Mike Bickle emphasizes the critical role of corporate intercessory worship in responding to global crises, asserting that God's governance is released through the prayers of His people. He explains that while some events in God's plan are predetermined, many outcomes depend on the faithful intercession of believers. Bickle calls for a collective return to God through solemn assemblies, highlighting the necessity of prayer and repentance to avert judgment and receive God's mercy. He stresses that the church must recognize its responsibility in the face of sin and crisis, and that true intercession is a powerful weapon against the challenges facing nations today.

...full of intercessors, prophetic intercessors that care about your heart and your purposes. Lord, I ask that you would inspire and instruct, strengthen our spirits tonight in the name of Jesus. Amen. I'm gonna skip some of the material on this handout, and this is on the website, and if you don't have the notes you can get them back there in the foyer, or you can get them on the website when you go home if you don't have them right now. Roman numeral one, God's government, God's government in the spirit is released through corporate intercessory worship. That's a very important phrase, corporate, a lot of people, well it didn't have to be a lot, but I mean a handful, it's not just single, it's intercessory, we're crying out for the breakthrough of God, for the breakthrough, and it's worship-based. Not all prayer meetings are worship-based, but that's just because the musicians aren't there, etc., it's not because the heart of worship isn't there, but that's where the Lord wants to bring the body of Christ to a greater expression of corporate intercessory worship. A, God governs the universe, an intimate partnership with his people through intercession. That's a profound concept. God governs the universe through intercession. If we pray, his power goes forth more in his will. If we don't pray, I'm talking about the body of Christ worldwide, less is done. God waits on the prayers of his people for many things, and then his government goes forth. The majesty and mystery of intercession, that's the phrase I like to use, was seen first and seen most in Jesus' relationship to the Father. Jesus lives forever, it says here in Hebrews 7, on the PowerPoint. Let's go to the next, there you go. Hebrews 7, verse 25, Jesus always lives to make intercession. Do you know that Jesus is interceding now, and Jesus will intercede, he will lead intercessory ministries when he comes back to the earth in the Millennial Kingdom to reign on the earth. He will lead intercession. Intercession isn't something we do until the second coming. Jesus has been doing intercession way back when, and he's going to do it forever in the future. Intercession is the way God's government is released. Psalm 2, the next passage. The Father is speaking to Jesus, and he says to him, ask of me, and I'll give you the nations. In other words, you're going to lead the nations, but only if you ask me, Jesus. Jesus even has to pray for the nations to come under his leadership. B, God has determined many primary, he has a number of primary events in his eternal plan that are already established, meaning it's, they aren't contingent on prayer. God's already determined he's going to do them. Now, the timing and different things might have some influence, like the second coming, like Jesus reigning over the earth, Satan being thrown in the lake of fire, establishing the new heavens of the earth. These are major things that God has determined in his sovereignty. They're going to happen no matter what the devil does or no matter what people do, so there's a number of things in his plan that are finalized already, but that's not what we're talking about tonight. We're talking about the parts of his plan that are still in the balance, that are not finalized. C, God has chosen to give his people a dynamic role in determining some of the measure of the quality of life that we have. Beloved, if we pray more and obey more, there is a higher quality of life in the spirit that God releases, and if we don't, he holds it back. This is real. This is real. Paragraph D, the prayer room in heaven, the prayer room on the earth, all over the earth. It is the governmental center of the universe is the prayer room. The prayer, there's millions of prayer rooms across the earth, and we're in unity with the big prayer room in heaven, and that is the governmental center. This is the place where God's edicts, and this is the place where God's power are released from the throne of God based on the prayer rooms on the earth and in heaven in unity by the spirit. Paragraph E, God opens doors of blessing. God closes doors of oppression in response to prayer. There are blessings. I want you to get this. This creates a little bit of pressure. If you believe this, it creates a little bit of pressure on your heart, but it's a good pressure. There are blessings that God has chosen to give. There are certain kinds of blessings. Like I said a minute ago, there's already there. I mean, God has got some big things already determined that are not in the balance of the prayer movement. Satan's going to the lake of fire. That's already determined. Jesus is going to return, and those kinds of things have already been determined, but there are blessings God has chosen to give, but only if the people rise up in partnership and ask Him. James 4, 2, just a couple verses, kind of real favorite well-known ones. You do not have because you do not ask. There's many implications, and the opposite of that is true on some occasions. You do not have because you do not ask, and you do have because you do ask. It goes the other way around. Jesus talked about the young boy with the demon. He said this type of demon won't come out if people don't pray and fast. There's a dimension of deliverance that only happens in relationship to prayer and fasting. It's not true of every case, but there is a category of deliverance that is contingent on the people turning off their remote control, standing up, clearing out their schedule, and giving themselves in a definitive way to this thing called prayer. Isaiah 30 from the New American Standard. That's the NAS, the New American Standard. It says all the other passages are from the New King James. It says here the Lord longs to be gracious. He waits on high. He's waiting to show compassion. He longs to be gracious. He waits. He's waiting on us. We're waiting on the Lord in one sense, and the Lord's waiting on us in another sense. Look at verse 19. He will be gracious at the sound of your cry. When he hears it, when he hears the prayers, then he will release it. He will be gracious at the sound of your cry. When he hears it, then he answers it. If he doesn't hear it, he does not answer it. I have some other verses there that are familiar to most of you here. Let's go to top of page two, paragraph F. For those of you that are visiting, if you want to use any of these notes in any way, 1% of it or 100%, our copyright's the right to copy. You can use it word for word. You can put your name on it, put your mother's name on it. We don't care. Do anything with it you want to do with it, meaning it's freely yours to run with. That's true of all the notes on the internet. We have many notes and myself and many others, and you're free to use any of them. Make your own documents and handouts, and they're yours. And edit them, change them around, put your name on them. F. God has given the human race great dignity. There's great dignity in our humanity, and that part of that dignity is the fact we have a free will. And what that means is our choices really count for life and death, for time and eternity. That's part of our dignity. If we say yes, good things happen now, and good things happen in eternity because we said yes. We say no to God, bad things happen, and bad things happen in eternity. Now, I'm not saying that we don't have bad things happening to us now if we say yes to the Lord. I say yes to the Lord a lot of times, and still some bad things happen. I'm not going there with that, but what I'm saying is our choices really do matter, and they change things in time and eternity, or things stay bad in time and in eternity because the free will says no to God. This is the dignity of the human spirit. This is part of our dignity. Our choices matter for real and forever. They matter. It's real. This is not a practice game. If we say yes to God and righteousness, we give legal entry. We give legal access for the angels to move through our prayers. If we say yes to sin, we give legal entry access to demonic powers to touch our families and to touch our cities and to touch our nations. Now, they have other access points. Demons do besides just us, but we can open and close doors to angels and demons based on our free will and our prayers or lack of prayers. It really matters. It's really real. Paragraph G. Corporate intercessory worship is the primary means. I want to underline that word primary. Circle it. It's not the only means. It's not the only means, but it's the primary means that God has chosen to release his government, to release his power. When I say government, I mean power. This is how he does it with Jesus. Right now, God releases power on the earth related to Jesus's prayer. Jesus is still relating to the father, not only through intercession, but intercession is a part of their relationship. He asked the father and the father gives to him based on him asking. That will be true even on, uh, after, after the Lord returns on his kingdom on the earth, he will still run the earth through intercessory prayer and he'll do it. Not just private prayer. I mean, his personal prayer life will continue in a very powerful way, but it will be corporate. Imagine being in a prayer meeting where Jesus is the prayer leader. Imagine being in the prayer meeting where Jesus is the worship leader Singer. Do you know he could play the trumpet? You know, he can play the drums really good, really good. I tell you around the throne of God, there's thunder and lightning. He is a drummer beyond any, you can't imagine the whole universe will, will, will move and pulsate at the rhythm of his heart when he wants it to. It's great drummer. I mean, beyond anything we're imagining G let's go back to G again. Corporate intercessory worship. I, and my point is for this to be a revelation. This, this, uh, is a something that has touched my heart whenever. And it became at one time it became a revelation. It was like, wait, it's not just a nice thing. This is like, this really is what releases the government. And again, I'm using the word government synonymous with God's power and God's will. It is the highest. It's the, it's the highest expression of releasing his power and government in this age. And in the age to come, even in the age to come, our primary occupation will be intercession and worship. It's not all that we will do. It's like now we will do other things, but that will be our primary occupation for those highest in the government. I have at the end of paragraph G it's the most powerful weapon that exists. Honestly, it's far more powerful than the combined strength of all the nuclear weapons in the earth. Corporate intercessory worship that's in unity with God's heart is more powerful than all the armies of the earth, because it releases God's power and beloved. I would say it again. God will not release his power to the full degree, except through that means and God says, I will wait till I hear the cry of my people. H this is for a bunch of you in the room or some of you, I don't know how many. There's a lot of people who love prayer in terms of their communion with God. They love prayer say, oh, I love to just get alone and me and the Lord. And that's wonderful. Don't don't ever back away from that, but they don't yet have a revelation of the authority of corporate intercession. They love prayer, but they don't understand intercession yet. The same thing is true with worship leaders. I know many worship leaders. They love Jesus. I mean, really love Jesus and they really love music. And those are two good things to love in that order, but they don't have a revelation of the power of corporate intercessory worship. Many worship leaders that I know do not have a revelation of the power of intercessory worship. They love worship and they love music and they love Jesus, but they're almost completely devoid of this revelation. So it's something they do when it kind of feels good and it's right. Beloved, this is a matter of life and death. The prayer room isn't something we do if we're kind of in the mood that day, that the whole balance of the human race is not only in the prayer room, but that's the front line of attack. That's the first line of defense in the universe is the prayer room. That's a revelation. And I'm sure that that's a new idea to some of you in this room. And just ask the Holy Spirit, Lord, Holy Spirit, give me a revelation of this. Matter of fact, I'm going to do that right now. And you can join in with me just in your privacy of your heart. Lord, I asked even now you would give revelation. I asked for the spirit of revelation to be released upon 14 year olds and 80 year olds in this room right now for the revelation of the power of intercession, that it is the most powerful thing. I asked for the spirit of revelation to touch their heart about how powerful worship is in the spirit in Jesus name. Amen. Paragraph I God's primary call to a nation in crisis, not the only against the word primary is the key word, but it's not secondary. It's primary. And I have a lot of Bible to back this up. It's, it's, it's a big statement, but it's a, uh, it's one I can thoroughly back up from the scripture. And I'm going to say it again. I'm going to underline the word primary, the primary, not the only one, but neither is it secondary to anything. The primary thing that a nation must do in a crisis and beloved, we've had a couple of crisis the last few years and the crisis are mounting up and I, and it's, it's clear from the scripture at the time we're living in, it's clear that the crisis are going to Mount up stronger and mightier and more severe. And the primary thing God's wanting is corporate intercessory. Worship is the first line of defense. And I just have a sentence or two for each one of those. Let's go down to K some people, they trust the sovereignty of God in a non-biblical way. Okay. How do you do that? They said, well, I just, I'm just trusting God because they're trusting God to do the role God's assigned them to do. This is not really trusting God. This is called presumption. It's actually unbelief. It's unbelief. We cannot do God's part and he will not do our part. He will not do our part. Some misapply the truth. They say, if God wants something done, he'll do it. This is true. And those broad strokes of what I said a few minutes ago, you know, Satan's going to the lake of fire. That's going to happen. There are some major things you're going to happen no matter what, but there are many things that God will not give us that he wants to give us. He actually wants to, but he will not give them to us until his people rise up and walk out practically their relationship with God with faith and obedience. And it's not only in the program, I'm not making it all about prayer, but I'm saying prayer is, is the most neglected weapon. And it is clearly the most powerful weapon that exists in heaven and in earth in terms of releasing God's power. It's prayer. It's more than prayer. It's in corporate prayers more than that. It's corporate intercessory intercession and prayers. I'm using that synonymous. When I say intercession, I mean, prayer, I'm using the word the same way. It's corporate intercessory worship together. It's all those components coming together. I skipped it, but a moment ago in the notes, when I had the word corporate, corporate, there's a humility that's required in corporate. I like corporate half the time. And the other half of the time, I don't like corporate because in a corporate prayer meeting, there's a hundred things like literally a hundred. I've been adding them up over the last six and a half years. I've been in so many of them that there's a, just by hanging around, there's so many things that bug you and annoy you when it's corporate, but God requires the humility and the honor of one another. He wants it corporate. I said, Lord, that doesn't mean we don't do the private. We do do the private. And Jesus called us to do the private. And a lot of people, a few have asked me, well, Matthew six says, pray in secret. He was, he wasn't talking about private prayer versus corporate prayer. He was talking about prayer that was trying to get attention to yourself versus prayer that wasn't. It wasn't about corporate versus private prayer meetings. It was the spirit behind the prayer of doing it for attention or doing it for real. That's what Matthew six is about. It says, go to your prayer closet. But I, you know, being in the middle of this IHOP thing, I thought, Lord, this thing is, you know, just so many things that can bug you and wear you out. And we all have to do with that theology from song lists to people's personalities, to emphasis, to scores of things that can bother you. And the Lord says, yeah, I want you humble. And I want you connected, honoring my people. You're doing it together. Lord, what if I stay home and plug in by the internet so I can like kind of adjust it the way that I want? No, I want it corporate. It's having some fun there with a little bit of truth behind it though. Okay. We are not, we are not trusting God. It's presumption going back to that. We cannot do God's part. He will not do our part. There are many things he will not give us that he wants to like there's people he wants saved. It says at the end of the paragraph, God wants in second Peter three verse 90, he wants everybody to be saved, but they're not all saved, but he wants them all to be saved. There are things God wants that do not happen. Here's why he won't violate his free will. And he won't violate your, I mean, he won't violate your free will and he won't violate his justice. And God says, I would that this would happen, but I would have to violate your free will. I won't do that. So there's things that I want to happen in your life that won't happen because I'm not going to cross over in and violate the spirit of the relationship. I went with my people. I want them in partnership with me and I want the partnership to count when it works. And I want it to be real when it doesn't work, meaning there's a penalty. There's a negative of things that are withheld when we don't do our part. And there's a glory when we do the relationship is real. It's not, it's not just kind of a neat thing for a postcard. If we relate to Jesus, life changes, it's really real. The analogy I've used over the years, a lot of you have heard it, but the God will not do our part. We can't do his part. It's the preacher and the farmer. When the preacher went to the farmer's house and then they are driving up the great driveway and the, you know, has hundreds and thousands of acres of, you know, manicured acres of, you know, crops and the acres that beautiful. And the preacher says, boy, God blessed you, man, look at this. And the farmer snaps back. He goes, God bless me. He goes, when God had this place, it was a mess. And that's a, it shows the relationship. God will provide the sun, the process of life through the sun and the water. He'll provide the water, but he will not pull the weeds. He will not plant the seeds. He won't. And if we don't do it, the sun and the water aren't going to help bring forth life. We have to do our part. And he is committed to do his part. Paragraph. I mean, Roman numeral two, understanding God's role in the coming global crisis. There is nothing that will be more controversial and nothing that's more offensive than this point right here in saying what I'm going to say, just even a little bit, I'm not going to develop it real far, but enough to get you in the right direction. It's really easy to say to this room. It's a whole nother thing to say it on CNN. God's enemy is sin. It's not his only enemy, but that's his enemy in the most general sense. His role is to oppose every operation of sin. Israel made herself God's enemy by living in sin. The nations are warring against God through lives of sin, even in the church, James four, let's read this. It goes adulterers, adulterous. Don't you know that friendship with the world is enmity. It's at war with God. Whoever wants to be a friend of the world. And that's the key phrase here makes himself declares war on God. When they want to be a friend of the world, they are putting themselves in a position of enmity, which is, uh, as an enemy enmity means it's adversarial. It's negative. Now, James is talking to believers here. He's saying, get out of your adultery and quit making war with God by a friendship with the spirit of the world. That's powerful stuff. Be God's purpose is to remove it. God's judgments are mounting up in the earth right now. And though they're, uh, they seem to me stronger than they've ever been, but I haven't been around that long. So I say that measured, but, uh, it seems to me there's an, a clear increase, a clear increase just by a casual observation. But I know for a fact of the spirit that there is coming a far greater increase in the days to come. And behind God's judgments is his desire to remove everything that hinders love. That's what his judgments are about in part, not entirely. There's other dimensions of his judgment, but at, in a most general sense, he wants to his judgments break in to remove his enemy so he can release that he can release love. He wants to remove the things that hinder love. Now God's judgments as seen in the book of revelation are very severe. They're literal judgments and they're very severe. See, here's this principle. You can count on this principle. If you, you know, when the judgments mount up, you can be sure of this because they're going to go far beyond any time in history before the Lord returns. And I believe that we're in the beginning of that generation. Even now, I believe we're in the timeframe of the Lord's return. I believe there's some young people in this room and maybe some of us others besides, but some young people that will see the appearing of the Lord with their eyes. It might be, you know, some decades down the road. That's what I suspect. But I believe that if that is true, we will see in the next 30, 40, 50 years, a increase of judgments beyond any time in history. That is just absolutely beyond anything that we thought of, even though we've been students of the book of revelation and the end time prophets, I mean the entire prophecies, but here's the principle you can count on. God uses the least severe means to reach the greatest number of people at the deepest level of love without violating anyone's free will. That's what he's doing because he's training up the future leaders of the earth when he returns. Do you know that his people are going to rule the earth when he returns? I mean, people now are going to rule then after the second coming, you know, people, King David and the apostles, they will be ruling on the earth related to their obedience. And at the end of the age, God's going to use the end time judgments. He's going to release the least severe. Now, when I say the least severe, they are very severe. They are the most severe of history. But the Lord says, I can't make them any less severe than they are right now. I can't because I brought the severity as low as I can get it while I still get to still get the job done. Because I've got to reach the greatest number at the deepest level and I'm not going to violate anyone's free will. I'm going to train the future leaders of the earth in the whole process. So there's a dynamic wisdom and love in God's heart in doing this. Roman numeral three, there's four contributing factors to the crisis events that are in the earth now. And I'm thinking, well, now you've got to talk now, but I'm talking about in the decades ahead as well. That's what's really on my mind. There's four key factors and all of these factors work together. Let's go to B. Factor number one is God's zeal to remove everything that hinders love and beloved. I nor you, we don't have hardly just an ounce of revelation. I don't know what that means, but just the smallest portion of revelation is to the zeal God has to remove the things that hinder love. Things are kind of going along. He has a zeal in his heart for purity and a zeal in his heart that love would be released and he can't release his love if we're not in agreement with him. If we're walking in darkness, his love is hindered in the midst of his people. He has so much energy for this. I'm going to say it again. He has more energy than you and I can imagine for the subject. It's called judgment. He wants to remove everything that hinders love. He wants a pure bride. He wants a prepared bride. God's role in causing a crisis is often ignored God's role in it because as you look there on the page, we got Satan's role. We got man's sin and we have just the the travail of creation, but I want to focus here on God's. God has the greatest role of the four. Well, it's because of man's sin. That's the cause, but it's God's moving in action. God's moving in power and in his judgments, though the I am reading here. The church is quick to talk about Satan's role in the judgments. The church is quick to talk about man's sinful role, but they're very hesitant to talk about God's role in judgment. Now, when I talk about man's sin right now, I'm not talking about, you know, abortion and immorality in the land. Therefore, God releases judgment. I'm talking about man's sin like terrorist. I'm talking about evil dictators dropping bombs. I'm talking about man's activity in actual events that are led by sin. I'm talking about like terrorism, things like that when I say man's sin in this list here. Sometimes God is the direct cause of the judgment, and sometimes God has is the indirect cause by he's using other forces, but he is overseeing the process. One of the things that the preachers were real shy about was saying that what happened in 911 was a judgment on our nation. It was absolutely a judgment of God on the Church of America, on the Church of America, not just the nation itself. It was a judgment on the church. A couple guys got on TV. I truly don't remember who they were, but bunches of TV, you know, were on there. Some of them said God's judgment, and they got such a backlash of lack of popularity, and the polls went down, and it became clear that was not a good answer. And so everybody pulled the big question mark. I don't know the God part. Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, they probably drew back in shame, going those are our brothers. They obviously don't. When Isaiah and Jeremiah and those guys, they held the line, and I mean they got thrown in prison for holding the line on it. It's crystal clear it was the judgment of God. It wasn't the judgment of God just on the, certainly not on the 3,000 people in the building, and not just up on New York City, and not just upon America. It was the judgment of God, I believe, first upon the church in America. The first line of defense for a nation is the redeemed community in covenant with God. When God talks about lifting judgment off the land, He always talks to the redeemed community first. He says, I want you to cry out to me, humble yourself, and come to me, and repent of your ways. He's talking to those in covenant. And though it's clear there's two things going on right now in our nation. The prayer movement is growing, no question. The prayer movement's very small, very small right now, but it's 10 times bigger than it was a decade ago. It's growing very fast, but it's still very small, but it's still growing real fast. You know, if it was one percent, and it's ten percent, I don't have a clue what the numbers are. Ten percent is still small, but it's ten times bigger than one percent. I mean, it's really growing fast, but it's still overall very small compared to the whole body of Christ and our nation. But there's a second, and I'm excited, and there's a people getting a radical spirit of abandonment. There's more young people, but there's some older ones as well getting a spirit of abandonment. You guys know a bunch of those back home. I'm talking to the summit leaders here. You got friends, and there's a clear water level, as John Wesley said, a water level that's increasing. Clearly, God's on the move, and more is happening. It is exciting if you're paying attention. Very exciting, but exactly at the same time, the church in America is racing to an apostate position, which apostate means backslidden. The church in America is running so fast in its compromise, and more and more numbers are coming up with unified language and celebrating one another and claiming the grace of God to cover up their darkness and their sin and their lack of passion and obedience to the Word of God. And the grace of God means just about anything you want it to mean, as long as you're positive when you say it. And it's a deception. It's a major deception. There's a great falling away that is going to happen in the body of Christ. I mean, in the organized church, a great falling away that's going to happen, and it's already beginning, and yet numbers are growing, but the people coming are not being converted to Jesus. They're being converted to churches and church programs and feel-good scenarios with Bible verses and a little bit of Jesus sprinkled through it. It's not the real thing at all. We're in, and God is not happy with the church in America overall. There he is. He's breathing on it, and the numbers are growing. They're going for it, but the numbers that are using his name are growing also but are not walking with him. There's more mega ministries than any time in history. There's more people using the name of Jesus with less reality than any time in our nation's history. But there's more people in prayer rooms going hard. It's a paradox. Both of them are happening. It's not one or the other. It's both, and God's judgments are breaking in on the church, not just on the nation as a whole by itself. He is trying to get the church to wake up. Now, when God releases his judgment, it has 10 levels to it. God is so sophisticated in his leadership. If there's any guy that gets up and tries to give one thing that explains what God's judgments are doing, he's playing 10-dimensional chess all the time. It's completely not fair because we can't stay up with any of it. You know, we get one little move. We say, oh, I can see where that thing's going. We can see one move ahead on one dimension, and God's playing 10-dimensional chess. He's so brilliant. So I'm not saying it's all about the church, but I believe the primary thing on his heart right now in our nation is the backslidden state of the majority of the church, and they're happier and more confident than ever that they're right with God. And, beloved, it is really bad, and I believe the judgments, the first line, the first purpose of God in the judgments is to wake the church up. God clearly, clearly was judging America in 9-1-1 in New York City, clearly. God was clearly, absolutely the author of the judgment in New Orleans. It was a judgment against New Orleans as a city. It was a judgment against the nation. It was a judgment against the Western nations. I'm just going to end up on nobody's good list at the end of this if I keep going. And it was a judgment against the church in America, the church, and that's the issue that strikes me first. I mean, that's the issue that strikes me was the first on God's mind. And this is, uh, people don't like this, but the reason we gotta, we gotta understand this as prayer people, because the solemn assembly, the book of Joel, the prayer room is the way to undo the problem, because God, God is the source of the trouble that's coming, and His favor can turn it around, but His favor is only going to be released, not only, primarily going to be released in the solemn assemblies of crying out to Him. That's, if we know God's the source of a lot of what's happening, not all that's happening, but a lot of it, we can undo it by getting His favor, but we gotta do it His way. And the reason the prayer rooms are, are, are not laying hold of this, because they don't have the fundamental doctrine that God is the one that is their trouble. The biggest enemy to a nation in sin is God, it's not terrorists. America's biggest problem is God. And what I mean by that is because America's living in sin, and the church is, and God loves America, and God loves the church, and because He loves the church, and there's so much compromise, trouble is coming to the church. And our biggest problem isn't, you know, the, the, the, uh, the, uh, bird flu. Our biggest problem, although I think that's going to be a problem, very, very possibly, I don't know that by the spirit, just by CNN, but, uh, I mean, it looks like something's, uh, you know, not too cool there, but I don't really know that, uh, specifically, but our biggest problem isn't terrorism, and our biggest problem isn't, uh, uh, an economic crash. Some of those things might happen. Undoubtedly, they will happen in various pockets in different, various ways, and people, even the church, are focused on that. Our problem is God is not happy with the church in America. That is our problem. It's not terrorists. Terrorists are a problem, but they're down the list. We got a way bigger problem than terrorists, because terrorists, we can, you know, rebuke in the name of Jesus and solve the problem. You can't rebuke the zeal of God in the name of Jesus and get rid of it. In the name of Jesus, I rebuke this zeal coming against our nation. Father says, try again. Try again. Try. You rebuke the sin in your heart and get serious with me, and then we can talk business, but the reason this is so important, the reason this is so important is because without the theology, which is almost, it's so rare in the church, without a clear, confident theology, that God is the primary mover, then the solemn assembly doesn't make sense, because the solemn assembly, the solemn assembly means a bunch of people get together and praying and fasting and repenting. It makes sense because our need is for the favor of God. That's our need is for God's favor to break in. We can make deals with nations. We can all, you know, get together around the, you know, the United Nation tables and get economic policies and get terrorism policies and get, keep the disease out of our nation policies, but we can't keep God out when he wants to come in and if he's angry, and he loves us. That's why he's angry, because he loves us. He goes, I want you, and I'm not taking no for an answer, and that's trouble if you're not agreeing with me. Beloved, the church in America as a whole, although there's clearly a, there's a fire that's rising, it's clear, and it's exciting, but there's another thing happening, and the Lord's not pleased with it. Well, Satan's rage and man's sin, again, man's sin, I mean, man's sin in the general sense is the cause of the problem, but I'm talking about man's terrorist acts or man's intentional acts of violence. Let's go to a paragraph, I mean, Romans number four, top of page four. The most terrifying problem for a nation in sin is God. It is terrifying. Beloved, I don't know how many of you are connected to this. I know, I mean, I got to give you a little credit. You're sitting here in this room saying, hey, give us a break, you know, we're here at the Friday, Saturday night coming to a here on fasting and prayer sermon. We're on your team. Give us a break. Okay, I understand that, but at the same time, I don't want you falling asleep accidentally thinking that because you're wearing the badge, I'm talking about the IHOP badge or the team badge or the Summit badge or all the other badges we have around here. Wearing the badge doesn't mean you understand this. The most terrifying problem for America is God. It's terrifying. What happened? A city of 1 million people was disrupted and it was barely a sneeze from heaven. Beloved, God has the power to take cities out, not to wash them out and then have them all come back in a few months. I'm talking about he can take out a city in a minute and he showed it without any trouble whatsoever. But for real, these are wake-up calls and the nation as a whole. I'm talking about the church in the nation. I'm always talking about the church in the nation usually because that's what God's dealing with because if the church is on fire, the prayer rooms are full, the windows are open and the power is going to be flowing and many unbelievers will repent. Although I do hold unbelievers responsible, but in a secondary way, I hold the compromising church most responsible, which is most the church. It's terrifying what's coming. It's terrifying what's coming. God is so secure with who he is and he's so in love with his people. He is so secure. He will do these intense things with no apology whatsoever. He doesn't need the preachers to sign off on it. Most of the preachers will disown him and his involvement and he'll in heaven say it's wrong. I was involved. He will have his spokespersons. He's raising up an army of young people that don't have a whole lot of profile that they have to protect and they will say it crystal clear because they don't have a profile to protect. That's why almost always when a reformation happens in a nation, it's almost always led by young people because they have nothing to protect. They just don't care. It's not that they're any better than the old folks. They just don't have stuff to protect. They don't have a reputation or profile. They're reckless in that good sense. They'll say what God says. But it's trouble. I'm just, I'm looking at what's coming down in our nation and I'm thinking we have to get serious about prayer meetings. You can read those verses on your own. He's a consuming fire. It's fearful to fall in his hands. It's very terrible the day of the Lord. It's very terrible in Joel 2. His wrath, who can stand? Look at the next verse, Joel 1 15. The day of the Lord will come and that's trouble. That's revival too, but there's two parts of the day of the Lord. The glory part and the judgment part. It will come. You preach this and I tell you, you'll get in big trouble with lots of people. It will come as destruction from God almighty. They say, well, God won't do that. He's a God of love. That's why he is doing it because he's a God of love. It's his passion that's moving him. Roman numeral five, the response that God requires solemn assemblies. That might be a new term to some of you. Assembly is a gathering. This is an assembly right here. Assembly, solemn assembly means gathering places. It's gathering for prayer, but they're solemn. We're gathering for God and to God and we're gathering with it as our highest priority. When prayer, when our commitment to prayer is not something we do, if we're not too busy, it is solemn. It is the highest thing on our schedule, the highest thing in our priority. Now, some will have, are called by God to do it more than others, but, and you don't have to do it full time for it to be a solemn thing to you. You might do it a little bit, but there are times and I'm going to tell my, even your personal prayer life I'm talking about in times of crisis. My point is national crisis. God wants the body of Christ to come in the days are coming. I'm convinced of it. They're not far away where we'll be gathering in the stadiums, in the stadiums. I think one of the most powerful guys that I'm just crazy about is a man named Lou Ingle. And most of you know, Lou Ingle, the Lord used him to rate, to get, uh, all not all only young people, but most of the young people in the stadiums across America and Cheyenne, uh, to work together in leaders and in partnership. And of course the big one was in Washington, DC at the mall, right in front there in Washington, DC, that 400,000 people come for a day of fasting and prayer 400,000. And then they had, you know, 50,000 here in 80,000, 30,000, you know, all these numbers, these massive solemn assemblies. And the Lord was on him and they gather. This is God's going to fill the stadiums again, but I believe that Lou Ingle was a down payment, a very powerful down payment of it. But when you go back home or whether if you're here, know that Joel chapter two is God's strategy. We have to gather together and cry out before and during and after the crisis. We had to do it before the crisis during the crisis is when the meetings are the fullest. And then after the crisis, they go normally back to an all time low again. You know, three days after nine one, one, the prayer rooms of the city of the nation were full. Three weeks later, they were empty again. And the Lord says, well, at least you got the message. At least you and I have an understanding. You know, that I know that when something bad happens, the prayer rooms fill. You know that I know that now, don't you? Of course, God knew it anyway, but he can prove it just on, you know, the media proved how full the rooms are. In other words, they proved God's wisdom. It's documented. They were full when trouble came and the Lord, of course, he already knows this, but the wisdom of it is that's what works. Let's go with that for real. Let's read verse 12 of Joel chapter two. Therefore, says the Lord, turn to me with all of your heart. Turn to me with fasting. Turn to me with weeping. Turn to me with mourning. Tear rend. The other word for rend is tear. Tear your heart, not just your garment. Turn to God. Here's why. He's there's five things. He's gracious. Number one, merciful. Number two, slow to anger, great kindness. And number five, he relents or he changes. He turned. He changes. He changes his plan from doing harm. He takes the harm he had scheduled and he puts it away. He relents. Oh, beloved, that is phenomenal. Put that in your refrigerator. He relents from doing harm. It might, you know, scare and Lizzie, you know, when she visits, but he relents from doing harm. This is our most powerful thing that we can lay hold of. He relents from doing harm. God does goes on in verse 14. Who knows? The great question of the hour. Who knows if God will turn and relent and leave a blessing where judgment was scheduled. God is open and God is waiting. He's watching things are in the balance and he doesn't guarantee that every prayer meeting is going to lead to a city right revival. But God says, I'm beckoning you. Come. I want you to know I'm in the business of changing the plan if the people will pray and I will lead a I'll leave a blessing in the place of the disaster zone. Then it goes on verse 15, blow the trumpet, get consecrated fast. The consecrated fast means make the fast of the highest priority. Make it holy. It's not just, well, it's my fasting time. I think I'll skip it. No, when it's consecrated, there's no options to it. It means it's holy. Call a sacred assembly. That's the new King James. The solemn assembly is the new is the other translations, the new American standard and others call a solemn assembly, gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, the leaders, and let them cry out to God. You can read the passage more. Let's go on to the next page. Or I mean, I mean, uh, paragraph a, it's what I meant and Joel to this passage. God tells us exactly what we are to do to receive his mercy and deliverance beloved. This is his mercy. This is his message to the church. I want to ask you the question, not is the church doing it? Cause we all know a hundred churches that aren't, that's not the point. It's easy to find a big list who aren't, are we doing it? That's the question. I don't want to talk about them. I want to talk about us. Am I doing it? Is Mike doing it? Are you doing it? I know John Wesley Adams is doing it. Okay. God gave his answer for crisis in Joel's generation. Joel had the big crisis cause they were, there was a military invasion from Babylon about to break in and Joel's a generation and uh, they're in trouble. And Joel says it's coming. It's coming. War is coming. A military invasion. Fast and pray, fast and pray, fast and pray. And beloved trouble is coming in many different forms in the nation. The end of paragraph a, God is asking his people for a specific response. He doesn't leave us guessing. We know what he wants. There is no guesswork. He says, get together in rooms, tear your heart and fast and pray and see if I won't relieve a blessing in the place of where judgment was scheduled and determined already. See paragraph C, this is the clearest passage in the word of God. It describes what God wants us to do. It's a very clear roadmap for the global drama. He wants us, I have it underlined to live holy confidence. He wants us to have holy confidence. He wants us certain. This is what we're supposed to do. Beloved. When crisis mounds up, I know that I know that I know what I'm supposed to do. I'm supposed to get with people and do Joel too. That's exactly what he wants. And many people try many other things and the Lord says, you can do some of those. Some of those things are okay. They're permissible, but I told you what to do when crisis mounts up. Are you doing the only main thing that I required of you to do as the whole body of Christ? I mean, we've got other things we have to do as well. That was, I want to bounce at it statement. God wants us to walk in love, to be responsible in our relationships and all the other things, but he wants us to make this a top priority. Let's go to top of page five. Turn to God with all of your heart. All of your heart. And I have a little bit written on that. I'm going to skip that because this is a crowd that's into all of your heart. He wants all of our hearts. That's powerful. That of all the things in the earth is crisis mounting up. God says, in essence, I want you to love me. That tells us more about God than almost anything. What do you want? God? I'll do anything. Oh, you know, the false religions, they cut themselves and they, all these crazy things. I said, he goes, I just want you to love me. That's it. Love me. And the thing will turn around. Well, you're serious about this. I want you to love me because I love you. The trouble is about you not loving me. And it, it tears my heart when you don't love me. I want you to tear your heart and get the things out of the way. So our love relationship works now and it, and it blossoms in eternity. It's fantastic. It's about love paragraph. I mean, Roman number seven, render heart, render heart. This is, this is a powerful uh, sentence. God wants us to render because God's heart is rent. It's torn over the situation. God's not on his throne, looking down the earth and saying, well, I'm sorry. It's a little inconvenient for him. And a lot of people died. It tears God's heart. When this happens, this is real. Jesus becoming human tore the heart of the father and it tore the flesh in the heart of Jesus on the earth, the tearing of the heart. God did his part and he did it for real. And the people that say, oh, he's a God of love. How can he done it enough? And God could say, he'll tell them face to face on the last day. I, I tore my heart over throughout history. And I did it when my son came at Jesus will show the scars and go, I tore my heart. We went on the line for what we're asking you to do. We did to tear your heart. Paragraph a is a non-optional part of wholeheartedness. We've got to turn to God wholehearted. We have to tear our heart to, to rend means to tear something violently, even to render, to tear it. It's got a violent dimension, a strong, a strength to it. When we violently tear our heart away from the areas of sin, then we are lining up with what God requires. Paragraph B, when we tear our hearts, we are radically aligning ourselves to be in agreement with God. Joe was crying out, tear your heart open, spare, not be ruthless with your areas of compromise. If there is an issue that standing in the way of quenching your full obedience or quenching the anointing, it's the same thing. Get rid of it. Speaking symbolically of this, Jesus said, if your right hand causes you to sin, you're right. I pluck it out. He was talking about a radical pursuit of righteousness. That's even painful. It tears the heart beloved when something's in my heart and I don't want to go away. And the Lord says, it's a problem between you and me. It hurts. I don't like it. I go, ah, I want to do it, but I want you more. I'm in a dilemma. I really want to do this, but I really want you more. Oh, why is life like this? The Lord says, I know I tore my heart to come after you. Now I want you in light of the fact that I did it. I want you to tear your heart, Mike. And I want you to say no to this. And it hasn't out. The word is tear. It's what it is. It doesn't, it's not, it's not subtle. It's not, it's not a tame thing. This is violent. And in terms of our emotions inside. In other words, I have written here, forsake, radically forsake everything in the way at all. My it's costly. There's relationships, there's money, there's bitternesses, there's addictions. There's many things that are in the way. There's our reputation, our profile, our security in the future, all kinds of things that are safe to us. And they're dear to us. And some of those things, some of those things can be the will of God. And for some people, some of those, some of those even legitimate things are not God saying, I want this out of the way here. Nobody can tell you what the issues are, unless they're the biblical areas of sin, then they're obvious. If you're in immorality, that you have to stop that. If you're into stealing and bitterness, you have to stop that. But there's other areas that are legitimate. The Lord puts his finger on my heart and your heart. And he says, I want this area out of you now. And I go, Ooh, there's no exact Bible verse. Yeah, there is come to me with all of your heart. Ooh, does that mean that the Lord goes? Yeah, that means that. Oh, Lord, that all your heart thing is a big catch phrase, man catches everything. That's my money. That's my entertainment. That's my recreation. That's my pride, my profile, my reputation, my view of the future, my relational style. That's ooh, everything. Oh my, oh my goodness. This is invasive. Well, love is always invasive. Love real love always is invasive and it presses in. The last of paragraph B, some people pursue wholeheartedness so casually, which is an oxymoron, obviously what they want. I'm talking about it's even the prayer prophetic shunned. I'm a Hyundai movement. I mean, those guys, they want a wholeheartedness. Look at this. They want a wholeheartedness that is gentle and non-costly, subtle, tame. They want a tame wholeheartedness. I remember talking to one lady. It doesn't matter who it was just some many long time ago. And she was talking, I mean, her lifestyle was so entrenched in so many things. It doesn't matter. And she says, you know, people like us that are really going radical for God. And I said, I have just seen the epitome of delusion right here. And my point is that I, it was this obvious. I mean, it was her lifestyle was so out of line, but she had all a bunch of cool books about prophetic books and cool books about revival. And I just thought, man, this is, this thing is entrenched deception. I said, radical. She goes, yeah, radical like us. Look at the books I'm reading. They're cool. I tell my friends about these books. So that means you're radical with all these other areas, huh? It's entrenched self-deception in the church. See, there's often pain when we cooperate with the Lord. I mean, I've had a couple of those in my years. We all have to pull out. There's root systems, root systems of, of wrong thinking that keep us in bondage. It hurts, but the Lord says, I want you to press through. I pressed through the father pressed through. He said in Jesus and the way he's led the human race, you know, it says that God is slow to anger. Another word for that is long suffering. You don't long suffering means they suffer long, slow to anger. Another way they translate is long suffering, suffering long. God has suffered in his leadership of the planet patiently to give us an opportunity, but it, it terrors his heart. He didn't just tear it at Jesus. There's a long suffering that's in the heart of God because he cares so much. He doesn't care passively. He doesn't care in a distant way. He doesn't care detached. He cares with suffering in his heart when he relates to his people who won't say yes, but he's patient. He's patient. He bears with us because he says, I want to do it the easiest way possible, but you're, you're wounding my heart, but we're in this together because I love you so much. You're the delight of my heart as well. You can read through a paragraph C and D and E if you want more on this. And I think the most important thing on this is a, this handout is the rending of the heart part. I don't want to go on and on on it, but I think it's by far the most important thing, but I just, I want to finish in just the next moment or two here, paragraph eight. I mean, Roman numeral eight got be confidence in God's kindness and his mercy. Here's what he said. Turn to the Lord wide. He gets five reasons. He's gracious, merciful, slow to anger, great kindness. And he relents. He relents paragraph eight, Joel summons the people to return. He gives them five reasons why it's doable to return. See, if God was not like this returning, he would wipe us out. It's like, you know, it's, it's like the, uh, runaway prisoner returning to the judge here. I am judge I've been looking for you. You got the death penalty waiting for you. If he, if he's a different personality, you're not going to turn yourself in, but this is doable. He says, no, I will be gentle on you. I will make a way. And I have a couple sentences for each one of those. I will make a way where there is no way to restore you, to help recover you. I will help you repent. I will help you get this thing in order. I'm on your team. I'm on your side. It's doable to turn to me. There's no reason we have to go somewhere else. Okay. Let's go to a C my favorite one. God delights in mercy. Micah seven, paragraph C he delights in mercy. You know, one of God's favorite dimensions, when he leads the universe, he looks down at you and me. And when it dawns on us that we have mercy, we failed and failed and failed. And when it connects with us, we got a brand new beginning starting today. We go, Oh, he goes, Oh, I delight in it. I delight in mercy. I love what happens to my people. When it connects to them, that there is a new beginning starting now. And that all their failures, I'm going to put them aside when it hits them. And they look up and they go father. He goes, I delight in this. This is one of my favorite things to do is to communicate this to people. Let's go to Roman numeral nine. He relents from doing harm. Let's skip that. We talked about that for a minute. Let's go on to a Roman numeral 10. Oh, wait, daylight savings. We've got a whole nother hour. No, just kidding. Some of you lost your spirit of repentance there for just a minute. Let's end with this, this thought here, the mysterious, perhaps of God. I call it pockets of mercy. It says in Joel 2, rend your heart. He's gracious in all these things. Verse 14, who knows? I like the new king, new American. It says, perhaps he will turn and relent and leave a blessing. Look at the next passage underneath it. Zephaniah to seek the Lord, all you make of the earth, seek humility. It may be the word is perhaps there again. Perhaps you will be hidden in the day when the judgments break forth. God will hide you. That's what I call a pocket of mercy. You will be protected. He will hide you. Perhaps he goes, you cry out. And above it, I believe there's going to be whole geographic areas that will be hidden under. They'll be hidden under God's hand when the wrath is breaking out. He says, if you cry out to me with fasting and prayer, perhaps I will hide you. I will cause your whole geographic area, not just your family, but beloved. There's whole geographic areas that will be pockets of mercy in the, in the escalating judgments that are coming. And the thing that we want to do above all things, we want to get with people. It doesn't have to be a large number. You want to build a history with people that are fasting and praying and being wholehearted. You want to be in the middle of that. It's not just the day of the calamity. I want to stand before God with a company of people. We've been doing it for years is what I want to say in that hour, Lord, years, we've been coming after you, Lord, perhaps you will hide us in that day. And there'll be a whole nother thing happening. And we could be a, a, a vehicle of salvation and deliverance for others because we're walking with you, even in that hour of your judgments. And the thing that we want to do is we want to connect with people. We want to get a history with people. We want to be collectively building something with people that are going after this together. We in, in geographic areas and even across the nation. Some of them are crisscross the nation, others, and it doesn't take a large number of people. Amen. I'm going to end with that. Let's stand.