In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the need to focus on the greatness of God rather than our problems. He highlights the importance of preaching and praying for revival, both individually and as pastors. The preacher encourages preaching about the Lordship of Christ, His personality, passion, power, provision, and plan for our lives. He also emphasizes the significance of praising God and the impact it can have on our lives. The sermon concludes with the preacher sharing a personal testimony of experiencing God's revival and the lasting impact it has had on his life.

David Broome at the Sessions on Revival Ministries in Elyria, Ohio, August 1984. For additional copies of this message, or for other messages available, please contact Sotera Twins Crusade Team, 1801 Stony Ridge Court, Mansfield, Ohio, 44904. Or in Canada, contact Canadian Revival Fellowship, Box 584, Regina, Saskatchewan, S4P 3A3. That's what revival's all about, isn't it? Before I start tonight, I'm going to pray. By the way, I have copies of my message, rather than taking time to pass them out, copies of what the Lord has laid on my heart. So many of the notes that I'll be giving tonight, I have already down here in front, if you'd like a copy. There's 150 of them there, and you can get a copy afterwards. I would like for all the pastors to stand. Dear pastor, praise the Lord. Let's pray. Father, thank you for these men. God, my heart goes out to every one of them, though I don't know most of them. Lord, I pray that as a result of what Ralph has already said, what I'm going to say, what others are going to say today, tonight, this weekend, I pray that every single pastor's heart would be moved in a new way, a way that would cause their people and their cities to recognize that you have done a work in their lives. Father, it was four years ago tonight at Rives, Michigan, that you spoke to my heart in a new way. You broke down denominational barriers and prejudices and began a work in my life that continues to grow, and I thank you for it so much. For it is not of me, it is all of you. And I pray that even as I speak that which you have laid upon my heart, I pray that every one of these men's hearts would be open to hearing from you. God, that you would take the few minutes we have together and put them together in such a way. In every man's life, you know every need. There'd be no way that I could speak to every need, but you can. And I pray that your Holy Spirit would speak in such a way that these men would know they've heard from you. And then everyone that's here tonight, God bless them, encourage them, cause the lay folks to back their preachers and pray for their preachers, the associates to be the right-hand men that you want them to be. Cause us as pastors to fall in love with you and fall in love with our people like never before. That the precious love of you, Lord Jesus, through your Holy Spirit would flow through our lives so that no one could come around us without experiencing your love. Do a mighty work that would bring great glory to you, Lord Jesus. Not to this preacher, not to this conference, not to any denomination, but to you. We pray that you would bind the devil. Oh, he hates this rally. And he'll do everything in his power to hinder and to take control of our thoughts. And to cause things to happen that would disturb us and cause us to be upset and to be having frustrations and fears and to miss what you have for us. God, burn in our hearts the truths that will change our lives more than anything. It will bring greater glory to you. In Jesus' name. And for his sake we pray. Amen. Have a seat, fellas. Thank you for standing. It was four years ago tonight that I was at Rives Junction, Michigan. And I was there because I had heard something good was happening through the Souterras. But I also sensed that because of some of the things I was reading about, their emphasis upon the spirit-filled life, I didn't think they were very baptistic. And I was an independent, fundamental, separated, soul-winning, pharisaical Baptist back then. And God that night saved me from that. And has set me free. I still pastor the same church, Green Meadow Bible Baptist Church, that I pastored then. But he set me free from that bondage of Pharisaism. And it's been exciting. And praying about preparation or preparing for revival. I pastored for several years before I went to Green Meadow. And then I went to Green Meadow and pastored there several years. And then the Souterras came to our church, held two weeks of meetings of which God did a real work in our church, the lives of people in our church. And now I've been there, it's been at least two years since they were there. So I was there pre-revival and mid-revival and post-revival. And I would, I just urge you, I would encourage you pastors especially. By the way, let me apologize right off the bat to all you lay folks. I'm not against lay folks. I love lay folks. But my burden is pastors. And my message is preparing for revival. Unless the pastor prepares for revival, it's just going to be pretty tough for the church to see revival. But I would encourage you to get that message that Ralph just spoke on tape. And listen to it over and over and over again. And believe what he says is true. It's true. If you're not ready for it, the devil, I mean when God blesses and God blessed us. We couldn't get our folks to go home during the meetings. Our folks would get there, some of them at 5.30 in the evening. And most of them wouldn't leave until after midnight. I mean you couldn't beg them to go home. God had moved in on us in such a way that they were so excited that you just couldn't get rid of them. They didn't want to go. But then afterwards, the devil really began to blast. And he's still working today. But God is still blessing and the devil is still blasting. But I've prayed much about what to share with you on revival. I wish you'd turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. How to prepare for revival. Much of what I'm sharing with you, Ralph has already shared with you in the session prior to that. So I'll hit it from a little different angle, but basically the same things. And you can see that Ralph has influenced me. I get hung up on the letter P. I like P's. And so my outline is to pray for revival, preach for revival, plan for revival, and pay for revival. And I have many P's underneath that as well. 1 Corinthians chapter 1, beginning with verse 26. For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called. But God hath chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise. And God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. And base things of the world and things which are despised hath God chosen. Yea, and things which are not to bring to naught things that are. That no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. That according as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. I think revival, and you'll hear a lot of definitions of revival, and I'm not saying this is a definition, but I think revival is when we recognize that we are foolish, base, and we are nothing. And we desire more than anything in this world to see him glorified. In everything we do, in everything we preach, in everything we teach, in everything we sing, our desire, burning desire, is to see him glorified. The hard thing in revival, the hard thing is verse, letter, pray. Someone said, in fact his name is Gehrig, Reverend Gehrig, he said, Revival does not come by chance. It'll take men and women who are willing to get low before the Lord and pray. It will take hard work, but the results are glorious. Prayer is work. If you really pray, prayer is work. 2 Chronicles 7.14 tells us that God says when his people, called by his name, will humble themselves and pray. When we begin to pray, really pray, and seek God's face. In the book of Acts, in chapter 1, it says that they, right down by verse 14, they all went to the upper room and they began to pray. Now you remember what took place in chapter 2. I doubt that would have taken place in chapter 2 if chapter 1, verse 14 hadn't taken place. They got together, they began to pray. As I read about the great revivals, and the one that I enjoy so much reading about, the Wales revival with Evan Roberts, and the phrase that comes out so often is, they were moved to pray. When we begin to get moved to really pray, God begins to work. And God often works, often as a result of prayer. We need to pray that God will revive us personally. And of course, as pastors, we need to pray that God will revive us. We need to first of all recognize that we need revival. I've heard others say, and I can say this because I'm a pastor and I've been a pastor for over 10 years, pastors, you and I usually are the biggest reason that our churches don't have revival. Usually we as pastors are too proud to let God move in and do a work in our lives and in our people's lives. We're too proud, too professional to really let God work. We need revival. David prayed in Psalms 139, 23, and 24, search me, oh God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts and see if there'd be any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. I pray that often. I say, search me, oh God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts and show me the wicked ways in me. Show me the way you see me. The hard thing is he does that. And you usually don't like what he shows you. Wicked ways, ways of pride. And by the way, I did a study on the word pride in the Bible. I'd encourage you to do a study on that. We have been taught humanistically that there are two kinds of pride and some great Christians teach it. Two kinds of pride, there's good pride and there's bad pride, but you won't find them in the Bible. In the Bible, there's only one kind of pride. It's sin. God calls it hideous, wicked sin. The word pride is used in some form 100 times in the Bible. Every time it is not good. God hates pride. God hates a proud look. And I discovered in my life, I didn't think it was so. I thought I was a very humble person. I didn't tell a lot of people that, but I thought I was. Until God began to show me what he saw. A very proud young man. I had prayed for years that God would do a work in my life. One of the years of pride that he dealt with me was four years ago. Tonight, when I was at the meetings there in Rives. Brother Ralph Soutera got up and I knew Ralph was the teacher and Lou was the preacher. God was really working me over. You can't come to the Flames Freedom Rally and have your heart open. God, speak to me. My heart is open. I'm going to listen to what you say and I'll do whatever you tell me to do. You can't come and not have God speak to you. You just can't do it. I didn't think much about it. I went and my heart was open. I prayed for it. That night, the second night, Ralph was teaching. God was working me over. I couldn't get away from it. My pride was so big. Ralph was teaching and one of his points was pride. Professional pride. I was fighting it like crazy. I knew God was dealing with me and I should get my heart right with God. I knew I was going to have to go to the prayer room. I'm not going to that prayer room. That guy is a teacher. I'll wait until the preacher gets up there. I'm not going to a prayer room for a teacher. No way in this world. I'll wait for the preacher. God said, you're not waiting for anybody. When Ralph prayed, before he could say, go to the prayer room, I was gone. Brother White was in the prayer room and I was the first one there after him. God did a work in my life, especially in the area of pride. I went back home and I had been praying that God would do a work in my wife's life. By the way, that's my second sub-point. We are to pray not only for personal revival, but pray for partner's revival. Don't forget, pastors, to pray for the revival of your wife. If God revives you and he doesn't revive your wife, you've got problems. The devil will use that to divide you. A house divided against itself will fall, Jesus said. Pray for your partner's revival. Pray that God will touch your partner's life. I was at RISE. My wife was in Kalamazoo, Michigan. When God did a work in my life, I had been praying for my wife. I got on the phone afterwards. I couldn't do anything but cry. I couldn't say anything. I had to call a long distance to talk to her. All I did was cry. Good night, I'm wasting all this money. She can hear me cry when I get home. I've got to tell her something. She said, what's the matter? What happened? I told her, God did a work in my life. I met God in a new way like I've never met him before. I can honestly say, and she's here tonight. She knows that for four years, we've had the ups and downs. We've had the battles of the devil, but it's still real. It's still lasting. I remember that night when I heard people standing up and sharing how it was still lasting. A dear old saint of God from Michigan, south of us somewhere, said it was eight years ago when God did a revival and it's still lasting. I thought to myself, I hope it lasts that long for me. It's so good. Well, I'm halfway there. Praise the Lord. Pray that God will revive your associates. Pray that God will revive those leaders in the church with you, your deacons. Pray that God will revive them. Don't pray that God will remove them. Pray that God will revive them. You see, the devil will all of a sudden bring in, get the old self stirred up again and get you thinking, if it doesn't go your way, even if you get revived, go back and do it. The revival truth has got to be this way. I went back. I wanted it exactly the way Ralph had it all laid out. This is the way we do it. The Lord touching their hearts and lives. And so we prayed for our people to get revived. And many of them got revived. And then pray specifically, personally, for your mate, your partner, for your people, that they will have, you will have, and they will have a greater desire to know God and to please God more than to please you. And that's hard. Because what do you do when God begins to do that in your church, and he does, and he is, in our church, God begins to put that desire within your wife, within your people, to please him more than please you. And one Sunday morning, you come to church and a half a dozen of your people got impressed upon their hearts to go to another church and they're deacons. Or they go to a Sunday school class or they do something else. And you find out that you didn't get all that pride taken care of. That's what I found out anyway. It's hard. But when your people begin to desire to please God more than to please you, that's a big step. That was a big step for me to even pray. God, cause my people, cause those that I pastor to desire to please you more than to please me. I thought that's what I really wanted and I realized for a while that isn't what I really wanted. God had to change that in my life. He had to make that a genuine desire. We have a prayer, a special request around there that we say, God, make it obvious. Make it obvious, Lord, that it's you and not us so that when you do it, you get all the glory and not us. Make it obvious, Lord, it's you and he will. He will. Make it obvious, Lord, things that I can trust you for. Again, so that when you give it, you get all the glory again and not me, not us. What are you trusting God for that only God can do? Someone said, if the Holy Spirit of God was taken out of the Bible-believing churches in our country today, 99% of the work and preaching and the ministering that's going on wouldn't skip a beat. Wouldn't skip a beat. Isn't that sad? What are you trusting God for that only God can do? You asking God to give you things you can trust him for? Hey, now, don't panic when he does because when he does, there's nothing you can do but trust him. And I've discovered that's hard. Begin to pray and fast. I didn't put some of these things in the notes, but most of them are. Begin to pray and fast faithfully. That's an art or a ministry that has been long forgotten. I was counseling in a counseling class up in Grand Rapids recently and my trainer shared with me that he was counseling with a young lady recently who was converted, saved out of a Satan worshiping cult. She worshiped Satan. She shared with him that every month on the day of the full moon, all Satan worshipers are praying and fasting to Satan that he will put a spirit of anxiousness within every mother of every Christian home to cause problems. They are praying and fasting the day of the full moon every month that Satan will put a spirit of rebellion within every child and teenager in every Christian home. They are praying and fasting on the day of the full moon every month that the devil will put within every father of every Christian home a spirit of lust. And then they have a group who are really dedicated who pray and fast every week, once a week that Satan will put within every Bible believing preacher in America the spirit of immorality. It's no wonder it's happening in our country today because there are more Satan worshipers dedicated and sold out to the cause of Satan than there are Christians. The sad thing is there are a lot of pastors who don't pray and fast. We can't, you know... We had a day one time in our pastor's fellowship I was the president of the fellowship and I said, I think it's time we come together and we feast. We fellowship and feast and I'm for fellowshipping and I'm for feasting. But I think we need to have a day of prayer and fasting. We had a good sized fellowship and it was growing and probably every once in a while we were all on the list we had over a hundred pastors on the list and so I said, next fellowship we're going to get together and we're going to spend from the morning when we start at 10 o'clock until about 3 o'clock we're going to spend the time in ministering in prayer and fasting. Two showed up. Now everybody had good excuses but see we're not interested in prayer and fasting today but that's what we need and fellas it's got to start with us as pastors. We need to pray. We need not only to pray for revival we need to preach for revival. Preach the Lordship of Christ. Preach his personality. Preach his passion. Preach his power. Preach his provision. Preach his plan for our lives. We need to preach what Brother Ralph was talking about. Preach our position in Christ. Preach our possessions in Christ and preach our practice in Christ. And then the last one I have is preach how much we need to praise him. We don't praise enough. Praise him enough. Praise him. Preach messages that get our eyes off of the problems and on the person of Jesus Christ. You know what our problem is? Our problems are so big because we have such a small God but if we would preach so that our people would see that our God is so big then they would see we have small problems. Our God is big. And our God wants to revive every Christian if we believe him. But he did not many mighty works in that city because of their what? Unbelief. Unbelief. Preach the principles that you'll learn this week of dealing with sin, self, and the spirit. The Lord just gave me this this week. I was excited about it. Powerful praying prepares powerful preaching and powerful preaching prepares powerful people. And that's what we need in this country today is powerful people. Powerful Christians. I mean in the power of the spirit not by our power but by his spirit. By the power of the spirit of God. Spirit filled Christians. Plan for revival. Now there are a lot of things you can do in planning for revival. I've got the pastor must be flexible. The people must be flexible. And the programs must be flexible. Now you've got to plan that for revival. Because when the spirit of God begins to come upon your life pastor and your life and the lives of your people he's going to change things. See when God is allowed to become God the pastor the people and the programs all begin to change. And when God is really allowed to be God you say well God is God. Most churches he's not. Well we sing he is Lord he is Lord. Yes he is Lord. But the scriptures say the day will come remember when every knee shall bow. Every knee is not bowing now. And every tongue shall confess. Every tongue is not confessing now. That Jesus Christ is Lord. Well when that day comes in your life and pray that it would be today that you really let Jesus Christ be Lord you watch and see how flexible you'll have to become. Because the Holy Spirit even uses teachers like Ralph Zutera and laymen like Harold White and Don Godfrey and others. And many of us as pastors want to check their credentials out. Which seminary did they graduate from? What was their GPA? What kind of credentials do they have? I doubt that you would have found much with John the Baptist. Or Elijah for that matter. Elijah was just a farmer. Wasn't even in seminary. I mean Elijah was a farmer. Which one was a farmer? Elijah was a farmer. That's all I was too. You see if we're not willing to say Lord I'm willing to be flexible. I'll tell you when revival comes when the Zuteras came there were times they didn't even get to preach much. When we went back in our church on Wednesday night the Wednesday night I went back to the church after God had touched my heart and life and I was one you've got to have a special song you've got to read the scripture and you've got to preach a message you've got to do that or it's not a biblical service. Chapter and verse. And I went back and God began to get a hold of our people that night and before I could get up to preach the layman who'd come in to share was giving an invitation. And I didn't even get to preach. And God had the audacity to fill the prayer room and I didn't even preach. Yeah. Praise God. He didn't need me. Now you talk about pride that hurts. I'm a pastor and God's showing me He didn't even need me. He took the farmer from west of us who'd been touched in revival a couple years before and he used that farmer to share in his testimony and a couple other lay people sharing their testimony no preacher got up and preached and God touched our church. And over half of our adults in our congregation went to the prayer room and met God in revival. But I wasn't saying amen. I was wanting to get to do the preaching. But God said do you want me to really meet with your folks or do you just you want to be able to preach so you can say that because you preached I met with your folks. Because you did it a certain way. I remember one of the first years at Rives one young college fellow said we box God in. We've got God in a little box. In my case God was an independent fundamental separated soul winning pharisaical baptist. That's what he was in my case. I knew God wouldn't work any other way. And when I found out the Suteras went to a Christian and missionary alliance church I know one thing it's going to be a waste of time this weekend. I mean I thought they had to be independent baptists if God was doing anything. You know isn't it amazing how God crosses denominational lines. Isn't it exciting? Hallelujah. I'm so glad he doesn't look at denominations. I'm still a baptist. It's a good thing God crosses denominational lines isn't it? I say I'm a non-denominational baptist. You have to figure that one out. Flexible. The last area you have to be flexible on the price for revival. Ralph talked about it a little bit earlier. Pay for revival. The price for revival. Look at with me Luke chapter 14. And when you get the outline there are many verses of scripture on it. And God will bless your heart just to read the scriptures. But in Luke chapter 14 and verses 26 and 27 well in fact 25 and there went out great multitudes with Jesus and he turned and said unto them if any man come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters yea in his own life also he cannot be my disciple and whosoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. Now Jesus isn't telling us we're supposed to hate our loved ones but he's saying that we're supposed to love him so much and be so totally sold out to his will for our lives that it's almost as if we hated the rest. Did you ever say boy that car passed me like I was standing still. Well you weren't standing still. Well that's kind of what Jesus was saying. He didn't say he didn't want you to hate your wife. He didn't want you to love your wife because in his word he tells us husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church. But you know we can't love our wives as Christ loved the church unless we love him. I find as my love for Christ grows my love for my wife grows. As my love for Christ wanes my love for my wife does the same. That's when the devil really battles. The cost of revival and I put it in three areas. There's a cost concerning your people. People pennies and programs. I couldn't think of another word that would mean money other than pennies. Let's start with a P. You can put it in there. You see what Ralph alluded or shared earlier it's biblical. In Ephesians chapter 6 it says for we wrestle not against flesh and blood but most of us think we do we wrestle against flesh and blood. We think we're wrestling against and you'll find when God begins to do a work in your life and then begins to do a work in your people's life many people do not want to hear the message of the cross. The chairman of my deacon board whom I love very much within a few weeks after God had touched my life resigned and left the church. He made this statement to one of my other men. If that preacher thinks I'm ever going to get up and open myself up to this congregation he's nuts. You see when God began to open me up I had to apologize to the people and ask them to forgive me for manipulation and all kinds of other sins and I would apologize to them publicly for those things that I had done to them not private things if I did things privately I had to confess to those privately but to the congregation whom I pastored I had to constantly ask them to forgive me especially for my manipulation. You know people get scared about that they don't like that unless God doesn't work in their lives and you can't force people to get up and share because if you do they'll run but you'll lose people and we've lost people you'll not only lose people you'll gain people you'll gain the kind you don't really want. Now we read this scripture that we read first in 1st Corinthians chapter 1 that says God chose the kind that he sends we want God to choose and send the doctors and the lawyers and the rich people and the middle class people but we don't want God to send the down and outers and the retarded ones and the poor people those are the ones God chooses and you know what I've discovered even since the satyrs have come we got to talking about the different people that God has sent all the talented people many of the talented people God has weeded out they've gone on to other ministries and now we just have the other kind but God uses that kind God chose to use that kind you know one of the greatest things in revival is as far as a pastor goes is God proving to me that his word is just that his word and he does things exactly as he says he does things but somehow through the manipulation of our society we think as brother Ralph was sharing we think that if we could have the rich people if we could have the talented people you know in every area of our need if we could have all these kind of people I mean everything would click and it would all go and God gave us some of those kind of people and it didn't click he even gave us a millionaire I won't mention his name but a man who is a president a vice president of a huge oil company he gives oh I don't know fifty dollars a week you can build a church on that I mean it's coming from a millionaire no you know what he's given us he's given us widows who when we're really in need say preacher I don't have much but here's ten dollars you say wow we need two thousand what good is ten dollars going to do well you know then Jesus says remember the widow in the bible well yeah I know that Lord but this is 1984 you know I mean it works different today right wrong and that's revival when we begin to recognize that God works the same today as he did back then and our problem that hinders us in revival is we somehow want God to work differently today than he did back then and unfortunately there's a price that we have to pay Homer Duncan said are we praying for revival are we ready for revival when it comes are we willing to pay the price are we expecting it at any moment be prepared ye ministers of the Lord be prepared are you prepared for revival prepared to pay the price there's a great price price on your patience all your patience be tried remember when Zutera started our sharing time you know we got the sharing time going and sharing time is exciting nothing more exciting than sharing time until it begins to get dead because people try to have something better to share than the guy before them and then you might do as I did and panic a little bit and just scratch it because you know that after a few weeks of it it's been exciting and God's really doing a work and then all of a sudden this one dear lady who never has anything to say always when you say we're going to have sharing she's out of her seat right down to the front standing by the microphone and she squelches the whole sharing time and everybody else says I don't want to get up and share so you cancel it but that's not the answer I discovered God was once again trying to teach me to trust him with his people I kept saying my people my people I still say it once in a while my people my people they're not my people they're his people and I'm just an under shepherd under him the chief shepherd the price your practice is going to be tried as Ralph said earlier too you're going to find your time being consumed by all kinds of other things because the devil wants to keep you away from praying and really spending time with God and your time will be so caught up with all kinds of things and sermon preparation and I've discovered my best sermon preparation is when I'm on my knees just talking to God almost every one of these points you may have read them before somewhere I didn't take them out of any book but almost everything that I got here came while I was on my knees it's so exciting because then I can get up and say it isn't me I can't make outlines I'm not an organizer I watch Ralph go through all of his detailed outlines and I just shake my head someone said of another preacher and I relate to it I'm about as organized as a train wreck and so when all of a sudden God gives me just four words in an outline wow I get excited because I know it's from God because I'm not organized but it's exciting because I can always come back to that place in 1 Corinthians 1 and say Lord I qualify Lord without you I can do nothing but you know what my biggest fight is pastors? my biggest fight is admitting to God every day when he puts me in another situation that without Jesus I can do nothing that's my biggest battle without him I can do nothing and he means what he says and the harder I try the worse it gets and he puts me deeper and deeper into the trying of my persistence and my practice and my patience but the beauty of it all is the deeper he drives me and right now in our church the devil is battling like never before we're excited because we're in a growing program we're in a building program but the hard thing is during the summer months we're having to meet in a public school gymnasium away from our building with our nursery back at our building several miles away and the devil has bombarded us and the attendance has gone right to the bottom and the Lord keeps saying is it me or the attendance is it me or the building which will it be it's hard and I say Lord it's you and I got discouraged and so down for a time there the devil had me so down and I by the way lest I forget I would encourage you if you have been involved in revival or if you're really planning to get involved in revival so that you will recognize many of the tricks of the devil the book War on the Saints by Jesse Penn Lewis was written as a result of the great Wales revival and the great deceptions that the devil brought upon the people who were revived and the one that the devil got me on the worst was the deception of passivity and the Lord's going to do everything so much so that I believe that the Lord was going to pastor that church and I might just as well get out of the ministry and I was really down I wanted to resign every day but the Lord wouldn't let me and I was really down praise God I was wrestling against the devil but are you willing to pay the price? prayer is a price preaching biblical truth and not personal preference is a price are you willing to pay the price? I try to close with this I tell my folks I close three times God, with all my heart, I believe this, from my own personal experience, I was literally a fighting fundamentalist. Fighting everybody that dotted the I's and crossed the T's different. But I was hungry to know God. And I would read that verse in Philippians 3.10 that Doug referred to. And Paul would say that I may know Him. I may know Him, the fellowship of His sufferings, the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death. I wanted to know Him, but I didn't want to go through suffering. And I didn't want to be conformed to His death. And I didn't want to be conformed to His death. But if you really want God to prepare you for revival, and you're willing to pray and be open, transparent, honest before God, and you're willing to preach the truths of the Word of God, and when you have a question, it doesn't matter if you were taught this in seminary, when the Spirit of God caused you to question, you study and see what God says. Get away from what tradition has said. What does God say? That's what counts. What does God say? And you're willing to pay the price to be His disciple. God guarantees He'll meet with you like you've never been met with before. And you'll know God in a new way. But if you have the experience as I did, I knew God four years ago in a new way. And in the last four years, through much heartache and trial and test and failure after failure, I love Erwin Lutzer's book, Failure, The Back Door to Success. I've hit that back door so many times. But if you're willing, that knowing God will grow and grow and grow. And you just keep going deeper and deeper and deeper. And it just gets, I haven't heard Ralph say it yet, and I'm surprised, gooder and gooder and gooder. It really does. But you've got to be willing to pray and preach and plan and pay the price for revival. Thank you, Lord, for this time together. Lord, we've just committed this time to you, and again, I thank you for allowing me the privilege, a greater privilege than the President of the United States could have today, to speak to these pastors and these folks. God, I pray that you would take anything that I have spoken that is of the flesh, that would not bring glory to Jesus Christ, and just wipe it out of our minds. And take that that comes from your Spirit, that has spoken to the spirits of these today. And burn it deep, and don't allow that dirty devil to snatch that seed away from them before it takes root and brings fruit to the glory and praise of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It's in His name I pray. Amen.