In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of the Great Commission and its connection to Pentecost. He urges pastors, evangelists, and church leaders to call the church to repentance and to return to the significance of Calvary and Pentecost. The preacher then shifts to discussing the life of Moses, highlighting his close relationship with God and the lessons he learned in the desert. He emphasizes the need for victory over self and the importance of being equipped by God to fulfill His purposes. The preacher also addresses the issue of the church losing its reverence for God and warns against the devil's attempts to rob the church of its reverence and steal its worship.

We welcome you again to O'Neill's Wings, a church revival ministry designed to encourage the pastor, the local church, for revival, for walking with the Lord, being right with the Lord. We want to be an encouragement to you. We trust that you would get your Bible and follow along with us, if you can, if you're not driving, and that you let the principles from God's Word soak in. Prayerfully consider some of the things that are said. We want to challenge you to consider the Lord Jesus Christ. Is He your Savior? Or do you just know some things about Him? Have you just been a church goer? Why not take a spiritual inventory on your life? Pastor, challenge your men to take a spiritual inventory of the church, just to see what kind of condition you really are. And if there's things they're not right, to be willing to humble yourselves before God, and to let Him restore you, build you up. Trust that God will use this as a time of ministry in your life today. Amen. David said in Psalms 138, 7 and 8, Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou wilt revive me. Thou shalt stretch forth thine hand against the wrath of mine enemies, and thy right hand shall save me. The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me. Thy mercy, O Lord, endureth forever. Forsake not the work of thine own hands. One of the verses that's been a great encouragement to me is Philippians 1, 6, which says, Be in confident of this very thing, that he which had begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. We're here to encourage churches for revival, pastors. Last week, I shared some from a pamphlet by James A. Stewart on the phenomena of Pentecost. And I thought I might share a little bit more today before we start our desert survival series on the life of Moses. He went through some things about the church. Our churches today, he said, are mere imitations of the real thing. We've substituted and offered up strange fire in the place of the fire of God. And he went through about five things that we've lost. Four or five things, I think it was, maybe four. But I thought I would touch on these before we get into our study on the life of Moses to show how the cross applies to our life. He said, we've lost our garments of holiness. We've lost our holy garments by compromising with the world in order to escape the offense of the cross. We have not invaded Hollywood, but Hollywood has invaded us. Instead of being persecuted by the leaders of this world system, we've allowed them to flatter us and have compromised with them. We sit at truth tables with the enemy. Our message and our lives are no longer an offense to these whirlings. And they of the church and they of the world walk closely in hand and heart and none but the master who knoweth all can tell the two apart. I hope this doesn't describe you, Mr. Christian, Miss Christian. I hope you haven't lost your garment of holiness. If you have, you can turn back. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. You can turn back. It's when the church is terrible with as an army with banners in her Christ likeness and separation that she is a phenomena to the unsaved. It is when she is despised, reviled, and persecuted that the church returns to her pristine glory. Would you lead the way? Back? Would you be the one to humble yourself? If we humble ourself, he will exalt us and lift us up. But if the church is full of pride, she's full of self-glory. You know how you can tell if you're full of self-glory? Everything you do and say will revolve around yourself. It's your goals, your desires, your preference. Has it been that way? The most miserable person to be around is the one that's the most self-oriented. We're to be Christ oriented, Christ conscious, not self-conscious. There's another thing. We've lost the wonder of redeeming love. If you've got over your salvation experience, maybe you never got it in the first place. The men of old like Charles Wesley, John Newton, and other such men of God to their dying breath can never get over the wonder of the Christ of God dying for them. Writes the sweet singer of Methodism, and can it be that I should gain an interest in the Savior's blood? Died he for me who caused his pain? For me who him to death pursued? Amazing love, how can it be that thou, my God, shouldst die for me? Tis mystery all, though immortal dies, who can explore his strange design, in vain the firstborn syrup tries to sound the depths of love divine. Tis mercy all, let earth adore, let angel minds inquire no more. Charles Wesley. Well, I think that we have lost the sense of the presence of God in our midst. It's the devil business to, it's his business to rob the church of its reverence for the great God of wonders. He'll rob you. He's a thief. He comes to steal, to destroy. It was more than, more than 75 years ago that that keen evangelical scholar Bishop Westcott of Durham Cathedral wrote, every day he makes me tremble at the daring with which people speak of spiritual things. This is an age of impoverished conception of the God of the Bible. This is an age of blasphemy and irreverence inside the church of Jesus Christ. How often our worship and service are as a loud and irreverent tramp in the ears of the Almighty. I believe God is crying to us today in these solemn words. When you come before, come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand to trample my courts? Isaiah chapter 1 in verse 12. What would the good man say today? That was many years ago. Much of our so-called worship and singing is an abomination to the Lord. By all means let us sing cheerfully and joyfully, James Stewart said in this book, but never let us forget the majesty and holiness of God whom we adore. We've slipped into an age, I'm afraid my friend, of the good Lord bless us and keep you. Oh the man upstairs, he's, him and I are, we're on good relationship. We've got a good thing going. I've heard men talk like this. This is the age when everyone seems to be on good terms with God and yet never was there so much sin and wickedness in the church. Dishonesty, greed, lying, sensuality, blasphemy have struck at the very foundation of our nation. This is the day when we're trying to humanize God and bring him down to the popular level of a good pal to everyone. And then Mr. Stewart went on to say, there can never be a mighty movement of the Holy Spirit inside the church until we clothe ourselves in sackcloth and ashes and repent of this sin of irreverence. There's another one. We've lost the power of the miraculous. Mr. Stewart said the church always fails at the point of self-confidence. When the church is right on the lines of a circus, there may be crowds, but there can be no Shekinah. Miracles are the direct work of his power and without miracles the church cannot survive. The root trouble in the present distress is that the church has more faith in the carnal methods of the world than in the power of Pentecost. I'd like to stop and just say something here. The church that's going to be in the disciple making business may not very much be in the crowd making business. Disciples are few nowadays. Those that are willing to take up their cross and follow the Lord Jesus Christ. We've cut down the standards so much where you can do this and be a disciple, you can do that and be a disciple. We've given so much leniency that God hasn't given. When the early disciples took up their cross, they died to everything. They died to their friends, to their family if need be, to their to their reputation. They died to their glory. Have a sermon on on Joseph. Joseph was a type of Christ and seven things that he died to when he was taken prisoner and went to Egypt. Maybe sometime on this broadcast, I'll be able to share that with you. But Mr. Stewart went on to say, Our great church programs and mass evangelistic campaigns are usually along the lines of sound business organization and promotion. Hollywood evangelism and Madison Avenue advertising were entirely absent from the ministry of the Apostles Peter and Paul. All worldly methods of promotion and propaganda are a direct insult to the Spirit of God himself. As Samuel Chadwick has stated so eloquently, worship is idolatry until he, being God, inspires it. Preaching is powerless if it be not a demonstration of his power. Prayer is vain unless he energizes it. Human resources of learning, organization, wealth, and enthusiasm are less than useless if there be no Holy Spirit in them. It was the miraculous inside the church that aroused the interest of the unsaved without. No wonder there's there's no interest. They don't see anything miraculous. All they see is a puff of smoke. I've said these things and Mr. Stewart went on to say something in quoting Andrew Murray. Mr. Murray said the missionary revival we need and pray for can come only by a return to Pentecost. The end is ever contained in the beginning and returns to the beginning. To know what Pentecost means, to have its faith and its spirit, this is the only power for evangelizing the world and this generation. The Great Commission was given in connection with Pentecost and its fulfillment was made dependent entirely upon it. Haven't been so long used to the natural one wonders if we are prepared for the supernatural and I'll end with one other statement. It is the duty, now pastors listen, evangelists listen, Bible teachers listen, church leaders listen. It is the duty of all pastors and evangelists and Bible teachers to call the church to repentance. Back to Calvary, back to Pentecost. Oh Father, we pray that you'd turn us back to Calvary. Now I'd like to take you in the last few moments of this program into the life of Moses in the Desert Survival Series. We said a few things last week about Moses. His testimony in Deuteronomy 34 and verse 10 was one of having walked with God and few men have walked with God like Moses did. Powerful man. His testimony was was that which gave evidence of a man that had paid the price. Are you willing to pay the price to walk with God? Well this series, this Desert Survival Series is designed to develop discernment, to discern doctrine. I mentioned those passages to you last time and to teach us how to be desert dwellers. Now let me say something about the desert dweller. Isaiah 48 21 says they thirsted not when he led them through the deserts. Are you going through a desert? A dry experience? A bitter experience? A very trying experience right now? Maybe you lost your job. Maybe your marriage is is on the rocks and in the process of caving in. Are you willing to let God be all to you? I have a message on the book of Colossians where where I teach and preach how Christ is all and in all and I say in there there's a lesson I learned and that is that Christ is all we need but is he all we want? Are you willing to be a desert dweller? Or do you always have to go get the pleasures and the treasures of the world? Those things leave you dissatisfied, unfulfilled. God said in Isaiah 43 19, I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. The desert experience when the children of Israel went into the desert that the word exodus even means the way out. It looked like the way to death and Pharaoh and the children of Israel laughed at them when they went out in that desert. They thought they were gonna die. By the way, when Jesus came to the disciples in Mark 6 31, he said come yourselves apart and rest for a while. The devil says you're gonna die in the desert. There's no food out there. You better not. You can't trust God in that desert. Jesus says come you yourselves apart into a desert place and rest while Jesus has come unto me all of you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. Could it be you've been going everywhere except to Jesus with your problem? He's still God. He hasn't changed. We change, but he doesn't change. He's the one that rose from the dead. When he said it was finished, that meant he had finished everything in relation to your needs. All the way from your sins to your suffering, he is sufficient for everything. And let me tell you this, if we learn to bloom in the desert, then we can learn to bloom anywhere. Those that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. Maybe it's time. We stopped running around so much and took time to spend with the Lord. Time in prayer, real prayer, not just ten minutes, but to maybe take an hour or two or three or four hours and just pray and meditate and read. Well, it seemed foolish to go into the desert. First Corinthians 1 25 through 27 talks about how God takes the foolishness of the world and his his foolishness is wisdom, but he takes these things and he turns them into a blessing. Now, for a little bit of background, getting into the book of Exodus, Joseph was a slave. He was sold as a slave. He grew up down there. He ended up second to Pharaoh and he just stayed there. Seventy entered the land when his family came down. There were seventy entered the land and several years later when they left the land, approximately 400 years later when they left the land, it's estimated there could have been two to three million people that went out. They entered free, but they were made slaves. The book of Exodus tells us that when a new king arose, he was afraid because there were so many of them. So he began to put them in bondage and we'll get into that when we get into the first chapter. But let me say this about Moses. Moses was a type of Christ and Moses was misunderstood. The Bible tells us in the book of Acts, in chapter 7, that he was misunderstood when he was 40 years old, chapter 7, excuse me, and verse 25. It says, he supposed his brethren would have understood how that God by his hand would deliver them, but they understood not. Moses had took into his own hands a situation. He'd killed an Egyptian and he had in his heart that God was going to use him and that was right. But there were some things that Moses also didn't understand. He didn't understand God's timing and he was misunderstood. You know, one of the greatest burdens is the burden of being misunderstood. Lord Jesus was not understood. He came into his own and his own received him not. Could it be that you're bearing that burden of being misunderstood? Jesus understands you. If he understands you, why are you letting others affect you so? He's all you need. He can take you through the desert of your trial, of being misunderstood. You know, Moses gave up the treasures and the pleasures of Egypt, Hebrews 11.25 tells us. He was a type of Christ. The Lord Jesus gave up his throne with the Father and John 17.5, he says, And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was. When Moses gave up the treasures and the pleasures of Egypt, he went out into the wilderness. But it was in the wilderness that he came to know God. Have you come to know him in your wilderness? Moses was a deliverer. The Lord Jesus was a deliverer. Moses was a mediator. He said, I stood between the Lord and you at that time. The Bible says there's one mediator between God and man. My friend, I hope you haven't been trusting a false mediator. The church can't be your mediator. Some religious person can't be your mediator. The Bible says there's only one mediator, one go-between, between you and God, and that's the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one that's alive. He is the scar prints in his hand and on his side. You come to him. Oh, there's a beautiful passage, if I can get to it, in Isaiah 53 5. It says he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes we are healed. You see, the Bible says the wages of sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Our Lord's sin must be paid for. Well, Jesus paid it all. Won't you accept the payment that he made for you? Well, Moses life was 40 years in Pharaoh's palace, 40 years in the desert of Midian, and 40 years in the wilderness, and he got a doctor of desertology degree when he was finished. Now I might say this before we have a closing song in a minute, that his training in the world did not teach him victory over self. He learned that in the desert. He learned it in the desert. What are you learning in your desert? And also his training in the world did not equip him to deliver Israel. He learned that also in the desert. He couldn't deliver others. Paul said, I am crucified with Christ nevertheless I live, yet not I. But Christ lives in me. My friend, have you come to the point where you're crucified? His training in the desert did these things. And I might give you this little statement, that your desert experience is designed to kill you. That's right. It's designed to kill the self-life. Not to harm you, your person, but to destroy the old carnal nature that you're born with. Could it be that you're struggling and fighting and and trying to to lick all the all your problems yourself, and you're you're a bitter person? Could it be that you're angry and you're blaming somebody else for your problems at work or your family problem and really, all you're doing is blaming God? Now, I believe that God puts us into circumstances to get us to him. And we often try to run or get rid of that very thing that God designed for us. And we need endurance. We need it. We need to learn to be stable. We have a generation that doesn't want to work now. We have a generation that wants it easy. If we don't have air conditioning all the time, we cry and complain. If we don't have it our way, we're turning into a generation of softies. We need to learn to be strong so that we can face the the trials. I was reading over in James 1 verse 12 says, blessed is the man that endureth temptation. Have you been just eating it up? Have you been placing yourself in positions of being tempted? For when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord had promised to them that love him. That was James 1 12 and James 5 11. James said, Behold, we count them happy which endure. A sad person is a person that's that's undisciplined. And you have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy. By the way, that's another lesson, the lesson of Job, the things that he went to. Well, Moses. Moses was the shepherd. He led the flock to the backside of the desert, came to the mountain of God, he led them to God. But first, he had to go out in that desert and meet God and get to know God himself. Could it be that the reason you have no power to reach others is because you have not let God take you into the desert and make you the person he wants you to be? If you'll follow Jesus, you'll have to turn your back to the crowd and you'll have to go where he leads you. And it may be that he just wants to lead you out into that desert and wants to just teach you things by faith that will help you to endure. Let him bear you on eagle's wings. Please, my friend, let him bear you up on eagle's wings. Be still, my child. Be still and know you are my own. I love you so. I paid the price on Calvary and gave you faith to come to me. And I will lift you up with wings as an eagle. You'll not be tired. I'll not let you fall. And I will lift you up with wings as an eagle. You'll not be tired. I'll not let you fall. Sometimes you stray so far from me and in the dark you cannot see. But in the time of deep despair I hear your voice in silent prayer. And I will lift you up with wings as an eagle. You'll not be tired. I'll not let you fall. And I will lift you up with wings as an eagle. You'll not be tired. I'll not let you fall. You'll not be tired. I'll not let you fall.