In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of taking advantage of the upcoming difficult times to grow spiritually and help others. He believes that American Christians are too comfortable and need to become more serious with God. The preacher also discusses the brutal treatment of captives and how it should serve as a wake-up call for Christians to prioritize prayer and sacrifice for the gospel. He urges the audience to redeem their time and avoid wasting it on trivial pursuits, emphasizing the need to bear fruit in their lives. The sermon concludes with a reminder that God will ultimately crush Satan and that believers should trust in Him for guidance and provision.

Alright, we're still in the 18th Psalm. We'll just review the last couple of verses here, starting with 27. You save the humble, Psalms 18, 27. You save the humble, but bring low those whose eyes are haughty. You know, we Americans, we've got a reputation through the world of being proud. And we are. You go to some of the third world countries, you'll see the difference. We really are stuck on ourselves. And I think that before this cultural clash is finished one way or the other, we're going to be brought down to the place where we realize we need God. But we can't do it ourselves. We boast of our military, we boast of our wealth, we boast of our education, we boast of all these things. But when you boil it right down, the Muslims are really better off than we are in a certain respect. In that they're fighting to spread their religion, but we're fighting to preserve our way of life, which includes Hollywood. I mean, there's a pretty big difference there. Now, wrong they are. We know Allah is not the God of heaven and earth, we know that. But nonetheless, in their heart, they feel they're pleasing God. And that we're all morally decadent. And that gives them a moral strength there. Fight to the end for their religion. Go to paradise and have 70 beautiful women around them. And what we're fighting is to save our right to promote moral filth. Come on. Come on. We want business as usual. And that in red hot. So, they don't think we have the stomach for a fight, a prolonged fight. They're counting on it. And we may not. I don't know. We started off the Vietnam War over there, over there. By the time that war dragged on, the servicemen were being despised. Because we didn't have the stomach. But they have the stomach for a fight. So, it does not behoove us to be proud, because we're going to get our comeuppance. I think we're going to get our comeuppance. And don't ever be hornswoggled into stereotyping Muslims or Arabs. Don't ever be drawn into that. The enemy is Satan. Not the people. If you knew them and were well acquainted with them, there's many of them that you would love and realize they're very fine people. So, we don't get sucked into that. But we just, God, what can you do? God has permitted this enemy in the history of Israel. Whenever Israel turned against the Lord, the first thing God did was raise up their enemies. It even happened in Solomon. David had the whole world conquered. And before Solomon was finished, God was raising up enemies, because Solomon was not serving the Lord. And so, we haven't been serving the Lord, so God is raising up enemies. It's as simple as that. And they're moved by spirits they don't understand. And we're moved by spirits we don't understand. And that's the history of the world. And in all that mess, God will bring forth a bride without spot or wrinkle. In all that mess, God will bring forth a perfect church. That's the way He does it. Praise the Lord. Reminds you the way they make potting soil, doesn't it? They let loose a whole bunch of worms in a pile of manure. And when those worms are through, they've got potting soil that you can sell at a profit. So, that's right. John's looking bewildered. That's one way to make potting soil, John. Exactly right. That's exactly right. Fertilizer brings forth good fruit. And that's the way the world is. And if everything was just lovely, we didn't have a care in the world, we would all be worthless for the kingdom. So, in the travail that's coming, you can really prosper and be fruitful and help other people. It's a golden opportunity. Because otherwise, American Christians are not going to listen to preaching about righteousness or anything of the kind. They're happy with their little thing they do. But now they're going to get serious with God. And it's a wonderful opportunity for God's kingdom to be built. If you look at that, you'll see how God is doing wonders. We don't like it. And as I mentioned this morning, I don't see any little children here. So, I'll tell you that the way they treat captives, as proven by their Russians, prisoners of war, the way the Afghans treated them was sometimes to cut their throat and sometimes to cut off their head. And when we see that on television, when we see American boys with their throats cut or decapitated, we're going to quit saying prayers and go to praying. Another thing too, Lloyd sent me stuff, Bill sent me stuff, Lisa sent stuff, and Merle C. Roy has sent me stuff, and I don't know which was which, but one of them said something very noteworthy. And this was by a soldier who had been in Afghanistan and now is advising the President. The President is calling in all these people with experience in Afghanistan, and he said, Whatever you do, don't send a woman into combat. Don't ever do that. Because the Afghans regard that as beyond belief that a man would put a woman into war. That's against their morals. It's against their scruples. It's against mine too. But personally, a woman in the infantry, but we're just liable to do that to protect the right of the woman to be bayoneted, have her throat cut and her head cut off. We're just liable to do that. But in so doing, we lose the support of the Northern Alliance of Muslims who are fighting the Taliban. They're not going to accept American women in the theater of war. Yes. Yeah, they would think we were cowards. Yes, they would think we were cowards to put a woman out there. And so you see, there are cultural problems here, and I hope our government listens to it, and not to the blather that goes on about how women are equal and all that, and have every right to have their throat cut if they want it. Because, you know, in the rights of people, and etc., and blah, blah, ad nauseam. We're proud, and it says here, you save the humble, but bring low those whose eyes are haughty. And when you get to these people and the way they live in their little corrugated tin enclosures, in the freezing cold of winter, with so little food, age span in the middle 40s, because of malnutrition, these are not proud people. But they're fighters. And the kids at 12 years old are already in the army. They're fighters. They're shooting guns in combat when they're 12 years old. Now you picture our children at 12, are in the, let's see, you're 10 years old in the 5th grade, so I put you in the 7th grade, and your big problem in life is, will your mother let you go to the prom in your miniskirt? I mean, that's a big issue. My mother won't let me go, and all the kids are going, and they're all there. And here in another culture, they're carrying rifles. People, we have no occasion to be proud. We've got a lot to learn. And we can learn it, and we can profit from it. You save the humble. God loves the poor. James tells us that. The kingdom is for the poor. God loves the poor. Jesus said the gospel is for the poor. We say, well, that certainly doesn't mean poor in money. It must mean poor in spirit. You know, oh Lord. You, oh Lord, keep my lamp burning. God is going to keep your lamp burning. He isn't talking about lighting up his palace. He's talking about the strength of his life. And when you get into, now hear me. When you get into situations in which you're in peril of your life, you're going to find there's a life force in you that you have to fight to keep yourself vibrant. You have to fight to keep yourself on top of things. You have to have strength. It comes out of your stomach. That's why they say, do you have the stomach for a fight? You've just got to fortify your knees and take a few deep breaths and go on. Go on. Don't quit and lay down and start crying. You fight. You know, all creatures of God have an instinct to fight. And it's something, sometimes you'll see, I remember one time, there was somehow a baby gopher snake got upstairs on the second floor of our house. Carol and the kids were up there, and they were screaming and yelling. And I went up there, and it was a baby gopher snake, and it was about that long. And he got under one of the bookcases, and I reached down and I got him. I thought I was close enough to his head. I thought I had him by the neck, but I didn't have it up to his head near enough. And he whirled around, sunk his fangs in my hand. Well, it didn't hurt all that big on a little baby snake. So we got him in a box, and I took him outside, and I put him by a gopher hole. See, I thought, how neat, you know? Solved two problems at once. And you know, that little cuss, he'd come after me. I mean, this long. And he or she, I'm not really into snakes that much, but he or she, unisex or whatever, came after me. And I mean, he wouldn't stop. I picked up a rake, and I'm holding the rake like this. This little thing is chasing me. I could have killed him with the rake, but I mean, that was admirable. I had a banty rooster. When we lived in Poway, we had some chickens, and we had a banty rooster. He'd take on anybody. I don't care who you were or how you were armed. He'd take you on. And there's a lot of fight. You know, they talk about a cornered rat. And so, we're going to need that. We're going to need to just hang tough, no matter whether we're freezing cold or sick. A lot of soldiers have had to go into combat when they were vomiting, when they were freezing cold, when they were in a foxhole with freezing water up to their waist, and keep on going. That's why they train the SEALs like they do. Well, we're soft as a people, aren't we? But those people in Afghanistan are not soft. So we just need to not be so proud and recognize and be ready, like David said. David was a man of war, wasn't he? He was always fighting. He was a military man. And he fought until they nearly killed him, and his soldiers wouldn't let him fight anymore. They said, you're the lamp of Israel. You're worth a thousand of us. You don't fight anymore. One of his soldiers had to rescue him. He was about ready to be killed. You, O Lord, keep my lamp burning. My God, turns my darkness into light. And if times of oppression come, if we're hearing over the television that we're being driven back, or Russia and China have joined with them, and they're sending out nuclear submarines into the Pacific and the Atlantic, see, that's what I'm afraid of, that this is a trap. See, this whole thing may be orchestrated from Libya or somewhere over the last ten years. We'll just get the United States in a war of attrition, and when they're weak enough, then we'll jump on them. We'll defy the spoils. That's the way they operate at high levels of government. I'm afraid it's a trap. And I wish they'd keep out of there. We can't fight in the Kush anyway in the winter. You can't do that. Talk about ground troops is nonsense. You can't put American men in there. The Afghanistans can hardly stand the cold and the altitude. We couldn't even hike up there. We couldn't breathe. You freeze to death. Talk of putting ground troops in there is absolutely nuts. But you see, they're reacting to public opinion. Do something, do something, do something. Malcolm? When I was in the Army, they sent us to Minnesota in the winter to train. And after two weeks of combat training, the commandant said, if we ever went to war in the winter, we're in big trouble. Sure. The Afghans can hardly stand that. It's a terrible climate. Imagine American infantrymen up there. So, it's in these times and you're hearing this on television. It looks like we're being whipped. I can remember when Hitler was so successful with his pocket battleships and with his Messerschmitts and with Blitzkrieg. It all sounded like he was going to win. He came very close, very close to licking England. And that's why Franklin E. Roosevelt suckered the Japs into attacking us, which in turn caused the Americans to get all patriotic and it saved England from certain defeat. That and Hitler watching his astrologers who told him he could go into Russia and his generals were saying, you're crazy to go into two fronts, but he did. So that was the end of him. But I can remember as a boy, I remember when December 7th came at Pearl Harbor and I was going downstairs. We had a furnace downstairs and it was my job to shovel coal. It was a coal furnace. This was in Connecticut. And to take care of the ashes. Well, I was going downstairs, I can remember, and it came over the radio about that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. And then that was a Sunday. And then Monday we all were in the high school assembling to listen to Franklin E. Roosevelt tell us that we were at war with Japan and to take the vote of the Congress. And everybody voted in favor of going to war against the Japanese, except a Congresswoman from one of the New England states. She was against war regardless and she was the only one that did not vote in favor of going to war. This was after we had been bombed. Well then as you track the war you could see how Europe was just falling before Hitler and you got the feeling, what if he wins? In your generation, you've never experienced that. But you see, other countries have. Germany's been defeated twice. See, they know that. France knows what that's like. England knows what it's like to come close to extinction. Close to slavery. And that fear was in the United States. You know, what if they win? We've never experienced that. Your generation has never experienced that. Wasn't there a short time of fear with the Cuban Missile Crisis when you said we might actually go to nuclear war? Yes, I remember that too. I was teaching in Rochester, New York up in the Kodak area and we would have, and I can remember when John F. Kennedy was being put to the test. It was John F. Kennedy that was put to the test, that decided not to knuckle under. And he was, because they were going to, the Russians were moving in heavy armament into Cuba and John F. Kennedy had to make a decision. Go to war with Russia and stop that stuff coming in or just let it come in and not risk a nuclear war. And fortunately for us, he had the stomach but we didn't know. And I was teaching in fifth grade at the time, school number seven in Rochester, New York and we would have drills where we would go down into the basement and we would all be standing down there for half an hour drills. So yes, there was a time there when we were right on the edge of war and John F. Kennedy decided to gamble and he told them, get them out of there or we're going for it. And so Russia backed down. But for the most part, we have not, most of you probably have not experienced that. You don't know what that's like to really wonder if the United States could really be defeated and you would end up as a slave. Like when the Japanese invaded China, for example. It was terrible, terrible. They came in, they would come into a house, take the baby and bash his brains out against the fireplace. Oh yeah. When the Japanese invaded China in the late 30's and the Christians afterwards were saying, you told us we wouldn't be here. They were there alright. And so, we're not used to this. This is new for us and we're in a very dangerous war here and I think for myself they did the wrong thing. My idea was build up the Afghans, go over there, give them food, give them clothing, build up a thing and don't mess around with anything until the spring. Just leave it and show the Arab world we're not fighting them. And kind of let nature take its course, but they may see reasons why this is not practical. I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm trying to get you prepared to hang tough no matter what happens. No matter what comes over the television. Be like that snake, like that gopher snake. I'll fight you, I don't care if you're 20 times as big as I am with a rake in your hand. I'm after you, buster. See, that's what any military Bill, where's Bill? He studied war. Lloyd studied war. Any person who studied in a war college will tell you that that attitude is more important than weapons and everything else. The will to win. The will to win. With the Japanese, you know they would attack our tanks with swords. Just hacking away at a tank with their swords because they had such a will to win. But because of the atom bomb, we won. And because they were so surprised at their success at Pearl Harbor, they didn't follow it through. They were astonished at what they had accomplished. But they had a will to win. They had a will to send out suicide pilots. They had a will to win. And they know, students of war, know that that's the number one factor. It's the will to win. So the United States could have all the money, all the weapons, who's got what guns, you know. We could have all of that, but if we don't have the character, the will to fight against heavy odds and to stay in there like Churchill said, what was that famous speech he made when the Germans were getting ready to invade England and he said it's England's finest hour and we're going to fight you from every field and every ditch and every hamlet. And here the old guys were out with pitch forks and old weapons that were from World War One and every Englishman was going to defend England. He said this is England's finest hour and we're going to fight you right to the last man. That will to win like that. We need that. We've got to have it. We don't want to take the attitude of the English. They had liberals among them 40 years ago saying well, better red than dead. We better let the communists give them what they want. Better that than being dead. See, that isn't necessarily so. You might be better dead. But the nation that has the will to win will win unless God intervenes. It's also a military strategy that after you have the will to win and all of this, there still is an element in there that it can go either way depending on chance. Seeming chance. There's factors that enter in that no one could imagine that turn the tide of war. But if you don't have a will to fight you know, I'll tell you this, this is true of the Christian life. Many times when I've been teaching the overcoming life, people will say, well, I can't do that. It frightens me. You'll never make it as an overcomer if you can be frightened. You've got to have a will to overcome. You've got to have a will to face Satan. The idea you can do what you want, but I am in here for the duration. I'm going to overcome. I'm going to win. If you don't have it, you'll never be an overcomer. Satan will scare you. Threaten you. Do something. Tempt you. And you'll go down. I like one of my favorite verses is Romans 16. 20. We need to get this down in our viscera. Viscera is a fancy word for guts. Viscera. That's a good word. V-I-S-C-E-R-A. Yes. It's not pronounced viscera. Viscera. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. Now, you've got to put yourself back in Paul's condition. Paul spent a great deal of his latter years in prison in danger of his life. He did not preach in comfortable surroundings and nice churches and traveling around and booking concert tours. He was in danger of his life a good deal of the time, but that fight was there. That light was there. God is going to crush Satan under your feet shortly. Don't worry about it, guys. We're on the winning side. That was in the apostle Paul. He never quit. And yet, he was a prisoner a good deal of the time. Brought before Nero more than once. Terrific oppression brought into that castle of that crazy man. My God turns my darkness into light. If it gets dark, go to the 18th Psalm. If it gets spiritually dark, go to the 18th Psalm. God will turn your darkness into light. He'll do it. Don't hide under the bed. Pray. Not always to pray and not to faint. Stand up on your hind legs. Remember that little gopher snake. Go for it. You can do it. The will to win. Very important. Mary Brown can tell you that the will to live is very important in people that are dying. Isn't that so, Mary? The will to live will keep people alive. One time, Admiral Rickover was in the hospital dying. And it came over the radio and he heard it that he was in the hospital dying. And he reached out and got one of his shoes and threw it across the room and broke the radio. The will to live is important. It's the difference between life and death when you're mortally ill. It's that will. The nurses will say, fight! You know, fight! Fight! And you can bring yourself through that way. You bet. With your help, I can advance against a troop. One person. I can advance against a troop, Lord, with your help. But without His help, we can have all the military resource we want. We're going to get messed up. There'll be sand in the gears. We've got to have God. We cannot trust in our military as wonderful and devoted people as they are. The battle is the Lord's. The battle is the Lord's. And the only thing that's going to save the United States is a turn back to morality. Nothing else will do it. Our only hope is for God's people to turn back to morality. And when we do, the world will see this and they'll glorify God. But if we're talking about grace, heaven, rapture, there's no morality in that whatever. There's just a lot of religious stuff that people wave that out and say they're crazy. They think they're flying up in the air. They need to see honesty, uprightness, moral purity. I don't do drugs. I don't drink. I don't smoke. I don't swear. You're different. Yes, I fear God. God will help you. God has helped me. That's what America's got to hear, people. Nothing else is going to work. No, I don't listen to late night shows. I don't listen to that filth. I don't have anything to do with it. No, I don't watch pornography. No, I don't think it's all a big joke. I think it's serious. I fear God and I'm going to serve God. You do that and people will follow you. They'll follow you. They don't know what they're doing. With my God, I can scale a wall. Go right up. I don't know why they do that in the service. If they do that in the Marine Corps, maybe Chief or Bill knows. One of the big trainings is scaling walls and I've never seen anyone have a need for that. It must be vestigial or something that at one time meant something. They're forever training you to scale walls. Well, it's good exercises. I don't know how practical it is in a computer age, but they still do it, I guess. Do they still do that, Bill? Oh, yes. They still scale walls. As for God, His way is perfect. Now, there's going to be times in your life when you think God has blown it or has forgotten it or something. Remember, God is perfect. You may see things go wrong with your life. I love what David Wagner said and it was so true. It was so true. And of all the times when he's right there in the presence of his brother there, he said, what did he say? Somehow I knew it was right or somehow it made sense. And when I heard it, you know, it gives you two parts to your brain. I knew it was God's will. I didn't like it, yet I knew it was God's will. You ever get into that kind of a situation? I know it was God's will to take part. I know that. But yet, we hated it so much. He was such a strength to all of us. And such an example to the young people, but yet it was God. Well, that's the way you've got to run your life. I mean, things may go nuts. You know, all of a sudden your wife dies, your husband's died, one of your kids gets sick or something. As for God, His way is perfect. Just make sure that you're praying that the devil didn't get one in between the cracks because you were careless or foolish. Stay serious. Prayed up. And as for God, His work in your life will be perfect whether you understand it or not. How many know that's true? I found it true. His work is perfect. Sometimes we don't understand it at the time, but later we see that He was right. The word of the Lord is flawless. You know, I know more about being a writer, and I've written a great deal. If you've ever looked at the library on our site, you know that there's a lot of stuff there. But there's something about the Bible that's different. God has put His seal on the Bible. Every word like Jesus said, not one jot, not one tittle, talking about Hebrew vowel points and things, will pass until heaven and earth will pass, but these will not pass. You know, what a thing that is. The word is perfect. Now, when you stop and think back about the book of Numbers, every time I come to that, I read the Bible through about once a year. I don't know how long it takes, but I keep going until I finish Revelation. I start at Genesis. I read three pages a day and keep doing this. I've been through it a lot of times. And I dread coming to Numbers. Does anybody know why? Because you can go through three pages and all you saw was this and that and this person and that person. Everything names you can't pronounce. But you know what? Those words are flawless. It's all perfect. Heaven and earth. One of these geeks back in Numbers, this one always amuses me. His name is Bunny. B-U-N-N-I. Bunny. You're reading now these heavy Hebrew names and you come to Bunny. One kind guy was Bunny. And then some parents had a great brainstorm and they evidently had twins and they call one Huz and one Buzz. I mean, Huz and Buzz. Really? Heaven and earth shall pass away, but not Huz and Buzz. They're in there forever. Huz and Buzz and Bunny. They're in there forever, people. There's something about this book. And God put that same kind of anointing on the apostles that it became what is called technically the plenary verbal inspiration. That means it's full verbally inspired. The Word of the Lord is flawless. He is a shield. I pray that sometimes around my family. God put a protection around that. Do you do that for your loved ones? Put a shield around us, Lord. God hears that and He does it. Ask God to bring the angels into your home so when you're absent, the angels are there. God will answer prayer. We have not because we ask not. But ask God to be on your property. Make it holy. God, if there's anything unholy on you, get rid of it. I don't want it. I don't want anything unclean on my property or in my house. Whatever. Are you praying that all the time? Do it. God will answer prayer. Your home will be holy. Holy. Protection. God's protection on your house and on your loved ones. He is a shield for all who take refuge in Him. Now, that's the problem with our nation right now. The temptation is to try to find refuge in something that we can see. Some material thing. But God is our refuge. Not dying. God is our refuge. Not going to heaven. God is our refuge. Not getting under the bed. God is our refuge. How many of you get under the bed when you're scared? Grace, did you raise your hand? No. I thought you raised your hand. Don't get under the bed. Pray. God! Where are you? Lord! It's dark. The enemy's around you. Lord! And as I've told you many times, and this is going to be... I've been saying this for two or three years. Don't let dread dwell in your house. You see, if you're facing something like a biopsy or a lawsuit or a sick youngster or something like that, you've got two problems. One is the actual condition, and the other one is the dread that comes into your home. You get up in the morning and you're thinking, man, I've got six more days to wait to find out if this thing is going to be positive or negative. Or, how's this suit going to go? And what's the maximum amount that can be allowed? Is it more than my insurance? I know, I'm speaking from experience. I had this happen. You know, you're always thinking, is it going to be over my insurance? And what happens is it fills your house with dread. Two problems. One, you might not be able to do anything about, like the biopsy. But the other one, God will hear you if you say, Lord, I'm not going to have dread and fear in my home. I'm not going to have it in my home. You promised me peace, I'm going to have peace in my home. And hang in there and fight it until it leaves. You do not have to have dread and gloom in your home. Whether anyone's sick or not, you don't. That's enough of a problem without also getting up and feeling terrible and dark and everything else is wrong. You don't have to have it. And if you have it, it's your choice. But you need not have that. God will get that out of your house. It's evil. It's a force of evil. Come to crush you and to discourage you and make you feel bad. That's all it is. You don't have to have it. Any question about that? That's going to be important, isn't it, in the days to come? It's going to be important that you don't let dread into your home. Because God can turn things around at the last minute. He is a shield for all who take refuge in Him. See, this is David the warrior. This is his prayer. For who is God besides the Lord? No one. Allah is not God. The Hindu gods are not God. We're the only ones that got the right God. And He's greater than the other gods. And the other reason we get in trouble is because we don't do His will. When you're doing His will, you're on the side of victory. Regardless of what the rest of the nation does. We got the right God. Look at all those millions of Muslims. They got the wrong God. They're willing to lay down their life for the wrong God. Are we willing to lay down our life for the right God? They're dedicated to fight to death. They're wondering, well, now let's see. If I take up my cross and follow Christ, maybe that means I won't get to own my own house, and I won't get the husband I want, and I won't get the wife I want, and I wonder if I'll get the job I want. And I wonder. They don't have any wonderments like that. They stick a rifle in their hand and say, son, defend your country. Your older brother died from the Russians. And now it's your turn to fight. They don't have to worry about all these things. They're ready to lay down their life for what they believe. That wins. That attitude will win in life. But doesn't Jesus ask us to do the same thing? Doesn't He say, hate your own life? Doesn't He say, if you lose your life for My sake and the Gospels, you'll gain it? You see, the difference between the Muslims and us is, they're living their religion and we're not. Because we're told the same thing. Lay down your life for the Gospel. Now, how many Christians are doing that in America? How many Christians in America are doing that? No, they're watching the late, late show. They're watching all this garbage. Well, you know, everybody's doing it. It must be alright. This is scriptural. It says redeem the time. Because the days are evil. How many here are redeeming the time? Do you know what it means to redeem the time? It means not to waste it. Are you doing things to waste time? Personally, I'm a man of many hobbies. I've got many interests and many hobbies. And boy, I could waste time so I wouldn't quit. Doing all kinds of interesting things. You don't get bare fruit that way. I used to teach a class of gifted children. It was a split four-five in Rochester. School number one in Rochester. Gifted kids. Oh, Lord, were they gifted. A lot of them were Jewish. And do you know what their problem was? It was a problem of all gifted kids. What? They start a bunch of stuff and they don't finish it. And that's right. You see their desks. They couldn't even close them. Because they had this and this and this on their desk. I finally gave a talking to one day. I love to work with gifted kids. I just love that. I told them about thinning corn. You don't have to do this in Iowa. They don't understand this in Iowa. But in California, they understand this. You have to go through when the cobs start coming out and you have to go through and pull off every ear except two of every stalk. You just go through and yank them off. And then it becomes silage. You can feed it to the pigs or the cows or whatever. But you can't leave it on that stalk. Why is that? I've done that. The two that are left will be decent ears. You leave maybe six or eight on there and they'll all be run ears. You won't get a decent ear out of it. Because we don't get enough rain. Now back in Iowa, no problem. There's plenty of rain. You can get every ear of corn off that stalk that will grow. But you do not do that here in Southern California. And so I told that one day to those gifted kids. I said, look, you're not going to bring forth any good ear at all. You start this, you start that, you start the next thing. You're not bringing forth any fruit to perfection. You're not bringing forth anything. You're not finishing the job on anything. So narrow your activities down. Get rid of the extra activities and concentrate on a couple and finish them. Well, these are bright kids and they got a hold of that and they did that. Well, how about you? You've got a lot of stuff going that really isn't necessary. Sometimes God will do just that with us. He just strips off the stuff that's not really necessary. And we scream like 60. I imagine like those stalks do. Ouch! Ouch! Oh, I love that one! Ouch! Ouch! Ouch! That's me! You're pulling things off. You might find one of these days that God's going to remove a few of those ears that are growing that are good, but they're not the best. Redeem the time. Watch what you're doing and ask yourself, is this really doing the job for the kingdom that's necessary at this time? I've had to do that. I've got my vacation in heaven, I'm telling you. At all kinds of things. I intend to study piano under Bach. And it would be nice if Chopin made it, but reading his life, I doubt it seriously. So, I'm going to have to settle for Johann Sebastian Bach because he was a godly man. And Beethoven was a godly man too. And that would be a pretty good piano instructor. Or have an angel or something. I am going to spend time getting to learn to play the piano right. Do you have things you'd like to do? I know when Peter Marshall died, his wife saw him in the spirit realm a couple weeks later. You remember what he was doing? He was working in the garden. He loved to do that. Here he was in the spirit realm. She saw him, Catherine saw him working in the garden. He was just enjoying himself. I've got stuff I want to do. Well, I can't spend an hour a day practicing the piano now. I can't do that and do the Lord's work. A whole bunch of other stuff. I'd love to master Hebrew. I can't do that. There's not time for it. One thing. You bring forth one fruit to perfection. So, I spend all my time on one thing. So much so sometimes I walk out and I'm astonished at the world. I look at it. There's a sky up there. Trees. Well, you sit in front of a computer day in and day out, hour after hour after hour. You walk outside and it looks strange. But that's how you get something done. You make your time count. You don't spend time doing stuff that isn't going anywhere. I hear of Christians playing golf. I hear of pastors playing golf. And a lot of these guys are neat guys. Don't misunderstand me. A lot of them are young and they're giving their lives for the gospel and they're working a job and down to the church too by vocational people. I'm not downing them for one second. But they're out playing golf. Golf. Golf. Golf, I'm ashamed to say, is a scotch game. It's probably because the ball is economical. I don't know what it is. Very economical game. But I think here the world is dying. I mean, there are nations of people who have never heard the gospel. I mean, these little nations, you know, not the major ones. And people are playing golf. I have a hard time with that, people. I tell you, I have a hard time with that. Christians playing golf, honestly. Hell, I imagine you play golf. I don't know. The way you're looking at me now, I expect you play golf. He didn't do it. And if you play golf, for heaven's sake, enjoy yourself while you're doing it. You can go up there to Lawrence Welk. They have people dying up there all the time. These old duffers, you know, they get up there and they're playing golf and they drop over dead and the rest of them keep playing. They call 911 and the fire department comes and takes them away. What a life. Redeem the time. Make your life count. Don't try to get all the ears going. Just get it down to where you're doing something. Focus on it. Pray till you find out what you're supposed to focus on. And don't get yourself spread so thin you don't bring forth anything to perfection. Who is God beside the Lord? There is no God. The only God there is is our God. And we're up against religious people, but we've got the God who loves them too, but they can't see us because we do nutty things like sending women into combat and protecting a thing like Hollywood and sexual perversion and abortion and everything else and they can't understand what business we've got living on the earth. It's because we're immoral. And it's a religious based opponent we've got. And yet we've got the true God. Whoa, put that one together. Who is the rock except our God? We're going to need that. We're going to need something under our feet that is solid because there will be panics, Bill. If something happens and the president has to close the banks there's going to be panics, Bill. Where will I get milk for my children? And start screaming and going around, what if we run out of food? What if we have no electricity? What if we have no water? Well, before you do that, why don't you just stop and say, no, wait a minute. Father, you're my rock. Now just show me what to do. Cut the panic and just show me what to do. You love my children more than I do. Just show me what to do. And you'll find that God will give you wisdom. I told you about those East Russians and I heard this from the son of one of them who the white Russians white Russians, I didn't mean Eastern Russians, white Russians you know, there's a white Russians and red Russians where the white Russians had to get out of Russia and they went all, this group went all the way across Russia talking in tongues because they didn't know who to trust. And they were fleeing. They started off in the western part of Russia and they were going toward China. And they didn't know who to trust, so they were living by talking in tongues. A group of Pentecostal Russians. When the communists were taken over and we heard this, we were in the Fremont Assembly of God, Audrey and me and we heard this from the son of one of the people that, they finally ended up in the Philippines and then they went to South America. But this boy now is doing Christian radio broadcasting working on antennas and stuff. But anyway, he was telling it first hand from his parents. So they got all the way across Russia to the border of China and they were there was guards there was guards patrolling. Guards with dogs patrolling the border. And so God was advising them not to move, not to move, not to move. And he was creating food in their stomach. So one stormy night the Lord said now. So they all filed out and went across the border into China. Which in that part of China is all sand. And they had just gone a short distance and here came the guard with the dog. The dog didn't smell them and the guard didn't see them. And so they just kept going and they began to get very very thirsty. And one of the elders got down and started digging in the sand. Water sprang up in the sand. God can do these things when he has to. Then they by a miracle they went south and were able to get on a boat to the Philippines. And then from the Philippines they went to South America. And he told this story. But they went across Russia not knowing who they could trust. Talking in tongues and getting the interpretation and the Lord telling them who they could trust and who they couldn't trust. And that's an actual thing that happened. And there are so many accounts like that. But this would impress me because I knew it wasn't something made up for religion. This was a guy whose parents had experienced this. So God will take care of us. But we won't be proud in that day and say well we're American. We've got money. We've got water. We've got food. We've got shelter. We've got this that and the other. It'll be when we don't have them. Who is the rock? Who can be counted on not to be shaken? Who's there when we need him? We say to people, I'll be there for you. Well God is there for us. And He can't be shaken. And if we're shaken it's because we've got our eyes off Jesus and onto the circumstances. We keep our eyes on Jesus we're not going to be shaken. God is a rock and He's under there. It is God who arms me with strength. We sang that this morning. Stan had two songs going there about strength. I noticed he always does that when the Spirit is getting ready to emphasize this. God arms us with strength that we don't have. Do you remember Elijah was up on top of Mount Carmel and there was a sound of abundance of rain. He's an old guy. And so he said to Ahab, get down, get down because there's going to be a flood here. So Ahab gets in his chariot and they start down. Well they can move along at a pretty good clip. But Elijah was on foot in front of the chariots. Running. God can do that. We're not helpless. We don't have to despair no matter what happens. He arms me with strength. He makes my feet like the feet of a deer. He enables me to stand on the heights. God wants us in the heights up praising, worshipping Him, dancing though the world is in flames. Because otherwise we're not going to be able to help other people. If we go down in fear, we're not going to be able to help other people. We've got to be so ahold of God that when people see us, they're strengthened. When they hear our words, they're strengthened. We've got to communicate strength to people. It isn't going to come from our money. It's got to come from God. God is the one who will decide the battle. My arms can bend a bow of bronze, David said. A bronze bow. I've never seen anything like that. Boy, you'd have to be awfully strong. You give me your shield of victory. And your right hand sustains me. You stoop down to make me great. You know, things like this are nice in times of peace. But when they really work is when you're in trouble. When they really work is when you're down. That's when this book comes alive. And it will come alive for you. You have nothing to fear. As long as you're into God. If you take the gospel lightly, if you don't lay down your life, you have something to fear. Because our nation is in peril. Our way of life is in peril. But if you stay steadfast in God, if you really live it, you think we'd ever end up with a church full of 100% disciples? It's possible. But that would be some church, wouldn't it? Everyone in it has laid down his life. And is following Jesus. Now, Audrey spoke tonight about the opportunity for the young people to go as missionaries. We haven't always had that. You know, well, go to Life Bible College for four years and then we'll consider it. And the Foursquare is saying they want to think out of the box. They've been talking like this now for a year. They want to think out of the box. I don't think they knew war was coming. We're really going to be out of the box now. And so what they're saying is give us your young people. Work with us. We'll put down $300 a month for this person. They'll match it with $300 and we'll send them off before they go to Life Bible College is what it sounds like to me. So, guys that want to minister, we've got several young people in here that are ready to go to the nations. We've got to rethink that one because that presents a romantic picture out here. And when you go, you're going to find out it's a lot of grungy people that don't want you there. We need to think more realistically about this going to the nations. There was one lady, she was about 55 years old, 55, 60, and the Lord told her to go to Africa. No money or a thing. This is a true story now. And so she went down, the time came and no ticket, so she went down there to the train station and someone handed her a ticket. She is right in the Lord. And she went over there all by herself without any backing or anything. Got off the boat or train or whatever she was on, bus or whatever. Sat under a tree with her Sunday school materials and a couple of kids gathered around and she started to teach Sunday school. Pretty soon she had a work going. Because God was with her. God can do those kind of things. You may have to learn to eat snails and things. I remember Brother Dow used to tell us about one fellow who was a missionary to China who learned to eat snails. Snails, lizards, and everything else. I'm talking about going to the nations. And the first thing you get is diarrhea. Of course, you get the change in the water. After you get over that, by that time your romantic ideas are gone and everyone's hostile and they're glaring at you. And you, American, get out of here and say, I'm going to the nations. You've got to think about it more realistically. You've got to lay down your life. Say, I'm laying down my life, Jesus. I'm going to go. Lead me a step at a time. Lead me one step at a time. You know, God can do such miraculous things. One time Audrey and I were over in Copenhagen. Denmark. Denmark. If you could believe this. We got off the airport shuttle. We didn't know where we were going to stay. Of course, we didn't know the language. We didn't know where we were going to stay or anything. Why did we go there? I can't even remember why we went there. But anyway, here we were in Denmark. We got off the bus and there was a lady standing there looking at us. You know, how did it go? What did she say? She said, aren't you Dr. Thompson? Yeah. Whoa! Copenhagen, Denmark. Aren't you Dr. Thompson? You may not believe that, but I'm here to tell you that happened. I may lie, but you know Audrey would never lie. We got off the bus. Aren't you Dr. Thompson? We couldn't go around. The people couldn't speak English or anything. But this lady guided us around very nicely. We got in a nice room in a hotel and everything was fine. Now, God can do those things. And if you have a heart for the nations and you feel God is calling you, then what do you do? Go to God. Where? When? Lord, lead me. And He'll lead you one step at a time. He might tell you to go learn Arabic. You know, one of the big problems with our State Department and our intelligence services, they don't have anybody who can speak Arabic. It was in the paper that one of the people there that works in the CIA or it was the CIA said we don't have any agents. He said they don't want to go over there in Afghanistan. They don't want to learn Arabic and they don't want to be there where there are no girls. That's our foreign service. This was a guy that resigned from the CIA. He said they're all desk bound. They want a desk job in Virginia at the CIA headquarters, but none of them want to go to Afghanistan because of the food and the climate and there's no women. That's the shape we're in. You know, the CIA and the FBI are really under congressional scrutiny because they have really blown it big time. No one wants to go on to be a field officer. They need people who can speak Arabic. The Arabs can speak English, but we can't speak Arabic. Now English is supposed to be a very difficult language to learn. It's not one of the easy languages in the world to learn like Spanish. Spanish, so simple, it's ridiculous. But English is a difficult language. I don't know about Arabic. I know Hebrew is. I know Chinese is. But the Latin languages, most of them are Italian and Spanish are fairly easy to learn. But English is not an easy... And here's all these Arabs speaking English. And we don't have anybody in our intelligence services that speaks Arabic. And yet this has been a threat for several years. Now these Arabs need God. And it wasn't too long ago, I think about six months to a year ago, that God moved in an Arab village. And several Arabs got up the next day and began to tell each other they'd all had the same dream about Jesus. And it was Bill Bright, I think, that told that story. God can speak to the Arabs. If He's got people that He can use that'll go there, that He sends, God could convert whole nations of Arabs. Burma one time, the whole country was converted. I mean, people were being baptized by the thousands in Burma. I don't know what it's called now, they've changed the name of it, but it's on the border of Nagaland. Do you know, Benny, what Burma's called now? What? What? Myanmar. Something like that. But it used to be Burma. But there's been times when God has moved down an entire nation. You know, God loves these Arab people. He loves these people. And they're worshiping a false god. And it may be there's someone in this very room that God wants to use as an apostle, male or female. Male or female. It'd be a bigger miracle if it was a woman. But if she went in enough power and people started getting healed, they wouldn't be worrying too much about their veils. Because if women would be bringing their children. Now, God can do that with power. And God might have it in mind for someone in this room to be an apostle to the Arabs. And when you say, I want to go, I want to go down to Greg Niemeyer and have him send me right out to Baja, California. And God might say, I want you to study Arabic. You realize how many people in the world speak that language? People of feels are white on the hardest. But we don't rush out. We've been trained for 25 years. Listen. Let Jesus do it. But don't go to sleep in the meantime. Be ready. Are all of you in here that are comfortably ensconced with your nice income and your IRA plan and all the rest of it, are you ready to drop it all if God says, go and study Arabic? Are you ready? If not, you're not living as a disciple. At all. Don't kid yourself. We're just playing church. You've got to be living, ready. Audrey and I are ready to go. We're ready to go. You say, you're so old you die before you get there. Well, that may be. But our heart's right. We're ready to go. There's nothing Audrey would love better than to go with the poorest people on the face of the earth. That's where her heart is. She'd love to go and live with the poor and feed them and help them and everything. That's where her heart is. We're ready to go. How about you? Are you ready to go? Shall we stand? Just remember the 18th Psalm. God can do that for you in the middle of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Sudan. He can make you run through a troop and leap over a wall.