In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the power and importance of the word of God as the only instrument of judgment. He highlights the challenge of finding a saint who is too far away to hear from heaven, and how the word of God is the only way to reach them. The preacher also discusses how Jesus Christ broke free from the restrictions of conventional religion and marched beyond its boundaries to keep humanity free. He emphasizes the need for believers to take responsibility for their actions, including making amends for wrongs committed, and emphasizes the importance of being unwavering in seeking God's will and pressing our claims in faith.

Reading tonight from the 6th chapter of the book of Isaiah. The 6th chapter of the book of Isaiah, beginning with verse number 1. Isaiah chapter 6, verse 1, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphim. Each one had six wings, and with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the post of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips. And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphim unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from off the altar. And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this has touched thy lips, and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. I'm going to preach tonight on the subject what it means to pray through and what it takes to pray through. I pray that God will help me. You know, in this age, there's been a connotation of a lot of terms. Now, when we talk about praying through, in the modern thought, it doesn't mean the same as Sister Williams back here and some of the others meant when they talk about praying through. When you talk about peace, the Communists mean one thing, and we Americans mean something else. And there's been a lot of changes of terms. Doesn't necessarily mean that God changed, but the terminology, the meaning of the terminology has changed. And when you talk about praying through in this age of easy-believerism, you have a lot of nonsense of saying it's done, and it's done. A lot of silly folks say to you that if you ask for anything over once, then you're asking the second time in unbelief. I tell you, if you don't pray the second time, if you didn't get it the first time, you're sure acting in unbelief. It's an unbeliever that won't go back to that altar and lay hold of God till he gets an answer. To pray through simply means that we lay hold of God and don't turn loose until God has given an answer, until there's an assurance in our heart that the thing that we're petitioning for is about to take place. Now, that kind of praying has all but been lost in among the great Pentecostal church. I met an old man one time. He was above 80 years old. He grew up. All of his life he had spent around the Pentecostal crowd, never have been saved. I don't know how that can happen, but yet it happens. A rare human being that spend his life among the place where heaven is open and the presence of God is poured out and yet never get into it. That old man said to me, there was a time when I could recognize a Pentecostal believer anywhere. I said, how's that by the way they dressed? And he said, oh, no, sir. Back there in the beginning, everybody dressed decently. You couldn't tell any difference too much in how the average lady dressed that wasn't saved and the one that was saved. You'd have to go somewhere in a red light district to find folks that didn't dress modestly. I said, then how could you tell? He said, well, always the toe of their shoes were wrinkled up from prayer. Don't you what the God that we were so marked today. Amen. That they could recognize us that our shoes were wrinkled from kneeling in prayer. Amen. To pray through. I believe we have here in the sixth chapter of the book of Isaiah, just that. Here's a young man called to be a preacher. Many times referred to as the silver-tongued orator of the Old Testament. But yet there's something got between him and God. He's got an uncle, that's a king. And the scripture says that in the year that King Uzziah died, that Isaiah saw the Lord. That is, he prayed through. Thank God when the idol was cut out of the way, then the man of God prayed through. Now, I don't know how long it took him to pray through. I don't know how long it'll take you to pray through. I want to tell you tonight you can. Thank God you can touch God. I believe the greatest truth that ever gripped my heart was this. That any man, any woman that really wants to touch God can touch God. Thank God we can pray through, folks. I said we can pray through. We can touch God. Young people, you can know that God's real. You can know God's real. This young man, the Bible said that in the year that his uncle died, that he saw the Lord. I can just see that young preacher heading for the temple on a Monday morning. And the rabbi says to him, where are you going, son? And he said, I'm going to church. Well, what are you going to church? It's not Saturday. There's not anything going on over there today. And the young man said, I'm going to pray through. I'm going over there and talk to God. I'm going to find out. And the rabbi said, what do you mean pray through? Well, all of my life I've heard you tell the story about how God rolled back the waters of the Red Sea, fed the people with manna, parted the waters of Jordan, kicked down the walls of Jericho. That's been a thrilling story. But it all happened yesterday. And I believe Isaiah said to that rabbi, I'm glad for what God done yesterday, but I live now. And if there's a God, I'm going to know it. Let me tell you some folks, I'm glad for what he'd done for Mary Magdalene. I'm glad for every miracle of the Bible. But I live in 1975. I want to know God tonight. I want to know God tonight. I want to know that He's real now. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Oh, that old preacher said to him, now, I don't want you to be disappointed. He said, don't worry. Don't worry, Padre. I'm not going to be disappointed. I'm going to find God real quick. I'm going to find out. If there's a God, if He's real, I'm going to know Him when I come out of that temple. If there's really a God, and that God can do all that you say He can do, then he said, I'm going to know Him when I come out of that temple. And if there isn't one, then I'm going to quit the business and get on with something else. Let me tell you something, folks. I wouldn't spend five minutes of my life in religion. I'm not interested. I'm interested in God Almighty. Thank God. Listen to me. This Bible said, let the God that answers by fire, let Him be God. There's a God in heaven. He answers prayer. If the church will take time to pray. Oh, he said, no, sir. I'll not be disappointed. I don't think that's a bad place to come to. Let me tell you, dissatisfaction is the greatest place a church can come to. Amen. That place of dissatisfaction where it's something in your heart says, I want to know God. I want to know God. I want to find Him real. I believe He's real. I don't care how difficult the situation, how dark the night. God is bigger than every problem. And every human being alive has the privilege to approach the throne of grace. And if you'll set your heart that it doesn't make any difference how long it takes, you're going to find God. I can tell you tonight that you're going to stand up one day with a victory like you never dreamed possible. Thank God, he said. If there's a God, I'm going to find Him. Oh, listen, you know, some time ago, God spoke to my heart in prayer and I just impressed. The Holy Spirit seemed to say to me, you're making, your propaganda is too cheap. Your propaganda is too cheap. You're afraid you're going to make me bigger than I am. This has been the big problem. Why, we've got to apologize for everything we do, folks. When we go to preach, we're so afraid that we're going to get out of bounds. I know some folks have over-exaggerated themselves, but God said to me, when you've used up all adjectives and your mind has wandered to the twilight zone, I'm still bigger than anything you can imagine. Ask, how big? Thank God. You can never make God bigger than He is, folks. You hear me? I said, you can never make God bigger than He is. We was riding on a plane, my wife and I, right after God had spoke this to my heart. I read in the flight magazine of the Delta airline where they found a new star, 10 billion, think about it, Brother Jones, 10 billion light years away. That's where they said that star was. I said to my wife, I said, do you have any idea how tall that is? She said, no. I said, well, light travels at 186,000 miles plus a second. Now, I said, if you can tell me how many seconds there are in 10 billion years, multiplied by 186,000, I said, I'll tell you something, I'll tell you how tall that star is. But I said, when you get through, I'll tell you what Job said. Thank God. He said, God's taller than the stars. Hallelujah. God's taller than the stars. It's impossible to make God bigger than He is. Let me tell you something, folks. When you set your heart to find God, don't be afraid that you're going to find Him or make your estimate too big. You may be disappointed in a man, and you may be disappointed in a church, but you'll never be disappointed in what you find in God. Isaiah said, I'm going to find God. I don't know how long it took him. I don't know how long he prayed. I don't know how many days he stayed in that temple. But there come a time when the prophet said, I saw the Lord. Thank God. That's the first thing it means to pray through. This poor, sad, sick generation, if there's one thing on this earth it needs, it needs to see God. I said, it needs to see God. There's been so much unbelief preached from the pulpit of God. I said, so much unbelief, so much said that God can't or God won't do. God's been reduced to something about the size of a man's mind. Listen, if there's one thing on this earth that the church needs, it's a new revelation of God. Every revival that's ever come to this earth has come with a fresh revelation of Jesus Christ. Every time a man prayed through, he saw Christ. Thank God. That's the first fallout of praying through, mister. He said, I saw the Lord high and lifted up and his train filled the temple. But it's progressive. I said, it's progressive. Anytime the revelation stops, the revival stops. God is bigger than our theology. God's bigger than our imagination, bigger than our organization. Anytime we codify our belief, put a period behind it, we're lost, mister, and revival is stopped. Every revival ever come in this world has been lost. Every revival has been lost whenever men codified their belief and said everything beyond what we're saying is heresy. That's the reason they kicked our forefathers out. We believe further than they did. Amen. I preached one time, I believe over at the Eastern camp on the subject marching off the map. Alexander the Great had said, when it got to the river Euphrates, those folks that give them a charge to read the maps said, we can't go any further, General, because we'll run out of map. And the General give the command to march across the river anyway. His army panicked. But the great General marched off in it, and the soldiers followed him, and they found the riches of Egypt. When Jesus Christ come to this earth, a man was restricted to a 50-foot or a 50-yard walk on a Saturday, couldn't eat with hands unwashed. He could never pluck corn on a Sunday. The rules had stitched him in. But let me tell you, Jesus stepped out of the philosophy of conventional religion, stepped across the line of it all, thank God, and marched out and set humanity free. They said, you can't pluck corn on a Saturday. He said, I am Saturday, thank God. They said to him a thousand things, but he marched off the map, thank God. He dared go beyond the boundaries of conventional religion, and like Alexander the Great, found the riches of the grace of God. Let me tell you something, church. To see God is to see a progressiveness, to see the unfolding of the greatness of God. And whenever that happens, whenever it stops, revival is over with. I said revival is over with when revival is lost, when a peer is put behind it, and it's regained by what religion terms as rebels that refuse to be shackled by the mere boundaries of religion. I used to preach that Moses was backslid for 40 years. But I learned better, mister. God kept him out there. There ain't never been a slave deliver a slave. He didn't want him to have the mentality of a slave. He moved him from that place and put him out there by himself. When he got ready to deliver him, he wasn't steeped in the unbelief of that religious crowd that had fed on the leeks and the garlics of Egypt. It's always. First time I ever met Abraham, he's 75 years old, old enough to be drawing his Social Security, got his pack on his back, got the most beautiful wife in the east, and looking for a country that he didn't even know where it's at. What? He's 75 years old, and he's on a stretch for a country that he's never seen. The last time I saw him, mister, he owned a ranch 100 miles wide and 400 miles long, and he's looking for a city. Thank God. Oh, yes, sir, mister. That's the only way revival stays, is when always the revelation of God enlarges. It's bigger to seek God. I said to seek God is the first fallout of praying through, and if there's anything this poor sick generation needs denied is to catch a glimpse of God. I said to catch a glimpse of God. At first he said, I saw the Lord high and lifted up his train filled the temple. Then he said, His glory has filled the whole earth. And then the doorpost started to jump around. Thank God. That's a lot of folks get nervous when we go to dancing. I'll tell you, if these old pillars begin to dance out here, thank God you can know we're in a revival meeting. Oh, hallelujah. Oh, yes, sir. It means to seek God, but then when a man sees God, he immediately sees himself. Revival doesn't come with a miracle. If it did, America would be saved 100% tonight. Miracles and the presence of God turn man's attention toward God. When a man sees God, then he ought to see himself. Isaiah prayed through the first thing he saw was the Lord. Now in this generation, every time God does something, move a little, work a miracle, we feel like that testifying that everything's all right. That then one thing we've got to do, that God has approved everything we're doing by the working of a miracle. But that isn't so, mister. That isn't so at all. When God intervenes in the affairs of man, when Isaiah saw the Lord, when the miracle of his presence took place, the next thing that happened was Isaiah said, I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among that kind of a people. No man can see God. I'll tell you that holier-than-thou attitude that gripped the church in our time would disappear overnight if we saw God. Oh, listen, many of us, we got too high a thought of ourselves. Amen. Our super-spiritual attitudes, amen, has broke the heart of God. Let us get a real glimpse of the Almighty. Let us seek God, and there'll come a cry from our hearts, from the saintliest one among us, that I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among the same kind of a people. Let me tell you something, folks. Revival comes in a new dedication to God, and that dedication comes when a man has prayed through to the point that he sees God. As long as it's just a little religion, as long as it's just a Sunday affair, as long as we have sounded our conscience to think that all there is required of us is to go to church once in a while, and to pay our tithe, and to live about halfway decent, then we'll never get anywhere. But when the church prays through, and God shows up at church, then our hearts are exposed for what they are. There'll never be a revival until the church repents. I know there's a charismatic movement on, and a move of the Spirit. There's no real revival, mister. All the conditions are getting right, but we haven't repented. Our prayerlessness has cursed us, amen, our lack of spirituality. The nation sinks in a moral crisis that scares and frightens the heart of the people that Revival changes things. Oh, let me tell you something. It takes more than getting down here and somebody giving you a few little words and tongues to bring a revival. Yes, sir. It takes more than somebody exercising a gift here and there. We've tried to produce a revival in a thousand ways. I'm trying to produce it through the gifts. You can't produce a revival with the gifts. The gifts are operating in the heart. There's already a revival in that heart. It's a working of the Holy Ghost. You can't produce a revival by operation of gifts. I was with a dear brother on a vacation just traveling. I stopped in one of our churches on a Sunday morning. A friend of mine had a $1,700 note due, and he said, I've got to pay it tomorrow. He got up there and prophesied for 10 minutes to them people about giving. When he got through, he got about $95. We went home to eat dinner. I stayed in his house. I said, dear brother, you can't prophesy that money in. God never intended that at all. Amen. That isn't the way it comes. I said, get up there and tell the folks, I want 17 people here tonight to give me $100. The church has got to pay its bills. You can't do one way what God ordained another. He said to me, you know so much about it, you do it tonight. Sure wish I'd have kept my mouth shut. But I raised the $1,700. Some of them folks wasn't too happy, but we had to pay a bill. We paid the bill. What I'm saying is, we try to hide behind some things. Let me tell you, you don't have a revival by prophesying. You have a revival by getting your heart right. Amen. By seeing ourselves, by old-fashioned repentance, by going one to another and saying, sir, I've done you wrong. I've talked about you. Pastor, I haven't paid my tithes, but I won't catch them up. Amen. Going one across, back and forth. I was in San Antonio, Texas in a revival meeting. Amen. And when I went there, it's been a great revival church, but it's dead now. It's gone. Only 40 people attended services on a Sunday. One time was a real revival church of that great city. Glad Tidings Assembly of God Church. An old friend of mine, Brother Jim Lamb was its pastor. He said to me, when we got there on a Saturday, going to start on a Sunday morning, he said, last Sunday, I just laid down on the altar and told the saints to gather around that the devil had the outfit anyway. I went there on a Sunday morning. The roof had leaked. Nobody had cleaned the church. You could see the neglect, the loss of revival had brought a disgraceful look about the church. I preached on a Sunday morning, and I preached so hard my wife got alarmed. I don't know. I just preached what he'd give me. And she said, Daddy, that's some way to start a meeting. I said, I know it. I know. I know. But I did the only thing I knew. I come back Sunday night, and I preached again the same way. Long about Wednesday, she said to me, why don't you preach something else? Pour a little oil in. Help them. I said, I can't say anything else. I preached, and it looked like a splinter of those pews. There wasn't but 40 of them. They'd come every night. They wouldn't miss anything. One fellow told me that Brother Bill Graham, that is our superintendent, had held a meeting in that church, and one of the fellows whipped him with a rubber hose after the meeting one night. Every time I'd get out, I'd look all the way. Amen. See if anybody's out there with a rubber hose. Nobody whipped me, and I kept preaching. Come Saturday night, it'd been our week. Those 40 folks, just like a bunch of owls, no move. You couldn't get them to come to an altar. They didn't do anything. Just sat there. When I'd get through preaching, I'd leave. I told my wife, I ought to leave myself, but I couldn't. And I preached Saturday night. On the way home, it's communion service the next morning. My wife said, honey, I hope you have a better message on a Sunday morning. I said, I ain't been preaching good. Amen. Or she said, you've been saying real good what you're saying. You've been saying it real good. But said, my gracious, there's nothing. Not a rabbit ever jumped up that you haven't shot at somewhere or another. And said, I hope you can just kind of help them. Well, I woke up four o'clock Sunday morning. Stay in the pastor's house. And I said to her, I said, tell him I won't be eating any breakfast. I'm going to dress and go to church. I'll meet you there. I went down there and prayed, God, give me a good communion message. All I ever got was 1 Peter 4, 17. Judgment must begin at the house of God. Oh, brother. Amen. That's the only text I could get a hold of. And so when he gave it to me, he gave it to me about 10 minutes after 11. And I got through about 25 after 12. I preached an hour and 15 minutes. I couldn't believe all that I was saying, brother. I just couldn't believe it. I preached that God's only instrument of judgment is the Word of God. And brother, pastor, the hardest job that any of us have got is to find that saint that's a good person, but too far away to hear from heaven. And the only way I've got to find him is the Word of God. I said that morning to him. I said, every time you hear this Word preached under the anointing of the Holy Ghost, you have been judged by the Word. You may be not guilty, but you've been judged anyhow. I preached. I preached for an hour and 15 minutes. I don't know. Humor moved. The preacher told me, when you get through, just call them in for the communion. I closed the book, and I said, folks, the pastor says it's communion morning. Let's come have communion. Not a sound, brother. I mean, it's a frightening thing to look at. I said, you folks hear me? The pastor said it's communion service, and you come on, and we're going to take communion together, dead silent. Brother, you talk about old stone face. That's 40 folks are looking at me. I don't know whether they're mad. I don't know what's happening. There ain't nobody moving. So I turned around, and the pastor's been sitting in a chair behind me, but he ain't no longer sitting in that chair. He's out of it and got his head under it, and he's going, ooh. I never heard a man groan like he's groaning, brother. I got down there by him. I said, Jim. Oh, Jim went to heaven last year. Great man. I said, brother Jim, I don't know what to do with these folks. What's the matter with them? They won't come to communion. He looked up at me. Ooh. I said, what's the matter with them, Jim? He said, my God, son, you've killed every one of them. You have killed every one of them. I said, what are you going to do? He said, I ain't going to do nothing but stay under this chair and groan. That's all. Amen. I ain't getting up. I ain't doing nothing. I got back up in that pulpit. I don't know what to do. They won't nobody do nothing. But all of a sudden, a man way in the back. I'll have to go to hell to hear such a scream. That man come down that aisle. He ran to where that altar was and threw nine $10 bills at that preacher and said, I told God I'd starve you to death. And he fell, hit that floor. I've never heard such a groan. And it broke, folks. My God, they jumped up. Women went across the church. Said, oh, I've called you animals. I've hated you. I'm sitting in the church with you. They came to the pastor. Over $500 worth of tithes was put there. They'd come together to starve the preacher to death. Amen. Three girls would sing every night during the revival. All three of them in love with the same old unsaved boy. Man, they prayed through, threw him out. Thank God they repented everywhere. It was 2 o'clock before we got out of church. 2 o'clock before we got out of church. Let me tell you something, folks. I'm talking about praying through. We came back to church that night on a Sunday night. Not a spot on the radio. Not an ad in the paper. That old glad tidings church was full of people. And as the cloud came down, the only time I ever saw it in my life, it came down just outside, out of the reach of a man. I don't know how many got the baptism. But the glory rolled in that church, brother. I mean the glory rolled in that church. I'm talking about praying through and seeing our hearts see God and see ourselves. We had a revival that week. God, we had a revival. Amen. But it couldn't come until that people could see themselves. Me and the preacher got out on a Monday morning in a prayer meeting. The phone rang. He went back there and picked it up. And it was a Roman Catholic family. They have four doors down. And she said to him, preacher, what in the world is happening? That's the first time in four years I heard anything out of that outfit. Amen. Last night, first time in four years they'd heard anything out of them. Amen. But revival come. I said revival come. When we pray through, number one, we see God. Number two, we see ourselves. And when we see ourselves, there comes that consecration. And there, mister, is where the victory. Amen. When old brother Jacob, after 20 years of living over the wrong country, worked all him years for his wives, one day there come a move of God on his heart. The Holy Spirit said, it's time to go home, Jake. Amen. He began to gather up his family, his cows, camels, all of his goods, and getting ready to go back home. Let me tell you something, folks. I believe there's something echoing in the heart of the church tonight. We're in the wrong country. I said we're in the wrong country. We're about to go home. God's saying to us, it's time to get out. It's time to go back. We've been here a long time. And told the folks that, now you take them over there and tell Esau I want to be a friend with him. I didn't know where to get along with the devil, folks. No, no. We've cut out everything we've got. We've told the devil, if you'll leave us alone, we'll shout in the basement. Amen. We'll cut out a lot of this tongue talking. We'll knock our winds tonight. We'll have a Vesper service. We're going to have one of them sometime out here. Now, I want brother Cookman to tell me what that is. That's wonderful for WMC, our missionettes, but the church is having that kind of stuff all over. I've wondered what a Vesper service is anyway. I was glad he mentioned that the other night because I've run into that thing so much on a Sunday night. The church not having an old-fashioned Holy Ghost devil-chasing revival service, having a Vesper service. Amen. The devil crowding them in a corner, and they said to the devil, we'll give you our cows. He sent his camels. He sent his goats. But the devil kept on coming. I'm telling you, folks, there's only one language the devil understands. You've got to hit him if he ever goes away. You've got to resist him. The church has got to stand up. You can't appease the devil. Old Jake come that last night. Tomorrow, Esau's going to come. There comes a time, brother, when you've got to face reality. You can put the creditor off so long, but after a while, you've got to talk to him. I know old brother Jacob said to his mama, said to his wife, brother, he said, you take the kids on across the creek. I'm going to stay over here tonight. I can hear that oldest boy. When he started over, he said to his mama, said, mama, how come daddy's going to stay over here? And sister Rachel said to him, said, son, your daddy's going to do now what he ought to have done 20 years ago. Amen. He's going to pray through. Thank God he's going to touch God. He's going to do now what ought to happen 20 years ago. And old Jake stayed on that side of the river and began to pray. Wasn't long, because he's wrestling with the Lord. And the Lord says, let me go. I've got to get out of here. And Jacob says, I ain't letting you go till you bless me. And the Lord said to him, tell me your name. Now, I'll tell you a part of praying through is confess what you are. That's the only way it happens. You can't cover nothing up, brother, to confess. Your name is to confess your character. Old Jake knew to tell God what he was, was to tell him that he's a crooked, if they bury him, they'd have to screw him in the ground. Amen. That he's a surplatter. There's nothing good about me. I've cheated. Everything I've got, I beat somebody out of. That's what it means and implies in telling his name. And what God's saying to him, you tell me your name. If you'll confess your sin, I'll forgive your sin. But there is no praying through. If you've done your brother wrong, you're going to your brother. If you've robbed that church of tithes, you're going to give that church. You don't just pick it up, brother. You owe last year's tithes. If you didn't pay them, and there's a 20% interest charge being placed on top of it tonight. There's no such a thing. I know it's an old-fashioned something to preach about restitution. I'm going to tell you the big problem is, we think we can walk out on God and pick up where we want to, but it don't work. If I hurt you, I'm going to have to come tell you. Flesh don't like that. God made it that way. And it's got to be embarrassed. Pretty rough. It won't do it again. It must be awful embarrassing for God to see his children act like some of us act. And so it's embarrassing to us to do what we have to do. I'm here to tell you, folks, if you stole from somebody, you're going to have to go give it back to him. If you owe a debt you haven't paid, you're going to have to go pay it. If you hurt somebody, talked about somebody, it isn't enough to go to that altar and ask God to forgive you. If it's possible, you're going to have to go to those that you've wronged. Don't like that preacher. I know. I know, but God does. I'll tell you that. That's where revival rests, mister. That's where the victory is. That's where praying through is. Then he said to Jacob, what's your name? Finally, he said, well, you're not going to do anything until I tell you. And I'm going to die for doing it. I'm Jacob. That's what I am. I'm no good. I stole every spiritual blessing that I've got. All these cattle I beat my dad-in-law out of. Amen. Everything I've got, I've got through this scheming car of mine. I'm not worthy to be here. And God said to him, you're no longer Jacob. You're Israel. You prevail with God. You're a man of God now. Thank God. There's a changeover. There's a pray-through. The old flesh is withering the next day when he crossed that creek. That old limp in his leg, brother. That old Esau met him. It's Esau bowing. Not Jacob, thank God. It's Esau wanting to make the peace. Let me tell you, the devil knows where he can get in and where he can't. He knows what's what. He knows when you're right and when you're not. I'll tell you, he doesn't attack God. It's when we walk in the flesh. When we live in that world of carnality. When we're life is full of sin. Amen. The devil can't do anything to me. The three weapons of this Bible is the blood, the cross, and the name of the Lord Jesus. The blood is the ground that he secured for me to stand on. I'll stand there, mister. I said, if I'll stand there, then the devil's up against it. The cross is the instrument against my flesh. And the name of Jesus, the devil has to bow. Thank God forever. If we pray through, walk right, has to pray through. Just to have peace in your heart, victory over the devil. That's what it means to pray through. To see God. To see yourself. To rededicate your life. And revival rests in that. But I'm going to tell you, and I'm going to try not to preach all night. What it's going to take for you to pray through. Because I want us to pray on. I think we've made some headway. We haven't gotten to water yet, but we're close. Thank God. I believe the Holy Ghost could come in here like it did in that Presbyterian church and knock us off the pew. Amen. Oh my God. I don't care if he comes through the windows or he comes sideways or backwards. Just so he comes. Thank God. Just so he comes, folks. I want a move of God. My heart. Oh, my heart wants to see this camp so set afire. Such a move of God. Such a stir of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Such a stir of the Holy Spirit that God could be honored and the devil put out of business. That's what it means to pray through. Amen. But I'm going to tell you, it requires something to pray through. Number one, when you get out there to pray, you're going to have to know what you're after is right. You've got to know it's the will of God. Bible says a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. I'm going to tell you, not too much of our praying that isn't the will of God. We analyze it. God wants to save. God wants to heal. God wants to fill with the Holy Ghost. God wants to give a revival. But you can't be half-hearted about it. You can't be. You've got to know it's the will of God. You've got to know that God wants you to have it. Number two, then you must never waver. You must never waver. Thank God if God has made a promise and God wants us to have it, then there must never be a wavering on our part. It doesn't make any difference to know this truth, that I have a right to be here, that I belong to God, and that God will answer prayer, and to know that what I'm after is the will of God. It doesn't make any difference, brother, how dark the night, how big the problem. We can win. You've got to know it's the will of God. You must not waver. And number three, you've got to press your claim, mister. Let me tell you something. There's a little layman down to sleep praying that the church does get nowhere. I've never had my eyes open to this kind of thing until God began to deal with me. And I began to see, here's a woman, her husband's out of job. And she said, oh God, why did my husband lose his job? She's a-hollering around, blaming God. God didn't take the job away, the devil did. Get mad at the devil. Oh God, why is my boy on dope? Well, I'll tell you, God didn't put him on dope. The devil put him on dope. I found out in praying, folks. I said, I found out in praying that it's more than just asking for something. Your faith has got to be against something. It's got to be against something. That faith has got to come against the devil, against the disease, against the problem, and prepare to really become violent. It's got to recognize there's a real devil out there trying to keep me from getting what I want from God. And when I get down, I mean business, mister. That's the price of my claim. Hold it up. Say to God, I'm going to have it before I quit. He got a lot of silly preachers telling you that if you prayed that away, it's unbelief. I had heart trouble for a whole year. I knew I was dying. Heart wasn't beating. Right pain. My mother had angina. She had terrible heart condition. I had the same thing. I went to an old doctor. But I knew I couldn't breathe. Blew my Adam's apple half the time. I'd preach and look like I was going to die. And I lived that away for a year, preaching on the outskirts of Houston. One of the big healing evangelists was in Houston. I went in on his morning service, got in his line. He prayed for me like to die that night, brother. I ain't never been any sicker than I was that night. Next morning, I'm standing right before him again. When I got there, he said, I can't pray for you. I said, how come? He said, I prayed for you yesterday. I said, what's that got to do with it? He said, be unbelief for me to pray for you the second time. Oh, I said to my wife. I said, one of these days, he's going to read the book that he professes to believe. I'm going to have a heart attack when he does. Even have a heart attack when he reads it. I can show you a man in this Bible that prayed seven times for it to rain. It don't make any time difference how long he prayed. How many times he prayed. What counts, brother? It rained. That's all that matters. Jesus one time prayed for a man that's blind. Put his hand on his eyes. And when he opened his eyes up, he said, I see men like trees are walking. Oh, he said, son, they ain't half that big. I'll pray for you again. Amen. And said he saw everything right the second time. Oh, yeah, I'm talking about being violent. Yes, sir. If you're ever going to pray through, your spirit's got to become violent. You've got to lay hold to things. You've got to lay hold to things. There's got to come a time in your life when you say, it's going to happen to me. That's right. I'm going to hold it up. The Bible said pray without ceasing. That doesn't mean that a man prays 24 hours a day. That means every time you get down, you say, God Almighty, I got to have that money for that new church. I've got to have that building. I'm going to reach this town. I've got to have my heart healed. I've got to have my boy saved. Every time you get out, push it up there to the throne of grace and say, devil, get out of my way. God promised me my household. I'm going to have an answer. That little old whining around about praying. Get nowhere, brother. Get violent. God will be as fervent as you are. That's right. If you don't care, God don't care. If it don't mean much to you, it don't mean much to God. But you rap on that door. Amen. God says he's here to get it. Amen. Don't turn loose till it happens. A violent take it by force. He didn't pray for my heart. I left there preaching revival meeting in Edna, Texas. Little old church. The secretary had stole the money. They were going to put a roof on it. They fought. Police had to separate them. Wasn't but 15 people left in it when I got there. And God just took it. We start revival, and I'm telling you folks, God give us revival. I preached there for three weeks, and you couldn't get another human being in that church. Holy Ghost was appalling. He wanted me to go another week, and I said I just can't. He prevailed. I went. Preached another week. Saturday night. Saturday night. I got up in that pulpit. My text, Jesus to conquer. I'm going to preach about that Lord. I've said about 15 words. My lips become numb. Pain hit me there. Went out in both arms. Amen. Lost my vision. Fell out. Had a massive heart attack. They prayed, prayed, prayed. Gotten over into the parsonage finally. Had another one in the night. Laying over on the couch. They prayed. There's a registered nurse there. She fell. Couldn't find any pulse. Said I was dead. I could hear everything they were saying. Couldn't move. My wife wouldn't give up. Just kept on praying. Just kept on praying. Finally God didn't heal me, but He let my heart beat again. And the blood to flow, and I could sit up. And I got up. I'm dead, man. I got no color. And just dead. But you know they said my wife was praying in tongues. But I heard every word she said in English. That's when I learned the miracle of Pentecost, brother. Wasn't it? There's 120 people up there speaking 50 languages. But there's 50 ears out there hearing tongues in their own language. Thank God. The miracle was to hear it. You get 120 people on that platform up there speaking 25 different languages. You couldn't pick out none of them. And I'll tell you one thing. When they went to talking in them tongues, that ear picked it up in every language they had. The Englishman there said, he's telling it in my language. Amen. That's there. He's telling it in my language. But she took me to the farm. And up there on the third night, I had another heart attack in the night. The bed was just as wet, brother, as if you turned a water hydrant on it when I woke up. I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe no further than my Adam's apple. I was paralyzed. It seemed like I couldn't wake my wife. I said, I'm dying. And I said to God, if I can't preach, let me die. Didn't want to be a preacher. Didn't want to be a preacher. But somebody told me today, he said, I think you got the preacher's itch. I said, I've had it for 23 years. Rather preach than do anything on this earth. Brother, you don't come to my church and see every hot and dry stuff up there on a Wednesday. I'm there. I'm going to preach, brother. Oh, they may not want to hear me, but I'm going to preach. Amen. Yes, sir. Thank God He called me to preach. I didn't want to preach, but I'm a preacher. And I said, now, I don't want to live if I can't preach. But somehow survived till the morning. And when my wife woke up and saw me, she knew. Amen. She was horrified. Her folks weren't saved. They said, get him to a hospital. I said, I ain't going to no hospital. I'm through if I go there. He'll tell me I can't never preach again. I might believe him. I'll die right here on this farm. I ain't going to hospital. They like to drove me crazy for two days. Finally, I said to my wife, I want you to take me to town, to the hotel. Oh, she said, I ain't about to take you. You'll die. I'm not going to be responsible for that. I said, then I'll take myself. She said, you can't drive. I said, well, one of us is going to try. I put that precious lady in an awful stretch. She took me to town. Amen. Cried all the way. Registered me in that little old hotel in LaGrange, Texas. And the rooms are all on the second floor. Brother, it would never be more hard for me to climb Kilimanjaro than it was to climb that flight of steps. I like to never got there. I thought I'd die. I couldn't breathe. My poor wife was crying. Amen. She took me finally to that room. And when she got me in, I sat down on the side of the bed. And I said, honey, you go home now. I'm me and God. We're going to have conversation. I'm talking about being violent, brother. God will answer prayer. I'm telling you, if you'll make up your mind. Oh, she said, I can't leave you. I said, you got to leave me. You go on. She closed that door. And about an hour, the porter came. And I told him, I said, now, look, sir, I won't be needing nothing. Nothing. You don't come bother me no more. I need no towels. I don't need anything. Yes, sir. That door wasn't opened again for nine days and nine nights. That door of that hotel wasn't open. I never ate a bite. Fellow told me, he said, that's the worst thing you could do. I said, I look awful healthy, brother. Amen. I'll tell you one thing. May have been the worst, but I'm sure in good shape. Amen. Nine days and nights, I prayed, brother. I prayed. I never slept three hours. I couldn't lay down, because lay down, it did something to me. I had to sit up most times, so I stayed kneeling. When my Bible opened, I started reading in the book of Genesis. I prayed and read. He never said nothing to me in Genesis. He never said nothing to me all the way up to the book of Psalms. Nothing. The heavens are brass. Thousand devil said, they'll find a corpse in here. When you begin to stink, they'll open the door and you'll be dead. And what an awful shock it's going to be. You ought to stayed out there and died on the farm. Amen. You're never going to get anywhere, but I prayed on anyway. On the ninth night, three o'clock in the morning, I'm kneeling to that bed, and I got to the Psalms chapter nine and verse number 10. And I read it. It said, it reads like this. There is it knows thy name, or put their trust in thee, for thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee. I didn't say anything about feeling him, anything about seeing him, but it said God hasn't left a man that'll seek him. No man on this earth ever sought God anymore than I did in those nine days. I read that again. It jumped out. I felt it, brother, the hand went inside of my chest, squeezed that heart. I jumped up, broke every slant in that bed, brother. I mean every slant. I broke them. I run out the hall in my pajamas. A lady come out with a gown. She said, Mr, what's wrong with you? I said, God just healed me. She ran back in, slammed the door, and peeped out. Oh, she said, there's a madman out there. Brother, I'm breathing all the way down to my belt. Oh, that heart is healed. Listen, instantaneously, instantaneously. I went home the next day when I got off that old bus, I caught a bus, rode out that farm when I was walking up that hill. Oh, that lady of mine coming running off that hill. My Lord, she said that he's healed. I said, I'm as well as I've ever been, brother. I'm as well as I've ever been. I'm 53 years old tonight. Amen. I don't take very little sleep. I can get it most anywhere. But when I was 46 years old, the church, by order of the folks that I borrowed money from, had to take a $150,000 whole life policy out on me. 46 years old. I stayed in that Jewish doctor's office for nearly two days before I got my clothes back on. I took them cardiograms running. I took them laying down. I jumped on one foot, then another. And after two days, I got dressed. Old Dr. Blum said to me, he said, you've got the best heart of any 46-year-old I've ever found. I said, doc, it's only 13 years old. Thank God he gave me a new heart. You can pray through, is what I'm telling you. But to do it, you've got to press your claim. You've got to press your claim. You've got to hold it up. And heaven and hell and everybody else has got to know you're being business. That's right, brother. If you can get knocked out, you're going to get knocked out. If you can be sidetracked, you're going to get sidetracked. But if you make up your mind, this is for me, I'm going to have it, thank God just assures you alive. Oh, let me tell you something, young people. Make no mistake about it, there's a God up there. And if you'd really like to know it, set your heart to seek Him. I don't know how long it'll take. I don't know how long it took Isaiah. Took him less than a year, though, because it said in the same year, that Gizi died, he saw the Lord. I'll tell you one thing, I don't care how long it takes. It'll be worth every effort. I don't care how much you have to seek Him. When you find Him, it'll be worthwhile. I'd close, boy, that's the father of my granddaughter, was the first janitor I had, worst one I ever had, Robert. I put him through college doing janitor work. I'd go over to that church and couldn't see him no where paper ever were, church song books ever were. I'd look around, I'd see over that broom leaning up in the corner. You make it around, he's stretched out. I mean, he's gone. But he had something wrong with him. His body would get just like that post. He'd have a stale kind of life, an epileptic. His body would harden up just like that. They took him to the hospital. He stayed that way for two days, barely breathing. Such a stress on his heart, and it enlarged it. And the doctor told his mother that if he can't survive, no more of him, he'll die. One night about 11 o'clock, he was over at the church cleaning up, and I was at home studying. It was on a Saturday night, and the phone rang. And when that phone rang, I picked it up. It was Robert on the other end. He said, Brother Clinton, I'm a dying. And I heard him hit the floor, and the phone hit the floor. I got in that car. I was at that church. We wasn't living about a mile from it then. When I got there, he was in my office. When I stepped in the door, almost panicked. He was dead, looked like, just laying there. I've never seen such a contorted human being. And I just, you know, I knew he was dead. But the first thing that happened, I almost panicked. But the second thing, Holy Ghost hit me. He weighed 180 pounds. I picked him up like a rag doll. I mean, I shook him, Brother. When I come to myself, and he come to his self, I had him up. I said, Demo, you're going to turn him loose. And when I turned him loose, I've never seen a man dance like he danced, Brother. Oh, Lord God, Brother, the devil turned him loose. Hey, he'd been married to my daughter eight years this June. He never had another one, never had another one. Amen, never had another one. I couldn't pick him up. He'd lay on that floor. But I got him up from there. I mean, I'm shaking him like a rag doll. I said, Demo, loose him now. There's a violence about it, Mister. You can pray through. Let me tell you something. If you're tired of being sick, you can get well. If you're tired of the devil pushing you around, you can push him around a while. If you're tired of not being filled with the Holy Ghost, you can get full tonight. If you're tired of that habit, you can get rid of it. You don't have to be defeated. We're not the victim. We're the victor. To pray through is to see God, to see yourself, and to rededicate your life. To do that, Sir, you got to hold on. Press your claim. No matter how dark it looks, sometimes it looks like you're farther away in the answer than when you started. But hold on anyway, because many times God leads the devil out just as far as he'll come, not to show the power of the devil, but to show the power of his Christ when he strikes the blow of victory in your life. Let us stand and worship God. Hallelujah.