In this sermon, Catherine Ruth preaches about God's love and forgiveness. She shares a story about a deformed and ugly woman who was isolated in a cell, but Catherine emphasizes that God loves everyone, regardless of their appearance or past. She quotes scriptures from the Bible, including the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20 and Luke's account of being witnesses of Jesus' resurrection. Catherine emphasizes that everything God has provided in Christ is to make believers more effective witnesses for Christ. She concludes by highlighting the importance of understanding God's passionate love and purpose in order to effectively share the message of salvation.

If you will turn to Ephesians chapter 1, you will be able to follow in the reading of the scripture. I shall begin reading with verse 15 and conclude with verse 23. This is the first of the so-called apostolic prayers, first prayer of the Apostle Paul. I want you to notice in the 15th and 16th verses that these people whom he describes as saints at Ephesus, faithful in Christ Jesus, have just gotten on to his prayer list. About the time that they'd get off of everyone else's, they've gotten on to his. And there's very real reason for that. Our Lord said he did not pray for the world, but for them that the Father had given him out of the world. And thus it is that this prayer echoes the prayer of Christ. And if you wish so to see it, I think you will be blessed by thinking of this not as a prayer that Paul prayed 19 centuries ago, but rather as a prayer which Christ is praying for you tonight. If you see it that way, I believe that it's going to be far more personal. Go beyond the Apostle and see the Lord Jesus at the right hand of the Father. And hear these words, not coming as it were from the Apostle written from the prison there in Rome, but from the throne of heaven, as he would like you to know that which he is praying for you. In the light of that light, we read, Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints, cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, the eyes of your understanding, being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him, and will you notice the first two words of the second chapter, and you from the dead, and set him and you at his own right hand in the heavenlies, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come, and have put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all. Now to understand this, I think it's important for us to go back to John 17, and I would like to ask you to do that. John chapter 17, verses 20 through 23. Our Lord Jesus is expressing this in his prayer. I think Rainsford, the English Bible scholar, was correct when he called this John 17 our Lord's prayer. What we customarily call the Lord's prayer might better be thought of as the disciple's prayer. He said, when you pray, say. This is what he said when he prayed, and hear it as such. Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word. Now that's better, far better, than if your name were here. Because you might just have the same name as someone else. And yet, you know you're included, because you came to believe on Christ through the word of Peter, James, and John, who looked into the tomb and saw it empty. And they testified and sealed their witness, even with their lives, that Jesus Christ is raised from the dead. And it is thus that you've come to believe on him through their testimony. That they all may be one. Now this word is union. That they all may be in union, as, just as, accordingly as, in the same manner that. As thou father art in union with me, and I am in union with thee, that they also may be in union with us. In order that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be in union, even in the same way that we are in union. I in union with them, thou in union with me, that they may be made perfect in union, and that the world may know that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me. Now I made the statement, almost every service, the Bible is a missionary book. And here, our Lord Jesus is indicating that the object or purpose of his prayer, and his prayer is that he might live in you the way the father lived in him, and that you would live in him the way he lived in the father, in order that the world might know, that's the first thing, that the father sent the son. And the second thing is, in order that the world might be able to believe that the father sent the son. Not just enough to know, to learn, to hear, but to have the problems, the difficulties, the hindrances removed that would stand in the way of their being able to believe. And thus it is that this, his prayer, is tied right in to the great missionary part of the triune God. Remember, he said, as the father sent me, so send I you. Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, discipling them, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. After that the Holy Ghost has come upon you, you shall receive power, dunamis, energy, and you shall be witnesses unto me. And in Luke he said, you are witnesses of these things, his resurrection, in order that repentance unto remission of sins might be preached among all nations. And so we're right back here to the heartbeat of the Godhead. Everything that he has provided in Christ for you, his child, is to the end of making you a more effective witness for Christ. All the instructions that he's given in the word to believers is to the end of preparing us, teaching us, that we might be more effective witnesses for Christ. I do not believe that we can understand the word of God apart from understanding God's great passionate love purpose that the world here. Now we need to remind ourselves a little bit about that world. It's important for us to sort of measure how well we're doing. About 350 years before Christ was born, there were 125 million people in the whole world. That's all. About 650 years after Christ was born, there were 250 million people in the whole world. In other words, it only took a thousand years for the population to double. In 1650 AD, a thousand years after that first figure, there were 500 million people in the world. Now it would have been a lot easier to preach the gospel to every creature in the time of Christ when there were probably 175 million, than in 1650 AD when there were 500 million. And in 1850 AD, 120 years ago, we reached for the first time a thousand million. That's one billion. It took 200 years to go from 500 million to one billion. But it only took from 1850 to 1930, 80 years to go from one billion to two billion. But it only took from 1930 to 1956 to go from two billion to three billion. In other words, it took until 1850, from the beginning of time, to get one billion people. But it only took 26 years to go from two billion to three billion. Now, it's only going to take 35 years to go from three billion to six billion. In the year 1991, there will be six billion people in the world. And it's only going to take eight years to go from six billion to seven billion, 500 million, and by the year 2000, that's what the population will be. But here's the other interesting fact. In 1950, I was meeting with a group of missionaries in Macon, Georgia, and they said, Paris, what's going to happen in missions in the next 50 years? Based upon what we've done in the last 100 years. So starting in 1850 with one billion people and going up to 1950 when we had upwards of nearly three billion, taking the number of missionaries, the amount of money spent for missions, and the number of Christians in the non-Christian world, and finding these figures as best I could for each 10-year period, I was able to draw a graph. Now, the most exact figure I could find was that of the increase in population. The demographers have been very, very accurate in their predictions. If anything, they've always underestimated. It's usually more by a given year rather than fewer. And this is what I found. Based upon what we've done in the last 100 years from 1850 to 1950, and projecting from 1950 to the year 2000, I found that that half a century from 1950 to the year 2000 was going to see the greatest missionary failure in the history of the Church. There would be three times as many unevangelized in the year 2000 than there were in the year 1950, based upon the way we were going. Well, one of these factors was this, that on the projection of the increase in the missionary community, or the Church community, among evangelicals, and against the increase in inflation, I saw that by the year 1970, we would never again have enough money to make up the deficit that incurred because of inflation. In other words, in 1967, we gave 200 million dollars, evangelicals did, to support missions. And in order to have as much money in 1968, there would have had to have been a 12% increase, 224 million, and we didn't reach it. And the next year, there would have had to have been a 12% increase, about 6 or 7% in the U.S., and more in the mission field countries averaging out to about 12%. So on that basis, beginning in 1950, beginning rather in 1967, not 70 as I projected, we would have to run like everything to stay in place, and we wouldn't catch up. Because of the tremendous inflation. Now, that is, we're two decades. This was 1950 I did this study, and that's the thing that pressed and drove and forced me to study and search and pray. Because I realized we had to find new ways if we were to complete this responsibility given to us. I couldn't believe that, and still can't believe, that the Lord has tied all of us who are witnessing to the one way that we've been doing it. Now we have to go on doing it that way, but we have to find other ways. And so here's what his prayer is. Father, I am praying that I can live in them the same way you lived in me, and they will live in me the same way that I lived in you, so that the world will know that you sent me first, and secondly, the world will be able to believe that you sent me. Now I just absolutely refuse to believe that our Lord has failed. And I will not believe that this prayer cannot be answered. I don't care how many billion people there are, I just will not bring myself to believe that we've sung so often, Jesus never fails. I will not bring myself to believe that he'll fail. But I believe the methods that we've had aren't adequate. I think we've got to keep doing it, but I think we've got to continually understand that there's innumerable methods hidden in the heart of God to do the same thing. The apostle Paul had one way of witnessing, and have you ever wondered whatever happened to that fellow Thomas? You know, Thomas was there that day. The Lord made a special return visit to be there when he came. Thomas, you know, somebody said, where was Thomas when the Lord came? I know where he was, no question. He had gone down to the local unemployment agency to register. He figured he'd be just ten up on the other fellas if he got there before they did. Well, they can't prove that, I really feel it's something like that. At any rate, when the Lord waited until he was back, and Thomas had missed him the first time, he said, I don't believe it, I don't believe it, I'll have to put my finger in his hand, my hand in his side, and then I'll believe it. Thomas, stretch forth your finger, stretch forth your hand. And Thomas fell on his hands and knees and crept across the floor. He never said anything about the nail wounds in our Lord's feet, but I imagine he bathed them with his tears as he cried out, my Lord and my God. Whatever happened to him, he's never mentioned in the Bible after that, never. Tradition tells us something about him, pretty well verified, about saved in history. Thomas went into business, export import, a trader. He made a couple of trips out to India to buy spices. And he went out by boat and came back, carried them from down the Gulf of Aqaba up to Jerusalem, and he sold them. You see, they didn't have refrigeration, the only way to preserve food was to mix it with pepper and make sausage out of it. So spices have been very valuable for a long time. And Thomas was on a buying trip, getting many things. But he was also on a, had seen Jesus, and he'd been filled with the Spirit, and he had a missionary heart, and he started to preach. And you know, he was so successful in preaching that a church was established. That's right. The Church of South India is called today the Church of Mar Thoma of St. Thomas. That was started by him. And he made a second trip back, and tradition says he made a third trip back. And his evangelistic efforts as a businessman were so successful that the local pagan clergy got excited. When he landed the third time, they had a reception committee there to meet him. And they heard him, and clubbed him, and dismembered him, and he was buried somewhere in India. But the Church in South India, the Church of Mar Thoma, is a monument to one of God's methods of getting the gospel. And listen, after 150 years of missions in India, there are more Christians in the Church of Mar Thoma, the work of a traveling businessman, than all the missionary influence we've had in India in the last 150 years. God may have some other methods, some other means, some other ways. But the secret is not the method. The secret's not the technique. Oh, these are important. I think God has many different ways of doing it. I'm not worried about programs or plans. The thing I see here is a relationship that's the key. And he's saying, Father, I want my people to understand that I want to live in them the very same way that you lived in me. Now, how did that happen? Well, remember, Mary, the chosen handmaid of the Lord, was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit. One cell in her body was quickened by the Holy Ghost. That infant born of Mary was God come in the flesh. And he was from his birth indwelt by the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Very God of very God. That would mean Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, perfectly indwelling in the union in nature, this infant. He was Emmanuel, God come in the flesh. And for those first 30 years, he lived in the light. In fact, all of his life, but in a particular way, first 30 years, he lived in the light of Philippians chapter 2, verses 5 after. Being let this mind be in you, said the apostle, which was in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it not something to be insisted upon and grasped after to be equal with God, but being found in passion as a man, he accepted, if you please, he humbled himself, for he accepted the limitation of his humanity. In other words, our Lord Jesus was in every sense very man of very man, save in sin. He was tempted in all points like as we are, and yet without sin. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ, therefore, was nonetheless God. Isn't it interesting that the first attack on the Son of God came with the attack on his humanity? They said he didn't have a real body, that it was a theophany, just the appearance of a body. We've lived through, many of us, the attack on the deity of Christ, that he wasn't God come in the flesh. But that wasn't the first attack, the first heresy, the first one was on his humanity. And that's why the council said he was very God of very God, very man of very man. And yet, at his baptism, in baptism a picture of death could only mean that our Lord was publicly declaring what he had already done before the foundation of the earth. That is, accepted this humiliation of coming into the world as a man, and relinquishing the right to act in his own essential deity of Son. And there, at his baptism, he pictured what he'd already done. And then John said, I saw the Holy Ghost come upon him. But, the Holy Ghost was already in Christ, even when he came upon him. Because if he had not been, he wouldn't have been God. But he was God. And so the, the scripture is very exact. He said, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. He hath anointed me. He hath sent me. Forty-seven times in the Gospel of John alone, our Lord uses such expressions as, I do not speak of myself. I only speak as I receive commandment of the Father. The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works I only do as I see my Father do. Our Lord, therefore, indicated that he was totally and completely subservient to the Father. Totally available to the Father, and obedient to the Father. And everything, and this is very important, everything done by Christ in the three years of his public ministry, was done by the Father through the Holy Spirit. Now he could have done everything he did as son. He had perfect right and absolute power to have spoken and worked as son. But, if he had, it never could have been said that he was in all points like unto his brethren. Nor could he ever have said, as the Father sent me, so send I you. Would have been totally different. Completely other. But because he presented his body to the Father, and the Holy Spirit came upon him, and everything that was done by Christ was done by the Father through the Spirit, then he could say, as the Father sent me, so send I you. What does that mean? Well, the Spirit of God overshadowed you. He awakened you. He convicted you. He brought you to repentance. He quickens your heart with faith to reach 2,000 years in history and embrace the Son of God savingly. And he witnessed to your heart that you've been forgiven, and pardoned. And he became your life. And the Scripture says, if any man hath not the Spirit of God, then none of his. And so it was that you too were born of the Spirit. And this is an expression that we use. And yet, the apostle makes it so abundantly clear in his writings, he said, I am crucified with Christ. What is this? A conscious relationship of himself to the cross in his union with Christ. Then he said, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your body a living sacrifice. Your body. Well, why? You've presented yourself to the cross. That's that ego. That's that part of you that drove and used your body, and your personality, and your faculties. Now he says, present your body a living sacrifice. What's he talking about? He's talking about your body. That's what he said. Well, he's talking about your brain. He's talking about your eyes. He's talking about your ears. Talking about your heart, your hands, your feet, your lips. When he talks about body, he's talking about body. It's just that simple. Talking about your faculties, and the powers of your personality. And he's saying, present your body a living sacrifice, presented once and for all irrevocably, which is your reasonable service. Present your body. Now, it's so important for you to understand that you're not going to even be inclined to present your body to the Lord until, if you please, you've presented yourself to the cross. Because as long as that body is the vehicle of your ego in yourself, it's a very important tool and vehicle to do the thing you want to do. When with the apostle, you can say, I'm crucified with Christ. To my own plans, and my own purposes, and my own ambitions. Here it is, Lord. And then you can present your body. Then you say, Lord, as long as I live, I'm going to stay here on the back of the cross. Now, there's my brain. You can use my brain to think your thoughts. And there's my eyes. Lord Jesus, I'm giving you my eyes so that you can use them to see the loss. There's my heart. I'm giving you my heart so that you can live in me and use my heart to be moved with compassion. Lord, there are my feet. I'm giving you my feet. You can go anywhere you want to go, Lord Jesus. They're no longer mine, they're yours. And Lord Jesus, here are my hands. You can use my hands. My lips, Lord. Have you ever discovered the thing that Reginald Wallace of England found out? In one of his little books, he puts it this way. The happiest day of my Christian life was the day that I discovered I couldn't live it. How about you? Have you discovered you can't live it? Well, I'll tell you one thing. If you haven't, your neighbors have. Your family has. Your friends have. You see, it's totally unnatural to you that it's absolutely natural to Christ. You try to live his life. It's like I say, now look, I'm tired. You take my life next week. It wouldn't be so good. I mean, if you said to me, take yours, that wouldn't be good either. It's my life, and I'm accustomed to it. Your life, you're accustomed to it. It's his life. You try to live his life, and yet your neighbors have a right to see Christ. And that's the only thing that's going to make it possible for them to believe. And that's why he said, Father, in the very same way that I lived in you. And you lived in me. I want my people to live in me, and I want to live in them, so that the world will be able to believe. You see, what we say about Christ isn't good enough. The world listens and says, what you say, what you are, thunders so loudly, I can't hear what you're saying. To try to bring the loss to Christ on the basis of sound doctrine is trying to feed a little child with a dry shredded wheat biscuit, and pushing it down his throat. If you can get it in, it may nourish him, but you're going to choke him to death trying. And I'm afraid that's what we've done with some of our friends, and our neighbors, and our family. We've held them open, and we started to poke their doctrine down their throats. And after a while, they're blue in the face, they're choked on it, and they run and get away. Now, that's got to be lubricated with sugar and cream. That's got to be lubricated with the life of Christ, with the Holy Spirit, with the fruit of the Spirit, with love, and joy, and peace, and long-suffering, and gentleness, and goodness, and meekness, and faith, and self-control, and turn it on. Just go ahead and turn it on. I know you. I don't need to have any. Somebody said to me, you know, who's been telling you about me? Nobody's been telling me about me. I know you. I know you. We were apples off the same tree, don't you remember? We were woven on the same loom. And I know you. Full of good intentions and unfortunate performance. And that love, and joy, and peace, long-suffering, and gentleness, and goodness. Oh, I know some of you were born so much nicer than the rest of us that you had a long head start, and I'm willing to admit that. But your breaking point may be a little further down the road, but it's there. And the thing that the world has got to see is something that's genuine and real. And that's, as Reginald Wallace said, the happiest day of my Christian life was the day I discovered I couldn't live it. Have you? That doesn't mean it isn't to be lived. It just means it's to be lived the way the Lord Jesus prayed. He says, Father, I want them to live in me the way I lived in you, and I want to live in them the way you lived in me. Well, how is that? He said, I don't speak of myself. I speak as I received commandment of the Father. I don't do the works. The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the work. I only do what I see my Father do. Isn't that what the apostle said? I am crucified with Christ, he could have added. I am buried with him. I am quickened with him. I am raised with him. I am seated with him. And Christ liveth in me. Christ liveth in me. That's what the Lord is praying for, that he will be free to live in you his own life. Now last night we saw something of what that will mean. When the Lord Jesus Christ lives in you, he's not going to be somebody other than he's been. He was revealed in time. And when he lives in you, the same compassion, the same concern, the same burden that he had when he was here, is going to be manifest in you. He's going to just be living his life through you. And you are going to be a what? You don't have, you can't see them, but I can. Here are three there and three here, light bulbs, spotlights. It's all a little light here. The wells here, the fluorescent tubes don't quite illustrate it. But I happen to know about these lights and the three sockets on each side. These lights have a proper socket with threads on it. And they were manufactured by some firm like General Electric or Sylvania, Westinghouse, or others. And they were tested, and then they were put into a nice cardboard carton. And that carton was put into a box, and that box was put on a truck or a train, and it was shipped to Florida. And the custodian went down to the store and brought them. And there's some closet around here that's got some spares in it, or they ought to have, or probably have. And you know what I look, when I go to a church on Sunday morning and look out, you know what I think of? Light bulbs in cardboard cartons. Honestly. Christians, attractive, beautiful, lovely, and they're there. But they look just like light bulbs on a shelf, all lined up. The question that I'm asking is, have they ever, are they abiding in Christ, crucified with him to have victory over themselves, buried with him to have victory over the world, quickened, raised, seated with Christ to have victory over principalities? Are they abiding in Christ, and is he abiding in them? You see, it wasn't just for you to be tested by the Word of God, and proven to be saved, and a Christian. He said, you are the light of the world. Now, you don't need to prove to me that in the day that the Scripture was written, they didn't have electric light bulbs. I happen to know that. But I also happen to know that the Lord knew there were going to be electric light bulbs. Because he lives in the eternal now, and Thomas Edison had to make 10,000 experiments, and God says, you're getting warmer, Tom, you're getting warmer. And then he ended up with tungsten as the filament. That's why Thomas Edison went down to Fort Myers. He thought once that they were going to use the little sprigs off of bamboo for filaments, because when they were burned in a controlled way, they made a nice little charred arc, and it would glow. And that's why Edison came to Fort Myers. It was a very good thing, excellent in real estate investment, but it wasn't the answer to the electric light bulb. Someone said, aren't you discouraged? He said, certainly not, I haven't failed, I've just found 10,000 things, but it isn't. And I don't have to do that again. And so it is that in due time, we had the electric light bulb. And it was developed, it was invented, and it's manufactured, but it isn't complete when it's in a cardboard carton and on a shelf. That light bulb is not where it is intended until it's in a socket somewhere, and electricity is flowing through it. And that's what he said he wanted. He wants you in a relationship with him, crucified with him, to be relieved of the tyranny of your own disposition. Did you hear me? To be freed from the tyrannical control of your own traits, and attitudes, and habits. You're your own worst enemy, you've been for years. You know what they tell us, that when a person goes to work for a firm, and he starts in, 50% of his value depends upon his skill, his ability. But as he goes on and rises in the company, his skill becomes increasingly less important until he gets up to the top echelon. 95% of his value depends upon his ability for personal relations with other people, and 5% of his value depends upon his skill. Don't go tell the president of your company that, he might not like that too much, but it's still nonetheless the truth. And so it is that so often the hindrance to our witness for Christ, and our service for Christ, is not the fact that we don't have Bible training, or we haven't been taught, but it's the angularities of our personalities, and it's the temperament which we inherited, and traits that are part of our makeup, and attitudes that we've cultivated, and habits that we've developed, learned responses, means of meeting problems. These things become the barriers and the hindrance. And so he said, we're crucified with him to have victory over ourselves, buried with him to have victory over the world, and crucified with him, or seated with him rather, to have victory over principalities, and powers, and the rulers of the darkness of this age. So there it is, crucified with him, buried with him, quickened with him, raised with him, seated with him in the heaven. There's the late Paul being tied up. Abide in me. Set in the socket. And then he said, I'll abide in you. And what will it be? It'll be the flow of his resurrection life. The flow of his resurrection life. That's why Paul, writing in that prayer I read, said, that you might know what is the greatness of his power to usward. Isn't that a nice archaic way of saying, do I know the greatness of the power that's going to flow through your personality? Well, it's the very power that raised up Christ from the dead. Now, you see why I said earlier, I will not believe that Christ has failed? Because he died and shed his blood to make it possible for everyone that was saved from the penalty of sin, and from the fear of death, to be an electric light bulb through whom he could flow by the Holy Spirit, so that person became incandescent with the resurrection life of Christ. He wants us to know what is the greatness of his power to usward who believe according to the working of his mighty power which he wrought. Working, mighty power which he wrought. The apostle Paul exhausted the Greek language in one verse to try to tell us how marvelous is the power that's to flow in and through your personality. That you might know what is the working of his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and sent him and you at his own right hand in heaven. And that's the power that's to flow through you, through your personality. And you are to become incandescent with the resurrection life of Christ. Someone said to me, we were talking about the world and all of its need and threat and danger and problems. So what can one person do? One person without Jesus Christ can't do anything. But one person through whom the power that raised up Christ from the dead, well one person is enough to change the course of history. So I don't believe that. Well I just happen to believe it. When I've got pretty good evidence for it. There was a chap back in the old testament that had the son of promise beloved by his father. But I want to tell you something about that fella Joseph. He was an arrogant little snip. He was. His father put the coat, you know that coat belonged to Reuben? That was the coat of the son that was to be the firstborn who was to get the double portion and to be the head of the family. And Jake, he wasn't a very smart father to put it on that little, little spoiled fella. And yet he went out and he stood around and said, see I got quite as much as Reuben. And then he had a dream and he told his brothers, in your shoes you're going to brother. I don't really blame the brothers for being upset. I think they carry a little too far. But I know how they feel about it. Oh he had an awful lot of killing to experience for he'd be very useful to God or man. And they were really going to, they were going to kill him. And then, and said don't, don't do that. Let's, there's those Midianites. Let's sell him into slavery. We'll kill a lamb and tell our father he's killed. So there's Joseph going down the road with a rope around his wrist behind a camel. And hey fellas what's this? He said boy goodbye you little. And off he went. And there weren't any tears except for the father and the spoiled little boy. And God saw that fellow and saw that he was not going to be useful till he came to the end of himself. There had to be death. Oh I think he did very well in Potiphar's house. I think he was very self-righteous and very proud. And so God just let the cross hit him and he ended up in prison. And finally he comes to the place that something happens. And that arrogance and pride and haughtiness gives way and we begin to see God starting to manifest himself to him. And the first thing this man has discovered is that he can serve. He needs to be a servant. He learns and then he finds that God is on him and that he has certain gifts and abilities. And Pharaoh, now God has permitted problems to arise, fantastic difficulties. They're so enormous that even if the magicians and the advisors knew what the problems were they were afraid to tell Pharaoh for fear they'd be killed. And one of them said there's a man in prison. He told me what would happen, bring him up. And Joseph now is quite a different man. He's come to the end of himself. And this man now has obviously come into a relationship with God where God can use him, flow through him, and he can be a servant. What I'm saying is one man that's come to death to self and life can change the history of a country. Joseph did. He got an answer from God, a plan from God. Then he had this ability and the anointing given meant the plan. And the result? That one man with God was a majority. I absolutely categorically refuse to admit defeat. Not as long as this is here. Not as long as it's possible for you to be filled with the fullness of God. Not as long as it's possible for you to know what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us were to believe according to the working of his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead. That's the power. That's the very power that God wants to penetrate your intellect. The power that God wants to control your ears and anoint your eyes and fill your heart and strengthen your feet and your hands and move your lips. The resurrection life of God's dear son. I don't know what the...sure that just as there are 25 watts and 250 watts or larger and so on a company. God has made each of us with different capacity but I'll let you know that little five watt, that 25 watt lamp can be filled with electricity as the 250 watt lamp can. And he wants you to be filled with all the fullness of God. That's a normal relationship. The trouble with that Booth fellow was he didn't want to build a church. He was so worried and burdened about all those poor people out there. And Booth just saw them and he saw the squalor and the filth and the darkness of the hunger and the misery. And he had to do something about it. And he asked the conference if they wouldn't let him and they said you take him to your church. And he said I can't, I can't, I can't. I gotta follow the dream. I gotta march to the drum. I hear I gotta do what God wants me to do. So he got a few people he called them the army of the Lord and somebody then said why don't you call it the salvation army. And he started out. And then finally his son-in-law went over to England and his younger daughter Catherine then went over. Catherine was a beautiful girl, lived to just a few years ago. Marichal, she's known, quarreled by her friends. She preached in French and preached in the women's prisons. One occasion she learned about a cell block in the women's prison in Paris that she'd never been permitted to see. She was done going and she had permission to go but the matron said oh they're too terrible, horrible, ugly for you to see. She said but I must go. So reluctantly they let her go. Down at the end of one cell block was the last cell in the corridor and between it and the next cell they had put boards because the woman on the other side in that lonely end cell was so deformed, so mutilated, so ugly that the other prisoners said it made them ill to have to look at her. And so she consented to have the board put up at her side. They didn't want to see her, she didn't want to be seen. Seeing her told it made her indescribably ugly. Well Catherine Booth is there preaching that God loves them. That was her message. God loved you and Christ died for you. If you'll open your heart Christ will forgive you and pardon you and come in and make you a new creation. Been preaching a little while. Behind that partition in the cell came a screaming, screeching, blasphemous torrent. That woman was cursing with every filthy word she could dredge from her gutter mind and calling Miss Booth every kind of foul name and every kind of liar saying you say God, God loves me. She said look at this partition, these people won't even see me, they're in prison and yet they can't stand to look at me. You say God loves me, you're a liar. And Miss Booth said oh my dear, God loves you and I love you. And then the woman started to laugh, a high-pitched cackling laugh. Oh she screeched again blasphemously, you're a liar. I know love, there's only one person in this world who will love me and that was my mother. She died before I was six and yet I can remember. She took my head between her hands and she kissed my cheek and my brow and my eyelids. I know anyone ever loved me. You say you love me, you say God loves me, you kiss me. Well, the matron said Miss Booth, we must go. And the other inmate said no Miss Booth, you can't, no, no. And she said of course. You see, God loves her and I love her. And so she strode down the aisle and there was that ugly, deformed, mutilated face pushed up between the bars, leering, scowling. Without even hesitating, Miss Booth went up and put her hands in her pockets and she took the back of the woman's head as a mother would a lovely child and she kissed her cheek and her brows and her eyelids. And a few moments later there was a soft sob and the woman slumped to her knees in the straw in the bottom of her cell. And she said, it is true, it is true, you love me. You must love me and God must love me. You couldn't have kissed me like that if God hadn't helped you to love me. And a few minutes later she'd open her heart to Jesus Christ. Hear me friends, the world is for love, love that cares, love that shares. When Jesus Christ is in you, he who loves the world, loves that world again through you. And it's the greatness of his power toward us were to believe to enable us to love the unlovely and to bear the burden of the weak and care about those in need. And that's the evidence when Christ is in you. I don't believe that we failed. I just believe we're beginning. We've tried everything else. The only thing we have left now is just to come back to the way we haven't got around to trying yet. And that is for you and you and you and you and everyone here. Just simply say, Lord Jesus, I'll stay here with you on the back of the cross. Here's my body, my personality. Fill me as electricity fills a light bulb and live and labor and love through me. That's what he's praying for. Now we've tried everything else. Let's try his way. It's the only thing that'll succeed. That's what he's praying for. Father, in the very same way that you lived in me and I lived in you, I want to live in them. And I want them to live in me in order that the world may know and may be able to believe. Oh, whether or not this prayer is answered to his satisfaction in us. Oh, Father, we've been so doctrinally straight. We've been so theologically correct. We don't want to be less than that straight and that correct. But Father, we can still be doctrinally straight and theologically correct. And Jesus Christ can fill us and live in us and manifest his love through us. And bring that doctrine and that theology to its incandescent loveliness. And people will want to know him because they've seen him living in us. This is the cry of our hearts tonight. We ask that somehow the Holy Spirit will so breathe upon us here. Some, oh, we wish it would be all. It could be all. But some here, in a new way, will meet thee at the sight of their