back a little there if you're in Lamentations to Jeremiah, chapter 4. One of the most, best known verses in scripture, I guess, is in chapter 4 and verse 3. Thus saith the Lord to the men of Judah and Jerusalem, Break up your fallow ground and sow not among thorns. Over to verse 8. For this, gird yourselves with sackcloth and lament and howl. Do anybody preachers doing that? We don't do that anymore. People love to quote the second chapter of Joel, you know. He's going to pour out his spirit and all flesh. But there's something important before that in chapter 1 of Joel. Verse 11. Be ashamed, O ye husbandmen, if you like, you preachers, howl, ye vine dressers, for the wheat, for the barley, because the harvest of the field is perished. The vine is dried up, the fig tree languishes, the pomegranate tree and the palm tree and the apple tree, even the trees of the field are withered because joy is withered from the sons of men. There is no joy. Joy reaches its highest peak when there's a Holy Ghost revival. Not when we clap our hands and try and bring God down. We try and work up an atmosphere but God comes down. Joel 1. Verse 13. Gird yourselves and lament ye, priests, howl ye ministers of the altar. Come all night in sackcloth. I was invited to a conference this past year. I got a fantastic brochure with the names of I don't know how many professors and doctors and leaders of movements and what have you got on revival. I didn't go. We're going to move this. I said, listen, I don't scorn scholarship. I have a son who has an earned Ph.D. and his wife has and the other boys are pretty smart as far as I'm concerned. I wrote back to the man and said, sir, you've sent me about 60 names. This doctor is a professor of something at a certain university. This man leads a certain movement. This man is one of the best known Christian philosophers. I said, you've sent me all those men. I've never heard of them. I'll tell you who are drawing the men to God. Not just because they have no degrees. Dave Wilkerson has no degree. Billy Graham has none of what was given to him. The men that are pulling the crowds in America today are men who have no degrees. They've been to the university. I went to Bush University. I told a lady when she asked me, what university do you go to? I said, Bush. Well, do I know anyone that went there? I said, Moses. She said, Moses who? Maybe she thought it was a basketball player, Moses. I preach in a big college and seminary and I said to the professor sitting there, I was preaching on Hannah actually, in her travail, and I quoted this. It says, the priests weep between the altar and the doorpost. I said, do you have a graduation class here for those who howl? And if they learn to howl, can they get another degree in weeping between the altar and the doorpost? It's foreign to us. We want revival our way. Go to hell. If you're depending on some way you're going to work it, it'll never come. The Christian life will only work one way, that's God's way. Revival will only come one way, that's God's way. Billy Graham is going to have another gathering. Last time he had it in Lucerne in Switzerland. They sent free tickets for men in Philippines and Borneo and Timbuktu and what have you got. And they came and had a nice vacation and they had a good time I guess. It cost 14 million dollars. I'll tell you something in presence of God, revival doesn't cost a penny. It costs obedience, broken hearts, writing the world off and say, I don't care, I hang about the world, the flesh and the devil. If some of you guys could get your church to say, listen, we won't watch TV for a month. We'll meet every night in the sanctuary for prayer, for intercession, for our town. Everybody's a success away from home. You preachers go to somebody else's church, have a great time. You left a bankrupt church behind, so you kicked your heels in somebody else's pulpit. But Jerusalem is the place, the home base is where revival must come, beginning at Jerusalem. And that's the hardest place. They were most despised, discredited, disappointed, disillusioned men in the world. You wonder why people don't believe you. They didn't believe Jesus, so forget it. Even when he was risen from the dead, going down the road, going to Emmaus, we trusted, it was in the past tense. They didn't believe then. Went to the upper room, there was Thomas and they said, you missed it, he'd just been, who, Jesus, yeah, yeah, yeah. I heard a woman screaming up the road, saying, he's risen, he's risen, he's risen. You know, those high-powered women that scream their heads off. You won't get me to believe. Until I take my finger and put it in his side, and I put my finger in the nail print. Boy, if ever a man lived to regret it. Next time I went to the meeting, Jesus turned up. That's why Thomas missed it, because he went to a meeting late. That's why you miss it so often. Sometimes the blessing is in the first hymn or in the prayer. I get more out of hymns than out of preaching, usually. Except my own, of course, but anyhow. There never has been revival without intercessory prayer and tears. I thank God I've got precious friends that I can pray with and weep with. Billy Graham's going to repeat in Amsterdam what he did at the other place. One of his closest friends wrote to me afterwards, he said, I wrote to him, I said, what was it like in Lausanne? Did you have a night of prayer? Was there brokenness? Did the fire come down? No, no, Len, you'd have been disappointed. I sure would. It'll be the same thing this next time. If it costs 50 million dollars. Obedience, trust and obey, there's no other way. As the old Englishman said, I'd have trust and obey or rust and decay. It's as simple as that. Gird yourselves, lament ye priests, and howl and lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God. There you've got it. What do you say, that's for ministers? Wait a minute, come on. I heard Dr. G. Campbell Morgan preach often, and I remember more than once he said this, one of the saddest days in the Christian church is when we divided the professional ministers from the laymen. There's no difference in the sight of God. Because I'm 12 inches above you here, doesn't mean I'm any bigger in the sight of God. He's made us a kingdom of priests unto God. We're a royal priesthood and we're a holy nation. If you're born again of the Spirit and the Holy Ghost is in you, you've as much access to God as I have. You see, the thing again that troubles me, as I've said often, I'll still say, I read Hebrews 11 with all those fantastic, that vast scope of men and women. All they had was not money and prestige. Every one of them had a faith. They subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions. Come on! And not one of them ever had a Bible. What in God's name, what excuse do you have? Suppose you died tonight and went straight to judgment. You won't do that. See, when a man's dead he isn't dead. Spurgeon's dead. Thousands of Baptist preachers will resurrect his sermons Sunday and preach them. He still lives. And he's going to get payment at the end of the journey for every sermon you've preached of his. Do you think God's going to reward you for preaching Spurgeon? Forget it. Oh, fellows say, I've been preaching so much... Good! I preach through my Revival Charities. I preach a message wall over... Great! Keep laying up treasure in heaven for me. They say, what, for you? I say, why, do you think God's going to reward you for a sermon you stole? There's going to be some trouble up there I'll tell you. Sanctify a fast and call a solemn assembly. People scorn the Pharisee that stood. He went up to the temple. He went up to the front. He lifted up his voice and he said, I thank God I'm not as other men are. Extortion is unjust or even of this public. I fast twice in the week. You can't get Christians to fast once a week, never mind twice. He fasted twice every week because of what the law said. You remember that hymn that says, fasting alone in the desert? There was Jesus alone. No sirree, we don't know how to fast. Call a solemn assembly. Get the elders and the inhabitants of the land. This chapter in Joel here for a minute again. Verse 11 says, The Lord shall utter his voice before his army for his camp is very great for he is strong that executeth his word and the day of the Lord is great and very terrible. Therefore now, not tomorrow, the choice in America lies either we either we concentrate in praying or we pray in concentration camps. Make a choice. Most preachers spend more time in bed than they do out of it. If you're under 40 years of age, I don't see any reason why you should be in bed after 4 o'clock in the morning. John Wesley met with his friends and they were friends. John Newton that wrote Amazing Grace. William Cowper that wrote There is a Fountain Filled with Blood. And a bunch of other intellectuals and they met at 4 o'clock in the morning unless he said we prayed at 10 at night till 4 in the morning and then we stood up and raised our hands and sang the doxology. You don't need to do that now when you're a popular church, do you? When people are tired and you can spend anything you like on the church, do as you like, get some nice soft seats so they'll sleep better during the sermon. Where are the fasting, weeping, praying pastors? Verse 12 Therefore also now saith the Lord turn ye even to me with all your heart and with fasting and with weeping and with mourning. Are you reading verse 13? Gird yourself Lament ye priests and howl ye ministers of the altar come all night in sackcloth. Is there anybody that mourns? Sackcloth is indicative of mourning, of grief, of sorrow. Our preachers have to go to the best suits they can get. Sackcloth And not only sackcloth but it talks about ashes. That means that something has been consumed. Now he doesn't let them off again. He says that word in verse 12. Then 15 he says blow the trumpet in Zion. In Zion, not to the world. I'm not worried about a revival in the world. I'm worried about a revival in the church. Getting cleaned up and purified and sanctified and getting all the dumb things that take up your time. You can always tell a church that's bankrupt it has a sign outside in another building family gathering. Entertainment is the devil's substitute for joy. There's a king in America I'll tell you his name the king of America and I'll tell you the name of his queen. The king is called sport and his wife is called entertainment. And come on now between them sinners don't tithe don't give God a measly tenth of what they earn. They'll spend every penny in that too. And borrow money to get drunk and borrow money to go to oh this weekend World Series some of these guys will shout their heads off they couldn't squeak Amen in church. But they're screaming like Comanche Indians. Brother. That brother is a full-blooded Indian bless him I love him. I'm asking you when are we going to get serious? People write to me Are you writing another book on revival? I've almost made a vow today I won't go to any gathering of men about revival unless they lay all night between the altar and the door post. Are we trying to improve on God? Oh well Raymier's arrogant he talks revival he won't come and no I won't go why should I? This is God's prescription it's not Wesley's it's not Finney's it's not Spurgeon's it's God's recipe if you like you can't tell people to weep they weep when they're heartbroken they weep when they're terrified I don't wonder Paul said knowing the terror of the Lord you see today we are all so sweet and sugary Dear God we're in bad shape skip down to verse 17 a minute before I leave this I'm not supposed to preach Friday nights you know the verse 17 says let the priests the ministers of the Lord weep between the porch and the altar and let them say spare thy people oh God I believe the shortest cut to hell is down the middle aisle of the average church why did Jeremiah stay with it to the end of the road because he says your word burns like a fire in my heart why did Isaiah go on with all the opposition he had because he says when he cried to God the Holy One a cherubim took a live coal from off the altar and put it on his lips and said after he confessed I'm unclean I'm undone then the angel came on the cherubim with a pair of tongs took a live coal and he touched him where he was unclean on his lips Wesley said in his day gossip is the curse of the church gossip slander criticism ridicule I've been to ministers meetings where they told borderline jokes then somebody gets a bit bolder and tells a blue joke and everybody laughs I've never been to a dinner with ministers yet with any intelligence there they don't talk about God they talk about football talk about their Sunday school numbers watch a golf handicap we got dirty preachers like that in the pulpit no wonder the church is dirty let the priests and ministers of the Lord weep between the porch and the altar let them say spare thy people O Lord and give not thine heritage to reproach that the heathen should rule over them I'm going back to 64 now if I can find it somewhere here you know we talk about Jesus living to make intercession for us I'm just thinking of this word here in the 53rd chapter of Isaiah where we have a picture of his crucifixion it says therefore in the last verse will I deliver him a portion with the great he should divide the spoil with the strong because he has poured out his soul unto death I'm maybe off my horse here I think the dying thief suffered as much as Jesus did physically the Catholic church has made a lot you see you go and see a plastic Christ with blood running down his forehead and his hands and his side ripped open but this is very clear it says his soul was made an offering for sin all thy billows the wrath of God came upon him he tasted damnation because God blew the sun out and wouldn't let men see the crucifixion his disciples forsook him God forsook him my God my God he cries Eloi Eloi lama say back to me why hast thou forsaken me he was separated from his father for a moment so that you and I didn't have to be separated from him for eternity that's why that same verse 12 of 53 therefore will I divide him a portion with the great he should divide the spoil with the strong because he hath poured poured out his soul unto death and he was numbered with the transgressors and he bared the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors didn't he pray for them every crisis in the life of Jesus read the life of Jesus in the gospel according to Luke and you'll find the prayer life of Jesus it says that when he stepped down into the water he was praying when the spirit descended upon him it says he was on the mount of transfiguration and the spirit descended upon him there in every crisis you'll find the spirit descending on Jesus he's praying oh dear I'm going to just talk a little about this 64th chapter verse 10 again I can't think of this man saying this with dry eyes our holy and beautiful house where our fathers praised thee the Pentecostals talk about the Holy Ghost coming on Mazuza street that nobody's ever been in a meeting like that since and it's not God's fault it's our fault we're satisfied with clapping our hands and you refuse songs and tap our feet our holy city I remember when the bombs came on England and the bombs hit indiscriminately one of the great pictures of World War II was the cross on top of St. Paul's Cathedral with a background of terrible black clouds but all around the buildings they never hit the house of God in that sense but they're talking historically here the beautiful house where our fathers praised thee we don't have to praise I've never been in a church in the world where they know how to worship I've been in meetings where they say let's all raise hands and worship that's not worship that's praise praise is the gateway to worship worship is the gateway to adoration adoration is what you do in prostrate on the floor Dr. George used to say to me often now brother Leonard if I go before you remember you and I worship God face downward you can't be distracted looking at the rug that man would lay 3, 4, 5 hours on the rug he showed me the rug and he said Leonard I can stay there on my face 3, 4, 5 hours without saying a word of prayer without saying a word of praise I've just worshiped I might be turning over in my mind Faber's marvelous words how beautiful how beautiful the sight of thee must be thine endless wisdom boundless power and awful purity oh Jesus, Jesus dearest Lord forgive me if I say for very love thy sacred name a thousand times a day burn, burn within me love of God burn fiercely night and day till all the dross of earthly love he said I get there 3 or 4 hours I gaze on his holiness one day I gaze on his incredible majesty another day I gaze on his ineffable love another day I move to tears and brokenness as I meditate the mercy of God why didn't he cut us off the commandments of Jesus, of God ten commandments have been broken ten million times in America today and God seems to relax and do nothing about it but he's going to do it why doesn't he judge now because he's appointed a day Paul said that to the philosophers didn't he it happens what is it 16th, 17th of Acts 16 the Epicureans and Stoics and philosophers and poets and he said you worship an unknown God I want to tell you about that unknown God I hate the devil every day more that I live I remember in Thailand that brother Steve was here last week he gone to Thailand I remember going up a street at 4 o'clock in the morning and they have great wooden fences there made of teak it doesn't rot they don't paint it and there's a little door and a shelf and they put a big bowl of rice and there's a big hefty priest coming down and a boy goes and takes the rice and throws it in the bag and off they go I went to the great temple with a reclining Buddha 120 feet long covered with gold and people bowed their noses to the ground and were crying there to a God who can't hear to a God who can't feel to a God who can't move himself never mind anybody else millions of them in damnation tonight doesn't move the church you get more people to your church with a chicken supper than you get ever a night of prayer for people in Russia the beautiful house where our fathers praised thee it's burned with fire and all our pleasant things are revised version says ruined are you going to say that they could look at all that waste and destruction they could see their history and now they see all that their fathers built and the prophets built has been destroyed and it's crumbled away and nobody's moved to tears I think it's very near the day that we're living in there's a wonderful book by J.I. Packer not because he's English but he's a great preacher it's called Knowing God I copied this from it today well I paraphrased it a little myself this generation has unashamedly sold itself to the gods of greed I put a sign there greed in Christian circles today is called prosperity but it's still greed anyhow this generation has sold itself without blushing to the gods of greed and sex and pride and self will but the church is mumbling on about the goodness of God and we're as near hell as a nation as ever we've been oh preach the goodness but listen there's another side to the coin it says the goodness and severity of God I won't take you to the reference remember Moses was up on the mountain and he preached with God turn away from my fierce wrath he says and later in the chapter Aaron says to Moses you turn from your fierce wrath you see he lived in the presence of God till he's like him you'll get like the people you live with if you live with a holy goat you'll become a holy man if you live with a bunch of backsliders you'll get like them if you're not careful Moses had been with an angry God and he got angry the trouble is we don't know how to be angry we get angry over something a child does and when you do that you're the child and he's the father do you think somebody will have the courage you know Methodist Baptist what have you got Church of God I'm going to preach there some night Church of God the other end of town do you think any denomination dare call its ministers together to fast and pray you go to a conference and ministers are talking hey we're going duck hunting you know one of our deacons has a hut up on a hill and there's a lot of ducks they'll go duck hunting they'll go deer hunting but God held them at the judgment bar they'll sing let the whole realm of nature mind they'll give hunting three days they won't give God three days on their face before God fasting and praying we've lost the fire our God is consuming fire where did Moses get his life revolutionized at a burning bush Ezekiel says the fire burned him Jeremiah says I have a fire burning in me we quote people slang terms I hate people asking questions at the baptism what in the world do you mean he shall baptize you with the holy in the Greek it's he shall baptize you with holy ghost fire there never has been a moving of God without God the holy ghost the fire of the holy ghost coming first consuming sin and then enlightening intellectually in every other way the holy word of God yes we sold ourselves out to sex things that used to be done in the back street now you can see on TV show if you're stupid enough to watch it nobody grumbles about adultery anymore my friend my neighbor couldn't come tonight his little boy is sick he just came back from Sweden you know sex is a sport there kids fornicate on the way home from school but while they're the most reckless kids in the world remember this that they have the biggest suicide rate too of all the nations of the world mercy I think of all the gimmicks and everything else we have in evangelism today and yet those men came out of the room without money without prestige without a purse just power rejected by men on every level but accepted by God rejected by orthodox religion the temple crowd wouldn't acknowledge them but they went out anointed with the Holy Ghost and what happened? they turned the world upside down it says we turn nobody upside down I'll just go back and quote this and finish again in Joel 2 in 12 verse 12 it says therefore also now saith the Lord turn ye even to me with all your heart no divided heart with all your heart not a heart that's half interested in sports or even business with all your heart and with fasting and with weeping and with mourning and rend your hearts and not your garments in other words don't put a profession on outside when there's nothing inside that's really moving I don't know how people live today that don't know God you know a few years ago we blamed all the trouble of the world on Mussolini the wicked fascist and Hitler and the old Georgian Stalin we had about four or five men Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin if we get rid of them we'll clean the world up we've got a bigger madman than all of them by the name of Gaddafi right now the devil isn't short of captains for his army they're not short of funds they're not short of courage to do the most wicked violent things in the face of the world but why in God's name are we so timid oh dear we've got a precious brother here, an Indian a real Indian not a dime store Indian he was telling me last week about the condition you know one of the greatest mission fields in the world is on our doorstep it's neglected the black people often say they've been neglected, not like the American Indian if the American Indians had been as violent as some of the blacks they'd have burned this country up years ago I thank you for this dear brother here are the American Indians this is the percentage of alcoholism in the Navajo tribe it's 50% in the Sioux tribe it's 80% in the Shoshone Arapaho is that what you call it Arapaho it's 90% in the Apaches it's 95% in the Kiowa tribes it's 30% the mortality rate amongst the American Indians is 4 times the rate of whites and blacks that's the mortality that's the death rate they die mad in drink I'm sure there are hundreds of murders never reported the suicide rate among Indians is 4 times higher than that of the white people now here's the thing that makes me kick and get mad the Mormons and Jehovah Witnesses continue to make Indian converts all over the nation what in God's name have they got? he's most likely a clean cut handsome looking Mormon when we were in England there wasn't one mosque today we left in 58 today there are 500 Muslim mosques in England they're building a university there they're building what they call their Bible school that teach the Quran and send out missionaries and they say to people oh you're a Christian nation you're the most drunken nation on earth after America you see we do not okay we do not drink we do not have any pornography in the Islam faith and they go and parade all their virtues and people say well they're better than Christians I've got neighbours that profess to be Christ but they're drunk we've got a man next door and he keeps showing me copies of Playboy and they boast of their morality there's nothing wrong with good morality except Nicodemus had impeccable morality but he's as lost as he could be but the thing is that they're going after the American Indian the Indian tribes are steeped in spiritism and witchcraft they desperately need preachers and teachers to commit it for life it's more attractive to get on a boat and go across the sea isn't it a doctor friend of mine a few years ago decided to go see up the west coast of Canada he went in a small boat that almost terrified him and he said we've pulled into little narrow necks of water and there was an Indian tribe they were dancing they were mad they were half dressed, some of them they were committing adultery they were doing every evil thing you could imagine and the most drunken man in the whole tribe is the priest we went from one to the other and they said in some of these camps the Royal Mounted Canadian Mounted Police didn't even come here we've had two murders in six months and never been investigated what in God's name are we doing what population of Indians are there if you put all the tribes together brother do you know two million two million lost people in witchcraft in superstition while you're polishing your car or having some stupid thing in your church we ought to get some of our young people and take them out in the summer I think Dale go to some of these camps and see how they live see the degradation see the poverty see the ignorance see the witchcraft see the terror in which they live what makes me mad is they live in hell before they get to hell it doesn't bother people at all I wish before God we'd spent as much time teaching people to pray as we teach the choir to sing if 10% of the choir missed a rehearsal the choir master would give up if the pastor saw 10% of his so-called you know church house like Mr. Chrisworth 26,000 members half of them never been in the place Billy Graham's one of them when does he go we build these colossal numbers up they'll meet us at the judgment no church anywhere under God's heaven is stronger than its prayer meeting and no life is stronger than a prayer life but you see you don't get hit in a weekend when the man says my bowels are moved my heart is broke my liver is out of order he's saying my whole being is being disintegrated by God I quoted a verse last week I couldn't find it today where in Jeremiah he says God has torn me apart he's torn apart with grief his eyes are always swollen with tears you can't interest him in material things in the old economy a priest couldn't own anything I've got preachers doing I went to one place and I said boy this preacher is an iceberg he said he sells refrigerators I said it's obvious this is a total job demands all our time we can't be thinking this way and thinking that and looking for ourselves if we don't weep between the ox and the doorpost we'll be weeping in captivity before too long I'll tell you that I know our friend over the road there Dave Wilkinson says he believes America is going to be wiped out with the bombs I don't think that I wrote the foreword to his book but I told him I didn't agree with that America is disintegrating just tonight in the 6 o'clock news they said now there are possibly 2 million people in the armed forces with AIDS or some form of it and it will be more than that and if you have AIDS when you test it to go in the army you can't get in the army now and they're going to start isolating you know what we'll do in a few years we'll take people with AIDS and put them in institutions like we used to put people in with smallpox and they ought to do that and half starve the rascals to death they're asking for government help they didn't ask the government if they could get AIDS did they? what was the guy they buried the other week a film star Rock Hudson we treat him like a national hero the dirty rascal he got it himself you read the news and there's a sign for beer and somebody comes on and says if your husband is an alcoholic remember he's got a disease well that's the only disease you go and buy in a bottle in a shop isn't it? you think anybody goes round and says I want a cancer I want a large one from my mother-in-law we don't buy disease alcohol isn't a disease it's a filthy rotten habit that ruins and damns people I'll shout hallelujah if you hear somebody shouting louder than anybody else at the judgement when all those brewers come boy I tell you what every broken home is going to be charged to the brewers the bottom line when they get to the judgement they'll squeal like hell itself and God will kick them into the bottomless pit the only barrier between our national destruction oh let me say this this AIDS is terrible there's another disease out now it only goes to women you can get it at 16 you won't have a rash on your face you won't have a mark you won't know a thing about it from 16 maybe at 22 you want to bear children you won't bear any of them because it withers the womb maybe it's God's vengeance on us for pushing babies down the jam we don't want them now when we do want them you won't be able to have them and there's no surgery will help you there's nothing scientific will help you see God is a God of vengeance but he waits his time I'm deeply troubled about this business I've asked you some Friday nights pray for the what 2 million you say Indians drunken mortality rate 4 times that of the whites suicide 4 times higher than the white people and the Jehovah's witnesses are getting in on them and winning them to their rotten religion while we sleep you know we ought to weep because we have no tears we ought to blush that we're unashamed we ought to get down before God and repent with no broken heart I don't want to put you on the spot not that I'm afraid I like to get people embarrassed I wonder how many of you this week when you look back over your prayer life have prayed for the American Indians dying on our doorstep terrified with witchcraft the witch doctors they're all you've got and yet the Mormons are going and offering them a false peace America is in the gravest situation it's been in since 1734 the Great Awakening but the God who started that Great Awakening is my God tonight He wants me to be humble enough and broken enough well you're old you've lived your life somebody asked an old man 95 have you lived there all your life he said not yet well what do I start my 80th year next year so what I'm still a young man Wesley said he preached better at 85 than 35 so I'm going to try and copy him I know you think there's a lot of room for improvement on my preaching so don't look so sympathetic but God is going to pour out his spirit God cannot lie the conditions are ours when we're broken enough and humble enough and tearful enough and serious enough get serious about being serious and saying this is number one my number one proposition in my life to get a touch from a holy God so that wherever I go I'm disseminating truth and righteousness and the beauty of the Lord our God that's what he wants we're not going to sing my watch goes too fast Friday night we're going to go to prayer I'm asking you to concentrate tonight if you can remember the name of the tribe do it or pray for the American Indians don't let God say I've been looking for somebody to lift up holy hands today and not one person out of a hundred in America has prayed for the Indians they've prayed for India they've prayed for Afghanistan and that's okay but what about these people who perish on our doorstep we've stolen their land we've stolen their mineral rights we've made millions out of what they should have had some get compensation for sure but their greatest need obviously is spiritual pray for this precious brother as he goes back to his tribe give me a chair