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Launch Out Into the Deep - Part 1
John Follette

John Wright Follette (1883 - 1966). American Bible teacher, author, and poet born in Swanton, Vermont, to French Huguenot descendants who settled in New Paltz, New York, in the 1660s. Raised Methodist, he received the Baptism in the Holy Spirit in 1913 while studying at a Bible school in Rochester, New York, later teaching there until its closure. Ordained in 1911 by the Council of Pentecostal Ministers at Elim Tabernacle, he affiliated with the Assemblies of God in 1935. Follette taught at Southern California Bible College (now Vanguard University) and Elim Bible Institute, mentoring thousands. His books, including Golden Grain (1957) and Broken Bread, compiled posthumously, offer spiritual insights on maturity and holiness. A prolific poet, he published Smoking Flax and Other Poems (1936), blending Scripture with mystical reflections. Married with no recorded children, he ministered globally in his later years, speaking at conferences in Europe and North America. His words, “It is much easier to do something for God than to become something for God,” urged deeper faith. Follette’s teachings, preserved in over 100 articles and tapes, remain influential in Pentecostal and charismatic circles.
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Sermon Summary
In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of detaching oneself from the natural world and its ways in order to deepen one's relationship with God. He mentions that our depth in God is determined by how far we have become detached from worldly thinking and philosophies. The preacher also discusses the concept of different natures, including the divine, angelic, human, and animal natures, and how man was originally created to manifest the divine nature. However, due to the fall, humanity has fallen into a broken and fallen nature. The preacher encourages the audience to recognize their fallen state and seek restoration through God.
Sermon Transcription
And we pray that as we move out upon the day that you will be very near to us and deal with us as you see good. Feed us with the portions of the bread of life which may be adequate for us. Be glorified in getting greater access to us and greater possession of us. That in the end isn't for our advancement and our glory. It is unto thee, thou wonderful. We desire growth and maturity and fullness of life for thee. It's all we will ever be able to offer to thee. We can't offer to thee our work to do it. We all will offer but gently our spirit. And whatever impact of truth has been brought to bring the chastens, that will be refreshing to thee and will delight thee. And though we are just little infinitesimals, yet thou art so interested in each one and in the welfare of each one to get out of us all that may be to the glory of God. Coming back again to our hearts and making an hour we hope to bring to you to reflect to you. It's good to have a little breath of heaven. I almost feel like not talking. I just feel like doubling in on our Lord. I always like to preface what I have with Him. I like Him to be. I want to be in a higher way but somewhere the Lord hasn't anywhere in me. Veiling the truth only through us. I've often said, Lord, if I could only be a shadow, and no one would know what under the heavens made it or where it ever came from. But I'm not a shadow. I wish I might be. How wonderful, we can't always bear this. A lovely relief. And we shall move in our right habitat, that for which we have been designed and that for which we are now being trained and disciplined. That's before us. I'm glad that there is a hunger on the part of you, dear souls, to come and sit here. And you are my inspiration. If I didn't feel a response in you, I wouldn't want to stay on this countdown. But when I feel a response in your spirit drawing at me, drawing and pulling, then I feel, well, it's all right. And then I'm relieved. And the burden is on a relief. And I wanted to find a place in your hearts too. So it's lovely to find people who have a sense of truth and desire. Now, I don't expect everybody to come around to my meetings. My ministry is not popular. Not for no laugh. There are assemblies where they wouldn't anymore have me as an antichrist. But I know it. I know assemblies. In there, it would disturb. And there they are. And to have anyone come in and disturb it in the lead, then they don't know what to do. You might rather be totally right. Can you send... Let him drink a cup of that. There are assemblies where I think the very best thing in the world would be to let him compose himself so that he could get in there, moving a job of the people until he would find it. Now listen. There would be plenty of ministry if that could be accomplished. You're concerned too much with the ministry, the external has to have a source of motivation. Isn't that a sweet testimony? I could just bless anybody with it. They don't come from here. I've talked to... I'm trying to get initiated already. Trying to open the things of the spirit to venture in. That you will be made hungry to venture in and venture in. That's all I hope to do. Now, I don't expect you to have in a week or two or... What some of us have been working on for 50 years. That would be simply ridiculous. I only want to... Each one of us have a... And all I ask of you is to be sure. Then when you are filled... How many of you know if you are really filled with it, you can't be more filled, in your opinion? I don't know... How many know you can't be... If you are perfectly filled, how many know then that's enough to satisfy that? All right. Be sure that that little reach out that you have is being satisfied in God. Everyone who has really the spirit of God in you, you already have that urge. You really have. That was like in the little baby that nurses. The mother doesn't teach the baby to nurse. No one tells that little child in a few hours of anything about nursing. The law of the urge to lose. The urge to lose is basic in that little... And all you have to do is give contact to the mother. So it is. Don't be disturbed if your appetite isn't too enormous. If you can't take problems in the realm of the spirit, in what we call the laws of the spirit and the dimensions of... Take what you can. And be very sure that you let God do in you what he wants and not what you want him to do. No, you all come pray. I hear it everywhere. Now Lord, and you direct all the traffic. Now Lord, just come in and be here. And oh Lord, I am so needy of this at night. I don't like that. It's good if you have to say that to release you. Then when you get all done, say, Well Lord, now I kind of feel better. Then all we can do is to lay it out in all the colors and when it's all done, the highest prayer you can say is, Thy will be done. You do in me what you want to. Bring me to a place more perfectly where I will act. Not well, I suppose. Well, that's doing the will of God with a little pipe in your spirit. The same all the time. I'll do it. I'm doing the will of God. I know, dear, you're doing the will of God. But what's the state of... I don't know what's on the back side, so I better do the will of God with the decision of your will. You get that or not? Very often in our decision, in the will, where we live, I've often said, Lord, look at what everything's saying. And we have two things going on at once. Well, don't be afraid of that. Don't be afraid of it. I have said yes, Lord, to curious many times. They weren't curious of resistance nor rebellion. They were curious because my poor spirit was being crushed. But which was very good for me. Not my will was being broken. Never say, oh great, my will. He doesn't want an old, busted-down will. He wants somebody with a good, strong will which is dedicated. Which is surrendered. He can do much more with a good, strong will that is dedicated than a little flabby one that says, can't help you. And so the people say, he's never had his will broken. God doesn't want to break anybody's will. He wants your will, sir. So don't be discouraged if you're not able to grasp fully all the things which I have to present to you. I'm only going to be here two weeks. And I'm just touching some of the surface things. I'm not getting into anything deep yet. I can't. I can't go into a lot of things in the realm of spiritual reality where I really live. And where I'm finding, I can't do that. And where we live. Have you found the things I've been telling you for these last few days are, after all, most practical? Then that's all right. I want them reduced to real, practical, everyday Christian living. We'll leave the philosophy of it out here. We could go into that. But I want you to find how to demonstrate and lose, in reality, the truth to which you give your mental consent. All the time in my mind, I want to help you with something. There doesn't seem to be very much teaching. When I go around and deal with people in the assemblies and churches and places where I go, and people come for help, and the realization of it, they don't seem to know the difference between that at all. Now, for instance, here this morning, we may have a great big sign up here. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the Savior of the world. Now, how many of you believe that? Put that up your hand. Four. Eight. Of the world. Well, now, that's what we call a judicial statement of truth. It is a fixed truth, a value, which will never change. That fixed, it's a judicial statement of goodness, that before the foundations of the world, it had to be explained as it had before the foundations of the world. So that is a new truth. That is an eternal bit of truth, all right. Now we come and we say, Oh, I believe that. I am moving. Well, that's good. But now be careful of something. Many people are deceived in thinking that just merely saying, I believe that, and they believe it mentally because they are convinced of the fact that that is all that's necessary. No, no. Well, now, supposing the devil stands here. How many of you know that he too, the devil, can say, I know, and he believes, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the Savior of the world. How many of you know the devil knows that indeed? He believes it. Yes, he does. That's what's the matter with it. He knows that truth. And if he could destroy that elemental, basic bit of truth, he wouldn't enjoy it. He isn't fighting in a thing that he doesn't know anything about. The devil knows that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the Savior of the world, and he believes it. He wouldn't fight if he doesn't, if he didn't. Is it doing him any good? Does it save him? Is it ever saved because of that? No. Well, then, what's the matter between you standing up, or I standing up and saying, and the devil? Well, it's just this difference, and you always have to get it. That truth, or any truth, is never yours until it is personalized in your own life and living. Then it is yours. It is not yours until it is personalized in your own heart and life. You get it? Now, let's get to the difference. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the Savior of the world. That's a judicial thing. Sinners all know that. They all know that. But listen. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is my personal Savior coming here All the difference in the world. All the difference in the world. Well, what made it? That truth has become personalized in your living because you accepted it as the Word of God, and your faith laid hold of it, and you began to work from that premise in the building of your life. You were working from that basic premise. I am a child of God. Jesus Christ, His Son, is my Savior. And that truth becomes, not because you did mental offense to it, but because something in your outer life has grasped that, and it has become personalized until it is not a theory, it is not a biblical judicial truth, it is actual living truth within you. How many get it? I want you to do that, not with salvation only, but you have to do it by revelation or by preaching. I have heard people say amen to a lot of things that I preach, and when I touch them in spirit, I know they don't know one thing about it, and I say, no, but it meant I said that first. Hallelujah. And I want to say, I know, my dear, and you don't know the first ABC of it. I don't know. I don't know. The Holy Ghost in me knows. The Holy Ghost in me knows a lot of things that I don't know anything about. And quite sadly, the delinquent, when he pushes on past my little intelligence and my little discernment and my little intuition, he pushes things past that. You see how this is? Well, keep that in mind so that when you give assent to truth, which you know, you're saying, now don't try to know, say God or the power of thy spirit, make that truth a living dynamic reality in my life. Even though you slay me. You know what he will say? That's what idols have to do. You get it? So when this old creation has to be subjected to its death, don't go mourning and crying. Say, I'm so glad God has shown me that there is still yet great territories in my life over which he wants me. So you say, amen, Lord. You can't force it. He said yesterday, you may see it years before it can actually become Jewish. We can all of us look back on our experiences and remember hearing messages on things that we all said amen to and how many have had to realize that even 20, 30, 40, and 50 years later, it hadn't happened yet in reality. I'm thinking like that all the time. After most terrific things, I don't know, it'll be something so vastly different. You know, it has the most wonderful reason. In this little lesson this morning, begins to teach. That is all the preparation. That's the receiving of the word. That is like the unfolding of the prophecies. I call them the initial understandings of the law of the spirit. Your first adjustment. Now, maybe if I put it on a blackboard, this is all the stuff. Can you hear if I stand here? I didn't know what to call it. And a little response. Now, it says, And instantly, the motivation, clear, of hunger. To hear, to know, to hear. He says, and trust. Now this is, now this is going to be the great feeling. When we leave the show, I think, and we enter into this little boat that caps out. That is purely a mere imagination. You get the opportunity to expand. And I say, Help me! Now I'm an apple tree. No, you're not. Now you're a tree. No, I'm not. Hallelujah! I'm an apple tree! No, you don't have to be an apple tree. Well, you are an apple tree. You're a man. You don't have anything. And God says, I am well free. He was well free to see us limited within the realm of our natural creation. And he was well free to see us dependent creatures for in the way that you are. And unless you abide in me, you can't be an apple tree. There's no magic about it. And you want to live in spirit. And you and I, how many of you think you recognize them? Never get this mixed up. You have now with you the Lord Jesus. In the Liverpool, which is your country. Now you're going to have some storms and terrible weather. Now he finishes his message. Well, this land doesn't end here in its great precipice. No, there isn't. How do you know? You have to project out here where you can walk in it. How do you get it? I don't get it. This is the land level. This is the land. The pictures are all up here, of course. This is all a beautiful level. But what is underneath? It's the land dropping down. And how deep do you go? Your depth is determined by how far you have separated. You get it now? How many of you? Your separation determines how deep you are. If you separated from the shore, well, from here, you're just that deep. If you are separated from this shore, over here, you'll be that deep. The deep has nothing to do with you so much. That's God. But the deep has to do with what? How far have I separated from this old shoreline? Why, if I go way out here, how many know you? Do you get it or don't you? I want to go so deep. God would like to have me to go just as deep. Well, by and by, we're going to get over here, where he doesn't talk about that. When you got in the boat, when you got in the boat and you're separated from the land, he's not talking about the land anymore. No, the next time that he gives a command about pushing, he doesn't say, thrust out, but he says, launch out into the deep. Well, that's quite a different thing. So, how many can see that a little better now? You see how it goes? I'm an old school teacher, and I have to have chalk and blackboards, you see, because I'm used to dealing with children. I hope you won't forget that. Your depth in God is determined by your own doing. So when he says, that's the initial. Are you getting something so far? This word of God and the depth. Remember that your depth in God is determined by how far from the natural world and even all the things that pertain to its philosophy, its ways, and its doing. You become detached from that. You don't allow it to regulate your real life. You have to be obedient to it while you're here. You eat in the world, but not of the world. Well, that's it. In it, I don't want to be such strange, freakish folks. I want to be as natural as anybody. But all the time, you are a million miles from the thing that people are looking at. Just a million miles from it. They think they know who you are. No, they don't. They see a surface representation and a manner of living and coming. That isn't who we are yet. So don't get that mixed up. Now, this idea of going into the deep, your depth depends upon how far you have got to show. Your depth is determined by how deep you have any consciousness. You can't go into a deep place until there's a conviction of your awful desperate need of it. You never heard of people eating less about hunger. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. I can lead people on, but I can't make the decisions that they should make themselves. They have to make their decisions and they have to be conscious of that need within them before we can do very much in their feeding. I minister to people lots of times when I am conscious of just about their capacity that I know I can't go any farther with this group now. Maybe if they will push on into God for a year or two, I may come back and be able to pick them up there The consciousness of the need has not yet come to its fullness so that it can be fulfilled. So that would be a second. Now, a third thing that is in there is a little hard for us. Our powers of apprehension. I think we shouldn't think that. How many of you know that our depth is governed by our powers. That will determine, because there is always a deeper place. So many times people get this reaction from people and it's wonderful the response that I can find in twenty classical circles and now last winter and the winter before I had a class why, because they knew that this thing they call collect had an insight into the things of truth and an approach that the majority of the Christians don't seem to and they invited me. I've had three sessions. Last fall I had four classes. I had the class at Harvard with the Christian Fellowship group from Harvard and at Yale. Then I had a summer conference with them way up in, I didn't tell them why, because there are people they want God. They asked me to tell them the whole truth all about it. But why? Because they had sensed there was a little capacity in there by anything that they had. They're leading churches. And they told me on the side we don't get this. Who are you? I said there's none of your business who I am. Well where did you get this? How many know you couldn't explain to them anything about the spiritual revelation in life? How many like to try to explain in terms of a philosopher what we get in the spirit? They wouldn't know a bead about it. Now I get strange reactions in teaching and letters. Spiritual God is not asking you to be a reproduction of Paulette. He wants you to be exactly who you are. May be filled with the full and that this holy will precious, wonderful will for you may be accomplished. That's all he's asking. He's not asking you to be a teacher. He's not asking you to be a mystic or an advisor. He's not asking you that at all. He's merely asking you with whatever ability you have be sure you bring it that it is filled full. I've gotten some friends last night years ago when God first brought me into this realm I've tried to get without the slightest that I may salvage some who are hungry and waiting. That's all I do. And sometimes he will give me five or six people out of five hundred. And maybe one or two out of a thousand. I've met them before. Good sized audience. But why? Well because we are all geared differently. We all have different capacities. And there's no need of us trying to be something or somebody when we are not that. Recognize what you do have and be sure that that is going to God for all that he can possibly give you. And you'll never want any more. If he can give to you what your capacity calls for. And the power. When he speaks of the talents almost always people think of a talent being he has the talent to sing. Now listen. Those are not talents. They are not talents. As he teaches. How do you know? Because when he gave to those servants he gave to every servant the same thing. Didn't he? Now or not. Did he give one talent to another in a business and another in a custom? He did not. He gave to every one of them the same thing. But the reflection of that may be manifold. Now what is the talent? The talent is the responsibility of the life he has. And he gave to some how? To each severally according to his ability. He didn't make the ability. He found it in a man. Now get this straight. You hear people say well this is the way the Lord made me. And the Lord created her with such a lovely voice. Oh sit down. Why haven't you got to read the Bible? This is the life. God is never such a person. He is not. All God is responsible for is to breathe that breath of life into every lump of clay that comes. What kind of clay? All that is broken down and messed up. He didn't mess up the clay and breathe in it. He found the clay horribly messed up. For the creation of every one of us we were nothing but a little chunk of messed up lump of clay. And all God does is to breathe the breath of life in it. He is not such a person that he should sit up the night before these babies are born and say well they are now that's the daughter of the elder of the church. He's always given these quiet little transmissions the sense ones. And now this baby is going to be born and I'm going to make her a beautiful singer. And therefore I'm going to take that and a beautiful large duck. And this baby says well that's the baby that miserable thing that baby I'm going to make a piece out of him. That one I'm going to make a bunker down the line. This one I'm going to make a missionary. And that one I'm going to make a preacher. And this one I'm just going to make him just as holy slave that doesn't know anything at all. If that kind of God was there how many God of God like that would burn him up? I wouldn't live with a God like that. Well to tell the truth I'm going to be honest. I couldn't live with a God that most of these people have. And I go to church I said I do occasionally. And I do service and I will spend time in school and there he is. Well I said my goodness I couldn't live ten minutes with that God because he gave him the scriptures all the stuff he got taken out of him. How many get it there then? He's changed. He never did. Then another one gets up and says I am a self-made man. How many people say that? How many know that? No. Here now I'll show you. I'll skip back this slide. Now this is the nature that he was supposed to hope may be manifest by this kind of a man. Well you see what I mean is that that's the fallen creation here. In sin was I born. My mother conceived me of not that favor. That's the truth. How many of you know you were born in this mess? That's the mess that we were born. Alright. The godless class? This is the result of man's foolishness and this is the terrible crash that comes. Alright. Now as these little children come popping out of this humiliation we'll say let's get going down here and go to some space. Now how are you going to look? Like this? Oh no! All these young men and ladies and everything they're all mixed up just like they really were. How many of you are now a new creature in Christ Jesus? How is that for you? I'm still here saying oh I'm a mess. Well he said I've known it for a long time. How do you get this now? Do you get it? These little creatures have all come and he breathes the breath of life and he has a little strong energy. And the Lord only knows what he holds potentially. He may be the President of the United States or he may be President of the or he may be President of the United or he may be President of the States or he may be President or he may be the President of the States. He may be president or he former States. Or he may be the President president of the It's the fact that God has put that limit back in another person's mind, and we, Christians, are the new creation. Now, we have human beings of no power, and how do we know we feel the power of this message? Now, how do we know we feel the power of the message? Why? Because now you're limited. Man is a trinity. Suppose you look at him as a personality, he is a trinity. If you look at him as a human being, he is a trinity. Now, you can keep that in mind because when man's faith, when man's prayer, And if he doesn't fall, I don't like that, that's a theological term. That's religion. The scripture says, in the days I'll do the same, I'll surely die if he doesn't say, I'll just fall. I'm good with that. I'm a little Christian, and the devil doesn't care how long you believe that the man has just fallen, and it's something to do with the time you accept him and tell him not to go. But the devil doesn't want everyone to know he's dead. How many of you have ever heard of the terminology that God will assume that I want to be a Christian? So that is the truth of that. It's the truth. The Jews always have a chance to assume that God does. God, first of all, that's the only thing that God doesn't like you. Christ isn't just like you. You know, it's important. But not the modern thing. So now let me tell you what I mean. Give me a new birth. And when we are born anew, how do we know that new creation is from heaven? How do we know it is full of truth and beauty? How do we know we can give great brandish to it as we contemplate it? In the power of our will. Someday I'd like to analyze this movement so we can see who we are and why God does what he says he does. He deals with it intimately. I deal with it intimately. Either in my human being or in my personality. I deal with it intimately. If I didn't deal with that and connect to what God is doing intelligently, I'd get into all kinds of trouble. That's the point. When you can't help it, good riddance to God. I wish you had some teachers. I can't stay here too long. I'm getting too old to stay. Yes, I'd rather it would be to help somebody to see what God is doing, who he is and why he does what he does. It doesn't matter. We'll do everything that we think that God would help. Conscious people want God to be present with them, but they don't know it. So don't tell them. If they were to ask me, they'd know that also. So this is my advice. Keep them out of paradise, really. Don't get them anywhere. Because the root problem intelligently is the things of God and of truth. Now... Oh, goodness. I've done everything so far. I was so stupid to put that in. It's so good to listen. You're listening, Charles. I didn't know that. It's such a reason that I said I'd go on out of it. That's how it is. Now, I'm not a very wise man, but there are very, very wise men who listen. So the words of the Lord are drawn out. You know, I can feel the drawing. I can feel the drawing. Sometimes I can feel that at times, miles and miles away. I remember one time I was taking a trip to Europe. God was calling me to go over there. I took a trip all through Europe. Six months in, and I took the whole country. And before I went, when the Lord was calling me and burdening me, I could feel the flowing blood all the time. Somebody was pulling on me. Just pulling, just pulling on me like that. And I thought, what's the matter with me? When I stood up, I could feel this strange invisible thing drawing in my spirit. I spoke to somebody in my head, and they said, walk away. We'll talk with the Lord. So when I got over there, I would preach and speak in the churches and different groups of people. And every little while, God would give me a soul. I was that group. He would come to me to ask questions. And they were always questions relative to this life in God, in spirit. The meaning of the baptism of the spirit. Why was God given to us? Why are we unmonded by the Holy Ghost? Why? I never heard, I guess, maybe one or two friends in my life that ever told me. I never heard them talk about it. But I don't mean that. You know what would happen? As I would learn to do them, I would feel the same. If God allowed me. If God allowed me. And God would say, walk with that to your soul. And I would go. So come here, I'm that soul. And I would allow you that you should contact that spirit and renew spirit. That is true. Do it now. I will do that. And you need to do that. Now, you see, I said, yes, God. I've had that done I don't know how many times. Just this last time. And it was a union meeting. Pentecostals, Methodists, Evangelicals, Lutherans. I saw a man come down the aisle. I said, I didn't know who he was. I'd never seen him. And I said, oh, you're here. And I wanted to go right up and touch his arm. I really did. I wanted to say, I'll see you by and by. I know. I know all about it. And I'll see you by and by. But I can't now. I wanted to do that in the impact of the spirit. But, you know, you can't always do things even in the spirit. Somebody would think you were crazy. So I didn't. I just restrained it. I said, I remember I said, all right, I know it. I will see you by and by. But I can't now. But I'll see you. Well, we had the meeting. I proposed the meeting. He was very polite, but he was very much of a gentleman. And he came again. And he came two, three meetings. I wanted to talk to him. Why this was, he talked to Eric. And so I made an appointment with him. And we had two sessions together. And he was the finest doctor, the leading physician of their country. And I know truth. And I hear it. But I have never had any light on spiritual living. You choose spiritual living, don't I? I said, yes. Because that's what we're here for. Well, he said, I want to talk more with you. Well, I said, that's all right. So we had two or three sessions. And he invited me up at their home for dinner with a servant. So I thought that's all right. But I know who you are because I knew you when you came down that aisle. Well, in Registry 208, I knew you. And I knew I was to deal with you. And I know God is going to give you something. I could have told you that when you stepped in there. I knew it in my spirit instantly. And I wanted to shake you by the arm. But he said, it's true. And you know, I had the joy of dealing with that man until he really surrendered his heart to the Lord and became a real Christian. And I said, are you willing to make this decision? And he said, yes. I said, do you want it badly enough? He said, yes. He said, yes. It was sweet. There was a cultured, educated guy. Hungry. He was running around there day after day. Hungry. Hungry. Hungry. Hungry. Well, then afterward, I said, well, I know. Isn't it nice when people do that? My meetings were very informal without us fucking around with it at all. We don't have to fuck around. If we would stop fucking, God would work. But we'd fuck around getting Him to work. Telling Him how to do it. And now we will all work. I said, that's nice. He said, please. I never proceeded to. I already started with the messages on my heart. And I saw three people coming in and a woman with them. Oh. Oh. And the Lord said, she's very needy in body. Give her a word of encouragement now. Right in the middle of the message? How could you? Do you know God can swing you around till you can talk on divine healing? Even if you're talking on the third note? How do you know He can do that? And in two minutes, my first thought was changed. And I did a word of encouragement. I said, I didn't want her in the Heavens to work. But He did this. And I said, give that woman a word of encouragement. And so God gave me just maybe ten minutes of real truth. You know, real truth. And we closed the meeting. I didn't think that was normal. Because I never follow up a lot of these things. I said, I can't. I can't do that. And I went out on the street. And somebody came running up to me and said, are you free? I said, yes. Will you come over to this parked car over here? Somebody wants to see you. And I went over. And here was Revere's soul. And then we had our first contact. And there was the first touching. And since then, God has led her on wonderfully. And she said this. After I had ministered and heard my messages and read my books and read my tracts and everything. All my life. That that man is the only one who really takes me into God. The rest of them take me out just so far to God. And it's frozen. But they'll never get me in. How do you conclude that? I can't. I thought, well, what a strange testimony. You know, that was like the Holy Spirit was doing. I didn't know it. You don't have to know too much if you're yielded to God. You just don't have to know a lot of things. Because now, just think about it. And then the boots into which we'll go. The depths of his word. That means the revelations of truth. I said, isn't that nice? The depths of his word. The end, the moving, the will of God as it's projected out here in time. Because he wants us intelligent to know his great purposes. The depths of a life in the Spirit. How many of you see three great men? I don't know that there's fish in the boat. I don't do anything else. I only get these fish. But how many see some very enchanting ground in there? And he's the truth. Isn't that a nice one? A new creature in Christ. Capacity is what he found in this mess. And what is his capacity? He discovers in my opinion that's how he works now because he said so. And he gave the power of life to each one separately according to his abilities. If you have 60% caliber for spirituality, amen. See what it feels. If it be 90, you got it full. Amen. Oh, now somebody's getting a privilege again. I feel it. Then if they have 30? Yes. Why? Because each one will have a reward accordingly. If your life is full, full of full, come and go you'll be quite satisfied. I can say. I can say. You understand what I'm saying? I'm full. I have everything in my hands that I can do. But I don't have a choice. I can't go on. It's in the Bible. Yes. You didn't pay a thing when you saw it. I did. That's absolutely right. I do it and I do it because I want it. Isn't that nice that he can? Now we've got to get the fish. I've got to get the fish. Oh, it's too terrible. First out. Now, if we take one shot into the old abundance of fish. What's that? Well, now here. Here. Abundantly. I'm going to put in more abundantly here. You see? More abundantly of life. Abundantly, I call it. Abundantly. It's abundantly meant to die. You don't have any more. I don't want this to happen. I have a home, a lovely little home God has given me. Didn't you know you could burn it up this morning and tell a man to come down and say, well, your home is burned to ashes. Well, I say, that's wonderful, Lord. Isn't that something to do that way? Now, I like it always that way. But I don't feel attached to anything. I don't enjoy it. I don't feel that any of it has any heaven but only God. Anything. I don't care where you are. I'm always there because I have a freedom. Oh, I have a freedom in God. I have a freedom in God. It's very natural to me. It all has a soul. It is positive. It's love. It's technique. It's habit. I feel like a god. I feel like another creature. It doesn't bother me that way. Let me be straight. I don't weep and cry and say, oh, oh, oh. No. I think that's it. Well, do you love her? Very much. Well, you love her very much. Why don't you weep and cry? Because that's it. Life of abandonment. The detachment is terrifying because he will separate you from every last item that pertains to your whole life. Now, that may be the consent for the detachment, or it may be the detachment itself. Paul says, I counted all things as lost that I might attain to this thing in God. He counted it. Then later he says, I not only counted it that I was willing, that God told me. Do you see a difference? I counted it, and God accepted it. Now he says, since I have accepted your willingness to lose all things, I'll let you lose it. Then he said, I suffered the loss of all the things in the world. One is the consent. The other is the actual experimental duties of that thing. So I would like to talk about let down. What are you throwing over? All the consent that you have. It would be absolutely out of my life. Now, next, this is the question. I surrender all. Now, see this. Oh, now, look at this. How many of you can't see that? He said, throw it over for me. It's so dark. The water is cold. And I'm to be plunged into this. How many see your deeper depth? All night there, and there are no fish. And you know I know about fishing. And I'll yowl, yowl, yowl. How many of you? Don't yowl for long. Unless you say, quit it. If he says, let the net down, then let it down. Peter, I can't. Nevertheless, if I were you, I would let the net down. But if there are no fish, it's your fault. You told me that. Nevertheless, of course, it's your fault.
Launch Out Into the Deep - Part 1
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John Wright Follette (1883 - 1966). American Bible teacher, author, and poet born in Swanton, Vermont, to French Huguenot descendants who settled in New Paltz, New York, in the 1660s. Raised Methodist, he received the Baptism in the Holy Spirit in 1913 while studying at a Bible school in Rochester, New York, later teaching there until its closure. Ordained in 1911 by the Council of Pentecostal Ministers at Elim Tabernacle, he affiliated with the Assemblies of God in 1935. Follette taught at Southern California Bible College (now Vanguard University) and Elim Bible Institute, mentoring thousands. His books, including Golden Grain (1957) and Broken Bread, compiled posthumously, offer spiritual insights on maturity and holiness. A prolific poet, he published Smoking Flax and Other Poems (1936), blending Scripture with mystical reflections. Married with no recorded children, he ministered globally in his later years, speaking at conferences in Europe and North America. His words, “It is much easier to do something for God than to become something for God,” urged deeper faith. Follette’s teachings, preserved in over 100 articles and tapes, remain influential in Pentecostal and charismatic circles.