In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of focusing on God and His Word rather than being distracted by worldly desires, such as relationships with girls. He shares his own experience of prioritizing his health and exercise for the sake of his ministry. The speaker also highlights the need for believers to diligently seek God and build themselves up in faith through the Word of God. He emphasizes the refining and testing process that God uses to strengthen our faith and encourages believers to embrace challenges and combat in order to grow spiritually. The speaker references biblical passages such as Hebrews 11:6 and encourages believers to have a fixed heart and allow God to cleanse and correct them.

I don't think you've memorized the 119th. Anybody memorize it? Nobody. Okay. It's said that every other verse in this psalm has something about the word of God. Go back to verse 1. Blessed are the undefiled who walk in the law of the Lord. So, that's one aspect of the word, the law. The next verse has what? His testimonies. Verse 3, walk in his ways. Thou hast commanded us to keep thy precepts. Verse 5, thy statutes. Verse 6, thy commandments. Verse 7, thy righteous judgment. Verse 8, thy statutes. Makes a tremendous, tremendously interesting reading to go through. Again, to keep us kind of limited down to the word of God. But what I wanted to remind you of here, that at least, I don't know how many, 6, 8 times, the psalmist says, quicken me. Do you remember, what does it say there in Hebrew, the word of God is what? What is it? You're right, don't worry, go on, say it. The word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword. That's verse 12 of the 4th chapter. Well, this is what the psalmist is saying here. Notice in verse 25, my soul cleaveth unto the dust, quicken thou me according to thy word. Now, notice what he says in the first place, my soul cleaveth to the dust. Which again, is an act of humility. He has no self-trust, he has a distrust in himself, which is always a healthy thing to have. Our confidence is not to be in ourselves, our confidence is to be in God. I think people are in trouble when they start teaching things from the standpoint of experience. It's not a case of, however much experience you have, it's not going to do me too much good. I've got to have it from God's word, I've got to build, I've got to be established again on the word of God. And here he says, my soul cleaveth to the dust, quicken me according to thy word. Why? Because the word of God is quick and is powerful. Now, we think of quick as somebody running and saying, well, he was quick the way he was. But it doesn't mean that actually, it means it's something that stabs me, it's something that awakens me. It's something that provokes me, the word of God is quick. Well, it's quick in the sense again, that if I've got it hidden in my heart, God brings it very quickly to my remembrance. I don't have to wait and say, oh, I wish Gabriel would hurry up, they've got the computer wrong upstairs. No, no, no, no, thy word of thy hid in my heart and then immediately God touches and then it's quick and it comes to my defense. Or it comes to build me up, it comes to stimulate me. Or again, it's quick to correct me. Or again, it's quick to cast me down if I'm getting exalted. The word of God is quick and powerful, quicken thou me according to thy word. In verse 37 he says, turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity and quicken thou me in the way. Remember that word over in Exodus, I being in the way, the Lord met me. And this is where I'm going to be quickened because I'm right in the way of obedience, I'm in the way of truth. Verse 40 says, behold, I have longed after thy precepts, quicken me in thy righteousness. Now again, as we said earlier, I have a responsibility in this. His word will quicken me, His word will inspire me, His word will correct me. His word will lift me up or His word may cast me down. But look at the human side of this. Back in verse 23, it says, princes also did sit and speak against me, but my servant did meditate in thy statutes. And right through this one psalm, particularly again, it's statutes, commandments, precepts, laws. They're repeated over and over again, thy precepts, thy commandments, thy laws, thy statutes, thy judgments. They run right through this amazing 119 psalms. And David says, I've meditated upon them. Notice he says it at the end of the 48th verse. My hands also will I lift up unto thy commandments, which I have loved, and I will meditate in thy statutes. Which is another way of saying, I'll meditate in thy laws, I'll meditate in thy commandments. Now verse 88, he says, quicken me after thy lovingkindness, so shall I keep the testimony of thy mouth. Now quicken me after thy lovingkindness, it is urged me to seek after thy lovingkindness and thy tender mercies. In another psalm he says, why art thou cast down, O my soul? Hope thou in God. Well if I'm going to get rid of those, they'll come to everybody, there's no question. You know when people, we used to sing a hymn, I remember in England we were singing, one day I'm living on the mountain underneath a cloudless sky. I'm drinking of a fountain that never can run dry. And I was sitting next to Dr. Fawcett on the platform that day, and he gave me a nudge and said, well look at all those faultless, don't you wish you were like them? Living on a mountain underneath a cloudless sky, drinking of a fountain that never shall run dry. He said, I find my experience more in a hymn that says, Days of darkness still come o'er me, and sorrow's path I often tread, but the Saviour still is with me. And by His path, and by His hand I'm safely led. There's no immunity from temptation as long as you live. As long as you and I live we're going to be tempted, as long as you and I live we're going to try. You know the biggest temptation to believers is to want to live without temptation. Now if I have God's Word hidden in my heart, after all, the greatest, holiest man that ever lived was who? Okay. And after the anointing of the Spirit came, he was led of the Spirit into the... And there he was tempted for... 40 is a sign of probation. How many books are there in the Old Testament? Oh you don't know, well, okay. 39. So Matthew is number what book? 40. 40, alright. And it's a period of probation for the Jews because God sent His Son amongst them for a period of testing to see what they'd do with Him. Now Moses was how long, how many days was he in the mount? And then he came back and he went back for another and it seems, it seems to me it's an incredible thing that I can't find that he ever ate anything for 80 days, not 40, because he went straight back in the mount. Alright, after the resurrection of Jesus, he was with them for how many days? Well there was 40 days of temptation after anyhow, there was 40 days of trial for them. Now Jesus was in the wilderness and the Scripture says he was tempted what? No, but he was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin. Now temptation is not sin unless you yield to it. Temptation is the normal Christian life. But again let's consider this, there are degrees of temptation. There are temptations to the mind, there are temptations to the body and there are temptations to the spirit. There are temptations to children, there are temptations to youth and there are temptations in old age. I've given an illustration for years of how when I was a little boy, maybe you've heard me say, my mother made the best jelly and jam in the whole city. And when it came to fruit, you know, I used to say, mum's going to start making jam again. All I got was to lick the dish out, you know, when she cooked it and I used to get a spoon and scrape it. Man, when I'd scrape that dish, a fly couldn't have got a mouthful of it. I really skinned that dish, I really, really, you know, I actually boiled the fruit. I used to stay there and get this big thing in my hand, go around with a spoon and stick my finger in and clean it up, you know. And then she'd put it up in what we call a pantry, a dark room, you know, and she'd leave it there and have it all labelled strawberry and raspberry and gooseberry and bilberries and all the other jams and jellies she made. And, you know, I'd go steal it, I'd go up and steal it. When she'd gone out sometime later, I'd go steal it and, you know, I'd take the top off and I'd get a spoon and go like this. Ooh, that was great, that was great. Then I'd suddenly, oh, oh yes, but there's a great tribulation ahead. I'm going to get spanked for this. So I may as well take another spoonful and, you know, it's worth getting spanked twice. It's delicious. Then I'd take another and before long it's, ooh, I didn't intend to take so much. I'd lick the spoon and smooth it over and put the lid on and put it right to the back of the shelf, you know. You know, somehow my mother got a habit of going to the back of the shelf first. And I remember one day she brought this out and I was in the yard, in the garden. We had a, in England you don't call it a yard, you call it a garden, you see. You have a vegetable garden, you have a flower garden, you have a lawn if you have grass. And I was working in the, I guess, in the flower garden because I liked flowers. My dad liked them, he did an awful lot with flowers. We all had a beautiful garden. I was working there and my mother called, Len, Lenny she called, Lenny. And I thought, now what's she after? Oh, I, she, oh, just before I came out she got cooking things out and she got some dough, I guess she's making pie and I guess she's going to use some jam and I guess something else too. I said, Mummy, I'm, I'm busy. She said, all right, dear. And she called about 50 minutes after, Lenny, I want to see you. Mummy, I'm still busy. Okay, dear, it will do when Daddy comes. Oh, no, it won't. Oh, no. No, that, that, that couldn't wait till Daddy came. As I say, my daddy believed in laying on of hands and he could lay them on too when he, when he started, you know. And I would go in and, and she'd say, did you steal? Oh, yes, I had to admit that I'd done it. Now, you know, I, I usually give that in the part of a message on Peter to, you know, help people after the week. They always say I scalp them or skin them or something. So I try and build them up on the first epistle of Peter, the first chapter there on, you know, what, what is consistent with a Christian life, what isn't, temptation isn't. And I use temptation, I use the illustration of jelly. And, you know, by the next meeting, before I leave next morning, some lady comes with a bag of jelly this size, you know, jars of jelly. I come home with loads of jelly. So I'm, I'm trying to find a way to use the illustration on Mummy and see if it works that way. But, you know, when I, I stayed in a home recently, a beautiful home. And, you know, I was in real victory. I realized at the end of the week I hadn't stolen jelly once. You say, well, you've outgrown that kind of temptation. Well, that's what I'm saying. You see, you can outgrow certain temptations. And there are certain temptations you don't know until you come to a certain age. A child will steal jelly, he'll steal cookies. A man doesn't steal them, he snitches them. But, he doesn't steal them, but he, he, he isn't worried about any consequences. He knows his wife made them. She says, well, darling, help yourself anytime you need one. He does it. A child is tempted on one level. A full-blooded young man is tempted in another area. Very often in the area of sex. This is a, this is a curse. If I didn't know the Bible said the number of a man in Revelation is 666, I'd think it was 666. Because we're a sex-mad age. It has never been as wild, it's never been as acceptable. Perversion and cleanliness, violation of God's laws in this area, don't mean a thing in the way, in our, in our present lifestyle. So, temptation that works on a, a, a, a boy up to 10 years of age wouldn't work on a 17-year-old boy. Temptation on a 17-year-old boy wouldn't work on a 6-year-old boy. Temptation to a 6-year-old boy wouldn't work on a man 60. Temptation to a man 60 wouldn't work on somebody that's younger. You see, one of the temptations that is not recognized as a temptation amongst young people particularly, is prodigality. You say, in, in morality, no, no, no, no, I'm not thinking of that. We're prodigal. For instance, you say, well, I'm only 19. Good night, Mr. Radner is over 70, and I've got, I've got, phew, I've got another good 50 years coming on. No, if you go up the road there, and you care to take a nice inspiring walk in a cemetery, you'll find somebody died at your age. Sometimes you hear people say, do you know who the richest man in the building is? I say, there isn't one. I was in a meeting where a man pointed a man out. He said, that man there, I, I know for a fact he has $750 million. There's a man in a First Baptist Church in McAllen. Actually, he's the father of Senator Benson, the Senate, one of the Senators for Texas. And his old dad was in the meeting. $750 million. I said, it must be good when he tithes. But anyhow, he's $750 million. No, he doesn't. What does he have? He has one beat of his heart. That's all he has. You see, we, we become so generous. We become so generous. We say, well, I, I have this, or I have that. No, no, we don't. Now, do you know what temptation does? Well, it's like trials of life. What do they do? In that epistle to Peter, you'll find this, that when Satan gives up on temptation, what does he swing to? He swings to fiery trial, which is a temptation. It may be over like that. You can, you know, the hymn writer says, I need thee every hour. Stay thou nearby. Temptations lose their power. When? When thou art nigh. Well then, is this the insulation I have? Well, what do I have? Against me, I have the world. I have the flesh. I have the devil. What do I have for me? Well, I have the indwelling of the Spirit of God. I have the exceeding great and precious promises of God. I have somebody pleading at the right hand, but why do I stumble and stagger? Now, it's not failure on God's part. It's failure on my part not to appropriate those things that God has laid out for me. I can fight the devil off the way Jesus fought him off. How did Jesus fight him off? He threw the book at him in our language. Satan came and said, do you know this? And Jesus says, yes, but it's written, get out. Threw the book at him. It is written, yes, but Jesus said, and notice again, Satan did not quote the scripture. He misquoted scripture, as people often do. Now, you read that and do a little homework on that and see where the difference is between what Satan said and what the psalmist said. But again, you see, we have this defense mechanism, if you like, set up for us. There's no way that I'm going to go in grace and in the knowledge of God without going through what... Jesus was what? He was tempted in all points like as we are. And Hebrew says what? Of the Lord Jesus Christ that he grew in grace. He that spared not his own son. Well, if God didn't spare his own son from trial and tribulation and testing, is he going to spare me from it? Do you think there was any variation in the... Do you think Jesus had his peaks and had his... as we say, do you think he had his highs and he had his lows in his spiritual life? I don't think he had. In his emotional life, he had. Because I read going into Gethsemane that he was very heavy. Now again, these boys, so many of them right now teaching about Abraham. But you see, it says there in that... what is it? 15th chapter of Genesis, where after he makes a sacrifice, he took a heifer from... pardon me, Genesis 15 and verse 9. He said unto him, Take me a heifer three years old and a she-goat three years old and a lamb three years old, turtle, dove, and a young pigeon. And they took unto him all these and divided them in the midst and laid each piece one against the other. But the birds he divided not. And when the fowls came down upon the carcasses, Abraham drove them away. Now I don't care how much sacrifice you yield to God, whatever you yield, the old birds of doubt and fear and criticism and somebody else's opinion are going to try and steal that sacrifice that you made. And you're going to have to drive them off. How do you drive them off? Again with the word of God. It is written. This is what God says. Now remember, they're always stressing, you can be so rich. Do you know how rich Abraham became? Do you know what God wants you to have? But they never give the other side of the coin. It was one thing for him to make a sacrifice. It's another thing for him to let it stay there permanently. And again in New Testament language, I don't care whatever commitment you make to God. Before long, the challenge to the believer is come down from the cross and save yourself. You see, that brother isn't sacrificing like you're doing. He doesn't take as much time. And look, I mean, he gets more favor than you do. Some people like him. It seems the staff like him better than they like me. But that's not your business. What is that to thee? Follow thou me. God's making you not them. If he thought you needed that, he'd put you there. You see, get this sure in your life. If you're climbing the ladder of spirituality, if the devil can't keep you at the bottom, he'll help you to get to the top and then he'll push you over the top. Why? Because so often, as it says about in the year that King Uzziah died, is it to... I forget the chapter, somewhere there in... But it says of Uzziah anyhow. I think it's in the 26th chapter of the 1st or 2nd Chronicles that he was mightily helped of God until he became strong. He was a wise man. He was an inventor. He ran the nation very well. He took it over when he was 15 years of age. He ruled it for 50 years. And everything expanded. He had a midas touch. He did marvelous things until he became strong and his strength was his weakness. He fell. Now look, you settle this in your mind. You're on the ladder of spirituality. You're in the service of the King of Kings. If God wants you on the top rung of the ladder, there's not a demon in hell or a deacon on earth or anybody else who's going to keep you from getting there. As long as you're humble and you walk with him. If he doesn't want you there and you get pushed up by promotion and, you know, you're uncluttered to be the boss in this group and that group and they give you a promotion, you'll make it. You know, in the early days of the Salvation Army which came, as we said yesterday, out of the Revival that swept America and then it swept England. Do you know the secret of the Salvation Army was this? William Boole had a large family but he never promoted one of his... because they were children of the General. Now they were on a military basis. You know, you became a soldier then you became a corporal then you became a major then you became a lieutenant and I don't know what in the world it was. And they had brigadier generals and then they had finally the General himself. But he never gave any of his children's accolades or he never gave them promotion unless they earned it. With the result that when his children became very efficient and they were very brilliant. I've told you the mother used to put her head hand round the head of each of them when they were in bed at night and they were still babies and unconscious in sleep and she used to pray the same prayer every night. She said I'm not raising children for the devil and while they were sleeping she would pray this over them God bless you darling sleep, the world is waiting for you. Every one of them became distinguished poets, writers, preachers, missionaries but you see when they got up and they got adequate to run the Salvation Army themselves they didn't like to take orders from Daddy and Daddy didn't promote them above other guys Oh no, you'll get seniority when I think you should have it and so what happened? He lost his family. They broke up and went off here and went off there. That was William Booth. After him, I saw William Booth as a tiny little boy and I saw the second General, Bramwell. Oh, he was all personality he had a shock, great shock of white hair. Man, he was very imposing. But when his family was raised he promoted them whether they deserved it or not. He gave them key positions all in the Salvation Army after all, he's my son, she's my daughter just has a lovely personality to choose and do this job. What happened? The first General would not promote them except they were adequate and therefore he kept the Salvation Army intact. The second General promoted his family and he kept his family but he lost the army. They voted him out. You see, now that holds in a spiritual life I'm quite sure of this out of long experience and out of reading other people's lives and after conversing with some of the greatest men in the world men that seemed they weren't at the starting line in the race, brother they were a hundred yards behind and yet they overtook so many men who were far more brilliant. I went to a Bible college in England for about 8 months. When I got there I was totally embarrassed I was disintegrated the first week I was there because I'd had no... I left school in the 8th grade I hadn't been to high school I had to take some lessons in English which I certainly didn't master and I had every disadvantage like the Irishman said all my advantages were against me. I just didn't have a thing to go on. And you know, fellows would come out we had an exam every Friday night and the list was always put on the board and I was always in one important position usually at the bottom holding all the others up. And guys would come out, you know, with in England you never get 100% marks nobody would ever give you that not in university which isn't healthy. Nobody does it. If you get in the 90's you're a genius. I'd be around the 40's usually. These other guys would all... but I determined one thing after one day receiving a book called Bound's Power Through Prayer I made up my mind I'd go through that book I didn't go through the book it went through me. But I anchored on to that truth that what Bound says it takes God 20 years to make a man I said alright, here I am, try it. And when other boys went to do things now we did not have any basketball. Chadwick said you've only one life you don't have time to play a game. There were no girls there you get too interested in girls they're distracting. Now I don't think I think if I had a school I wouldn't be as rich I'd have basketball I certainly wouldn't enter competition. I wouldn't waste hours running after other groups and going all over the place I wouldn't do that. I'd do it for health sake. All the recreation we had with a pair of rubber shoes and we put on shorts and a swim shirt and we ran a five mile run every Wednesday afternoon. You could go with a fast group or the slow group. And part of it you had to go through a river that was ice cold and nearly took your legs off you didn't know if you had any legs by the time you got through. And that was the only exercise we had. See Mr. Chadwick said listen gentlemen you do this this one thing I do you don't have time for trivia. Now this is again where discipline comes in. They do it let them do it. Hey we're going down shopping oh it's Christmas shopping I don't have any money well come with us alright I'll come and look at the windows. Why? Why? Now this seems nitty gritty no no no perfection is made up of trifles. But perfection itself is no trifle. When I think of as I've mentioned before the last time I went to the Bible School of Wales Mrs. Howell said come upstairs and talk and we went and stood on the veranda and as we looked over the ocean over the sea there then she turned around and said you see that room Daddy meaning the husband went in that room at six o'clock in the morning and he didn't come out till six o'clock at night and he did that every day for eleven months with the exception of the one day that his mother died. Now do you know any how many people we talk about ability and we need stickability. Could you stay twelve hours a day in a room for eleven months? What was he doing? He was building himself up in his faith. You don't fly you don't leap from here to there in faith you build yourself up in the word of God. You get to the place where you're absolutely sure again that the secret is in Hebrews 11 6 that God is and that he is the reward of them that diligently seek him. But God has to do some refining some correcting. If I'm going to have perpetual fire in my life God can do a lot of stirring. What does Paul say to Timothy? Stir up the gift of God that is in thee. Well there's another meaning to that word there it is actually it's the same as saying keep yourself in revival. It doesn't say God will stir you up it says you stir up yourself in your most holy faith. Or stir up the gift of God which is in thee by the laying on of my hands. Now again I do not believe that my Christian my love toward God needs to ebb and flow. I don't believe my faith in God needs to ebb and flow but my emotions will change. David said of one occasion my heart is fixed. Now do you know that's about the only thing that is fixed. Sure in a world like this the world could blow up tomorrow. We're sitting on a powder keg. We don't know what in the world's going to happen through this Ayatollah Khomeini. We could have third world war world war three on our hands before very long. We could have the first and the most awesome atomic war in history. We could have a holocaust that would supersede all other holocausts. We don't know what but we know our hearts my heart is fixed David said. His emotions weren't fixed. He had a son trying to pull a throne from underneath him and steal a crown off his head. His social life wasn't fixed. He didn't know where his enemies were. Everything else is fluid but he says my heart is fixed. But if my heart is fixed God cleanses my heart through the blood. He corrects my head with a rod. And whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. Now we don't we say because we love our children well I won't spank you this time. Well you don't love him that's why. You'll have to love him you'll have to spank him twice as hard up the road for the ones you miss now because children don't understand love like that. There is correction with love you don't beat the daylights out of him but you correct him and Proverbs again says if you correct him you won't kill him. Now God has promised so much to Abraham sure he's going to have children like the sands by the seashore but when he's made his sacrifice he has to beat the birds off in a school like this or anywhere else. Your eyes so very often turn sideways what's she doing what's he doing. Now God's making you he isn't making Agape he is in one sense but he isn't in another sense he's making you. He's maturing you he's bringing you to maturity. He's bringing you to the place where he can strengthen you. He's bringing you to the place where he just takes Peter and James and John maybe out of this class God got free select persons that he's going to lead to eventually to leadership somewhere in the world that you don't dream of even now. I remember when I went to Bethany in 1950 I went first and then we went to live there in 58 as a family and I'd been many times in between. And I remember one night a young man came out I think in 1950 or 50, 50 exactly 50 or 51 and he came to the altar it was a nice clean cut Lutheran he had been saved through Ted Eggers ministry he came out that night wanting to be filled with the Holy Ghost and as soon as he hit the bench there he let out a roar that they said you could hear you know a mile away just a groaning in his spirit for God and he said Oh God he said cleanse me and fill me with the Holy Ghost and the joy of the Lord came on him he's one of the best leaders they have in the world today he's gone to a certain country and built a staff around him and he's seen a measure of revival I think of other kids that I looked at that didn't seem to have much potential I remember when we went to Cliff College Mr. Chadwick said I looked at him the first day he said gentlemen there were only men there you know gentlemen are you sure God called you are you sure if you are nod your heads we all nodded our heads he said it's a good thing he did he said I never would have called one of you by the look of you you know that's a nice way to set off isn't it I mean you know all the confidence the school has in you kind of thing but God he's going to do his probing he's going to do his correcting and he says you've made your sacrifice you'll have to fight the birds off if God leaves you alone the devil won't and sometimes he uses the devil because you remember Jesus said Satan hath desired thee so who was it to Peter again Peter's going to be one of the out Peter is going to be the man that stands up at Pentecost it wasn't John that stood up it was Peter the problem boy that God has purged and empowered it's Peter that ran away when a girl put her finger up well Elijah did the same thing so it's in the apostolic succession but he put his finger up she put her finger up he ran but then you find him in acts pointing his finger to the whole nation he ran away from one woman he stands up and he says you crucify the Lord of Glory but look at his ups and his downs and his ins and his outs as it were Peter talked to Jesus not only more than any other disciple he talked to Jesus more than all the disciples put together and conversely Jesus not only spoke to Peter more than any other individual he spoke to Peter more than all the disciples put together we don't like to see the weaknesses in him and going down the road Jesus said when you get round the corner Satan's going to try and ambush you he's going to clobber you but cheer up I've prayed for you well how many people have said that to you and you thought phew you know you can't pray for yourself what are you praying for me for kind of thing but Jesus didn't say Peter I saw Satan down the road there and I said what are you doing here he said I'm waiting for Peter I'm going to beat him up and I said Satan you go back to hell and leave my little boy Peter alone I love him and I'll take care of him the Lord didn't say anything to Satan he said to Peter I've prayed for thee because what your faith needs it needs a shaking it needs a testing it needs a purging it needs a strengthening and the only way you can get it is combat it's one thing you know to put a lot of sketches on a board and put guys in combat uniform and then say you know when you meet the enemy they don't all have blue eyes and they don't all have white faces some are yellow and some are this that don't do you a hill of beans good five minutes of combat and boy you you know you can't say mother you know they said when some of the troops American troops came to England then got in combat in Europe and got into some wretched situations that at the end of the day some of them asked where the showers were the others said where what I need a shower and I need some old spice or something showers boy the only shower you'll get if the sky starts leaking you may not get a bath for the next two months what? I get a bath every day at home well mummy isn't here to bring you in a nice warm towel you're in military service now get down to it you see and there'll come a time when and this is the big test after all isn't it it's when God takes what I call a protective atmosphere from us it's easy to make vows in a meeting when emotions running high and somebody puts their arm around you and says praise God I'm glad you did it oh you've made this commitment I love you I'll be praying for you and tomorrow morning they run into trouble and the next 10 days in fact if you met them 50 days after and say how many times did you pray for me after your promise oh I'm sorry but you know the next day I got news from home my sister was sick and the next day my dad had a somebody scraped his bumper on his car and the next day my grandmother fell down pulling roses or something and you had so many problems you never thought about Marianne you see God takes that supporting atmosphere you need it so long then he takes it out it becomes a walk of faith then the temptation comes down from the cross and save yourself alright let's stay in the context of this 15th of Genesis the vows came upon verse 11 down on the carcasses Abram drove them away verse 12 when the sun was going down a deep sleep fell upon Abram and a horror of great darkness came upon him did you ever have an experience like that did you ever read a classic who wrote it Teresa it's a famous book it's it's more than one book called the dark night of the soul you never had one cheer up you got one coming the dark night of the soul we make it all joy bears praise the Lord let's clap our hands have a great time that's alright I'm not against it but I'll tell you what there'll come a time when clapping your hands won't lift your spirit there'll come a time when you sing a verse of a hymn and it'll fall dead on your ears and on your heart and all you have is a naked trust in God a horror of great darkness came upon him so the hymn writer said right when he said days of darkness still come on me but in that sorrow's path I often tread but the Savior still is with me again the emotional side of my life is in chaos but right down in the center notice these boys when there's a hurricane they say well we flew out over the Atlantic and we got right into the eye of the storm there's a still spot in the middle of that thing that's swirling at whatever it's going 150 miles an hour whatever it's doing but there's a dead spot in the center a dead silence a dead stillness the old Methodist used to sing a hymn that said the storm may roar without me my heart may low be laid but God is round about me shall I be afraid well he didn't have it quite right God isn't only round about me he's in me how am I fortified against adversity because he said peace I live with you no no no he said peace I live with you my peace I give unto you what was the reward for the holiest man that lived in this life? a crown a thorn that's what he gave for living a holy life his reward on earth was a crown of thorns his reward on earth was desertion by some of his closest friends and that will be the toughest thing in your life after some something Satan that you know is directly a work of Satan or the powers of Satan and then one day somebody breaks off in your life for no real reason at all and you feel you've leaned on this person and the Lord says well that takes that away you're leaning on Mary Jane or Jim Smith too much and your prop goes the Lord by God is a jealous God I remember once leaving in a plane from Manchester England I wasn't particularly fond of going to Ireland because the plane was terribly slow you know with rubber bands or something it just you know sit in the plane it was only about 50 miles and it took about an hour to go and oh it was a dreadful thing and over the Irish Channel it's always rough and dark and when I got on the plane we had to walk about 150 yards to the little plane that held about 20 people and it was pouring rain I put my coat collar up you know and when I got on the plane yeah I was wet my trousers were sticking to my legs and I sat in misery on that plane and I thought well this is horrible I'm flying all the way to Ireland in this pouring rain and it's as black as night and then the little thing got up in the clouds and you know we were hemmed in in fog and the motors were going 10 times louder you know and it was so dark and we kept going what a miserable I'm miserable inside I'm wet through and I'm in a dark plane like this and I can't see a thing and then suddenly whoop like that and it was like being like this and I saw the top side of the clouds and you know it seemed I could see for hundreds of miles and they were pure gold because the sun was shining on them and when I looked at the other window it looked as though it was all beautiful snow because they weren't getting the sun from the angle I was seeing it just exquisite now here on earth it was pouring rain here it's thick cloud I can't see through it when I get above the cloud the sun is shining well very often between me and God there are clouds days of darkness still come over me and sorrows pop I often fret but the saviour still is with me faith that is going to be trusted is going to be tested you say I've been having some tests well cheer up you'll get some bigger tests before long why because God has a bigger task further up the road and if you haven't developed as it were the muscles of your heart you won't be able to take the pressures when you get further up the road just by the same token if you won't be led by somebody you'll never make a leader you may kick sometimes about something you're asked to do but wait a minute a bit further up the road you'll be giving commands to somebody and they don't want to do it either again one of my old cliches a man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument a man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument you later say you go to a mission station in another country and you say to somebody listen we need somebody to dig a cesspool I didn't come here to dig cesspools I came to be a missionary and give out tracts and talk to others well you go do it do you ever do it oh yes I remember digging something at agape or somewhere I didn't want to do it and I got blisters on my hands and boy or it may be some other situation and you say but listen I passed through this school myself they give you a sense of authority all right to rush over this then a horror of great darkness came upon him a horror of great darkness came upon Jesus in Gethsemane do you think it was fun he took with him the same three men why did he give them that glorious revelation on the mount it was Peter and James and John that had it and it should have fortified them when they got into the black hole of Gethsemane but it didn't somehow now don't you get too worried that people don't hear what you're saying and when you get to teach a class or become a leader of a group that they don't all go on quickly because by a long shot the disciples didn't do that as I said often enough they said Lord teach us to pray and when he took them on the mount of transfiguration to pray they all fell asleep and then he let them off that time and he took the same three men to Gethsemane and would you believe it what did they do and he came back a second time and they were and he came back a third time and they were I can't imagine that's real I get all kinds of people asking can I come and spend a day in prayer with you can I do this I'd love to pray with you well sometimes they come sometimes they don't if everybody came I'd never get off my knees but I know certain men very very few that I'd like to spend a day in prayer with I know guys I like to talk to there are not many men I'd like to spend a day in prayer with but they were permitted to pray with the greatest man of prayer that ever lived and he prayed all night was that the reason they fell asleep they weren't used to they had no stamina they weren't used to praying more than an hour or half an hour and and when he prayed on and prayed on and prayed on it was too much for them wouldn't you wouldn't you have thought that they would have learned that lesson there on the mount of transfiguration and yet when they had a chance to stay with him in his most critical hour they fell asleep Lord do you think God may be as grieved with the church today that we spend so little time in prayer I'm convinced we've come into a form today of Christian humanism that's all it is we'll do it you bless it Lord you've got to bless our TV program you've got to bless our tracks we give out or our records or something who says we have we want to do in the energy of the flesh we sanctify the flesh to a great degree we put personalities up just like the world does there was a big rock concert recently up on the north east coast various groups were there to sing one of the star guys comes up he demands $13,000 a night well if I get $12,000 for teaching here this week it would be unusual but he gets $13,000 for one night and they don't pray they just stand up and sing and pull faces if it's singing I don't know if it is you make a noise with the guitar anyhow