In this sermon, evangelist Lester Rolof emphasizes the need for revival and repentance in the church. He urges listeners to commit themselves to holiness and to love Jesus wholeheartedly. Rolof shares personal anecdotes and uses vivid imagery to convey the consequences of spiritual apathy and indulgence. He reminds believers that God's people are meant to be victorious and that Jesus has provided the power to overcome defeat.

Welcome to Invitation, the teaching ministry of Dr. Arthur Bellinger, pastor of Bible Way Baptist Church, Worcester, Massachusetts. All this week, we'll be introducing you to the late Lester Roloff. God has used this man to literally turn the tide of sin in the lives of many. During this edition of Invitation, evangelist Roloff compels us to commit ourselves to holiness. Friend, it's really true. There's no room for compromise or complacency. The church is desperate for revival. That means repentance. Repentance from apathy to the hearing of God's word on the Lord's day. We're thrilled that we can introduce to you this man of God. However, our main concern all this week is to introduce you to our need for revival. Now, here's Brother Roloff. Dear friends, the whole message tonight is built on one thing. If you love me, you will. All I want to know tonight is how much do you love Jesus? I know what the Bible says. I read it again today. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. All I'm going to ask you tonight is which one do you love the most? The world or do you love Jesus and heaven most? Now, again, if your answer is, I love Jesus more than nothing I'm going to preach, whatever faith you accept, you say, praise God for it. And I want to get a little closer, walk a little closer, and climb a little higher, dig a little deeper, and be better for Jesus' sake. That's what you're going to say. And the mule walked on. Now then, we're living in a mechanical, superficial, synthetic, and natural age. We have let the superficial take the place of the supernatural. Therefore, our wings have been clipped, and we're earthbound creatures tonight. Nobody flies in the realm, in the heavenlies, like we ought to. He said, they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their fling. They shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. God's people are not to be a fainting people. We're not to be a failing people. We're not to be a falling people. God's people are to be a victorious people. Listen, Jesus never did put up with defeat down here when he was here. In the life, in his own life, or in the life of those that followed him closely, neither has he made any provisions for our defeat as he left here. He said, he that's in you is greater than he that is in the world. I noticed as I was driving across town a couple of times today, and in conferences over at the juvenile shelter and other places, I noticed that the radio said 30 people were killed over the weekend. Sixteen of them drowned right around here. Right around here. Sixteen of them. You know when they did that? That's on the Lord's Day. I wonder if God's not trying to warn this bunch of heathens around this part of the country that we're not to go to the lake but to the Lord on Sunday. I'm talking about something that's literally eaten up the spiritual life of the people. We don't have any Lord's Day observance anymore. People work, mow lawns, I mean, run out, fish, go swimming, play ball, listen to television, watch all sorts of ball games and go to ball games. That's to me a desecration of the Lord's Day. Everything in town wants to open up its places of business now. You see places open on Sunday. I believe the Bible says six days shalt thou work and do all thy work. We've gotten away from the observance of the Lord's Day. Listen, when Bob Ingersoll and that bunch of infidels decided to destroy Christianity in France, you know the first thing they said around their big conference table? He said and other infidels said, listen, if we intend to destroy Christianity, we've got to first destroy what the Christians call the Lord's Day. They said about it and they destroyed it. Now America's coming right down the same dirty, stinking road and our church members are by the thousands out somewhere else except worshiping God on Sunday. And look at the people that have been killed over the weekend. It's not the weekend, it's the wicked end. And so I believe, I don't think a Christian has any right to buy and sell on the Lord's Day. You'd say, legality? Call it what you will, child. Just call it what you will, you runt. I'll tell you, we were a lot better off, I'll guarantee you, when we took a day off. We didn't have heart attacks then, we didn't have cancer then, didn't have ulcers then, and we didn't have hepatitis of the liver then, we didn't have juvenile delinquency then, we didn't have broken homes then. What are you talking about? If that's legality, give me some more legality then. I'm not talking about keeping the Lord's Day in order to be saved, I'm talking about keeping it because I am saved. In fact, everything we've got. Brother Leonard goes out to these lakes, they claim to be Christian. Well, I'm a Christian, but I just need a day off. Yeah, you wear off too, buddy, when you get out there. I'm talking about something we've forgotten all about. I remember the time when nobody, nobody did any work on the Lord's Day. Listen, if a man hooked up to a cultivator back yonder 40 years ago, 50 years ago, he was classified as nothing but a low-down, trifling heathen. And there wasn't many heathens that even tried to do it. Now then, look at it. Every lawn mower in town is gone, going on Sunday. I mean, just everybody's working in the backyard and the front yard and doing everything they want to do on the Lord's Day. The Bible says we need a Lord's Day. God didn't need it. We need it. God didn't get tired. He never has been tired. You and I are the ones who get tired, and we need spiritual refreshing. And say what you please, God put this on my heart, and you know where I got it? Some of you Southern Baptists, bless your sweet heart, I got it from Dr. B. O. Herring while I was in Baylor University. That's back then when he had some great conviction. As for the Baptists, all began to backslide and run off into the world. Come on, you might as well listen to me. Dr. Herring, great sweet Christian, well, he said, Listen, I've gone to bed at 11 o'clock. I've gone to bed at 11 o'clock on Saturday night. And he said, it just dawned on me before I went to sleep, I did not fill my gasoline tank with gas, and I had to go preach on Sunday out to those little places around Waco. And he said, I got up and put on my clothes at 11 o'clock, and he said, I got in that car. I know you think this is kind of funny, but I got it from Dr. Herring, and I believe it's a good thing. I've been practicing ever since. He said, I filled that tank with gas so that I wouldn't have to keep something in the filling station open on Sunday. And I tell you what's happened since then, nearly every preacher, nearly every church member, he'll beat it down to cafeteria, restaurant, drive-in, everything else, and make everybody and his dog work for you while you sit in church on Sunday morning. I don't think it's right. I believe you're out of the will of God when you do it. Oh, but you'd say necessity. No, it's not a necessity. I've gone, and I'm not posing as an example, I've gone 36 years without going in a business place on Sunday. It's not all that hard. I travel all the time. You say, well, what do you eat? Eat out of my icebox. I drink juices, make salads, eat fruits, veg, anything I want. I've got it all right there. It's not hard, brother. You just need to make up your mind to get to some conviction instead of a bunch of sorry opinions. And the mule walked on. God's people ought to be ashamed. Our old grandmothers without a deep freeze. Our old grandmothers without a refrigerator. And yet, they did their cooking on Saturday. You remember that? Old four-layer cakes. You remember those old four-layer cakes my mom would make and put the icing all over the top of it? And my mother never did go to school too much, but I don't understand. She must have had a built-in computer. I know she had a lie detector test on the inside. She had all that equipment. There's nothing new about that, I guarantee you. She had one built in. And she caught me many a time. I could look just like an angel in the face and had the devil in my heart. She said, son, you went swimming, didn't you? I said, well, I went with them. And she said, you went in, didn't you? I said, yes, ma'am. All right. Well, listen. Why, she'd get up and she'd take on Saturday morning and she'd get all, everything ready for Sunday noon. She'd say, you boys shine your shoes now. Get your shoes shined on Saturday. Tomorrow's Sunday. Put up your BB gun. Be no shooting on. Uh-uh. There won't be any ball playing on Sunday. I mean, tomorrow's the Lord's Day, boys, huh? That kind of ground in to me, and I believe it did me good. I still respect the Lord's Day. I mean, in the morning. You think I'd read the newspaper on Sunday? I wouldn't read it on Monday, let alone Sunday, because it's not holy. Come on. That's one of the first things you do. Bunch of preachers get up and go get the newspaper and sit around and read the funnies and all the gossip and all the junk and the filth and all the murderers and everything else. Then wonder why you run out of fire on Sunday morning before you got through preaching. You can't read the paper like that and soak your soul in a bunch of garbage and then expect God to give you fire and let the fire fall. Why don't you preachers quit doing it? Why don't you throw it away and get in the Bible? It'll soon be over with all. I used to go to town and to Dawson, Texas. My daddy would give me 15 cents, and, man, I'd go up there and I'd get some Tom's Toasted Peanuts and I'd get me one of these little ice cream cones, a triple dip, triple dip for a nickel. Man, I'd tell you, you'd stick up that high in there. And then I'd go there and get me a great big bottle, that's for a head good scent, a Circle A soda water, one of those great big bottles made down in Corsicana, you know. And I want you to know I'd fill my little old stomach full of that stuff and I'd come home and my mother, my mother would look at me and say, Supper time! I said, I'm not hungry. Mm-hmm. I'm not hungry. And about 9 or 10 or 11 o'clock that night she'd hear me a-groaning. And she'd come in, she said, Son, you're just too full of junk, aren't you? That's what's wrong with our church members right there. They're too full of junk to feed them. You can't feed somebody who's that full of junk. We've got to have a cleansing process, brother. We've got to have a cleansing out of our spiritual system before we'll ever get hungry. By further word of God, the Lord says, needs to be observed, dear friends. Compromise. Complacency will always affect you in a way that you just can't afford. It'll affect you emotionally, financially, physically, and spiritually. It's really true, friend. Compromise will take years from your life and life from your years. And the only remedy for the backslider is to yield themselves to the willingness of Jesus Christ to forgive and cleanse them from all unrighteousness. The Bible says in 1 John 1 and in verse 9, If we confess our sins, He, that's Christ, will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. He is faithful and just to do so. This five-part series entitled Revival is available on audio cassette. To obtain your copy, call us at 1-800-BIBLE-14. That's 1-800-BIBLE-14.