Mike Bickle emphasizes the urgent need for God's people to recognize the critical moment in history we are living in, where a significant outpouring of the Holy Spirit is occurring alongside a troubling compromise within the church. He calls for believers to boldly declare the truth of God's Word without succumbing to societal pressures or fear, as both revival and falling away are happening simultaneously. Bickle stresses the importance of being forerunners who prepare themselves and others for the challenges ahead, while actively engaging in prayer, fasting, and living out their faith. He warns against the dangers of complacency and encourages a deep commitment to Jesus and His teachings, as the church faces unprecedented moral crises. Ultimately, he invites believers to recommit to their faith and to be active participants in God's plan during this pivotal time.

Well, go ahead and open up your syllabus, your teaching notes to page one. And again, we're not going to cover it word for word, nothing like that. We won't cover even 50% of this teaching notes, but they're there for you to study and to take back home. And again, all of these are on the internet right now, electronic copies, and our copyright is the right to copy. Father, we come to you in the name of Jesus, and we ask you for the power of your Holy Spirit. We ask you for the spirit of wisdom and revelation. We ask you to encounter your people and call these people to your heart. And those that are joining us through God TV and through the internet, we ask you for a spirit of revelation and power to touch them in the name of Jesus, amen. And those that are joining us right now, live around the world on God TV, you can go to the IHOP website and get these notes, just ihop.org, or you're joining us by the internet and follow along. We're going to look at just a little bit of this first session called The Need of This Great Hour of History. This is a great hour of history in which we live, but there's a need in this hour, and it is for God's people to understand the time we live in and then to respond to the Lord appropriately and to become forerunners who lift our voice boldly, tenderly, yes, but boldly, fearlessly, and declare what the Spirit is saying to the church and what the Spirit is saying to the nations without drawing back with the political spirit, without drawing back in the fear of man, without a man-pleasing spirit, but tenderly and boldly to say what the Spirit is saying, because the church in this hour in the Western world is in a very, very serious and dangerous position right now. Two things are happening simultaneously. The Lord is pouring out His Spirit and He's calling people to Himself like no time in history. The greatest outpouring of the Holy Spirit in all of human history is already begun. The missions movement around the nations is exploding. The prayer movement around the nations is exploding numerically. The Lord is visiting in power, but at the very same time, particularly the church in the West, more and more people who name the name of Jesus are living lifestyles of compromise. They're letting go of their commitment to the faithful witness of the Word of God. They're backing off from what the Scripture says because it's unpopular and politically incorrect. So at the very same time, things are getting better and things are getting worse. It says here in paragraph A in Isaiah 62, verse 20, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth and the deep darkness, the people or the nations, you can put the word nations, but the Lord will arise over you and His glory will be seen on you. So notice two things that are happening. The darkness is increasing, deep darkness over the nations, but it's not a time for despair because the glory of the Lord is being poured out on the people of God at the same time. So someone says, is it going to get better or is it going to get worse? And the answer is both. The greatest revival in history has already begun that will lead to the second coming of Christ and all the nations will receive a witness of the gospel of the kingdom in power. And at the same time, the greatest falling away in church history will happen simultaneous to the greatest revival. Now the Holy Spirit is speaking clearly to His church right now. And a lot of people are responding, but a lot of people are ignoring it and they're casting it off with the spirit of cynicism and mocking. And they're saying, oh, I don't care about all that. Let's be practical. Beloved, let me tell you this, there is nothing more practical than knowing the truth about the crisis that's emerging in history and the great revival that is increasing. There's nothing more practical than understanding this from God's point of view and preparing your life and throwing yourself into this great plan of God. Paragraph B, the greatest revival in history is being released. The outpouring of the spirit, look what it says in Acts chapter two. In the last days, I will pour out my spirit on all flesh. Every single nation of the earth will have an outpouring of the spirit. Your sons and daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions. Your old men shall dream dreams. I will pour out my spirit in those days. They shall prophesy. Now notice, this great outpouring will happen before, before the second coming of Jesus. Now, it is true this outpouring, this promise in Acts chapter two began on the day of Pentecost and it has been ebbing and flowing throughout church history, seasons of revival. However, just before the coming of the Lord, this will accelerate on a global level beyond any time in history. The greatest outpouring of the spirit that will surpass the power and the miracles of the book of Acts, I believe will happen in the lifetime of the people in this room. I believe we're in the beginning days of that revival right now. It's building and many of God's people, many in their teens and their twenties, they're responding extravagantly to Jesus, aggressively with a deep allegiance to him. But many are going the other direction. They're buying into compromise. They are trivializing the truths of the Bible. They say, yeah, I'm Christian, but we gotta be practical and they're dumbing down the truths of the Bible and they're negating them. And a great falling away is already beginning. We're in the early days of the greatest falling away from the faith in history and the greatest outpouring of the spirit in all history. Look at Matthew 24. The gospel will be preached to all nations and then the end will come. The mission leaders, the top mission leaders across the earth today, of which we are blessed to have one of the premier leaders of the 20th century in this building tomorrow, Lorne Cunningham with YWAM, Youth with a Mission. He is going to be with us and there's nobody in my opinion alive today that has more experience in the missions movement. The other man that comes to mind is Bill Bright who went home to be with the Lord a few years ago. And then there's others like Dick Eastman and others that have been holding the line for many years preaching the gospel in the nations but one of these great patriarchs will be with us tomorrow. But here's what they're saying. They're saying that within the next 10 years there will be a witness of the gospel in every single nation and people group of the earth within 10 years. This is a unique dynamic. It's never happened before in history. We're in the, we are in the timeframe where the gospel will be preached in power to every single nation of the earth and the great outpouring before the great and terrible day of the Lord. Paragraph D. But it's not just a great outpouring and we're gonna spend a lot of time talking about the outpouring. We're gonna spend time talking about the positive things but we are not honest with you if we do not talk straightforward about the negatives. There's a lot of folks today in the body of Christ. They will only talk about the positive. They talk about the great revival and the great increase and we need to over and over again. But they are silent about the crisis that's coming to the planet and the crisis that's coming to our nation. Now I have no clarity as to which ones should be speaking up and which ones should not. I don't know. It's none of my business who says what in the kingdom of God, that's the Lord's business. But I know this, if only, if you only think a great revival is coming and you're not prepared for the crisis you will be ill-equipped for the most glorious and terrible time in human history that I think will happen within the lifetime of the people in this room. It is essential that you respond to the Lord in these early days of what I believe is the generation of the Lord's return. I believe there are people alive in this room that will see the Lord's return with their eyes. I don't know if it's the 20-year-olds. I don't know if it's the two-year-olds, but there are people in this room that will see the Lord, I believe with all of my heart, with their eyes, in their lifetime. I may see the Lord, it may be a little bit past my time, I don't know. But I believe with all of my heart that many of you will see it with your eyes. If that is true, the Bible has tremendous amount of clarity about the unique dynamics, positive and negative, for those final decades leading to His return. Here's my question. Do you know what those unique dynamics are, the positive things, the great revival and many other things that are associated with it? Do you know what the unique negative things are? And do you know how they will interwork together and how they will affect the nations? Maybe some of you say, no, I don't. Well, nobody has all the understanding of that. But the Bible speaks with clarity about many issues. And God is raising up forerunners in this hour of history and these forerunners who are announcing the coming of the Lord and they are announcing the unique dynamics of events, good and bad, positive and negative, unique events that will happen in the decades leading to the coming of the Lord. God is raising up forerunners that will speak with clarity that Jesus is coming and unique dynamics, positive and negative will be occurring and they will give understanding, they will operate in power, they will operate in faith, they will not waver in fear, they will not draw back in compromise because they understand what's happening. And one of the things the Spirit is saying to the church in this hour, He is raising up forerunners who will move in the power of God today, who will lead people to the Lord today, who will heal the sick today. But at the same time, they will be going deep in the Word to gain understanding to be one that prepares the unprepared for the unique dynamics that are yet ahead. There are many forerunners in this room right now. Many of you know that you're a forerunner. Some of you do not know. There are many forerunners that are joining us right now through God TV. You're in your living room right now and you're saying in your heart, I think I am one. I wanna be one that moves in the power of the gospel today, but at the same time, I'm preparing in my understanding for the unique things that are gonna happen only in one generation and I think it might be my generation. Beloved, if these things are true and I believe they are true with all of my heart, we must be zealous. We must be extravagant in our going after Jesus and going deep in the Word and learning to flow in the power of God right now. We don't have five or 10 years to kind of put this on hold and get around to it later. God is raising up forerunners and many of them are in their 20s and in their teens right now. He's marking them. That's how we ended last year's conference. 5,000 young people came forward and made a sevenfold commitment of a lifestyle. They made it for a several year period of time. Some made it longer, some shorter, but to prepare themselves in an intentional way while preaching the gospel, healing the sick, growing in holiness today, not putting that off for a future day. Paragraph E, abortion is killing 4,000 babies every day in America. The sanctity of marriage is under attack, threatening to destroy the moral foundations of our nation. Sexual immorality is reaching epic heights of depravity. I could spend an hour on these subjects and so could many of you. Entire school systems are being given over to these perverse ways of thinking. Five and 10 year old little boys and girls are learning that immorality is normal and abortion is normal. The human trafficking in the sex industry is exploding. Around the world in America included. I could go on and on and I have in the notes more issues. The crisis is mounting up. There is an encroaching spirit of darkness that's increasing in our land. And a lot of believers, I'm talking about prophesying men and women of faith, they are oblivious to the crisis that is moments away. We believe for the positive. Well, beloved, we need to believe for the positive in context to the negative because it's the truth and that's reality. Others don't care about the positive or the negative. They just want to be neutral. They just want to be liked. They have a brand of Christianity that is so bland. It's not even Christianity. And we'll develop that more throughout this week in this conference. Now there's many in the church and I'm not trying to be negative. I'm trying to be clear that are so spiritually dull. They cannot feel the danger of killing 4,000 babies a day. The danger that's looming over this nation from heaven's point of view. The blood guilt, the blood guilt of killing 50 million babies is rising up to heaven in an outcry. And God is looking and God is watching. He loves us. He loves this nation. But something very, very terrible and dangerous is on the horizon. He will not look away. At the murder of 50 million babies. This angers his heart. He says in Ezekiel 22 that he beats his fist with fury over the murder of the innocent. But many in the church are so spiritually dull that doesn't even register the danger that is looming in our future. They go, well, I'm thinking about my career, who I'm gonna marry and my ministry and you should be. Young adults should be thinking about their career, who they're gonna marry and their ministry. But that's not the only thing that we should be thinking about. There's a great revival and there's a great shaking that's coming. Many can't feel the weight of the increase of sexual perversion that is growing so rapidly in our nation. They can't feel what heaven feels when God is looking at this nation. A great revival is already beginning. A great falling away has already begun. A great crisis is already in motion right now. The economic crisis, it's only a whisper right now. Beloved, let me tell you something. There may be a few reprieves in the economic crisis where the Lord gives us a minute to catch our breath. But great trouble is coming to our nation economically. Great trouble is around the corner. The people who can make a difference, it's the praying church, the prophetic church, the people who believe the Word of God, that have a spirit of grace on them for fasting, prayer. They live with revelation. They're hungry for the Word. They love the power of the Spirit. The Lord says, let me hear the voice of those people before my throne. Cry out for mercy. Cry out for mercy. Raise your voice against the abominations in the land. Prepare the people for the greatest revival. That's the calling of the forerunner ministry. And that's what this conference is about, giving you some language as to what we believe are some of the critical points the Holy Spirit is focusing on in our nation right now. And in these teaching notes, I laid out a few of them. They are the representative of what our leadership team thinks. I didn't put every important point in these teaching notes, but I put many of the points our leadership team believes that God is focusing on right now. The hour is exciting. The hour is dangerous. The hour is dark. The hour is light. There's never been a greater time to be alive. There's never been a more dangerous time in history than right now. The balance of our nation is not in the hands of Washington. The balance of our nation are in the hands of prophetic intercessors who believe the word of God. And they are fearless. They are courageous to declare the truths of the word, the positive and the negative, with no regard to a man-pleasing spirit. Everyone wants to hear that only things are gonna get better. It is a lie. To say that things will only get better, it is a lie. Many of God's servants, they are telling lies about the future. The people are applauding. Yay, yay, yay. They're telling lies. It's not the whole truth. There is a great outpouring, but there's great danger around the corner. They're telling lies about Jesus. They're telling lies about the kingdom of God. They're telling lies about the word of God. God is raising up a people that will have a profound allegiance to Jesus. They will do works of justice. They will do acts of compassion. But with an allegiance to Jesus, an allegiance to the word of God, to the whole word of God, the whole counsel of God, the whole purpose of God, not just the part that pleases men to hear. But we must go deep in the word. We must stick together because we're all weak and broken people in our flesh. We need the grace of God. We need each other. We need the whole body of Christ. God is raising up forerunners in all the different parts of the body of Christ. They all have different labels. Some are Baptists. Some are Methodists. Some are Presbyterians. Some are non-denominational. Some are campus ministries. Some are in the Catholic church. Some are in the Eastern Orthodox church. They're all over the earth. God has raising up men and women for such a time as this. We need each other desperately. There isn't a group here and a group here and a group there. God has groups all over. But we have to be serious and we have to be intentional about the hour of which we're living. I'm excited. Now in this conference, we're not gonna give you a lot of how-tos. Our messages, we're gonna limit them to 30 minutes. We wanna give you some bullet points. We're expecting you to take these notes that represent what our leadership team believes. Again, it's not a full statement of all that we believe. We're expecting you to receive these bullet points to be stirred in your faith, to be awakened in your understanding, to go home and to go deep in the things of God. We're only giving bullet points because we wanna have time for worship and we wanna have time to wait on the Spirit because the Spirit's moving in power in our midst. But we're gonna give you enough bullet points that if you have a hungry heart, you will know what the Spirit is saying and where He wants you to focus your time and energy for the next year or two. They're general truths, but they're very important truths. Let's go to the middle of page three. Just the last five minutes. The middle of page three. Paragraph C. No, paragraph H, I'm sorry. Last year on this very platform, 5,000 young people came forward. We spent the entire conference talking about forerunners. And the reason we spent the whole conference, because so many had no understanding of even the most simple basic truths related to the positive and negative dynamics of the generation of the Lord returning. That was okay. So we spent an entire conference laying out some real simple points. Now they were complicated to some because they were so new. But what we told you last year, just stick with it and the fog will lift. That which seems new and complicated will become familiar and it will be easy to understand. Just stay with it. Not for a week or a month, stay with it a couple of years. The fog will lift in your understanding and these truths will become apparent and they will be clear and easy to understand. Stay with it and many of you have. We called people to a sevenfold commitment. It was one of the greatest moments in my ministry of 30 plus years. It wasn't the number 5,000 is actually a very small number. There's six and a half billion people on the earth. 5,000 is a very small number, but there was a resolve. There was a yes in the spirit. In our weakness, there was great sincerity and the Lord honored it. And many of you made a commitment and we all come up short in our commitments. And the grace of God covers us and he gives us opportunity to begin again and again and again. He's not the God of the second chance. He's the God of the third, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth, the seventh, 70 times 70. He will give us a chance to fail and return with a new beginning. So don't look at last year and say, oh, I made the commitment, it felt so right. Have I been fasting regularly? I did in January and February. Oh, not so good in March to December. How come I know that's true? I was in my 20s once and I made commitments to fast. I know how it works. I made lots of commitments. I meant them and I didn't have the maturity to follow through. But when I came up short, I repented, I confessed it, I pushed delete and I began again fresh with a full heart the next day. And that's what we're asking you to do. Don't worry about how much you came up short last year. It's a new day. Say, Lord, I came up short. I made a commitment, forgive me, repent of it, reset your heart, push delete, it's a new day. It's a new beginning. It's a new commissioning. We call it for a sevenfold commitment of a forerunner. Those that will proclaim the coming of the Lord and the unique dynamics in the generation, the great revival and many things related to it and the great crisis and the many things related to it. They would proclaim his coming and the events related to it while preaching the gospel, healing the sick and making the disciples in the here and now. Not postponing their involvement in the kingdom to the future, deeply engaged in kingdom work now, but deeply committed to preparing themselves to go deep in preparation to prepare others for tomorrow. Forerunners live in two timeframes. We seek to live in the fullness of what God wants today. And yet we're preparing for the fullness of what he wants for our lives in the future. We have a lot more about this in the notes. We have a book that I wrote with Brian Kim and a lot of our team contributed to the ideas. We laid out these seven commitments. These seven commitments are only a starting point. They're not the final statement. They're only a beginning point. We called people to pray daily. To connect with God. Look at paragraph H. We're just gonna end with paragraph H. To pray daily, to connect with God while changing the world by releasing his power through prayer. To fast weekly. Fasting doesn't earn us anything, but we position ourself to receive more from God and to receive it faster and to have a deeper impact. Fasting tenderizes us to grow faster. To do justly. We wanna be zealous to do works of compassion and justice, but it's not enough to do works of compassion and justice, but we do it with an allegiance to Jesus and the Bible. There's a lot of movements that are doing works of justice, but with no allegiance to Jesus. We pledge our allegiance to the Lamb of God no matter what it cost us. We are in this for Jesus and the Word of God with no hesitation and no apology whatsoever. If we lose our life in the process, it is our greatest glory if we lose our life in our ministry in the process because people come against it. We did it for him and it would be worth it if we did it over and over again. And that's the kind of spirit that's in this room. We made a commitment to give extravagantly of our finances. To not just do that little bit, but to give extravagantly regardless what the amount is, it's the percentage. And in the sacred charge book, the seven commitments of a forerunner, we talk about extravagant giving when you only have $10 a week. You can still be an extravagant giver in these days if you only have $10 a week. It's not the amount. It's the cost and it's the heart to give all to him. We talked about living holy and living holy is not just keeping a bunch of rules. It's living fascinated with Jesus. It's living in the pleasure of God exhilarating our spirit with his love and with his beauty. Living fascinated is the way to live holy. We call it happy holiness. Living exhilarated in the pleasures of God. Not gritting our teeth and wishing we could do the devil's lifestyle. No, we're not gritting our teeth wishing we could live in darkness. We are pursuing a lifestyle of exhilaration and the love of God fascinated with the beauty of the man Jesus. Fully God, fully man. We talk about living diligently, taking initiative to minister to others, taking initiative in leadership to make disciples, to lead Bible studies, to lead prayer groups, to be involved in the leadership team that goes out. Maybe there's five of you. All five of you are the leadership team and you're out serving people in the name of Jesus. You're taking initiative to lead. And then seventh and finally, to speak boldly. This is the most difficult one. That because we live before his eyes, we ask for grace to cast off the man-pleasing political spirit that is stifling the church of Jesus in this day to speak tenderly, but speak boldly and clearly about truths that are not popular even in the church. Those are the commitments we made. I wanna recommend that little book to you. You can get the hard copy in the bookstore. You can get it free online if you want it. We're not in this for the money. We're in this for the truth to go forth. You say, I don't wanna buy it. Cool, don't buy it. Get it on the internet for free. Take it up a notch, cut and paste, make your own book and you put it out in your own name and use the same truths and run forward. We would love it if you did that. We don't want your money. We want Jesus to have your heart because he deserves it. Because it's the reward of his sufferings that a people would be wholehearted to for him. I wanna call the worship team to come up. Laura Hackett and the worship team. I'm gonna ask you to stand. If last year you made that commitment and it's still in your heart, no matter if you blew it or not, we all blew it last year. Push delete and start again. Or maybe you're saying, hey, I wasn't a part of that last year, but this sounds right to me. I don't know the details, but I like the sound of this. I'm not asking you to make a holy sovereign covenant right now, but I'm asking you to set your heart in a new way before God that says, Lord, I wanna search these seven things out. I wanna give myself to them in the grace of God because I wanna be prepared to prepare those people for the most dynamic and the most difficult hour of human history that's yet ahead of us. So stand if you're making that commitment. Everybody standing. Either you didn't understand my altar call or I'm at the right conference. Maybe that's it. Maybe that's just what you're about, these kind of things. Laura, are you ready? Now this song, how many of you know what song she's gonna sing? How many of you can guess? What's it? What's it? Tell me what you think she's gonna sing. The battle is raging. The battle is raging. I love that song. She won't let me sing on the worship team, but I can sing this in my car and I'll tell you. She's recording it and it's coming out in February. So we're just gonna be before the Lord right now. You're making your own recommitment or your initial commitment. Laura, oh, oh, oh, I'm sorry. I heard the, I heard him. Okay, I thought that was you. Let's, let's go before the Lord. Father, just talk to him in your own words. Father, I say, yes, I'm weak. I can't do this in my flesh. I don't even fully understand it, but I want to be prepared to prepare others. I want to go deep. I want to move in power today and I want to go deep while I'm doing it for tomorrow. Talk to him right now. Just say, Lord, I want to do it. Now the Lord says, forget last year. Just push delete. Just forget it. Forgiven. Forgiven. New beginning. Start over today. Tonight. This week. Those in living rooms with God TV, make this commitment. Give yourself to this. Those that are listening by the internet. Say yes. Go with us. As Laura sings this song. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. Oh God, Holy Spirit stir us out. For the battle is raging, the devil is raging. And I don't want to be sleeping while the battle is raging. For my spirit is willing, but my flesh gets tempted. Rise up my soul and start praying. Because I don't want to be defenseless, yeah. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I don't fight, it's when it beats the air. Give me eyes to see and ears to hear. I put on Christ, make no provision for my flesh. But on the whole armor of God, leave no open door to darkness. And I'll take the scroll, I'll eat the scroll. I'll open up my mouth and speak for Your Word. And I'll take the sword of the Spirit. I put on Christ, make no provision for my flesh. But on the whole armor of God, leave no open door to darkness. Yes, and I'll take the scroll, I'll eat the scroll. I'll open up my mouth- Bless it be- that trains my hands for battle, that trains my hands for war, bless it be. trains my hands for battle. that trains my hands for war. Bless it be, bless it be the Lord my God. It trains my arms for battle, it trains my hands for war Mexico