Edwin H. Waldvogel emphasizes the necessity of coming closer to Jesus by submitting to His will and authority, illustrating that true fulfillment and rest are found in taking His yoke upon us. He warns against the dangers of pride and independence, using the biblical example of Gehazi to show how a lack of humility can hinder our relationship with God. Waldvogel encourages believers to seek a genuine connection with Christ, recognizing that only through surrender and obedience can we truly experience His power and blessings. He calls for a heart transformation that allows Jesus to reign in our lives, leading to true peace and purpose.

A wonderful thing that we can all come closer to the Lord. In order for us to come closer to Jesus, there are certain, what shall I say, certain things we have to observe. What is his will for me? What is the thing God came to accomplish here in this world? We must seek the Lord according in the way it says of his commandments. What does God want? I can't seek to know Jesus and get to know him so that I can do my own thing, so that I can boast of my knowledge of God. But to fit into the plan of God is one of the things I ought to find out what he's doing and what he wants me to do, where I fit in and that's where I'll find him, as I find my place in the kingdom of God. And we cry to come closer to Jesus because there's a benefit in coming closer to him. We are blessed as we come closer to him. There is power. The power of God, the life of God, the blessing of the Lord, the anointing of the Spirit, all of these wonderful privileges are ours as we live close to him. And it's very easy for us then to try to become quite independent and want to be used of God and show off what we are and who we are as sons of God. Some of you have heard that kind of teaching and you know it is so necessary for us to get down, to get down as we come closer to Jesus. Jesus said, I am meek and lowly in heart. We have some tapes at home. I haven't heard them myself from Brother Bettschel, who was teaching in Kirchheim months ago, and they sent us a series of the tapes they took at that time. My wife has been listening to them and he said in one place, he was just telling me, if you feel that you don't fit in, you feel frustrated, you feel as though you just don't, things don't just seem to go right, you ought to slip your head into the yoke. Jesus said, come unto me all you that labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart and you shall find rest unto your souls. If you can't fit in somehow, it's because you're not under his yoke, under his authority. You haven't given your life to him, but Jesus promises as we do come to him and let him show us his will and let him reign in us that we'll find rest unto our souls. My, he says, my yoke is easy, my burden is light, and still you find people who all their lives, they can go through life and never really become yoke fellows of the Lord. They don't want to come under his authority and his control, but I'm thankful for God's way. I was reading today about a man in the Bible who, well, was a young fellow and wanted to be a prophet. And his name is Gehazi. Some of you know about him. He was the servant of Elisha. And he must have had quite a good opinion of himself. After all, he had been chosen and he had been chosen to stand with his master before the Lord and see the great miracles that God wrought through Elisha. And I suppose Eliza, I thought, boy, this is great. This is wonderful. Elisha, my master, followed Elijah, that great prophet. And he just served him and before long, his master was taken to heaven. And then the Lord's power, a twofold portion of God's spirit came upon him. And he is really being mightily used of God. And I'm the next. I'm next in line. Yes, sir. He got it. Elisha got the power of God through his association with Elijah and his faithfulness to him. And God's spirit came upon him. And now I'm going to be, I'm going to be the next one. But you know, it doesn't seem that he had the goods. He didn't have the humility about him. He didn't have the ability to come down. He wanted to be big. He wanted to be used. Apparently, he had some good points about him, perhaps. But he thought, here, I'm the prophet's servant. I was reading about the Shunammite woman who came when her son died. She came to Elisha. And as they were on the mountain, watching the roadway, and they saw this woman coming with her servants and her, her donkey she's riding on. And they're riding as fast as they can, in real haste. And the man of God saw her far off. And he said to Gaze, I behold, yonder is that Shunammite. Run now, I pray thee, to meet her and say unto her, is it well with thee? Is it well with thy husband? Is it well with the child? And she answered, it is well. When she came to the man of God on the hill, she caught him by the feet. But Gehazi came near to thrust her away. The man of God said, let her alone, for her soul is vexed within her. The Lord hath hid it from me and hath not told me. Then she said, did I desire a son of my Lord? Did I not say, do not deceive me? You know the story, how she had received a child because of her favor to Elisha, her kindness to the prophet. He had prayed for her and the son had been born and now he had died of a son's stroke, apparently. Then he said to Gehazi, gird up thy loins and take my staff in thy hand and go thy way. If thou meet any man, salute him not. And if any salute thee, answer him not again and lay my staff upon the face of the child. The mother of the child said, as the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee. And he arose and followed her and Gehazi passed on before them and laid the staff upon the face of the child, but there was neither voice nor hearing. Wherefore, he went again to meet him and told him, saying, the child is not awakened. When Elisha was coming to the house, behold, the child was dead and laid upon a bed and he went in. Therefore, and he shut the door upon them twain and prayed unto the Lord. He went up and lay on the child and put his mouth upon his mouth, his eyes upon his eyes, his hands upon his hands and stretched himself upon the child and the flesh of the child waxed warm. Then he returned and walked in the house to and fro and went up and stretched himself upon him and the child sneezed seven times and the child opened his eyes and he called Gehazi and said, call this Shunammite. So he called her and when she was come in unto him, he said, take up thy son. She went in and fell at his feet and bowed herself to the ground and took up her son and went away. It seems here when you read the story and if you read the rest of the story, you find that this man Gehazi had things about him that were not very commendable. He was a covetous fellow. He wanted a reward. He wanted to get rich through the blessing of God that was upon him and that shows already at the beginning. Now here he had the great opportunity of his life, didn't he? Why? I'm going to raise this child. I've got my master's staff in my hand. I'm going to go and he has sent me to go and lay it on the child and boy will the people look at me when that kid jumps up and he's well again why he could just count his blessings you know and think I'm going I'm getting there pretty fast boy this is a real promotion for me and a real opportunity for me to make a name for myself and alas he rushes in takes the staff lays it on the child nothing happens what a disappointment maybe he turned the staff around a little bit try it again maybe another way and you know nothing happened but it's a lesson for us because I think we can see here how he was a man that wanted to be used of God and he wanted the power of God and here something had to be shown to him about his own nature and his own pride of his own heart and you know we all need that as I was reading this today I was thinking about myself experience that I had years ago we had just bought this church building and you know the church had been purchased in just a few weeks time we as a church had no money saved up at all in our treasury we used it all for the missionary work and gave it away and had no money for a building and suddenly we had to buy a building because our place that we rented was sold and we had to get out and so we moved we we looked for a place and found this place and we had to have forty thousand dollars right away in about three weeks time forty thousand dollars people had given that money it was all here and we bought the building and we saw marvelously God moved and then after a while we needed money to fix it up and God again gave us the opportunity to get the funds this was a this was a basketball court down here at that time and this where I'm standing was a little higher it was a stage a real where they had plays and you know entertainment for the neighborhood they'd have the dance on the basketball floor we found some of the circulars yet that they had when they advertised what a service they were doing to the neighborhood and we wanted to change this into a meeting room and a prayer room and it took a lot of work and most of the work was done by the men of the church and we of course had to get plumbing and heating contractors and electrical men and so on and we were able to do that and get a loan for that and everything went so quickly we saw the hand of God moving so quickly I think that if I'm not mistaken that maybe right around this time was the first meeting my uncle had in Brooklyn in 1925 that's a long time ago isn't it 60 years ago end of April and my wife tells me she came to America on the 26th of April too so I told her she'd have to say something tonight I'll try to give her a chance yet but we it's a great day you know and he came and had a meeting here and the things seemed to move so well everything moved so well and just at the same time we wanted to buy a pilgrim camp and we had looked around we had been renting property on Lake George and the camp children it was mostly for children at that time in fact only for children and there we had the rented place and that was inadequate and we went around to buy property we went up and looked for a week we spent real estate men around that lake and there was no place that had a decent beach and they were all so very very expensive on Lake George and finally when we were praying one morning we said there must be other lakes around here it doesn't have to be Lake George and so we went to Warrensburg and asked there there any camps or any property available for a camp and a man in in Warrensburg told us there are two camps one is Brant Lake and the other one is on Friends Lake and both of them are available and you can see them so we went up and Friends Lake is a little closer but we found out that you couldn't get in there in the springtime because the road had thawed out and it was just one big mass of mud in spots and no cars were going in and so we drove on to Brant Lake and found the camp grounds there and oh we saw right away what a wonderful provision God has made for this camp and for this church that we can have that camp and you know we came back here and we decided I remember how we decided together we're going to have faith now to buy Pilgrim Camp we're going to just believe God ourselves we're not going to bother anybody else but we are going to band together and we're going to have faith it seemed so easy you see the church had been bought so quickly and the repairs were being taken care of and it seemed so easy the way God moved and we young fellows we thought we're going to do that too and I just just reminded of that today when I read about Gehazi here he really wanted to have the power of God and here was his chance to show what he could do and God let him down nothing happened absolutely nothing happened he had to learn something didn't he he didn't know his God he didn't have faith in his God you know you can have an empty form and if you have a form no matter how religious it is if you don't have living faith it's dead nothing will happen you can lay luscious staff on the deadest person and nothing will happen unless you have a living faith and a living contact with God and we fellows we got together we meant we were going to we were going to believe God we came back to the church and told them about Brant Lake and the brethren said we can't buy Brant Lake we just bought a church we can't buy that camp you know how much that camp cost was I think at that time was eighteen thousand dollars now that property is probably worth 250 to 300,000 today it has really tremendously increased in value but right after the war most of the lake on the other side was empty no places in there at all hardly few camps but empty lots of property to be had and here we came and the church said no so we said well praise the Lord we'll go ahead anyway we'll we'll buy the camp we'll form our own corporation if the church won't do it why we feel God wants us to do this thing and so I remember how we banded together we prayed that God would give us eighteen thousand dollars you know how far we got about two thousand we weren't going to bother Uncle Hans you know we were going to believe God boy you know we had to go to Uncle Hans closing day came the money had to be put on the line or you lost your deposit oh I never forget those days or that day we had to fall back on him well somehow or other he was able by the help of the Lord to come up with the money that was needed but I saw something today I thought my wasn't that kind of the Lord wouldn't we have felt like big shots if we had been able to come up with plenty of money to buy that camp without the Uncle Hans and without the church here and just go ahead you know believing God God saw that he saw our hearts he knew we meant it well but you know there's always a danger of trying to be successful trying to be somebody and the Lord seemed to just give us the greatest and the nicest letting down never forgot it never will forget it you know but I saw today what how would it have turned out with my own heart and pilgrim camp and all of this work if we had been able in ourselves without getting down depending on the church here the will of God the purpose of God upon my uncle who was leading the work at that time under God I think there would have been a great danger to rise up and act independently and think we can do it too we are able you know God has to show us that we're not able he has to show us that he alone is able and sometimes there is within us a pride of heart and we want to be used of God we want to do great things for God we read uh Hudson Taylor's statement attempt great things and do great things and make you know real steps of faith and we feel as though all you have to do now is just agree with that and you're okay but God has something better for us he wants to show us first of all his ways what are God's ways what did God have in mind oh we had to learn some things and we learned them I think from my uncle better to get down first of all to learn humility to learn to get your head into the yoke of Christ we don't like to obey naturally speaking we think we can become great saints without obedience never works oh the most wonderful thing that you can do brother and sister is to learn to obey Jesus Christ and get down at his feet and let him be Lord that's worth a lot more to him than we know and the world is full of people today and full of churches and full of folks that are wanting to be something and do something great for God but never learn to get down and obey the Lord and you know they go astray and it brings reproach upon the things of God and the work of Christ but isn't it nice that he calls us that he loves us and that he's willing to teach us he's willing to show us his will and use us for his glory if we'll get down at his feet and say Jesus show me your ways I don't think that we perhaps have learned some lessons that we needed to know God knew that but you know God has a purpose and he had a purpose over this whole work that was begun there 60 years ago when he sent my uncle to New York and he started on Patchen Avenue above a garage there in a little German church God had a plan he had something in mind he wanted Jesus to be glorified and manifested among his people and he wanted to get a hold of our hearts and live within us and make us to know Jesus Christ reigning within being our Lord and Master being in charge of the church and being in charge of everything that pertains to the church we are his church we the people of God we're just a little branch of it here tonight but he is head over all things to his church and to come under him and to learn of him is a great great lesson and you know I believe the Lord just wanted to help us at that time and he let me down I still remember how I felt I said oh God how you let the wind out of the air out of my balloon oh boy oh my but you know the great thing God was after and the purpose of God still today is that we get to know Jesus Christ himself and that we let Jesus reign in us let him be Lord let him cleanse us thoroughly that word of God is given unto us to really cut and not for the preacher to swing a sword that cuts everybody's heads off but he's got to cut it right in here first you know and oh I tremble sometimes when I think of the call of God and the purpose of God to take the word of God into my own heart first of all and say oh God cleanse me purify me you search me oh God and God searches us through his word and I see more and more how slow we are to recognize that the Bible is truly the word of almighty God and that God means what he says we'd like to sing about the coming of the Lord we talked about his coming last Sunday in the German meeting and in the English meeting how we are saved by hope but hope that is seen is not hope but we're looking for the day when we shall be like him and you know all through this week I've been thinking of that blessed hope does that hope really grip my heart I began to search my own heart every man that hath this hope in him purifies himself and I got to thinking am I really honestly purifying myself as he is pure we're satisfied when we look okay to other people round about us oh we look pretty good but that will never satisfy the heart of God he's got a deeper work to do and he wants to make me pleasing in his sight and I need to get into his presence and I need to get still in his presence and I need to recognize that he is Lord and that he is present as we heard tonight at the beginning of this meeting Jesus Christ comes to walk among his people and if I want to be cleansed he'll cleanse me if I really want to be changed if I really desire his word to speak to my heart he'll speak to me but you know we can go through the forms and and we can go to meetings and we can get used to the word of God and we think we know the word of God because we can grasp it in our minds and we have our minds filled with scriptures that's possible and many people are satisfied there but that word of God must come into my soul as it is the word of God and cleanse me Jesus said to his disciples now you are clean through the word that I have spoken unto you sanctify them through thy truth thy word is the truth oh I need that word to search me out I need that word to search my heart I need to pray my God cleanse me search me oh God and know my heart try me and know my thoughts my own heart will deceive me and I was so thankful today thinking about these things and saying Lord I'm glad I'm glad you you put the brakes on us there when we wanted to buy pilgrim camp and we young fellows were going to go right ahead and believe God and go ahead why wouldn't we have gotten inflated wouldn't we have had a some story to tell you know we did it and God never allowed it but we needed to learn to get down and we needed the ministry of my uncle you know he had been called by God over this work and he had the word of God in his mouth and we needed to stick close and get down and allow God to move the way he wanted to move we've had all kinds of things throughout these years years ago one of my own brothers he got blessed in the army and the great revival meetings they had and so he wanted to have revival meetings among the youth he was inspired he meant it well he came back here now we want meetings for the young people we don't want any ministers to come to these meetings we want to have our own meetings you know that's not God's way it's never been God's way here but the idea simply was we don't want to come down underneath the ministry of the Holy Ghost and there have been a lot of frictions along that line we don't like to fit in to God's way and we like to go ahead and do things and show who we are we know how to move the world and we know how to save souls and we know how to do it and you know it never worked out always petered out didn't work out but there is a way and that way is to seek the Lord and to find him to get to Jesus and he will work in our hearts as we come close to him and he'll show us ourselves that's where we don't like what we don't like and we don't like to go very far along that line because it's unpleasant but when we allow Jesus to show us ourselves then he shows us himself and he's to say you know I'm the only one that's really able why don't you let me do it why don't you take me why don't you just lose yourself in myself and let me be everything to you and you be nothing that's the way God dealt with my uncle when he came here the Lord had talked to him he said now let me be you and you be crucified wow isn't that a good religion that's the gospel that's God's way Jesus wants to come and live in you and in me and he wants to live out his life within us but we don't like to be crucified we don't like to recognize and let God show us oh you're not as not as wonderful as you thought you were no you aren't I blessed you and then you take that blessing and you feel good and you feel important and then you feel as though you can turn the world upside down and all it is is just our you know the blessed feeling we get the enthusiasm that we get but it's rooted in pride oh say how we need to follow Jesus and I want to thank the Lord for that on this day it's sort of a day of remembering God's goodness to us and his mercy to us but God has always called our attention to Christ himself and our great need of Jesus we need him we need to get down before him oh it's so good for us to get down when my uncle came here the meetings began why they were known as a free meeting and we have a free meeting people are encouraged to let God use them as he wants to and as soon as that got known my boy we had visitors from all over who wanted to let off their steam and preach their doctrines and he said sometimes it seemed like a very free for all one got up and then the other got up and the other got up and one shouted and the other tried to get everybody to shout and it's good to shout when the Lord wants you to shout but they wanted to shout too and wanted to show off and he said I just didn't know what to do sometimes and I wanted to get up and say now stop it now let's have order and then the Lord reminded him this is not your meeting this is my meeting and I want you to believe me and then a strange thing happened but God brought quietness over the meeting people came and just worshiped God and they felt drawn into a silence and then those people that like to blow their trumpets they felt so out of place they didn't know what to do with the silence that's too still for them so they left you know it's like the Swiss my uncle used to tell the story of the Swiss streetcar conductor he knew his stuff you know what he did they still have streetcars in Switzerland but there was a there were several women on the car and one said open the window I'm suffocating there's no oxygen in this place and so he opened the window and then another woman began complaining oh shut that window there's such a draft I'll die you know what he did he said all right then we'll shut the window until this one dies and then we'll open it until this one dies and then we'll have peace so you know it finally turned out all right but it took time it took a lot of time and a lot of patience and a lot of faith and you know the Lord after a while began to work and began to move and then he gave his word and great real power and some people couldn't stand that and so they didn't show up either they stayed away but God got a company of people who wanted Jesus and who wanted his word and who met business with God when he spoke to them about their tongues and their loose tongues why they prayed about those things they said God we want to be changed we want Jesus we want Jesus to rule in us and reign in us we want him to have his way with us and they got down and they sought the Lord and God talked very strongly sometimes and then he comforted his people and God did a marvelous work and he began to sanctify and build up a people that really wanted Jesus and were satisfied just to love him and know him and belong to him and let him work in them and through them we never sought for gifts for speaking in tongues and prophesying and the wonderful gifts of the spirit which we need and which are given to us of God but we always thought just Jesus have your way do what you want to do in the meeting that's the way we came to church and that's the way my uncle came he just wanted Jesus to be manifested in every meeting whatever kind of a meeting the Lord wanted made no difference to him and so we had great variety but Jesus came and ministered to hearts oh thank God and he did something in the hearts of men and women that made them to realize Jesus is the one we want Jesus is the one we need Jesus has begun a good work in us and we want him to work on perfect that which concerns us but it's such a a necessary thing for the Lord to deal with each one of us personally and deal with his self life within us and make us to see how greatly we need to get down at his feet and let Jesus work in us you know there are people that never really get through right through to Jesus and that's important for us this Shunammite woman she would not let Elisha go she knew he's the man of God he is the one that stands between God and us and has this ministry given to by God and she didn't wasn't satisfied with Gehazi she didn't like him I think she could see through him better than Elisha could when he came to meet her and said how are you and how's your family and how she didn't talk to him much that must have hurt you know why don't you know who I am she said all is well and went right past him oh that must have hurt his pride my you don't recognize the dignity that has been conferred upon me as the associate of Elisha she didn't bother about that at all she went right to him and she said I won't go until you go with me she had a light in her soul where her help came from now we don't need Elisha today we have Jesus he is the mediator of the new covenant but folks we all need Jesus himself we need him we need to have him we need to find him we need a living faith in Christ have you come to Jesus can you honestly say I have put my faith in Jesus Christ there are a lot of people are saved to a church my it's nice to belong to a nice church but that won't save you that won't help you you may get good teaching you maybe get pointed to Jesus but the only one that can really help you is Jesus and there are people that were saved to an evangelist many people were sort of stuck on my uncle and he tried his best to point people to Jesus I'm not the fountain I'm not able I can't do anything but point you to Jesus he was very faithful in that wasn't he and we want to be very faithful in that also Jesus Christ is the one we all need and the one we can all have and he is able to save us to the uttermost he can get right down into these hearts of ours he knows us and he knows us not to condemn us but to save us there isn't a thing you can hide from him you can't hide anything in your heart from him he knows our thoughts are far off he knows what you think before you think it he knows and the wonderful thing is that he loves us and the wonderful thing is that God has given him to be our savior and he alone can really save us and he can save us through and through and how we need to come closer to him and find him and you know if you have the son of God you have life John says and if you don't have the son of God you do not have life no matter who you are you may be a lively person but you don't have eternal life unless you know Jesus Christ himself in a very personal way and that's been our message and that's been our desire and we come together as we have come this evening to worship him to worship him to open our hearts to Christ to let Christ speak to us to let him deal with us and oh he is able for every single one of us he wants to have his way and as we yield to him and say Lord I want to be what you want me to be we have a prayer we pray take me as I am and make me what I ought to be or what you want me to be or what I should be spirit and soul and body regardless of the cost now anyone who prays like that and who really means business with God God will accept you and mean business with you and sometimes it costs as we young ministers we're going to buy the camp oh boy what a letdown we all had to come back to Uncle Hans and say brother Walt Fogel we just don't have the money to buy this thing and we'll lose the camp and we'll lose everything unless unless the Lord does something well we found out that we needed to come under his leadership and his faith and his guidance and that we couldn't just scoot off you know God has put you in the body of Christ too maybe there's something in you that likes to be independent you like to I'll show them what I can do you'll soon find out that you can do nothing really nothing without him we need one another and we need the love of one another we need one another's faith we need to grow together and God in his great mercy sometimes lets us down I had a man come to me one day and he said the Lord let me down now I use that expression and I don't mean it the way it sounds he may let us see our need but this man said the Lord let me down I said brother you're the first man I've ever spoken to or know of who can say the Lord let me down oftentimes we it appears that way and then after a while we find that he really loved us too much to let us go our own way and that his purposes were so wonderful over us that he just didn't let us lose our souls and rise up and be able in ourselves he didn't let us down but maybe he got us down and down at his blessed feet oh say brother and sister I would call upon you to get under the yoke take his yoke upon you let Jesus control your life let him be your Lord and you know as you do that well you'll have a friend you'll have a master who has promised to never leave you and never forsake you and you will find rest unto your soul and that's what people are looking for and that's what we're all looking for oh that rest that freedom from anxiety and fear and care that freedom from the fear of death and the future he gives us rest we find it in Christ have you found have you really found Jesus oh let's love him tonight and serve him and give ourselves to him more fully say Lord Jesus thank you thank you that you persist in dealing with me and in in working in my soul I want you to sanctify me truly I want you to cleanse me and make me like yourself and that's exactly what he'll do he'll come and live within us and make us more than conquerors and then it won't be our doing won't be that we're wonderful and that we got the staff and we can go around and show what we can do oh boy here's my opportunity I heard someone speak like that not too long ago oh what a great opportunity God has given me now he's going to put his what do they call that thing anyway this is imprinture upon me and I'm going to be his genuine apostle God let them fall down right flat on their nose he has to we don't want to be glorified but we want him to be honored and him to be glorified we want to get out of his way and if we mean business we'll say Lord search me God help me he's kneeling next to a minister in one of our meetings some time ago and he was praying so earnestly we were all calling on God after the meeting and he kept saying Lord save me from presumptuous sinning don't let these sins have dominion over me and I struck me because you know that I had been praying that same prayer in German the German Bible says Lord save me from these proud things these things that blow me up that make me think I'm I can get away with it because I'm your child and and you I gotta in with you you know how many people think that today they can sin carelessly because they feel they have a special corner somewhere on the Lord one sister told me I've served him 20 years so faithfully do you think he's going to mind if I do this little sin I said how can you talk like that how can you talk like that even if you've been serving him and loving him that you would trifle with a little sin but she thought because she had been so good we're not saved by works not at all we're saved by the grace of God and when he saves us he delivers us from those ideas and that poor woman she lost out entirely because of her little sin you know that she wanted to do God would overlook it no those are those things David says God don't let me do that don't let that happen to me he says there who can understand his errors who can see his own mistakes oh God you search me save and keep back your servant from presumptuous sinning that means just taking going ahead anyway God will keep us walking softly with him oh let us ask him for that near as we've been singing near still near bring me closer Lord bring me down lower at your feet take the pride out of my heart this spirit within me that doesn't want to obey and doesn't want to get down and doesn't want to really be thoroughly delivered and God has to and he does in his great mercy if we follow after him he's begun a good work and he's going to finish it and he alone can do it but every one of us he is determined we shall be like Jesus isn't that marvelous isn't that wonderful are you willing for that I think we all are aren't we or if we aren't we can say Jesus like Mr. Meyer F.B. Meyer you know him he's a real saint of God and we love to read his writings somebody gave me one of his writings today such a blessed blessed man but he wasn't always like that he was such a smart kid he could he had mastered greek I think before he was 14 just a prodigy you know really a genius in these languages and things and then he got went into the ministry and was so smart such a clever man good man wanted to do the right thing and who should come into his church one day but a bunch of cricket players from England four sportsmen they had a meeting in his church C.T. Studd was one of them and he gave his testimony and told how under Moody's preaching had been saved and changed entirely and he was a very wealthy boy his parents had cut him off from his inheritance entirely when he went to serve Jesus with all his heart and so he lost the wealth of the family that he was heir to but he was so happy that in that meeting Mr. Meyer in his church Mr. Meyer heard him and he said I haven't got what he's got he had a far better education he said I don't have what he has freedom in his soul he has joy he has Christ he is satisfied and I don't have that and he talked to Mr. Studd after the meeting and then you know he went to his room to pray and call on God he said God I want to give my life to you I want to give everything to you and he prayed a long time and the Lord showed him something in his heart that he hadn't given to God he hung on to that that's mine and he put it like this that one room in my house that was my room I was going to keep that room for myself the Lord could go into every other room but that room was mine and finally God kept dealing with him and he said Lord I'm not willing to open the door there for you but I am willing for you to make me willing that did it he kept on praying he said God I want you to make me willing I'm not willing how many many people there are who try to hold on to something here or something there and they're not willing but he prayed God I'm willing for you to make me willing won't you do it and Jesus did and before the morning dawned that man was a transformed man he gave in he surrendered he humbled himself he opened every avenue of his being to Jesus and Jesus came in and the river of life is still flowing through that man's writings he's with the Lord many years now but oh Jesus Christ is wonderful and he's looking for hearts he's looking for you he's looking for us all and we can say Jesus I don't want to be important and big I don't want to make a name for myself but I do want to be yours I do long to be yours and Lord if I'm not willing to get down and put my slip my head into the yoke I'm willing for you to make me willing break the resistance in me help me Lord to be all together yours take the pride from my heart whatever there is that holds me back and let me be yours and that's the kind of a savior we have and the kind of a savior we proclaim he will come and do it because he loves us so much and you'll never be sorry oh Jesus we want to thank you we thank you Lord that you work in such wonderful ways you know what we need you know what every one of us needs you know our hearts and you know Lord we long for peace we long for joy we long for fellowship with yourself and we've tried to find it in our own on our own terms in many instances we want to come on your terms Lord we want to really bow before you oh Jesus help us to get down help us to be willing to get down help us Lord Jesus to be willing to learn the lessons that you want us to learn we pray that you'll cleanse our hearts from all those things that grieve you and that defile them oh God we pray that our hearts shall be clean dwellings in which you can come and exercise your authority and dwell within in all your fullness we know you're working to that end cleanse us we pray you purify us take us Lord tonight oh God if there are those here have not really found peace and not really surrendered their lives fully to you we pray that tonight you will give grace Lord to each one to say Jesus have your way Jesus we pray that you will give that grace tonight Lord that hearts may be set free and hearts may enter into a real joy of the Lord and knowledge of the Lord and walk with the Lord and be victorious because Christ is victorious in them we pray that we shall be willing to be crucified to the world and the affections and the lusts and all that pertains to the flesh Lord we pray that we shall rise up and let you rise up within us and have your way with us entirely teach us Lord we want to thank you for your great love to us and your presence that you have manifested so persistently throughout the years Lord you've been so true to us and we thank you that you're still working tonight and we pray my God that you will yet find Lord God an abundant harvest for all the prayers and all the ministry of the Holy Ghost throughout the years amen