In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the importance of faith and belief in God. He shares his personal experience of not being moved by anything until he believed in God. He talks about the power of the word of God and how it can bring blessings and open people's eyes. The preacher also discusses the current challenges faced by people and encourages them to trust in God and have faith in His plan. He concludes by emphasizing the significance of holiness and the greatness of God's gifts.

...to hear a man. She'd never heard a Protestant preacher in her life, never been in a Protestant church in her life, but she went up to hear this lady. The lady preached. My mother was a good woman, never heard her say anything I couldn't say this morning over the air and embarrass no one. She's a good neighbor, a good mother, a good citizen, but she didn't know the Lord. This lady told how Jesus had saved her. They got to preaching. They sang for one hour, just one hour by the clock, before her hand would even go up for prayer. At last my mother's hand went up for prayer. This godly woman said, Mrs. Fleming, step out and kneel here. Her being a Catholic, she wasn't ashamed to kneel. A lot of Protestants are, but the Catholics are not ashamed to kneel. They kneel many times in every service, and that's commendable, too. We should never be so stiff we'd be ashamed to kneel. My mother stepped out and knelt down. I could see her from where I was sitting. I think it was about four or five minutes, she arose and said, Jesus saves me now. Well, I thought I would die. I knew my mother was not lying. I'd never known her to tell a false story in any way of any form. She said, I was my boy. She became a missionary immediately. She started down the aisle of the large Baptist church. She went down the aisle and passed me. I was on the left of the church and went on around with those eyes in a knot. Really I hid. I just piled up in a knot. I was weeping like a baby had been whipped. She went on around the rear of the church and came up the other side and found my brother John, the first service he was ever in in his life. This was the first my mother ever was in. He was the first my brother ever was in. I'd been to these few services before this. The first service my brother ever was in, the first person ever came to him and invited him to Jesus. He went and he went now. He went in a hurry. He only weighed 108 pounds. He was small and he's a nice looking young fellow. He was dressed in the latest patent leather shoes and his collar and tie and everything matched. He fell at that, not on order. There was an old bench. They just turned the bench around. I said, hello, but I wouldn't say hello. There was a bench turned around. We'd never seen an order. And at his first service, other people went. In fact, the choir was finding a bunch of girls that had ever lived, but they were unsafe. They thought the war was coming to an end. My brother fell on his knees there at that bench. He just fell out of that choir all around him. And they took a hold of him, pulled him away from him. This lady did. And they was on the floor. They were not just kicking around. They were purchased girls, unsaved girls. But they just wanted to see my brother, you see, get saved. He'd never professed religion, anything, never even go to Sunday school. But when they heard him praying, it affected that congregation till the whole crowd was on their feet, just a weeping aloud, just a weeping out loud. You couldn't have heard a revolver. They said, something's going to take place. The war is coming to an end. John Trimmings was on his knees. About two o'clock, he gave up. He said, there's no hope for me. I'll have to go to hell. God can't never save me. A man away in the rear, a lot of good people, they don't think the Lord could use a sinner. And we think if a sinner get on the platform, why ruin the meeting. But a sinner, a one-armed traveling man, way in the rear of that church got up, didn't profess a thing, and came down. The preacher had given it up. My brother had given it up, all of them. Came down the aisle and got on the platform and laid his head, hand over. He only had one hand. And touched my brother and said, John, if I were you, I'd try it once more. And just that word from a sinner had encouraged me. My brother looked up and said these words, live or die, survive or perish, come what may, I'll give up. He was down to one thing, just one thing, that no one on earth knew but myself. He, myself, and God knew what he's up against, and no one on earth knows it today, what he's forgiven of, but myself, but myself. But when he looked up and said to live or die, sink or swim, survive or perish, I'm going through, the man that wore the seam of rope, that died on a cross between two thieves, stepped in and took hope. The preacher had given him up. Father had given him up. Mother had given him up. They'd all stepped back. Touched him and lifted him to his feet. He turned around and said, what's the matter? He said, I'm on top. He was on top. He never heard anybody testifying. He said he was on top. He was on top of the devil. We was in business, buying and selling horses. Now I had a new bedfellow. We didn't get home until after three o'clock. We was up at four. He had drank and smoked. Whiskey and tobacco, cigars were both in the room. Nobody to preach to him. Nobody to tell him. I don't know where he got his life. He said, something said, get you a drink of whiskey. It'll help you. Of course, he felt bad, you know. Been up all night. Hadn't had more than about 40 minutes sleep. He said, no, I don't want whiskey. Jesus is saving me. Something said, get you a cigar. He said, no, I don't want a cigar. I've been saved. Walked out a clean man. Talk about bleeding in religion. I had to bleed. What was I going to do? There it was, in the bed with a new brother, a new partner, in the barn, feeding the horses, curing the horses, harnessing the horses. I had a new partner. I went to buy a horse that day and bought one, a beautiful horse. Brought it back and was showing it to the people. They're getting around the barn, long about sundown. Young people came by, no meeting announced, didn't have to announce it. They were there from far and near, in every direction. The place was 20 feet deep around that church on Monday night, and no meeting announced. God bless you, Jesus saved me and sanctified me right now, and I'm satisfied with Jesus. Brother Boner's here, and he's going to speak for us. Brother Boner Fleming. I haven't any polish to make, but last night, for the way people came to the altar without any singing, without even the people getting on their feet in the kind, no. That's what I want to see, what I pray to see, and that's what I've been praying for before the rooster ever took his head out from under his wing this morning. If anybody don't like that kind, why, there's a way off of this hilltop. We believe in the dear Lord that blesses his children and men. Hey, well, somebody shouted, didn't live right. Well, if somebody steps around, don't live right too. Think about that for a little bit. This morning, maybe somewhere in the world, I don't know where it was, maybe somewhere on earth, there may have been someone shouting out of the spirit. But between 11 and 12 o'clock this morning, where there might have been one person somewhere shouting out the spirit, there were a million shouting out of the spirit. Well, if they live, it's all right to shout. Well, if they live, it's all right to feel too. If they don't live right, they don't be in the setting still. They ought to be on their knees. My gun, get blessed. You hear that? My gun loaded with single-tree tips and iron wedges, all kinds of materials that blow the crowd up that never was blessed. You can't find a place on earth where you see people's teeth like you do in God's meeting. Cut the chin down, and God's against us last night's service. I don't know how the hell they got him dead. I can see he's in water. Now they say preaching killed John Fleming. His body put in the grave, they preach it. Killed John, preaching didn't kill John Fleming at all. The one person, I don't know where they were and where they ever lived. But there's been one person ever. Now, we've got two brothers. Warn them, heed it none. Blender evil or evil unto any man. But ever follow that which is good, both among yourselves and to all men. Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything, give thanks. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Quench not the spirit. Despise not prophesy. Prove all things. Hold fast that which is good. Abstain from all appearance of evil. And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly. W-H-O-L-L-Y, wholly. And I pray God, your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is he, all of you, who also will do it. Brethren, pray for us. Greet all the brethren with a holy kiss. I charge you for the Lord that this epistle be read from the wall of the Holy Brethren. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen. That's all Paul could think of. He's through. He said amen, he covered the ground. There's nothing else to say other than amen. You just read that, you'll agree with me too. First Thessalonians, the fifth chapter, the fourteenth, through the remainder of the chapter. Now, I'm going to be brief starting off this afternoon. I'm going to be brief all the way through this whole study. We should notice when I read the Bible, remember I said at least three things. What are they? We should always notice first who the writer is. Second, who he's writing to. And third, what he's writing about. Now if you turn to the first chapter of first Thessalonians, you'll find who the writer was. The writer was Paul. And you'll find out who he's writing to. He was writing Paul unto the church, unto the church. People can't say Rockefeller built a church over in New York City, cost sixteen million dollars. Rockefeller put up a building over there, cost sixteen million dollars. I've been in it, and about everything that I've ever seen anywhere in the world, you'll find that. Pictures show Saint Paul accommodates three hundred couples, molding out everything about, and you can see that it told me three sets of chefs work, run twenty-four hours a day to feed the people. About everything going on, courting parlors, sure, sure. About everything going on, Rockefeller and Henry Ford and all the rest of them haven't got enough money to build a church, because the church is not built with silver and gold and concrete, because Paul was not writing unto a building. Paul had been there previously and had a great revival. Sent away and writing back to these young converts. And he said, unto the church of the Thessalonians, which is in Coptopolis, and him the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, you'll have a work of faith and labor of love and places of hope in the sight of the Lord Jesus Christ, God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, remembering about ceasing your work of labor of love and places of hope. He said, we can't forget you. You seem to stamp something on us we can't shake off. I remember, he said, your work of faith and labor of love and places of hope. You're a wonderful crowd. He said, for our gospel didn't come unto you in just word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance. He said, you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word with much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost. But he said, your faith is so fast from him we need not seek anything. They've taken note how you've turned, not for fast, but turned from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his son from heaven. I don't know who I'm waiting to, there's no one there's not a man or a woman on earth of intelligence that professed to believe the Bible would change the back path that Paul was fighting to. There is an intelligent person on earth. There isn't. He said, they're in God the Father, in the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, they had a work of faith and labor of love in the sight of God. Our gospel didn't come in just word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance. He said, you became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word with much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost. Not tickled, joy of the Holy Ghost. He said, your doubts, your modernism, just kept us in the know. He said, your faith is so fast from him we need not even seek anything. I take a note how you turn, you turn from idols, to serve the living and true God, wait for his son from heaven. You want to say that Paul, I said that to say something else. You turn to the third chapter, tenth verse, as the Paul writes the church, remember this, converted people, he's in God the Father, from a praying night and day for you. Oh, what's the matter? You've been thanking God, Paul. He said, we thank God for you all. Not of that kind of crowd, not a hypocrite in the crowd. No, sir. Thanking God for you all, he said. Night and day for you. Paul, you should come a praying night and day for you, for God, that I might see your faith, and my perfect, that's what is lacking in your faith. They have faith, the faith that's not been perfected. They have love, but not perfect love. They have joy, but not fullness of joy. They have patience, but he said that patience has her perfect work. So listen, after the third verse, write it for this, not something else. For this is the will of God. This is the will of God. Your, not, here he says, the church, for this is the will of God, even your. You're not sinners, for you, what is it? Your, your sanctification. Not for justification, you're already justified. You're in God the Father. You're not holy ghost God. This is the will of God for you. He said back in Ephesians, Paul, the sheep should therefore be brethren, not sinners, but brethren. You may prove the will of God. Don't be unwise, but you know, if people were to get the heavenly Father's will, get the current wheel, you can't eat him. The father, Adam, he had a doctor, Dr. John Owen. I preached one day, I wasn't preaching on this line, sermon to get our heavenly Father's will. A spot of milk, I said, your father leaving a wheel. The big farmer walked up, his skin quivered, and he said, brother Coney, who told you about the loss of the day? The folks said, I just said that. Well, he said, we're in lawful, left the whole town. He told them about his will. He said, my brothers, you know, he said, you know what I'll do? Let them say it's my father. I'll thank God. I went to law and Jesus Christ took the case, but I got the will. Right now, of course, chapter seven, verse one, clean up whatever cause people to hold it because it did not get hot. You never lose him. You always change. There's no place to preach. No place to preach. For the conclusion of this sermon, please fast forward the cassette to the end and then turn it over for side two. He's everybody right. There is more people losing the charge. Hey, what else did I burn up? And the fella came along more ways than one. Well, but I read out close to the car. John and I go in there. So New Jersey case. I saw it had fire in his eyes. He could have preached all he could have said he can preach. Hey, man, this city and every other don't possess a thing. You have to give a beautiful talk. What do you want to do? He stepped down to the platform. He had fire in his eyes over here. He said, I remember, I remember he said now he said that lung power is not Holy Ghost power. And he said, be careful now, be careful. I said, what are you doing? I said, we all know that. I said, we all know that lung power is not Holy Ghost power. But I said, you took the wrong way. I get it. That's what you're going to do. You better take your tip. So we don't purpose to put on going to the last 10 words. And he calls up his Bible. He's singing away. I'm praising God. Don't just praise God for the Jews. Believe it. I've never put it, believe it or not. He was gone when he's just arrived. It was time to go and down the same. The Lord made me to be paid. God wants you to pray to what I don't believe in. They don't like it. After lunch, if they can't have it, let them jump it. Start to stop praising God. I was coming in this city a few years ago, out here, out here at Carthage, Labor Day, Labor Day. And the train was about four or five hours late. And it's dark. Carthage, California, it's dark. The train came along, oh shit, the city had poured out. And the lights, the lights had gone off. And Labor Day, it looked like everybody was gone. I've never been in such a crowd in my life. The train's packed, the baggage car's packed, and the steps are packed, and the aisles are packed. I go along down the aisle, and they're just singing all kinds of songs. There's a rhyme, there's a heave, and there's a stomp, and there's a pan on the floor, wicked songs. I told God he'd have to talk to me in more than half a second. I was ready. The last one is my savior, please, and it's my sovereign die. Would he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I? At the cross, at the cross, where I've hurt all the life, and the burden of my heart, over me, kept beside my faith, I received my sight, and now I am happy all the day. They stopped. They thought somebody drunk. They turned loose, worse than ever. Oh, they've lowered and carried on. The devil said, now you may have fooled yourself, but the blessed Holy Ghost is going to give me another little fun. It went good again. And I started that old song, from the comfort of the Lord profound, and time shall be no more in the morning, wake the colonel right in time. God, the Holy Ghost took a hold of that prayer. God, God, and the Queen, I'll give you Christmas spirit, all right, on obeying God. Things got like death, got like death. And I thought to myself, somebody pull my sleeve, pull my sleeve, you know, if you'd have come out here, some of you pounds up from Newport here then, and as light as a suit, an old woman, real skinny old lady, about seventy-five pounds, she said, mister, mister, could you sing that song, dear my God to thee? I said, anything you want. Just any song you want, I said I could. I said, anything you want, I said, you sing it. Sing that, people give you up in Newport. Said, who is that fellow? Who are you? Where is that man? Came to pray for us. Never had so many people in my life. He came to pray for us. I never told him who I was. Never told him how far we were going. Didn't matter who I was, all I wanted to care was to keep my mind on the Lord. Say, I'm a preacher. Whenever a person comes around and says, I want to show you my prediction, I kind of back off. Oh, you know what we are? We're kind of a bunch of cowards. See, get together and have a big time, and go back home and never say a word about what God has done for us. It can't be. Take this pivot and move now before the king comes around. Have your neighbor love you. I was over here in Chicago one time with Fr. Churman. I was up four times in Nazarene Church in Chicago. Fr. John and I were together four times there. And some women up in the gallery one night, they said to the gallery, there was a big congregation of church over there. Congregation of just reformers. It was one of those big, I don't know, just reformers it was. And next day they called up the hotel. Won't you come and speak to our missionary. Women's missionary meeting. Oh, I said, you've got the wrong party. I'm not a missionary. I'm not the receiver. They called right back, said, no, no matter what, you be the missionary. We do who we want. We want you to speak tomorrow afternoon at our missionary society. There'll be about 800 of us there. 800 women. Well, I said, I'm not a missionary. Well, they said, will you speak to us? Well, I said, who will be there? Said, women. I said, I don't want the pastor, that's all. Sitting around there criticizing me. I don't want him in there at all. Don't want him in there at all. Don't bring your husband. If I speak to women, then I want to speak to women. Well, she said, if you come, we'll send a taxi after you. And take you back to the hotel. I tried to get off, so I didn't know the way, and I didn't. But she had the taxi there. I went down. They were honest. They were honest people. I didn't talk to them on China and Africa. Oh, no, India. What did they talk on? I said, how many of you people have got people living above you here in Chicago? Said, number, put your hands up. How many of you got someone living beneath you? Said, number, hands up. How many of you got people on the right and the left of you? Said, hands up. Everybody said, hands up. I said, how many of you people have some colored people around you, working for you? Said, Greg, number, have colored people working for you. I said, how many of you people ever have a woman come to town and plunder you? What number? I said. How many of you folk around here where the Japanese are? Said, number. I said, how many have ever spoken to a colored person at work for you, or a Chinaman in the laundry, or a Japanese, or anybody else? About this old man. Got a hand went up. Got a hand went up. I said, do you want me to talk on foreign missions? I said, here we are. Here we are. We don't need to go 12,000. God won't hear your prayer 10,000, 12,000, 13,000 miles away, when you won't do one thing for Jesus Christ. Won't do one thing for Jesus Christ. And that's that soap I get in my brain. Cries out, prophesy. Hold fast, for which is good. And he hops on the top raft. He leaps on top. He says, 10,000 miles. He leaps 1,000 miles beyond evil when he gets there. There is no power on earth. They're in the air. They're in the pit. And capture all the young black or white, rich or poor. Well, take those instructions. Go through the tunnels and plains and come out open. He's got there more than a conqueror. That's his name forevermore. Talk the kind of a son of a candidate. He's the only son of a candidate. Ho, ho. Try to take praise. Not just a moment. When he said it came not from evil, but the parents of it. Plenty of people in Chicago and New York, East Park, Philadelphia, those large cities, have never seen a cornfield or a wheat field. They're the very kind. People told me, Chicago, corn in Chicago, live in Chicago, raise a family, marriage, human marriage, and got little grandchildren. Never saw the city. Intelligent people, too. Never seen a cornfield or a wheat field. They're not alive, these big cities. Take a young girl now. Next month, in July, up in New York City, run a New York Central train to the Grand Central Station. That'll go up to New York State a couple hundred miles. It's an awful little small station. Her uncle meets his eyes and knows. Gray horse in a buck-and-four-truck, drives up to the country. So her aunt, that evening when they're washing their stuff for Jesus and putting them away, the aunt said, now listen, Terry, we're going out tomorrow for a black man's ticket. What's that? I thought we were going to pick blackberries, pick them right off the vine. Bullshit, you mean that? No, pull the berries out of the bush. Black, blackberries. She's delighted, she has dreams that night about picking berries. Goes up next morning, puts on her blanket, throws her jacket off, the old-fashioned sun bonnet, the pair of half-handles. Listen, listen, she's got her tail sitting on the ground. The bottom rail gets rocky, you see? The ground, fertilize the ground. That big vine and big berries, that evening you saw. Not sure of the pulling off berries, you feel that tail, but you cut the curtain over the car with both hands. She's a cook, the berries, not tails. She's a thinking of what she's going to tell the New York young people when she gets back to the city. She's never given a thought of the rattlesnake during the time. All the snakes she's ever seen look through the glass in the zoo. Some are creeping around. She's never given a thought of the rattlesnake. How she's a sitting on that table with those big berries, compromise the way down here among the rocks where the berries arrive. She feels something whip around her ankle. Look to the fence block, can't you see? A big old striped rattler. Taking his rattles back there and licking his tongue out there. I just wish, how long do you suppose that young lady is going to stand there and look at that snake, the old rattler full of stripes? But now I want to see how close I can get to it. You believe me? How close I can get to it. I want to see if I can catch those rattles. I want to see if I can tell the people how many you have. I want to see if I can keep that poison there in his mouth. How close I can get and I'll jump out of the way just in time not to be struck. You don't believe that? Listen, listen, that girl don't have to be tooted and tooted and chopped and tooted and chopped. The other way that snake goes, there's something funny in that girl. There's something funny in that girl. How it seems from head to heel. It's in her blood. It's all to her. It's the very appearance of that snake that caused her to give a few leaps and travel down the hillside to a prominent man. Nobody saw her. Tell me, tell me, there is no house on this earth that such a dude would take someone from. The evidence you've been throwing against your body you're the fading appearance of evil. You have a heart ain't nothing but the evil ain't nothing but the evil, ain't nothing but the good. Whenever, whenever you find young people, or middle-aged people, whether that's preachers or laymen, or holy people, or anybody else, all of them mixing around. I just, wait a minute, there's been a few people trying to stop my mouth on this. They said this to me, they said, you know, Boney, if you preach about this it's supposed to teach you a lesson. I said, all right. I'm not a fool, and let it tie me up on preaching against anything. But if that's not going to let me, they say you're upsetting about people getting too sick to get off the step. Whenever, preachers or laymen, whenever men want to mix around the women more, they do the men. Look now, whenever the women want to be around the men all the time, they're going to obtain the appearance of evil. No, no. I look back not many years after, I didn't know Genesis from Revelation. Didn't know Job from Caesar. That's how I met the living Christ that I'm proud every month of heaven will hide on me in a moment. I tell it now to people, I'm never afraid of anybody rising on me whenever I get to preach. Tell them lies. Yes, when I'm with any of them. Yes, he may say, I see this is wrong. Got him saved and baptized at nightfall. He's bigger than Mother Charlotte about 200 years ago. Sweet and ice. It's always time. Asked somebody for his noon lunch. We went over and this lawyer came over with ice for dinner. Well, his wife was going to bring him to the home there. So I was sure I heard him say, he said, now look, he said, I'm going to walk back to the office. You can take Tony home. That wasn't nice of him. He's the kind of woman who's ever had the sun shined on. And I, I see at home, he was a sinner, a lawyer. I said, now just wait a moment. I said, I trust your wife to jump an off place. And I said, my wife trusts me too. But I said, this is strict time. And I said, suppose that this car was driving somebody else's car. And we'd have a wreck on the way home. If you don't harm me arriving home with your wife, but if we'd have a wreck, that'd be news. For a preacher and a lawyer's wife to be in a wreck together. I said, I wouldn't have my papers. And I'd rather die and then bury the power to you. To bring your pulse upon my wife and children and my job. I'd rather die than let my people beat me up. If I never do anything else. People say you're going to treat yourself like John. Die like John. Who would try to die like John? Saying, oh let's just die like John. Who? I said, I can't ride home with your wife. I'll take the streetcar and get there some way. Tears filled his eyes. He said, Pony, he's told this boy that I won't talk to him any time. He went through hell for a night or two. But he had a lot of things to give up. But this last fall, he cut the shoreline. Cleaned his carpet. Cleaned his coat. God saved him. Sometimes you won't have a night of shelter. Worrying about God. Refusing to get in the car with his wife when they find the Christmas. Don't think I'm crazy. Don't think I'm a fool. There's a lot of people to my ears because they don't want me to say these things. Me trying to hold it to his name. How does that pay? For statements he could call a Jew. No, we'll do it for the other professionals. But my leader wouldn't operate heaven and earth. I did. I did. No one else ever said what I said. No one else ever ever had to say it. I like jeans. And I like jeans with a chunk of bacon put in them and cooked. I don't want jeans cooked in water. Why? I want a hunk of bacon yep, no. A nice leg. Quicking up a silk. I tend to have jeans cooked in water. On my head. The toenails on my feet. What I'm equipping right now is the greatest thing for Christ. There is nothing beyond. Do you know this way to me? Gift. Little gift people talk. If I'm alone in darkness there's silence of blessing. But when the sun comes up the light on looks modest. Great gift in the Bible looks small when he comes up. I believe this. I believe this. It's the best thing for the physically. Paul said in his top of the life what now is. Now everybody's better off physically for serving God. They're better off mentally. You've got more sense. You've got more sense for serving God. Well, I got my well. What? Some of them never had the phone below. Qualifier. He said I don't want the nervous people. The Holy Ghost. So do I. Him to found them. But where would the poor soul be if it didn't have the Holy Ghost? Where would they be? Like in this state. I visited one. I visited one. Do we have about five minutes? She's too proud. I won't tell. Well, that's prominent. Man's life. He's taught the blessing. Not a good. I don't need sound. She was too proud to humble herself. She thought she knew it all. That's right. That's right. We deserve panic in the universe. You're better off physically. You're better off mentally. You're better off. Nothing to distrust me. If you say what I could have been. One son of. Oh, I've wasted my time. Thank you. A priest. I'm a waste of time. Thank you. Wasting his time. He's not a priest enough. Brother wants to hear him. Waste his time. He hasn't done it. Waste. He's here. You have nothing to give. Talk about a waste of time. You're going to pay. What? You're going to pay. Makes me sick. You're better off this afternoon. They dug me out. I'm a sinner.