In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of walking with God and avoiding backsliding. He highlights three key actions that must be consciously and deliberately done to backslide. Firstly, one must start the day by immersing oneself in the word of God. Secondly, deep and unhurried prayer with God is essential to prevent backsliding. Lastly, the speaker shares a personal experience where he was led to preach from Isaiah 53, emphasizing the power and relevance of this scripture. The sermon encourages listeners to prioritize the Bible and prayer in order to maintain a strong relationship with God and avoid backsliding.

Well, thank you for the word that you shared to us this morning, brother. It was precious. And thank you for the very lovely testimony. I do bless God for each one of you. It has been a wonderful joy to be here, and it's hard to believe that I've only got one more meeting tonight. But I have been very grateful to be part of this fellowship, and just to be part of you and get to know some of you, it's been very precious. Thank you for that. I don't know if this is loud enough, but if it is, forgive me if I drop my voice in my old age, but you perhaps will have to put it a little bit louder. I don't know how many people here have come from far, but I believe there have been people who've travelled up to four hours, and some of them have done that twice, two days in a row. And it's been very thrilling to meet people here who've said these things, and thank you for the sacrifice that so many of you have made to come so far to these meetings. I think quite a lot of them in their own churches today who have been travelling, but bless you for all those of you that have travelled from far. I really appreciate that. My wife and I have received so many letters from America that we can't answer them, and I was sharing with people last night who have written to me and to my wife, who I know I didn't write back to. But I do thank God for the wonderful love of the Christians of America. And I think there are quite a few of you here who receive our newsletter, become conscious of that, who've written to Jenny and asked for the little newsletter that you can pray for us. And I bless God for those of you that do pray for us, with all your hearts as you do. We're conscious of people's prayers from all over. And I do bless the Lord for the many, many people who write. We have hundreds of letters, you know, from America. You must appreciate, I don't know how it's possible that so many people write, but I've said to my wife long ago, I know we'll never be able to keep up this correspondence. So I do thank God for the much fruit. I think Mr. Keniston, Benny Keniston, has had such a vision for Tate to be spread, and I think that's where so many started writing. Other people, too, from the Heartstrife Revival, and also the Men's Conference, and these tapes, and to see the wonderful way God met with people through messages that were brought just once. And then I just left it there, but I didn't realize that God was going to take, especially this charity work, and spread over these tapes all over America and other countries. We've had letters from China, and I don't know how many countries have received these tapes. They've been spreading all over, people who met with God. And I have spoken to a lot of you. It seems you've heard all my messages. So I'll have to go and really work out some new messages. I cannot believe how many people have heard messages I've preached once, and we've just got literally hundreds and hundreds of letters about one particular message. This is spread all over America, and all over Canada, and many other countries. So I do thank God for the tapes and the videos that it seems they use. I don't know too much about videos, but I've seen people spreading those. And I do bless the Lord for all of you who have been praying for me since you've heard these tapes and the messages that I've preached. And a few times I've been to America. It's a wonderful ministry, the tape ministry, and I thank God for all of those of you who've in some ways had those tapes. And God bless you as you spread them also. My wife writes about 50 letters a week, you know, that's the best she can do. And I try, I won't tell you how many I try to write, but I've said to the Lord I just cannot write to all these people. But I do thank you. I've had so many phone calls from America also, and that's something that I really appreciate, is the folks who phone from all over America, all to the other side of the world, to say that somehow they got a tape and that they've met with God. I've been touched how God can use these messages again and again, over and over. I can't tell you how many of your ministers across this country phoned and said, I've lost everything. Everything I ever had is gone for years, and I've so found a walk with God through this message. And I had to phone you just to say thank you. And I, I just want to thank those of you that have spread the tapes, because I know that it wasn't only one church that spread it, and that Bible school of two years ago. But it seems people just take them and spread them on and on and on. And I have become so aware that God just never lets a message once be preached. It goes on and on and on. I do pray for all the fruit of these tapes and all the messages that have been spreading. God will keep it under the blood of Christ. I was conscious through the night that there was deep dealings with God here. And I, I know that it's not easy to stand up and testify and pour your heart out through things. But I believe with all my heart that many of you, as you knelt and sought God as I watched you and saw how the tears were flowing down your eyes, down your cheeks, I knew you were having dealings with God, that between you and God were very sacred. And I believe with all my heart that your lives, by God's grace, as you sought God to change them, will be changed. And I think we need to pray for each other that whatever God has done will be kept under the blood of Christ over these nights, and work out and on and on and on. I know I preach differently. I know I preach a standard that I tremble more than anyone else who listens. But I do thank God that I know the fruit is there through his word, and will never return unto him void. So bless you for letting me be in your pulpit these few days. And I know that it will work out, I have no doubt it will work out, the things you've sorted out with God and asked God to do in your lives. I wonder if I can ask you just to bow for a moment in prayer, please. Father, thank thee for all these dear people, and I know they love thee. From the youngest boys here I see in their eyes, and I ask them, is Christ in your heart? Do you love him? And I do thank thee, Lord, for the love for God from this people that are gathered here. I thank thee for the oneness, and the family atmosphere, and the care, and the compassion, the prayers for each other. But above all for the example of the believers here, and there are so many, so godly, who are an example to the younger, so many of the younger examples, already at their young age. And thank thee, Lord, for such a witness as this building, and this people who gather and love Christ. I can understand, Lord, it must bring great glory to thee in this area, having such a people. O keep them true, Lord, keep them faithful to thee, and keep them winning the world for Christ with their lives more than their words. O bless them now, Lord, and thank thee for these few nights of meetings that thou hast given me this great privilege to be. I know I'm nothing, Lord, thou dost not need to remind me. I know that I am the least of all thy servants, and I marvel at thy grace that thou hast kept me, and allowed me into the purport of God so many times, in so many places. But I do bless thee, Lord, that I can ask thee to wash me now in the blood, fill me with the Holy Spirit, cleanse the atmosphere of this building with the blood of Christ, and hold us under the blood of Christ safe from all the powers of darkness. And come stand now, Lord, in the purport of God with me, and take me up, and speak to the depths of all of our hearts, as only God can speak, in mercy. Take this request, O Lord, and glorify thy name. In Jesus Christ's name we ask these things. Amen. And as we went home that night, there were many of you that started taking the riches that God wants you to have, and applying to your lives, embracing them. And I hope it goes on repercussions through the rest of your lives, in your home especially, until you are wealthy indeed of the things God holds out to you. But in Proverbs chapter 14 and verse 12, we read these words. There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful. Oh my, that's tragic. That's tragic. If you think you're enjoying life, but you're not. But outwardly, you're even trying to convince yourself you're happy with what you're about, with what you're doing. But down in the heart, there's sorrow. It's possible. If a man tells a lie to someone else, it is tragic, but it is lying to himself. You've got to go far to find a more tragic man. A man who can be laughing, but his heart is sorrowing. The end of that mirth is heaviness. It always ends up with heaviness again. Who is he speaking about? The backslider. In heart. So find, so be filled with his own ways. The backslider. In heart. You'll find this word backslider spoken of so many times in the Old Testament that it's tragic. It's tragic how much backsliding went on with the people of God. It's tragic, no matter what God did, how much backsliding came about. And God speaks with grief about the backslider in heart again and again and again through the Old Testament, which was not written for them. It was written for us, this side of Calvary, for God to speak to in his own way. To sow his grief and his dealings with such people. Every verse ever mentioned in the Old Testament was not just for us to know it happened, but for God to speak to our hearts. Nothing was written for history, including these words about the backslider in heart. Those who in laughter can be sorrowful while they're laughing, and everything they do ends up with heaviness. Heaviness, no matter how much they laugh while they're doing it, but they go back to it, and that's the backslider. Tragic. What is a backslider? Oh, the tragedy of the backslider. It's much more difficult for a man who is backslidden to find vital reality with God again. It's much more difficult for a man who is backslidden to ever find vital reality with God again than it is for an unsaved, godless, wicked person to find vital reality with God. That's a staggering thought, but it's true. It is much more difficult for a man who is backslidden to ever find vital reality with God again than it is for an unsaved man in wickedness to find vital reality with God. But this is the greatest shock of all about a backslider. This is the greatest shock of all concerning a backslider. There are three things that have to be done to backslide. There are three things that have to be done consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently to become a backslider. To consciously backslide spiritually, there are three things that have to be done consciously, carefully. You can't just easily backslide. It's not easy to backslide. There's no such a thing as you suddenly find by mistake you're backslidden. You know. You know when you're backsliding. And you have to consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently do three things to consciously backslide spiritually. That's the tragedy of a backslider. That's what makes it so tragic. Firstly, the first of the three things that you must do consciously, carefully, consistently. Firstly, if you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the word of God, you will backslide. And yet, people do it. If you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the word of God, you will backslide. You will backslide. You will backslide. Don't doubt it. If you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the word of God, you will backslide. I went to Bible school about thirty years ago. And in this particular Bible school, the emphasis was very much on the spiritual, not on the academic. The academic was there and revered across our land. But somehow your spiritual walk was all they were concerned of. You got eighty, ninety, a hundred percent results in your examinations that didn't impress anyone. If it didn't work out in your life, they were grieving over you, and you knew it. They wanted to see the results of all this reaching you academically working, or they wouldn't even accept you into their work. So you got the highest marks. Somehow they plunged us into preaching. It was a sort of Bible school that didn't allow you to sit down there and just take all lectures in. From the day you arrive, they put you out and say, now go preach. They had this idea, you know, that the River Jordan comes into the Galilee, and Galilee still stays fresh and life-giving because it flows out. The Dead Sea has everything coming in, but nothing flowing out. That's why it's dead. So you've got to give out. Everything you take in. So right from almost the day we arrived at this Bible school, we were giving out. Thrown into open-air meetings, standing on the street corners. Should have seen a Presbyterian do that. To stand on the street corner was something for me to tremble about. But we were told to preach. We were given opportunity in churches and schools and prisons, anywhere. And I remember, time and again, all these opportunities were given to us. And it was lovely. I preached many, many, many times. Then something happened to me one day at this Bible school. I came to a place where God really had me in a crisis. A crisis where I knew I had to have a personal Calvary. And I was in desperation corner with God. I remember the spot, kneeling before God. When I walk there these days, through that same Bible school, I slow down past that room, because it's sacred ground to me. With what God did, I never, ever recovered from that day to this. Of what God did to me on my knees, when I absolutely surrendered to God with my whole being. Oh, I was saved. I was preaching. But I came to a place here where I had a personal Calvary with God. And God was able to take control of me, and anoint my life. Well, the first time I ever preached, after that moment with God, was a few days later, about three days later. The first time, though I had preached many, many times before, the first time was in a reformatory, I think what you people would call a correctional school, I'm not sure, where they send young boys that are too young to go to prison. Many of them murderers, many of them have done terrible things. So they're too young to go to the prison, but there they put into these reformatories that we call. We had a very, very large one, one of the largest and perhaps the largest in our nation, where boys of terrible backgrounds, of terrible things across their names, were all put together. I think more bad came in those reformatories than any good that could come to them through the years. It was a breeding for a life of criminal activity. But they sent young people to preach who had Christ in their hearts. And here we were from the Bible school, and we were told to go. And I had been going, and had a little group of about ten young fellows, the younger ones. And I arrived there this day, and this fellow turned to me and said, listen, I've got something difficult for you to do today, but I want you to go, not to these little fellows that I've been giving you, I want you to go to this one big cell. All of them, I think, are murderers. They're the elder ones, but the fellow who was supposed to be speaking has not come. You're going to have to go. Now, I said, but I don't think I'm ready for that. I was just a young student at this Bible school, hadn't had all that much experience, and I said, I don't think I'm ready for that, to be honest with you. He said, no, you don't say no to me, young man. You go. God will help you. Well, I trembled as I thought of these fellows. This warder opened this big steel door, and then he shocked me. He shut the door, and was on the other side. I just heard this bang, and heard this echoing of this big steel door, and I looked, and he was the other side. He hadn't come in with me. So I turned around, and there were facing me about sixty boys in a circle, waiting to be preached to by a man who they had been expecting, and they looked at this young fellow coming along, and all they saw was fear. So they started laughing. Terrible when people start laughing, you see, when you preach, you know. I hadn't opened my mouth, and they were laughing at me, roaring with laughter as they saw the fear in my eyes. When that door shut without the warder, I was along with these fellows. Well, I stood there while they were laughing, and I began to try and bring out to them about the gospel of Christ, but they laughed the louder. So I said, listen, there's a hell. How can you laugh at someone who comes to warn you of hell, and judgment of God, who tries to bring you to be saved for eternity? How can you laugh? There's a hell, there's a judgment coming. Don't you know that? Anyway, one of the fellows grabbed with his arm another fellow, and rolled him on the floor, and held him down, and screamed, yeah, he's going to hell. If anybody's going to... they all started laughing as these boys started to romp on the floor now. They were just screaming with laughter. Well, I tried to talk a bit more, and then suddenly, I could never put into words, suddenly I became conscious that Jesus Christ came and stood beside me. I'd never known that before. Suddenly I became conscious of a boldness in my heart, and a compassion. I wasn't, in any way, groaning and weeping over the humility of being laughed at. There was something of a compassion to these boys laughing that I'd never felt in my life before that moment. Suddenly, I saw these boys in their sin, and I began to cry out. I find myself weeping and calling out to them in a way I never knew to speak before in my life. And I wept, but there was something of a consciousness of God that I'd never known, never ever experienced, never thought would ever happen to me. It was like Christ took me up and spoke for the first time through me. I was just aware of God, and I wept as I looked at these boys. Within about five or six minutes of speaking, conscious of God, for the first time conscious of anointing upon my life, I looked out in the whole room of boys. There was not one that was not weeping within minutes. No more laughing. There was a sobbing. There was some that was sobbing so loud that I stopped preaching, and I realized God had come. And then I said these words, those of you who have courage, and it will take you more courage than anything you've done in your life. Those of you that have courage, I want you to come forward and kneel, and in front of all of them, give your life to Christ. It'll cost you in this place to do that, but do it in front of them. Those of you that are weak, with no courage, who are cowards, you won't come to Christ. I know that. But I want any of you that have courage to come to Christ now, in front of everyone. Six boys came forward. The rest sat looking, tears flowing down their eyes, but they wouldn't come. The six boys knelt on their knees. Two of them couldn't pray. They just groaned like they were in agony, sobbing, sobbing in agony of conviction of sin. The others I helped to pray, and those that couldn't pray, I just prayed for them. Well, I went back to the Bible school, and a few days later, the principal of this reformatory contacted our principal of the Bible school, and said there was a young fellow that came here and preached the other day, from your Bible school. And six of the boys responded when he preached, and asked God to save them. And he said, I have never in my life, and I have been here for twenty-something years with reformatory work, I have never ever seen such a transformation as these six boys. These boys are the worst in the whole reformatory that came to God. Somehow the worst, those that feared the most in this whole reformatory, came forward and prayed with that boy, that student. And the transformation in their life is so real, that this whole reformatory has gone into silence. There's a silence full in the whole reformatory. I want you to bring that boy, and I'm giving him the whole reformatory to preach to. Well, I didn't know what happened, but principal came in my room, and I was studying. It wasn't lecture time, he said, get your Bible, you're going to preach. I got my Bible, we went into the car, and he was driving to the reformatory. And he said, this principal is letting you have the whole reformatory, there's hundreds of these boys. Well, I sat there, and I thought for a while, I said, but sir, I don't have a message. So he looks at me, the principal says, that doesn't matter, God will give you one. So we sat in silence, I thought, well, that doesn't sound too helpful to me. I don't have piles of messages, I'm a young student, who hasn't done all that much preaching. Anyway, I didn't know what I was going to preach, when he suddenly arrived there. We got out the car, and we're met by some of the warders, and the principal, and some of the teachers. They stopped all the lessons, they stopped everything of the school. And they made me stand there, and all I had was my Bible. Well, I looked out at these boys, and the same broken heart just suddenly came into my heart, that I'd felt looking at those, I would say, eighty boys, that first time, a few days before. And God said something to me, that I shall never ever forget, turn to Isaiah 53. It's the Holy Spirit in my heart. You don't know what to preach, brother, just turn to Isaiah 53, I guarantee you, God will use it. I turned to Isaiah 53, and I read it. I didn't have a message, I read Isaiah 53. And here and there, I just put a little sentence in, little sentence in here and there, but just, Isaiah 53, a few minutes later, I looked up at these boys, and they were sobbing. I couldn't believe it, when suddenly it was like wailing, going across the whole place. Just Isaiah 53, God whispered to my heart, you don't need a message, my word is all you need. I learned it that day. I learned the power of the word of God, when God anoints his word. You don't need wonderful illustrations. You don't need great homiletical exegesis. You don't need to have training. You just need the word of God, and it needs to be brought in an anointed way. With a heart that's broken for the souls you're speaking to, and suddenly those words become life. Well, hundreds of them responded, literally hundreds. I didn't know what to do, nor did the principal of a Bible school. How do you pray with hundreds of people? We were taught to pray individually, but here were hundreds, even of the staff, even the warders, weeping, sobbing. So I said, all right, let's all kneel, and you pray this after me. And I prayed the sinner's prayer. Well, God helped me to get follow-up, to get Bibles, to get from all the Scripture gift missions, boxes, and I would order and phone, and take along everything I could, to just give to all these boys some form of follow-up while I was still there. Years went by, I'm talking about a number of years, and then God did something peculiar. They started walking up to me in the streets. I'll never forget the first one, this young fellow with his wife, and a baby, and this fellow said to me, are you Keith Daniel? I said, yes. He said, you won't remember me, I was one of those six in the reformatory, of the first that ever came to God, when you preached. And I said, but that's wonderful. And you're out of the reformatory now? Oh, yes. Many of them are out, most of them are out now. And I said, are you still walking with God? He said, yes. I said, did you have your quiet time this morning? He said, yes. I said, you've never backslidden? He said, no, no one backslid. I said, no one? No. Not one backslid of the whole reformatory. Everyone knows that. I'm surprised you don't know. Everybody speaks about it everywhere. Not one single person backslid. Everyone is following God to this day. I said, but can that be true? I haven't been near there for years, all these years and years. Oh, you see, we're inclined to say, if it isn't me, they're not going to make it. We take our eyes off God, who saved them, who knows how to keep them. I had to learn a lot of lessons, you know. I said to him, not one, not one in the whole school backslid. How can you be sure? He said, but everybody knows it. We're all sure. Everybody knows there is not one. I know of not one that backslid. Every one of them is following God, sir. And then he looked at me in my surprise, and he looked surprised at me. He said, do you know why no one backslid? Do you know why not one is known to have backslid of all those hundreds? I said, you tell me. He said, because you stood up, sir, and you cried these words the last meeting before you left. You held up the Bible, and you said, this is your source of survival. This is your source of survival. This, if the devil could keep you from, he would do anything, for this is all he worries about. His greatest priority every day of your life to the day you die would be to somehow to keep you from this book, from soaking yourself in the Word of God as the greatest priority of your life every day. But if you somehow can keep the devil from keeping you from this book, and if every day of your life you soak yourself in this book as your greatest priority every day of your life to the day you die, you will never backslide. You said that, sir, and we believed it. Everyone believed it. And no one backslid. I was blessed, you know. That first fellow was one of then hundreds who came up to me in streets, or phoned me, or walked up in meetings. And everyone said the same, no one's ever backslidden, and they're not going to, sir. Oh, I was blessed by that. I was blessed by that. In that same reformatory, there was another incident that shook my heart. One day they let me into a certain cell, a ward, where there was probably about fifty boys. But they said these boys were very, very problem boys. They had emotional, some of them bordering on mental problems. And they were, the most of them, murderers. Some had killed their fathers. Oh, the terrible things to have heard of what was going on in that particular place that special care was taken to them. But they allowed some of the other boys who had been saved in the full meeting to be there. And I was preaching, and there was this young fellow, he was a very short fellow for his age. But he began to weep. He began to weep so loud that I tried to go on preaching, but in the end I knew I couldn't. He was sobbing, he was in pain. It was like he was in pain, like it was inflicting pain upon him to carry on preaching. I had to stop. He was groaning and weeping. So I sat him down, and I started to speak to him. And I found that he didn't understand one word of English. He spoke what we curl Africans, and had come from a part of the country where there was no English heard. And I said to this other young fellow there who was saved, well ask him why was he weeping if he couldn't understand anything I was preaching. And so this fellow asked him, and this boy said, that's why I'm weeping. I don't know English. I can't understand English. I don't know anything. I don't know how to speak one word in English properly, he says. But every single word this man was preaching in English, I understood it as it was my own language. And he said, I knew it's God speaking to me. That's why I'm weeping. I knew God was speaking to me. Every word. Oh brother, I don't know what you understand about tongues. I think that's about the closest I've come to understand what tongues is. I don't understand a lot of other things. I wasn't speaking in another language. I was speaking in my language. And this boy understood in his own language every single word as if it was his language, and he knew it was another language being spoken. Oh God knows how to reach a heart that's in desperate darkness. He knows what to do. Even if it's another language being preached to him. Well this boy came to Christ. He was the only one in that meeting that came to Christ. He gave himself to God by the help of this other African boy that had been saved, that was there to help him. Well I gave him follow-up. The first thing I gave him was a nice Bible that I had my hands on. And I told him, now soak yourself in the book now. Just make sure. Burn your bridges behind you now. Get on your knees. Open the Bible. Doesn't matter what the cost. Let them know you've made your stand for God here. Well they phoned me about a week later. And the principal led me down into this room and said, this boy needs to see you and you need someone to help you to interpret. And there sat this boy who couldn't understand English. The last time I'd seen him I'd given him a Bible. And his face was bleeding. And his body. And he was sitting there silently weeping all alone in that room. And I sat with him with his other boy, who came with me to interpret. And I said, what happened to him? Well, he did what you said, sir. He got on his knees with the Bible. And that's the last thing he should have done. Oh, I wish I had more wisdom those days, you know. I used to make mistakes. Telling them to go and burn the bridge behind them. Make their stand openly. I was wrong. I was wrong there. Well, this boy, it seems they had beaten, they kicked him. They kicked him as he was kneeling in his stomach. And they kicked him on the floor. They hurt him so badly it was terrible. They took the Bible and ripped it to pieces and threw it around the room like a ball. Throwing it to each other and ripping it as he tried to stop them, weeping. Then they punched him down and kicked him again. Well, I looked at this boy and I said, well, what are we going to do now? He says, I want another Bible, sir. Can you believe that? That's all he wanted. I want another Bible. So I looked at him and I said, all right, I'll get you a Bible. I went and got him a Bible. And then I said, you know, I don't think it's too wise to get on your knees again with the Bible in front of you. Maybe you need to get under the blanket and take a torch. But don't invite persecution. I don't want to come and see you like this again. Somehow, don't bring it on you anymore. Try and do it without inviting persecution. You don't need to do that to prove you're a Christian. Well, you know what the boy did? He went into the bathroom, into the toilet. You and I might think that's a stranger's place, but he spent hours in the toilet with the Word of God. It was his only place of safety. And he soaked himself in the Word of God. He soaked himself in the Word of God daily. Every moment he could find it was the Word of God. And you know, that boy never backslid. To this day, he walks with God. I can't tell you who he became in my country, between me and him, what God made of him. But that boy never, ever backslid. Nothing could keep him from the Word of God, you see. Nothing could keep him from the Word of God. And he never backslid. He was determined nothing would keep him from soaking himself in the Word of God, no matter what the cost. Now, tell me, what excuse do you give God that you don't soak yourself in the Word of God? The one thing you know you will backslide for if you stop. What kept you from the Word of God? You were never persecuted for having a Bible along with God. What reason do you want to give God as to why you backslid, if it is the reason you backslid? And tell me, nothing would keep him from God, from God's Word. What reason do you want to give God as to why you neglected the Bible? And you knew it's the reason you backslid. What good reason can you give? Nothing would stop him. I want another Bible. He spit with blood on his face. I want another Bible. The Word of God is your source of survival, beloved. Your source of survival. There are three things that have to be done to backslide. Three things that have to be done consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently to become a backslider, to consciously backslide spiritually. Firstly, if you enter into your day, if you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the Word of God, you will backslide. You will backslide. You will backslide. If you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the Word of God, you will backslide. A young fellow of about 20 years of age lay dying with a tumour in the brain. And he called for me. A message got through to me. His name was Richard Dionne. I had known him in my unsaved days, in all our wickedness. He had been there. And now he lay dying. So I made my way to this boy's house. Saved. I was saved. Never seen him since I was saved. His parents wouldn't allow me to see him for three days. I just heard him choking and groaning and crying in pain. It was about two days before he died that I was there when I finally did see him. They led me into his room, and he was sitting up, and he looked so frail, so terribly frail, I could hardly believe it was the same boy. But he wanted to see me. His parents said he has to see me. So I kept coming back until they let me in. And then he said, I heard you've been saved, Keith. And I wanted to hear it from your lips. Tell me how you were saved. I want to hear. So I told him. The tears came down his face as I shared with him how God had saved my soul. And then I said, when were you saved? He said, I always was saved. When I was with you, I looked at him. He said, Keith, I was what you call a backslider. You wouldn't know about that yet. I was backslidden. And believe me, when you're backslidden, you can do evil things—things like Samson did, and David did. Terrible things can happen in a backslider's life, though you once knew God. Oh, I knew I was in wickedness with you, but I was backslidden. And then he said to me, do you know how God spoke to me about my backslidden state? It isn't through this sickness that I got right with God. I was combing my hair one night when I was to meet you. We were going to go to sickness, all the boys. And I held my knee, keeping the door open while I was combing my hair, and the mirror reflected back, looking back into the shelves of the cupboard. And on one of the shelves, as I was combing my hair, I saw through the mirror, there was my Bible. And I looked at it, and why I looked twice was because it was covered with dust. And as I looked at this Bible covered with dust, my heart broke. My heart was broken. I said, oh, oh, look at my Bible. I was convicted, just looking at the dust, this white layer of dust on my Bible. And God said to me, that's why you backslid. That's why you're backslidden from me. You neglected that book. I didn't come out to meet you that night. I didn't leave the home. I began to weep, and took the Bible, taking the dust off, and went on my knees, sobbing, and opened it, and began to soak myself in the Word of God again. And I got right with God that night, and stayed right, righteous and nice. Well, he died. I think it was two days later, but I'm so glad he shared that with me. I treasure that God said to him, that's why you backslide. That's the reason you backslid. You neglected the Bible. Do you know, I saw a man one day stand in the pulpit, and he held out the Bible to the congregation. And he said, this, this, friend, is worthless. I wouldn't have said this too easily years ago, but I have to be honest now. And I'm wanting to be honest here. This can do nothing for you. Don't waste your time with this. It's worthless. I've proved it. And I have to be honest now. Don't waste your time with this. It's meaningless to you. It's a waste of time. It's a waste of time. Well, people were getting uncomfortable, as this man was holding out the Bible, and saying, this is worthless. This can do nothing for you. Don't waste your time with it. Well, then he opened the Bible, and he said, but this, oh, this will make you holy, brother. This will make you walk with God, sister. Tell me, you have a big Bible. Is it open? It's no good having a Bible beside your bed, if it's mostly closed. Is your Bible mostly open, sir? Or mostly closed? How much of your life is this book open? Virtually? Permanently? You can't backslide then. One of the greatest theologians I ever met in the world. You pick up the IVP commentary, you'll find about a third of the most popular evangelical commentary in the world today is written by this man. And he stood with me as he was talking of the love we have for the Word of God, and he opened up his Bible, and he had written in the front of his Bible one sentence. And I tell you, normally if you take the Bible, the beginning, the openings of the Bible, what a man wrote and dared to put in between the covers of this book to add to the words of God and to put something must be very precious to him. The only words this man who was regarded in Oxford University and many others as one of the leading theologians of our day, the only words he had dared or found fit to write in the front of his Bible were these words. Simple, but I never forgot them. Sin will keep me from the Bible, but the Bible will keep me from sin. Sin will keep me from the Bible, but the Bible will keep me from sin. Listen to this. Let it burn in your heart. There are three things that have to be done to backslide. Three things that have to be done consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently to become a backslider. To consciously backslide spiritually. Firstly, if you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the Word of God, you will backslide. You will backslide. You will backslide. Secondly, if you enter into your day without deep, unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you will backslide. Can I repeat it? If you enter into your day without deep, unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you will backslide. You will backslide. God says these words in the Bible, pray without ceasing. That's a staggering statement. How is that possible? How is that accomplished? Why did God call us to such a high standard? Pray without ceasing, God says. I find a verse in the Old Testament that's the equivalent to that verse. Pray without ceasing. I don't think any of you would be able to guess what that verse is. Enoch walked with God. That's the same thing. A man who lives fulfilling what God says in the New Testament to you and I. Enoch walked with God. Do you know what the literal meaning of that is? As you look right into the Hebrew word and look at everything that Hebrew word says and its truth, for our English language is limited sometimes to one word, where there are four or five of the Greek and four at least of the Hebrew words that bring out the full meaning. So we have one word in our translation of what can be applied forward. But the full, without taking any chance, without adding anything to the words, Enoch walked with God. Enoch lived in deep, habitual prayer and communing with God. Habitual. There's something of forming habit here with the discipline of communing with God. It's prayer. Deep communing with God. I wrote a book years ago. This first little thing I wrote and sent it out and found suddenly it was all over our land and other countries. Far further than I thought it ever would go. One of the chapters, and I only wrote the scriptures, it's just scriptures upon scriptures all put together. I'd like you to listen to these few words of this one chapter. Abraham, my friend. Isaiah 41 verse 8. Imagine being called the friend of God. Not just someone who is saved, but you become a friend of God. Do you honestly believe that's not possible? You're his child, so only are you his friend. Who in here does God say, Abraham, my friend? Who does God say that of here? The friend of God. He was called the friend of God. James 2 verse 23. When Abraham was 90 years old, the Lord appeared to Abraham and said, I am the almighty God. Walk before me and be perfect. You know what the literal Hebrew is? Live in habitual fellowship with me. Walk. Live in habitual fellowship with me. There's a discipline here. Be blameless. The word perfect means. Genesis 17 verse 1. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God. Noah was a just man, blameless in this evil generation. He walked in habitual fellowship with God. This is the literal Hebrew. The full meaning of the Hebrew. Habitual fellowshiping with God. Enoch walked with God. Enoch walked in habitual fellowship with God. Again, you can go to any commentary, any Hebrew expounding exposition of any commentary in the world and it will tell you this is the literal meaning. He walked in habitual fellowship with God. Our fellowship is with the Father, with his son Jesus. 1 John 1 verse 3b. If we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie. We do not the truth. 1 John 1 verse 6. He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk even as he walked. 1 John 2 verse 6. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not. No one who abides in him, who lives in communing and habitual fellowship with him deliberately and consciously goes into habitual sin. That's bringing out every part of what the Greek can say. According to the greatest theologians in the world today, who are evangelical. 1 John 3 verse 6. This I say then, walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. Walk and live habitually in communing with God, enabled by the Holy Spirit. And you will not fulfill the cravings and the desires of the human nature. According to the man who wrote most of our commentaries today. Well, most of the most loved commentaries. Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit. Ephesians 6 verse 18. Abide in me, Jesus says. I in you as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in the vine. Vitally united to the vine is what it means that word abide. No more can ye except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in me, I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. Without me, that is severed from me. If you read in the margin, the Hebrew says, cut off from me. Cut off from vital union with me. Cut off from vital union with me is the literal translation. If you take the literal words, you can do nothing. Nothing can be done for you. If a man does not abide in me, he doesn't abide in me to habitual fellowship and prayer in me. He is cast forth as a branch. He is eventually, he finds everything going wrong. Tragedy comes upon your life spiritually. If you abide in me, vitally united in me and to me through habitual prayer and fellowship with me, my words abide in you. You shall ask what you will and shall be done unto you. There is something vital here about abiding in Christ. Enoch walked with God. He lived in habitual, deep communing with God through prayer, enabling him to walk with God. This is the true meaning, the full meaning. We have our country has one man that stands out in our history as our greatest prophet. His name was Andrew Murray. Andrew Murray was revered across the whole world and is to this day as one of the three foremost writers in the Christian world. He is always among the three top writers of all the sales of Christian literature. Andrew Murray is one of the top three for years and years through the ages. His writings are loved by the godly. Andrew Murray of our land. Oh, he was loved, this dear godly man. He was the only man we honestly had a true revival in South Africa through. When he was young and heard from the pulpit as his father read Charles Finney's writings of the Council of Revival here in America, Andrew Murray fell on his face, weeping in front of all those hundreds of ministers in such a way that revival was to break out in our land such as would turn the history of South Africa Oh, the history of our land turned to this one man, Andrew Murray. God was with him in the most remarkable way. And the preachers of America and England, the greatest names, you have their books, all refer to Andrew Murray as the one to whom they sat at his feet. He was so godly when he dared to venture from South Africa to the great conventions of England. For twenty years later, people were saying, godly people, one of your greatest preachers in your history said, it's like going to deadness. For twenty years later, we came. It was like a dead convention after Andrew Murray had preached, for no man brought the presence of God into our midst like that man did. He was revered by the godly of the godly. He still is in the most remarkable way. In our land, he was so revered that I don't know of any president or prime minister that was so revered as a religious man was. After God had used him that thousands and countless thousands across our land had turned to Christ. In the early days of our land, in his old age, he had a pulpit in Cape Town, where I live, the most revered pulpit in our land. I've had privilege of preaching there again and again, trembling knowing this was Andrew Murray's pulpit. But he would walk from that massive church that holds thousands and thousands. And as he walked out of the door onto the street, Adderley Street in Cape Town, the whole street stopped. That didn't happen for a president, sir. In our land, whenever he walked out, in their hundreds, men would just stop, the traffic would stop, people would stop, it's Andrew Murray. Drunk people would stand and take their hat off as he passed, everyone knew it. There was a reverence shown to this man, a reverence such as was shown to no other man in our history. People from overseas who were visiting South Africa would stand and would point, there he is, that's the Andrew Murray the whole world talks of. He so shook the world through his life and his writings and his preaching. One day he was walking down the street from this massive church, and as he walked, the crowds were stopping. Everything became a standstill, there was just this silence as he walked, and the hundreds just came to a standstill. And he was oblivious to it, he didn't seem to notice people would do that. And as he walked, suddenly, with everybody watching, in their hundreds and hundreds, in silence, looking at him with reverence, suddenly he fell. In his old age he fell and went onto his face and his body. His hands didn't protect and he went down into the paving, it was cobblestones, and smashed his face into the ground. In his old age, oh, the people panicked. They ran, in the hundreds, all around, where this man had fallen. The closest to him was an English speaking policeman, a traffic policeman. And he got to him first and lifted him up, slowly, to help him up. Eventually he got him on his feet. There was no one speaking, there was this deathly silence, deathly silence, all just looking. And the policeman said to Andrew Murray, why did you fall, sir? Why have you fallen? Are you sick? Are you faint? Why did you fall? And he held this frail body of this godly man as he asked him the question. And Andrew Murray was reluctant to speak and said, I'm fine now, just leave me, I want to go on, leave me. And the policeman said, no, I cannot leave you, sir, I will not leave you, you will fall again. Why did you fall? Are you ill, sir? Are you faint? Why, I will not let you until you speak to me. Why did you fall, sir? And everybody was waiting in the silence of hundreds of people, all just looking. And Andrew Murray shook the world at what he said. He shook the world at what he said to that policeman. I think the world needs to be reminded of what shook the whole world those days, for that statement spread across the Church of Christ to every nation on earth. Andrew Murray looked in the eyes of this policeman who wouldn't let him go unless he had an answer as to why he fell, and the tears poured down this old man's face, the tears. And he said, the reason I fell, just for a moment, sir, just for a moment, I lost the consciousness of the presence of God. It was such a shock to my being that I fell physically like this. That is why I fell, sir. It was so foreign to him for so long in his life that a moment of losing the consciousness of the presence of God made him collapse, head first. You talk of Enoch walked with God. You ask me, what does that mean? Andrew Murray walked with God. Do you think Enoch was the only man God wanted to pray without ceasing? Do you think prayer without ceasing is unattainable, it needs all explanations? How can we pray without ceasing at our work? How can we pray when we're occupied with other things? Oh, beloved, God doesn't make us confused in our minds. He doesn't hold us guilty of anything. But there's something about your busiest moment that you can be commuting with God. When I'm sitting in a room full of people, I'm more talking to God with all the voices going. I'm more talking to the Lord about what's being said than anybody else I speak to in the room. You don't have to cut yourself off from God in your busiest moment. You can be doing it with God. There's something about the practice of the presence of God, Brother Lawrence says, that enables you in your busiest moment to have the consciousness of the presence of God with you always. But it's a discipline at first and becomes a habit, becomes an habitual state of life. Tell me, this is the university of the school of God. This is the highest attainable level in God's school. But do you honestly believe God doesn't want you to attain what Enoch attained? Do you honestly believe Enoch was needed to be unique and no other man could attain what Andrew Murray attained? When will you ever, will you ever apply your life? And it will cost you, sir. It will cost you. But will you ever apply your life? Will you ever walk with God as Enoch walked with God? It's up to you. It's not up to God. It's up to you. It's your choice. It's a deliberate conscious choice of putting God first, foremost. Entering into the day in a way you cannot walk with God unless you enter into the day. Seeking God in such a way that you don't get up when you're finished with the quiet time and leaving behind. You've only had a quiet time in truth. If you can get up and open the door and as a result of the time with God, it enables you to walk with God, not leaving behind. The quiet time is worthless if it doesn't enable you to get up and enable you to walk with God through the day. You didn't have a quiet time. It has to be the most nurtured, vital thing in life to get you so in touch with God that you stand up to walk with God through the day. And you don't leave Him behind. You're now in touch with Him. You don't stop communing with Him. You walk out the door talking with Him. You walk down the street communing with Him. You sit in the crowd communing with Him. In your busiest moments, you still have thoughts going up to Him and words to Him. It doesn't mean that you aren't full-time speaking, that you're not tenderly in touch with God. Will it ever be of you, sir, lady, that God will ever write against your name what He wants to? What He found He could write against Enoch and Andrew Murray. Will He ever find it of you? Will that ever be said of you, sir? You can. If you strive to attain the university level in the school of God, you can learn to walk with God. You can walk with God. There are three things that have to be done to backslide. Three things that have to be done consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently. Never forget this, not one day of your life. If you forget everything I ever preached this few days, forget them, but don't forget this. There are three things that have to be done consciously, carefully. It is careful you're not doing it by mistake. Deliberately, you know you're doing it. You know you're choosing other things. You know you're filling up your life with other things that will keep you from this. You allow it to happen. You will become a backslider. There are three things that have to be done carefully, consciously, deliberately, to consciously backslide spiritually. Firstly, if you enter into your day, if you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the word of God, you will backslide. If you enter into your day without soaking yourself in the word of God, you will backslide. You will backslide. Secondly, if you enter into your day without deep, unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you will backslide. If you enter into your day without deep, unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you will backslide. You will backslide. And finally, if you enter into your day without being determined to witness to every person you can, you will backslide. If you enter into your day without being determined to witness to every person you can, you will backslide. I won't expound on that. I'll leave that between you and God. Let's stand, please. Father, we don't get right with thee by doing these things in a discipline. But when we are right with thee, we stay right. And it reveals the right with thee by doing these things. But as much as we all long to say that it doesn't need discipline when we are right with God, we soon find out it's the greatest discipline in life. For it seems everything in this world cries out to keep us from these three things daily at many times of our lives. Help us, Lord. Help us to remember these three things, to hold them in our hearts, and to guard that we never, ever, ever enter into our day without being determined to do these three things with all our heart. And I know, God, that if we do that, we will never backslide. We will never, ever backslide. We will eventually, like Enoch, walk with God. And our lives will stagger the world. Keep these words in our heart, Lord. Keep these words burning in our heart as we go through our days till the day we die. Let these words echo daily and confront us daily as we rise from our bed. And help us, help us to have the grace to fulfill them. Now bless us, Lord. We've had much of meetings. And I know, I know, Lord, that there is so much being done in so many hearts here that the devil will never, ever take away these three things. These three things are applied now. Please protect all that has been said in every message. And find it coming back like a vengeance to us, as if we're sitting in a meeting. Years from now, as if we write in the very meeting, the whole message is coming back into our heart as if we write there again. Lord, never let us lose these things. All that was from God's heart, please let it come back. Circumstance, circumstance, in our homes, at our work, when we're confronted with enemies of persecution. Whatever, Lord, bring back, bring back the promises of God to the bruised that read, to the smoking flax. Bring back all the mighty healing promises of God for when we're wounded. Help us to keep that open book, to be healed by the promises. Help us, dear God, through life, to reject what the world thinks makes us rich, and only to embrace what God says makes us wealthy and have true riches. Help us to be so disciplined as to become wealthy in God's eyes in this lifetime. Oh, please do it, Lord, that we will consciously reject anything and everything that would keep us from the true riches, and never be tempted to take up the riches that men think make them rich, men without God. Oh, do it, Lord. Do it. The things we thought of last evening with my dear father's life. Thank you for the memory of my father. Thank you for the example he was to me and to so many. And thank you that I could share his life, though he's gone so many years, to be with God, that his life still speaketh. Oh, I bless thee that I could have shared that last night. And if it was just that he threw down those cigarettes that he smoked sixty a day to make one man say, I'm throwing them down. Thank thee, Lord, that we could have remembered how he threw them down. If it was just the way he wept for souls, in a way, few weep. Not because he was dying, but because he was dying without a soul to sow God. But may God heal him, and make him one of the greatest soul winners our country's ever known. Thank thee we could have remembered it and shared it last night. Thank thee if it makes anyone in this building look at their lives and begin to weep for others, not for themselves. So that God, in his holiness and his obligation to answer their prayers, will take them up and bring the world to God through them. Thank thee for the many other things we looked at, Lord. How he became crucified. How he had a personal Calvary. And how it brought my mother to weep, not just to be stunned by the change of his life. So that she saw someone totally different in the home. If there's any here, Lord, that through that would come to a place of personal Calvary. For last night as they knelt, so many, the most it seems, knelt before God, weeping. God, if it was just to bring that out in their lives. Oh, we bless thee. We bless thee that Christ may be seen in them from now onward. Whatever it was that God spoke, Lord, through these past meetings, let them come back upon us through the rest of our lives with such a vengeance that we will never be able to escape what God said to us, but just fulfill it till our dying day. And this message too, Lord. Oh, please help us. Help us, Lord, to do these three things determinedly, consciously, deliberately, carefully, and not to do determinedly, consciously, deliberately, carefully to not do them. We have the choice, Lord, and we know when we're not doing them. We know when we walk from the home without meeting God. We're so conscious of it, we wouldn't be more conscious if someone hit us with a hammer on the head of what had happened. Help us, Lord. Help us to not neglect the things we heard this day. To throw our lives into them and never to backslide like those boys who were murderers, who never backslid. Never backslid. Not one of them. Because they took to heart the things that were cried out to them from a broken heart. Oh, keep us under the blood now. Keep us deeply under the blood of Jesus, safe from Satan and demons and evil people, and fulfill thy will in our lives as we leave, as we have fellowship over lunch and go to our homes. God, fulfill thy will in our lives and through our lives, over and above that we have asked of thee and wept last night and the other evening for thee to do. God, fulfill it above that we thought thou would ever do. By thy grace, Lord, let things happen so in our hearts that we will receive spontaneously in our lives, without effort, so much of what we trusted God to do, but kept spontaneously because of the things we do do, the quiet time especially. Oh, bless us now. Bless us richly with the presence of Christ as we eat, with the presence of Christ beside us as we leave this place. Help us to start now practicing the presence of God. Help us to start now walking with God. With deep, habitual fellowship and prayer, communion with God until the discipline becomes a habit, until it becomes a way of life, until one moment without it will make us fall on our faces. We're so conscious of God and that can be ours. Help us to strive for it, not to settle until we, like Andrew Murray, like Enoch, walk with God in this world, more than we walk with anyone else or conscious of anyone else in our lives. Help us to find this walk for thy glory. Bless tonight, the last service. We know there are many who have to go back now, who've come from far, but all that can come to this evening, bring and give us a goodly ending, Lord, of this series, with the voice of God penetrating our heart. Take in thy mercy, this weakest of all thy servants, this basest of all thy servants, and in mercy prepare me. Give me a word from the heart of God that will burn forever in all the hearts of thy people who are here tonight. We ask these things in the name of Jesus Christ, God, Saviour, King of kings, Lord of lords, the name that every knee shall bow to and confess that he is Lord. Every tongue shall confess it. O God, we praise thee for Jesus, and we ask all these things in his glorious name, and for his sake. Amen.