In this sermon, the speaker shares his personal journey of seeking inspiration from the Holy Spirit. After two weeks of struggling to find a message, he is guided to study love and reconciliation in the Bible. He emphasizes that God is a friend to the lost and backsliders, and his love for them is even greater. The speaker also discusses the concept of God being in control, using the analogy of a strong hand guiding a car. He concludes by sharing a vision he had during prayer, affirming that he is not at the mercy of Satan or any lust.

We're going to talk about the blood, the precious blood and the mighty hand, the precious blood and the mighty hand. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the anointing on this service tonight. We sense the power of the precious blood and the mighty hand of God. Do something very unique in us tonight. Let us hear from heaven. Let us be a channel tonight. Give us open ears to hear what the Spirit is saying. If we have preconceived ideas and this goes against them, help us to judge it, not by what I say, but what the Word says. Oh, Holy Spirit, we judge by the Word tonight. Bring forth in this congregation tonight a new sense of the glory there is in being secured by the blood. Give us a new sense of the mighty hand of God at our disposal. Do we have power against Satan and sin? Do we not be under the dominion of lust and sin? Oh Lord, show us the mighty preciousness of the blood of Christ in this service, I pray. Amen. The precious blood and the mighty hand. Let me take you back to the Passover. You know, the Jews are shut up in their home, but this is the night of death. God's going to pass through the Egyptian camp and the firstborn is going to be killed this night at midnight. The blood of an unblemished lamb had been stricken and with a hyssop the blood was applied to the upper door post and the two side post. They had been told by God, the blood shall be to you for a sign upon the houses where you were in and when I see the blood, I will pass over you and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you when I smite the land of Egypt. Furthermore, they were told the Lord will not permit the destroyer to come into your houses to smite you. I'm going to see the blood on the door and I'm going to pass over your house. Now, let me take you to Egypt that night and show you two Egyptian, two Israeli homes. In this particular house, they're meeting around the table. They're sitting there at the Passover feast partaking of the lamb and the father and the mother very nervous. They look at one another and they look at their firstborn child and the father is filled with fright, the mother scared, the whole family's frightened and suddenly the father grabs that firstborn in his arms and he says, family on your knees, pray, pray. We may have grieved God somehow. Maybe we'll lose him tonight. Pray, trust we may have grieved God in some way. Next door, the same feast, the same night and what a spirit of joy there is in this house. They're eating the Passover lamb and the bitter herbs and the unleavened bread and the little firstborn looks at his father with inquisitive eyes and his father takes him in his arms and says, all is well, son, family, be at peace. Didn't he say the blood when it was applied will give us safety. We need not fear tonight. Now, which of those two houses, which of those two houses were the safest that night? The one where people were nervous and afraid and tenuous or the one where there was such peace. Which house was the safest? They were both safe. Equally safe under the blood, no matter how they felt, no matter how nervous they were. He said when I see the blood, I will pass over you. It's not how we look at the blood. It's how God looks at the blood. How God looks at the blood. Hallelujah. God was about, God's not about to trust deliverance and safety to our feelings and our fears, not even to our goodness and our righteousness. Their part was simply to apply the blood to their houses and trust God's word that they were secure. Now, they had not as yet come to the Red Sea. They were only one day out of Egypt when God reminded Moses and Israel, remember this day in which you came out from Egypt out of the house of bondage for by strength of hand the Lord brought you out from this place. He didn't bring them out by the blood. He brought them out by the strength of his hand. All right, the deliverance of Israel from Egypt is a very clear type of our deliverance as Christians from sin and slavery. Now, are these things happened unto them for our examples? And they are for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come. For our admonition means that we can see in their struggles a shadow of our present battles with self and lust and sin. Their Egypt is our ungodly world. Their bondage to the Egyptians the type of our slavery to lust and sin. Their house is our temple of the Holy Ghost. Their lamb is our lamb, which is Christ. The blood of that unblemished lamb is the type of the blood of our unblemished Savior. And if you want to know something about where we are in Christ and about our power over sin, you have to go back to the example for our admonition. And I want to bring to your attention three marvelous lessons that few Christians have learned. Not in the charismatic circles, not in the Baptist or Pentecostal, any circle. Very few Christians have learned these principles and it's kept us back from enjoying. But God's trying to say to us, all right, lesson number one, the blood removed them from judgment. The blood completely removed them from judgment. But I will pass through. I will pass through the land of Egypt. I will smite. I will execute judgment. See, this is judgment day. I will execute judgment. I am the Lord. When I see the blood, I will pass over you and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you. This is judgment night. It was frightening. Death was coming. And what weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth throughout Egypt that night. The Bible said there was not a house where there was not one dead. There was a dead son in every house in Egypt. Yet that same midnight hour of judgment did not touch a single Jewish home. These Jews were completely secure out of judgment. Some of them didn't enjoy it. Some didn't appropriate. Some of them didn't understand it. But the blood completely removed them from the judgment of God. Of course, there was obedience involved because they were to stay in the house under the shelter of the blood. But it was the blood alone that placed them out of judgment. There was no goodness in these Jews, not at all. The very night God said, pack your suitcases, your satchels, you're going to leave. They packed idols in those satchels because later they were called upon to give up those idols. If God had waited for these people to be righteous or holy before he gave them security through the blood, they would have died in Egypt. This was absolute mercy and grace on the part of God because the scripture said that they were unworthy. They were backslidden, earthly minded, gay saying, disobedient. They were, again saying, disobedient people. These are the same people who 40 days later would be dancing drunk and around a golden calf. And God knew what was in their heart. It was all mercy, was all grace. God was trying to raise up a people after his own heart that he could reveal his holiness and majesty to. God, David said it was because you had a favor for them, you love these people in a very special way. Now, when we talk about the blood of Jesus Christ, there are many lessons that we've learned. But the first lesson that God tries to teach Israel, and it's the first lesson you and I need to know when we come to Christ, is that the blood of Jesus Christ secures us from judgment. Now, you know that later Israel would see the blood in a different way. There would be a sin offering, a burnt offering. There would be an atonement through blood shedding. But the first lesson about the burnt offering, the sin offering, the atonement, the first lesson of the blood is that the believer is completely safe from judgment on the blood of Christ. He's safe. Oh, yes, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. The blood is our atonement. But first of all, it is our security. It's God's way of securing himself, a people who can be delivered. They were safe, but not yet delivered. The first lesson is that we are safe under the blood of Jesus Christ. You know that there was still a red seed across. There was a wilderness to face, there was a warfare with giants imposing walls like Jericho, enemy strongholds to come down. Oh, yes, many battles ahead. But first Lord said, I'm going to secure you before I deliver you. Now, you've got to get this lesson and get it well. And I know this to be a fact, and it's taken me 25 years to come to it. I'm convinced that you can't battle the devil of principalities and power. You can't resist any lust or temptation. You can't touch these modern giants of ours today until you have a knowledge that you're secure under the blood of Christ. You can't resist the devil until you know your security in the blood. No matter what my heart condemns me about, no matter how guilty I may feel, no matter what little voices whisper to me, I've got to know beyond a shadow of a doubt, I am out of judgment. I'm safe because the blood shelters me. The blood of Christ shelters me. The blood on the door of my heart secures me in his sight. It's sad, there's not a handful of believers in America today that are resting in the security of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. We come to church, we sing all the blood of Jesus. We sing about the cross and don't have the slightest idea what that blood has done for us. We never enter into the joy and the victory and the glory of its shelter, sheltered from judgment by the precious shed blood of Jesus Christ. We can't believe that God could look on us because we still have disobedience in us. We still feel our unworthiness. We still feel the staining of our spirits by this age. And we can't accept such marvelous love and grace that he could pick out a people after his own heart and says, even though you're not where you should be, even though there are giants in your life, even though I've got a ticket to a wilderness, I've secured you under the blood. We're always questioning our safety. You know, if God based your security the way you felt or how good you were, you would be more guilty before God than you were under the law, because there's a higher claim under Christ than the law. There'd be no man saved. God must take our security out of our own hands so that it stands on nothing but the pure grace of God through Jesus Christ. It's not our devotion. It's not our obedience. It's not our goodness. It's his raw, pure mercy. Tell me anybody in this building that deserve the blood of Christ. Tell me anybody in this building can stand up and testify. I've got good enough to have the blood applied to my heart. I finally was obedient enough. I got rid of all the shit and lust. So the Lord finally came and secured me by his blood. You got it all wrong. It's backward. He came to you when you were dirty and filthy and sin. He was reconciled to you while you were out of grace and law. And he came to you in your filthy condition and he revealed his love and he gave you his blood. Hallelujah. Now, if I'm not preaching eternal security because I believe that you can trample the blood, you can do despite to it and be lost and go to hell. You've got to stay in the house. I believe that many, many people trample the blood of Jesus Christ who claim to have been Christians and they're going to hell and trample the blood and it's possible to be lost. You trample the blood. But the Bible does not say those who were disobedient that they suppose they did not partake of the unleavened bread. It doesn't say they were going to be out of the security of the blood. They were going to be cut off from Egypt. However, from the fellowship of the family of God, this cutting off the original Greek means almost disinherited from the family. They're still going to leave Egypt, but they're not a part of the fellowship. They're not a part of the reality of what God was doing. And I see many, many people like that. They may be going to heaven, but they have no fellowship with Christ. They have no no communion whatsoever because of disobedience. They've been cut off. And sin will do that. Sin will stand between you and Christ. You may be secure. Look, now you can't flaunt your disobedience, you can't stay in your disobedience, but there are many Christians who have something in their life they have not laid before the Lord. This has to do with the unleavened bread. The unleavened bread means absolute separation from everything that stands in the world and of the world. The bitter herbs is the memory of what you were and are without Christ, and that's bitterness. But first of all, God never once intended that his people live under fear, anxiety or guilt. He has prepared a rest that remains for the children of God. What is the rest? The blood. The security of the blood, the shed blood of Jesus Christ, it's a rest that remains for the children of God. Oh, perfect rest. God was saying to Israel, now that you see that I've secured you and removed you from fear of judgment, let me deliver you physically from the flesh. I'm going to secure you now in your body because they still had the flesh coming after them in the form of Pharaoh. Was John Wesley and George Whitfield who argued for years whether the Christian work towards security or from security. Do I keep getting better and better and more and more like Christ until finally I'm secured or am I secured and then work toward his perfection through faith in Jesus Christ? Well, I think we have the pattern right here, don't we? Did the children of Israel work towards security or from security? Weren't they secure under the blood? And it's almost as though the Lord was saying to us, now that I've secured you by the blood that you and I, by the power of the Holy Spirit, work on these things in your life, let's deal with them. I'm going to secure you so I can make you holy. I'm going to secure you so I can reveal the holiness of God. Not one thing must be added to the blood of Jesus Christ, not one thing much more than being now justified by his blood, being made just right by the blood, we shall be saved from wrath. Judgment is the word there in Hebrew. We shall be saved from judgment through him, through his what? His shed blood. We're saved from what? Judgment. We are saved from judgment through the blood. Do you believe that? Do you believe that you're sitting here under the blood of Jesus Christ and you're saved from wrath? You're outside of judgment, that the thing that was in God's eye that offended him has been removed by the cross, that God looked on what Jesus did and said, it's perfect, it's absolutely finished. And anyone who comes and receives that, I see him just as I see Christ. Perfect. Justified, made just right in my sight, not by works of righteousness. You saying that tonight, did you believe it? Oh, hallelujah. Oh, but you see, we don't want to do that. See, it's blood plus discipleship, blood plus self-denial, blood plus asceticism, blood plus obedience, blood plus mortification of the flesh, blood plus feelings of holiness and righteousness. All those are all services you do unto the Lord out of a secure heart of love. Those things you will do because you love me, said if you love me, you'll obey me. All that obedience comes from having the security of his love in his blood. Now, in theology, there's a term called redemption. That means to be rescued from sin and its penalty, not just from sin, but the penalty of sin. The Bible says in whom we have redemption through his blood. Forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace, rescued from the penalty of sin to the blood, not what I've done, but through his blood. I want to tell you something, God is not bent on condemnation, wrath and judgment. The heart of God is to bring many sons to glory. You can't read the story of the prodigal son without saying that's not just a story about a backslidden Christian coming home. That's a revelation of our loving heart of God who stands waiting and grieving over every strange child of his and how when that child comes back, he rejoices when the woman found the coins to rejoice when they found the lamb to rejoice. It's a story of the heart of the father who rejoices over his children who come to him in love and accept his mercy and grace. It's the rejoicing heart of the Lord. I took a hard look at the church two years ago and decided I'd quit my crusades and I locked myself in a prayer chamber up in the hills of Arkansas. And I looked out over the church with its divorcing and its disobedience and the lust and everything. And I said, oh, God, I'm going to stay here till you give me the greatest hellfire brimstone sermon you ever gave a preacher ever. I want to thunder like Jeremiah. And I got my Bible out and I I read Jeremiah and Isaiah and Ezekiel. My nature is that way. I tend to be a little more Jeremiah type as far as looking at the dark side of things. And, you know, I started reading about the bloodstained captain who comes with wrath in his eyes. I said, I'm getting close. I'm going to stand there and I'm going to flail and wail and I'm going to bring people to their knees. And there's a place for that. But it better be behind eyes that are tear stained and a heart that is broken. It had better come out of the dignity and the love of Jesus Christ. But for two weeks, I couldn't get anything. And finally, after two weeks, the Holy Spirit whispered in my heart, get your commentary and your tablet and your pencils. And I want you to write down hand word by word everything you find on love and reconciliation. And I was surprised there was that much in the Bible about love and reconciliation. And I'll tell you, I saw that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself and he's given to us the ministry of reconciliation. God said, I'm a friend. I'm a friend of the lost. I'm a friend of the backslider. I'm a friend to my own children. If he loves those backsliders, those sinners out there, how much more does he love us? Oh, there may be disobedience of God in his spirit. We'll deal with that. Oh, yes, he'll deal with that. But in the meantime, he loves us. Glory to God, like the preacher who preached one of those hellfire brimstone service, went home and said, oh, God, I sure skinned him good this morning. Lord said, I don't want hides, I want souls. Listen, listen, if you're sheltered under the blood of Christ, you are safe tonight as Christ is. Oh, hallelujah. For when I saw I was removed out of judgment. Christ's blood fully satisfied the heart of God over my sins. God didn't say when you see the blood, he said, when I see it and you and I look at the blood and we wonder, does it really secure me? Oh, there's still some spots. There's still some things in my life. By the way, it's I was reading last night about the sin of leprosy. It always started with a little bright spot, you know, something that attracts you. And they were that little white spot that was thrown out of the camp. That means you're out of fellowship. You're cut off just like these. They were still Israelites, but they were cut off from the camp. They're going to be brought back when God healed them. But they weren't pronounced healed until the leprosy covered them from head to toe. And there wasn't a spot left that wasn't white. That means if you've got sin in your heart, you can't be healed until it's fully exposed. Absolutely, totally, fully exposed. And the priest took two little birds and he took one bird in a little basin of water and a little hyssop and he broke the neck of it, causing the blood to pour out of the neck. And it went mixed with the water, the blood in the water that took the hyssop and sprayed it. The priest sprayed it on the wings of the other little bird and shushed the bird away and the blood, the bird flew away. An image of Christ in his two marvelous works of the shed blood and then being ascended to the Father's are high priest. And when the blood was supplied to the leprosy, pronounced clean, even though he was covered with it from head to toe, you're cleaned by the blood of Christ. And then he was told, now go wash yourself. You're going to learn obedience now. Oh, it's a marvelous thing if we could only see we have missed it. If any, this is a Pentecostal church. If any church should know the power of the blood, this should be it. We preach about the cross. We sit at our the supper, the Lord's supper, not even discerning the body, not understanding what it means. That means shelter. That means safety. That means protection from everything that the devil can throw at you. Hallelujah. I'm going to tell you something else. Now, you listen close. If God passed over the blood of a mere lamb, would he not pass over the blood of his own dear son? I'm going to tell you something else, and I'm going to say it with as much love as I can muster in my heart. I don't have anything to do with the preaching in America today that a child of God under the blood of Christ can be possessed of a demon, because if God won't cross the bloodline, how's he going to let a demon cross it? I can't be possessed of a demon under the blood because the devil can't even find me because my life is hid with Christ in God. He can't possess me because when the devil was cursed, he was told to eat dust. And the Bible said I've been raised from the dust and there's no dust in me, there's nothing he can eat in me, so he can't come anyhow. And I'm seated with Christ in heavenly places, if I'm seated with Christ in heavenly places, you mean to tell me that God's going to let a demon sit beside me in heavenly place, at the throne, in the Holy of Holies? Oh, let me tell you what's happening, and I say this in love. This teaching is coming from some honest, stirred, awakened men of God, because the first thing you do when you start seeking the Lord, he'll put you in the dust, he'll put your face in the dirt, he'll show you your sin and the hopelessness of it, and you crawl to the cross, and the first thing you see when you crawl to the cross is a snake, and he's a strong snake and he's wiggling and it looks frightening. But you see, if you just lifted your eyes a little bit, you'd see there's a man with his heel on the head, and that's Christ, the Son of God, and he has his foot on the devil's head and he's robbed him of all of his power. It's not that the teaching is wrong, it's just not a high enough vision of the cross. It's the first vision, but it's not that high vision. It's not that these men are preaching error, not at all. I love every one of them, and I say them in my heart, I'll hug them and love them, but I'm saying lift your eyes a little higher and see the blood, see that my Christ has his foot on the head of the serpent, and the Bible said he rendered him useless, a symptom of his power, a symptom of his power. Oh, the blood of Christ protects you from demons, from devils, from everything that Satan can throw at you, safe and sheltered under the blood. Don't let the devil take that hope away from you. This is God's Word. Hallelujah. I'm not passed over that blood. You're secure. Now just about time you think I'm preaching eternal security, let me turn the coin. Now some of you going, go the other way and say, well you, you're doing all right there bro Dave, till you got on my sins. All right, second lesson. They were delivered from Egypt's power by the mighty hand of God. Now listen to me please, we're not talking now about security, we're talking about deliverance. We're not talking just about the blood, we're talking about power. Boy, you've got to hear me please. The scripture says, for with a strong hand hath the Lord brought thee out of Egypt. The scripture says, by strength of hand the Lord brought us up out of Egypt from the house of bondage. The house of bondage is the house of slavery to sin in our type. Listen to this scripture. Thou didst drive out the heathen with thy hand and planted them. Thou didst defect the people and cast them out, for they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them. But thy right hand had a favor unto them. Thou art my king, O God, command deliverance for Jacob through thee will we push down our enemy, through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us. For I will not trust in my bow, or that's my righteousness, neither shall my sword save me, that means all of my good will and all my intentions and all my promises, all of this will not save me. How do we get saved from the power of the enemy? In our flesh, the mighty hand of God. By thy right hand, thy strong hand, the Bible said, and we left Egypt with a high hand of God. There was a high hand that took us out and delivered us from our physical enemies. Oh, some Christians have a sense of being forgiven and safe and secure, they feel the relief of that, but they lack this sense of power in their daily life over sins that so easily beset them. I meet Christians like that all of the while, I meet preachers like that. They can preach against sin, but they never really have this confidence, they never have this sense of having in them a mighty power that delivers from the powers of the enemy. His blood secures us, then his mighty hand breaks the power of sin. Sin still dwells in us, but it no longer rules us. The principle of sin will be with you until Jesus comes. But God comes and strips it, drains it of all of its power and all of its force so that you can go like the leper and cleanse yourself, you go battle an enemy who has already been defeated. Now, follow me on this please. What an incredibly encouraging word in this day of all of our superhuman efforts to be holy and pure. Listen to this. Delivered from slavery by the strength of his hand. There's the key. Delivered from slavery, delivered from my habits, delivered from this thing that haunts me, delivered from this lust by his, what? His mighty hand. Oh glory be to God. The Lord saveth not with sword and spear, for the battle is the Lord's. Now that goes against our pride, our sense of justice, and even our theology at times, to accept the truth that our salvation is outside of us. Oh, you hear me, dear saints? One of the greatest things God ever revealed to me, and revealed it to me in its fullness, that my salvation was accomplished for me outside of myself, outside of anything I've ever done. Outside, outside, keep saying it, it's outside. God did it outside of me. He delivered me, He secured me, His mighty hand. It's all there outside of me. I didn't earn it, I didn't deserve it, I didn't do anything that merited it. It was all done outside of me. God did it from the foundation of the world before you were born. Oh hallelujah. Thy right hand, oh Lord, has become glorious in power. Thy right hand, oh Lord, has dashed in pieces the enemy. I would imagine you've got enough wisdom and knowledge to know that an enemy's dashed to pieces doesn't have any strength against you. Right or wrong? Who dashed the enemy to pieces? Did you bite the bullet and said, bless God, I'm gonna lift this somehow? I'll tell you what, if you wanna go out and fight it that way, you keep making promises and you say, I'm just gonna get a certain quality or quantity of faith and I'm gonna make God enough promises, I'm gonna isolate myself, I'm gonna knock down this flesh somehow, I'm gonna get the power of it. Well, you go ahead and go ahead, but God will let you fall on your face and fall on your face, despair after despair after despair, till you realize it's gonna take a stronger arm than you have. It's gonna take a bigger bow than you have. A greater sword than you possess. So why not have one big despair and get it all over with? Get it all over with. You're no match for the devil. Now you see, the blood secured Israel from divine judgment, but the high hand of God delivered them from the power of the flesh. Hallelujah. God has one commandment. Do you remember what was God's commandment to Israel concerning their enemies? Anybody here know what God told Israel concerning all their enemies? Drive them out. Spare not. Well, that's the only message God has for sin. Drive it out. Spare not. You shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you and destroy all their pictures and destroy all their molten images and demolish all their high places. But if you will not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall come to pass that those which you let remain of them shall be pricks in your eyes and thorns in your sides and shall vex you in the land wherein you dwell. Now let me show you a picture. Have you ever been to Israel? To Jerusalem? Or you see pictures of Jerusalem? There's a mosque right in the middle of the holy city. Gold domed mosque. You know why that mosque is there? It's a testimony to every generation till Jesus comes of the falling, of not driving out the flesh. Not getting victory over the flesh. Now let me show you what that means. And the children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites that inhabited Jerusalem, but the Jebusites dwell with the children of Benjamin to this very day. Now Judah had once defeated the Jebusites and cast them out, but they allowed the Jebusites to come back in and regain control. The Jebusites were non-Semitics and their Hebrew name suggests immoral. This was an immoral seed and the Bible said Jerusalem was then known as Jebus, a city of strangers, not of the children of Israel. Do you know that Jerusalem is still a city coexisting with strangers that are not of Israel? Do you know that that seed of immorality was even allowed when David came in and captured it and set up Zion on that 24, 30 acres in the top hill of Zion, of Jerusalem? The Jebusites were allowed to be absorbed into the Judah culture. That seed of cancer was still there, never dealt with. And so even today we have a testimony to the flesh that remains. The mosque in Jerusalem is a monument to all times of what happens. The Jews still cry. It's a prick in their eye, it's a thorn in their flesh and they weep over it every day. You will never get victory over flesh until you share God's hatred for it. Israel never did share God's hatred toward their enemies, but they had hated their enemies like God had hated them and felt the wrath of God toward their enemies. And God had a reason for that because their cup of iniquity was overfilled. God had dealt with these that were in the land of Canaan. They had the gospel even before they had turned it down. But they never did share this hatred. They made covenants, they made peace with their enemies, they made agreements with their enemies. They've been told that if you'll drive out your enemies and spare not, I'll bring you into land flowing with milk and honey. Because he loved your fathers, therefore he chose his seed after him. He brought you out in his sight with his mighty power out of Egypt so that you could drive out nations before you that were greater and mightier than you now are, so I could bring you in to give you a land for your inheritance as it is this day. Can you hear the words of the Holy Spirit for you in this tonight and for me? Listen to it. I saved you. I brought you out so that I could give you power to drive out from before you all your enemies and that you spare nothing, that you drive it all out. But oh, but we say, can we not spare? It's just such a little thing and we spare this, we make an agreement with this, we learn to live with it. No, God's attitude is it must all be driven out. You cannot spare because whatever you spare will eventually become the most painful thing in your life. It will prick your eye, it will be a thorn in your flesh, it will be painful to you the rest of your days. We've got to learn to hate our sin, no agreements, no compromises with an entrenched stronghold. There's no other way to please God. If you're going to coddle your sin and play with it and let it remain and refuse to bring the hand of God to demolish it, you can quit praying about victory over flesh and sin until you cultivate a hatred toward it. Paul said it's called seeing the exceeding sinfulness of our sins, that God will not allow you to be appeasing with it. No excuses. And if you're hearing me with besetting sin, there's a secret sin in your life that's been causing you turmoil and anguish physically and spiritually. If you're listening to me right now and you've got one thing left in your life that's been bothering you for years, and you say, I know if I could just get the victory over this, I could enter into such a revelation. Because you remember it was to Andrew, the only disciple Jesus said it to, behold an Israelite in whom there is no guile, behold you will see an open heaven. You don't get the open heaven, you don't get the revelation until the guile is gone. He'll not give any man of God, he'll never give a Sunday school teacher, he'll never give anybody revelation knowledge. You all minister just words, you minister eventually death because it comes from an appeasement with our enemies. Drive them out. Once you share God's hatred for your sin, and once you're convinced that God will not let you toy with it, once you know it's God's command that it must be driven out and dealt with, then you're ready, and only then, to call on the high hand of God. And only then will the high hand of God be revealed in your life, releasing the power over the devil. Joshua said unto the people, sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you. He will without fail drive out before you the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Givites, the Perizzites, the Gergesites, the Amorites, the Jebusites. All of those lusts, all of those besetting sins are going to go. He will without fail drive them out. He will, He will, He will drive them out. Well then you go into the word of God, and you see what appears to be a paradox immediately. The Bible said the battle is His. He's going to destroy and crush the enemy. He's going to put them to flight, not with man's sword or spear. And then you look at Israel, you find them taking their swords and their bows and going up and doing battle, doing bloody battle. They were bleeding, they were fighting. It comes back to age old question, what is my part and what is God's part? Doesn't it say right here, God does it all? He'll fight with you by His mighty arm? Well look what these scriptures say. Then ye shall rise up from the ambush and seize upon the city, this is A.I., and the Lord your God will deliver it into your hand. There's another, and the Lord said to Joshua, stretch out the spear that's in your hand toward Ed, and I'll give it to your hand, your hand, your hand. And then we've got my hand up here, and God says, your hand. Theologians have struggled with this for centuries. You go back, all the way back to Augustine, the city of God, that's the whole two volumes, there's this great thing, Calvin, and Arminian, James Arminian, it's the same battle. What is God's part and what is my part? Is my will bound or is my will free? The scripture here says God delivered into their hands. Let me try to illustrate it for you as much as I possibly can. You see, God put all their enemies at their mercy, under their power and authority, God divested their enemies of all their strength, and He rendered them helpers, then sent them in to do battle against an already defeated foe. If you had been in Jericho, and you looked around and nobody was carrying a ramrod, and there were no stones flying, and the walls come tumbling down, and the city shakes like a mighty earthquake, you think they're ready to fight? All he's ready to do is round them up. Round them up. I saw a picture on CBS the other day, a news account. You know that Iran and Iraq are in a war? Anybody know that? The Iraqi army had gathered up 2,000 prisoners. Iran, Khomeini said they were using nerve gas or chemical warfare. All the pictures showed was thousands of little groups of Iranian soldiers and their weapons piled up, and they showed five or six of the leaders, this was Khomeini's inner council that had been in the battle, and they had caught the leaders. There was an Iraqi soldier looking into the camera and said, this is our defeated enemy. Still the enemy, but defeated. And there were the principalities and powers of Iran, sitting there, their weapons over there, piled up, they're still the enemy, but they're defeated. They're defeated. Oh yes, he's still our devil, he's still our enemy, but he's a defeated enemy. That's what the Bible says, he's defeated at the cross. Some of you people giving the devil more power than he can claim for himself. The devil's not omnipresent. He can't be everywhere at one time. The devil can only be one place at one time. And by the way, the devil doesn't need much help. We've got the flesh working for him with 17 sins mentioned. Even witchcraft and adultery are mentioned as sins of the flesh with no demon activity, even witchcraft. I heard a preacher in New York say, pray tonight, the devil's here, we're going to bind him while the rest of the world can relax if the devil's in New York. And I'm not being facetious. The devil can only be one place at one time. He is not omnipresent like God. He can't. Oh, what blasphemy preachers are preaching today that the devil is doing all this to me. You're just afraid to face the flesh. Get the victory of the flesh through the blood of Jesus Christ and the strong arm of God. You want somebody who gets down to cure you. You don't want to get in your Word and study and pray and seek God and grow in strength. You want a quick miracle. I'm going to tell you, if you're a Christian and you have any demons cast out, you better be in that prayer room every time. You better be witnessing for God because if he sets you free that way, and I'm not putting that down. There are some Christians demon possessed. It's because they went out of the house. They went out of the house. They got out from under the shoulder of the blood. Oh yes, I know a lot of Christians that way. You know, it was years before, I have two sons. Gary was about six years old when we were out in the car one day with Greg, his younger brother, and I used to put Gary on my knee and let him drive the car. Dad, do you know what I'm talking about? I'd say, be careful, stay on the road. Gary was six years old before he found out that he never drove my car. Because while Greg was on my lap, he could see my hand under the wheel. Strong, steady hand. And here's Greg with his hands on the top of the wheel and he's just turning, smiling at Gary. He's driving Daddy's car. That's what a lot of you think you're doing. You're driving the car. You never knew that strong hand of the Lord was already there. He's the one that's doing the driving. But how can he teach you unless he makes you think you're doing it? You've got to learn. And all God's doing is letting you in on the lesson. He could do it, but you wouldn't learn anything. Please turn the tape over for the remaining part of this message. I am not at the mercy of Satan. I am not at the mercy of any lust. I am not at the mercy of any sin. Hallelujah. We're to hate our sin, but not to fear it. Not to fear how many people are so afraid of demons. Remember what Jesus said about the garden? He said, leave it alone. He said, I'll take care of it. He said, I'll take care of it in my time. Don't you touch it. It might pull out some of the good fruit. And here it is right now. You've got to see this. Oh, it's blessed. You will enter into a joy of the Lord like you've never known. You see, Israel feared their enemies and hardly ever appropriated God's power. They never rested in God's word of deliverance to them. My hand is going to deliver you. And it's incredible that not one moment when they trusted God were they ever out of His power. He worked with them every time. Can you tell me one time that Israel was in trouble with their enemies when they trusted God's word? Was there one time they were at the mercy of their enemies? Oh, God help us, dear saints. Some of us are afraid. Some lingering thing in us is going to overwhelm us and shipwreck us. And we live in constant fear and anxiety that one of these days, after all, I'm going to lose everything. Hallelujah. Sin does not have dominion over God's people. Hallelujah. We're not to cower before any giant. We're to stand there with a stone in our hand and say in the name of the Lord, not by might, not by power, but by my Spirit. You're done. Hallelujah. Glory to Jesus. You don't have to run in fear from any lust or temptation. God's mighty hand is going to drain it of its power and defeat it. Glory to Jesus. You cannot mortify a flesh in full battle array. Nobody can mortify the flesh when it's in its fury and its hot passion. God has to take the fury out of it before you can mortify it. And God has promised to do that. You don't stand before a devil in full battle array. You stand before a devil that at the cross was defeated and put to an open shame. None of us could stand before that kind of an enemy. The battle is still His. First of all and above all, the battle is His. And our enemies are first and foremost His enemies. That lust in you is His enemy, not just yours. It's His enemy. Oh, if we could only believe that there's a glorious place of victory, security, peace and safety. Lesson number three, Christ is God's strong arm in us to deliver us. Christ in us. To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? For He, Christ, shall grow up before Him and root out of dry ground. Christ is the mighty arm of the Lord revealed in us. We're to humble ourselves and yield ourselves to Him. The Bible says, Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time. The word exalt here in Hebrew means to lift you to a higher plane. And He said, I'll bring you out into a place, a sense of life, above all principalities and powers and over the fury of temptation and lust. Now, Christ in me is not just a tea guest coming sipping tea with me. Christ in me is not some kind of a benign, doting, rich brother. He just dotes on me. Gives me anything I want. I couldn't serve a Christ like that. The Christ that I serve, dear saints of God, is a captain of the host of heaven who comes in my heart with a sword in His hand to deliver me from all the power of the enemy. He's an all-powerful king in full battle dress, anxious to stand up against all my lust with me. And He has with Him innumerable chariots of holy iron, driven by angels that are armed and ready to defend my cause. The chariots of the Lord are mine and they're all on my defense. Hallelujah. If we could only see our eyes open, God's more willing to bring you to a deliverance than you are to have it. If you would just yield to Christ and His power. But like Job, we sit in our assheap of defeat. We want just enough grace to die right. We don't want to live right, we want to die right. Bless God if I can only make it through. God never intended you just live to die right. He died that you could live right and enjoy the blessing of God. I have one of my converted drug addict pastors with me here tonight. Saved years ago on the streets of New York and a man of God. And I was trying to share what God's been saying to me and I said, you can interpret the whole Bible in an easy way. There's a beautiful pattern all through the scripture. God has prepared a mighty feast for His children and His desire is to have everyone around the table eating of the lamb. The fullness of the lamb, the beauty and the glory and the power and the richness and the admonition, the strength from the lamb, which is Christ. God's whole plan is for His children to sit around His table getting riches of Christ. I'm not talking about material riches, but growing in the knowledge of the Lord, increasing the fatness of the lamb. But you see, we're out here, the prodigal son, that we ran off with all of the riches of God in Christ Jesus to spend it on ourselves. We made the material. We didn't have real faith, we had Gentile faith. You see, the Bible said the Gentiles seek after all these things. That's Gentile faith. We've got this Gentile faith of materialism and it's like this servant, the bond servant. I know it's so beautiful, Lord, you've just been blessing my heart through it. Can I share with you just a minute? Do you remember the story of the two kinds of servants? The free servant, the bond servant. And if you owed a man money in those days and couldn't pay it, you had to serve him for six years and the seventh year went out free. And if you stole something, you had to pay it back by giving servitude. You became a slave to the master or the person you stole it from for six years, the seventh year. You were allowed to go out free and the master had let you go into his flock and take out all the best of the cattle. You were to be loaded down with the wine and the grain, all you could carry. And the Bible said the master was not to feel bad about him going out. And see, I used to harangue against the health and wealth message, the prosperity preaching. I used to harangue against it because I've dealt with so many starving people around the world and I work in the ghettos and the gutters and I see black families, they say, pray that God will prosper me. I say, what do you mean by prosperity? Well, shoes for my kids and food on the table. For them, that's what prosperity is, just enough to eat. And I couldn't see Christians just squandering on Mercedes and bigger and bigger houses when the world is starving, going to hell, hungry. And it bothered me. But you see, the Lord corrected me on that, I think, by showing me this servant who went out free, loaded with all the benefits, still in good graces of the master. And the Bible said if he served well, he was worth more than two hired servants. He was to be respected for that. But there was another servant, a different kind, the bond servant. He said, I love my master, I'll not go out free. And if he said that, the master took him to his house, put his ear against the door post and took an awl, a drill and drilled a hole in his ear against the door post. It was called a sacrament of service. And he went around proudly bearing that. Can you imagine what the master must have felt from that servant? He said, this man loves me so much he will not go out. He had more than anything else, if he were a son. Remember, Jesus was a son who took on the form of a servant. And if it was a servant, a son who says, Father, I want to be the form of a servant, drill my ear. David said, that was digged into my ear. And God said, David, are you going to be one that goes out free without condemnation? Go ahead, enjoy it. You'll wind up dry and empty. You're still a child, but you're dry and empty at the end. And here's this bond servant, he sees these free servants going out loading their cattle and they're turning to him saying, you're crazy, man, these are your rights, take them. Take them, you've earned them. And he folds his head, poor deluded souls, don't you know I'm eating at the father's table? I'm going to eat the fatted calf. And don't you know, don't you know what the father said? Don't you know what the master said? The servant who serveth well enters into the inheritance of the son. I'm going to inherit all this. You go ahead if you want, I've got it all. I've got the true riches. And that bond servant could watch them all going out. And he says, Master, I'm here, whatever you want, I'm your bond servant. Oh, that's what I want, I want to be his bond servant. But you can't be his bond servant until you know this, that you are not at the mercy of anything out here in the world. Because you're under the blood, you're not under the mercy. You're under his mercy alone, nothing else. See, the feast I was talking about, this is the thing that, yes, I've been reveling in it. Here's the prodigal son. He takes his, he's the servant that went out free. And if you go out free, you usually squander it. And you get empty, and you come to the end of yourself. And if you've got any wealth at all, you know that doesn't buy you satisfaction. You know, I don't have to tell you that. You can't get any joy out of those things you own. So he comes to the end of himself, and he gets awakened. Now, see, God's problem is how to get us out of this pig pen of self-materialism and self-righteousness and get us into the feast. That's his problem. That's not a sinner out there, that's a charismatic believer. That's a father's son. He's of the household of the Father. That's a Christian who's walked out and squandered his faith. He's empty, he's dry. I was talking to the pastor, he's telling me how God's been stirring his heart, and I'm getting letters. In the past 30 days, I've received 3,000 letters, in excess of 3,000 letters from ministers who are saying the same thing. I'm so hungry. I know there's so much more. I'm going deeper. I don't care what anybody else says, I'm going deeper in the Lord. Now, that's an awakening. That's an awakening. You can't just keep getting awakened and awakened and awakened. And some people stay in a perpetual state of an awakening, and never move to the next step. And that's an acquittal, where you go back to the Father. The Father's waiting there with no questions, no guilt trips. Puts his arms around you and says, I've been waiting for you. Tears of joy. He says, bring the robe and the ring and put shoes on his feet. Take those dirty rags off. And that's where most people, that's as far as they get. They want relief. That's all they want. They don't want to know their sins are forgiven. That's all. They want relief. So what, if he gets the robe on, and he turns and says, goodbye Dad? No, he's got to take another step. It's called acceptance. Acceptance. A lot of people know they're forgiven, they don't know they're accepted in the Beloved. I know I'm accepted in the Beloved. I know Jesus loves me. I know His arms are around me. I know I'm salted under the blood of Jesus Christ. I'm accepted in Christ. My God accepts me as though I were Christ Himself. He sees me as Christ Himself. As Christ in me. He sees the Christ in me. He accepts me as such. Isn't that something? These are some of the people in a little deeper spiritual life. We're going deeper and deeper here. And so we're accepted. He doesn't know though that he has access yet. He's not just to be forgiven with a new robe of righteousness. He's supposed to be sitting at the table eating of Christ, the good things of the fatted calf. But the Father brings him to the door, and he says, Father, I'm too unworthy. I've sinned against God in heaven. I need three months of discipleship, then I'll come in. Lord, I've got to feel my grief more than I feel it. Lord, I'm going to stand out here and cry for three weeks. I'm going to stand here and fast and pray that You'll forgive me. Oh, I've grieved You for... Accept Your forgiveness. Some of you confess, and all you do is confess. My children were taught from their childhood to pray, Thank You, Jesus, for having forgiven my sins at Calvary. I accept Your forgiveness. Oh, there's godly sorrow for sin, of course. Access. The Bible says through Him we have access to the Father. Access. Folks, God's trying to bring us in. And that final step to the table is a sense of life. Seated in high places, in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus. Seated. I don't have to be raptured. I've been raptured. My hope, folks, I believe in the coming of Jesus more strong than anybody in this house. I believe in the second return of the Lord Jesus Christ, but my hope is not the second coming of the Lord Jesus. My hope is Christ in me. The hope of glory. Now, I want to live a life above the principalities and powers of this world. I don't want to go through my life focused on my sins. I don't want to go through life and anxiety and the blues and depression. I'm going to reckon myself to be everything God says I am. I'm going to consider myself to be everything God said I am. I don't care what the devil says. I don't care how my conscience rages. I don't care how demons rage. The Bible said I'm dead to sin, so I'm going to believe that. The Bible said I'm delivered from the power of sin. I'm going to accept that. The Bible said I'm clean through His Word. I'm accepted in the Beloved. I'm alive to God by the Spirit. I'm more than a conqueror in Christ Jesus. I'm secured through the blood. I'm loved and reconciled. I'm kept by His power. I'm faultless before the throne of God. I've ascended in high places in Christ Jesus. I accept that. God said it. I accept it. And once you accept it, you enter into an ascension life. Hallelujah. Something else I want to tell you. Jesus isn't coming for me like a thief in the night. That was a message for Sardis. Sardis was backslidden. That was a threat. That was a threat to the church of Sardis because they were living so out of the presence of the Lord. The Bible said He's coming for those who love His appearing. Not as a thief, but for lovers of Christ who say, Jesus, You fill all things. I want You to be everything in my life. Hallelujah. Oh, what a rare privilege it is to be waiting, looking, expecting, and eating the lamb all the while. Hallelujah. Passover. Paul said, Let us keep the feast. Let us keep the feast of the Passover. Let us eat to the fatted calf. I feel sorry for some Christians who, like the four lepers of Samaria, say, Oh, I'm so hungry. I'm so needy. And right now, as far as they can throw a stone, God's mighty hand had already delivered, and there was no one they could ever eat. I mean, God had chased out a whole army and left the camp intact just as it was, enough to feed a whole city. Maybe you ought to do like they did. Say, Well, I'm so dead, nothing else to do but get up and move. Why don't you move out tonight by faith and say, Jesus, I know there's more. There is more. And what God, by His Spirit, is doing, He's saying, Will you go deeper? Are you going to come into my ascension life? I don't live a crucified life. I live a resurrected, ascended life. I'm crucified with Christ, but I live an ascended life. You can't live a crucified life. You are crucified. You live an ascended, resurrected life in His power and His strength. It's amazing that people will run to meetings all over the country where they can see signs and wonders and miracles. And I believe in signs and wonders and miracles. But what Christ is trying to do for you is what He did for Peter. Peter was there when Jesus taught. He'd been there all day, elbow to elbow. And the preaching of Christ at that time had not yet touched him. But all of a sudden, He said, Cast the boat out. Cast the net out. And that load of fishes that started to sink the boat was such a manifestation of who He was. He suddenly saw who Jesus was and all of His power. And He fell on His face and said, Depart from me. I'm undone. I'm unclean. I'm a work of iniquity. One of these days, the Lord is going to manifest who He is so real in our audience. We'll not be applauding. We'll be on our face. I heard someone say recently there was a meeting in the West Coast and a well-known lady speaker said, Oh, she preached one of those powerful sermons and they gave her a five-minute standing ovation. And I thought to myself, if she'd really preached who Christ was, they'd be on their face. Nobody would be applauding. And all we're doing is applauding Him. And when He comes in His righteousness, even a holy man like Isaiah said, When I saw Him, I cried, I'm a man of unclean lips. Even the seraphims, my gosh, His glory and His power. That's why I never felt very good when I heard God used His daddy. The sovereign majesty of God. There's such a lack of reverence. We don't have an exalted vision of who He is and His greatness and His might and His power. Like Job, we say, I'm righteous, I'm doing right. And God said, Just be quiet because you don't even begin to know who I am and the glory. He had to get an exalted vision of the mighty arm of God. See, the message of Isaiah is see God and die. See God and die. I was told in the past, with this I close. It's been three years now since God got a hold of me in a new way and said, David, you're going all the way or nothing. If you're going to keep my anointing, you're going all the way. And I shut down all my crusades and I began to seek the Lord. I don't like to talk about what God's doing in or through me anymore. But I do know this, that when I got hungry, and I began to seek Him, I got an exalted, reverent vision. Oh, the holy reverence that came to my heart. Well, when I pray now, I have to lay on the floor. Well, there are times of joy when He just lifts me up and there's holy laughter and there's blessing and there's anointing. And we are to praise God. This is marvelous praise here tonight. Continue the praise. But all that needs to go on to worship where some night the presence of the Lord comes in such a manifestation where we're on our face before Him and say, Lord, I've been unclean. I've not been dealing with the sin in my life. I've been allowing things. I've been making appeasements with the devil. I've been doing things in my heart with the flesh. Lord, I want it all driven out. I want to be a free man. You've got to be more than secure. You've got to be in communion. And if you don't have His righteousness, you have no communion, no fellowship. I would die. I would die on the spot tonight if I lost the sense of His presence. I'd rather die. And if you're a true man or woman of God, you have to say the same thing. You'd rather die than lose the sense of the presence of the Lord. If you've got sin in your life tonight, the Lord wants to let you know that you're not only secure, you've got to come and say, Lord, I want it all driven out. I want it out. Hallelujah. I want tonight the word, the word of the Lord to get into your heart. Do you have an exalted vision tonight of His mighty arm? With this I close. Can you imagine that God would give Israel two silver trumpets? And every time God moved the cloud, the priest took the silver trumpets and blew a certain blast for the east camp, a certain blast for the west and the north and south. They knew what every trumpet sound meant. If they moved without the silver trumpet sound, they were under the curse. They were out of the will of God. And Israel did not make a move until the silver trumpet sounded. Do you tell me that under the law, before the cross, the Lord would give better guidance with two silver trumpets than He will today under the grace of Jesus Christ? Will He not guide us? Will He not give us a clearer silver trumpet? And that's the Holy Ghost. That's the Holy Spirit. He'll lead you, guide you, if you'll just get along with Him and give Him some time. You're not given enough time. The one thing we're not giving the Lord is our time. So that we could have Him deal with these things, the Holy Spirit put His finger on it to show you the security of the blood and then to bring you out into a life of holiness and righteousness and purity in Him through the power of the Holy Spirit. And when Christ came into me, He actually put God's fist in me. That's what Jesus is in me. He's the fist of God against my sin. And I'll tell you something, if the fist of God can't handle it, my puny little work can't do it. So you quit trying to fight the enemy of your flesh in your own strength and power. You begin to call on His mighty name. Hallelujah.