In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the need for the Holy Spirit's power in the face of the challenges and trials of life. He highlights the limitations of human reasoning and the importance of relying on Christ to navigate through storms, fires, and difficult situations. The speaker also expresses his brokenness for the state of America, where violence and the rejection of God are prevalent. He shares his personal testimony of being delivered from fear and panic attacks by the power of God, and encourages others to trust in Jesus for their own deliverance. The sermon references the story of Isaiah being called by God and the account of Peter and the early church facing threats to their testimony.

Good morning, Times Square Church. God bless you this morning. We trust that you've already been ministered to by the presence of the Lord in this service today. We thank God for His presence more than anything. Again, greetings to all of our visitors and we trust that the Lord will, Lord Jesus Christ will bless you and strengthen you today. Psalm 81, please if you turn there. Message title this morning, open thy mouth wide and I will fill it. Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it. Father, God Almighty, Lord, all of our religious activity is worthless if it isn't empowered by you. If you're not at the center of it, if your heart and mind are not leading it, then all of it's in vain. It's a form of godliness with no power. Father, I ask you, God Almighty, to touch me with your Holy Spirit and the people who are gathering this day to listen in the sanctuary and on the internet and help us, Lord Jesus Christ, to be your church in this last hour we're living in. Speak to us, Lord. God, let your word go deep. Let it find a lodging place in each of us and help us not to turn away from what we hear. Help us not to modify it into something that better suits our liking, but help us, God, to hear it the way it's written, to receive it the way it's spoken and to act on it the way it's leading. Lord, help me. God, help your people. God, help this city. Help our country. Lord Jesus Christ, we turn to you today. None of our plans will work. Only what is empowered by the Holy Spirit will make a difference now. You have to raise us up, O God. You've got to breathe on us. You've got to cause us to live. Lord, we yield ourselves, O God, to your purpose for each of our lives as best as we know how. You have to take us that extra distance that we need to go. Father, we thank you for it. Thank you for quickening this word and making it live. In Jesus' name. Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it, Psalm 81. Sing aloud unto God our strength. Make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob. Take a psalm and bring hither the timbrel and the pleasant harp of the psaltery. Blow off the trumpet in the new moon in the time appointed on our solemn feast day. This was a statute for Israel and a law of the God of Jacob. This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony when he went out throughout the land of Egypt where I heard a language that I understood not. I removed his shoulder from the burden. His hands were delivered from the pots. Thou callest in trouble and I delivered thee and I answered thee in the secret place of thunder. I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee. O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me. There shall no strange God be in thee. Neither shalt thou worship any strange God. I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt. Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it. But my people would not hearken to my voice, and Israel would none of me. So I gave them up unto their own hearts lost, and they walked in their own counsel. O that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways. I should soon have subdued their enemies and turned my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the Lord should have submitted themselves unto him, but their time should have endured forever. He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee. I want to speak to you this morning in measure about why so many are experiencing such an unprecedented heaviness. Many here today, you know what I'm talking about. You wonder why is it that I come to church like this this morning, and there's such joy here and there seems to be a momentary lifting of the burden that I carry. I'm a seeker of God. As much as I know, I'm not living in willful disobedience to God, and of course if you are, then you know why the heaviness is on you. But I'm not living, many could say, I've done an inventory of my heart, and I suppose there's areas that need to change. There always are, but as much as I know, I'm walking with God as he's revealed it, and yet suddenly this heaviness has come on me. Am I chemically unbalanced? Is there a depression coming into my, and these are reasonable questions. Is something happening to me physically? Is it just the moment? Is it just the hour that I'm living in? Has it become so demonic and heavy in this world, in our society? Are we living at the end of time as we know it? What is the reason for this? And I know many of you have come in here this morning with this question in your heart. Why am I feeling this way? Why am I going through this time? I want to suggest to you this morning that it is a precursor to something that God wants to do. He wants to do it in our world today. He wants to do it in his church. He wants to do it in your life and in mine. In the Old Testament, Israel was in a very precarious position. Society was failing, people were faltering, and there's this common denominator among all humanity, no matter how God blesses us, we find a way to walk away from it. Astoundingly stupid. There's no other way to put it throughout history. Even in this nation, when you look at how God so blessed this nation in just a few hundred short years to rise to prominence and preeminence in the world, a place of freedom where people could freely worship God, a society in essence, I mean, it wasn't complete. I know that from researching some of the founding fathers of this country, but in essence, the Judeo-Christian ethic was the basis of law and practice and freedom and liberty. It was essentially built on the principles of God's word, love God, love your neighbor. The liberty to worship, the liberty to become that which God intended every man to be. A wonderful, incredible social experiment. But now we're living at an hour when, because of the casualness of the way that God's people handled this truth, because the encroaching value system of a fallen society found its way into the church and began to be the predominant themes in much of the preaching today, that Christ was used to bring heaven on earth and heaven after life on earth. There was no sense of sacrifice, no sense of holiness, no sense of separation. And to the point where it became an offense to talk about the blood of Jesus Christ in the house of God. Unthinkable. Now we've filled stadiums with powerless people in America. We're not going to be able to stand because only the Holy Spirit can make us stand in the days that we're facing now. Human reasoning has a limited value, but it has no lasting weight of eternal glory on it. Human reasoning will not get you through the storm, folks. It's only Christ coming to you, walking on the water that will get you through. Human reasoning will not keep you in the fire. It's the fourth man in the fire that will keep you in the midst of the trial and difficulty. Human reasoning will not shut the mouths of lions. It is God almighty himself who will come into your trial, your difficulty, and give you and I the strength that we need to make a difference in our situation and in our time. Israel was in this situation one time, many times actually in the Old Testament, but one particular time, God decided he was going to speak one more time to the people. And so he drew a young man called Isaiah into his presence. Now Isaiah had already been prophesying. Isaiah was an attender at the house of God. He was a student of the word of God. He had a measure of revelation and he was sincere and honest in what he was doing. But when he was lifted into the presence of God and he saw the holiness of God suddenly being surrounded by the glory of God, he said, Oh God, I'm undone. I'm finished. My works are rags in the sight of a holy God. And no matter how much we say, we know you, we don't because my eyes have now seen the King. My eyes have seen the Lord of glory. And there was this weight of heaviness that came upon him for a moment. He experienced the heaviness that many in society were one day going to feel who are living without God and who are going to in some measure experience the voice of God speaking to them. It was at that moment of being undone that that life, that living coal from the altar was taken and touched his lips and God filled his mouth. The message now was not about anything that humanity can produce. The message now was about God. The message now came from the heart of God. Isaiah was given a panoramic revelation, one of the most momentous revelations in all of the Old Testament. Isaiah saw the cross. Isaiah saw the Savior. Isaiah chapter 53. Isaiah saw the Gentiles coming to Christ. Isaiah saw a day of Jubilee for all who wanted to be free from bondage and burdens. Isaiah saw the returning King. Isaiah was given this incredible panorama of Christ to preach in a generation that had never seen the Messiah. The Messiah was simply only some fading illusion for many. The psalmist says in Psalm 81, thematically it's, I want it to fill your mouth. I want it to give you a testimony. I want it to do God says something in my people that will do what it's always done. It would astound those who live outside of the kingdom of God. I want it to lift you into the supernatural. I want it to empower you with the Holy Spirit of Almighty God. This is not to be a natural kingdom. Men are not to be able to figure it out with their minds. This is a kingdom of faith. This is not a kingdom where the naturally strong rise to the top and the naturally smart become the leadership. This is a kingdom of nothings and nobodies, of weak people empowered by the Spirit of Almighty God. This is a kingdom of men and women who the secular leaders look at them and say, I don't understand how they speak with such wisdom because we know that they don't have the learning that we have. The only thing we can say about these people is that they've been with Jesus. This is a kingdom where God said, I want it to open your mouth. I want it to fill it with that which could only come from heaven. But isn't it tragic that people turn away time and again throughout history. There shall no strange God, verse 9, be in thee. Neither shall thou worship any strange God. It is tragic in America how we took the embodiment actually of the constitution of this country, the inalienable right of all men and women to pursue life for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And we took that, and that's a good concept in itself, but it must be kept in its proper place. It is never to become the substitute for the worship of God and it is never to become the worship of God. I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, but my people would not hearken to my voice and Israel would have none of me. So I gave them up to their own hearts lost and they walked in their own counsels. I gave them up. I don't know if there's a more tragic story in the world today than America. My heart is broken for this nation, folks. I have to be honest with you. My heart breaks every time I just take a moment to look at the news. All the fathers and mothers shooting and killing their children now. Our children are not safe in our schools anymore. The abject violence that people are becoming so dull to now that seems to be around every corner in our society. The social engineers in this country that are working underneath the scenes now to produce a nation where evil is called good and where good is called evil. And folks, gaining that platform under the guise of tolerance, but when it gets into power beware because it will not be tolerant of the church of Jesus Christ. Mark my words this day. My heart is broken for a nation where we raise our children in school and tell them there is no God. Let them watch violent video and listen to violent music and wonder why they become violent. And now, and the commission studies about the violence. We don't have to teach all the commandments in school. How about just this one? Thou shalt not kill. That might be good enough in some cases. Now to the church of Jesus Christ, to you and to me who have to make a decision in this hour because time is short now. This is the hundredth anniversary of the Titanic this year. I've always believed the Titanic was God's warning to the Western world. I've always believed it. I remember preaching here years ago, years ago, long before the spillover effect happened in our economy, that America is going to hit an iceberg one day soon. And we've compartmentalized. And I remember hearing some guy on the news say, we've compartmentalized now our financial systems and our stock markets so that if one sector goes down, it can't take the other sectors with it. And I remember that's exactly what they said about the Titanic. And I remember preaching in this church that when we hit this financial iceberg, it is going to spill over from one sector to another sector from the financial district to the banks, to the corporations, to the housing, it's going to start spilling over and this thing is going to go down. But to the church of Jesus Christ, to anybody who can still hear, the Psalmist says, sing aloud unto God our strength and make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob. Take a psalm and bring a timbrel, a pleasant harp and the psaltery. Blow the trumpet in the new moon in the time appointed. For this was a statute to Israel and a law to the God of Jacob. He ordained this in Joseph for a testimony when he went to the land of Egypt. I removed his shoulder from the burden, his hands were delivered from the pots. You called to me in trouble and I delivered you. I answered you in the secret place of thunder and I proved you at the waters of Meribah. And here's what God says, for those who are my people, here's where it starts. Open your mouth with a song. Open your mouth in the morning. That's why God told his own people in Deuteronomy, when you're walking with your children, when you get up in the morning, when you go to bed at night, rehearse what I've done for you, lest you forget who I am. It doesn't matter how many backstabbers are in your workplace. You, when you get off that elevator, don't join them. When you walk in, have a song in your heart. The Psalmist David says, it's a song that can be seen long before it's heard. A song of joy, a song of hope. Remember God says what I've done for you. Remember I broke your chains. Remember I rendered powerless your captors. I delivered you with secret power that's not known by ordinary people. Think it through for a moment. Some of you would be dead and in hell if Christ hadn't come to you. Many here were captivated by hatred and vengeance and pornography and a lying tongue and all of the things that this sin nature can produce and you didn't know how to get out and sometimes it might even be years ago, but you cried out to God and he says, I want you to remember what I did. Because our tendency is to get lost in the present if we forget the past. Remember David, when he came back from being sent back from the Philistine battle and he came in his own family, were captivated and the men around him wanted to stone him. It says he encouraged himself in the Lord and the only way I know he could have done that is he had to go back and rethink how faithful God had been to him. Rethink when he was a boy and the lion attacked and he was able to slay it and the bear attacked and he was able to kill it and as a teenager when he ran into the valley and faced a giant that all of Israel was terrified of and he had to go back and he had to think about what God had done and he had to sing about it and he wrote songs about it. I delivered you with secret power God says, secret power, power that this world knows nothing about. You know my story, many of you, after nine years of panic attacks and just nine years of living in hell on this earth, nine years of captivation, nine years of doing everything I knew in my own strength to get out of this prison of fear, nine years were broken in thirty seconds by the power of God. Thirty seconds God's Holy Spirit came upon me and delivered me from a strong enemy that I could not get away from and not only did he deliver me but he opened my mouth and put something inside of me to say to others. He sent me around the world to tell others a simple message, what Jesus did for me Jesus can do for you. It's no more complicated than that. And he says, and I proved you at the waters of Meribah, even after I worked so powerfully in your life yet your faith was still small. Remember the children of Israel came out and they thought they were going to die because there was no water. He says, I stayed with you. In other words, I still called you my own even though your faith is small, even though you're not great pillars in the international community of faith, I stayed with you and I stayed your God and I didn't deny you but I still received you as my own. Celebrate with song. Psalm 89 verse one says it this way, I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. With my mouth will I make known thy faithfulness to all generations. I will not allow, I will not allow the tenure, the thought of this generation to take my song. And don't you let the devil take it from you either. Don't you let the evil of this society take that song of God out of your mouth. You keep singing that song. You repeat that song. You rehearse that song. You sing it every day. You sing it every night. Great is thy faithfulness, O God. Verse two he says, for I have said mercy shall be built up forever and thy faithfulness shall thou establish in the very heavens. I said these words when I was a young Christian and I'm sure you did too. God, your mercy cannot fail and your mercy in my life will continue to be revealed until the day that I'm taken up with you to be in the very heavens. We sang about, we've sung about everything God put on my heart this morning to speak. We've sung about it every song and we don't ever orchestrate this in this church. Never, not one time. We've sung about this moment that we trusted in and believed in that he's going to be faithful to us till we get up to the heavens themselves. Yet darkness has stood up and opened its mouth against the testimony and the glory of Christ and his church. And that's where you and I are living today. There's a darkness and it has stood up against Christ. It has stood up against his church. It has stood up against you. But God says to you and to me, I am the Lord, verse 10, God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt. Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it. Open your mouth. Acts chapter 4, verse 23. This is a season. Now the day of Pentecost has come. Peter has preached. Three thousand have been saved. The church is growing. There's a more widespread acceptance of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Miracles are happening. But then this voice rises up to threaten the very testimony of God. Verse 21 says, So when they had further threatened them, they let them go, finding nothing how they might punish them because of the people. For all men glorified God for that which was done. For the man was above forty years old on whom this miracle of healing was shown. And being let go, they went to their own company and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said to them. And they strategized. They formed a committee. They said, Let's find seven steps to get out of this mess. Is that in your Bible? Not in mine either. And when they heard that, what did they do? They lifted up their voice to God with one accord and said these words, Lord, thou art God, which has made heaven, the earth, and the sea, and all that in them is. Who by the mouth of thy servant David hath said, Why did the heathen rage and the people imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ. For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together. For to do whatsoever thy hand of the council determined before to be done. And now, Lord, behold their threatenings and grant to thy servants that with all boldness they may speak thy word by stretching forth thy hand to heal and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child Jesus. And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together. They were all filled with the Holy Ghost and they spoke the word of God with boldness. The Lord says to you and I today, open your mouth in prayer. This is not a time to be quiet. This is not a time to recede. This is not a time to go to a pharmacy and look for some pills to make you happier. This is a time to go into your prayer closet. And even if you've got to go in there with trembling and weakness as Paul did and with tears, this is a time to open your mouth in prayer. And God says, you come to me. I am the Lord God which brought you out of Egypt. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it. These people were keenly aware of the past, keenly aware of what God had done. You and I have to be keenly aware that this was a nation founded on the principles of God. The New York City in 1857 had a momentous revival that swept a good part of this country starting down the Wall Street area with six businessmen who got together to pray. By the time it was done hundreds of thousands of people had come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. You and I have to understand what God has done. We have to think through what God has done. We have to know what God has done because he says of himself, I am the Lord, I change not. The writer of Hebrews says Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. They were keenly aware that darkness had risen against the present and subsequently against the future. They were not praying for their own security and safety but they got together and they said, oh God, this is against Christ. This is not against me. This is not even against the church. This is against Christ. This is against the Son of God who died on the cross and sits at the right hand of all power. These are men and women resisting and rejecting their own salvation through the ignorance of their own hearts and don't even know it. This is against Christ. And folks, have you ever noticed in this country that they can't even produce a PG movie now without cursing the name Jesus in it at least one time? Isn't that tragic? It shows you the spirit behind all of this. The spirit behind entertainment. The spirit was to erode the very foundation of the nation then subsequently impose another value system on it. Open your mouth in prayer and the Bible says the place where they were gathered was shaken and they prayed, oh God, stretch out your hand and heal. Lord, give me power in my speech that I can speak to people in my neighborhood, in my workplace, in my home. People I meet on the street and put power in it to heal, to heal wounded hearts, to heal broken homes, to heal hopelessness, to bring victory to somebody who might want to take their life. God Almighty put something in my mouth. I can't live in silence in this generation. Neither can you. Lord, stretch forth your hand to heal and do great signs and wonders in the name of your Holy Son, Jesus Christ. My God, do it in me. Lord, take me from image to image and glory to glory. God, I yield my body as a living sacrifice to you. Do with it whatever you will, but all I ask is let the fire of God touch me again. I can't do this without the Holy Spirit and neither can you. God, forgive us as a church age for trying to advance a kingdom with our own natural strength that we can't even see. We can't even recognize it or rationalize it. Open your mouth in prayer. Psalm 81 verse 9, open your mouth in dedication. There shall no strange God be in thee, and neither shall thou worship any strange God. Oh Jesus, it has to be the Christ of the Bible that I follow. It has to be the whole counsel of God. It has to be the words of God in the text of scripture. I can't modify it or pick and choose it to satisfy my own liking because that can become a strange sound in the sight of God, in the hearing of God. No strange God. No homemade Jesus that I go into the prayer closet to worship. It has to be the Christ of the Bible. He has to be the God of my life. He has to have the right to say, don't go there, go there. It has to be his right. He is Lord. I've often said it, he's either Lord or he's not Savior, folks. Now there's a place of grace where we have an opportunity to recognize this truth, but many people have wanted him to be Savior in our generation, but not Lord, and I'm sorry to say it doesn't work that way. If he's not Lord, ultimately he's not Savior. And then he goes on to say in verses 11 and 12, my people wouldn't listen, so I gave them up to their own heart's lust and they walked in their own counsel. This is a cry of my heart, oh God, that I will listen to your words and not walk in my own counsel, not walk by what I think is right, and not do what I think should be done. But oh God, you have to help me to die that you may live. You've got to help me, Lord, to abandon myself that you might become what you want to be. For your namesake, oh Jesus, and for the sake of people who are going to die and spend eternity in hell, whatever that fullness of that means, my mind can't comprehend it. But oh God, you have to come and empower me to do these things and to give me the strength to walk away from my own thinking and to recognize in my own thinking. Isaiah saw it when he's lifted up in the presence of God. My own thinking is filthy rags. My own thoughts are worthless. Even if religion is attached to them, it's only the leading of God and the word of God that receives the power of God. And it's only the power of God that can move through this darkness and cause it to abate, cause it to move back. In verses 13 to 15, he said, Oh, that my people had hearkened to me and Israel had walked in my ways. I should have subdued their enemies. I mean, soon I would have and turned my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the Lord should have submitted themselves unto him. He would have fed them also with the finest of the wheat and with honey out of the rock, I would have satisfied you. Step out in faith and open your mouth with declaration. Now, what I mean by this is in Acts chapter two, ordinary people like you and I went into a prayer closet and they lifted up their voices to God. Every one of them knew it was a heavy time like ours. The whole of society of that time was anti-Christ. There was a bloodlust in the people and they knew it. It was a society that had just killed the savior as they thought they had. And they were, they wanted all traces of him gone from their society and which would include the people who represented God. And so these people went into an upper room and they opened their mouths and they said, Lord, it had to be a prayer like this. God, we are here in obedience to you, but we don't have any strength in ourselves. We're not the wise and we're not the noble and we're not the powerful. We're not people, the movers and shakers in society. We're just ordinary people. But oh God, we ask only one thing of you that you would enable us by your power as you have spoken to be witnesses of you in our generation. And I don't know exactly how it transpired, but I do know that these same roomful of people burst into the marketplace and they burst in there and out of their mouths, remember the Lord said, open your mouth wide and I will fill it. And out of their mouths in the Greek New Testament, it said, we're coming to Megalios of God. And the Megalios of God was essentially words being spoken by faith of what the living Christ within them was about to do through them. And there was an initial evidence upon them that all the barriers had been broken down, that people were given the ability to speak to people of other languages and other cultures. And these are languages they had never learned, but they were speaking eternal truths. And people came and when they heard it, suddenly darkness, suddenly the grip of darkness, this violent spirit, this eradication of Christ is broken. And suddenly 3000 people at least are beating on their chest and saying, what do we have to do to find God in this manner? What do we have to do to be taken out of this normative religion that is, we're sick of ourselves with just its endless and repetitious services with no power and promises and bring no life. What do we have to do to get out of this and to find that? And Peter opens his mouth with the power of God, Peter and preaches an eloquent sermon that can only have come from the throne of God itself and tells the people, this same Christ that you have crucified, God raised him from the dead, but he has risen again and he has given us this power which you now see and you now hear. It is the living God inside of human vessels. That's what they saw. They saw the church of Jesus Christ. These were people alienated from God. Folks, these were Christ haters in their generation and they suddenly saw God inside of a body, God inside of people and all of a sudden the hatred dissipated. Remember the Lord said, I would have subdued your enemies and turned my hand and the haters of the Lord would have submitted themselves unto him. And suddenly those who have been hating God are melting in the presence of a holy God. Suddenly there's a recognition that what they have is right and what we've held to as far deficient and far short of the glory of God. And they're saying, what must we do to be saved? And Peter told them, turn from your sin, repent, repent, believe on Jesus Christ, be baptized. In other words, put away your old way of living and fully embrace the new life that God has for you. And you shall receive this gift of the Holy Spirit for the promises to you and to your children and to many who are yet far off and away from the kingdom of God. And I'm paraphrasing, but essentially that's what he was saying. The former haters of God bow before him. There's no other plan of God for the time in which we live, folks. There is no plan B. There is no superstar going to rise up. There will either be a church or there won't be a church. And that's the choice that you and I have to make right now. There needs to be a people who are God gripped by the Holy Spirit, who are walking in the supernatural, who are filled with the tenderness and compassion of God, who have no other gods before them. Their only purpose in life, yes, I know we have to work and pay the bills. I understand that. But their purpose in life is to see the suffering of others alleviated by bringing them to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. They're willing to be yielded and ridiculed. They're willing to stand out in the marketplace, whatever it costs, that others may come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. They're willing to do it, and they're willing to do it by the power of the Holy Spirit. I've been praying lately, oh God, I had a marvelous encounter with God one time. Marvelous, when I was a young Christian, I didn't appreciate what God had done in my life. I was too young and too stupid to know what God had done. But I had an encounter with God that left me terrified, left me trembling, it left me absolutely nothing before a holy God. And I have for years cried out, oh Jesus, would you do that again? God, would you touch my life again? Because I can't do this without the Holy Spirit, and I'm not willing to try. It's impossible. And you don't ask us to do this. New York City will not be saved by a strategy. New York City will not be saved by sweet voices on the radio. New York City will not be saved any other way but a body of believers in Jesus Christ who are filled with the Holy Spirit of Almighty God. There has never been another plan. There never will be another plan. That is the plan of God. And that is the plan for the time in which we're living. We have a window. I don't know how long that window is, but we have a window where multitudes may turn to Christ in our time. We have a window where the churches could live again. We have a window where the testimony of Christ could rise out of the ashes and have a great effect on our society. We have a window but it's not for long. And you and I have got to go into that prayer closet now. We don't have a hundred tomorrows to get this right. We've got to go into that prayer closet and say, God Almighty, whatever you have to do in my life, I invite you to do it. Wherever you've got to take me, I invite you to take me there. What, you have to speak to me? Speak to me. Where you're going to call me to go, I will follow. But Lord, I cannot do this apart from your strength inside of me. And I'm not even willing to try. Lord, you have to raise me out of the ashes. You've got to come into my life. You've got to open my mouth. And if I open my mouth to you, Lord, you said that you will fill it. And this is the only altar call that God's put in my heart for this day. For those who just simply want to either stand where you are, and if it means something to you to come to the front of a sanctuary, you do that. But you say, as I'm saying, and this is my prayer. It's been my prayer for weeks now. Jesus, Son of God, you've got to baptize me afresh in the Holy Spirit. You've got to give me strength for this journey. You've got to strengthen your people. You've got to make us a testimony for the sake of Christ and for the sake of the people in this city. I'm not willing that people should perish in their sin when the church of Jesus Christ is still here. I don't know how long we've got, but we have a season. And folks, today, if you can hear the voice of God, don't harden your heart. If you can hear his voice and are willing to say, Lord, if you brought this heaviness on me to show me my need of you, then so be it. That suffices me. Today, I come forward and I say, God, I thank you, Lord, for bringing me to an end of myself. I thank you, Lord, for the distress in my mind and my heart. I thank you, Lord, for just bringing me to the place of understanding that I need you. And God, that is an awesome thing that you're doing in my life. So I'm just coming forward and I'm saying, Lord, fill me with the Holy Spirit. It's no deeper than that. I will have no other God before me. I will not walk in my own counsel. I want your thoughts. I want your words. I want your plan. I want your power to accomplish it. I want to make a difference in my generation. I am simply unwilling to stand one day at the throne of God with an empty basket, with a full notebook from church and an empty basket. I'm simply unwilling. I'm going to be used of God in this marketplace to make a difference. I'm going to trust him for the miraculous. I'm going to ask him, God, shake the place where I am and fill me with the Holy Spirit. We're going to worship for a moment. And as we do, if that's the cry of your heart, now I can't cry out for you and you can't cry out for me. This has to be something that's birthed in your own heart. And I don't see in the upper room, I don't see this tucky, nice little prayer meeting. Would you pray brother Peter? Would you pray brother Matthew? No, I just see a bunch of people. Oh God. Oh God. If you don't do something in me, Lord Jesus, if you don't do something in me, I'm going to have no effect, no power. I don't even know how I'm going to go forward, but oh God, I want to make a difference. I want to do something. I want you to do something through me that will glorify your name. I just see a whole bunch of people crying out in that upper room. And then suddenly a rushing mighty wind comes. The cloven tongues of fire sit on them and they began to speak in other languages they'd never learned. They're known languages and they're speaking about the wondrous power of God that is available to those who turn to him. Hallelujah. Please, my friend, don't sell yourself short. Don't settle for powerless religion and thoughts about God. Get a hold of a living relationship with God. Get a hold of the power of God. If you got to hang onto the altar until he comes and do it, but whatever you have to do, just do it that the power of God may rest on you in this generation. Now, Lord, I've delivered your heart. I don't know what else to do, Lord. There's nothing else I can do. I've stood here in obedience to you, Lord, and I've let you use this body. I've let you put thoughts in my mind. My God, precious Jesus, would you simply consider the threatenings of this hour? Lord, we are your people. Forgive us, Lord, for what we've done to your name. Forgive us, God, for filling stadiums and arenas with powerless people. Forgive us, Lord, for not allowing you to be Christ in us. But God, I don't know what else to do, and neither do your people, but just to come into your presence and say, Lord, according to your word, if I'd open my mouth, you'd fill it. If I'd open my heart, you'd expand it. If I'd open my life, you'd take it and use it for your glory. But, oh, Jesus, oh, Jesus, oh, Jesus, I lift up the 17 million people in the New York City area. God, I stand before your throne this day and say to you, Lord, don't let them perish. Lord Jesus Christ, don't let them perish. Breathe on your church again. Breathe on every church in New York City. Breathe on every denomination, every house, every place, every place of worship, Lord. Breathe, oh, God, and do it so powerfully that nobody can touch the glory. Not even a fool would dare touch the glory, oh, God. Do something, Lord, that can only be attributed to the mercy of almighty God. And Lord, would you do it here today for us, we're gathered in your name. I don't know what else to do but to cry out and to believe, Lord, that you've not changed. You're still the same today as you've always been. We're not strong, we're not powerful, we're not mighty. We haven't done any great exploits. But, oh, God, you're able to take us and use us for your glory. And so this is what I ask you to do today. Father, ask it in Jesus' name. As we stand, if you'd like to come to the front of the sanctuary and just pray, God fill you with the Holy Spirit. Please just do that. Hallelujah. In the annex, you can step between the screens in the same at Roxbury. Lift your voice. This is not a time to be quiet. Lift your voice. In the audience, you pray together if you want. Pray with one another. Pray for one another. God Almighty, in Jesus' name, give us the power of the Holy Spirit. Hallelujah. Lift your voice as we worship. Lift your voice. Lift your voice to the Lord. Don't be ashamed. Just lift your voice to God. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Just pray. Just pray for a little while. Thank you, Jesus. Please, please lift your voice. Please lift your voice. Don't sit in silence. Lift your voice to God. Pray for those that have no voice. You pray for themselves. Lift your petitions to the Lord with thanksgiving. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, mighty God. Thank you, mighty God. Thank you, mighty God. Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah. Father we ask that you forgive us dear God for seeking satisfaction in broken cisterns and wells that cannot satisfy. Lord only in your presence can we find fullness of joy. Only in your presence dear God do you fill our mouth. God you told Moses who made men's mouth. We yield our mouth, we yield our heart, we yield our soul, we yield our bodies, we yield our hands, we yield our feet, we yield our present and our future into your hands dear God. Father take us, fill our cups till it overflows till we can't contain it anymore dear God. Till our neighbors and our co-workers dear God and our loved ones, our friends and our family have to see the glory of the risen Savior inside broken vessels dear God. Break us, take us dear God in this hour. We yield our souls to you Jesus. Come Holy Spirit we need you. Come like a mighty rushing wind we need you. Come dear God in this hour. Lord for the sake of those who have no voice, for the sake of those who have no hope, for the sake of those who are looking to see the light dear God but cannot find it unless your light shines through your church in this hour. God they have no testimony unless they see it in the church of Jesus Christ. We yield our life for such a time as this. We yield our hearts this hour and we thank you for drawing us. We thank you for inviting us. God to open up our hearts to you. God we open our mouths this hour. You said you would fill it. Fill our hearts with boldness, fill our hearts with compassion, fill our hearts with tenderness and love for all those around us dear God. For the church of Jesus Christ, for this nation, for this city. Break us, make us and mold us into what you've called us to be all along. Come Lord of Lords, King of Kings be enthroned upon our hearts dear God. Take us into a realm of the supernatural that we've never known before. God cause us to walk upon the waters of impossibility. This morning we determine in our hearts to step out of the boat and to walk towards you cause we've heard you call us. We've heard you say come. The Holy Spirit and the bride say come. And we invite you dear God to do everything you want to do in us. We don't want to shortchange this generation dear God and give them less than what you have intended to give them through your church in this hour. God we give it all to you. Give yourself to us in fullness, in grace, in power, in majesty, in power. Father to reach the lost in this generation for your glory. Fill my mouth Lord, fill my mouth dear God. Fill it with the glories of your presence dear God. Fill it with the declaration of your victory dear God. God forgive us for complaining, forgive us for doubting, forgive us for yielding to other things instead of you. God you are the Lord, you are the God. We set no other gods before us dear God. No other gods before you. Jesus you are Lord and King of our lives. In Jesus name we pray. We give you praise, we give you honor. It belongs to you. Praise God. Lord we thank you for this gathering today. Oh God, oh Jesus, Lord keep drawing us. Don't let us turn back, Lord don't let us sidestep this wooing of the Holy Spirit. Keep drawing us forward Lord. God Almighty, Lord this is a wonderful opportunity that you call us to Lord to know you and to walk with you. Father we thank you Lord with all our hearts. Hallelujah to the Lamb of God. Thank you Jesus. Thank you Lord.