In this sermon, the preacher discusses the danger of preaching without the living presence of God. He shares a conversation he had with a famous manager of a rock and roll band who revealed their plan to incorporate religious services into their concerts as a marketing strategy. The preacher emphasizes the importance of living in eternity and not just going from event to event. He also mentions a historical event where a revival was missed due to a navigation error, highlighting the need for spiritual discernment.

I'm fifty-one. Sometime or another all of us are captivated with the idea that a chapter that we've read suddenly kind of comes to life. You wonder why you've read it so many times and haven't seen what you're seeing today. Some of you read this, oh, I won't say how many years ago, it wouldn't be fair. I read it sixty years ago anyhow, maybe seventy. But it's a favourite psalm. There are, you remember, a hundred and fifty psalms. And roughly, roughly half of them are written by David. Out of the psalms he wrote there are eight penitential psalms. But this is the greatest of all penitential psalms. Remember the history of David right here is that he stained on one hand with the murder blood on one hand and on the other hand the black stain of adultery. And you remember that Shakespeare has, isn't it Lady Macbeth looking at that spot of blood on her hand and she says in her own language, this damp spot all the perfumes of Arabia can't take it out. And now when you think of it, it's awesome today that men have gone to gods of stone and wood crippled with guilt and burdened and anxious because they know inwardly that there's a condemnation and yet they find no relief. I'm amazed the church of Jesus Christ drags its feet as it does. We've got the most explosive and the most expensive message the world has ever known. That Christ is able to save sinful men. One of the wonders about this psalm, I'm going to leap through it quite a bit but one of the wonders is this that I didn't find this till about a few years ago. The psalm is a monologue. There's nobody in it but David. Have mercy upon me O God according to thy loving kindness, according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies brought out my transgressions and wash me throughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin against thee, thee only have I sinned and he said no he sinned against Bathsheba I don't think he did, he sinned with her but it's himself right through the whole psalm brought out my transgressions. Isn't it interesting he comes asking for mercy whenever did a king do this you know kings used to whether they do now or not I don't know they used to believe in the divine right of kings they could do what they wanted to do like King Uzziah when he managed the government and managed industry and got his army going and raised the economy and did everything with a magic touch and then suddenly decided to go into the temple and minister holy things and God took hold of him for that when would this as it happened before or since I'll tell you what Mary Queen of Scots would have done in Scotland she would have said well this may be true of me but I want to tell you this I'm above the law, James II would have sworn witnesses hired witnesses to swear away the testimony of Bathsheba Mohammed would have produced a revelation authorizing both his crimes Charles II would have publicly abrogated the seventh commandment Queen Elizabeth not the present one the one 300 400 years ago she would have suspended Nathan you know what's wrong with our day as I answer before God I believe that evangelism is being killed in America by evangelists they're not preaching evangelism they're preaching forgiveness let's look at this just skipping through quickly have mercy upon me oh God according to thy loving kindness according unto the multitude of thy blot out my transgressions I notice the different words he has for sin in verse one he calls them transgressions in verse two he talks about iniquity in verse two he talks about sin you see the wretched evangelism of our day has changed its vocabulary there are no adulterers anymore they're just having an affair there's no iniquity it's just infirmity there's no wickedness it's just weakness and therefore it doesn't burn because God won't honor it this is God's language we should use it it's God's kingdom we're effecting last week I used an illustration it's lived with me since sometimes when I didn't want it in the middle of the night we were dealing with Luke 16 last week talking about the man in hell he could see he could hear he could feel and there in down there in the depths of hell he can see away there into eternity into Abraham's bosom and he could hear in hell I believe when one of the agonies of hell is they'll be able to see everything that's going on in heaven and there's no chance of getting out I wrote a brother the other day a week ago and I said you know we need some bumper stickers with hell has no exit mercy called me yesterday said I've got the bumper stickers for you I said well I don't know have them oh I'll put one on mine front and back if you like hell has no exits the present church doesn't he believe that hell exists we talk about once saved always safe why do we talk about once lost always once once a man gets into that state he can never get out I imagine a young man his his daddy and mummy talked to him about God he heard his mother pray and thought it was sentimental he's a big swashbuckling boy he's gonna live his own life do his thing he wakes up in hell and sees the marriage supper of the lamb he sees his mother with a glorified body sees his father with a glorified body he sees that multitude which no man can number they can hear in hell and I guarantee that when that choir of a hundred and forty thousand musicians play they'll hear it in hell dear old William Bull died in 1912 I never saw him yes I did I saw him once when the tiny time now a friend has a picture of him on the refrigerator door that's a that's a cold place for a man who preached hellfire all his life he was a remarkable man and one day he decided he would go to Australia because they'd had revival of the Salvation Army in Australia and remember the the the Salvation Army made in its whole existence from the time he inaugurated it under God to the time he died never had as much money as some of the gospel corporations around here the lifeblood of modern evangelism is not the Holy Ghost or the blood of Christ it's money God hasten the day when America goes bankrupt except for the fact the poor would suffer more that's the only thing that keeps me from praying God smash the banks they're going to smash anyhow within the next five years a hundred a hundred banks closed in America last year 130 will close next year we're told a lady wrote to me today from the inter-first bank in town here she said I suppose you know that we're laying off 2 000 people across the nation they're paying about 50 off down at the inter-first in town the conditions are very bad and they're getting worse but here's a boy he can't get out he sneered he recuded his mother and father he drank rich liquors and wines while he was living there isn't a spot of water in hell and his wife his mother's there drinking wine the wine of the kingdom he wouldn't listen to her now she can't listen to him they're going to tell me that the fundamental church of America believes in hell I won't believe you try you think we're an empty seat here tonight if all the believers around here really believed in hell we'll be here storming heaven to get God's glory down it's an eternal separation there are three different words here for sin verse one again transgressions and verse two iniquity and then at the end of that verse sin by the same token there are three different words for washing or cleansing verse one is blot out that's erased something like a blackboard and it's completely obliterated you know I think many of us well some of us didn't have a very bad history anyhow but some of you have a bad history one of the things is you find it hard to forgive yourself and some of your neighbors find it hard to forget but every day you ought to send a hallelujah to heaven he forgives and he forgets music chorus when God forgives he forgets God forgives he forgets he'll no more remember our sin doesn't matter how much you may have sinned enough to damn a million people he forgave it and it's thrown into the sea of his forgetfulness I told you about the man in England a rough boy and uh he was always disturbing the church you know I didn't know it's supposed to be quiet supposed to be a Methodist and it was a morgue but he kept shouting hallelujah if anybody touched him he ripped the air you know one day he went to see his preacher oh the new preacher sent for him and said come into my office you know you disturb people on Sunday nights we had a man in our church like that he was great I loved him he was a funny looking guy but you know when he was getting he got hallelujah oh everybody jumped you know there's old joe there's old joe well glory we need some folk like that you know some people are quiet like me and some are noisy so this fellow went into the office of the of the preacher and the preacher said I've got a friend in there now now be quiet be quiet he said read this book so he's reading an encyclopedia and he thought that boy he won't find a thing there to praise God for well that was what he thought 10 minutes after the fellow shouted the biggest hallelujah he'd ever heard the preacher said what's wrong with you that's not a bible it's not a hymn book it's not a history of the church what are you shouting hallelujah for he said it says that off the shore of the Philippines there's a hole in the sea they've never measured the depth of it some parts of the ocean have 26 000 feet of water they can't find the bottom they can't get a plumb line to go to the bottom hallelujah what's a hallelujah for he said because the lord has cast my sins beyond the depth of the sea and if the devil tries to get me to get drowned anyhow maybe his theology wasn't very good but boy i'll tell you what it's great when you know it isn't it nobody can rake them up not even bring them up they're fully paid for Jesus paid it all in that sense for us anyhow he goes on you see there are three prayers in this marvelous marvelous psalm we could stay a week on it we won't i promise you the first is a prayer of a sinner have mercy upon me oh god have mercy i love the old hymn that says depth of mercy can there be mercy still reserved for me how many times did you accept to hear the gospel before you accepted it i'm sure i heard it hundreds of times and there's a patient loving god wanting to invade my life and me stupid little me shuts an almighty god out of my life if i debate him the first time i heard the gospel had to be a hundred miles further up the road spiritually than i am tonight you know every meeting is full of tragedy i don't care whether people come to the altar or not i'm no longer mesmerized by altars we've killed the church we've killed missionary we've killed ministry with altercars i told you what the precious men said in the where was it 1500s where that wonderful man preached that message on the sinners in the hands of an angry god do you know he actually preached 500 messages they're still in print and there's only one of them that's full of wrath the others are full of love and full of mercy and full of grace but those preachers got together gilbert tenant was one his son was gilbert george whitfield davenport a whole host of mighty men in america we don't pay tribute to them we pay tribute to film stars and sports sports people but they made a covenant together and remember they never staged a revival ever that brother could have waited why preach his message on the sinners in the hands of an angry god and remember it wasn't staged it wasn't advertised it was in the ordinary course of preaching when the holy ghost came in that phenomenal thing and shook america but they made a covenant together as i say they didn't stage it jonathan edwards could have said we're going to have a revival but you know mr whitfield is the greatest preacher since the apostle paul he'll arrive uh he'll arrive in about four days do you know what happened the navigation instruments were not very good in those days and they missed the port they were after they missed it by 150 miles that's a long way to swim isn't it 150 miles off course and if they'd announced that whitfield was coming he wouldn't have been there anyhow but the holy ghost came but those men covenanted together that they would not pluck i like the figure that we will not pluck unripe fruit we're getting people saved who don't know they lost you have to sing an emotional chorus because the holy ghost hasn't stirred them so we stir them emotionally oh we're insisting on repentance i've made up my mind i keep a little book in which i have a lot of notes you should read them you think they were solomon's i mean you think there's someone else's and when i put the other morning about two o'clock i was in my office i put this down there is no repentance to repentance without restitution remember the man in the scripture that says if i've done anything wrong i'll pay fourfold back we're always raising that storm about abortions and that's okay but i'll tell you what there are far more spiritual abortions than physical abortions in america in natural birth you have three things you have conception gestation and birth and you have the same thing in true revival and you can't speed it up what i liked about the i'm reading a a kind of brief history of revivals in america right now the times when men would go into meetings and they'll be stricken tormented you don't get that anymore come the lord loves you just as you are well why get changed if he loves you just as you are if you're a prostitute stay a prostitute it still loves you if you're a drunken if you beat your wife up don't beat her as hard but still beat her come on have some sense god doesn't love you as you are he's angry with the wicked every day mercy is open to them but they rebel and they pile up their rebellion they pile up their judgments i like to hear the welsh people sing i think they're the best singers congregational singers in the world and they have a great hymn and when i read this first verse where david is his supply as a supplicant i think of a hymn they sing great god of wonders all my ways display thine attributes divine but countless acts of pardoning grace above all other wonders shine who is a pardoning god like thee or whose grace so rich and free i'd say this quickly when uh what was leonard leonard bernstein a few years ago was the maverick conductor of the new york philharmonic somebody brought him a piece of dog-eared manuscript and said play this he's a brilliant concert organist appear this thing is all right i can't you can you won't i can't you can't i can't why not you say this is 200 years old it was written in some man in the loft of a great cathedral if i could get behind him and catch his spirit how he played it i don't know how he played it i need the spirit of the man well how do you get the the drift if you want to say that about this song it wouldn't pulsate with life unless the holy ghost who wrote it inspires it right but when you see this man he's a king what does he say have mercy upon me i acknowledge my transgression my sin is ever before me look he looks out of the window and he sees a soldier a handsome young man standing there with a not with a gun but standing there with a sword to defend his king and when he sees that smart young man he remembers that he sent the best captain that he had in the army to his death so he could steal his wife he looks through the window and he sees his sin a baby cries and he remembers the child he fathered to Bathsheba his sin goes in his ears his sin goes in his eyes we try to get people reconciled to god and they don't know they've been enemies against god i'm not a wicked man i'm not a vile man the biggest sin in the world is not adultery rotten as it is and all that corruption the biggest sin in the world is to say i run my life and not god as i say jesus did not come into the world to make bad men good that's a fringe benefit he came to make dead men live there are some very admirable men i know some men i'd rather trust they're unsaved i'd rather trust them in business than christians but this man is having a terrible time he didn't sit down and dictate this i don't know how he wrote it i'll tell you how he didn't write it he didn't write it in the lounge chair drinking orange juice and eating the grapes of escrow this man is writhing on the floor this paper i have is indian paper and it's beautiful type but this wasn't written with his hand if you can take the figure of speech here it's written in black ink on paper it was written in blood and in tears it's not he didn't punctuate it with commas periods and all the rest he punctuated with sobs and cries and groans this man is prostrate he's lashed with conscience he's a load of guilt he's condemnation a baby scares him to death because he fathered when he shouldn't father he sees a soldier polishing his uniform and he knows that he sent the best man that was in the army to his death you find people do that they'll commit sin and then they'll tell a lie to cover up their sin it's the way of the transgressor all the time but again i say this man is is stricken but i'll tell you what when god redeemed him he was just as marvelous for god remember the psalms he wrote he wrote the 23rd psalm it's a lovely psalm where does it fit into his own history he says he went down into the valley of the shadow of death i haven't read this i dug it up myself and it may be wrong but i'm sure it's right i believe the valley of the shadow of death and when he went down there to fight goliath and goliath says i'll break you over my knee and feed the birds with you all israel is looking on the king of israel is looking on jonathan's looking on the kings of the the captains of the army are looking up and here's a boy never had a moment of military training dear god i wish half the preachers in the country hadn't been to cemeteries seminaries they get so confident and cocky with their greek and their hebrew what have you got i know a little hebrew i knew one in new york used to repair my pants i know a little greek he keeps a station on eighth avenue where i park my car that's all greek and hebrew i know we used to have a man testify in the open air he would say i haven't been to college but i have the blessed knowledge that my sins are forgiven and i'm on my way to heaven oh that's as good as shakespeare ever said i acknowledge my transgression my sin is ever before me against thee only have i sinned and done this evil in thy sight that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest and be clear when thou judgest behold i was shaped in iniquity and incended my mother conceived me i said there are three different words in the first two verses for sin there are three different words for cleansing in the first two verses there are three prayers in this psalm the first prayer is a prayer of a sinner have mercy upon me the second prayer is that is a prayer of a backslider restore unto me the joy of thy salvation of course there are no backsliders anymore you know that of course there are about 50 million people in the nation out of fellowship but you can't find backsliders anywhere they buried the grandfather he was the last backslider in their church they haven't done any sins the only thing the church today is lively as it is professor to be is in a big delusion the devil cheated us what do you do with a man like this he's broken hearted because three times he mentioned brokenness the method is used to sing a hymn blessed are the men of broken heart who mourn for sin with inward smart we don't mourn for sin people just come in we whisper in their ear just tell the lord you're sorry they come to the altar damned and they say a prayer and go out damned except a little after that they get baptized and tithe and of course that fits you for the kingdom of god they stress works we're not saved by works but boy if you if you die untied you go straight to perdition that's what they imply anyhow isn't it make me to hear joy and gladness verse 11 take not cast me not away from thy presence take not thy holy spirit from me come on now who's the most miserable man in the world tonight a man begging at the street corner a blind man the man they showed on tv the other day a couple of weeks ago they dragged him out of the debris there in the in mexico city they had to amputate his legs he left his legs behind in the debris they sawed his legs off and one of his arms is broken now he's no legs and there is handicap for life the most miserable man in the church is a man in the world is a man that god has walked out on oh i don't believe he ever will well then you don't believe the scripture why does david cry here take not thy holy spirit from me because he'd seen a king by the name of saul and he was anointed and he was filled with the holy ghost and he prophesied but he died a suicide what did he see him do he saw him go here he go there he tries to find deliverance he can't the last thing he does he's cringing at the feet of a dirty filthy spiritist medium and says bring up samuel and samuel came up the only genuine appearance i think ever in history and what did the king say to him he said i've sinned and he said yes you have sinned he thought oh no no no uh kings have a special permit but they but the spirit said samuel said you have sinned but here he is wandering around god has taken his spirit from him it says clearly do i believe that happened yes i do believe it does not often but i believe it does i used to take teams of young men around england college fellows and they were all much smarter than me happen to help them if they weren't we had one young fellow who had been saved from a spiritist medium's home he had been a spiritist medium god miraculously saved him i've seen that fellow when we used to preach middays and midnights catching people coming out of the legitimate theaters or movie houses i've seen that young fellow hold a crowd spellbound for an hour while he just told his testimony of deliverance he was marvelous i sat at the feet as we say so very often as a figure of speech i sat at the feet of dr g campbell morgan maybe one of the greatest expositors ever and yet this young fellow when he had the anointing could out preach campbell morgan but he got slack he backslid you know where where everybody starts yes a deacon's run away with a woman he's backslidden no that's a fruit of his backsliding he backslid backslid months ago in his prayer life in his devotional life every backslider starts there so if you're chilling off in your experience of prayer if jesus isn't as real and as wonderful if the word isn't sweeter than the honey in the honeycomb get on your belly and groan i saw that young man as i say move audiences there were six of us we would pray use preach i preach one night the others would preach finally he quit he had a church and then he got into some company that was rich and he got into a high state of living the last thing i heard about him was he took off his clerical collar and banged it on the table after a sunday night service and he walked out and he became a terrible drunkard smoking drinking sinning women sure i would almost cringe when he preached about holiness and the majesty of god and yet that guy goes and sells out did he go to hell that's not my business i'm telling you you can lose the anointing of god in fact i guarantee 90 percent of the priests in the country have lost it if they ever had it the anointing of god is the hardest thing to get this side of eternity and it's the most difficult thing to keep yes because we begin to develop our own personality our own eloquence our own style instead of having the thundering anointing of god that makes people tremble as i read about these men tenants and others were preached and people would go home and weep the whole night through and fast the next day and weep the next day and they couldn't be consoled you couldn't whisper a scripture into their ears until god put the fire of condemnation out through the blood of jesus christ they were the most miserable men on earth now god help us we've got we've got homosexuals in pulpits we're ordaining homosexuals sin doesn't appear sin to the church never mind to the man outside the word says there's no fear of god before there are there's no fear of men in the world there's no fear of god in the church how many people tiptoe into the sanctuary expecting to meet god did you come here to meet god tonight i preached a good-sized congregation last sunday night i went there in earth in texas the other side of dallas i asked them did you come here to hear a sermon about god or did you come to meet god he says restore them to me oh come on haven't you just read the charts you know king saul was up here and he's lost his job number one is david he's selling all the records people in the street are clapping their hands and singing saul has slain his thousands but david is tens of thousands come on you're number one up on the charts you're the greatest king you've subdued the philistines you've subdued all your other enemies don't get too worried just about a little trivial break in your devotional life a bit of coldness but once a man has tasted the fire of god he'll never be content till he gets back there and an old preacher in england used to say if you had the fire you won't be content with the smoke restore them to me the joy the methodists again i have to quote them because i was raised a methodist went to a methodist college but they used to sing a lovely song the joyful news of sins forgiven one of the preachers every sunday morning gives you a little bit of scripture there what we have seen and heard with confidence we tell but the old methodist hymn says what we have seen and heard with confidence we tell and publish to the sons of men the signs infallible with joyful news of sins forgiven of hell subdued and you can't get a squeak out of anybody you say i didn't live a very bad life i mean i wasn't lifted out of a horrible pit i've got news for you you were going to a horrible pit worse than all the pits in the world put together you're going to an eternal hole a place called hell there's no way out i'd love to say i'd love to be in a crusade i'd love to be in a town where there came a deluge of holy ghost conviction where people can't sleep at night they don't want to buy they don't want to sell they don't want to go to a restaurant they don't want to buy new clothes they suddenly realize that they are bound for eternity either eternal life or eternal death but that isn't ours anymore it would be if we preached properly it would be if we prayed properly it would be if we fasted properly we're trying to become millionaires by paying a dime and god says no again revival will only work one way and that's god's way he says restore unto me the joy of thy salvation i guess i've told you before the place where i met my precious wife i preached on this psalm in 1937 and a woman came to the altar the tent was almost empty she crawled practically up to the front she was the ugliest woman i've seen and i've seen some ugly women in my time but anyhow she was ugly she was dressed in black she was wrinkled as a prune and she'd all the signs of death about her she knelt and i said can i help you said my name's mrs shepherd i said so what mrs shepherd this has been a wonderful night i said well i didn't think it was super the tent was nowhere near filled you don't realize no i don't 40 years ago i was one of the outstanding officers in the salvation army and i went home after a meeting and i had an argument with my partner we'd quarreled over the hymns and finally i said well i'll have my way and she wanted her way i went home after the meeting so angry i took off my uniform and i i just cut it to pieces i took off my skirt and i cut it in strips i took my straw salvation army bonnet and i put it on the fire and then i took my bible i ripped all the pages out then those big eyes began to weep tears were bouncing off her craggy cheeks she said mr ramiel tonight god spoke to the first time in 40 years when i walked out on god i went to hear william booth and he could thunder hellfire but he never moved me i heard the holy man colonel brangle he never moved me i heard commissioner lawley outstandingly powerful in the holy ghost he never moved me i've been to meetings i've heard the world's great preacher no one's ever moved me but she said when you read the psalm tonight restore unto me the joy of thy salvation i said god that's it i've never really smiled in 40 years i never had any joy in 40 years i'm sour i'm bitter i'm antagonistic against god i love nobody i've opposition against everyone i said well let's pray and we prayed and she surely cried that was about nine o'clock saturday night i said well remember we have a prayer meeting in the morning at seven i stayed on after that crusade to try and put that church together as it were and you know that woman was the first of the prayer meeting i've gone to the church at seven o'clock sunday morning and she'd be ankle deep in snow she was never late for a meeting and she would say over and over again oh that verse became so real with joy shall he draw water from the wells of salvation the joy of sins forgiven the joy of being reconciled to god the joy of having an eternal home in heaven i noticed the other week they announced on radio jb priestly an english playwright and writer of popular books he made a statement once when i was in england about when it's around about the 1930s and he said i drove my car up to a great church of england a monolith beautiful like a miniature westminster abbot and i drew my car to the side of the road and watch people go in there was one man and 10 women and he said when they went in they looked as though they were going to the dentists he said i waited till they finished when they came out they looked as though they'd been i don't think every meeting should be exciting in the sense that we mean use the common word i think it should be inspiring we can be broken with joy as well as with sorrow what do you sing visions of rapture now burst on my sight what do you mean when your eyes are closed you mean when you get a revelation of the glory that's yet to be as i've said before if i could push the door of heaven open just an inch and you could look in and see you'd never backslide your prayer life would never go cold you never say lord it's getting hard brother one side inside eternity we'll be embarrassed how little we really really really suffered and and prayed and worshiped god let me leap over here a minute he prayed the prayer of a sinner he prays a prayer of a backslider um he's trying to get back to god but look at verse 16 he says thou desirest not sacrifice why not there's another way to god but sacrifice you have to bring different sacrifices for different sins you have to bring them to but he says you don't desire sacrifice and he's still under the old economy of blood sacrifice what's he saying thou desirest not sacrifice god desires more than sacrifice what do you do it desires a broken and a contrite heart three times he mentions brokenness here in verse eight make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice i've told you and i'll say to you in less than a minute i jumped out of a burning hotel in 1951 in chicago i broke my back in three places my left leg was broken in three places my feet were broken i lay there at two o'clock in the morning in the street there's no place for a preacher to be but i couldn't move my back was what my legs wouldn't function a man came around the corner he said what are you doing here i was tempted to say playing tennis what do you think i'm doing he said you can't stay here i said i don't want to he said get up i can't i can't walk well then he said you can't stay here a car may come around the corner and you'll get hurt oh brother hurt and i'm aching in every limb and my mind is going a thousand ways my wife's four thousand miles away with three boys i had no insurance i'm lying in a chicago street in snow at nearly three o'clock in the morning between two and three oh the man says i've got to move here he put his hands under my legs and my back and lifted me and everything in me screamed the bones which thou hast broken is anything more painful than a broken bone and he hasn't a broken bone in his body he has a broken relationship with god the trouble is that many people break their relationship with god they leave the sacred page for the sports page a meeting is too long particularly if the cowboys kick off at 12 o'clock apparently they got kicked off the field last sunday that's because there's so many christians watching and not praying dear dear dear i'd love to have enough energy and strength and touch with god to pray that something would happen in tyler where people just felt again that their relationship with god was broken and it's as it's as painful there's nothing can heal it but he says you have to have a broken and a contrite heart you have to break with everything break with your habits break with your friends but the inner man has to be broken thou desirest sacrifice not sacrifice and i would give it the sacrifice of god spirit a broken a contrite heart he prayed the prayer of a sinner he prayed the prayer of a backslider look at his prayer in verse 10 he prays the ultimate for a human being to pray create in me a clean heart oh god and renew a right spirit within me i can never think of that oh god if i go back into that so many what does it say he says hide thy face from my sins the most miserable man in the world is a man whose god has turned his face away from her i'm not sure god hasn't turned his face away from america we don't even know it that wonderful 80th psalm don't look at it now but three times in that 80th psalm the psalm david said he knows that the nation's in trouble he says cause thy face to shine upon us and that's all america needs is god to smile upon us in his benevolence in his mercy visit us just one more time often when i pray and then i bite my lip when i've prayed it i say lord spare america one more year like the man whose tree was going to be cut down he says don't cut it down just let me fertilize it one year and if it doesn't bear fruit cut the thing down and burn it do you think we love america enough to say that give us just 12 more months of mercy 12 more months of grace and after that send us to hell if need so verse 10 he says what create in me a clean heart skip over to verse pardon me to psalm 139 when he's laden with guilt when he's broken down with condemnation when he knows his guilty past is catching up with him what does he say he says hide thy face from my sins now look what he says here at the end of the psalm 139 well let me go to verse 1 a minute i think you take verses 1 to 6 you see the omniscience of god verses 7 to 12 you see the omnipresence of god verses 13 to 18 you see the omnipotence of god i think i can say that in my judgment the psalm 139 begins what is the grandest contemplation of divine omniscience that was ever put into words look at the majesty of god he's talking about this is the god he's inviting to search him he says oh lord thou has searched me verse apparently psalm 139 verse 1 oh lord thou has searched me and known me thou knowest and yet though he says god has searched him though he says god knows thou knows my down sitting and monopoly he not only knows he says at the end of verse 2 and you understand and verse 3 thou compasses me about verse 4 there is not a word in my tongue but thou knowest it altogether he knows he's in an inescapable situation for what reason because he says here in this verse 7 whither shall i go from thy presence here's omnipresent whither shall i go from thy presence whither shall i go from thy spirit if i ascend up to heaven thou art there if i make my bed in hell behold thou art there if i take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea he says darkness cannot cover me there's nothing can cover me god has an all-seeing eye god's an omnipotent arm and he's crying to this god to have mercy upon him he says search me oh god the hebrew word there is very emphatic it says dig deep lord he isn't saying search israel he isn't saying search the high priest he says search me oh god and know my heart do you know there are about 120 references in the psalms to the heart there are about 19 references to the heart in in this psalm 139 remember what the scripture says search thy heart and probably it says the man that trusteth in his own heart is a fool why did it say creating me a clean heart because jesus said out of the heart are the issues of life as a man thinketh in his heart as i said last week you can show me my brain on an x-ray you can't show me my mind you can show me my physical heart you can't show me my emotions you can't show you my will and they're not just in a little ball of flesh there otherwise when a man gets a heart transplant all his sins go with it i think it must be hard for a woman to go in and her husband says you know darling i've had a heart transplant i've got a plastic heart she says well dear i'll have to be going he says well honey i love you with all my heart what a plastic heart and prays over and over and over again one hymn he says oh for a heart to praise my god a heart from sin set free a heart that always feels the blood so freely shed for me a heart in every thought renewed and full of love divine perfect and right and pure and good a copy lord of line another hymn he says refining fire go through my heart illuminate my soul scatter thy life through every part and sanctify the whole in another hymn he says purge me from every sinful blot my idols all be cast aside cleanse me from every sinful thought from all the filth of self and pride i think it was a methodist well i remember the first time i was at cleve college and they began to sing a hymn and if i remember right it was written by a standard says i want dear lord a soul on fire for thee a soul baptized with heavenly energy okay let's put it a bit down in the scriptures the scripture says we're to have the mind of christ and the scripture says that a man thinketh in his heart i don't think with my intellect i think with my heart if i'm an impure heart of impure thinking of impure loving of impure desires if i have the mind of christ it's all this junk that goes through the mind of the average christian does he have the mind of christ there's only another man you can have the carnal mind which is enmity against god and yet this man is reaching out search me oh god and try know my heart try me know my thought forget israel it's me it's not my brother not my sister it's me oh god standing in the need of prayer cease there being if we could win me and this is what he wants and lead me in the way everlasting meeting about two o'clock last sunday morning i was preparing to go to that meeting and i came across something which awed me just a scrap of secular history you know there are lots of caesars julius caesar and how many other caesars were there caligula a whole bunch of them but julius caesar had a very very beautiful daughter and she she married a man by the name of pompey a brilliant general there was rivalry between her husband and her father and she managed to be a peacemaker for years then suddenly she died and pompey became vicious he became a great problem for for julius caesar but somebody told pompey you don't need to stay in little italy like this there's a country over there a very wonderful country it's not only wonderful for gods like we have but the god who made heaven and earth lives there they have a great temple built to him and so he made the perilous journey all that way from italy and he went away there to uh to jerusalem well he went with a pomp and splendor that romans went with trumpets to herald him and all the rest of it and after he'd been a day or two and got rested he said well where's the place where god lives and they said it's there that great big temple well you remember in 740 years about before jesus was born usai went into the temple and four school priests plus asariah which makes 81 of them tried to refrain him from going in but he fought them off after all he changed the country it subdued all his enemies it changed the economy he'd invented war machines he was the idol of the crowd i'll do as i want i'll go into the temple so he went into the temple you remember immediately went in the temple he was smitten with leprosy as Isaiah 6 says in the year that king usai died you see it's no fun preaching i don't care whether anybody is there somebody here lost tonight they may get saved where they're sitting some of you god is speaking to you for the last time what does he owe you nothing he's prayed with you people have prayed for you they've given you tracts you've heard sermons if god cuts you off you go to hellfire after this meeting god owes you nothing and he won't blush when you see him see we say don't put off till tomorrow the scripture says today if you will harden your voice harden not your hearts see how many times today is mentioned in the epistle to the hebrews we preach the gospels or gods and heaven boy well if you don't get saved tonight or maybe you have a date tomorrow and you're going to some nightclub and you can have your fun and get drunk and have some women have something else don't put it off till sunday i was suggesting almighty god can come you say you come and save me now he says no you had your chance it's worth going through the new testament to say how often it mentions today today today well this man anyhow he saw the splendors of the of the jews he saw their sacrifices he went through the gentile court he went through the court of israel he came to the holy place and he saw the showbread and the other things that were there and in his arrogance he marched from there there was a curtain dividing the holy place from the holy of holies that curtain was six inches thick so when it's the scripture says we rent from top to bottom only god could do that nobody else could do it but when he saw that curtain and they said don't go in there that's where god dwells he dwells in thick darkness nobody goes in but the high priest not even a priest a high priest only can go a man who's been sanctified a man who's being purified a man who has a clean heart a man who's been washed a man who has a place across his forehead with holiness unto the lord you know also people don't like holiness well go to hell if you don't i'll tell you what's going to happen before long the scripture says holiness is going to be on the bridles of the horses holiness you'll go buying pots and pans in sears and they give you some you say don't want those one holiness written on them that's what the word of god says and the scripture says holiness becometh by house forever i know nothing more thrilling and more humiliating than the script is it 12 of hebrews where it says about in verse 12 that we we we in this life now we can be partakers of his holiness that shakes me to my toes because two verses after that it says without holiness no man shall see the lord it doesn't say without the gift of tongues they may be precious it doesn't say without ministry it doesn't say without miracles it says without holiness you have no chance of getting into heaven it's a holy place prepared for holy people well this man goes in and all his arrogance thousands of jews are watching outside to see what will happen he's gone into the to the gentile court the jewish court he's gone into the holy place he's going into the holy of holies and he has them rip that curtain open and it was pitch black and he screamed down in unholy anger god isn't here they said god lived in here where no man could go that he comes with glory blinding more than the sun and he was angry he'd made the journey so far he'd gone through the different operations and he went there to the holy of holies and there was no god there you hear his people say lord i wish you would come in and seek your glory i'll tell you when you come when we're holy without holiness no one shall see the lord worship the lord in the beauty of holiness we don't become beautiful by worshiping him we worship him because we are beautiful he loves beauty over and over the psalmist talks about the beauty of the lord our god be upon us is anything more beautiful than a sanctified life a life that bears the fruits of the spirit a life with love joy peace long suffering the very character of god and to be saved from hell is a fringe benefit jesus came more than to save us he came to cleanse us more than to cleanse he came to indwell us i go back to the figure this man's come all the way from and i don't know whether he came by land or over the land which he could do or whether he came by sea which was perilous but he saw this great temple this is the temple where the great men of god walked jeremiah walked here hezekiah walked here isiah walked here the most stupendous men that ever lived walked here and he wanted to walk and he wanted to go in and see the glory of god and it was as black as night he screamed that there's no god here come on what do you think how many of our young people go to church they go through a performance every time stand up and sing hymn 12 sit down stand up sit down stand up sit down now the choir will sing we go through the ritual and the kids coming out come out saying but god isn't there we cheat them we explain them some little magic words of a preacher which he says so carefully and he's very correct in his theology but there's no living presence of the living god and they go away disgusted let me read this quickly to you before i close here's a man sitting on a plane one of the most famous managers of the biggest rock and roll band in the world he says he relates it to me in the conversation i had in that conversation i was shaken to the core my friend told me first of all that he was shocked at the intelligence of a man who was a musical genius he asked him what he thought was the future of rock and roll listen to it now i didn't write this if you study rock music says this man who's the head of the biggest rock band in the world if you study rock music you'll see it has gone through four phases each one appealing to one side of human personality in the late 1950s and early 60s we appealed almost entirely to sex in the late 1960s and 70s we moved young people into a new area of consciousness in the terms of their spirit we evolved involved them with causes it was then that drugs became a primary association with the rock culture in the late 1970s we moved them into an active addictive form of rock and roll called punk or new wave music was not really predicated on talent but mainly we were trying to create an addiction to violence and then he explained the fourth phase we have just discovered listen this is an ungodly man heading up one of most satanic bands in the world we have discovered the best motivation that there is to buy a product in the world the best motivation in the world is religious commitment no human being ever makes a deeper commitment than a religious commitment so we've decided in the 80s in the 1980s we're going to have religious services in our concerts we're going to pronounce ourselves as messiahs we're going to make intimate acquaintances and covenants with satan to pray for the sick and pull people out of their wheelchairs see the sarcasm there he's seen on TV they yank somebody out and say you're healed and it's psychosomatic to pray for the sick and pull them out of their wheelchairs we will be worshipped two years ago in Canada in Toronto a rock group that i will not name held a concert held and it was attended by more than a hundred thousand people at the end of the concert the group gave an altar call for young people to make covenants with the devil and hundreds and hundreds responsible we are moving into the fourth phase that man on that the man on the plane predicted the devil can psychosomatically create healing because of his power what will happen when young people go to concerts rock concerts and see miracles and come to church and see nothing you think the devil isn't one upon us do you think we're going to dazzle people into the kingdom you see again i say this and i'll finish here the trouble with most of us is we've never been in a revival in revival the lights don't go out in the sanctuary for weeks there's brokenness there's contrition humiliation days of jonathan edwards men screamed audibly as well as women strong men screamed doctors lawyers teachers suddenly realized there's one common ground we're all sinners we're all lost there must be a door of mercy open and the only door that's open is through the blood of jesus christ god's son creating me a clean heart i've got to be broken my pride has to be broken my self-sufficiency has to be broken leaning on my intellectual power has to be broken my oratory whatever it is if you go to france i want one thing to say there's a village in france there's an unusual monument it's it's erected to a man called policy or policy he was a pioneer in making enamel the only other man keeping pace with him was a man who lived in italy and policy or policy if you like he made all kinds of beautiful beautiful ornaments he made them in blue he made them in peacock blue he made them in short all the colors of the rainbow but never once could he make a vessel in white that wasn't marred he used all his family's money he did the work in his own room he had a crucible there he had no money left so what did he do he took priceless antique furniture and he broke it and he fed it into that crucible he kept making mixtures he would make a vessel hold it up oh it's a slightest flooring it people chimed on the windowsills and pointed he's crazy he just wants to make a vessel like that pure white just because his rival in italy has made one when he brought the new he was mad if he can do it i can do it as i say he sent his family bankrupt he used all their priceless antiques to feed the crucible he got to the last mixture and he made his vessel and he picked it up very cautiously he held it up he looked all around it there wasn't a floor on it he screamed with delight i found it i found it it's cost me everything but it's worth it i wouldn't have those things back i've done what that man's done and i'm told it's a better quality and it's a purer thing that i've made but it cost me every penny i had it cost me my friends they ridiculed me my relatives ran away and said i was insane i took all the priceless furniture but i've got what i wanted i wanted purity i wanted purity and i've got it do you know when we get revival when we long for purity more than anything else in the world i want dear lord a heart that's true and clean a sunlit heart with not a cloud between or where we can say search me you say the same as this man said to an omnipotent god an omniscient god an omnipresent god he knows my thoughts are far off he knows my down sitting right my uprighting i can't hide in the dark i can't hide in the light whither shall i go from thy presence whither shall i flee from thy spirit if i make my bed in hell out there and then he says search me oh god paraphrase it says search me oh god my actions try and let my life appear as seen by thine all searching i to mine my ways make clear search all my thoughts is what he says the secret springs the motives that control the chambers where polluted things hold empire or the soul search till thy fiery glance hath cast its holy light through all and i by grace am brought at last before thy face to fall we've got to get to the place where there's nothing on god's earth i want except purity precious little petite french lady lived a century before wesley and she she summed it up so beautifully for me anyhow she says nothing here she is elite favored mixing with royalty but then she says nothing on earth do i desire but thy pure love within my breast this only this will i require and freely give up all the rest wealth honor pleasure and what else this short enduring world if you see the brevity of life and the length of eternity you you sneer at people almost who refuse to be totally committed to jesus christ i got a letter today from a young man i haven't seen since for 50 years almost 50 any 40 he traveled with us a while tall handsome blonde fellow he had to look up to him he was so tall all the girls looked at him he was so handsome and he left us and he went to timbuktu in the heart of the sahara desert and he's still there he said len i'm 73 years of age now i've got a wonderful son and he hasn't had a he hasn't had a furlough for 10 years he said our salvation down here physically is having a land rover made in england of course we have a land rover but he said the nearest gas station is 100 miles away i suppose by the time you fill up and get home it's time to go back for gas but he said my son i admire him so much he said who will come down here there's one bunch of muslims not too far from us he said and never once has a white man set his foot amongst them who will come he says who has made such a total commitment that they say god almighty here it is the past is the past i live by faith i'll follow you can't give me a challenge too big you can't give me a mountain too high to climb you can't give me a burden too great to carry he said brother len can you do something for us here we are in this burning sahara desert it's a hell in itself nearly but he said who will come do you think those easygoing young men in america will come with a sloppy lifestyle and wanting to eat and drink at every every blessed place they pass they want a coke or a sandwich or something do you think any of those young men have the guts to lay everything on one side will those young american men come he said with their easy lifestyle or will a younger englishman with their lack of discipline he said when you think of all that's put into training in america those cowboys how many months they train the other athletes how long they train they're training now for the next olympics getting up at four o'clock there's nobody there but a misty rotten morning and they're looking at the gold all the way as they go pumping themselves through the air we don't see eternity like that most of us don't live in eternity we live from meeting to meeting and if there's a bigger meeting we'll go to the bigger meeting it's a bigger concert we go to bigger concert most christians live by events they don't live on sacrifice they don't live in total submission to jesus christ but if i see the cancer in my breast and say there's no way that can be it can be removed except by merciful fingers that are operated by a hand with a a nail print in it and he can come and pluck out the root of sin from me and he can fill me with love nothing on earth do i desire wesley said that it changed his life it changed history nothing on earth do i desire but thy pure love within my breast this only this will i require and freely give up all the right and he did it converted at 35 turn it around makes 53 at 53 and 35 together makes 88 when he died and he left six english pound notes worth five dollars each six silver spoons a faded minister's gown a handful of books and something else what was that oh i know the methodist church i thought there was something else oh well holiness is old-fashioned so it is truth is as far as that goes you're going to be a liar because everybody else is alive what does holiness mean it means soul health pure the word holy comes from an anglo-saxon word halig which means to be entire to be whole you know the devil fears holiness that's why people they give up smoking and drinking some of the lousy thing that will kill them anyhow it's when you give up your rights to yourself your rights to your future the rights to your lifestyle the rights to the bed to lay in it lay in in the morning and you make one joyful glorious commitment that makes angels rejoice and demons mad and from there god takes over completely and revolutionizes your life your prayer life you're living you're giving you're talking you're walking takes care of the whole lot he gave his all for me can i give less to him well oh i thought the pittanist had gone she hasn't let's let's sing a stand as we go to prayer and i'm not going to dismay show if i usually do we're going to sing a stanza when we come to the last line we're going to get on our knees