In this sermon, the speaker shares a personal story about his mother and her connection to his preaching on television. He expresses gratitude for her sacrifice and the impact she has had on his ministry. The speaker also discusses the importance of studying and preparation in producing effective sermons, which has led to the writing of numerous books. He then recounts a powerful deliverance service where the spirit of witchcraft was cast out, resulting in intense manifestations and chaos. The sermon concludes with a reflection on the power and significance of the Bible as the eternal word of God.

Welcome to From the Pulpit in Classic Sermons. Each week we bring you a different message from some of history's greatest speakers in the Christian faith, and powerful sermons from modern preachers too. This week, we have John Hagee with his message, Great is Thy Faithfulness. Join with me to Psalms, the 89th chapter, as we speak on the theme, Great is Thy Faithfulness. This is not a sermon, it's a testimonial to the faithfulness of God in my life and ministry over the past 50 years. On the first Sunday of March, 1958, I walked into the pulpit for the very first time to preach the gospel. In a way, it seems like yesterday, and then on the other hand, it seems like an eternity. The celebration of the accomplishments of Cornerstone Church, with its more than 19,000 plus active members. The celebration of John Hagee Television Ministries that reaches America and every nation on the face of the earth by television almost every day. The celebration of Cornerstone Christian Schools and the building of the beautiful Tarpley Retreat Center. The celebration of the accomplishments of a night to honor Israel and Christians United for Israel is a monument to the faithfulness of God, not John Hagee. I assure you, the God that we serve is a faithful God. I want you to read with me Psalms 89, 1 and 2. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. With my mouth will I make known your faithfulness to all generations. For I have said, mercy shall be built up forever. Your faithfulness you shall establish in the heavens. And then let me read to you Lamentations 3. Through the mercies of the Lord, we are not consumed. Because his compassions fail not. They are renewed every morning. Great is your faithfulness. Say that with me. Great is your faithfulness. If you've been saved more than a week, you know that's absolutely true. The faithfulness of God is far, far, far beyond our deserving. Father, we stand here today through the blood of Jesus Christ and the mercies of God in your faithfulness. Thank you for the great things that you have done. Thank you that the majesty of your name can be proclaimed from this platform to the nations of the world. Thank you God that a foundation has been built for which future generations can launch into the 21st century. And the best is yet to be for your glory and for your honor. We have not arrived. We have only just begun. In Jesus name, amen. You may be seated. Our God is a faithful God. The truth is I have failed the Lord many times, but he has never failed me one time. Our God is a faithful God whose mercies are renewed every morning. If that weren't true, God would have fired me a long time ago. Saint Paul said, the things that are not seen are greater than the things that are seen. For the spiritual and the invisible are greater than the physical and the visible. Many are watching this celebration today from the balconies of heaven, whose blood, sweat, and tears help make Cornerstone Church and all of its related ministries possible. Generations of the Hagee family who have preached the gospel all the days of their life are gathered around the banister of the Celestial City today, celebrating the goodness of God, celebrating the faithfulness of God in the generations that followed them. I have been asked by many pastors on many occasions, what is the secret of your success in the ministry at Cornerstone? And the answer is, like Joseph in Egypt, God was with me. God was with me. He held me in the hollow of his hand until the storm passed by. He is Jehovah Shammah, the God who was there in the darkest nights, showing the way to walk. By his sovereign grace and his eternal faithfulness, we survived the most vicious and sustained storms. We survived assassination attempts. We survived criticism from all directions. We survived the toxic tongues of Christians who were certain I had missed the will of God for this church. Our God is a faithful God. He is a faithful God. He is a never-failing God. And he is the Lord that has made this church and all of its ministries possible. Give the Lord a praise for his great work. The faithfulness of God placed me in a godly home. The child that's born into a home where both parents are Bible-believing Christians has an advantage over other children greater than wealth and fame, better than apples of gold or pictures of silver. My father, Bythel Hagee, was an ordained minister in the Assemblies of God for more than 50 years. He had only one passion in life, preaching. Preaching the gospel. He has now been with the Lord for 20 years. My mother, Bythel Hagee, will be 95 years of age in another two months. She is suffering from dementia and living in an assisted living center for those who are suffering with Alzheimer's. Without my mother's prayers, I assure you, I would never have come to know the Lord. I was not saved by my father's preaching. I was saved because of my mother's praying. I certainly would never have entered the ministry. I would never have preached one sermon. I would never have built four churches. Never preached the gospel to the nations of the earth by television. Never founded a night to honor Israel or Christians United for Israel. If Cornerstone Church has a founder other than Jesus Christ, it's my mother. She was the chisel in the hand of God that sculptured my life. There are no words in human speech to describe the love I have for her. When I go to see her, she doesn't know me. I have to introduce myself to her every time. And I go down the factory, she's got four sons. And she said, which one are you? And I say, my name is John. Do you remember me? And she says, vaguely. I'll tell you, that'll take the wind out of your sails in a hurry. Your own mother looks at you, I remember you vaguely. Now get this. She's been watching me on television for 30 years. And she knows me on television. I'm standing right beside her. She says, do you know my son that preaches on the television? I said, yes, I know him very well. She said, I want you to sit down here and listen to him preach. She still says it like MacArthur. Sit down and hear him preach. So I sat down and listened to a sermon. Because of her sickness, she has been separated from us in a way. But through the television, she's uniquely connected to us. So I would like for this audience to give my mother an ovation for the sacrifice of her life and to the kingdom of God. Because without her, we wouldn't be here today. Would you do that please? Mom, this is for you. Thank you. God was faithful to save me as a teenager. When I was growing up, going to church every service was not an option. It was a command. My father was very inflexible when it came to the rules of the house. We went to church early and we stayed late. Late was 10, 30, 11 o'clock. We had four major revivals every year. Some of them lasted six weeks. We went to church on Saturday night even. We didn't have time to sin. We didn't have the energy to sin. After 42 offerings, that would be seven weeks times six. After 42 offerings, we didn't have the money to sin. And that's the gospel. I sat on the back row of my father's church as close to the back door as I could get with a mechanical drawing board hung on the song book rack where I wrote English themes, worked quadratic equations, waiting for the preacher to shut up who was generally my father. In those days, the Assemblies of God considered sports worldly, something Christians simply didn't do. I was a four-sport letterman which made me the devil's poster child sitting on the back row of the church. I didn't like sports. I loved sports. I told the people in my father's church, if all of you people are going to heaven, hell is not going to be half bad. They were shocked. It was a major miracle that I ever got saved. I had an appointment to West Point, and being in the ministry was not on my radar screen. I told my parents, when I'm 18, take a picture of me going through the door. That's the last time you'll see me in a church house. And I fully intend to keep that promise. But God had a different plan because of my mother's prayers. In January of 1958, after one of those long everlasting eternal sermons that never shut up, sitting on the back row, waiting for the altar call to mercifully end, it was going now into its 20th minute. Suddenly, like a light in a dark room, like the Apostle Paul on the road to Damascus, I wanted to know, who art thou, Lord? And what wilt thou have me to do? I walked to the altar that night and surrendered my life to Christ. Ten days later, I went to Southwestern Bible Institute, which is now Southwestern Assemblies of God University in Waxahachie, Texas. I took one course in high school to graduate and took 12 hours in the Bible college because the high school and the Bible college and the junior college were on the same property. God was faithful to help me to get a job to stay in school. I will never forget the Sunday I left home at the age of 17 and watched my father write a check for $75 out of a checkbook that only had 80. That would pay for six weeks of school. I had six weeks to find a job or come home. If I was going to stay at Southwestern, I had to find that job and fast. And I'm going to tell you something, Waxahachie then and now is not downtown New York. On the last day that I could possibly stay at school, by the grace of God, I found a job making church pews at Southwestern Wood Products. I don't know why God always waits to the midnight hour to answer. I don't know why he lets you hang by the cliff, by your fingernails, knowing or feeling you're going over the edge, but he just seems to like that somehow. I simply don't know. Southwestern decided to make a movie, Life at Southwestern. I was chosen to make that movie. I sang in the Harvester Choir and was the president of my class at Bible college. I preached my first sermon on the first Sunday of March of 1958 at the First Assembly of God Church in Houston, Texas. I was 17 years and 11 months old, and I preached that sermon out of this Bible. This Bible was given to me by my father's church before I left for Bible school. I want you to know that this grand old book is worn out. If I held it upside down, pages would fly in all four directions. But the truth that's found in this battered old book are still greater than all of the knowledge in the world and every book and every library, because this is still the eternal unshakable word of God. This message is a consuming fire. This is still the two-edged sword. This is still the living water and the bread of life. This is still meat for men and milk for children. This is still a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my pathway. Here the gates of heaven are open and the gates of hell are closed. This Word rules our lives. It guides our thoughts. It controls our speech. It determines our relationships. You don't read this book. This book reads you. People who have a Bible that's falling apart have a life that's not. Thank God for His Word. For the flower wilts and the grass withers, but the Word of God shall endure forever. Hallelujah for the unshakable foundation of the Word of God. I want to express my profound appreciation to the pastors of the Assemblies of God who had the raw courage to turn a teenager loose in their pulpits. I have to tell you that is real courage. You learn to preach by preaching. And while in Bible college, I averaged preaching about four or five times every week. I would drive Friday to the church, preach Friday night, Saturday night, Sunday morning, Sunday night, and then drive all night back to the school in time for class on Monday. Most of those pastors that were brave enough to let me preach those revivals that went two or three weeks are now in heaven. Pastors Lonnie Mullins, R.R. Taylor, Jimmy McClellan, Elbert Smart. Elbert Smart is a member of this church now. He was a child pastor, by the way. G.Q. Manley, C.E. McNeely, J.J. Land, J.S. McMullen, Charles Wigley, J.S. McQueen, Pastor Eldridge, and many, many others who courageously gave me the opportunity to preach the gospel from their pulpits. God was faithful to expand the borders of my tent. In January 1962, I came to San Antonio to attend Trinity University after preaching for two years, revivals across America. I realized that I had been raised exclusively in the church world. You just don't know how exclusively that was. And I knew if I was going to reach my generation, I needed a broader intellectual base to do so. So I enrolled at Trinity University and was awarded a football scholarship. At a fabulous university, I certainly didn't have the financial ability to attend. Trinity University was one of the best decisions I ever made in my life. I was introduced to a level of scholarship and knowledge that I knew nothing about. I had never had to study in middle school or high school to make the honor roll, not in Bible school either. At Trinity, I had to study three hours plus every night to get ready for class the next day and make the dean's list. A whole new world opened up, and it changed my life forever as a pastor and as a writer. Those study habits produced far better sermons. Those sermons became chapters in the 23 books that I have written and the 24th that I am now writing. The prophetic book, The Beginning of the End, was dictated in one day to a team of stenographers and was in the bookstores around the world in 60 days. They came at 8 o'clock in the morning. We were in the executive dining room. We began page one, chapter one, paragraph one. At 6 o'clock that night, the prophetic book was dictated. And 60 days later, that book was in every bookstore, Christian bookstore around the world. It sold over one million copies, and they ran out five times. After graduation from Trinity, I coached football for one year in the Northeast Independent School District to get my finances ready to go to graduate school. We won the district championships in three sports, and I have to tell you, it was one of the most enjoyable years of my life. It was lots of fun. I was offered a great job right after that, and I talked to Jesus about possibly pastoring 60 sweaty boys wearing helmets rather than a lot of people with lots of problems. Heaven said no. So I, in the fall of 1964, enrolled in North Texas State, now North Texas University in Denton, and completed my master's degree in the summer of 1966. In the summer of 66, I was preaching a revival in Beaumont, Texas with Pastor R.R. Taylor. I was about to make a decision that would change my life forever. God was about to bring me back to San Antonio. Two couples drove down to Beaumont from San Antonio, James Roy Taylor and his wife Jean, and CB and Joanne Singleton. And they asked me, said, would you consider coming to San Antonio to start a church? I said, do you have a building? They said, no. I said, do you have a congregation? They said, no. I said, do you have any financial funding? They said, no. I said, how many do you have? They said, us. I said, man, I've never seen such an opportunity like this. Sounds like the will of God. And so we started. The first Sunday in October 1966, we started in a home because that's all we could afford. We leased a vacant storefront building on Loop 410 across from the Broadway Bank. We started growing very quickly. Every Saturday night, I would call every family that was on my list to determine exactly how many people were coming to church the next Sunday morning. And then Saturday night, I would go down to the church and put out 10 seats less than the people that were coming. Why? Because every Sunday, they would leave the church saying, we had to have more seats. They didn't know I had that jury rigged from the word go. They were absolutely certain we were broke. We lost our lease in about six months to the Oppenheimers. That's where I learned the devil is in the details. You better read a contract with at least two lawyers. I asked Dr. Laurie, president of Trinity University, if we could use the Earl Sam Center for six months while we were working on our church. Dr. Laurie said yes. God bless the Presbyterians. Dr. Laurie was a gracious man and he's heaven today. We found the property we could pay for on Nacogdoches Road, 2938 Nacogdoches Road. We had just enough money to buy the land. I was 26 years of age and had never pastored a church before. Our church was a new congregation, a new congregation that had no wealth, a new congregation that had no denomination to support us. We looked like poster children for failure. No bank would back us and so we went to the Security Church Finance of Houston. We got $65,000 from them from Joe Lee Todd who attended Reagan High School with me and we wouldn't have gotten that money if I hadn't have known Joe Lee Todd. Joe Lee Todd told the president, he said, I know that man and if he said he'll pay you back, he will pay you back. We gave him the money and they took a gamble to give us $65,000. It wasn't a lot of money then and it's nothing now but that helped us buy that property and that church was built by myself and about 8 or 10 men who worked on that church every night except Wednesday. We would take up money on Sunday, buy as much material as we could on Monday and work all week. It was cash and carry. That's exactly what it was. Our first winter on Nacogdoches Road, it was record cold. We had poured the foundation. We had put up the studs. Now this is a building that's square. It's just a little A-frame church hold 250 people and we had the naked studs there and the rafters were overhead and that was it. We had the foundation under us and we gathered for church. It was freezing. People were singing Amazing Grace and smoke was coming out of their mouth like they were smoking cigars just about that far. But tears were running down their face because we knew God was with us. We knew that in the eyes of men we didn't have a chance in this world of surviving but God put his hand on us and helped us get that church ready. It took one year to finish that little church but when it was finished it was beautiful from front door to back and already full on Sunday morning. If you were a member of that first church at Nacogdoches Road I want you to please stand. Most of them came this Sunday morning. Do we have anyone here this morning who was there? My first major book was written here in 1971 while I was on Nacogdoches Road. It was called Invasion of Demons. It was published by Fleming H. Revelle. It was a best seller and it split the church. Pentecostals didn't believe that demons existed in America and didn't believe that they could function in the church. I was told when I went to Bible school that they functioned in foreign countries where people were illiterate and they were poor. And I couldn't understand why if there were demons in Mexico they couldn't get across and I said fine. He said you're impertinent. I said good. One lady told me after I wrote this book and people were starting to read and said Pastor Hagee I don't bother the devil and the devil doesn't bother me. And I looked at her and responded lady you don't have enough of God to get a used demon to chase you. She was offended. She quit the church. In December of 71 a demonized man walked into our church with a loaded gun on a Wednesday night and announced to the church he had come to shoot me in front of the congregation to prove that Satan had more power than God. From a distance of eight feet he emptied every bullet in that gun. The supernatural power of God protected me from that man and I am here today to say that there is more power in the word of God than all the devils in hell. The church was packed to overflowing every Sunday. We met a wonderful young missionary and in a very short time we helped him to build a major church in Ciudad Victoria a Bible school to teach men and women of Mexico how to minister to their people. There were 52 village churches that Johnny reached by plane. He was a fantastic bush pilot. And an orphanage that we bought from a Mexican governor. It had 200 acres. It had orange trees, lemon trees its own irrigation system a swimming pool and by American standards by Mexican standards it was absolutely unbelievable. Tragically Johnny was killed in a plane crash and the work in Mexico was then and now continues to be headed by Ursel Lewis and his family. Ursel where are you? There you are. Please stand. Would you give this man 35 years in Mexico to show you how the fruitful vine of Cornerstone is growing. He's a talented young man. He's married to a very brilliant young lady graduated from the university. Paul came to me one day and said Pastor I have the opportunity to get on television in Mexico but I don't have the money and I don't have the equipment. I said I've been there. I know exactly how you feel. So I gave him the money and I gave him the cameras and I gave him the switchers and I gave him everything he needed to start. That's fine. They don't know that you're not in a million dollar studio. Take off. He has a fabulous television ministry going at this time. Right now he and his wife are having marriage counseling seminars over the year to 42 Hispanic nations throughout South America. Give the Lord praise for his faithfulness. So we moved from Nacogdoches Road out to Wincrest in 1972. We bought 14 acres on I-35. I told the architect that I'd gone to school with to build all we could pay for. That was 750 seats. When the church congregation saw those blueprints they said with one voice we will never fill that church. There's just no way we're going to fill that church. No one in that church had ever attended a church bigger than the church we were in and that wouldn't hold but 250. I was called a lot of things then and none of them were good but by faith they become fearful and they say things they later regret. By faith and bulldog grit we built that second church and it was packed to the back walls the first Sunday. We went to two services and it was still full. The church expanded so quickly I felt like a guest speaker at my own church. I kept looking for that corporal's guard that had moved in with me originally. We started something with various trained spiritual leaders so that everyone would have a spiritual point of contact. After the book Invasion of Demons I started looking for someone that had more experience in this area than I did because I had none. I finally found an Englishman by the name of Derek Prince. Derek Prince I called him on the phone. How many of you remember Derek Prince? Good. Derek asked what denomination are you? I said well I was raised in a non-presidently our church is non-denominational. Derek said very kindly Pastor Hagee if I come to your church and present my teaching on demonology it will tear your church apart. I said if you can tear my church apart preaching the word of God come down here and we'll both tear it to the ground and start over to have a grander revelation of what God is trying to do. He came and it proved to be I've been in the church since I was two weeks old several times a week. Brother Prince taught the first two nights for two hours. He was British. He was a British professor. He was saved by reading the word of God. He was a brilliant theologian and he taught like a college professor. He laid a foundation down that was biblical and undeniable. The building was packed on the third night the night of deliverance. I couldn't believe no one left. They had no idea what was about to happen. The New York Times was there. They had two camera crews ready to go. Derek started the deliverance service calmly demanding the spirit of witchcraft to come out. What happened next was absolutely unbelievable. I was standing up a dozen women 12 of them instantly jumped to their feet and started screaming teeth and tonsils. I mean just wide open. I mean it was blowing your wig off. After about 30 seconds of that a 25 year old man started running up the center aisle and he knocked the communion off the table. He charged up on the platform after Derek and four big ushers took him down to the ground and there was the wildest wrestling match you've ever seen in your life on the platform and it lasted for 4 or 5 minutes. 20 to 25 people at the same time startlingly running in terror for the back door of the church. God was out of the box. Too much was happening at one time. We lost those 25 I never saw them again. I stood on the platform I laughed so hard I cried. This was wonderful. We had the wide world of wrestling going on right here. We had 12 women running around the back door it looked like a relay track meet. The New York Times camera crew was running all over that church taking pictures as fast as they could take it. The wrestling match wasn't over and Derek was up there just calmly saying come on, come on. It was quite a night. If you were a member of that church at Windcrest please stand. You were a member at Windcrest please stand. You went to the Windcrest church. Give those wonderful people They were so grateful to lead us to the third church building on Loop 410 of Roletto Drive. This would be our church home from 1975 until 1988. They built the church to seat 1200 people. Again we heard the mantra we'll never fill it. We'll never fill it. We had to fire the foundation crew first rattle out of the box. They underbid the contract so they could get it. When they got the contract because we underbid it and I fired them on the spot. I said get off the property. You've broken your contract. We'll do it. They said you can't tie steel. I said you're mistaken. In the morning at 8 o'clock we're going to start learning. I told the men on the staff in the church meet me in the morning with your blue jeans on. We're going to tie the steel for this foundation. We found one person and for what that contract called for to come in on time. We have a job description on every employee at Cornerstone Church that says assist the pastor as needed because here you never really know what you're going to get to do the next day. On dedication day the church that could never be filled was packed to the back walls. Hundreds of people were in the lobby and standing out in the front yard. We went to two services dedication week for church three. I started looking for property to build this church. No I didn't tell anyone I was looking. I knew they just couldn't handle it so I didn't tell them. Our parking lot at Loop 410 was an absolute nightmare. How many of you remember that parking lot? They haven't forgotten the church but they never forget the parking lot. Here's how it worked. We let everybody park in the parking lot. Every space was taken and parked between in the lanes and they were just bumper to bumper so we had a perfect gridlock and we had two dismissals to every Sunday morning service. Those of you who were parked behind the cars please get up and leave and we let them leave and we sang a song and when we'd sung long enough those of you now who are legitimately parked now you can go. Those were the days when we had our parking lot crew. That actually happened. At the third church on Loop 410 God was faithful to give us the vision to preach the gospel to the world by television. I said Lord I don't know how far this will grow but I'm asking you to open the doors to give us the ability to reach the city and the nation and the nations of the world to preach the gospel and whatever door you open I'll walk through it. My wife was in the other room and I said to him do not let him get on television. I'm over in the next room God I want that television. We've got to get that done. God's in heaven had to be laughing but he heard two different prayers from the same house. So I formed something called Global Evangelism Television Incorporated. We hadn't telecast across the street yet but that was a good name. Global Evangelism. The Bible says the power of life and death and the power of those things that are not as though they are. The Bible says whatsoever you say you shall have. Therefore if the Bible is true you need to start talking where you want to go and when you talk where you want to go God will take you there. So as it worked out the city of San Antonio decided that they were going to have a cable system and they brought the seven largest cable companies the president of one of the companies went in and talked to one of the members of our church who owned the store and they met each other got to talking to each other found out what each other represented and the man that owned the store my church member said to the president of the company said you know if you want to get that cable franchise you need to go over and talk to Pastor Hagee. He says he knows the mayor and he knows about half of those city councilmen. They all go over to his Saturday morning prayer meeting and they especially go over there when it comes election time. That hadn't stopped. And so he came into my office like his shirt tail was on fire. It took him 30 minutes to say will you lobby for me to go downtown. I said look I'm in the kingdom of God. I don't do anything that God doesn't get a benefit from it. I said you give me a contract that gives me the authority to preach the gospel 24 7 for absolutely free and my attorney approves of that contract. I said I'll go down and talk for you. He said you're asking a whole lot. I said 90 percent of something is better than 100 percent of nothing. It's your call. He ground his teeth for a little and he said OK. He left. He came back the next day with a contract. I took it to my attorney. We got all of the buzz words worked out and believe me if you don't have a good attorney get one. You need one. You may need two and they got everything worked out. I went down I talked to the mayor talked enough to the city council to have a quorum by the grace and mercy of God. He won out of all those other seven people he won the cable franchise for San Antonio. When they got 50,000 people on that franchise we are presenting San Antonio with a gospel. We're letting every gospel preacher in town preach who wants to preach absolutely free. I mean it was like Disneyland. We're the most loved people in town. We're taking TBN down. We're taking CBN down. We're taking the PTL club down and at about that time I got a call from Paul Crouch and Paul Crouch said I want to be on your cable system. It's one of the largest in America. I said I want to be on TBN. I said I'll give you Monday through Friday three hours. You let me on TBN national TV on Sunday morning for free. I could hear him sucking wind on the other end. We got together. For 12 years I was on TBN nationwide absolutely free. Think about that. Our television department started out in a room 8 by 12 with one lady answering the phone. Whenever they sold that franchise we had to start paying for our television time and it cost millions of dollars per year. But God has made it impossible for us to reach the nations of the world preaching the uncompromising gospel of Jesus Christ in every language that we can get it translated in. God is a faithful God who will help you do the impossible. If what you're doing brings glory and honor to his name and builds his kingdom, nothing is impossible to you and I challenge you to try it in every adventure of your life. Nothing is impossible with God. Give him praise and glory in the house of God. After we built the television, we bought our television cameras, we built TV studios in the back of the church over in 410 and we started to build a television tower so we could telecast. I want to tell you this that whenever you start to do something for the Lord that has real potential the devil shows up with every devil in hell to fight you and see if he can knock you out in the first round. If what you're doing doesn't have resistance, you're not doing anything worth doing. If it's easy, something is wrong. An 85 year old doctor started telling neighbors that live behind our church that that television tower was a radiating tower and it would give you cancer. He had a riot started in that city in 24 hours. The city attorneys for the city of Castle Hills called for a special meeting from me and the city council at city hall. We were in the newspaper again. No, it was not good. At the city hall meeting the building was packed, people standing outside on the lawn saying very unkind things about our church. The mayor called for what I will call this high tech lynching to order with the three witnesses and they said we do not want a mega church in Castle Hills. We do not want a mega preacher and we want John Hagee and Cornerstone Church to leave Castle Hills. I said we would be delighted to leave. I brought a TV tower expert to that meeting from Washington, D.C. who was the most knowledgeable man in the world about television towers. He said it was a radiating tower principally, but the fluorescent light bulb in your kitchen put out more radiation than that tower. You could live under that tower for 200 years and it would have not hurt you. Everyone in the audience snarled at him and he sat down. The mayor said we want you to take the tower down and I said we will take the tower down when hell freezes over, not coming down. He said we are going to sue you. I said get after it. I have got a lawyer too. Our lawyers met and we settled out of court. The settlement was to move the tower to the front of the church property. We had a Holy Spirit dove painted on the dish and when we hung it up there the newspaper called it the ruptured duck. True story. That television ministry has grown until it now reaches the world. And I want to thank those of you who are in this room and thank our television salt covenant partners around the world. You have made it possible for every nation and tribe on planet earth to hear the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ. God bless you and thank you. In 1981 we birthed the night to honor Israel. When the IDF blew up the nuclear reactor in Iraq I felt like it was the thing to do to tell the world that we felt the Jewish people had done the world a favor by taking nuclear weapons out of the hand of Saddam Hussein. And we had a night to honor Israel. And whenever we had that night to honor Israel we called a press conference. My picture was in the newspaper with the rabbi. And within an hour of that newspaper hitting the streets the church started getting threats. We're going to shoot your preacher by Friday. I called the FBI and said what do you do when someone threatens to shoot you? I said, you know they don't have a class in seminary what to do when someone tries to shoot you. And the FBI agent said well I tell you what do you do? You drive a different way to work every week. I said do you have to go to the FBI academy to learn such wise things like that? But I did drive a different way to work every week. We got to the event. The event was packed as the rabbi was saying the benediction. This is Rabbi Scheinberg. The security came to me and said Pastor Hagee we've got a bomb threat on this building. It's supposed to blow up in five minutes. I said is it serious? He said you might have right it's serious. All my security team is gone and I'm the only one here. I said dear God don't let this rabbi pray like Moses right now. Let him pray like a Presbyterian late for lunch. God answered my prayer. I went to the podium and I said I hate to end this wonderful night on a negative note but this building is now about three minutes supposed to blow up in three minutes. I want to tell you the Christians vaporized. If we would have had an Olympian coach there with a stopwatch we would have had a new United States 440 relay team right there. They broke a record getting out of that building. The Jewish people accustomed to that just flipped their hands if I had said kosher hot dogs are available in the lobby for those of you that would like to stay another half hour. A night to honor Israel last year was held in 70 major cities across America as we have developed a national organization called Christians United for Israel that's giving every Christian in America every pastor and every parachurch organization who believes the Bible is accurate when it says I will bless those who bless you. Who believes in Isaiah 62 and Isaiah 62 is true when it says that we should stand up and speak up for Israel who believes that Romans 15 27 is the truth when it says if we as the Gentiles have benefited from the Jewish spiritual things we the Gentiles owe it to the Jewish people to minister them and their material and their spiritual things. If you are watching this television program and you are a Christian or a pastor and you want to become a part of Christians United for Israel go online to www.cufi.org and we will contact you. Because from coast to coast we are doing exciting things. In July we are going to Washington and if you haven't been you need to go. In 1985 we had the blizzard of 85. How many of you remember that snow blizzard? Fifteen inches of snow. I had always told my congregation we will never dismiss church whatever the weather is. Rain, sleet, snow makes no difference. We will have church if hell freezes over we will be having church. It snowed 15 inches. The mayor everybody would say don't leave your house. So Sunday morning I got up an hour early from my front door to my Dodge van I fell down twice. Flat on my tush. And I will tell you the joy of the Lord left me on that second bench of that. I got in my Dodge and I went down. You couldn't see where the roads were I knew where they were and I just headed to the nearest stop sign. And I was driving that Dodge as fast as it would go. There was a problem. I had never driven in snow before. And as I was driving down the road my car was going up in the air like that. Because the snow was packing up under the wheels. I backed up hit the snow again. It took me 45 minutes to get to church. And I generally get there in 5 to 7 minutes. I walked in the church there was only one guy there. Dutch Eilert. Dutch Eilert was a German member that he had everything his father ever gave him for four generations. And he had a coat. Every coat he owned owned. And his arms were sticking out like this. He looked like that guy Schultz on television if you said I know nothing he looked just like him. He looked at me pastor and he said today hell froze over. So we went out on the church side and said church services dismissed. Hell froze over today. We came to this church in 1987. We built the television studios. We formed the government of 12. We bought the Ursuline Academy in 1992. We bought that academy. Was called by a realtor and said pastor would you like to buy this school. I said I'd like to look at it. We had on the blueprints. We're actually supposed to start that morning with a contractor. I said I have a lunch appointment. I really can't get there till 1 o'clock in the morning. I said I'd like to look at this school. He said no problem. I said let's look at it. We looked at it. It was in perfect condition. Absolutely perfect condition. I told her after the interview I said we're going to buy this. I'll have to get the permission from the executive board. I called them. They came to my house. We agreed to buy it. They thought I was getting ready to resign because that was the only time we'd ever had an emergency executive meeting for anything but as the pastor of this church I cannot spend the money of this church without their approval. So we called them over there. I said I don't want you to call the press. I don't want you to talk to anyone that we're talking. I said I want to close this thing right care about that this deal by the close of business Friday. She said, we've been trying to sell this school for two years plus, and you want to buy it in two days. I said, that's exactly right. She said, our lawyers would have to work all night. I said, let them. I said, it's good for them, be a new experience. The next day we met at 10 o'clock, we had breakfast, my lawyers, their lawyers. She said to her lawyer, she said, shall we tell Pastor Hagee the problem? I said, here it is. We're getting ready to be thrown under the bus. She said, the nuns that are on the property, what do you want to do with them? I said, what's the problem with the nuns? They were seven or eight of them, age 75 to 92. They'd been all of their life teaching at this school. She said, well, the archdiocese wants them to move off. I said, well, there's no need for them to move. I said, I will give them the lease of this nine bedroom house they have. We'll pay all the utilities and I'll give it to them for $10 a year. And I'll pay the first five years out of my own pocket. I pulled out $50. I said, they're taking care of them for the next five years. What's the problem now? She said, are you serious? I said, absolutely, I'm serious. She looked at her lawyer and said, get it done. We bought the Ursuline Academy. Shortly thereafter, the FBI called here and said, preacher, you're gonna get a bomb. There's a known bomber that's going to send a bomb to your ministry. He sent a bomb to President Clinton and it went off. He sent a bomb to us and we defused it. He sent a bomb to you. He has enough makings in his apartment before we arrested him to do 12 more bombs. Be very careful. The bomb squad showed up out here. We had ambulances in the parking lot, fire trucks in the parking lot, German shepherd dogs sniffing everything that moved. And if you think that won't shut you down, I'll tell you, every employee that walked down the hall, thank God that their tennis shoes didn't smell like cordite gunpowder. Monday, I'm watching the television, see where the roof of the Dallas post office blew up. The FBI called and said, that's your bomb. I was headed for your house. God protected us. A few days later, the Assistant Attorney General of the United States, the head of the FBI counter-terrorism and the assistant to the Attorney General came and started talking about what they were going to do. And I said, I don't really care what your legal procedures are going to be. I'm sure you're competent. I said, all I want to know is why did he send me a bomb and why did he send Bill Clinton a bomb? What do we have in common? They said, well, our psychologists feel this man hates all forms of authority. And the head of the terrorism guy, he looked like a linebacker for the Cowboys. He had shoulders this wide and tapered down like that. He pulled a note out of top of his pocket and he read it. He said, I knew you were going to ask that. And I have this note. And the note says, I heard Pastor Hagee preaching on the television and knew it was the absolute truth. And the only way to stop the absolute truth is to kill the messenger. And when I'm telling you that we are in a spiritual dogfight and a spiritual war, I'm not kidding you. It is a spiritual war. And the further you send the light beam, the greater resistance you get. And right now we are around the world. I'm here to testify to the glory of God. We serve an all-sufficient God. We serve a God who is faithful. We serve a God who is never failing. We serve a God who is always there. We serve a Lord who has never failed us. Give him praise and glory in the house of God. In closing, I want to say my God was faithful to bring into my life the most beautiful and wonderful wife in the world in Diana. Diana is a Proverbs 31 woman. She is loving. She is gracious. She is compassionate. She is a master organizer. She's a forceful leader. She's a marvelous mother. She's one of the best cooks on planet earth. And she is the sunshine of my life. She is, where'd she go? There she is right here. Stand up baby, stand up. God has been very faithful to bring into our lives five wonderful children. And the most beautiful thing of our children is not that they've graduated from college, not that they have good jobs, but is that every one of them are serving the Lord in a very practical way. They have presented us with eight of the most sensational grandchildren on planet earth. And I thank God for every one of them. God is a never failing God. As David said, the Lord is my refuge. He is my fortress. He is the high tower. He is my strength. He is my shield. And Buckler, though a thousand may fall at my right hand and 10,000 at my left, I will not fear for Jehovah God is my keeper and defender. Had the Lord not been on our side, we would have failed miserably and long ago. But because of his faithfulness, because of his amazing grace, because he is a defender of the righteous, because of his loving kindness, because of his mercies that are renewed every morning, we have survived and we have served our generation by the will of God. Cornerstone Church is God's church. It was built for his glory. It was built for his kingdom. It was built for the next generation. Tens of thousands have come to know Christ and the harvest field is greater than ever before. This is the church triumphant. Our past is going to be far less than our future because our future is greater than our past. The latter years are going to be greater than the former years for the best is yet to do. You have been listening to the From the Pulpit and Classic Sermon series. This week you heard John Hagee with his message, Great is Thy Faithfulness. Tune in next week for another powerful message from God's word on From the Pulpit and Classic Sermons.