South Africa Meeting 2000 - Part 2

A lot of prayer and anticipation has gone into these days. This is the first of the significant meetings of South Africa. We had one home meeting with young women. It was precious. This has been their official commencement. And they have a pond to restore. Before I begin, just to say something about the books back there. I don't know how to express myself rightly about my books. Every speaker thinks that his books are significant. I know that they are. Well, we were told that the church is the ground and pillar of truth. There's very little reference to truth. No love for the truth and what the nature of truth is. This is in Lithuanian for anyone who has that in need. French. Finnish. Russian. And this one was circulated to all. One of my earlier books. Very inspirational and it's difficult to read, but certainly another kind of purpose. We now have over four different episodes. A critical message in here is a message on Elijah. In the last days, the wilderness prophet was given Jerusalem at a conference where I chose a desire not to attend, let alone to be a speaker, but I invited him. Nevertheless, without having him on the platform to bring the word in this book, though by nonplussed, that's a word you've not heard all the time, N-O-N-P-L-U-S-W-E-B. I aggravated it. The founders of the conference was my publisher. The co-author of my first book in Israel was the National Self-Publishing. And they offended a number of celebrities. One of these was with Matt McCormick. My wife ended up shrieking on the sidewalk outside the auditorium. I stayed in panic. But that's the kind of word that I was. The Sisters of Mary were there, and they said that that word was the message of the conference. It's in this book. A remarkable single-message apostolic conversion. It's a little Holy Ghost masterpiece. You would think when you read it that this took weeks to deliberate and plan. This is the extemporaneous talk. Just transcribed and published. But it brought the congregation down to its place. Probably much like you. That is my record. But they had somehow an unspoken commandment to move it this far, but no further. And my spirit knew it. And after two nights of frustration, I was ready to throw in the towel. We cried out, Lord, I have no treasure that you give. But this is not a people who can receive it, unless you do something. So we fasted and prayed on the third day. This is their memory. It's in Dutch, it's in Danish. They were a religious choice in their study. And for those who are really tenacious and have long been concerned for the most ethical event of our times, and still is waiting for a right explanation and interpretation, it is finally in publish. The Holocaust. Where was God? Have you ever been to Japan? If you're not going to be truthful, you're not going to get anywhere. You have never considered it. You've swept it under the carpet in its past history. This is a dynamic. Not only an incisive attempt to find a biblical explanation for the great event of our times, but also a statement of a Holocaust that could come. Of which we know little. But I hope to speak about that before we are finished together in these days. Very important. And this will radically require a review on how you understand God. Because we have omitted one of the constrictive attributes of God, which to omit that is to omit God himself. And that attribute is just not judgeable. So I come up with this. The subtitle says an appeal for Jewish consideration. I've only gotten one letter back from the pew, and it was a letter of outrage. From the head of a Bible society in Jerusalem. And if he's outraged, what will be the response of secular Jews? They'll be grateful later. So, if you have any Jewish acquaintances, you'll want to pass this by. With prayer. It likes prayer. Okay. I'm going to speak from Acts 17. For myself. I've had the privilege in years past of visiting the apostolic spot. And slipping and sliding off the boulder that has been made smooth by the passing of feet. On the rock upon which legend has it posed for this remarkable progress. This will be an episode in the apostolic life of the great man. But oh, oh, oh. Is it ever loaded. The remarkable thing is, both of our extemporaneous addresses. I don't know that I'm able to spend more time in the preliminary of the chapter that brings us to the point of the address. But just quickly, a reminder, you'll see it as you read it. He was brought in flight for persecution. To a city he had no intention of visiting. Athens. While he was waiting for his colleagues to catch up. It says that he grieved a lot. He was stricken. As he saw the city holding him by poetry. And then the next verse says. Therefore he disputed with the Jews in the synagogues. What a remarkable dimension. Stricken with the issue of idolatry. Therefore he disputed with the Jews in the synagogues. You have to wonder what the synagogue has to do with idolatry. The answer is everything. Everything. There's no place where idolatry is more blatant, however subtle, than in synagogues. And so, that was set in motion by a man, waking, being grieved in his spirit. By seeing the city. And what city is it? Athens? The glory that was Greece? The epitome of human civilization, culture, humanity? I used to have a great sign in front of my history class. Go Greek! And I was more Greek than I was Jewish. In fact, I was on my way to Greece. Years later, I was apprehended by the guard of Israel. We were brought to the back of a train steamer. On my way to this very conference. Called the New Testament. So, as you can understand, the only two conditions of being a Greek are equal. And so, here's a Hebrew confronting the Greek mentality. Then, and forever, timelessly. And he strikes right to the heart of all that the world endorses as good. That gives every appearance of that which is commendable and desirable. And certified and validated by reason. Or pierces through. And he makes a statement about nations. That's very much on my heart these days. And I think that we have overlooking. And need to reconsider. So, Lord, may we hear. Something of what those Athenians heard. Coming out of this land. What do they call this? Babylon. And they thought this is Babylon. Amen. Something of the same substance. Content. Penetration. That came out of him. Because I know that I know. That everyone who heard Paul that day. Was eternally accountable before God. We hear an apostolic proclamation once. Out of an apostolic man sent. Is to be eternally accountable. So, thank you Lord. We're taking you too lightly. And we think that we can come at will. And listen to a visiting minister. And we'll see if we like it or not. We're not yet trimmed to know that if we were trapped. To hear a word. We shall be forever accountable for that word. In our generation and all time. As they were in this. Eternally accountable. And praise God for such a no-ass country. So, having said that word. Deliver the goods. Amen. Acts 17. So, Paul was waiting for them in Athens. His colleagues and spirit was provoked. For them, as you know, the city was full of idols. Therefore, he reached into the city like a jewel. Brought here 10,000 marketplace. Every day the boys were present there. That's that emotional role of an apostolic episode. Men heard of the uniqueness and strangeness of the scene. Particularly about resurrection. Which is patently offensive to the Greek mind. And none of us being Greeks and looking for some novelty. And to hear some new thing. They brought him to Mars Hill. That would be wonderful. Mars Hill. The platform. The outdoor. The high park. This was the high park. Of Athens. Do you remember the ruins of the temples? That you can see from the monastery. We see them as ruins. Also in their pristine beauty. And also elegance. They were the statement of all that is in the kings. We think that would intimidate the people who ran there. To have to speak an oracular message. In view of the physical statement of worldly prestige, wisdom, and so on. Because even seeing those ruins today is awesome. What were they in the statement? So the stage was set. And it's a stage of remarkable contradiction and contrast. Everything that speaks for man. Brought to its finest pitch. In the glory that was Greece. With a strange character. Brought to the city of flight from persecution. And one chance thing leading to another. And they bring him to the place of prominent speech. What would he say to another country like that? Because to confront the Athenian philosophers is to confront that civilization at its heart. It's a once in a world occasion. And I can just imagine him clearing his throat. And beginning with something like, unaccustomed as I am to public speaking. I want to express gratitude to those who have made this occasion possible. Call the occasion a pencil. Posted in this verse 22 of Aria of Bacchus. In the name of Aristotle. And said. Men of Athens. I observe that you are very religious in all respects. I think that King James says. Superstitious. True. Superstitious. And I think that that's the more accurate translation there. Now I used to be an intellectual myself once upon a time. Before I got sick of it. Then I lost it. But I know and I remember that if there's one point of offense. That an intellectual cannot bear. Is to be accused of being superstitious. Paul had a one erring instinct. To hit below the belt. And to go with his audience. And I don't think this was a man who was calculating. How can I attract attention? What mouth of gold can I strike? I think it's more like Jesus with a sermon on the mouth. And he opened his mouth and he broke it. This is the man. Who opens his mouth. He doesn't have to think of the license. Or consider his audience. Or how can I be found acceptable. He simply is what he is by the grace of God. It's the man. The thing in himself. That's the genius of what is apostolic. Brought to a point of ultimate confrontation. In a moment of time that will not be given again. Where the stakes are incalculable and eternal. And it's going to be requited for all austerity. To inform and challenge subsequent generations. How would you like to be in that place? You know what you would have to say? What you've never yet said. Who is sufficient in these things? You'll know that you're approaching apostolicity. When you begin to count. And calculate. And quibble. And say. Who is sufficient in these things? I can't imagine that you should be living in South Africa. In this present moment. In crisis and time. And have yet not said it. What is this? A kind of tolerance? Isolation from the realities that are everywhere about you? That are one man and one bunch? If you embrace them. And fling yourself into them. You'll be crying out at all. Who is sufficient with these things? I pray that that time will come soon. I was waiting to hear it. Because if nothing does. You're still constipated. And you're. Let's see. Afrikaaner. Ability. I don't know. Where is it? Where can I hope you? But probably on your self-sufficiency. Your religious ability. Your commendable qualities and traits. Are sufficient to meet every need. In the world that is not perturbed. But in the real world. In the crisis of real need. Nothing that we have humanly can be. That's why it may be impossible. So to speak. Is to meet God in the flesh. Is the continuation of Jesus. Who is now. Abiding and residing. In the body of a Jewish man. Who has forfeited. His Jewish distinctness. His intellect. His religious background. Everything that the Greeks would have admired. And considered sub-principal. Paul has forfeited. That the Christ who is in him. Can confront the epitome of human civilization. So to do so. This is why I was passing through. And examining the objects of your worship. See there's even a. Bar of that. If you have an object for your worship. You already have that out there. Because an object. Is something that can be handled. Seen. It's visible. It's tangible. Therefore it's not God. God is not an object. He's an invisible being. And so long as they're worshiping an object. They're already out of the dark. And then. Look at this. How penetrating it is being. But. God is really speaking through that man. I found that all of the inscriptions to an unknown God. And what therefore you worship. They proclaim. I proclaim unto you. Now. In Yiddish. You know this language? That we Jews speak or. That our parents spoke. When we were not supposed to understand something. In Yiddish we would say. This is a good start. This is not a good start. Him whom you feelingly worship. I. Proclaim. I proclaim unto you. What? Presumption. Or. Is it humility? May as well accept God as God in fact is. Before those. Who. Ignorantly. Worship him. As the unknown God. The Paul is really saying this. Your ignorance is not accidental. It's willful. You choose to have him remain unknown. But I'm not hoping that you get away with that. And go to make him known. I qualify. I know who you are. And once you hear about him out of my mouth. You're stuck. It's a good idea to shout. You're going to decide. Four or against five. On the basis of one student. Isn't it the way you report and conduct yourself? To the unbelieving world? Far. Far. You're much too much work. Deferential. To a lot of things. And want to be respectful. You don't have that apostolic edge. You don't have the absoluteness. Of this Paul's. The insistence. One God. One way. Matter as it is. Because the issue is in general. Would you love to see Paul's again? Because. The flesh and blood of my history. So. Now here comes the statement. The God who made the world with all things together. Since he is Lord of heaven and earth. Does not dwell in temples made with hands. Neither does he serve by human hands. As though he knew everything. Since he himself gives to all life and breath with all things. You don't have nothing of the apostolic mindset. This is what we're getting here. This is. The cosmic view of Paul. Of reality itself. This isn't a little. Force through to a world. That's how we have reduced the gospel. To a little formula. For salvation. Paul is giving them the breadth. Of this apostolic understanding. Of reality itself. Because that is the issue. And it begins with. The God who made the heavens. It begins with God as creator. Because if you don't begin with God as creator. You cannot speak of God as Lord. He's only Lord. And the authority over the creation. Because it is his creation. The Lord over heaven and earth. Because he made it. We talk like that. You think like that. You can understand why the whole issue of evolution is so even. Because there's a demonic press. To move us away from the foundation of understanding. Of the God who has created. Once you lose that sense. The Lordship will not be far behind you. We need to be restored to God as the creator. Of heaven and earth. Because once you state that. It means it includes Athens also. And every place and point in the earth. The earth is the laws. And the fullness of the law. And nations. And those that dwell there. Amen. When have we asserted that claim last? I will have foundation for this. Then he comes to really what is the heart of the matter. And he made of one blood every nation of man. To live on all the face of the earth. And the boundaries of the habitation. That they should seek God. If perhaps they might go to him and find him. Though he is not far from any one of us. I don't know how many times I read that. I don't know how many times I spoke that. And it is so unimportantly true. But it's the truth that needs to be heard. The whole purpose for creation. For human existence. For creating the nations and races of men. The diversity of nations. The bounds of habitation that they rise. Is the issue of finding God. The whole purpose of this life. Is the issue of establishing something. That we will carry to eternity. Not through our eternal battle of joy. But through our dismay and grief. That we miss the purpose for human existence. So what does that mean then? Our institutions. Our culture. Our universities. Our amenities. Our societies. All of these things are secondary. The primary first purpose for which God has created the world. And men and nations. Is that we might find him. I don't know how you could find a man more natural than Paul. We would probably pluck our tongues. If there was such a one in our midst today. Who has this myopic view. That the only purpose. The real and simple purpose for being. Is the discovery of God in this life. That's why God has given them breath. It almost sounds like a medieval view. Like the view of the dark ages. That the struggles of this life and the pain of tears. Has somehow to do with the issue of God eternal. And the mathematics. Yes that's true. You believe it? Don't look like you do. Don't talk like you do. Don't live as if you do. You're not conveying to those around you. The absoluteness and absurdity. Of this single purpose for human existence. That's why Paul is a challenge. And there's not only making a statement. He is the statement. The man is the thing in himself. He lives and breathes as if. The only purpose for his being. Is to proclaim the purpose of God to men. That they should not perish. Our Christianity is something other and less. So when we talk about revival. I can get excited. I have visited both places in the states. And came away relatively unchanged. In one place really dismayed. In fact I went to the receptionist. In Toronto. And I said you know. If I had come from another country. At an expense and inconvenience. Thinking that I was going to encounter God. In his supernatural power. I would have left this place profoundly disappointed. Now what I see here is nice. And it's pleasant worship. And it's sincere. But what? But I would not have gone out of my way in the distance. Like I have to go now. You have an obligation. To tell people before they embark. On transatlantic journeys or where so ever. That they're not going to find what they think is here. It's not here. So maybe I have a perverse sense of what revival means. For me revival. Is not excitation. And personal jubilation. And bringing the book to our cheeks. It's restoring an apostolic vanity. It's a church. Whose foundation is raw. And the superstructure is like it's foundation. It's a church singular. In it's insistence of what this life is about. And has the raw and apostolic audacity. To insist upon it. That's revival. Now. There came a moment. When I was preaching this text. This very message. That God has with one blood created all nations of men. That established the bounds of salvation. That hath made me like speaking up to him. I have always thought every time I spoke of that. Yes individual men. God has created us. And we live in nations. But it's only just a kind of arena. A platform. So that we can individually find God. That's true. But it's not the whole truth. Because it came a moment in time. In Nuremberg, Germany. That's the city that Hitler wanted to have. His Nazi pagan rallies. You ever seen those propaganda posts? Hundreds of thousands with their sick idols. And great Nazi swastika banners. And pomp and the whole thing. He loved it in Nuremberg. Because of his pagan history. Not yet liberated. Those supernatural angelic principalities and powers. That were with the pagans centuries before. In their revelry. Were also with the Nazis in theirs. Was in essence the same revelry. The same celebration. The same idolatry. The same power. That's what I was speaking of. I came to this point. That God has created nations. That they might seek after God. If half the humanity is on the other side. And all of a sudden it occurred to me. That God is not speaking about individuals within nations. Seeking God. But nations themselves as nations. Seeking God. Think on that. Nations seeking God. That they might be found of him. To reveal the purpose for which their nationhood has been given. He has established their bounds. And their habitations. And their diets. What for? That it should be our playground? That we should have the enjoyment of its resources? Its weather? That its physical things are our delight? What's his purpose for our nationhood? That serves his ends. And pertains to his glory. Is a question for which we have never sought God. But he's close to any nation that will seek him to find out. So you know what I believe from that day forward? God has an intention for nations. They are not just a providential supply or platform where we can do all that. We've made it that. But he has an intention for every nation. And I don't know if a nation yet that has ever sought him to find what that intention and purpose is. And God counts that so significantly. That whole wonder. That he has weeped in times past at your indifference to God's national intention. And you've gone about establishing your own at great tragic sorrow. Loss and suffering. World wars and calamities and tribal warfares and every kind of devastation. That is the outworking of the ambition of men who do their own thing at God's expense. In complete indifference and neglect of what his own purpose might be. He's weeped in times past. But now he commands all men who regret it to repent. For he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world of nations. With a long indifference to the creative establishment for himself. So then I was stuck with my face sticking out before a German came to my audience. And so I had to say, now, what would God's purpose for Germany be? Because I know what God's purpose is. Your impudent ambitions. I know that has cost the world, twice in the 20th century, almost a near annihilation of civilization itself. 40 million lives in World War II and 20 or 30 million in World War I. You have robbed two generations of its creed. I don't know how many Mozart's and Beethoven's and Fichte's, Hegel's, Nietzsche's, Schopenhauer's, Karl Marx's and Schumann's have died on battlefields. In the outworking of your imperialist ambition for power, for dominance in the world. Because you think that Germany is your playground and your plaything. What would God's purpose have been for you? Could it, just by any remark, figment of the imagination, have to do with, say, the Jewish people? Who have been 2,000 years at your risk. That there's no other nation in the world that has had a longer Jewish tenure and occupation than Germany. That the Yiddish language is German. That Reformed Judaism was born in Germany. Zionism was born in Germany. Marxism was born in Germany. Socialism. Freud was a German-speaking Jew, but we have been in this. What we call Jewishness and that has so affected the modern world, has laid its foundations and its configuration, is Germanic. So I was reminded, you know, every time I go to Germany or Europe, I look for Jewish cemeteries. I'm not a melancholy, maybe I am. I'm sorry, I'm not a melancholy, but every Jew is a melancholy. You ought to see my mother in the morning. I love to go to these cemeteries where they have not been destroyed by Nazi power. And get a sense of this Jewish continuity in that nation. Many of these tombstones have the inscription Hebrew on one side and the German on the other. And the German-Jewish names are well known. Metro, Oberlin, Mega, Lowe, L-O-V-E, Katz, Cohen, Kahn, all derived from pristine origin. Great German-Jewish names that have affected civilization. I came back from one such visit. The tombstones went back to the 14th century. They were cut out of thick slabs of granite that the Nazis could not even top. But they were faded from the exposure through the centuries. I was so moved by those stones. Not a living Jew anywhere in that area, but this monument to their past. I came before the German audience that night, and my first question to them was, these Jews were in your presence since the 14th century. How many of them were converted? How many of them came to the knowledge of their God through your witness? How many of them knew that the God whom you were celebrating on Sunday was none other than the God of Jacob, the God of Israel? How many of you even presently know or are willing to acknowledge that that is your God? Are you embarrassed by the designation, the God of Jacob? You should have seen the jaws drop. The fact of the matter is, they are embarrassed. They don't want to think of their God in a Jewish context and connection. Therefore, they never made him known. For those Jews who were in their midst, as a statement of judgment, being cast out of their land and being brought into the nations. I said, what if instead of your impudence and ambitions, you had taken on the priestly task of coming under these people and raising them up from the degradation of the judgment of being cast out of their nation and living in exile and explained to them the reason for that judgment, their forfeiture of the covenantal obligation and revealed to them the covenant made in his blood that they might be restored to the land and to their God and to their calling, which God has never dissolved. Because Paul says in Romans 11, the gift and callings of God are heretical. I said, did you do that? Would you be willing to do that as your primary and first purpose for your nation? It's not economic success or martial military triumph or imperialist ambition, but the coming under of this Exiled people cast into your midst and making them the foremost purpose for your being to lift them up out of the degradation of their judgment and being the instrument in their salvation and their return. For the return of Israel to its nation, to its land and to its God is life from the dead for all nations. And it never occurred to them. And I'm not saying that that was or is the purpose of God. I wouldn't discount that. But the issue is whether that's God's purpose or not, how many have sought or find what God's purpose is for their nation? It waits to be found. The geography is the purpose of the sun. And I travel the world. There's something one thing, there's something unique about each place and each people. The nations, the races, the ethnic, the geographic, all of these elements are not in any way half-sense. There's a mystery, there's a genius of uniqueness for nations in the first place. That needs to be considered. It needs to be sought. The fact that we have none has cost us greatly. And in our misunderstanding of what we think the spirituality would be, we left the national purposes to politicians. And we are happy to be allowed all sorts of services. Paul went into the heart of Greek civilization and he raised a big question of the reason for it. And he raised it with apostolic insistence and apostolic autonomy. And I believe that before this age is over, God needs again to bring the Pauls of our generation to the places of power and authority that have conducted themselves in complete disregard of him who created the heavens and the earth. If we need to confess and pray three days before coming to South Africa to preach to the church, what will it take for the church in South Africa to bring the message of God to its own nation? This might revive fasting. This might put a new premium on corporate prayer and intercession. Because how do we dare confront the locus of power except that we go in the anointing of those that are sent by the lame in advance? If you think that Paul had a name and that even if, once I'm discharged my oratorical skills, I'll come down this mountain, I'll go on elsewhere, you understand, a man who talks like this, anchored folks like this, has no assurance that he'll ever come down at all. Except maybe feet first. You don't strike at the heart of the thought on shouting or the worldview, the understanding of a people on which they predicate their success, their values, and get away with it. If we're getting away with it, we've not gored the ox, we've not touched the mainstream of the world and the nations and how it lives and spites, though it is grossly in their way. And if they continue in that way, they will pay eternally for that crime. We have not been guided in that fear that the world lives in a lie. Its culture stinks, it is corrupt. And we ourselves are not moving and growing in the ability to discern between that which is evil and that which is good. And we ourselves think it's good. We subscribe to that good. We share those values with them, and therefore we cannot be to them what Paul was to the Greeks. You've got to be separated from the thing you're condemning. Because if you're identified with it and enjoying its benefits, you cannot address it. You'll have no emotion, no learning, no authority. Paul was getting at the heart of a lie. Men thinking that their nation is their playground, that they can do with it what they will, employ its resources as they will, as if they have nothing to do with providing the issue of their comfort, their amenities, their power, their success. What was God's purpose? How can they live mindlessly without considering the evil created in them? Because he's a purposeful God. Isn't that so? I wonder if we're persuaded. And if we're not persuaded about his purposes for us, then by whose purposes are we moving and living in happy harmony? Who told you that you have the right to go to university and pursue a career, or attain to such and such a business? Or you thought God approved because he wants you to make a good living and he knows that, of course, you're going to have family responsibility and that you're free to choose the path that you're looking for? You know why we can't? Why God's not bringing us to myself? Because we don't sell to him what we can find. We ourselves are purposeful God for his purpose. We think that we have the full liberty to do what we will and it's not sinful, it's not gross, but it's selfish and indifferent. He does not consult and consider what his purpose might be. The fact that we're succeeding is not a statement of God's necessary approval. How many of us would go back to square one and say, well, I chose such and such a career, but if it's not your choice, then I had never consulted you. It just made perfect logic. The door was open, I had the opportunity, it's a well-paying profession, I thought surely you would come behind me and approve. But if I had moved in my own autonomy, indifferently or wantonly, who has created me as the explanations, then I'm ready to forfeit every benefit and advantage I have gained by pursuing something that you have not done. I think we would be in for a colossal shock. But I think the world would take note that something is rising up in their midst that is no longer a Sunday event in a Christian culture to which they can look with disinterest and passion. They will see a notice about a non-believer that cannot be ignored. It compels attention and requires those who observe to decide for or against God eternally. That's the purpose of human beings. I don't know if you all agree. This is the transcription of the previous speaker. I'm listening to text. I read the evidence. And it's on your internet, it's on your website. We have a website. www.benedictisrael.com That's one word. I hope I spelled this word correctly. www.benedictisrael.com I hope we'll come up with something called a burning bush. And in it are documents, things, papers, statements, books. Twelve chapters on a prophetic call. Outstanding material. People gasping over it. They've never seen anything like it. And quite frankly, Christianity is not anything like it. It's come out of thirty-five years of sweat, tears, agonizing feeling to the cross. It's a rich statement. And then another book called Apostolic Foundations. Already in Russian, not in English. It's been published on English and Spanish. In which you'll find the chapter on Paul and Russell. So I hope that you'll consult that website. Okay. What is it the nations ought to seek God for? Is it to find out the purpose for which they have been created as a nation? And a purpose for which their boundaries and habitations were given? The requirement of men and nations is to seek Him who is the Creator and Lord. It is a continual seeking. And because the Church has been building on us, we have no message for our nations. How much of our present activity has been initiated out of ourselves, even ostensibly for God's sake? Do you know what I mean? We cannot do as Paul, because we're not in that highest place. We've been compromised. We've not ourselves radically sought what is purposeful for us. How dare we then confront nations and their authorities to seek God's purpose for them? But seek it, we must. We cannot wait for nations to not seek God when many of us have not asked Him for ourselves. Most of us have been completely disregarding for the God who made us assume that whatever purposes we want can certainly be approved. To find God is to find out the purpose for which we were intended. There's no finding of God as God, nor is there any knowledge of God that is a true knowledge, independent of His revealed purpose. That's choice. That is being heard again. To find God is to find Him for the purpose for which we were intended. There is no finding of God as God, nor is there any knowledge of God as God that is a true knowledge, independent of His revealed purpose. What I'm saying is, we don't know God as we would, and have not the knowledge of God that we think we have, unless that knowledge is related to the discovery of the explicit purpose that God has for our life and for our mission. Not to seek God for that purpose is not to seek Him. It's not to know Him, and therefore, we're not able to make Him known. God is purposeful. To seek God and to know God is to seek that purpose, to find it, and seek to fulfill it. To think that we have found God, and yet not to have found Him for purposes, is not to find God. The true discovery of God is the knowledge of God as the God of His purpose, and it is in the seeking of Him for that purpose that we come to the truth and depth of real relationship with God. We know God, just know Him. You think that if we don't know God, do we know what church is? Because the issue of the mystery of the ecclesia, the call of outlaws, is altogether related to the purposes of God. If we have not consulted those purposes, and are indifferent to them, what are we then as a church? But the conglomerate of individualities seeking and fulfilling their own individual purposes, coming together under a single roof for the purpose of the benefit of the service. That is not apostolic. That will not affect the world, and it hasn't. We cannot become engaged in this text and begin to take it seriously, or it will call for a radical revision of what we know about as the church. It might bring into focus the genius of the church in its call to this. And we cannot go to Mars Hill on the basis of our individual philosophy, but only as the expression of the reality, the temple, the prayer base, the wisdom, the grace that is infused and is communicated to us as a body. To be just a bunch of individuals sharing the same facility robs us of any prospect of the authority necessary to confront issues. You know what we have preferred to be? A conglomerate of casual individuals because it does not cost us what it costs to be an apostolic entity, to send Paul. And maybe we have had to wait 14 years since my last trip to South Africa for our own fellowship to come to the place of corporate reality that I bring before you, that we could be sent here at this time to this nation. An authority that has waited on something that has had to come through our entire body that does not come easily, cheaply, or without suffering or pain. Once we start taking the purposes of God seriously, everything comes under review. And we will be found walking. You know the mystery that walking indicates? There are all sorts of walks. Ephesians, chapter 3. Again, God the Creator. God has created all principles, speaking again to Greeks and Ephesians. In order that, through the Church, the manifold wisdom of God might be demonstrated to the principalities and powers of the earth. And this is the eternal purpose of God in Christ Jesus. And you don't want to say something like, are you going to the womb? No, I'm not going to the womb. Nobody will be able to heal you. That statement is so compounded, deep, comprehensive, cosmic, that it goes right over our heads. It's been there, we've read it, and we are totally unaffected. In one fell swoop, Paul narrows and feels the purpose of God in the Church. And he says, it is the eternal purpose of God in Christ Jesus. Show me the Church today that has sought and discovered and taken to its heart God's eternal purpose for the Church. It's not a program. It's not an increase of membership. It's not activity. It's an eternal purpose of God that has not a thing to do with our religious success, the enjoyment of our services, the benefits that we can provide to our congregants. It has only to do with the mystery of something important to God. A demonstration, even to an invisible spectral realm called the principalities and powers of the earth. Show me a Church anywhere in the world that will take that as their purpose and primary reason for being. To fulfill the eternal purpose of God in a demonstration that can only be made by the Church of the wisdom of the Apostles and the Australian Epistolic Order. The same Church that will take the eternal purpose of God to its heart for its purpose in being is the same Church that will rule Jesus in the country. I know you haven't thought about that. Because the two thoughts are connected. They go together. It's part of the overarching apostolic mindset of the purposes of God. Cosmically, eternally, in terms of powers of the air that are invisible and yet are important to be treated in God's sight by a demonstration that can wake up the Church. And the other is in the earth a demonstration to the Jews who have been hostile and opposed to the Gospel that they might be won over by the jealousy that will come to them through something that is communicated to the same Church. That Church that is indifferent to one purpose is equally as indifferent to another. And I wonder if we could even likely use the word Church to describe any component of God's people who have forfeited both purposes. Or do not know of them, are indifferent to them, and make a salt out of them. And even that will not answer the question. Because both purposes have not a competent thing to do with your self-acknowledgment. It does not bring you any blessing, any benefit. Quite the contrary. It will rain the wrath and the opposition of dark powers that rule over the earth that you don't want to tread. You know how this trip began for me? Taking a nosedive under my own staircase. You can come and look at my foot. Twice the size of a mother. Boom! I went down like a proverbial hummingbird. And now it's near infection. And the same week this happened to some other member of our body. And another brother's wife was freaking out with emotional upset and distress. And this happened. We have never seen such marked opposition at any point in time in our 25-year history as the week that preceded the coming of South Africa. I wonder, why? Because South Africa, for us, is in God's purposes. And when you ascend in the fulfillment of something that is not unilaterally or arbitrarily determined on the basis of your religious conviction, but in the fulfillment of an expressive, explicit moment of God's choosing and declining, and you go forth from that to the extent where your body, all hell, will rail against you. Are you ready to candidate for such opposition? Merely to fulfill an eternal purpose in God? Are you that taken with God's purposes that you're willing to sacrifice? After having heard the loving that you sing your verses about Jesus, you sound like a bunch of numbers. And I'm not going to be impressed with your song service. I'll be impressed with your sacrifice. But let me see your love for your sacrifice. And it takes God's purpose to be foremost, isn't it, for your Godly being. Anyone can sing these verses. They come to euphoric celebration. And the powers of the air yawn in your face. On Jesus they groan, and on Paul they groan. But the, who's it, what do you call it? At least, who? The only thing that the powers of the air are required to recognize is that it's not all like it is. They're not at all impressed with cancer. They know that though you hold Jesus' word, you have not taken His purposes to be the foremost reason for your faith. You've not sought to witness the betrayal. They're not even in your mind. And as a matter of fact, there are people who turn you off. And then God says, on His love of the bishop, who brought the people through their fall, salvation has come to the Gentiles so that that's the movement of the jealousy. There's a purpose for your salvation beyond the satisfaction and benefit that occurs to you by being saved. They've renounced the damage. The move, the damage of jealousy is the purpose of God for your salvation. We as a church walk in that. We'll come sprawling out from one congregation tent one night and forget there's two more messengers to go. And I think that these mysteries are interlocked. The mystery of Israel and the mystery of the demonstration of God's wisdom to the powers of the air. Because God's wisdom is not the world's wisdom. Nor the world's wisdom is. The word wisdom really is a little bit confusing. It's not wisdom in the sense of wise, saving, or healing. It's wisdom in the sense of family system. What is the world's value as against God's value? The two value systems in collision, contending with the meanings of that. And the world says you're number one. Take care of yourself. Seek your own pleasure. Take care of your family. Enjoy this. You're going to come back to earth. God's wisdom says, the soul will be my own. Sacrifice, the cross, suffering, and a reward that has not been in common in this life, but in the age to come. Take God's purpose to yourself as your primary. More than your career. More than your family. More than your success. It's another kind of wisdom. When the powers of the air see that, they tremble. They no longer fear. And such a presence in any nation, in any city, in any locality, are the people who have embraced that purpose and are moving to the demonstration of that wisdom that will break up the consolidation of those powers that have fundamentally slaved the land since time immemorial. I can hardly think of another place on earth where these realities are more prominent and deadly than here. So I want to pray for you. Have a good rest of your day. God have mercy on my God-wise man. What are you requiring? You're still waiting for something, Lord. You have a flash of it at the first in that last publication that we need to be worried about. Those that were sent from the end of the world upside down. They controverted all that the world celebrated as wise. They showed its fullness. They showed its deceit in their so-called spirituality of the unknown God. And I believe, my God, such a witness needs to come again that evening. The nations are getting away with murder. They're creating the conditions for murder. There's no cognizance, no awareness of the eternal consequence of this vain and selfish living unto oneself, whether it's individual or national. And no one in the nation has pointed that out. No one has come to them and told them that God has a way of living in which he will be judged. By that man, we may raise him to death. So Lord, I pray somewhere in this nation, could it be here? You'll raise up such a people, such an entity who seeks your place, seeks you for your purpose, for their time in history, in this specific moment in which you have called them in this location, in the realities that are about them. How are they to meet them? What are they to express in them? What are they to be representing you in this context as the first reason for their being here? Shake us up a little, Lord, and show us our presumption of how much we have been so much like the world in the past. Thinking that you automatically approve what we have chosen to do without consulting you. So I bless this people, Lord. Precious God. Prepare to continue on, Lord, with what you say. Devastate our categories. Break in. Bring us into Paul's apostolic view, his way of seeing things. Bring us to his absoluteness about the insistence of God as God for all men everywhere. The sense of imminence on the day of judgment in which he spoke. Being closer now than it was then. That we would speak it not as a slogan, as a catchword, as a little cuesign, the Lord is coming. But with such a trembling, such a reality conveyed by our eyes, by our faces, by our voices, by the way in which we conduct ourselves that they know, that they know this is an absolute cuesign. The statement of Christian doctrine. This is an awesome imminent, soon-coming fact for which I need to tremble. Lord, bless this coming edition. Have a place in the earth, my God, where you have no end. And that people have surrendered themselves, and in total, with each new purpose and with each new will, no matter what the cost, what the consequence, no matter how many misunderstand, no matter what the public will be called rag-pickers and battlers, by which they will be called insane and mad, and they'll be scoffed at as all of us. They'll be willing to bear that work of work we've got to do in these days. It will not leave us permanently embarrassed, we will wish. We want to serve your purposes, our generations, in the nation and locality in that nation where you have brought us in your purpose. And we say from this night, we will do it whatever the cost. We'll be the church that embraces your purposes, no matter how it conflicts with our program, our intention, our we have it all together feeling. We're willing to be unbound. We are willing to be an apostolic entity in this locality for the life and death of many of us, black and white. I bless this people. Thank you for your introductory words. Give us an eagerness to hear you out in full. We thank and praise you for your generous love that will not let us remain smug, self-satisfied, content. Educate us well. Bring us divine discontentment about our present conditions of how we move from the apostolic realities and may that deliverance bring a juice to our mouth, a saliva, a reckoning, a delight, a word that conjures up such a sense of glory. May we drink it. May we desire it. Thank you. Thank you for tonight and for what has yet to come. We give you praise and glory for your pursuit of us in Jesus' name. In God's peoples' name. Amen.