In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of simply being in the presence of God rather than constantly striving to do and accomplish. He highlights the wonder and fascination of God's creation, referencing passages from the book of Revelation and Ezekiel. The speaker then discusses the testimony of Jesus, which he describes as the unfolding of God's plan throughout history. He mentions various biblical figures who demonstrated faith and experienced both triumphs and trials. Ultimately, the sermon emphasizes that all things are leading towards the complete leadership of Jesus.

Father, I just thank you, Lord, for Jeff. Tonight, God, we ask you to, again, allow him to center, Father, even in the things, God, that you have given him, Lord God, allow it to, the Word, God, even tonight, to unlock our hearts, Father, to embrace what you're embracing. And, Father, we just ask you, Lord God, to, again, bless our brother, Father, even as he speaks, Father, we just ask, God, that he would, again, hear what you're hearing, God, and say what you're saying. And we say, blessed be the name of the Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you, Mike. It's a real joy to be here with you tonight. It's a real pleasure and a blessing. I was just sitting there, just asking the Lord, besides just these few notes on paper, this is just something for you, and I just sensed so much, and I want to read it. I know you know the scripture. It's basic to a house of prayer out of Song of Songs, and we really love it as individuals. Song of Songs 4.9. You've ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse, you've ravished my heart with one look of your eyes, with one link of your necklace, and we are really used to praying this devotionally over our own hearts, and just loving and delighting in the truth of the fact that we, as individuals, can actually ravish the heart of an uncreated being. But as I was just sitting and worshiping and listening to the Lord, I just felt like he was saying that over you as a house. That this house, this Roseville house of prayer, in your weakness, in your desire, in your hunger, in your longing to see God come and do something here, I just felt like the Lord was just saying to this house, this Roseville house of prayer, looking down and just saying, you ravish my heart, my sister, my bride, you ravish my heart with one glance of your eyes. And I just felt a tremendous download of the pleasure of the Lord's heart over what you're doing here. Just a tremendous download of the pleasure that God receives and takes from his throne. He looks down and he sees this little house of prayer in Roseville, California, and he sees people singing and worshiping and longing and saying, we want more, we want more, we want more. We want to affect the earth from this place, this little house, which is a place of government in the kingdom of God. And I just felt this great pleasure that the Lord has over you. So I just want to bless you and just to say, keep doing what you're doing. The Lord just is delighting so much in you. Song of Songs 210, you know, that he comes leaping over the mountains, skipping over the hills. And then it says that he gazes. He says, I gaze. He's gazing through my lattice. He's looking over my wall. He's peering through my window. And I just have this sense of Jesus gazing through the lattice of our hop, looking through the window, peering over the walls, watching the rhythm and the movement of the heart of this place. And he is so pleased. His heart is so pleased. You've ravished his heart. The word ravish literally means to cause great feelings of emotional pleasure and joy. And that this house is ravishing the heart of Jesus. You're bringing great feelings of joy and pleasure to the heart of the king of kings and the Lord of lords by what you're doing here. And so I just wanted to say that I believe that from the Lord. I want to prophesy that over you because I really believe that is the heart of God over you in this place. And so I consider it an honor and a privilege to be here. We moved to Sacramento in 1993 and we're here for about eight years. Oddly enough, we got the call to move to Sacramento while we were in Kansas City at a conference. And we tried to move to Kansas City about five times before we actually moved there. And this was one of our trips back to Kansas City. We were in a transitional time in ministry and we were thinking, well, maybe this is the time. Maybe we get to move to Kansas City. We were living in Pismo Beach area at the time on the central coast. And everybody says, why would you want to move to Kansas City from Pismo Beach? I still haven't figured that out, but it's just a different ocean. So while we were there, we I had a picture vision or whatever during worship. And I saw this golden dome and there was a vulture on the top of the dome. And an eagle came and attacked the vulture and tore it down. I didn't know. I had no clue. I don't know if I've seen something to do with Islam. I didn't know. I just thought that was odd. And through another course of events, we got hooked up with a leader from this area and ended up moving here. And it wasn't until I moved here, I actually saw the golden dome on the Capitol and said, oh, that's what that was about. And my understanding was that the eagle represented the prophetic, the prophetic intercession. And so it is so awesome to be here knowing that prophetic intercession is tearing down the spirit and the culture of death over Sacramento and replacing it with the presence of the living God. So. So keep doing what you're doing. The only way you can fail is if you give up. Amen. You fall down, you get back up, fall down, you get back up, pray louder, cry out, fall down, get back up. The only way to fail is to quit. And song of songs, a man in love can't quit. Many waters cannot quench floods. Rivers cannot overflow it. So we love Jesus. We fall in love with Jesus. We can't quit. We press in. And that's kind of a little bit of what I want to talk to you about tonight. I want to talk about why we pray in the context of 24-7 house of prayer. And we'll look at Hebrews chapter 11, starting in verse 32. What more shall I say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak, Samson and Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword out of weakness, were made strong, became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of aliens. Women received their dead raised to life again. Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trials of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned. They were sawn in two. They were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted and tormented, of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in the deserts, in the mountains, in dens and caves of the earth. All these having obtained a good testimony through faith did not receive the promise. God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us. Therefore, we also, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. And then Revelations 19.10, which I'm not going to read, but you're probably familiar with it. The angel says, don't worship me, worship God, for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. So I want to talk a little bit about those two scriptures. And I want to develop two thoughts that will be the foundation, basically, for a 24-7 context of prayer. The first is God has a plan and history is going to the completion of that plan. The saints in Hebrews 11 that I read, they were all part of that plan. They all had their place on the wall. They had their portion, their destinies, their prophetic callings, and they fulfilled those. And we, with them, have a prophetic destiny and calling on our lives. God has a plan, it's going somewhere, and we are to go there with him. And then the second aspect, just kind of almost repeating what I just said. From the beginning, God has desired a people who will partner with him in the fulfillment of that plan. It's totally in God's power to do anything that he wants, with us or without us. But from the beginning, he has desired to have a bride, fully in love with him, passionately in love with him, abandoned to him, who will partner with him in the fulfillment of his purposes in the earth. I believe that the most significant thing any human being can do is to lift their voice to God. There is so much significance in the human voice. The fact that God gave us a voice, period, to communicate. The most significant thing that any created being can do is sit before the one who created him and talk to him. You don't have to be highly gifted. You don't have to be rich. You don't have to be poor. You don't have to have influence. You don't have to have any sway. You don't have to have anything but something in your heart that says, You made me, I want to communicate with you. Song of Songs 2.14. Let me see your face. Let me hear your voice. Your face is beautiful. Your voice is sweet. Over and over through the scriptures, there is this emphasis on the human voice as well as the voice of God. Every single believer, the highest calling, I believe, of every single believer, and the greatest point of significance of every single believer, is to be able to lift their voice in prayer to God, to the God who hears. Read through the Psalms. Over and over again, David says, This poor man cried out and the Lord heard him. Lift your voice to the Lord. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Call unto the Lord. Cry out to the Lord. Over and over again, it's this emphasis. And you don't have to be a pastor. You don't have to be a leader. You don't have to be a singer. You don't have to do anything. Every single individual has been given a gift of a place of significance and authority in the presence of God. Simply by lifting their voice. Simply by saying, Jesus. Let's just say that. Just say that with me. Jesus. In fact, let's just worship him for a minute. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. We lift our voice. Jesus. We lift our voice to you. Jesus. Jesus. We say we love you. We say you are worthy. Jesus. We thank you. We worship you. We exalt you. Jesus. Your name. The name above every name. Jesus. We exalt you. We magnify you. Aren't you grateful that you can do that? Aren't you grateful? You can do it in here. You can do it in traffic at 730 in the morning. In fact, that's probably a good time to lift the name of Jesus. Keep our voices occupied in something that's worthy. The highest place of the human spirit is to be before the presence of the Lord in an expression of worship and praise. So there's great significance to the human voice, and God has sought a bride who will partner with him for the fulfillment of his plan through the weakness of prayer. You have this great army of darkness, and the captain of the army of light says, Choose your weapons. And right away we look for the bazookas, and we look for the jet planes, and we look for all these weapons of warfare. And he's going, No, no. Choose your weapon. It's your weak prayer. It's your weak prayer. It's amazing to me that God calls an army of weak prayers to push back an army of darkness. By weakness and weeping and crying out, we conquer. The Scriptures in Hebrews and Revelations both demonstrate these ideas. Hebrews records the highlights of men of faith of the past ending with Jesus. There's a couple of things we can observe about these men and women that are mentioned. Mostly, I want to just say that they were men whose testimony was they were people of prayer, that they were friends of God, that when it was all said and done, whatever they accomplished, whatever they did in their lives, they were known as people who were friends of God. They had an intimate relationship. Their testimony was they knew how to pray. They knew how to be in his presence. And so because of that, there were men and women who changed history. The basis of the expressions of their prayer and faith was rooted in their intimacy and their friendship with God. And in Revelations 19.10, the testimony of Jesus is the prophetic unfolding of the Father's purposes from beginning to end. The testimony of Jesus is not just that he became a man and that he grew up and that he died on a cross and that he raised from the grave and he's sitting at the right hand of the Father. The testimony of Jesus goes back to before the world was created. God had a plan. He brought us into that plan. And his testimony is the gradual and continual unfolding of the purposes of God, which in the end will be to sum up all things in Jesus. We are going somewhere. Where we are going is this man, Christ Jesus, who was the lamb slain from the foundations of the earth, will receive a crown, will receive the kingdoms, will rule in the millennium, and the kings of the earth and all the nations will come and bow down to him. And so that's where this thing is going. It's going to the complete total leadership of Jesus. And you can look that up in 1 Corinthians 15 as well. So from the beginning to the end, things are going somewhere. And the whole presence of John in the book of Revelations is a testimony that God wants partnership in this. If John had not had the revelation, we would not know where this thing was going and we would not know the importance that we play as this thing unfolds. The incense and the bowl are testimony that prayer is a major part of our partnership and has been from the beginning. Now what I want to do with the rest of this time is just look at the backdrop of how this prayer unfolds and what our part of it is. If you want to look at Ephesians chapter 1, this is the divine backdrop that answers the question, Verses 3 through 5. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. Just as he chose us in him, Jesus, before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will. I talked about the testimony of Jesus being the unfolding of history. Verses 3 through 5 is where we get to step into that place. First of all, what we have revealed here is the heart of the Father who has seated us with him in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Now this isn't future tense, this is past tense. We have been seated from the cross. Before the world was created, God saw the cross and he called us to be seated with Christ in heavenly places. Now there's two aspects to this being seated in heavenly places that go to the heart of why we pray. The first aspect has to do with intimacy. He seated us in heavenly places. That means we sit with the Father. We sit with Father God in an intimate place. Isaiah chapter 57 says that God speaks and he says, I am the high and holy God. I dwell in a high and lofty place. And with him who is contrite in spirit and lowly to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the spirit of the contrite. We have this awesome, high, mighty God dwelling in heavenly places who takes us as lowly ones when we turn our hearts to him and seats us next to him and makes us partakers of heavenly things. He brings us into his banqueting table. He seats us next to him. Almighty God who has need of nothing. Almighty God, this burning one who sits on the throne in Revelations 4. This burning God who's consumed with a jealous desire for us. He calls us and he seats us next to him in a place of intimacy. I am constantly amazed at the idea of the uncreated God wanting me. I mean, it just blows me away. It's like, why, you know? I know you probably have never asked that. But I mean, over and over again, I can be in the prayer room and just meditating and looking at this almighty king, this beautiful God. I was looking at Revelations 5 one day, or 4, and I was just meditating through it. And I got to the man on the throne. And I began to look at this man on the throne. And he's burning. It says he's like sardonius and jasper. And so I'm looking these up and the sardonius is like this bright red stone and the jasper is like a translucent clear stone. And so I'm meditating and I know that John can only use words like sardonius and jasper because he's seeing something that human eye cannot describe or compare with anything else. He can't say, oh yeah, it was like a Maserati. He can't do anything like that. He can't say, oh yeah, it was like 25,000 forest fires on fire at one time. He has to just kind of make comparisons. So he sees this God sitting on the throne and he says his presence was like sardonius and jasper. And so I'm thinking, okay, what does that look like? And I'm just praying, I'm walking, I'm meditating. I'm thinking about that. I'm asking God, what is John seeing? What was John seeing? And I just had the impression that if you took an emerald and you held it up and then you put a diamond in front of it, that that diamond would reflect the red brightness of that emerald all over and it would just move all over from the different aspects of the diamond. And I just felt like the Lord was just saying that the man on the throne, that this God on the throne, he's like a consuming, dancing fire. He cannot be contained. He cannot be locked up. He cannot be perfectly described. He's just like this wild, consuming, dancing fire. And I'm just thinking on that and I'm just picturing in my mind this consuming fire. And I'm thinking about Isaiah chapter 33, 5. Who can dwell with the burning God? And I'm thinking of Hebrews chapter 12. Our God is a consuming fire. And I'm just like, whoa. I'm just kind of, okay, all right, how close can I get to the fire? How close can I come? How do I relate to this dancing, burning fire? I'm fascinated by him. I understand a little tiny bit of what Moses must have thought when he was gazing on the burning bush and he's seeing this consuming, fiery God. How close can I get and not get burned? How close do I want to get? You know, all those kinds of things going on. And how do I relate to this dancing, burning fire? And out of all that meditation, the Holy Spirit just spoke this little phrase to me. That in the heart of that dancing, burning, consuming, fiery God is the heart of a father who has longed for intimate fellowship with me since before the earth was created. I mean, I just got undone. I just sat down and I probably wept just 30, 40 minutes just thinking that this beautiful, consuming God in his heart is the heart of a father. He longs for me. He loves me. He wants me. I'm seated in heavenly places. We are, as the body of Christ, seated in heavenly places in intimacy. That's the first aspect. That's what gives us life. You know, people love to go do because we feel there's value in doing and accomplishing. And we undervalue just being. But here we are, sitting in the presence of this living God, and he enjoys us. He enjoys us. He loves us. He seats us with him so that we can know him, experience him, be washed by his fiery love, be captured in our hearts by his fiery beauty, and just be totally caught up in who he is. I was teaching a junior high school class at IHOP. I said, if you ever get bored, just go to Revelations 4 and just even just think about these living beings for a little while, you know, just just meditate on that. These guys that are zooming back and forth, you know, you look at Ezekiel wheels within wheels and they're back and forth and they have four faces and there's fire around them. I mean, just this beautiful fascination of the wonder of this God who created us. And what does he do? He seats us next to him. You know, we're not at the back row. We're not at the back door. We're not just, you know, I mean, this is how I would come in. I would come in if this burning God was up there and the door was back here and this is the wall. I would go. It's pretty awesome. I hope he doesn't see me. I mean, that's what I would do. He's consuming. People get consumed in his presence. He sends us fire and it consumes us. But he says, no, no, no, no. Not against the back wall over here. I seated you with me right here on my throne. Come on, come on, come on. Crawl up in my lap. Lean on me. Intimacy. I want you to know me. I want you to know my heart. I want you to know the workings of my being because I want you to partner with me in the plan that I have and that I'm unfolding in the earth. The second aspect of all that that comes out of the intimacy is partnership in government. Imagine. If you had a little court case going here in Roseville and you were arguing with this judge, you just would not see things your way. And suddenly you get a phone call from the White House and President Bush calls you and he says, hey. I pulled your name out of the hat, you get to sit with me behind my desk today and you get to resolve whatever things you want with any court in the land, with all the authority of the president. And you would just walk into that little courthouse here in Roseville and you just looked at judge and you would just show him this little certificate and you'd say, my course is done, man. It's ruling. It's set. I've got it. And he would yield to you because you were ruling from a greater place of authority. Well, we have been seated with him not only in intimacy, but also in the place where we exercise divine authority in the years through the vehicle of intercession and prayer and crying out. I don't care if it's taking place in Zimbabwe. I don't care if it's taking place in Kansas City. I don't care if it's taking place in India. When I am seated at the right hand of the father in the place of intercession, I am seated in the place of government. I am seated in the place where I share rulership with him, where he has called me to rule, to pray, to move the heavens, to open the windows of heaven, to move angels, to move demons. I am seated in the place of authority. And it's not just because I'm anything, but coming back to the significance of the human voice. You are seated next to Christ in the place of authority to change the history of this earth. You can't go to the nations, not every nation, but you can go to the nations in prayer. You may not ever be able to travel somewhere that's on your heart, but you can travel there in prayer and you can change the atmosphere of that place. You can shift the heavens over that place. You can shift the heavens over Sacramento, over Roseville. And I know all the arguments that we can face, all the human arguments. Well, you know, if the whole church isn't in unity, well, if this isn't right and that's not in place and this thing's not working and everybody's not all doing the same thing at the same time together, probably nothing's going to happen. But I don't believe that. I believe that God hears when people pray. And if there's a group of people who are going after it, who are exercising government from the right hand of the father, crying out night and day for their city, then God's going to answer. God's going to do something. God's going to shift the heavens over that city and he's going to release and bring what he wants to bring into that place. But we're called to partner with him. We're called to step into that place. So we have friendship as sons and daughters. We have friendship as a bride, but we also move from that place of authority. And that's we move from that place of rulership through government of prayer and obedience of praying his burden. We were made for him and we were made for divine partnership in prayer. Now, the heart of the son in this is to give us more of himself and his heart over the nation. It says in first for he chose us in him, in Jesus, before the foundations of the earth. That means that before the world was created, Jesus decided to die on the cross. That means before God created the earth, he desired a bride. He desired a people. He desired a group of people who would passionately love him and partner with him. I don't know what the conversation sounded like. I would love to have been there. But somewhere along the line, God's getting ready to create the earth. And in his heart, he knows that he's going to create man and give him a free will. A man's going to fall. And somewhere in that conversation, Jesus, the son before the foundations of the earth, says, I understand, father. You want them. You love them. You want to save them. You want to redeem them. I understand that there will be a price required to justify them, to bring justice against sin and yet not condemn them. I will pay that price. You can pour the wrath on me that will give them their freedom and bring the justice that you need so they can be forgiven and you can have a people. And all this takes place before the world is even created. I mean, it blows my mind when I think about it. All this takes place before God spoke the world into being. This idea, this plan, he sees us. That's why in Revelation 5, he's called the lamb that was slain from what? From the foundations of the earth. It was not the lamb who was slain in what we would call, you know, 33 A.D. It's the lamb slain from the foundations of the earth. It's the king of kings, the lord of lords, the suffering servant who told the father, I will go. I will die at a place and time. I will give my life to redeem for you, sons and daughters. And the father says to him, I love it. And I will give to you a bride. Jesus delivers to the father, you and I as sons and daughters. The father delivers you and I to Jesus as a bride. And so they have this plan and they invite us into this plan to jump into it and to live in the testimony of Jesus. So from the beginning, God had you in mind to bring about his purposes in this generation through worship, prayer, and fasting. Isn't that amazing? From the beginning of time, God had you in mind. I mean, I think about that. I think about Psalm 139. Psalm 139 around verse 17 says that before any of my days were, God wrote it. Before any of my days came to be, God already had it recorded in the book. And just so I wouldn't look at that and say, oh, man, am I messed up. He adds, and his thoughts towards me continually are good like the sands on the sea. He's thinking good things about me all the time. And he's thinking good things about you. Jeremiah 29, to give you a hope, to give you a future. He's thinking good things. You ravish his heart. You bring pleasure to him, even in your weakness, even when we fail. We say, oh, man, that was so bad, I blew it. And we get back up and we say, OK, Father, forgive me. I'm getting back up. I'm going on. He says, OK, it's done. Come on. I love you. Push delete. It's over. It's done. Let's go. Let's move forward. I love you. From the beginning, God had us in mind to bring about his purposes. I think that is such a total slam against the devil. I mean, I love that. That is such a total slam against the devil. He thinks like he's this mighty angel, like he's got all this power, like he's got everything under his control. And like, what are you going to use to beat me, God? And God says, oh, I've just got these real weak people, but they love me. And when they pray, I'm going to hear them. And I'm going to turn your darkness into light. And I'm going to shove you out. And that's how it's going to go. I mean, that blows me away. It's like the devil's going, yeah, what do you got? You got some big weaponry? Yeah, I have a bride. She's kind of weak, but she's really lovely. And she depends on me. And when she leans on me, I love to make her roar like a lion. And when she roars, you tremble. I like that. Verses 6 through 8. Okay. Our call to step in to the praise of the glory of his grace, by which he made us accepted in the beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace, which he made abound towards us in all wisdom and prudence. Okay. As I said, the testimony of Jesus started actually before the world was created. God had a plan. The testimony of Jesus is the unfolding of that plan. Really, what we call it is history. Those secular historians don't see it and understand it. When you look at it from a biblical perspective, you understand that God rules all things. History is going somewhere. It's unfolding. So we call the testimony of Jesus, basically we say it's history. And it has a place. If there was a starting place, there will be an ending place. The devil will be judged. The nations will be judged. The saints will rise with him. We will stand with him, rule in the millennium with him. So it's going someplace. It has an end. But our stepping in place was the cross. We stepped into this prophetic destiny when Jesus came, died, raised from the grave and was seated at the right hand. And then at our proper time, at our fullness of time, we said yes to Jesus. At some point, when we said yes to Jesus, our prophetic destiny opened up. When I got saved, it was like there was this invisible door that had been there all my life in the spirit that I never saw. When I got saved, that door opened. I stepped through it and I said, I want this more than I want anything else for the rest of my life. This is good. I don't ever want to look back. This is what I want to live in. I stepped into destiny. I stepped into a prophetic call over my life. I stepped into something that God had planned for me from the foundations of the earth, and I just said yes to it. How do we walk out the plan of God? We just keep saying yes. Day in, day out, day in, day out. Well, what's going to happen five years from now? I can't tell you what will happen five years from now, but I'm saying yes today. I'm choosing to say yes today. And I know if I say yes today and tomorrow, then five years will take care of itself because I'll just have a history of saying yes to God, ruling with God, standing with God, being faithful to what he gives me to do today. If I'm faithful with what I get today, then guess what? He'll give me more in the next five years. It's his principle. It works that way. So we stepped into this thing at the cross. We stepped into this thing at the first fullness of time. We came to the cross. We were redeemed. We were washed by his blood. And now we get to move to the second fullness of time, which will be the return of Jesus. The church misses it so often when we stop at the cross. Jesus come into life, wash me from my sins, help me get my degree, get rich, have many, many, many, many things, a few good kids, bless the Lord, and I'll move on. The philosophy of many in the American church is give me the maximum amount of pleasure, the fastest I can get it, with the minimal amount of sacrifice and cost. And in choosing that over the destiny that God lays out for us, we totally miss the excitement and the joy and the fellowship of a prophetic destiny lived out in God to the full adventure that he has for us. Now, when I say adventure, I don't mean that every day we're like high and excited. Oh, this is awesome. Sometimes the adventure looks like crawling on our knees an inch at a time. But it's still an adventure. So we step into the cross. The cross means three things to us. It means acceptance. We are accepted in Jesus. We're accepted by God. It means that we are forgiven. And it means that we are redeemed. I love to think about the cross. I love to think about Song of Songs 214, where it says, I'm hidden in the secret place of the cliff and the cleft of the rock, because when I look at that, I'm looking at the wounds of Jesus. And I'm thinking, here I am, hidden in his wounds, hidden in his love, hidden in that secret place. And in that secret place, he just loves me. He loves to hear my voice. He loves for me to lift my face to him. It's not a place of condemnation. It's not a place of giving up. It's not a place where he's looking to smash me. It's a place of acceptance where he gazes on me, loves my gaze, fills me, and causes me to love him with an even deeper love. I love to think about the cross. I love to think about Isaiah 50, where it says, He gave his face to those who plucked the beard. This beautiful man, Christ Jesus. I was looking through Song of Songs, and I was looking at the verse that says that my beloved is fair. He is pleasant above all things. So I started thinking about Jesus, my beloved. He's pleasant above all things. What does he look like? Well, his beard's plucked. He has spit all over his face. He's beaten and marred, Isaiah 51, beyond even human recognition. Isaiah 52, he gave his back to those who beat him. Isaiah 53, the punishment that I deserved was put upon him. What does he look like on the cross? He's unrecognizable. He's got millions of wounds, and every single wound bleeds with forgiveness for a thousand million other souls. What does he look like on the cross? He's bloody. It's in his eyes. It's on his body. Spit is dripping off him. His beard is plucked. But when I look at that man, I don't see a man who's beaten and bruised. I see the lover of my soul. I see him whom my soul loves. I see the one that says in Song of Songs, My beloved is pleasant. He's beautiful. He's the beautiful man, Christ Jesus, who suffered, who died, who's beaten, who's broken, but in his beauty, in his stripes, I find healing. I find redemption. I find forgiveness. I find life. It's this beautiful man, Christ Jesus, who has accepted me, who has forgiven me, who has redeemed me, who has washed my soul from sin and lifted me out of the pit. And I look at that man on the cross, and then I look at Revelations 5, where John says there was no one who could open the scroll, and I wept. And suddenly the elder says, Don't cry, John, there's one who is worthy. And Jesus steps forward. It's the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the King of kings and the Lord of lords. He is worthy to take the scroll. I look at this beautiful man on the cross, suffering, dying, bleeding for my sins, and I look at Revelations 5 and I want to say a thousand times, Yes, he is worthy to take the scroll. The Lamb of God slain from the foundations of the earth is worthy of praise, is worthy of blessing, is worthy of honor, is worthy of love. He's worthy of my best in this house of prayer. He's worthy of my life in the place of prayer before Him. He's worthy to be glorified. He's worthy to be exalted. He's worthy that all of Sacramento know the price He paid and the beauty of His name and the exaltedness of His glory and His majesty. He's worthy to be lifted high. I pray in a 24-7 context because I see the King of kings and the Lord of lords in His beauty. I want Him to get His glory. I want Him to receive a harvest for His suffering. I want Him to receive the inheritance that His Father promised Him before the foundations of the earth when He said, You give your life and I will give you a bride. I will give you the nations as an inheritance. I will give you sons and daughters. I will make a way for you and every knee will bow and every eye will see and every tongue will confess that you are Lord of lords and King of kings. That's His inheritance. And a 24-7 context of prayer is even when I don't feel like it, even when I don't get it, even when it's hard, He is worthy and I'm going to pray because He's going to bring His kingdom and when He brings His kingdom, I'm a participant in that. I'm receiving rewards in that. I'm going to go after it. It might be hard today, but there will be a day when I'll look back and I'll say, you know what? It seemed hard then, but it's nothing now. We talk about sacrifice, but you know what? When someone's in love, they don't consider it sacrifice. You know, if a wife does some extravagant act for her husband and somebody says, Oh, how you denied yourself. What a sacrifice. She would say, It wasn't a sacrifice. I loved him. And a bride on fire with the passion and the love of Jesus and the world looks and says, Well, she's beaten. She's destitute. She's sawn in two. She's persecuted. The world's not worthy of her. Look at what a sacrifice she committed. And the bride says in the end, It wasn't a sacrifice. It was about love. It was all about love. Don't equate it to sacrifice as if it was something I earned. My heart burned within me. I could do nothing else but bring Him glory and bring Him honor. So He makes all grace abound to us in wisdom and prudence. In wisdom, He's resurrected to the right hand of the Father. He's the great intercessor seated on the throne. And we're seated there with Him. Song of Songs 3.10 and a whole bunch of verses around there are all about Solomon's coach. And the bride sees Solomon coming up from the wilderness and she starts describing his coach. And she says all the things he made. He made it with pillars of silver and foundations of gold. He made it with the best of wood. And it goes on to describe all the wisdom with which he created the coach except one little spot. It says the interior of the coach is paved with love by the daughters of Zion. And I'm reading that one day and I'm thinking, this is how God has set it up. He rules in heaven. He sits on the throne. All power is His. What does He ask us to do? Pave the throne room with love. Pave the throne room with worship. Pave the throne room with intercession. That's all we can do. We can't build pillars of silver and gold for the throne room of God. It's already done. What's our part of paving it? Partnering with Him in intercession. Partnering Him with prayer. What's the bride's job? She gets to pave the interior of the coach. She gets to pave the interior of the throne with tears, with weeping, with groaning. Intercession. With worship. That's her part. He invites her in. Lift your voice and change the earth. Lift your voice and release heaven. Lift your voice and shift the atmosphere of your city. Pave the throne room with intercession, with weeping, with prayer, with love, with worship. And I will move my hand over your city. I will interrupt your circumstances. This is our part. Verses 9 and 10, it is going somewhere. Having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of times He might gather together one, all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and on earth, in Him. This is where we're going. This is where it ends up. There will be a wedding feast. There will be a bride that the Father will give to His Son. The mystery of His will just means something which was once hidden, but now is uncovered. In other words, God has chosen to let us in on His plan so we can partner with Him in His fulfillment. It's Psalm 2. Ask of me and I will give the nations to you as an inheritance. It's 1 Corinthians 15, 20-28, that at that day, all things will be conquered by Jesus and the Father will give the kingdom to Jesus and He'll give it back to the Father. It's Colossians 1, 19 and 20. All things in the earth, under the earth, all over, summed up in Christ, giving Him glory and honor. Revelations 19, Revelations 20. All things summed up in Christ. And we're not spectators. We're not sitting on the sideline in some stadium saying, yeah, it's recorded in the Word. That's how it's going to happen. I'm just going to be a spectator. I have no part in it. We are on the field as intercessors. We are on the field in a 24-7 context. We are on the field at 1 and 10. We are on the field at pushing back the enemy. We are on the field in ushering in and hastening the coming of the kingdom of God. In its simplest form, it's the fulfillment of the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6, 9 and 10. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That's why we're praying. We are going to release and bring the kingdom. It might not come exactly the way we want, when we want, every single time, but we will see victories. We will see changes. We will see movement because heaven says so. God says so. When we pray, He hears. When we pray, He answers and He moves. So why do we pray? It's the place where we exercise divine government and the hastening of the end of the age. There's a great cloud of witnesses and they're up there in heaven and they're going, Way to go, Roseville House of Prayer! We're for you! And you're 10 to midnight. Night watch. The angels are gone and the intercessors and the cloud of witnesses in heaven, they're going, Look, they're at it again in Roseville! Come on, guys! Come on, come on, come on! There's a cloud of witnesses gathering around us, encouraging us, pushing us on. They said, We took our place on the wall. We fulfilled our purpose on the wall. Now it's your turn and we're with you. Don't quit. Don't give up. What I'd like to do, Do we have a few more minutes? What I'd like to do is just pray for an impartation of grace. Maybe you were a little discouraged or maybe you just want to sign up all over again. You're just going, Yeah, that's... Yeah. I want to give you an opportunity to do that and I just want to pray that the grace of the Lord will just come and empower you just to go tomorrow and the next day and the next day and the next day. So if you're in a place you're just saying, Yeah, I want more. I want to plug in. I want to walk out my prophetic destiny in this thing. I want everything that God wants to give me in this. And I just could really use a little bit of the wind of the Holy Spirit on my heart to push me forward. Just stand up right now.