In this sermon, the preacher discusses the story of David and Goliath from the Bible. He highlights how David, a young boy, faced the giant Goliath with only five stones in his pocket. The preacher draws parallels between David's courage and faith in God and the challenges faced by Christians today. He emphasizes the need for Christians to rely on God's power and grace, rather than their own abilities, to overcome the forces of darkness in the world. The sermon concludes with a reminder that we are living in critical times and need to be prepared to face the spiritual battles ahead.

Again, our Father, as we come into Thy courts, we have already offered Thee praise and gratitude from our hearts. We thank You for these discordant hearts of ours that You brought into harmony with Yourself and with Your will. We confess that too long we've been of the earth earthy, and we long that we may be more heavenly, that as we are sung often but not always realize, the things of the earth may grow strangely dim. We thank You for the grace You've given us in another week. We thank You for every temptation that we have overcome. We thank You for every trial that we have endured. We thank You for every experience which has been enriching to us, and brought us to realize more of Your benevolence, Your love, Your greatness, Your majesty. We think of those who grovel around in the world about us, without God, without hope. There are millions who still sit in the darkness, in the shadow of death. There are millions in that area Your Word speaks of, the habitations of cruelty, and the places of evil, where the light of the glorious gospel has not yet gone. There are areas where this light once shone, and the light has become dim, and in some place even extinguished. We thank You for everything today, that in any way has brought light, illumination, to those who sit in darkness, for those who at this very moment perhaps are in prison cells, for those who go down the jungle paths, perhaps discouraged, stammering through a new language they've hardly mastered. Their bodies perhaps tortured by food that they're not used to eating, almost crushed by the environment of heathenism and darkness, where the powers of darkness and rebellious spirits hold empire over the souls of men. We don't know how You'll do it, but we pray that if Jesus tarries it out of this very meeting, somewhere we'll be birthed, that we reach those areas of darkness, where too long Satan has been Lord and Master and Governor. We're amazed not just at Your patience with those in heathen darkness, but we're amazed at Your patience with the church so-called, sleepy and careless and indifferent, that two thousand years after Jesus died and rose again from the dead, after He led captivity captive and gave gifts unto men, our feet have been like lead. We have not mounted up with wings as eagles, we have not run and not been without becoming weary, we have not walked without fainting. We have spent, I guess all of us, more time on ourselves, more money on ourselves, more interest on ourselves than we should. But Lord we ask Thee this afternoon, perhaps we don't know what we ask, but we ask Lord Jesus as You walked in the midst of the seven golden candlestick, walk in our midst this afternoon. We would say, Samuel Thy servant, when he was disturbed from sleep, speak Lord, for Thy servant hear us. I think of Wesley's word when he said, O for a trumpet voice on all the world to call. We would like to send a shattering message to every lost soul in the universe this afternoon, that there is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanuel's veins, and sinners plunged beneath that flood can lose all their guilty stains. That whether a man is a dying thief or a living thief, he can rejoice to see this fountain in this day, and there may he though vile as he, wash all his sins away. We thank you for giving us this word, we thank you it is a miracle book, it's a miracle that's been preserved to this day by the attacks that have been made on it, by the volumes that have been written against it, by the speeches that men have declared against it, and yet we thank you that it shines as clearly as the beautiful sun shines today. We thank you that it's your word and therefore it's indestructible, just as your church is your church and it's indestructible. We thank you for something permanent in a world that's constantly changing. We thank you for this truth in the midst of a thousand voices of error. We pray thee, open our eyes that we may behold wondrous things out of thy law. Open our ears as we sing sometimes, that we may hear voices, thy voice of truth that thou send us clear. Make this word to us what we need this afternoon, if we're lethargic stir us by it, if we have open wounds heal us by it, if the path has become dark illuminate us by it, if we have become weak strengthen us by it. Above all help us to see as we've already sung in this majestic hymn that very soon the tables are going to be turned and the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ and he shall reign forever and ever whose right it is to take the throne. We thank you Lord Jesus for shedding your blood for us. We thank you this afternoon for sitting at the right hand of the majesty on high. We thank you that you are the king eternal, invisible, God only wise, in light inaccessible and hidden from our eyes and yet thou art the unchanging God. We believe we live in the most dark cruel age that the world has ever known and Satan strives with all his mastery to bring destruction to our generation. But we thank you that we have a risen Christ, an exalted Christ. You've told us with all power it is that everything is under his feet. We pray that this may quicken our hearts and send us out with a love that burns and blazes for thee. That in this last day we shall witness that blessed holy promise of your word that you will pour out your spirit on all flesh. That just as the sun is shining this afternoon on the wicked and on the righteous, on the clean and the unclean, on men who are captives and men who are free. So we believe that you're going to give us this great final demonstration as we say so often a Pentecost that will out Pentecost, Pentecost. To give us a great last harvest for Jesus who deserves all the praise and all the glory. We thank you then we shall join in the everlasting song and we shall crown him Lord of all. We thank you for hearing us. We thank you for blessing your word to our hearts in Jesus name. We started last week in the epistle of Paul to the Ephesians chapter 6. Ephesians chapter 6 reading from verse 10. Finally brethren be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armor of God that ye may be able to stand, able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armor of God that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand. This is a very simple observation but to me a very challenging observation that this chapter begins in the nursery and ends in the armory. We have an awful lot of people who want to stay in the nursery. The apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians and said he had to feed them with milk and not with meat because he said you're not able to bear it. Now there is a very glamorous interpretation of the spirit-filled life which is a novelty. You can't find it in history but you'll find it today. It's all excitement and goose pimples. It's all sugar and spice and all that's nice. It's very far removed from this chapter that we have here which is a chapter speaking of strife and speaking of contention. There's a double warning here in verse 11 it says put on the whole armor of God. In verse 13 it says wherefore take unto you the whole armor of God. All our defense is revealed to us in this chapter. There's a recognition here again that there's a contention. We wrestle not against flesh and blood. We do not have an obvious enemy. We do not have a visible enemy. We have an enemy but nobody knows how old he is. Nobody knows how strong he is. Nobody knows what resources he has. He's greater than man but he's less than God. He's supernatural but he's not supreme. He's mighty but he's not almighty. I suppose there never has been a warrior like the apostle Paul that is in the spiritual realm. And as I've said so very often a man with a with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument. There's a poem and I don't know who wrote it and I can't for the moment connect it in my mind but the theme of the poem is this. What an embarrassment it will be as a believer to get to heaven without scars. We're in a warfare. And while again this uniform if you want to call it that this this armor that is described here is usually considered for the defensive and yet men did not go to war without their armor and then when they the enemy began to pursue them run home and put the armor on that's just a bit too late. We need this whole armor of God. You remember that when the children of Israel were warned of the enemy of death that was coming over them that they had to take a lamb and they had to spill the blood it wasn't enough to kill the lamb that was partly obedient partial obedience. It wasn't enough to take the blood and put it there in a vessel and keep it in the house and give a signal to the angels going past we've done as we were the blood must be put over the lintel and over the doorpost. Now if we had a condition like that in our discipleship if you were told that it was dangerous to go through that door tomorrow morning without putting the blood over the lintel and the doorpost we would do that. But you see so very often we rush out into a hostile world a terrifying world. I've said before that I've been asked very often like every preacher do you think we're living in the last days and I say definitely not we're not living in the last days we're living in the last moments. We may be living in the last seconds as God counts time or if he counted in our time. I had a man came to see me yesterday he stayed about seven hours and he's a very well-informed man on international affairs he's investigated government documents and he's photographed all kinds of things and he almost left me with a with a big cloud hanging over my head except that he did confirm what I have felt so very long. Brother Herb said to me the other day how long do you think we have before the kind of the curtain falls? And I said well I think maybe five years at the very most ten years. This man said to me you know I think that two and a half years from now we'll have ended all our liberties. No no we're not going to be invaded by communism that's not the thing. We have a warfare that began in the heavenlies and it still is there in the heavenlies and it's been manifest in so many other countries but it's been manifest more and more secretly here in our country. This man suggested that within two years we'll have a health program which means that everybody will carry a plastic card. Now now that's the very way that Russia overtook the and stole the the privacy of people in that nation many years ago. I said to you before and he confirmed this I guess in five years we'll have a cashless society. You can't spend money nobody will accept it. You'll have to have a card with a number on it and if you if you submit that if you don't submit that card and you say well look I happen to have convictions as a Christian this is an anti-Christ system and but but remember I have a wife and four children at home and they're going to starve if you don't feed me and he says listen I have a wife and four children and I'll if I do feed you. So I have the choice of letting you starve with your children or I starve because I help you. Now that that may sound unreasonable. I'm quite sure it's in the offering. As a matter of fact I I have a secret suspicion that in Europe before very long they'll not only devalue currency they'll abolish it. Italy is on the brink of financial disaster. We keep giving her an injection. She's not going to make it. The papacy said last year that if the if the Communists got a heavy vault this year that they would begin designing a cathedral in Jerusalem. It would be a duplicate of Notre Dame Cathedral. You see the Jews have a seat on the United Nations because they're established as a nation. No no no the Pope says they're not a nation. They don't own Jerusalem. It's the Holy City. I'm the Holy Father. That's my city. I don't recognize the Jews and there's an antagonism there. It's another interesting thing to me and I'm not not nationalistic in this. We're going to give the Jews another billion dollars but we're going to sell Taiwan down the river apparently. There are three million Jews in Israel. There are 13 million people in Taiwan and a very aggressive healthy spiritual church there. But we can do without 13 million people in order to establish some relationship with China and as much as we don't like Cuba we'd like to make a deal with her even though she has some soldiers in Angola. Now this is all a mix-up isn't it? Sure it is. But it shows you the affairs of men. You see there are two kingdoms. The kingdoms of our kingdom of Jesus Christ and the kingdoms of this world. Now we're not fighting a visible enemy. If the devil was a visible enemy I'd sell my car and my house and give a donation towards making an atom bomb to blow him off the face of the earth. But unfortunately he's not a visible enemy. And you remember that Jesus is talking in the in the 14th chapter of Luke. He says this. What king going to war or making war against another king sittheth not first down to consult whether he be able with 10,000 to meet him that come up against him with 20,000. Now what you have to do with your enemy obviously in fighting a battle you have to know who he is, where he is, what strength he has. Find his strategy, outmaneuver him and either go headlong into battle with him or back off and say well no chance. He's too much for us. Now we're lining up the church of Jesus Christ against the powers of darkness. You know it's interesting that Satan does not appear in the first two chapters of Genesis and he doesn't appear in the last two chapters of Revelation. The first time we hear of him is in the third chapter of Genesis the 15th verse where the promise is there that thou shalt bruise, he shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel. And then you have a continuous pattern of his activity right through the word of God. Now Paul has already said you remember writing to the Corinthians the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. You see unless we're careful they'll be hypocritical enough to say because we have in God we trust that's all we need. Don't believe it for a minute. Do you remember when the armies of Israel were lined up on a hillside? It's a story we tell to children but it's too big for us. And the king was there and his wonderful son the prince was there and all the children were men were there from their west point of that day. And a man came striding down the valley there he was a monstrous man maybe 10 feet high and he had a voice like a thunderstorm and and when he when he when he tried he shook the earth. And day after day he defied the armies of the living God. That was why he was there. He opposed the God of Israel. He was a champion the superman of the philistines. And you may remember even stepping into the story of Samson where they said look we don't need to bother too much. You know the God of Israel the supernatural the majestic the holy God. He doesn't divide the sea anymore. He doesn't lead his people by a pillar of fire or a pillar of cloud. He's gone out of business. We can soon get hold of this man Samson and reduce his power. Now that is the antagonism. You see however much satan fights against the church it is not the church he's against he's against the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. All right. Nobody can go out and fight this Goliath. A little boy goes up and says what are you waiting for? Run home and look after those few sheep. His brother says that you didn't come to bring our lunch you came to see the battle. I would have said where is it? They've been there a long while there'd be no battle. And he slips up one day and he says you know you know what I feel embarrassed that the God of Israel has to stand here and you're his representatives and you've no power you've no authority. Why in God's name don't you do something? Why do you take his name on your lips? You have no power. Isn't that what the world says right now about the church of Jesus Christ? Where is your power? Where is your authority? You want to shrivel it. I'm quite convinced in my own spirit otherwise I want to die now. I believe that before long organized religion will be bypassed and God is going to find his prophets where Jesus found his. By the side of the sea signing a document an income tax form as Matthew was. Jesus didn't knock on the door of the Sanhedrin. He didn't say Cleopatra sit on my platform and give me some prestige just to give me a start as an evangelist got it pretty rough. Why don't you go and talk to that man? You wait till you see him. You wait till you hear him barking out. And David says I want to tell you something. I've done my homework. What do you mean you did your homework? Well you see God says if you're faithful in the secret where nobody sees you. You see we like to show our ministry, display our power. Or come where you're prudential. Well one night I was there playing my harp and singing the 23rd psalm and having a great time I heard the roar of a lion I said hey put my sheep down and I went after him I killed him. Another night a bear came along and I punched him on the nose said come back I'll kill you too. Now look I saw a lion I saw a bear give me a chance to go to Goliath. Do you remember how Goliath came to him? Goliath ten feet high needed a man with a shield in front of him. You notice what David didn't ever bothered with a man with a shield. We're so busy running around after demons we don't hit the devil. Never didn't care how many demons we destroy. In fact you can't destroy demons. Jesus never destroyed demons he shifted them out of one place to another. I'm glad for those who can cast out demons sure enough. But isn't it something when you have a helmet of gold and a wonderful uniform and a sword with diamonds maybe in the like some of the daggers we have over in old England there and you can't do anything with it. Well in God's name I ask you what do we do with all the millions of people in pews and all the money we have and all the societies we have. The temp is shrinking, devilry is expanding. We're nervous and afraid. I was thinking this week of one of the hymns of Charles Westwith. I like Charles Westwith's hymns very much and he's facing the powers of darkness and the invasion from hell and he said should all the hosts of death and powers of hell unknown put their most dreadful forms of rage and malice on I shall be saved for Christ displays superior power and bounteous grace. Does it matter how big the enemy is if you're 10 times stronger than he is? So you want to go fight him? Yes I want to go fight him. Can you see his brothers looking around the tent and say what will we say to dad when we go home? We'll have to say a lion flew him or somebody destroyed him. That Goliath will take our little brother and break him over his knee and throw him to the birds. In fact the big shot said he'd do that. After all there's a little boy hasn't got a shield. Of course he has a shield. Doesn't say so in the book. It does if you read carefully. It doesn't in my version. Well it does in mine you better get mine. You know why because it says God said to Abraham I am thy shield. Isn't that better than a shield of stainless steel about three feet thick you hold up against the enemy? Yet faint holding it anyhow. He has an eternal God between him and the one who is going to destroy him and you can't get through God. The psalmist says the Lord is a sun and a shield. They're watching little David go down the hill and he's skipping along with happy you know praising the Lord and singing the 23rd Psalm he scoops down to say what did he get? I don't know. Something somebody lost I guess. He slipped five stones in his pocket. You know why? Because Goliath had four brothers and he was hoping they'd come and he'd wipe the lot out. He got five stones. I say this is going to be ridiculous isn't it? Yes yes yes. That's what Paul said after his struggle with the intellectuals you remember at the 17th of Acts. The intellectual capital of the world. He said the struggle with Epicureans and poets and and all the other intellectual group and then he comes to Corinth from the intellectual capital world to the festival of the world. The capital of immorality. And he says I'm coming to you. Do you know what with? Not with the wise words of the poets and philosophers and Stoics and Epicureans and all the learned people. I tried that. It didn't work. I'm coming to you with a gospel which is the power of God unto salvation and he established in the festival the hell on earth he established the church of Jesus Christ in Corinth. The very gates of hell couldn't prevail against him. Little David goes and throws the stone. Well the big man was like everybody else. He was protected everywhere except in his head. That's where the devil gets most people anyhow. Got a breastplate, arm plate, leg plate, name plate and and yet his forehead. Little David goes I guess he sat back and said wait for this, wait for this. He sees the stone going up. You know such a thing had never entered his head before and that's all it needed. One stone. Isn't it ridiculous when you've got men trained in warfare? Oh come on what has the church of Jesus Christ got with scholarship that isn't anointed? Give me scholarship on fire and I'll get excited but you just start dividing the word of God. I thought you're up in some old laboratory and you start you know discussing or dividing or dissecting dead doctrine and through. Forget it. Give me a mouthful of sand this is refreshing. The ridiculous things, the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. I think David would have said that if he'd known it in his day. He didn't know it but Paul said it later on you remember. All right we're fighting against what? Well Paul says here we're fighting against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Now that's that's a pretty terrifying record isn't it? They remind you of something. Chapter 1 verse 18 listen to what he says. The eyes of your understanding. Now are your eyes open? This is what he says. If the eyes of your understanding are open and then he says that you are enlightened and you know what is the hope of his calling and what are the exceeding riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints and what is the exceeding greatness of his power unto us Lord who believe according to his mighty workings according to his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and has set him in his own right hand in heavenly places. Now now we're fighting against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world. Look in this verse anyhow. In this verse 21 he says that Jesus is far above those principalities and he has principalities above principality and power and might and dominion and every name that is named. Now what's the opposition to the Christian? All right sum it up in scripture. The world, the flesh, the devil, the rulers of the darkness of this world. When satan was cast down he brought down the third part of the heavenly host. So there's your opposition. Oh of course your own lust and sinful nature. The world, the flesh, the devil, principalities, powers, the rulers of world systems, my fleshly desires, the lust of the eye and all those dazzling bewitching things that they're all militating against my spirituality. Such a pretty mighty host to fight against isn't it? But I said if you if you knew tomorrow morning that as soon as your children went through that door there were all kinds of monsters wanting to devour them, the school system will pollute them if you've nothing else. The hellishness, the filth, the sewers that run through schools. Somebody reminded me last night he'd been reading something of Wesley's. You know I turned that over in my mind. I tell you one thing he didn't fight. He didn't fight about the lousy school system like we do. They didn't have the devil piped in on tv in every home. It was the golden age for the church of Jesus Christ to shake the world in my judgment. You know why? Because most people couldn't even read in his day. And if a certain came to town they couldn't afford to pay to go. Sure they came in their thousands. Sure the anointing of God, but the principalities and powers and rulers of darkness hadn't invaded the world as they've invaded today. I'm not saying he wouldn't triumph today or Luther or something. I'm saying the odds against the church of Jesus Christ are a thousand times stronger today than they were in Wesley's day or Luther's day. The thing that used to be done in a corner is shouted from the housetops. There are multiplied billions of dollars invested in filthy, in pornography, in the film industry, in the drink industry, in the gambling industry. The devil's got the whole thing sewn up. So against us there are principalities and powers, the rulers of the darkness of this world. The satan and the third part of the heavenly host, the world, the flesh and the devil, that's an army, that's legions. And you say, well here I am all by myself. Just quoting Acts 1.8, ye shall receive power. I don't feel too strong against that multitude anyhow. Wait a minute, wait a minute, let me tell you something. When Jesus rose he put all things under his feet, not some things, all things. Against me the world, the flesh, the devil, principalities and powers, the rulers of the darkness of this world, appetites which I have perverted unless God trains me. But who's for me? Well look, who's for me? The Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost. You know they're a pretty strong combination. And since only a third part of the heavenly host fell, then two-thirds of the heavenly host are on my side. And I have the church of Jesus Christ. I have the prayers of the saints. I have all the wealth of God couched in this book. The greatest book of wisdom, the reason the devil drives us from it. He wants us to read other books about the book rather than read the book. You see because the word of God is quick and it's powerful. It's like the delayed bombs, people drop bombs over those awful Germans, drop them in England. And the kind English people drop them over in Germany. And uh, and you know what? They didn't always go off when they were dropped. And they learned to detect. They said there's a bomb there, it won't go off for 24 hours. There's one there, it won't go off for 36 hours. You know the word of God is like that sometimes. You read it and sometimes you're on a plane or somewhere else and suddenly it explodes. The word is quick and it's powerful. You know if we ever rediscover the greatness, the majesty of Jesus Christ in his risen glory will shake the world. We've gone to sleep on it. Now Satan, as I say he's not, he's greater than man but he's less than God. There's a very beautiful description of him in the 28th chapter. At least the consensus of opinion is that this is about Satan in the 28th of Ezekiel. Let me read it to you. Verse 12 says, Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God, thou sealest up the sun full of wisdom and perfecting beauty. Listen, thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was thy covering. The sardis, the topaz, the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, the carbuncle and the gold. Will you notice that nine of those twelve stones were in the breastplate of the high priest? Thy workmanship and thy tablets of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou was created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth. I have set thee so. Thou was upon the holy mount of God. Thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou was perfect in thy beauty. Thou was perfect in thy ways from the day that thou was created till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence and thou hast sinned. Therefore will I cast thee as profane out of the mount of God and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Thy heart was lifted up because of thy beauty. Thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness. I will cast thee to the ground. I will lay thee before kings that they may behold thee. Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries and the multitude of thy iniquities by the iniquity of thy traffic. And then in the 14th chapter of the book of Isaiah, in verse 12 it says, How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? How art thou cut down to the ground, which thou didst weaken the nations? For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into the heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the Most High. Yet thou should be brought down to hell to the sides of the pit. Now I can't conceive that that description in Ezekiel is about anyone else but Satan. He was in the garden of Eden, he was the anointed cherub, after the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. He was the greatest being maybe that God ever, it was fascinating. I believe that when the woman Eve saw him, she was dazzled by his beauty. Every precious stone was his covering. He had authority, he had power, he had majesty, he had dignity. And then somehow, nobody knows how, he desired to be as God. You see, the offer to every man who falls is the offer that came in the garden of Eden, you should be as God. In other words, you still have power. Satan came to Jesus and said, kneel before me and I'll give you power over all the kingdoms of the earth. That has been offered. Alexander the Great was offered the world, he almost made it. Spyrus, the king of Persia. Right down to Adolf Hitler. Offered power, offered authority, man craves for power. Now here's a scripture that just floors me every time I read it. You can tell me about the devilish destruction, you can try and estimate all the millions of people destroyed by death and wars and plagues and every diabolical thing that Satan engineered. And then I'm staggered by a statement of Jesus, when he said to his disciples, I give you power over all the power of the enemy. Isn't that something? I'm delegating authority, I'm delegating power. You know, if we'd spent as much time training people to pray as we've trained them to sing in choirs. And people get angry, people come to me say sometimes, you know, I feel I have a ministry of song. I say, well sing. Sing, I don't care. But I'll tell you what, there is no gift of the Spirit that's a ministry of song. The church is so sick today, you can get somebody to come to your city and, and, and rent an auditorium seating 5,000 people to get five dollars to sit for four hours or five hours in an all-night thing. And if you paid them five dollars they wouldn't come to an all-night of prayer. If we had spent the time, you see prayer, as we know it usually, as I said, prayer is preoccupation with our needs. Praise is preoccupation with our blessings. Worship is preoccupation with God. Jesus says when Satan tempts him on the level of the flesh, on the level of his personality, on the level of world dominion, he says listen, it is written. What is written? Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God. We have not taught people to worship. We have not really taught people to pray. I had a letter the other day asking me to go to a certain school. Will you come and teach me for three or four days about prayer? I don't know too much about it, but I'll sure go. No church is greater than its prayer meeting. Not stronger than its prayer meeting. I don't care what church it is, whether it's this or I preach in a church with 3,000 people not too long ago, 3,000 people jamming the church Sunday morning, 2,000 people, 1,000 midweek service. That's a miracle these days. But do you know what holds that church together? They've got lots of teenagers and 20-year-olders who are meeting all over that city in prayer and intercession and they're pouring out their hearts for revival in that city. That's what a king's ransom. Mr. Carter keeps telling us he'll turn the nation around. He said in six months he'd lower the unemployment by two million in six months and somehow the Lord raised it two million in the first month he was in. It's a bit embarrassing. He'll turn the nation around. Well, I'll tell you when I believe him and I've seen him swim up Niagara Falls. It's a total impossibility. Paul says that we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. Well, maybe we should say we don't wrestle at all and be honest about it. You know, I got so mad this week about the powers of darkness. I'll tell you I just felt like saying, hey Herb, look I'm through with a whole bunch of you and I'm through with myself and I'm going to shut myself on a farm. I'm going to do nothing but pray, seek God, wrestle in prayer. We're living in bankruptcy as the church of Jesus Christ compared with where we ought to live. I'm convinced of that. I'm embarrassed to be part of a church that's an embarrassment to Jesus. He wrote that we might have principalities and powers in subjection to us. The rulers of the darkness of this world. Mr. President, Queen of England, they have no idea that they're tools of the darkness of this world and there's nobody has eyes to see except the true believer whose eyes have been anointed. You notice this, that Paul said you're to put on the whole armor of God. It's not something automatic. You've got to put it on. You know, I think I'll say this, you can throw me out if you like, but if you're a good parent you need, you need 30 minutes on your knees as soon as your children leave the house every morning to cover them with the blood and protect them against the powers of the world in which we live. Now I mean that and I'm sharing it with you. You may as well throw your child in a sewer and send them to the, to the, to most schools. They'll get to know more about sex, impurity, drugs, all the devilry that's going on. It's a, it's a university of iniquity these days, the average school. And it wouldn't be so bad if it would be over in a month or you could put somebody out of office, but brother I got news it's going to get worse than it is. It's not getting better and the only way to stem the tide is the church of Jesus Christ, a militant church. Isn't this what it's saying? It doesn't say put on the armor of God, it says put on the whole armor of God and it repeats it, put on the whole armor of God, that you may stand and withstand when you don't understand. Withstand the fiery darts of the devil. We have a shield of faith with the helmet of salvation. Our feet shall be the preparation of the gospel of peace. Again this, this person we're dealing with is, is no man. Do you know what Jesus called him? The Son of God called Satan a prince. He called him the prince of the power of the air. That's his dominion. In the, in the tenth chapter of what, Luke? Jesus says he witnessed Satan pitched out of heaven. He was thrown overboard, get out of here before you contaminate any more angels or archangels and God threw him in. I know godly men who will not fly a plane. Do you know why? Because you're going through the territory of Satan. I admire their convictions, I may not share it all. I certainly think twice before I went in that supersonic plane that's coming to Dallas I see, and uh, and fly twice as high, fly what eight miles high it's going to fly? That Satan was cast out into the air. The book of the revelation says he's soon going to be cast down on the earth before he's cast down into the pit. But you know we ought not to be scared because again here, here is our defense. We have the prayers of the saints. We have one living at the right hand of the majesty on high. We've already stolen his plans. The apostle Paul says we don't have to be ignorant of his devices. If you're ignorant of the devil, you're ignorant because you want to be, not because you have to be. We know he'll attack us on every level. You may not know the moment, but we know his methods. Jesus stole all his secrets. The wiles of the devil, the tricks of the devil, the cunning of the devil, the craft of the devil, principalities, powers, the rulers of the darkness of this world, and they're all engineered, they're all controlled by his majesty Satan that Jesus again called the prince of the power of the air. Do you remember what Peter called him? It's not a nice term. He called him a roaring lion. You know what Paul called him? One who goes about as an angel of light. I'm not in any way diminishing what Finney did or Wesley, but I'll tell you what, they want bucking a thousand cults like we are today. They want two thousand gurus in this country. As a matter of fact, there's nobody around much but Indians at that time. We've two thousand gurus in this country that may be, that have nested mainly with the intellectuals and many of them with young intellectual jewels too. Missionary societies are craving for money. Mr. Sun Moon has got millions of dollars and he's buying up property all over the place. We've got Mormonism and Jehovah's Witnesses. We've got all the lesser cults. You see, the apostle, he intensifies this as he goes on in his writing. Listen to what he says to Timothy. You know it, I'm going to remind you of it. He says this now in the last days that perilous times shall come. Now doesn't this sound like San Antonio light tomorrow morning? He breathes. We're dealing with somebody. Listen, you can no more beat the devil than you can lift yourself with your shoe strap. He's six thousand years of studying human nature and human governments and human religious systems and he knows every weakness. He knows every way to pull a house down. He knows how to destroy empires. We're not wrestling flesh and blood. If he did, I'd take a sword, I'd put on a uniform. He said in a letter not long ago, Brother Radney, when you pray, you smite the nations. Isn't that a nice thing to answer? When you've got friends like this, you don't need headaches. You smite the nations when you pray. You know, if some of you would honestly say, Radney, I don't know what you're talking about, why don't you talk Greek? You can't remember the time you laid on a belly and you didn't merely say prayers, you prayed. You talked about praying in the Holy Ghost, not praying what I want, praying what God wants. Not praying that I may be blessed or things go easier, I'll make a bit more money, but wrestling. Somehow God says, look there's a barrier needs to be shifted in Russia or China. You pray against that. You don't have to anybody's applause. And God comes on you with his strength and you pray, maybe not with a language. Somebody said not recently, well you know Romans 8 where he says, praying with groanings that cannot be uttered is praying in tongues. No it's not. You may pray in tongues better if you do, but that's not praying in tongues. It's beyond tongues. As much as tongues may be on, it's praying a language that has no language. The poet says, what am I? An infant crying in the night. An infant crying for a light with no language but a cry. That little baby cries, the mother knows it needs feeding. It cries half an hour after and father says, well what's it doing this time? Needs feeding? You never fill it up. No dear, it doesn't. It's uncomfortable. It needs changing. It cries again. Oh does it need feeding again? No, changing not. It's frightened. I'll put the light off. The baby stops. The mother has an intuition. She knows when the baby cries. It has no language but a cry. And the greatest prayers in the Holy Ghost have no language. It's a cry. It's something born in the heart of God that comes into my heart. I can't explain. I won't. And I'd do it if the King of England was there or Mr. the President of the United States or Billy Graham. I wouldn't worry me a hell of beans. Just I'm a fool. I'm a fanatic. I don't know what I'm talking about all night. Wait till he opens the register in eternity and see. That's why if I wake at two or three in the morning, which I do most mornings anyhow, I want to know why. If God burdens me, I'm out of bed. I go in my office. Don't applaud. It's all right. I don't want anybody's opinion. I don't care a bit. God tells me this. I do it. The normal thing is go to bed and sleep. If I wake up, but if I've had too much supper, that's your fault. But if you wake up for some other reason, there's no physical reason why you should wake. Ask God why you woke up. What are you trying to say? You see, one of the hard things, the hard thing for a believer is not, is not to stand the criticism of the sinners. You can do that. Or as the Psalm 1 says, the contradiction of sinners, it's the criticism of saints that gets you down. Here's a little woman, she's barren, and she goes day after day, and she prays, and she weeps, and she groans, and the big shot priest says, you know what, I think that woman's going off her rocker. She's drunk. I'm going to have to say something to Hannah about this. He didn't care what he said or what he thought. She prayed. You know what she did one day? She came in and said, hey uh Eli, I want to show you something. This is the baby I prayed for. Now what do you say? Hmm? You'll be amazed how many children you could have birthed into the kingdom of God if you'd travailed, and I'd travailed as we should have done at the right time. Again, this isn't sugar and spice. You don't preach this kind of sermon, you know, when you go to a banquet, five dollars for a breakfast, or five dollars for a supper, they kick you out. I know because I've had the experience. That's why I don't go anymore. I'm tired of playing in play pens. Let them play pens and blow bubbles, that's their business. Time for action. It's time for warriors. We need saints, but we need soldier saints to put on the whole armor of God. Hannah prayed. Hannah groaned. Read the chapter. She wept. She had a sore spirit, a troubled spirit. She prayed, and she wept in her praying, and she travelled in her praying, and she groaned in her praying, and she had a troubled spirit. Sure, but I'll tell you what, like the good book says, it all turned around when the baby was born. You know, there's never been a revival in history that hasn't had trouble. Paul in writing, and I must tell you, Paul writing here, you know, again says, these are perilous times, but not if he's writing to a young man, like some of you fine young guys. I pray for you fellows every day. I pray for TLC too. Skip says he's to pray for the dead. But you know what Timothy, Paul is doing? He's writing to a young fellow, and you know when he looks at him, he says, oh my God, if I could lift my heart out and put it into the body of that young man Timothy, if I could give him my vision, my passion, if I could explain to him all that God revealed to me three and a half years in the wilderness, God, I'd do it gladly. I'm old, and I'm beaten, and I've been stoned, and shipwrecked, and the night and the day in the deep, in weariness, in fastings, in painfulness, all hell broke loose on me, but I made it. Now Lord, if you put what's in me in that young man. So he says to him, listen Timothy, you're a soldier. Next time you say I led somebody to Jesus, will you do a right job? Don't say you've got a kingdom coming, don't say you've got a mansion on Main Street, and a five decker tram, and a free ticket to the marriage supper of the Lamb, and you're going to rule over five cities. Tell them that, it won't all be true. But will you whisper in the other ear and say, listen, you're a soldier of Jesus Christ, and this moment you lost all rights to yourself. You've no time of your own, you've no money of your own, you've no interests of your own. This very moment you became a soldier of Jesus Christ, now put on my armor and go out and fight the good fight of faith. That's what he says to Timothy, hold fast, fight the good fight of faith, put on the whole armor of God. And he says that no man that woreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life. I don't know why, but God brought this to my mind. I preached in a certain town a while ago, a big husky young man came, typical football, you know, about as big as Goliath, he looked, enormous fellow. And he says, I'm cutting classes every morning, I'm getting so much time, I'm going to get this all down, and boy, I believe God's going to work. And you know, by about the third morning, you're sorry he came. He says, I want to talk with you. He says, I went home last night and started praying, and the Lord says, well sure, I'll answer your prayer right away, quit playing football. Well, I'm getting a test to be a professor. You told me you're a soldier of Jesus, quit playing football. How many hours do you spend preparing for football? How many hours do you spend in prayer? You want to fight flesh and blood on the battlefield, to fight principalities, and now come on, settle it. You know, that big giant, the tears ran down his face, he said, my career is gone, my career is gone, I can't be a pro. In a matter of life, you'll be the biggest pro you ever dreamed of, once God gets over here, knocks you into shape, and gets on a battlefield, and you start knocking devils down, instead of men that weigh two pounds more than you do, or something. What's wrong with being an athlete? Nothing, unless it keeps you of your prayer life. You see, the life's too short. This young man, Paul, covets for him the very best that he can have, and so he says, don't get entangled with the affairs of this life. Oh, it may not necessarily be a ball game, it might be a girlfriend that's going to get hold of you too soon, or a boyfriend. You see, that word discipline is almost as filthy as the word repentance. No, evangelist preaches repentance, it's a dirty word, it kicks you out. Or by the same word discipline, it comes from the word disciple, it's from the same root. But we're not disciplined, we're not disciples, we're followers. We're following so far behind, the preacher can't see us, and I guess the Lord can hardly see us, we're that far behind in what he's telling us to do. But all the disciplined man, tell me one man that's moved his generation for God, that hasn't been a disciplined man, because I don't know him. Sure Mr. Wesley did wonderful. Mr. Wesley was never in bed after four o'clock in the morning. John Fletcher was never in bed after four o'clock in the morning. Hudson Taylor said, the sun never rose on China but what it found me on my feet. No wonder that good hymn says, take time to behold his feet off with thy Lord. You see, there are no leaps. I was reading just today a chapter that we love, everybody loves it so much. No we don't, we love part of it. One thing in Sturkey, isn't it beautiful? It's so lovely, it's all about love. Makes you feel so nice, so loving, so lovely. But you know we don't dwell too much on the tail end of that chapter. Do you know what it says? Paul says, knowledge will cease, tongues will cease, nobody will have a miracle ministry in heaven, won't they be miserable? And there's so many things that won't be. But I'll tell you what hit me hard, it was when we were up at Ashbury, Brother Herb was there, it wasn't his fault. But this hit me hard and I meditated over it a few times. Right in the middle of all that excellence, Paul says, when I became a man, I put away childish things. And people say, you see he wasn't bothering me with gifts and miracles. No, no, no, don't you, don't, don't say that. Everything that God makes is precious. But I'll tell you what, I believe there was a moment when Paul consciously entered into manhood spiritually. Like a boy that has a bar mitzvah in the Jewish faith, he becomes eligible for certain mamas when he, when he passed that thing. All right, in the case of the Apostle Paul, in the case of John, John says what? I write to you little children, I write to you young men, I write to you fathers. I don't think he's talking about them in the physical area, I believe he's talking about them in the spiritual area. There comes an area where a man, where a boy changes to manhood. I could take you to the track in the floor of a factory, where I was working, it was about five minutes to five in 1930. And I heard the voice of the Lord as clearly as those men did by the Galilean sea. I took my tape measure off my neck, I was cutting a suit in the tailor's factory. There were eight thousand people in it, there were Jews, I worked opposite the natives. The other man was a communist. The other man had been something, I don't know what, he was a drunken, a liar, and a dirty rascal. And I put my hands together there and I said, Lord I heard your voice and I make you a promise. I won't look back, I won't turn back. I don't know what it means, but I'm going right ahead. I applied to go to a Bible school. You can't work your way through Bible schools in England. I had money, I had a dollar and a half. And uh, I wrote to the school and I hope they'd say no. I just told them everything that I didn't think they should like about me, you know. And they said, come ahead, come ahead. That's about the worst news I ever got. It's about the only time I got really accepted fully. They said, come ahead brother, you're the kind of fellows we're after, that's all right, God will make a way. I got right to the end of my money. I went up on the second corridor one day. I'd left a broom or something there. And a big fellow came down, he says, hi Len, how are you? Oh sir, fine, fine. How are you enjoying this school? I said, uh fine. Are you coming back? Semester's nearly through, term will you say? I said, uh well, well he said, are you coming back? It's yes or no, isn't it? I said, uh well, it's no and yes. It's no because I have no money, it's yes because God will provide a way. Oh, is it money? Yeah, he says, I'll pay all your bills to leave school. I said, thank you sir, and I left him, in case he changed his mind. I just hurried down that corridor and I, boy you talk about leaping for joy. I said, hallelujah, hallelujah. I never traded on his generosity, I never bought any new clothes, I never ran a bill up, he just paid for my tuition in that school, right to the very last day I was there. I say that because again, he can do the same thing for you, if that's what, if that's God's way for you. All right, I'm going to deal with putting on my helmet of salvation next week, God willing. But I'm going to ask you this, while I think of it, I'm going to ask you to pray. I'm going to Dave Wilkerson's school for three days, first week in March, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, over the hedge to the, used to be a gappy forest, now it's Christian Communications, to teach there, then up near Oklahoma, between, not far from Oral Roberts, not far from the, well, it's the largest Nazarene college in the world, I think. So I'm hoping to set both places on fire, Oral Roberts' place and the Nazarene's. But anyhow, and we're going to have some preachers come there, so I'm asking you now to pray, that's all that matters, that you pray. I have an invitation to talk to a thousand to fifteen hundred Presbyterian preachers in August, which will be a great challenge. Now it doesn't make me a hero, I'm asking for your prayers, because I don't have anything in myself to do it, but God has. If he wanted someone else, he would have ordered them to go, but he lets me go. Then up to another place, just to the side of the Southwestern, was it Southwestern Seminary, at Fort Worth, in August. God has given me a tremendous burden for preachers and students, particularly. I feel this is a great year in America, I think it's going to be a fatal year. We'll be in a vastly different situation a year from now. Let me wind this up with this. I'm saying that right now, I believe that you could lift up your hands, if you could plug into the world and say it in a thousand religions, you could lift your hands up and cry, in the words of the scripture, walls to the inhabitants of the earth, for the devil is come down. I'm quite sure he's intensifying every power that he has to destroy the Church of Jesus Christ, in this hour in which we're living. I'm sure that before long, if the world perished ten years, most of us will be in concentration camps in this country. I can tell you why there's a million acres reserved for this very reason, and you won't be put there because you're mentally insane, you'll be put there because you won't bow to the government, because you won't trade with a plastic card, because you won't bear a sign that can be photographed now with a laser beam on your forehead and you can't see it. That all money will have been destroyed and credit cards only will be accepted. I'm going to tell you something else, I won't, it's a secret, but it's a terrifying thing. I said that it's, can I take five more minutes, okay? I said a few years ago, nobody accepted the devil as a person, they ridiculed him. And I remember reading a poem years and years ago, that said something like this, men don't believe in a devil now, as their fathers used to do. They forced the door of the broadest creed to let his majesty through. There isn't a print of his clothes and hood, or a dart from his fiery bow, to be found in the earth or air today, for the world has voted it so. Who is it mixing the fatal draught, or drought, draught, who is it mixing the fatal draught, that poises, let me say, who is it mixing the fatal draught that pulses heart and brain? Who fills the beer, you know you carry a dead corpse on the beer, who fills the beer of this passing year, with ten thousand thousand slaves? Who blights the bloom of the youth today, with a fiery breath of hell? If the devil isn't and never was, won't somebody rise and tell? Who does the steps of the toiling saints? Who digs the pit for his feet? Who sows the tares in the fields of time, wherever God sows his wheat? For the devil is voted not to be, and so the thing is true, but who is doing the kind of work the devil alone should do? We're told he doesn't go about like a roaring lion now, then who shall we hold responsible for the everlasting row, to be found in home and church and state, to earth's remotest bounds, if the devil by unanimous vote is nowhere to be found? Won't someone step to the front forthwith and make his bow and show how the crimes and frauds of a single day spring up we want to know? For the devil is voted not to be, so of course the devil's gone. We simple folk would like to know who carries his business on. Yes, he did things secretly. Yes, we know there was an occult system. I met an old man in the alliance who'd been on the roof of the world in 1914, just before 1914 he was in Tibet. He was known for casting out demons, and he had a tremendous ministry in it. He went to cast out demons, he climbed one of those icy mountains, and he went to cast out demons on a girl, and as he cast out the demons in her, said, listen leave us alone, we're only little demons. That man whose name I forget, we have a book on him somewhere, do you remember him? Christie, Christie of the alliance, do you remember old Christie? I heard him once, I'd have crossed the Atlantic, I heard that man pray for 10 minutes, I would cross the Atlantic to hear him pray, he's dead now. You talk about praying, I'll tell you where it was, it was in the opera house in Chicago, having a big mass meeting there. That old saint, he was blind, he felt for the thing like this, you know, and you know he opened heaven, the glory of God came down. I thought, I don't want to give power over demons. And you know the demons in that girl said, we're only little demons, and Christie said, where are the big ones? You know what they said audibly? The big ones have gone over the mountains to Europe to help in the war. Principalities and powers, the rulers of the darkness of this world, testifying unconsciously that they were agents of the devil, helping to engineer war, helping to confuse minds, helping to stir up enmity and hatred. Now we've got the great high priest of devilry in the country. This little woman, Vasilia Schling, do we sell a book, Persecution? I haven't seen it till yesterday, it was printed, she wrote it in 1973, it was printed in English in England in 1974, printed in this country the same time, I got it yesterday, but right on time. You see there's a priest, a great high priest, they call him the black pope, Anton Levy, Olivier, Lavey. He started the Satan movement, this is what he said, he substantiates his theses by referring to those of Walsh Hulks, that's the guy that started the Illuminati and all the rest of that junk. All right, he calls himself a practicing Satanist. Lavey drives a car with the license plate Satan 9, he has a black house in San Francisco with a ritual chamber for Satan, he has written the Satanic Bible. And on the next page it says, in Michigan at a bookstore near a colleague they sell 100 copies of the Satanic Bible for every one that they sell of our Bible. That's the influence that he had. The Satanic cults, I'll paint that, Lavey himself said that the Satanic age began in 1966 when the theologians said that God is dead and when sexual freedom league came into prominence and the hippies formed their free sex culture. From that point on Satan, Satanic cults have expanded in every major city in the United States. There were 450 priests ordained to the Satanic movement in 1971. In the same year 4,000 people gathered to worship the devil in Michigan. All right, here's the other thing. They have a takeoff of the Lord's Supper, the consecrated wavers are passed round and you're invited to become part of the body of the devil. During the cultic rituals incense was mixed with hashes and whiskey and other other alcoholic drinks were served instead of wine. And the most internal music provided the background for these vile scenes. Now for centuries Satan's policy has been to spread the belief that he doesn't exist but now today he's come out into the open. Anton Lavey, I call him the apostle of iniquity, has established this this church which he says is a Satan church. It's a counter to the churches we know it and it is registered as a religious body in America which means again it's tax-free. Now what does this man say about his goals? He says this, in his opinion Satanism will lead to totalitarian world government. In this police state the leaders would practice black magic, the weak members of society would be eliminated and Satanism made the state religion. It is no surprise to hear that Lavey has the appropriate flag in his chamber. Do you know what it is? The flag of the U.S.S.R. United States of Soviet Russia. Hanging, it hangs in his lower chamber. Furthermore books about Satanism are published by a communist press and sold in large bookstores on the west coast of America operated by the communist party. Now this is what this is the effect of Satanism. Communism in its various forms has already shown itself true with a grotesque wholesale slaughtering of a hundred and twenty million lives. But now Satanism is unmasking itself. Beneath the mask now we see what? Murder, carnage and sadism. Now listen to this, in Los Angeles a young lady, school teacher was murdered. When they found the corpse a heart was missing, her lungs were missing, other parts of her body were missing and they had been used by a documented statement here, they had been used in a sacramental ceremony, in a ceremonial sacrifice to the devil. In another case a 21 year old murderer told a criminal investigator, Satan is my master. So he cut off the victims and leg, legs and arms and then he ate the heart of the man he killed. He ate, he pulled it out living in blood and he ate the heart. Do you think how diabolical a person can become? Cut off his fingers, cut off the members of his body, ate his heart out of his flesh A week later when he was arrested in Salinas in California, he was in possession of a satanic Bible and he had the skeleton fingers of a man that he destroyed. In 1971 in New Jersey a young boy persuaded two other boys to kill him, murder him and destroy him because he said, I shall arise from the dead and I shall come back as a leader of a legion of demons. A young female Satanist who swears, she once saw the devil himself during a black ceremony, was convicted of manslaughter for stabbing a 60 year old man and she said, I enjoyed doing it and she said this while she was giving elaborate ritual in a prison cell in Miami. The Manson family declared that they practiced black magic and all that they did as you know made headlines. All right here's the last thing. The rise of the church of Satan is an unmistakable sign of the times we're living in. The days come when communism and Satanism are achieving their common goals. These are the goals, revolution, chaos, persecution of Christians, the takeover of world power, the formation of a world state, a world ministry system and a world government. And right now Mr Carter says, I want to normalize relations with China which liquidated 42 million Christians. I want to get a little closer to Russia with all its diabolical destruction of the church of Jesus Christ in that conflict, not totally destroyed. But you see the enemy has come in like a flood and you know what God says and here's our hope, against this flood of iniquity, this avalanche of devilry. Thank God for Wesley Finney. I get a lot of thrills out of them. They never faced public pornography. Wasn't it this week they voted in Miami whether to allow topless bathing there? Go down some streets and you're blessed if you go down some streets there in in San Antonio, these other cities where they have vile nude parlors and all the other devilry. With such a flood of pornographic literature and filthy films and everything else, the devil's having a whale of a time. And yet God has said this, and this is my hope. I'll tell you what, I have no hope in organized religion as such. Twenty-five years the big shot evangelists have had millions of money and they haven't moved this nation to God, not one of them. So God's going to do a new thing. As sure as my name is Leonard Rains he's going to do it. You know how I know? Because number one he said, when the enemy comes in like a flood, and he has never come in like a flood like he has today. But when the enemy comes in like a flood, the spirit of the living God, not something we organize, not something we work up, but something that God sends down. Something supernatural to counter that which is supernatural. But instead of just the supernatural, it's the super person himself, the Lord Jesus Christ in all his supremacy, who already has everything under his feet. We have to explore the possibilities of grace. And then finally, a word that cheered me up as I read it today. Oh they went through hell to get there, sure they did. What do you think God's going to do? Give us all a Rolls Royce and a mansion? Some of us may find the greatest times of prayer in jail. We may have the most exciting times, we're in the concentration camp up north that they've already got with a million acres. But not only have we the promise that when the enemy is coming like a flood, not only have we the promise that he is above all principalities and powers, we have another promise, they overcame him how? By the blood and the lamb and the word of their testimony. You know that rung a bell in me? I like choruses, I like hymns, but I'll tell you what, all the new choruses are about love and sweetness and blessing and hallelujah. There's a shocking diminishing of appreciation of the blood of Jesus Christ, most of the modern choruses. And you don't defeat the devil by singing or by organizing. There's one thing that terrifies the devil and that is the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son. Because by it Jesus destroyed principalities and he destroyed powers. Now he says I've made all the provision, what are you going to do? Are you going to put on the whole armor of God? Are you ready to start sweating? You've been singing long enough, you're going to start sweating? Do some fasting? Drawing some lines and saying to Satan you're not going to pass that line? You see Satan's got an awful lot of power. I sometimes wish I could have edged up to some of those men that prayed in the Old Testament. I'd like to have prayed with Daniel wouldn't you? Man that must have been something. You know he prayed and he didn't get an answer for three weeks and he didn't panic. He said it's all right God's got it all worked out. One day a beautiful person came to him and said hi. You know the very first day you prayed God heard you and I was coming back to tell you how things were going and I got a block in heaven. I met the Prince of Persia. He withstood me. What? You expect me to prevail where the Prince of Persia held up one of God's holy beings? He held me up for three weeks. But I got through to you and I want to tell you what God said. You know I kind of think if the prayers of Daniel could be held up for three weeks. Mine could be held up for three years the way I pray. I don't sweat and toil too much. I do sometimes. I cry and weep. I call on God. But you think of it as there are barriers in the heavens. You know maybe one day when you're praying God will tell you what the what the high priest of devilry is. What the demon is that hangs over San Antonio or the God of lust that hangs over Hollywood or the God of covetousness that hangs over Las Vegas or the God of confusion that has his headquarters right over the White House and all those other boys up there. That was the secret of revival in in in the in Argentina. The boy the man that our dear Paul has worked with for 10 years Miller. God showed him he says there's a there's a demon over this area and and you know what the scripture says? You don't grab a crusade and then pray. You first bind the strong man. That's why I say you pray for me six months ahead of now. Because if we get him tied up here it'll be easy there. If you leave me to sweat and toil and boil while I'm preaching man I it's had enough weight in people. Never mind shitting the devil. So you better get underway then put some weight behind it and pray and believe God and say Lord I'm believing you for victory in every one of those meetings. Where brother Adrian has a chance to pray to preach to preachers. This is our confidence. Our weapons are not carnal. You can't have a marvelous sword. You can't have a shield with diamonds. You can't make a helmet. But I'll tell you what we've got the blood of the lamb. The lion of the tribe of Gouda hath prepared. No man was found worthy to open the books. Oh that's a scripture. I told the students the other week there at Asbury. I said this is the most scaring scripture I think in the in the awesomeness of eternity. That no man was found worthy. And he said do you know what he said? There is nobody in heaven on the earth under the earth or in the sea. Now that's pretty good going. If you can find any place after that go. I don't want to go with you. Nobody in heaven. Nobody on the earth. No there was nobody found. And I wept. And you know that word weeping is the same word that Jesus wept over Jerusalem. It isn't somebody because they've got a broken finger. It's a man with a broken heart. Nobody can take the books out of the hand of him on the throne. The title deeds of the universe are there. And suddenly a voice said weep not. I wonder he didn't say that John jumped 3,000 miles in the air. Weep not the lion of the tribe of Gouda hath prevailed. And he takes the book out of the hand of him that sat upon the throne. And he's worthy. He's worthy. Let's see that we put on the whole armor. You pray as you've never prayed before for those children. You pray as you've never prayed. God showed me coming to the prayer meeting Wednesday night. I was coming down the road. I thought there won't be a crowd there. And the Lord said you know what I did. I put a star in the sky and people came thousands of miles because of the star. I'll put a star over your fellowship and people will come. I believe you'll do it if we obey him. That's a hymn that we love so much.