In this sermon, the preacher describes a powerful experience where he witnessed a profound response from the audience. He emphasizes that true revival preaching focuses on undermining false assurance of salvation and bringing people to a place of repentance and crying out to God for mercy. The preacher contrasts counterfeit revivals, which are centered around human desires, with genuine revivals that result in people falling on their faces before God and weeping for their sins. The sermon concludes with the message that it is not acceptable to live in a state of sin and repentance, but rather believers must lay down a foundation of repentance and strive for a deeper walk with God. The preacher references Hebrews 6:1-2 as the basis for this message.

Let's just pray together, shall we? Father God, we again pray for your holy presence to come into this place. Father God, we just so honour and worship you. We place you above all things. Father, there's nothing I can speak of myself. There's nothing that will do. There's no man sufficient to speak these things, and yet we must speak them, Father. And so I just pray your mercy upon us, your people here tonight. Not because we deserve it, but because of your mercy, Father, we just cry out that there would be an outpouring of your Holy Spirit, that there would be a real anointing here, that every word I speak would truly be your word and not my own, Father. God, that your holy presence would come down amongst us, that you would be so honoured and glorified here, and that your truth would go forth with power, Father. Transforming power, we pray. In Jesus' mighty name. Amen. Okay, well, I even surprised myself last night with some of the things I said. It kind of almost throws out of whack my second sermon, which has got a follow-on from the first sermon, and goodness me. So, I think the first question that arises in our mind when we contemplate a God of such holiness, a God of such glory, as the one that we spoke about last night, is, okay, so where is the God of love? Where is the God who wants to be a father to us? How do we marry up this sense of God with the other sense of God? Because we know it's the same being. We know that the God we worship is not some, you know, I mean, he's not divided into umpteen million parts, and yet we're told in scripture how many names God has. He seems to have a, you know, he's a God of healing. You know, there's one scripture, at least one, probably more than that, describing God as being like a nursing mother in the Old Testament. So, you know, taking care of his children. We have all these facets of God which we've got to come to grips with. And I guess the major point that I was making last night is a fairly simple one, and that is, what is the dominant characteristic of God? If we can really come to grips with where God is at in his own home, where he really is at, the true God, the true Jesus in the throne room, where he lives. What is that God like? If I am face to face with that God, what is the impression of him that I will get? In other words, what does God put forth about himself? And all the way through scripture, as I was sharing last night, God, more than anything else, by far and away, is describing himself as a God of holiness and glory who cannot be trifled with, who is far above all understanding and knowledge of mere men, and whom we must approach with awe. But then we also find out, of course, and we find this especially in the life of Jesus Christ, we find a God who is not only a God who will judge all the earth, who is literally going to be carving sinners up and throwing them bodily into hell, who killed Ananias and Sapphira for literally just telling lies about their property situation before the Holy Spirit and before the Church of God. That's all they did, and they were struck dead, struck dead. Why? Because the glory of God was in the earth. The glory of God was in the earth. I tell you what we learn from Ananias and Sapphira. We learn that in a true revival situation where the glory of God is in the earth, this becomes almost like the throne room of God. You take great care even every word you speak. I remember some of Charles Finney's revival's people were struck dead. There was one case of a reverend who mocked the revival in a meeting of elders in a certain city. The very next morning, everybody woke up to find that man dead in his bed. He was a reverend and a dead to take up his mouth and use it as a weapon against the revival of God. Now this is the state of things in the case of Ananias and Sapphira, and if the glory of God comes again, which I believe is going to happen, we will see these things again because what is revival? Revival is the holy throne room presence of God coming down amongst men. How can I tell a true revival from a counterfeit revival? Well, most counterfeit revivals are basically flesh fests revolving around man and his desires and his wants. A real revival, when it's truly the throne room glory of God coming down amongst people, you can imagine how people react to that. They fall on their face before God. They start weeping for their sins. They start crying out to God for mercy. Again, Charles Finney, we hear that classic case of the time where he said, I had not spoken to them in this direct way, and he always had a kind of tongue-in-cheek way of speaking. You can bet your bottom dollar that when Charles Finney says, I was speaking in a direct way, that it was very, very direct indeed. His version of direct is kind of like scorching the walls on the back of the room. I had not spoken to them in this direct way for more than 15 minutes when all at once, he says, an awful solemnity seemed to settle down upon them. He said, if I had had a sword in each hand, I could not have cut them off their seats as fast as they fell. In other words, it says everybody fell from their seat onto the ground, not in this flaky, charismatic way that we've all become used to. He said they fell on their knees or their face on the ground and started crying at the top of their voice. Everyone in the room, at the top of their voice, crying to God for mercy. Can you imagine an entire room full of people doing that? He said the one old guy that invited him there was looking on, he said, with utter astonishment. And he screamed to this guy, Sir, can you please start praying? And the guy just gave up in the middle of his prayer and nobody could hear him. Everybody was crying to God at the top of their voice. God, have mercy on me, a sinner. This is the reaction, the true reaction to finding yourself in the throne room of God. And when I say that certainly we have a God of love. I tell you, one classic way that God's revealing his love to us right now, and that's not, we're not toast. God in his mercy decided against all odds not to turn human beings into toast when we richly deserved it. God in all his glory chose the amazing, you know, the thing that strikes me as the most incredible thing about God is that the God of glory that we discussed last night describes himself this way. He says, I am meek and lowly of heart. You imagine if our God had some of the characteristics of the devil, let's say. Where he was a haughty God, where he looked down his nose at the common people. He didn't care for them at all, you know, like the devil doesn't. Devil doesn't give a toss who he hurts, who he injures. He's happy to hurt and wound and damage people all day long. You imagine if we just had a God that was proud and haughty. Maybe even he had no other faults, so to speak, but that. Here we have a perfect God who describes himself this way. He is so glorious, he's so holy, he's high and lifted up and yet he says, I am meek and lowly of heart. I am meek and lowly of heart. And who did Jesus love to be with when he came to earth? Displaying the attributes of God, he loved to be with the sinners and the common people. The Bible says the sinners and the common people heard him gladly. The religious people hated him. He exposed all of their lies. And so we're left with this picture of God. The crucial thing I think that I need to bring out about last night is simply this. The avenue to finding the true and the most glorious love of God, to experiencing that in your life is the same avenue of finding the holiness of God. In other words, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. If we approach God as a holy God and we get into a state of holiness, what happens is God's love, we get close to God and we start realizing, my goodness, this God whom I am worshiping is so glorious. He is so worthy of love. I mean, he is just so, you know, he's the only wise God and he's my Savior. And when you start getting into his throne room presence and truly seeing God in his holiness, his majesty, his glory, even his judgments. I preached a sermon one time called The Old Testament God. And it was making the point that God has not changed at all. And I made this point last night. God has not changed at all. And I even took people through the judgments upon Egypt and how God was glorifying himself through his judgments. How Pharaoh would, you know, it says that Pharaoh hardened his heart. But there's many scriptures in those passages which talk about God deliberately hardening Pharaoh's heart. So Moses is going to Pharaoh and Moses is saying, let my people go. God, the God of Israel says, let my people go. And then this terrible plague comes down. Pharaoh may have been wanting to repent. For all we know, the Bible clearly says time after time, there's about three or four occasions that God hardens Pharaoh's heart so he will not let the people go. Why? Because he was going to bring Israel out from Pharaoh, from under Egypt with judgments that would glorify his holy name. He was going to show what a glorious God he was by wiping out one of the most powerful nations on the planet. He was going to show that you do not meddle with his people, that he is not some lowly God like the Egyptians believe in where you bow to an image and you worship, you know, worship the sun or whatever. No way. He's going to show himself the glorious God that he really is. Elijah carrying the glory of God is sitting on top of a hill. And it says that a captain of 50 came from the king to bring Elijah down from the top of the hill. Now Elijah is in this place, you know, he says, one of the opening lines of Elijah that most strikes me is this. He says, The Lord God before whom I stand. Remember he makes this statement. This is one of the early statements to the people. The Lord God before whom I stand. Elijah is a man carrying the anointing and the glory of God. And if you strike that man, you shall die. We're talking again about this throne room situation here. So the captain of 50 is sent by the king. The first captain of 50 climbs up the hill with his 50 men. Elijah says this, he says, If I be a man of God, fire will come from heaven and consume you and your 50 men. You do not approach a prophet of God in the way that you are, sir. No king will demand that his prophet be sent anywhere without God's say. Fire comes from heaven and consumes the 50 men. The second man is sent. The second captain of 50 climbs up the hill and demands of Elijah that he come to see the king. If I be a man of God, fire will come from heaven and consume you and your 50 men. Lo and behold, it happens again. I believe it was the third captain of 50, it says he crawled up the hill. He begged Elijah and said, Sir, please, if you will please come with me to see the king. The angel of the Lord says to Elijah, go with him. You see, you do not make demands of God in that scenario. And this is the God of glory that we are seeking. Now, if we're approaching this God of glory, and this is his dominant characteristic, I'm telling you, there's many characteristics of God. There's a teaching out there right now which makes Jesus our lover, and we approach him as a lover, and we're all lovesick over Jesus and all this kind of stuff. Do I think that that is a credible or good teaching? No, I don't. Is it a revival teaching of any kind? No. All of revival history is against it. If we make Jesus our lover and approach him like a swooning teenager, etc., etc., which some of this teaching suggests, and certainly being practiced in a lot of places, will we approach the God of glory? Will we ever see the true God? Will we ever come to terms with his holiness? Will we see him in all the glory that he has? I believe not. We have to choose the God that we are going to serve, that we are going to approach, that we're going to love. Now, the miracle is this, that this God, this God is the one who sent his Son to die for his enemies. This God so loved the world. This God so loved Adam and his descendants that he did not destroy us, but said, I'm going to redeem this people. I'm going to redeem this people. I so love my creation that I will not leave them in this state. My Son is going to die for their sins. And we are going to take them back, all the way back. We're going to leave nothing undone. It's all going to be paid for by my Son. That is the miracle. That a high and holy and lifted up God would go to that extent for us. Such is his desire for communion with man. And you know, I said last night, God so, Jesus so richly deserves the reward, all the reward of what he brought back, of what he paid such a dear price for. You know, such an expensive price. God so deserves to get all of us back into a state like Adam walked in. As I was saying last night, it's not about the state of our bodies. You know, we live in a fallen world. It's the state of our hearts. God wants us to be in the state of communion with him. What is the only barrier? I'm telling you, there's only one thing. It's sin. It's all to do with sin. If anybody makes the gospel about your happiness, they're preaching falsehood and lies. The entire gospel revolves around getting one problem solved. Our sins must be got rid of. Jesus died to take away our sins, the Bible says. Not just to pay for them, but to take them away. 1 John, he came to take away our sins. Wow. If we will allow him, he will take away our sins. He will take away our sins. And that's the topic of tonight's sermon. I call it walking in total heart purity before God. Walking in a state of total heart purity before God. I want to read out. I've quoted Charles Finney a few times. I didn't really set out to do that, but let's quote him again. Talking about his conversion experience. Now, you listen to this very carefully. This is very interesting stuff. He's talking about his conversion. He says, In this state, I was taught justification by faith as an experience. As a present experience. Justification by faith. I could not feel a sense of guilt or condemnation by any effort I could make. My sense of guilt was gone. My sins were gone. And I do not think I felt any more sense of guilt than if I never had sinned. I felt myself justified by faith. And so far as I could see, I was in a state in which I did not sin. I felt myself justified by faith. And as far as I could see, I was in a state in which I did not sin. You know, the thing that I've found by studying many past revivals and revivalists is it seems to me that we have entirely lost the meaning of some basic things like justification by faith. Justification by faith, in Finney's writing here, it's clear he's talking about a state of being. He's talking about walking before God in a state of being that takes away all consciousness of sin. All consciousness of sin is gone. I quoted John Wesley last night talking about his conversion, the gospel that was preached to him, talking about it's a gospel of total dominion over sin. And total peace with God on a continuous basis. Now, how do we walk in that? How do we get into a place before God? Everything I was laying last night as a foundation is merely that. It's a foundation for the walk. It's not the walk itself. Do I walk along every day personally in a state of, oh, woe is me, I'm a sinner, I'm aware of my sins every moment, I have to repent every quarter of an hour because I feel so sinful, God's a holy God, I can't approach Him. Is that my state of being? No, those are the foundations I've laid. The foundations I've laid that I was talking about last night where it's fear of the Lord and deep repentance. So we're getting rid of the sin out of our life. We're confessing it and turning away from it. Hatred of sin. Total surrender to God. Those are the foundations that we laid last night. Now, we're moving on into a new realm here where we walk in a clean state before God without any striving at all. Where we come into a place of total freedom in God where we are not even conscious of being a sinner. We walk before God with a pure heart and that's how it becomes our state of being. A lot of people think this cannot be done. And I just want to tell you it's just absolutely the normal Christian life. This is Romans chapter 8 through and through. Totally, there is nothing in any way extraordinary about what we're talking about. I'm talking about us living in a state before God where you are clean through and through and you know it and God knows it and you just walk in it as your natural state of being. This is what Finney is talking about. I've come to the conclusion actually in recent times that the doctrines that Finney and Wesley knew of 250 years ago or 150 years ago, they had such a better understanding of the basics and the truths of the gospel. We have no idea. Wesley had an entire system 250 years ago where he had worked out what sanctification is and how it leads on to perfection and they had an entire, you know, all these long words, sanctification and entire understandings for everything and it was all sorted out in his mind. I mean he had, you know, he'd write books about this topic. I mean we have no idea what they're even talking about. We don't even preach the gospel let alone what these guys were into. They knew what it was like to walk before God with a clean and pure heart. Now, when I was 17 years old I was talking last night about the foundations God laid in my life and how I came into this, it wasn't by accident, God had to do it because I wasn't hearing it from a preacher. I started realizing that there was a place in God where you not only repented but you could walk in that clean state permanently. You not only had to repent one time, you walk in the clean state permanently. You no longer are aware of sin in your heart or your life. You just walk in the Spirit. And I started walking in this without even really knowing what it was. I was just aware, hey, the thing that made me aware of it was this, I felt this very strongly, if I'm going to be entering the throne room of God, this holy God, every day in prayer, which I was every day, praying my way into the throne room of God, agonizing in prayer, I noticed this, my heart must be pure, my hands must be clean, otherwise I am not going to get there. And I found also that as I was doing that, I did not have to keep repenting. It was kind of like I started to walk in the Holy Spirit, and as I started walking in the Holy Spirit, the consciousness of sin disappeared. And I started to literally walk before God every day without even trying or thinking about it, like I would wake up in the morning. I didn't have to wake up in the morning and, like some people talk about, let's put on the armor of God. Okay, I'll go through this little process and put on the armor of God. Okay, let's pray through all these little prayers that talk about how clean I am and God and the washing of the blood and all this kind of stuff. No, no, no, no, no. If you're walking in faith, if you're justified by faith, it's not by my works, not by my works lest any man should boast. It's simply there or it's not. I'm either a new creation and walking in that or I ain't. What does it say? It says we're seated in heavenly places with Him. I'm a new creation, I'm a brand new man. All things are passed away, I've been born again. I remember that song. I'm a new creation, I'm a brand new man. For there is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. Romans chapter 8 verse 1. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. What does that mean? I no longer have to sin and I no longer have to die. People, I want to make it clear again. If Jesus did not accomplish this on the cross, He died for nothing. If He cannot get us back to how Adam was in the garden with a communion with God just like this, it was all for naught. God so loved the world that He gave His Son so that He could make us, He could buy us back out of slavery, slavery to sin, and allow us to walk before Him in the closest possible relationship between God and His creation whom He loves. And that is how we should walk and must walk every day. And do you know what I want to tell you is this. That is Christianity. The thing I just described to you is the normal Christian life. And if you are living in a Christianity that is below that, you are not walking in what the Bible describes as New Testament Christianity at all. If you cannot say right now that God looks right through you and sees you with a pure heart and you just walk in faith before Him, if that is not your experience, what makes you think you're okay? What makes you think your name is written in the Lamb's book of life? What makes you think you can approach a holy God and live there in His throne room presence? I'm telling you, you're in a pipe dream. Everything I'm describing to you today is not even the deeper life. It's not even the deeper life. I'm talking about basic A-grade Christianity. The very basic stuff that every New Testament Christian in the Bible was taught about. It's right through the book of Romans, it's through 1 John, Romans chapter 6, 7 and 8. That's what those chapters are describing. Everything I'm saying here. There's a book written about it by Watchman Nee called The Normal Christian Life. If you ever get a hold of that book, it's very well named. The Normal Christian Life. How to walk in Romans 6, 7 and 8. And when I discovered that book, I actually read it after I had come into this experience. It was really the first time I started getting my head around what had happened to me. And why it felt so natural and normal to walk in it. This is what Finney is describing here. In this state, I was taught justification by faith as a present experience. I felt myself justified by faith. So far as I could see, I was in a state in which I did not sin. Now is our body stumbling around and making mistakes and all those kind of things? Of course. But in our heart, it says God does not look on the outward appearance. God looks on the heart. All the time. This is God's pattern throughout scripture. Why did God love David? And why did Saul not please him? Because basically it was an issue of heart. Saul was not a man after God's own heart. He would not stand up for truth when the hour and the moment came. David was a man after God's own heart. He made mistakes. But his heart was always after God. God cares about the heart deeply. This is found all the way through scripture. And our state of being before God is a heart walk before Him. In other words, the thing that really is mattering, of course it matters what we do as well. It's like an outworking of what's in our heart. The things that you say are an outworking of your heart. The things that you do are an outworking of your heart. This is why we were talking before. David Kirkwood said today, he was talking about his heart for the poor. And he says, why do I do these things? Because I'm born again. No other explanation is needed. See, a new creation loves to do certain things. The old creation can't be bothered. It's selfish and lives for itself. The new creation, it's born with a nature that loves the commandments of God and loves the things that Jesus cares about and wants to do them all day and night. This is what happens when you first get truly saved. Your desires are instantly changed. God is changing you from the inside out. He deals with your heart. And if he can get you walking before him in a state of what I call total heart purity, total heart purity, that's what Romans 8 is about. Here's what John Wesley said. This is what was preached to John Wesley, and this is what he ended up preaching all his life. Listen to this. The Moravian guy that was preaching to John Wesley said that the fruits of a true conversion are these. Dominion over sin, that's number one. Dominion over sin. That means you rule over sin. Sin does not rule over you. Dominion over sin means that sin is no longer a problem in your life. And constant peace from a sense of forgiveness. When Wesley heard that, this is what he says about it. He says, I was quite amazed and looked upon it as a new gospel. He had to go to the scriptures and check it out because he says this. If this was so, it was clear I had not faith. So the Moravians were preaching something to him which so utterly convicted him. Here he was a missionary. Here he was an ordained clergyman of the Church of England. And the Moravians were preaching to him. You know, the Moravians are those famous people that had a prayer meeting that lasted 100 years. So the Moravians are actually preaching to John Wesley and saying the true gospel has these fruits. If you don't have these fruits, you are not saved. Dominion over sin. A constant peace from a sense of forgiveness. If this was so, it was clear I had not faith, says John Wesley. And soon after that, he was converted. And he preached that gospel all his life. Preached from Romans 8. He loved Romans 8. That was one of his major. He preached on 1 John 3, a sermon that will just raise the hair on the back of your neck. It's so strong. He's basically, you know, let's go to 1 John 3. Unfortunately, I've only got the King James tonight, which is not the clearest of translations in this particular case. But anyway, 1 John 3. Right down the back near Revelation. And this is an astounding scripture. Just reading it out is likely to convict you. John Wesley just expounded every verse and just whipped people to death with it. I should say pierced them with the sword of the word, because that's what he was doing. 1 John 3. Let's start with verse 2. We know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. So we will be like him. Every man that has this hope in him purifies himself, even as he is pure. Even as Jesus is pure. So we purify ourselves. All who have our hope in him purify ourselves. Down in verse 5. We know that he was manifested to take away our sins, and in him is no sin. Whosoever abides in him sins not. Whosoever sins has not seen him, neither known him. Little children, let no man deceive you. He that does righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous. He that commits sin is of the devil, for the devil sins from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin, for his seed remains in him, and he cannot sin because he is born of God. He cannot sin because he is born of God. Can you imagine John Wesley just ripping the heart out of everyone present with that sermon? He expounded it verse by verse, and just tore from under them every bit of false assurance that was in their heart. God woke me up at 4 o'clock in the morning, two years ago, in literally a blinding experience, the only time this has ever happened to me. It was 4 o'clock, I think it was August 2003. And he suddenly, like a flash of light that just illuminated my heart and especially my mind, he was teaching me a principle of revival preaching. And he was saying to me, it's all about assurance of salvation. Finney would undermine the assurance of salvation of every audience he preached to. John Wesley would undermine the assurance of salvation of every audience they preached to. Why? Because those people were falsely assured of their salvation, and they were happy and content in that, and God was giving them the weapons to go through and demolish their false assurance. You know what we're told to do? This is what I was told to do by Campus Crusade for Christ and all the other little organizations, well, big organizations that I belong to as a young Christian. We're told to do this. You lead them in the little sinner's prayer, which is like a two-line little prayer that they repeat after you. And then you say, Brother, welcome to the kingdom of God, you're saved. And don't let the devil come along and try and steal away your assurance, because you're saved and welcome to the kingdom. What did we just do? Well, we probably just sent the guy to hell. If he believes our words, if he's utterly stupid in his head to believe what we just told him, a lie from the pit of hell, if he's that idiotic, then I guess we just cast the guy away, didn't we? Because we just told a guy that did something that's not even in the Bible. We just told him that he's saved. We just gave a man complete and utter false assurance of salvation. We have entire churches today that are filled with people who think they're going to heaven because basically the preacher is telling them, come up the front, pray the little prayer, and if you come to church regularly, you'll probably be okay. That's what our gospel has sunk to. I mean, Finney right now as I'm speaking is rolling in his grave, seriously. John Wesley is doing cartwheels. These guys preach such a gospel so far above anything we can even comprehend that in the 1970s they took basic John Wesley principles and called them deeper life conferences. That's how low we have sunk. We have to call the basic gospel deeper life conferences, and we don't even have those anymore. The stuff that John Wesley would preach as a gospel message, we've even lost as the deeper message. We have no clue. We haven't got the faintest idea what the gospel is. We've lost it all. We don't know what the cross is. We don't know what justification by faith is. We've lost it all. We can read something like what Finney just wrote there as a matter of course. We haven't got the faintest idea what he's talking about. If I was to put that in front of a normal church member in most of our churches today, they'd read it with utter incomprehension, not the faintest idea what it means. What does he mean? It seemed like I was in a state in which I did not sin. What does he mean? I knew justification by faith as a present experience. No idea. We are utterly lost. Our generation of churchgoers is utterly lost. We don't even know the gospel to preach it to them. Is ask Jesus into your heart or anything like it in the scripture? No, it exists nowhere. There's not even a similarity to it actually. If you go right through scripture and do a search on it and look for, ask Jesus into your heart, give your heart to the Lord, etc. etc. What else is it? Let's make Jesus our personal savior. Let's open up the little door in our heart and let Jesus in. None of it exists in scripture whatsoever. It's a complete fabrication. Why we made it up, I don't know. Then we started telling people that if they did this little two-line prayer, they'd go to heaven. Piling one incredible error upon another. What did the apostles preach when they preached salvation as a basic day one message? Repent and be baptized and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. There was no such thing as a baby Christian in the New Testament who had not repented and been baptized in water and been filled with the Holy Spirit. That would all happen on day one. One of the few people I know who actually had that happen to them was my wife. She happened accidentally. Well, it was God's accident. She went along to a church. Actually, she repented the night before. She went along to one church service. They said at the end of that church service, would anyone here like to be baptized? She put up her hand. They baptized her in the bathtub. She came out of the water speaking in tongues. Praise God. A complete New Testament basic experience which almost nobody has. Almost nobody. They would see that as a matter of course in that particular church because they actually believed in doing what the Bible says. They would often see people coming out of the baptismal water speaking in tongues, filled with the Holy Spirit, which is what's supposed to happen. In my case, I was brought up in the Baptist church, spirit-filled parents and everything, but it was ten years between me getting baptized in water and getting baptized in the Holy Spirit. Ten years. We were part of a Salvation Army church in West Auckland where almost all of the leaders, a large number of them, had never been baptized in water. Such was the low priority placed on the most absolutely fundamental things in the New Testament. What happens to you if you get before God and you haven't been baptized in water? I'll tell you what He'll ask. He'll say, So when did you die? Because it's clearly in Romans chapter 6 that we are buried with Him in baptism into Jesus' death. So God will just simply straight out ask these people, He'll say to them, So explain to me when exactly you died because I have no record of you doing so. I'm talking about dying spiritually in Jesus. Excuse me, sir. When did you die? When was your old life buried with Christ in baptism? When did it happen? They'll hum and ha a little bit. The entire book of Romans chapter 6 is based on the fact that you have been baptized. If you have not been baptized, you cannot claim to have been crucified with Him. None of Romans chapter 6 applies to you. None of Romans chapter 7 applies to you. If you have not been baptized in water, the most blatant thing they would do, the most obvious thing in the book of Acts that we see again and again, is that they will baptize someone the instant they come across them if they want to become a believer. The Ethiopian eunuch driving down the road, Here is water. What prevents me being baptized? He says. He is instantly baptized on the spot. The jailers who are freeing Paul out of prison says that in that same hour of the night, it was probably one o'clock in the morning, he was baptized and his entire household. Paul meets the Ephesians. Acts chapter 19, Paul meets the Ephesians. He says. So what kind of believers are you guys? They're saying to him, Oh, we're followers of John the Baptist. Instantly, Paul knows he needs to baptize these guys. John's baptism of repentance will not do. He says, I'm going to baptize you in the name of Jesus Christ and praise for them. They get filled with the Holy Spirit on the spot. Acts chapter 8, the Samaritan revival. Acts chapter 2, 3000 coming to Jesus in one day. What happens to them? They all get baptized immediately after they have repented. Do we know these things? No, we've lost it all. We have no concept of the New Testament. We are utterly undone when it comes to Scripture. We have no idea what we're doing. Our evangelism is a sad joke. And so this most basic of questions is asked of us. What shall I do to be saved? And we always give them the wrong answer. An entire world full of Christians who don't know. It's like they don't know how to tie their shoelaces. That's how basic this stuff is. If you don't believe me, do a study. Get your concordance out and do a study on the word baptism sometime. Get the book of Acts. Find out what the apostles always preached. Always preached. Find out what the apostles always preached. Not difficult, is it? You would think not difficult. But we have lost everything and therefore we know nothing. You would think not difficult. You would think that instead of actually making up a way of coming to Jesus, that we'd actually read the Bible and come up with the way that they did it. In most organizations, if you start an organization, usually you go back to the original plan and you do things that way. So, here we are. What will revival be? Revival will be getting all the church people who are totally and completely unsaved and have never heard the gospel in their lives, saved. I'm hoping that it will start with that. It may be that Jesus bypasses all the religious people and says, I have absolutely had a gutsful and I was really hearing this in Darren's sermon. Was it yesterday or today? Today. I was really hearing this in Darren's sermon. Jesus came first to the house of Israel and when he was refused by all the religious people, he said, well, I've had enough. And I'm going to the hedges and the highways and the byways and I'm going to get all the homeless people saved and you can watch the prostitutes coming into the kingdom of heaven before you and I ain't going to speak to you again except to rebuke you to your face. You know, you look at Matthew 23, it's like an entire chapter of endlessly rebuking the scribes and Pharisees to their face, even saying to them, how shall you escape the damnation of hell? You snakes, you brood of vipers, you hypocrites. I mean, talking about Jesus signing his death warrant in one chapter. He was speaking to the very people who had, you know, at their command, Roman legions to help them arrest him. Here's Jesus, Matthew chapter 23, and he is spending an entire chapter rebuking them to their face. That's the kind of treatment those people got from Jesus. He was friends with the sinners and the common people. And he went to them, he went to the highways and byways, man. What if God chooses to do that in America? How lost will the church be? 40% of Americans go to church. None of them are hearing the gospel. Maybe the odd places are hearing it, almost by accident, like my wife happened to come across some little place that she heard enough of the gospel to experience God that day, you know. She was still on fire. You know, I literally, I was a radical zealot when I was a young man. I wanted, the only wife that would do for me was the most zealous, on fire girl I could find, and she happened to be it. That's why I chose her. Of course, she's beautiful as well, but praise God. Fortunate, fortunate package right there. I encourage all young men only to marry utterly zealous for God young women because otherwise they will steer you astray. I remember one of my close friends, the guy that helped lead me to the Lord, well, into true conversion, was a guy that was, he would play, he was a fantastic musician. He would play these Keith Green songs and sing them on the piano. He was into Ravenhill. He was reading Art Katz. He was passing all this fantastic stuff onto me to read and stuff like that. And I met this guy. I lost touch with him. This was in a Baptist church. Spirit-filled guy. When he got baptized in the Holy Spirit, it was so powerful, it almost half paralyzed him for about half an hour. Such was the glory of God that came upon him. I met him. He was studying to be a doctor. I met him several years later, and he wouldn't even look me in the eye. And I asked him, so he'd met a girl. He'd met some girl when he was at medical school. And that was the end, man. It was the end of his days of being a sold-out young man for God. It was the end of it. And I never thought that that would happen to that guy. Never crossed my mind that that would happen to that guy. And yet there he was. He was taken out. I don't know where he's at today. I don't know if he's recovered himself. I've got no idea. Okay, so the end message, where we're really going tonight is this, and I guess I should really start closing this up right now. The place that we're going to is this. It is not adequate for you to walk with God in a place where you are repenting all the time and are living in a state, in other words, it's not acceptable to live in the stuff that I was preaching last night. It's not acceptable to live there. It is not acceptable to live there. You must go through those things. They must become ingrained in you. They must be laid down as foundations in you. They are the foundations. Everything we're talking about last night and tonight is found in Hebrews 6 verse 1 and 2. This is how basic this is. The very next scripture, let's go there. Hebrews 6 verse 1 and 2. This is how basic this stuff is, and you'll recognize that this is where I've been going the last two nights. Hebrews 6 verse 1 and 2. Therefore, leaving the principles, some versions will say foundations there. Therefore, leaving the foundations of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection or maturity. A lot of Bibles will call that maturity right there. So let us go on to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, faith towards God, the doctrine of baptisms, laying on of hands, resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And this will we do if God allows us to. Okay, so it's saying there that everything that we've just been talking about is the foundations. It's saying let's go on from these foundations to maturity, shall we? We know all the foundations. We've been teaching them endlessly. This is what the writer of Hebrews is saying. You guys know all that stuff. It was laid in you from the start. Let's go on to maturity. Well, you know where we're at. We haven't even laid the foundations. Most of them are completely missing. We might have one or two in the modern church out of the six, one or two if we're lucky. We never preach on eternal judgment in most churches. We don't preach repentance. We don't really preach on baptisms. Laying on of hands is covered if you happen to be in a Pentecostal or charismatic church. Praise God. So we can go up front and get prayed for and fall over and spaz out for a while, go down to the back of the line and start again. Glory to God. Isn't that what it's about, oh charismatic ones? Of course, I'm a spirit-filled believer myself. Unfortunately, the movement that we're part of is its own worst enemy today. In fact, you look around us and you say, okay, so where's the counterfeit going to come from? Well, it's going to come out of our own movements. There's no question about that. We are utterly, utterly ripe for every type of deception. Utterly ripe. A church that gets the Holy Spirit and gets addicted to sensation, addicted to thrills, addicted to experiences, if it doesn't have the foundations, if it doesn't have tremendously strong anchoring in the foundations, it is just utterly ripe for every kind of deception. All history shows this. Where do you think Gnosticism comes from? Where do you think all the heresies of the first 500 years of the church come from? It all comes from this kind of garbage. And we're right in it, man. The charismatic movement, the prophetic movement is just utterly full of... I publicly left that movement. I stated I'm leaving the prophetic movement. Why? Because it is a joke of a prophetic movement. I'll tell you, there's one reason. There's one reason that's good enough to leave the prophetic movement alone amongst all the others. One reason is this. That any movement that calls itself a prophetic movement, if it doesn't have repentance and holiness at its core, is no prophetic movement at all. All history shows that every true prophetic movement in the world has been centered on repentance and holiness. If they don't have that at the heart, they are not worth listening to, and error and deception of every kind will follow. All history shows these things. It just boggles my mind, the ignorance. It just boggles my mind, the ignorance, that we think we can arrogantly go down trails which have already been shown to produce disaster, and we're just merely strolling down them. In fact, we're going beyond them in every way. Charismatic movement, prophetic movement, parts of the modern prayer movement, parts of the modern worship movement, you can just name every little circle that's whirling around us all. I mean, I can't avoid it. I'm part of it. I publish every week a newsletter which goes out to thousands of people. We're all being influenced and bombarded by this stuff. We're all part of these things whether we like it or not. We're part of the body of Christ, and our spirit-filled brethren, notably in the West, are partaking of these things, and we have to deal with them because deception of the worst kind is on the horizon and is rapidly approaching us, and the very, very deep likelihood is that many of the false prophets of the last days will come from our very own streams. It is very, very likely. Who will most likely accept a man coming with signs and wonders today? It's the charismatic movement who has lost all its discernment because it no longer knows the true gospel from the false, no longer knows the true God from the false, has no discernment whatsoever, rushes up the front for every man that has power in his hands and asks for some. Dear God. Dear God. Every man that has power in his hands. Let me just, in closing, repeat. The main message of tonight is this. Walking in a place of heart purity before God by faith is the inheritance of all the saints, is the way of life of all true saints. If you want to call yourself a born-again Christian, what does it mean to be born again? It means you have been recreated into a creature that is utterly new, that bears no relation to the old you in any sense. You have died and been raised in Him. Romans 6, 7, and 8. You have died with Him. You have been raised with Him into new life. You are an utterly, utterly new creature. That is born again. That's what Jesus refers to, born again. Now, don't go around calling yourself a born-again new Christian if you are not seriously a new creation in here. If you are not really the new creation, how dare you go around calling yourself that? If you're a new creation, you can and you must walk by the Spirit. This is what Romans 8 is talking about. Walking by the Spirit. Walking by faith. And man, you will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.