In this sermon, a simple and uneducated African villager shares his extraordinary experience of traveling across a dark plain and encountering a magnificent city. He describes the city as having countless buildings and a massive wall with gates. He also recounts a spiritual encounter with Jesus after witnessing his own dead body. Despite the challenges and dangers faced by the preacher and his team, they were determined to spread the word of God in Southern Sudan, a war-torn region. The sermon emphasizes the importance of intercession and patience in seeking peace and results from God.

Hallelujah. Well, I'm born an African, I'm the real deal. I just say my skin hasn't been burned yet. And I grew up in an Africa where the elephants still walked across our lawn in the morning. We would wake up to the lions sitting right in front of us. And that Africa is gone, but we have this wonderful privilege to take the gospel to the ends of that continent as well as to the ends of the earth. And I received Jesus, not because I went to church, not because I had any religious background, but one day I just sat down on my bed and I said, God, if you're real, I really want to know you. And just in my bedroom, and as I said those words, this incredible bright light, now I'm not into everybody looking for phenomena and seeking for some manifestation, but this incredible bright light filled my room. And I was actually terrified, I fell back on my bed in amazement, aghast, that a great wave of this light came towards me, my mouth was open, this wave went into my mouth and down into my belly, and I felt the warmth and the joy and the victory of it, and as soon as it hit my belly, I knew Jesus, I just knew Jesus. I hadn't mentioned his name, but I knew Jesus, and the moment that I knew Jesus, I said, God, I want to be a missionary, didn't even know what a missionary was, I was about 11 or 12 years old, but I want to be a missionary. And so it's been a lot of training, a lot of dying. Dying, you're never gonna be who God wants you to be unless you die, die, die, die. And that's the one thing we don't want to do. And that's why the body of Christ doesn't rise up to be who God wants us to be, because we're not ready to die to who we are, and unless we are ready to die to who we are, Jesus Christ can never fully live in us, Jesus Christ can never ever fully be operational through us. And beloved, what God is looking for, he's not looking for superly gifted, anointed vessels, he's looking for ordinary people like you and me who are ready to die for him, because it's not about my giftings, it's not about my abilities, it's not about my calling, it's not about my ministry, it's all about him. It's all about his ability to work through me, it's all about his ability to do what he said he would do through a vessel that is simply obedient. We are not super spiritual giants, we are just super obedient. Hallelujah. You know, people say, well, wow, no, it's not wow, it's wow God, amen, it's wow God, God does it all. And all we have to do is be obedient to him. Beloved, and realize that, you know, really, what have I got to lose? There's nothing, there's nothing that I'm gonna lose by stepping out with God into the unknown because God is the God of the unknown. The problem with most believers are, well, that's unknown to me, of course it's unknown to you, dodo. You know? But it is an unknown to God. Hallelujah. And then when I step out with God, he's with me, he's gone before me. I remember my introduction to Southern Sudan, I was, God, I was working in my office down in Southern Africa and God said, walked into my office, everybody said, how did he look? No, it was just this incredible presence of God and an audible voice and God said, I want you to go to Sudan. I want you to intercede for peace to Southern Sudan. And I said, yeah, Lord, find someone else, I'm busy. And besides which, Lord, I'm just a little bit tired of the war zones of Africa. Find somebody else to go and do that job and God, as swift as any, no, you're not tired of them, you're just used to them, amen? I said, well, God, that's okay, go find someone else. And you know what God said to me? There isn't anybody else. There isn't anybody else. I said, God, you got multitudes of people on the face of this earth, find somebody. Find somebody in America, find somebody in Britain, find somebody in Europe, find somebody else, I'm busy and by the way, it's for you, Lord. Like I thought that was gonna get me out of it, amen? And God said, there isn't anybody else who will go for me. And by the way, at that time, Sudan was, had been in 50 continuous years of civil war, the South against the Arab Muslim North. And it was wicked, wicked, wicked war. 2.5 million people slaughtered in the last decade in Southern Sudan. And the Southern Sudanese are black African animist, some Christian, but mostly animist, fighting against the Arab North who wanted to do, make them all Muslims and establish Islamic state under Sharia law. And God said, this is key. Because if Southern Sudan falls, the whole of Africa will fall to Islam. And in the 1970s, the Muslims, it's not available in the West, the Muslims wrote a book called The Islamic Continent in which they spelled out just like Hitler spelled out in Mein Kampf, exactly what he was gonna do. The Arabs spelled out how they were going to take the continent of Africa, change it from Africa to the Islamic continent and from there launch their holy war, their jihad worldwide. Well, I got news for Islam. God is bigger than them. Hallelujah. And by the way, in case you're confused, Allah is not our God. Allah is a demon prince. Okay, now, beloved, we don't go screaming and shouting at this demon prince, Allah. It's not my business to scream and shout at Allah. It's my business to touch the throne of God and God will deal with Allah. I cannot even begin in the short time that we have to tell you the amazing thing that God has done. But through intercession, yes, we went up there, we went 3,500 miles up to Southern Sudan. The road into Southern Sudan, it took us 10 hours to do 80 kilometers, 48 miles, 10 hours. That's how good the road was. I remember when we got established after some years and visitors would come from the States and elsewhere, people would say, is this the only way in? No, don't they have a, doesn't a plane come in here? No, the only planes that come are the bombers and we used to be bombed every single day. My introduction to the little village where we established our base in Southern Sudan was 4,000 dead Arab bodies rotting in the African sun where they had just had a war. Weapons as high as this roof just would have filled this whole room. Caches of weapons all along this whatever road as the Southern Sudanese were fighting for their freedom from Khartoum. And God said, this is gonna be your home and I want you to intercede, I want you to cry out, I want you to touch my throne, touch my heart that peace will come to Southern Sudan. I'm gonna let you know like we all are, we want instant results with God. God is not an instant God. It took us 10 years of intercession day and night. We established a Bible college in that place. Some of you say, well, how did you know that God was gonna come through? No, because we were in love with him, because he called us to do it as Pastor Raz said. He called us and that's the most amazing thing. When God called me, I said, okay, Lord, I'll go but there are three things that I want from you. I want first of all, your tangible presence. I want to feel you above me, below me, around me, everything I do, I wanna feel your presence every moment of every day. I'm not going into that God forsaken place and Lord, you're not gonna be tangibly present, amen. The second thing I said, Lord, I want your supernatural provision. I'm not going into that hell hole and I'd have to worry about where my next mouthful of food is gonna come from, who's gonna supply my needs and so on. God, you are the supplier. You want me to do this, you are the supplier. Beloved, when God calls you to do something, you can lay some conditions on him. Oh yes, you supply. I'll never forget, we built this amazing Bible school in the middle of the jungle and don't think of Sudan, all of Sudan is Sahara Desert. No, there's tremendous jungle in the South. We built this amazing Bible school, 180,000 square feet of roofing and after we built the school, I sat looking at it one day, no roofing, no money and I said, God, I need you to give me the faith right now. I need the gift of faith to see this place roofed and as I sat there looking at it, I literally felt like a seed drop into my spirit and again, when it hit my belly, when it hit that place of life, I saw that all those buildings roofed and that school operated. Suddenly, people from all over the world started sending in $50, $100. One lady even wrote, this is for roofing. I don't know what on earth you're doing but I have to say that this money is for roofing. We needed $70, $80,000 to buy the roofing and bring it up to Sudan. There was absolutely nothing in Sudan, nothing and of course, when we got the roof put on, it was a beautiful target for the bombers from Khartoum that would come every day, zero in on the school and bomb us every single day for eight years. We were bombed, bombed, bombed, bombed and in all that time, not a single bomb fell on our school, not a single person was injured, not one bit of damage to any building. God was our protector, hallelujah. Beloved, we had this beautiful driveway going up to our Bible school and as the Arabs had moved out, as they were being defeated by the Sudan People's Liberation Army, they planted anti-personnel mines and landmines everywhere and we were driving up and down on this driveway to our Bible school and in the war zone where there are landmines, you make sure you follow in the tracks of somebody that's gone before you because if they got away with it, you get away with it and so we'd been driving up and down on this road for about six months, taking in building supplies, getting this Bible school off the ground and one night, one of the Sudan People's Liberation Army commanders decided to come and steal some of our building material. Following exactly in our tracks, his truck detonated a mine that we'd been driving over for months and months and months after that, everybody said, I have nothing to do with these people, they're really the people of God, we need to help them. That was the third thing I said to God, God, I want your divine protection and God said, done and he was gone and in 10 years, he supplied our needs, he watched over us, he protected us, not a single person on our team was even scratched in all those years. Tom Ferguson came out to Sudan several times and it was just amazing what God did as he raised up a generation of Southern Sudanese, we taught them to intercede, we taught them to love God, we taught them how to cry out for their nation and after being there for eight years, suddenly, the war came to an end and here's the deal. When the Khartoum government met together with the Sudan People's Liberation Army from Southern Sudan, they had their meetings in Nairobi, Kenya. The first thing that the delegates of the Khartoum Muslim Arab Khartoum government said to the delegates of the Sudan People's Liberation Army, you have a Bible school in the South, we want it closed, that's our first requirement of these peace talks, close down that Bible school and get rid of those people because God had been doing such incredible things in the spirit, beloved, that it had so affected their war machine that they could never come down and attack in the South because the prayers of the saints were going up to God and God set up his shield, God set up his protection, God did an incredible thing and they said, no ways. Part of the peace talks is that Bible school stays, we're not getting rid of them. They have stood with us through the thick and thin of the battle and we're not getting rid of them. So if you wanna talk, you talk with that Bible school here. One of the phenomenons that had happened that really terrified the Muslims was that our graduates, as they went out to preach the gospel, there was a, right across Southern Sudan, there was a, not just one or two, but dozens of people were raised from the dead by the graduates. One of the first ones to be raised from the dead was two of our graduates were in a zone that was really animistic. People didn't, steeped in witchcraft, strong devils and they stood at the edge of this village and they were preaching to the bush and nobody came, of course, because they were all animists. After a while, a young native came running out of the bush and he said, I want penicillin, I want penicillin. Well, he had a dose of VD. And so one of our graduates, because all of them were in the military as well, was wearing his Red Cross bag, he was a medical officer and he said, I'm not here to give penicillin, I'm here to give the word of God. No, no, no, no, that's not gonna help me. I want penicillin. So after this young man prevailed upon him, he gave him a shot of penicillin, not knowing that he was allergic to it and in 15, 20 minutes, he was dead. Now, in Africa, that's a tribal war. You killed our son, we kill you. And so these two graduates were terrified. They started running away. They got a distance away and they suddenly stopped. No, no, no, we were taught in the Bible school that we can raise the dead. So they turned around and they came back and they began to pray. And they prayed and they said the heavens were like brass. It was like thick concrete. Nothing seemed to be happening and they prayed, but they didn't give up. They prayed one hour, two hours, three hours. They carried on praying. They believed that God would do what he said he would do and what he did in his word because, beloved, we taught them that God is faithful to his word. After about four hours, one of them said, I saw like this little shaft of light come down from the sky and hit that body and the moment that it happened, I shouted with everything in Jesus' name, rise up! And this man sat up alive. Now, let me tell you his side of the story. The first thing he did when he opened his eyes, he said, where's water? I must be baptized. And how must I know Jesus? He said, when he died, he stood looking down on his body and as he was gazing on his dead body with the two young men running off, he felt somebody tap him on the shoulder. He turned around and he said, there was a huge soldier in white shining armor. He said, come with me, grabbed him by the arm and started flying through the atmosphere with him. He said, we passed right by the sun and he said, touch the sun and he said, reached out to touch the sun, it wasn't even hot. He said, we traveled at an alarming speed. Now, understand, beloved, this is a simple, ignorant, African villager that's never even seen a double story building. Remember him? Put that in your mind and think, he knows nothing about the gospel, has never heard of Jesus, has never heard about the word of God. He's just a simple, ignorant villager who's had no education. He said, we traveled across this dark, black plain going faster and faster and he said, there in the far distance, I saw the most beautiful light coming rolling in waves and waves towards me. He said, then I saw this, well, how does a simple villager describe a city? He couldn't describe it. He just said, buildings upon buildings upon buildings upon buildings until I couldn't see to the top of it and he said, this wall around was so big with gates and he said, we slowed down and as we came to one of the gates, it opened of its own accord and Jesus came out. I said, how did you know it was Jesus? I just knew. How did you know his name? I just knew. Come on, beloved. So he said, the gate was open and there was, oh, as only could be described, a paradise and Jesus said to him, do you see that? He said, yes. He said, you can't go in there. You are not saved. I need you to be saved and I need you, now, of all the things that Jesus could have told somebody, this is exactly what he told him. I need you to be saved and I need you to be baptized in water by immersion. Simple. This is just simple and he said, but I'm sending you back because some people are praying for you and so that's all Jesus said to him. I need you to be saved and I need you to be baptized in water by immersion. Now go and the moment that Jesus said go, he sat up alive and cried. What must I do to be saved? Where is water? I need to be baptized by immersion. By immersion, the simple village, native village of beloved who never knew anything about the word of God. He had the exact thing that Jesus has told us. Go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father. Hallelujah. Now, we didn't look for those phenomenon to happen. We didn't ask for those phenomenon to happen. All we were doing is getting locked in with God, falling in love with God and crying out from the depths of our being for this nation, and I wanna tell you that, Tom can bear me out. The Southern Sudanese are the most unlovely people that I ever met. If you look at them, they wanna shoot you. And they're pretty ugly people too. When the men are taken at 12, 14 years old, they pop their front teeth out as part of their initiation rites. They don't have any front teeth and so their tongues flop out of their mouths. And then they cut themselves and the young men take their spears and they cut their foreheads in concentric lines right to the bone and they are cattle keeping people. They worship their cattle. And they take the dung of the cattle that they burn in the fire and then they rub it into those wounds and when those wounds heal, they heal with these scars, concentric circles of scars. And the same with the women, they take hooks and they pull their skin and then they rub all this cow dung into it. And I have to say, their toothpaste is burned cattle dung. And you see them go down to the cattle crawl every morning and they pick up this burned cattle dung. It sucks. And they got the widest teeth that you would ever imagine, I tell you. Isn't that so? You know, we could teach the dental association here some tricks of the trade. But beloved, it's all about Him. He told us to go. And as Pastor Russ mentioned, you know, God's work done His way will never lack His provision. And if God tells you to do something, then it cannot fail. It just cannot fail. We just have to tarry and tarry and tarry and tarry until it comes to pass. But if I do it, and this is the problem in the body of Christ, there's so much of this God told me, shut up, God didn't tell you anything. Yeah? We just wanna be super spiritual. We walk around, oh, God told me. God told me. No, God didn't tell you anything. If He did tell you anything, it was die and you don't wanna listen. Amen? You know, and we got a whole lot of people wanting to be super spiritual giants, you know, living in la-la land, woo. You know? God is looking for real people who will so fall in love with Him. And in case you all think that I'm, you know, not a Christian because I didn't read from the Bible. Hey, that preacher didn't read once from the Bible. He's a heretic. So I'll read from the Bible just for your sakes. In John chapter 15, you don't have to turn to it. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Now, beloved, you know, in all the war zones of Africa, there are many, many times I wish that I'd been put up against the wall and shot. That would have been an easy thing. God, why don't you just take me home? Some of the things that we've been, I never forget going through the swamps in the nation of Mozambique, up to my neck in water, walking up to my neck in water for three days. No place to stop. And, you know, the leeches were just, I mean, just encrusted my legs. Mosquitoes as thick as clouds, crocodiles everywhere. And I'm saying, God, this is for the birds. Find somebody else. And I remember feeling very sorry for myself, sitting on this little ant heap out of the water, sitting there looking, and it was midday. The mosquitoes were still eating us alive. And I'm saying, Lord, find someone else. This has now become too much. And God said, I know how much you can stand. Stop whining. And as I sat there, I saw the native bearers. And they had these 50 pound packs on their backs. And three boxes, again, 28 pounds a box, three boxes of Bibles on their heads, going through the same swamp that I'm walking through. But they were singing, they were rejoicing that we were taking the word of God into their remote villages. There was no misery and complaining from them. They were rejoicing, beloved. And I felt such a jerk as I watched them and said, yeah, God, I can go on. And if I die, I die. So what? Come on. I remember saying that to some friends of mine in Ohio. I was preaching in a church one Sunday morning. I said, anybody want to go to Sudan? At that time, not a single person came forward to go to Sudan. I said, well, give me your kids then. And if they die, they die. So what? You'll see them in heaven. Oh, I thought the whole church was gonna stone me to death. Well, the first kid up to the front was the pastor's son. And he about had apoplexy after the meeting. And I said, you can't stop him from going. You'll ruin his life. Let him come. God will protect him. What makes you think that, you know, I get so angry in Africa when there's the first sign of crisis and trouble and who gets on the planes and get out first? The missionaries. Come on, beloved, what a testimony. We tell people, oh, die for Jesus, live for Jesus, do this for Jesus. And when the first sign of trouble in African countries, the first people on the planes lined up at the airport are the missionaries. And then you've got some, you know, great hero, Hulk hero, missionary guy. Well, I'm sending my wife and children out. Well, you don't think that the same God that can protect you can protect your wife and children? Dodo? Come on, beloved. I have seen little children get us out of death situations in Africa because a little child of three years old looked at some thug with an AK-47, smiled a sweet smile and said, how are you? And there's this terrorist heart just melts in the presence of a little child. And I said, just get out of the way. Go on, go, go, move. Amen. You are my friends. If you do whatsoever, I command you. Henceforth, I call you not servants. For the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth. There are too many servants in the body of Christ. The servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth. But I have called you friends for all things that I have heard of my father. I have made known unto you. What rich words. What incredible words. God has called us into intimate friendship with himself. Beloved, and if you are in intimate friendship, he's gonna share the secret of his heart. That's the essence of intercession, is getting to know him. That's why it takes so long to become an intercessor. Not because God doesn't wanna share, it's because we're so stupid and we're so laid back and we're so dumb and we so don't wanna die because God can't deal with flesh. He's gotta deal with spirit. Amen. And we spend our lives thinking like stinking Adam. Everything about us is Adam. What I see with my eyes, what I hear, what I taste, what I smell, what people say. We would rather believe what the newspaper says and the television says than we would the word of God. Come on, beloved. We're so manipulated and controlled by the opinions of this world, which is all about Adam, but Jesus Christ died to deliver us from Adam and bring us into the nature of Christ that we are led by the spirit of God. Amen. And when you look at natural situations and you say, this is impossible. Of course, it's impossible in the natural. Of course, it's impossible to Adam, but all things are possible with God. Hallelujah. And I need to stop thinking with my mind, how am I gonna get out of this? How am I gonna address this? How am I gonna do this? And say, God, it's not up to me. You brought me here. It's your responsibility. Ask of me. Ask of me and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the outermost parts of the earth for thy possession. When did we last ask? When did you last take a map of the world, beloved, and lay it down and lie prostrate on it and say, God, give me a nation? Of course, God doesn't give you a nation, but God will take you to a nation and use you as an instrument to turn a situation around. God is about the nations. The nations are as a little drop, a very little thing in his scale, beloved. If that's my almighty God, then why can't he take you? Why can't he take you? Why can't he take you? Why can't he take me and use me to turn circumstances and situations for whole nations? Of course he can, see, but we've limited him. We've limited him. We've brought God down to our understanding and our size. And you know what? People say, well, nobody's done that before, so what? I remember when I first went to Finland and the Finns told me, that's not how we do it here. I said, excuse me, I don't give a hoot how you do it here. Well, that won't work. Who said it won't work? My God told me it's gonna work. And if God says it's gonna work, we're gonna do it and it's gonna work. Hallelujah. I remember in the days, and I'm jumping around Africa, so if you don't follow, don't worry. We got 50 nations, just like you got 50 states. And it was during the worst communist days in the nation of Mozambique, Southern East Africa. And Russia was in there and literally stripping the nation of everything that they had. This terrible, terrible slave labor camps and political asylum camps and people were just being persecuted, slaughtered. And God told us, I want you to get in there and I want you to take Bibles, to set up underground churches and pray, pray for the deliverance of the nation. And so we did, we went in there and of course, it was hell. Just like all the communist countries. And we had gone down into this one town, I had taken a team and we'd had to smuggle them in. And we were in the second largest town developing the underground church. And the night that we arrived in this town, of course, we didn't have proper documentation or anything and here we are, a group of 10 of us, and you can't hide a group of 10 people who have come into this place and only God could hide us. And the night we arrived, the rebels that were fighting against the communist government in Mozambique, they blew up the fuel depot in the city and the sky was alight with this burning fire. And of course, the next morning, there were Russians and East Germans and communist police and army and everybody at every single corner. You couldn't step out anywhere unless you were stopped and asked papers, documents. And I said, God, we didn't anticipate this. Now, He said, trust me. And for 10 days, we swam with the Russians on the beach. We went as we wanted, where we wanted, establishing the underground church, preaching and doing everything. Not a single soldier, policeman or anybody stopped us and asked us for our documents at any time. And then we were holding an evening service and we were planning to leave in a couple of days. And as I got up to preach, the Holy Spirit said, as soon as you have ministered, pack your things and get out. Now, it's 10, 11 o'clock at night and it's forbidden to travel at night and there's a curfew. And everybody, of course, all the wonderful Christians, no, you can't, are you sure it was God? Maybe it was the devil and here we start this wonderful debate. No, I know the voice of God. He was God who told me, pack up and get out. See, beloved, you gotta know Him. You gotta be so in love with Him. You gotta be passionate about Him. You gotta be on fire for Him. He's gotta be your very reason for living and there's nothing else that's as important as He. So after the service, we packed up our things and to the trepidation of everybody, the local pastors were weeping, don't go, they'll kill you. If they don't kill you, the rebels will kill you. I said, we have to leave, God's given the word. And surrounding the city was a huge barbed wire fence with all these soldiers. We got into the city, okay, now we were trying to get out. 11 o'clock at night and as we came up to the barrier, here the barrier was up and all these communist soldiers were talking to friends and I said, we're going for it and we just drove straight through. There was another one of our missionaries with a vehicle and trailer. We were both towing trailers. I mean, it wasn't like some secret deal. He came through and I was holding the steering, waiting for the machine guns to start firing at any moment, nothing, we carried on. Between where we were and our destination, which was about 150 miles, there was something like 22 roadblocks with communist soldiers at every one of them. As we drove on our way, every barrier was up. Not a single soldier was at the barrier. They were all sleeping, we could see them sleeping. We just drove through one after the other after the other. There was a massive bridge and over this big river and as I pulled up to this bridge, this supposed communist soldier stepped out and the first thing I noticed was he had this immaculate uniform. Now, they never had immaculate uniforms. Their uniforms were just, you know, they were just a rag tag, you know, poverty stricken, no clothes, no food, no nothing but he had this immaculately starched uniform. Everything was so presentable and there was just something about him and he walks up to me and he says, saluted. Now, they never saluted you, that was for sure. He salutes me and he says, sir, where are you going? I said, well, I'm going to Zimbabwe or Rhodesia then and he said, but you're not supposed to be traveling at night. I said, yes, well, I'm on the business of the king and he immediately saluted again, stood at attention, saluted and said, go on your way. When we got to our destination, of course, sailing through every other roadblock afterwards, when we got to the destination, my missionary behind, he said, why did you stop at the bridge? I said, didn't you see the soldier? He said, there was no soldier. I said, come on, man, you couldn't have been so blind. I mean, he stood, he was in your headlights. You had to have seen, he said, there was no soldier and we were wondering what on earth has the pastor stopped for? That night after we crossed that bridge, the bridge was blown up by the rebels. The whole bridge was destroyed. That was the only link to the outside world. If we had not left that night, beloved, we would have been trapped in that city for three to four months and surely we would have been arrested and captured. You, we don't have to worry. When God says do it, we need to do it. When God says go, we need to go. When God says stop, stop. And again, it was about 10 years of intercession and the wicked and of course, I know that there's great controversy and there are books that have been read, these kill and prayers. Well, we don't pray kill and prayers, but we sure pray God remove the obstacles. How God removes them is his business. Oh, just let's pray they get saved. No, if somebody's a reprobate, what are you praying that they're gonna get saved for? No, Jesus said to the father, I know who are mine. You gave them to me. Beloved, if you are locked into God and you know the heart of God, you also know who are God's and who are not God's. God's gonna tell you clearly, this is not one of mine. Remove him. I don't have to pray kill and prayers. God's the kill and God, not me. And we got this stupid mentality as Christians. We want everything to just love everybody. Let's just be nice and sweet. Yeah, well, you be nice and sweet when somebody's got a knife to your throat or an AK-47 pointed right in your mouth. And we'll have to be nice and sweet. God, take him out now. And after 10 years of intercession, we gathered pastors from Mozambique and Malawi and we had this great intercession conference. And people would walk for up to four weeks through the jungle just to come to a conference and then fast. I tell you, there was one amazing story of one of our pastors in Mozambique in those days. And he came to the great Zambezi River and he was no way to cross. And he was sitting there waiting. And somebody with a canoe refused to take him. He said, I don't have money. Please take me. I have to get to this conference. No. So he sat there two days. He was sitting there just praying to God. God, get me over this river. And the second day, here came an elderly lady with a basket of bananas on her head. And she sat down and they started to talk. And he said to her, where are you going? She said, oh, I'm going to Malawi. I'm gonna sell these bananas and I've saved some money and I want to buy a piece of cloth. She had nothing but a loincloth on. I want to buy a piece of cloth to make a dress for myself. And she said, where are you going? He said, well, there's this conference. I have to get there. It's about the future of our nation and I really need to get to that intercession conference. But I have no money and I have no way of crossing. And so the lady, she sat there for a while and then she scratched in the basket and she pulled out these few tattered notes and she handed them to the pastor and she said, you know what, I've been naked for so long. It isn't gonna hurt me to go naked longer. You take this money and go to the conference. We need the word of God in our nation. You go bring back the word of God for us. Beloved, that's real. We took up a clothes offering. I don't know how many bunches of clothes she got but that's how people were, that's sacrifice. That's preferring your friend. I've been naked so long, it doesn't matter if I continue to go naked but we need the word of God. We were in a village one time in the midst of this communist setup and here's the pastor, blind in one eye, a leg that he could hardly walk on. He'd been so badly beaten, so badly treated by the communists and all he was concerned about was our safety and he said, I've posted my deacons. How would you like this as a church? I've posted my deacons on the hills around the church. If they see the communists coming, they're gonna give us the alarm and you get out. We know how to suffer but we will not give up. When I said, we're coming back to you. What can we bring? He said, pastor, we have done without the things of this world for 10 years. We don't need them. All we need is the word of God. Bring us the Bible. My beloved, there's still parts of Africa that are like that now. And that night after, I think it was two weeks that we just fasted and prayed day and night, day and night, fasting and praying and this is the culmination of 10 years of crying out to God, making our voices heard to God. God, deliver this nation. Set this nation free. God, pour out your spirit in this nation. And that night, over 600 pastors and leaders, we broke into this rejoicing, this victory dance and shout that was just unbelievable. And I watched as this shout went higher and higher, higher and higher, right up to the throne of God, touched the heart of God. And here were these pastors, they were clawing out of the sky, just pulling down, pulling down as they were. I said, what do you guys do? We're pulling down the president, the communist president of Mozambique. He's gonna end tonight. Unbeknownst to us, he had been at a conference for the weekend with some of the other presidents of Southern Africa. He was flying home in his presidential jet. It crashed in the mountains of Southern Africa and he and three quarters of his cabinet were killed that night. And instantly upon his death, the nation of Mozambique turned around. See, beloved, it's not my business how God does it. It's God's business. It's my business to prevail with God. It's my business to touch the throne of God. It's my business to touch the heart of God. It's God's business to fill me with his passion and his desire, beloved. It's God's business to visit me and bring me into that intimacy that Jesus promised. I in you and you in me and we together in the father. Hallelujah. That's the thing that God is looking for, that we would be one in him. Hallelujah. You're my friends. If you do whatsoever, I command you. Come on, beloved. What changes? Obedience. No, we can do things out of obedience. The high priest in the Old Testament tabernacle of Moses would go into the Holy of Holies. You know, there's this myth that has been perpetrated by the church that he had this lovely golden cord tied around his ankle. This didn't die in the Holy of Holies, they would drag him out. There's no such a thing. If the high priest went into the Holy of Holies dressed as God prescribed, if the high priest went into the Holy of Holies carrying what God told him to carry, the blood, and offered it according to how God prescribed it to be offered, he never needed to fear coming out. He was doing according to obedience. But the Bible says by a new and living way, we have access now with what? Boldness. Hallelujah, beloved. What changes obedience into boldness? It's love. If you fall in love with God, if you fall passionately in love with God, beloved, and it's not something that happens overnight, and it's not just some nice feeling and goosey goosey. No, beloved, if you fall passionately in love with God, God will bring you into his secret place and will share the secrets of his heart with you. That's what the intercessor is all about. The intercessor carries the burden of God's heart. First of all, I gotta know the burden of God's heart. Then we go to prayer meetings and somebody says, let's pray for this. And somebody says, let's pray for that. Somebody else says, let's pray for this. And somebody, you know, we gotta know the burden. God, what is important to you? Some years ago in Britain, I want you to listen to this. Britain was in a desperate situation. Margaret Thatcher had been prime minister, the Iron Lady of Britain. And it was the second elections after she came in. And the intercessors for Great Britain gathered together in a venue for a weekend of fasting and prayer to cry out to God, you know. And of course, like your nation right at the moment, you know, this group wanted that, that group wanted that, this person's divided, that person's divided. Everybody's got their opinion. You know something, when we get into true intercession, there's nobody's opinion but his, amen? And they had a wise leader of intercessors for Great Britain at the time. And he said, no, no, no, no, we're not taking anybody's opinions. We're just gonna wait on God the whole weekend. That's all we've come to do. We wanna hear clearly from the throne of God. And as they interceded and as they waited on God and just waited on God and cried out to God, towards the end of the weekend, there was only one word that God had. And it was this, I hate the opinion polls of the newspaper. It's witchcraft. I want you to pray against the opinion polls. Beloved, who out of anybody would imagine God is offended by such a thing? That wouldn't even come into our minds. And so the intercessors for Britain began to carry that burden. And for the weeks up to the election, they cried out to God interceding to break the opinion polls. And it was done just before the elections. They had the sure word of God that God had heard and the power of the opinion polls was broken. On the day of the election, the opinion polls stated that this party was gonna win with a landslide majority, but the opposition won. Margaret Thatcher came back with a landslide majority. So beloved, the thing that offends God is not the thing that offends us. Come on. And the only way we're gonna know what is on God's heart, what is the burden of God's heart, what thing God offends you is by knowing him, knowing him, knowing him, being in love with him, getting his heartbeat and carrying his heartbeat. It's not that we just go into a nation and start to pray. Oh, we're gonna pray. God, how many years are we gonna be here? God doesn't tell you how many years you're gonna be there. He says, you stay until the job's done. Come on, beloved. You stay until the job's done. And we just get down and it's like, oh God, when is this gonna? No, no, no, we don't even bother with those kinds of things. You stay till the job's done. And if the job isn't done while you're still alive, God's gonna raise up somebody to continue the job. But if God told you to do it, beloved, God is gonna bring it to pass as sure as I am standing here because it's not up to me. I don't pray what's on my mind. I don't pray about current circumstances. But God, what do you want done? God, what do you want to be brought to pass? The great intercessor for Britain during World War II. You know, still yet nobody has written a full account of the satanic operations of Hitler. He was a Satanist high priest. It was no wonder how many bomb blasts, how many assassination attempts did he survive? Something like 14 or 15 assassination attempts at one time and the bomb was right next to his feet. Exploded and he wasn't even injured. Now you tell me that's not supernatural. And so beloved, we are not called to fight the supernatural. It's God who will fight the supernatural. What I gotta do is I gotta bring God into the equation and God will do the war, not me. Amen, I gotta prevail on God. I gotta touch the throne of God. I gotta melt the heart of God. I've gotta offer to God something that is gonna move God and undo God so that God may move in the natural circumstances, amen? If the great archangel of war, Michael, did not bring a railing accusation against Satan that said the Lord rebuke thee. Beloved, we need to be careful, yeah? We cast out devils. We heal the sick. We raise the dead. We do all those things. And we just don't rant and rave at Satan. He's God who must do the business, no? I think the most beautiful illustration of that is in the days of Nebuchadnezzar when Daniel was crying out to God to have a revelation. And I think it's very clear from Daniel's pervading prayer prevailing, continuing, but with the Prince of Persia. And see, beloved, your soldiers are getting slaughtered there. I haven't heard anybody in this country take up an intercession that God deals with the Prince of Persia. It's the same murderer, the same killer that has been doing it for centuries and centuries and centuries. God deal with the Prince of Persia. God hasn't told me to deal with the Prince of Persia yet. He may do. If he does, I'll take it up. But I can't just do something because it looks good or sounds good or maybe good, beloved. I have to do only those things that God tells me. Otherwise, I'm spinning my wheels and I'll get tired. I'll get exhausted. I'll get disillusioned. I'll lose my vision. I'll lose my purpose. And I'll end up burned out. But when God tells you to do it, he strengthens you. And of course, he strengthens you because it's about relationship. It's about intimacy with him. The intercessor is in intimacy with him. And I'm moving God. I'm moving the hand of God. And what's the biggest problem in moving the hand of God? Me. Come on. It's all about me. Beloved, if I have a nationalistic spirit in me, how can I pray for the nations? Come on. So God has to deal with me. If I got race attitude in me, how can I pray for people of other races? God has to deal with it in me before he can use me. And so many times we just love to hang on to Adam. We love to hang on to Adam. And God says, die, die. No, I like Adam. I'm comfortable with Adam. I'm comfortable with Adam. Amen. And until God breaks through and he deals with my attitudes, my feelings, my corruption, amen. He's called us out of the nations. He's called us out of the peoples. He's called us out of the continents. He's called us to be his peculiar people. Hallelujah. Amen. Beloved, if my nationalistic spirit, yes, I was born naturally in the United States of America or Africa, but I have been reborn into the kingdom of almighty God that knows no bounds, that has allegiance to no flag. Come on. And so when Reese Howells took up that intercession, he was dealing with Satan that was clearly directing Hitler and all of his armies and air force. Well, what could be more supernatural, beloved, than the German air force, I mean, blanketing Britain. It was over. Even Churchill acknowledged there wasn't another plane that the British had. There was nothing that they had. They could not answer to this attack of Germany. And suddenly, for no reason, Hitler sends a message, bring the air force home. And nobody dared to argue with him. And right when Britain was in their hands, the whole German air force turned around and flew back to Germany, to every base in Europe. And nobody could understand. And when they asked him why, he said, my spirit guide told me. Why? Why did his spirit guide give him the wrong message? Because there was a Bible school in Wales, the director who had been interceding and crying out to God, and they finally touched the throne of God. And when they touched the throne of God, God came down into the battle and confused the enemy. Beloved, it's simple. It's as simple as that. And it's powerful because it's about God. It's about his glory. It's about his kingdom. It's not about the kingdoms of this world. It's not. See, we're still about the kingdoms of this world. When you think about it, hear the disciples. They've got one last thing to say to Jesus. He's about to ascend, right? He's been with them 40 days and 40 nights. He's about now to ascend to heaven. And Lord, one last pearl of wisdom, one last great question. And what do they ask him? Lord, when will you restore again the kingdom of Israel? No wonder he took a quick exit. I'd have probably gone back and slapped him all. Like, what is it? For three and a half years, he's been teaching them about the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom that is not of this world. And all they can think about is the Davidic kingdom, the geographical kingdom of Israel. You losers. Just another reason to die a little more. Come on, beloved. God is looking for a people. He's looking for you today. It's not up to me. It's up to you. And you know, I can see some of you already throwing out those excuses. Oh, what about my family? What about this? What about that? You know what? God is bigger than all of those things. And all God needs is you to have a heart that says, Lord, I'm willing. Take care of the rest. Lord, I'm willing. And I lay it down. You take care of it. Let us pray. Father. Oh, Father. Oh, Father. You are awesome, my Lord. You are so incredible, so powerful, so fantastic. Thank you, Lord, that you died not to save us from going to hell. Do you realize that this morning? Jesus didn't die to stop you from going to hell, beloved. He died to bring you into intimate fellowship with the Father. That's what he died for. Oh, yes, it means I won't go to hell, but you know, if you're still hell-minded, get delivered. This walk is not about going to heaven either. That's automatic. If you're washed in the blood of Jesus Christ this morning, you are going to heaven. That's it. This walk is about intimate fellowship with the Father. This walk is about knowing him. This walk is about falling in love with him. This walk is about laying aside the Adam nature and putting on the Christ nature. You will never be an intercessor and really impact the nations until you impact the heart of God. Can one man change the destiny of nations? Absolutely. Absolutely. What a man was Moses. I'm not gonna ask you if you wanna be an intercessor this morning. Intercessors are made in the fire, the furnace of affliction. It's not a ministry for a select few. God, it's not a gift or a calling. It's really for the whole body of Christ. It's just that most of us are too lazy. But this morning, I want you, I wanna challenge you to a deeper, richer walk with Christ. I want you to come to that place of saying, God, I wanna know you. I wanna love you. I wanna experience you like I've never done before, no matter what the price. That's you this morning. Lord, I want her to know you. I wanna know you, no matter what it costs. I wanna know you. Why don't you just come down to the front, make a commitment to him or whatever it costs. Oh, Jesus, touch us, Lord, with your holy fire. Fill us with a new desire, passion, Father. Give me a passion for you. Set a fire burning. A burning deep inside, Lord. A fire that cannot be quenched, that, Lord, I might shout like the prophet. A fire shut up in my bones. A fire shut up in my bones. Father, I'm asking you this morning, by your wonderful grace, touch each and every person, Lord, that is desirous of a deeper, more intimate walk with you, Lord. I'm asking you, Father, set a fire burning inside of them. Set a passion inside, Lord, to love you like we've never loved you before, to know you like we've never known you before. That, Lord, when I go through the fire, when I go through the storms, when I go through the trials, and I won't run away, but I'll endure them because, Lord, you know, you know exactly how much I can endure. And you will never allow me to be tempted more than I am able. So, Father, this morning, I'm asking you to do something special amongst your people here, Lord. Touch each and every one, Father. Fill them with your fire. Fill them with a passion. Fill them with a longing. God, we may come into an intimacy with you. God, I just banish every thought, every thought, every sin, every habit, everything, Lord, that may stop me from coming into that place with you. But, Father God, pour out your Spirit upon us, Lord. Touch us with your holy presence. Fill us, Lord, with a fresh passion, a longing for you, Lord. Put your hooks in me, Lord. Put your hooks in me, Lord, and draw me unto yourself. Salaamu alaikum. Heelabakubahanaalabasiikando. Oh, Father, Father, be glorified in my life. Be glorified through me, Lord. Oh, God, I want to know you, Lord. And, God, everything that I do, just be an expression of you. Thank you, Father. Thank you, Father. Jesus.