Alan, brother, will you come and just lead
us.
I just feel that you're supposed to do
this for a little while.
Amen, church?
Amen?
Come on, brother.
Just come in.
I'm just going to give two or three
announcements while he's getting ready to go.
Again, if you have cell phones, be sure
they're turned off and not distracted or silenced.
Again, if there's anybody who wants a quiet
place to pray, off to my left, your
right.
If anybody needs a nursery, there's one out
there provided.
Also, in front of the sound booth back
there, there's a little box.
We're not going to hold any offerings as
such, but if anybody wants to bless the
local church here for the expenses that they
have chosen to shoulder at this time, they've
provided food and all the facilities, you're welcome
to do that.
There's a little box back there.
That's everything.
I can do all things through Christ who
gives me strength, but sometimes I wonder what
he can do through me.
No great success to show, no glory of
my own, but in my weakness he is
there to let me know.
His strength is perfect when our strength is
gone.
You carry us when we can't carry
on.
Raised in his power, the weak become
strong.
His strength is perfect when our strength is
gone.
But we can only know the power that
he holds when we understand just how deep
our own weakness goes.
Then his strength in us begins when ours
comes to an end.
And then he hears our humble cry and
proves again.
His strength is perfect when our strength is
gone.
You carry us when we can't carry
on.
Raised in his power, the weak become
strong.
His strength is perfect when our strength
is gone.
So in Jesus' name we press
on.
In Jesus' name we press on.
Dear Lord, with the prize so clear
before our eyes, we find your strength to
press on.
So when the valley is steep, when
the mountain is steep, when the body is
weary, and when we stumble and fall, when
the struggle is hard, when we're battered and
scarred, when we've spent our resources and
when we've given our all, in Jesus' name
we press on.
Dear Lord, with the prize so clear
before our eyes, we find your strength
to press on.
Lord, I'm yours.
I've been born with life so precious.
I'm brand new.
I'm brand new in you, my Jesus.
Lord, I'm yours.
I am yours.
You hold all my life in your hands.
And when I hear your spirit calling me,
I will follow.
I will follow because I am yours.
Pick up thy cross
and follow me.
I heard my Savior say,
I gave my life to
ransom thee.
Surrender your all today.
Lord, wherever you lead, we'll go.
We will follow you, Christ, because you love
us so.
Wherever you lead, we'll go.
It may be through some shadow's day, or
o'er some stormy sea, we'll still follow
you, Christ, whatever the cost.
Wherever you lead me, wherever
you lead, we'll go.
Wherever you lead, we'll go.
We will follow you, Christ, because you love
us so.
Wherever you lead, we'll go.
You just ask one thing, Jesus, just be
Jesus in me.
No other me but thee.
Let your resurrection power come and fill me
this hour.
Jesus, just be Jesus in me.
Let's sing those words, Jesus, be Jesus in
me.
No other me but thee.
Resurrection power, resurrection power, fill me, fill me
this hour.
And Jesus, be Jesus in me.
Our Heavenly Father, we bless your name, Lord,
tonight.
And we worship you, Lord, for who you
are.
Oh, Jesus, be Jesus in me.
No other me but thee.
Resurrection power, fill me this
hour.
And Jesus, be Jesus in me.
And Lord, prepare me to be a sanctuary,
pure and holy, tried and true
with thanksgiving.
I'll be a living sanctuary
for you.
Wherever he leads, I'll go.
I'll follow my Christ who loves me
so.
I'll follow my Christ who loves
me so.
Wherever he leads, I'll go.
Can you stand and lead us in prayer,
please?
Amen.
Brother Craig, if you'll come.
Brother Don had asked me earlier if Leon
would come give his testimony.
Leon is a man that we as a
church begin to pray for by name, he
and his brother, many, many months ago.
And I'd said more than once that the
day God saves Leon also be the beginning
of revival in Barnsdall.
And he calls me big brother, I call
him little brother.
You can see why that's funny right now.
But he's going to share with you.
First of all, I want to thank you,
Jesus, for giving me time to speak tonight,
dear Lord.
I want you to protect all these speakers.
The God-fearing people that come to preach,
dear Jesus, we appreciate it immensely.
Okay, here we go.
Thank you, Jesus.
On December the 22nd of last year, I
had a doctor's appointment.
I had to go take a stress test.
I went over and took the stress test.
You don't hear from him unless something's wrong.
About three or four days after that, he
called me and said he needed to talk
to me again.
So I go back over there.
He said, I had a heart transplant or
bypass.
They're 96.
Well, two of them plugged up.
Anyhow, getting back to the deal.
The main artery in there showed I had
it blocked 70%.
He said, well, we're going to have to
go back up in there and check it,
see if we can put a stent in
there.
I've got a couple of stents already in
there.
Two of them had plugged before, and he
unplugged them, or it was almost plugged.
But anyhow, I went back to the 26th.
He said, you're going to have to go
up in there and see what he can
do.
I said, well.
I swore I wouldn't do it again.
My wife, she didn't want me to do
it.
But I thought, well, I better go do
what he says.
So I go back over there.
He made me an appointment for the 2nd
of January.
So I go over there.
Brother Brian and Jeff, Brother Jeff come over
there.
All my family was there before we went
into the deal.
They prayed for me.
I was laying there on that deal, and
they put their hand on my knee.
When they was praying, I felt a little
tingle.
I went in there to get the treatment.
He went up in there, and he was
jabbing around on there.
First thing he came back up and said,
there's not no blockage in there.
How can you find any?
I said, well, thank you, Jesus.
Tell us what happened before you were ever
healed.
New Year's Eve when you came to my
office.
Oh, yeah.
I forgot the best part, didn't I?
I'm nervous, you see.
Anyhow, Jeff had been trying to get me
to come to church for 4, 5, 6
years.
I wouldn't pay no attention to him.
He kept on nagging and nagging.
Finally, I said, well, I might go to
church, but I said it's not going to
be out there on a hill.
I said, I don't believe the way they
do.
Anyhow, I was laying there.
The 30th of December, I was laying there.
I stay in the front bedroom, and there's
a guard light out there in the front.
It shines through the window.
It's not real bright, but you can see
light through it.
I've got one of them digital clocks there
on the end of the bed.
Anyhow, I go to bed about between 11
and 11.30. I'm laying there, and I
had this congestive heart failure, and I can't
lay on my back and sleep.
So I was laying there on my back.
Well, I'd never prayed in 40 or 50
years.
I decided to flop over on my left
side and go to sleep.
Well, when I turned over, I died.
Everything went black.
I couldn't see nothing, no feeling, no nothing.
I don't know how long I was there.
It seemed like five or ten seconds, but
I don't have any idea how long it
was.
Well, when I finally came back around, I
checked my pulse.
I said, Lord, if you'll let me get
through this tonight, I'll get right with you
tomorrow.
So I didn't sleep real well that night,
needless to say.
But anyhow, the next morning, I went down
to Jeff's, and I told him what the
deal was.
Well, we came out and got with Brother
Brian, and I got right with the Lord,
and I've been happy camper ever since.
And I know he's still alive because he
can look at me and see what he's
done to me.
Thank you, Brother Brian.
I'm not going to let him go yet.
One more thing.
What did you do the next day?
Your brother.
Well, me and my brother, we hadn't spoke
for four or five years.
We got a little fused.
Well, the next day after I got saved,
I went up there to apologize to him.
Well, I went up there, and his daughter's
pickup was sitting there.
So I said, well, I don't want to
go in there while he's got company.
He'll have to blow up.
Well, I went back to town, and the
Spirit wouldn't let me go home.
I stopped down at the Gertz Cafe and
sat there for a minute.
I said, well, the Spirit told me to
go back up there and apologize, so I
went back up there and apologized.
We've been friends ever since.
Amen.
Thank you, Brother Adrian.
Praise the Lord.
Good evening.
Welcome.
Why don't you step up here, and Brother
Joel, you come up here and pray for
Greg and Mark Greening.
Are you here tonight?
He's not here.
Brother Greg, Gordon, you want to come up
here, too, again and join us for prayer?
Lord Jesus, we commit our brother to you
today, Father God.
We pray, Lord Jesus, that as he speaks
your word, that you would fill him full
of the fire of your Holy Spirit, Lord
Jesus.
That you'd fill him full of your power
and your anointing to speak your word of
truth, Lord.
Lord God, we pray, Father God, that you
would fill him with a mind of wisdom,
Lord Jesus, to accurately divide your word, Lord
Jesus.
We pray that you would keep him from
temptation, Lord, to only speak your word of
truth and integrity, Father God.
We pray, Father God, that you would come
through with such an anointing that you would
touch every heart in this place, Lord Jesus.
That you would touch every mind, Lord Jesus.
That, Lord, that your fire would cleanse out
the sin of our hearts, Lord Jesus.
And that your fire would bring us to
repentance, Lord Jesus, before you, Lord God.
We pray that over our brother today, Father
God, and over this place, in Jesus' name.
Yes, Father, we just commit, Lord, this meeting
to you, God.
We commit this meeting to the authority and
headship of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And, Father, we thank you that this dear
brother, Greg, is here to minister your word,
Lord, by your Spirit, for your glory.
And we just stand in awe of not
of a man, but, Lord, of you and
how you use servants, how you use vessels
for your honor and your glory.
Lord, let no flesh get glory here, Lord.
Not one person in this room be any
glory unto, but unto the Lord of heaven
and earth.
Unto his Son, Jesus Christ, be all the
glory and honor.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Well, I'm incredibly honored to be here tonight.
I know this is God's remnant.
Folks that gather from all over the country,
even parts of the world.
For no other purpose than to glorify the
living God.
You know, when we stand in this place
tonight and think about what God is doing
and where we really are, there's hope.
And the message I sense God wants me
to bring tonight is that there really is
hope that there's a breakthrough that really can
happen.
But we have to truly understand where we
are.
You know, in Matthew 16, 1 and 2,
the Word of God says that we're to
understand the signs of the times.
If I were to ask you, where are
we really tonight?
I mean, really?
You know, we've had prayer and awakening conferences
now for 20, really in some places, 30
years in this country.
And yet, our nation is now in the
biggest collapse in the history of the world.
Why is that?
And yet, there's hope.
God's remnant is deepening.
There's a turning point in some parts of
the world.
We're seeing it, not so much in North
America yet.
But tonight, I really believe God wants us
to see how to go past the wall
that we sometimes seem to hit.
We pray, we pray.
We see God do some wonderful things.
We see some mercy drops.
But somehow, so far, there's been a wall.
We haven't quite gotten past it.
What is it that God is saying to
His church tonight?
That He gets glory.
That He can finally pour out His mighty
presence in such a way that no human
can touch it or take credit.
We are at a desperate turning point.
If I were to ask you tonight, what
are the signs of the times?
We could all state most of them.
You know that North America is the only
major continent where Christianity is not expanding with
all our churches.
That's an astounding sign.
We know that 70 to 75 percent of
churches in America and Canada, for that matter,
are either plateaued or declining.
Now, what we're going to look at for
just a moment is what God must quicken
in our heart to make sure we really
do understand just how desperately urgent it really
is that we cannot just keep having prayer
movements.
It has to have a turning point.
Something, the break has to come.
Where is that?
When does that happen?
Baptisms, as you know, in America for the
last ratios have been going like this for
50 straight years.
We're going to kind of take a moment
and see where we really are.
Now, what's happened to programs and strategies and
innovative methods?
Well, they've all just exploded through the roof.
That's interesting.
In the middle of all of our education
and strategies, the baptisms have been going like
this.
Now, what's happened to morals and family strength
and church unity in America and Canada in
the last 40, 50 years?
Well, they really haven't gone like this.
I don't have to tell you.
They've gone like this.
What we're in right now is not a
decline.
It can only be called an unmitigated collapse.
It's happened on our watch, our prayer movement.
You say, well, Brother Greg, you're being negative.
Not at all.
Don't hear that at all.
The prayer movement's deepening.
That's the hope.
But there has to be a turning point.
We can't just keep being content, which you're
not.
You're the remnant.
But where are we?
The baptisms like this, the morals like this.
We're seeing something that is incredible.
Many of the baptisms that are, the few
that are being baptized are not there in
three months.
Evidently, there's a lot of false evangelism going
on.
So we're really at an urgent moment.
This is interesting.
In fact, this has never happened, to my
knowledge, in the history of Christianity.
We're now in the middle of a 30
-year prayer movement in America.
You say, what do you mean by that?
Well, more books have been written on prayer,
revival, awakening in the last 30 years than
the 300 before that.
We've seen an incredible explosion of strategies and
prayer movements and prayer ministries in the last
30 years.
Yet in the middle of that, America has
moved to not the edge of judgment, in
judgment.
In fact, in many ways, if you know
the signs of judgment, they're screaming at us
that we're right on the edge of cataclysmic
judgment.
Now, the question is tonight, how could this
have happened?
Praise God, there's an answer.
And praise God, the Word of God says
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and
forever.
And guess how it was before most of
the last mighty explosions of the manifest presence
of God?
It was really dark most of the time.
But folks, in some ways, not as dark
as where we are now.
America's been really bad before, but we've crossed
some barriers.
What is God saying to His church right
now to take us to a place where
He's able to really release His manifest presence?
Not just mercy drops.
I mean like the mighty flood of God.
If I were to ask you tonight, can
you clearly remember 1904?
I think I know what your answer would
be.
Nobody can remember that.
The reason I ask, that's the last time
there's really been, and this may be arguable,
but probably the last time there's been a
real global awakening that swept the entire earth.
None of us really remember that.
We've seen mercy drops.
We've seen some little splashes since then.
But nothing like the real thing when God
just explodes in power.
In fact, one of the disturbing signs that
we're going to try to address tonight is
that we really have seen a lot of
little mercy drops that really don't become a
flood.
We're seeing an enormous number of little flashes
of revival that just really quickly fizzle out.
Why is that?
We need to understand that.
Otherwise, we keep doing the same thing.
And one of the worst things that could
ever happen to us is that we begin
to think we're further advanced than we really
are.
And that can happen to all of us.
And pride can get a hold of us
even at the point of prayer.
It really can.
We can think we're more spiritual or more
powerful than we really are.
But folks, there's good news tonight.
Someone said the prayer movement in America, the
only way you can explain how we've had
this big, loud, conspicuous prayer movement, and things
have not declined but collapsed.
Someone said, well, it's been a mile wide
but a half inch deep.
It's been an awful lot more about give
me, give me, and bless me, bless me
than cleanse me, change me, use me, and
glorify yourself only.
But great news tonight, folks, it really is
deepening.
And most of the prayer movement, a lot
of it's been very real.
It's just deepening now.
And I'm convinced of the core of my
being the group that gathers in places like
this.
You're that part that's deepening.
So I want to try to bring some
things tonight from the Word of God, I
believe God wants me to share with you,
that basically is the turning point where we
go past the wall we've been kind of
coming up to.
And we really see, the Word of God
says in 1 Corinthians 4, 20, that the
kingdom of God is not in talk.
Now, we can all talk good.
We can all, most of us, not me,
but most can preach good.
And we can do good meetings, and we
know how to do prayer conferences.
But where's the explosion of baptisms?
That's not the only sign.
But where's the explosion?
I mean the real thing.
That's what we're going to see tonight where
God brings us to.
And praise God, there is tremendous hope, even
in darkness.
Even if the bottom really falls out.
And it very well may.
But that's when the presence of God can
explode like a river.
I'm going to ask you to take your
Bible and turn to, well you don't have
to turn to 2 Chronicles 7, 14.
I do want to quote it in the
spirit of the Hebrew text.
Sometimes we miss it a little bit in
the English.
But if you would turn to Acts chapter
1 and verse 4 through 8.
That is such an incredible, beautiful picture of
the turning point.
When I mean we're not just praying for
a Bible, we're seeing it.
When we're not just crying out.
I mean the presence of God, it's not
a little drop.
I mean it's the kind that changes communities.
I love what happened in Wales in 1904.
Just remind us who God really is.
You know, 1900, that little country was about
as dark as it could be.
In fact, in some ways they were worse
than us.
In some ways they weren't.
But the people of God began to do
the two things we're going to talk about
tonight.
They took their quiet times deeper and really
embraced cleansing.
Not legalism, but grace-based cleansing.
And I mean the presence of God started
teaching them how to pray for a Bible.
How to experience the fullness of God.
They didn't have little quiet times.
They had intense, powerful times along with God.
Then they embraced prayer meetings.
Real prayer meetings about souls and about the
presence of God.
About repentance and getting right with each other.
And man, it wasn't long.
Well, it was about four years.
But in 1904, there came God's suddenly moment.
Isn't that a nice thought?
We've been praying for 30 years for a
mighty move of God.
But you know Richard Owen Roberts, one of
the greatest men of God of our generation.
And someone asked him one time, Do you
have much hope for America?
He said, If you're asking me do I
see a lot of good signs, no.
And if you're asking me do I see
a lot of health in the church, no.
But then he got that twinkle in his
eye.
And he said, But you know what, I
believe in the God of suddenly moments.
You know folks, when God really moves, I
mean when it's His time, we don't tell
Him when.
But all of a sudden, He's so real.
Anything we thought before was revival, we find
out.
Man, He's so real.
In Wales that happened in 1904.
All of a sudden His manifest presence, His
glory, His holiness.
He made Himself so real that within 6
months, 100,000 people joined the churches by
conversion.
Now let's put that in perspective.
You know what that would look like in
America.
Percentage wise, based on population.
In fact, there was a little miner by
the name of Evan Roberts, believing God for
that very thing.
100,000.
Well, to do that in America, you and
I would have to believe God for 30
million Americans to get radically born again and
join churches and go to work for God
and still be there 5 years later for
that to happen in the next 6 months.
Would that change America?
Everything from Washington to Hollywood and everything in
the middle.
Ladies and gentlemen, that's basically what God did
in Wales in 1904.
That's the God we're praying to and the
God whose presence we're in tonight.
But how does He do it?
What's the principle?
What does He want to do in us
so that suddenly moment comes?
So we don't spend the next 10 years
just having conferences and just praying.
That's tremendous because that's where it all comes
from.
But there's got to be a turning point.
Well, these passages really, really tell us.
Before I read the Word of God, I
always pray.
You know, we should never, ever read the
Word casually.
So I'm going to ask that we bow
before God one more time.
And I so praise God.
You're not here to hear speakers.
You just want to hear God.
In the quiet of this moment, just between
you and God, would you just praise God
for giving His only Son to die for
you?
Just praise God for Jesus right now.
Would you praise Him that His grace is
greater than all of our sin and weakness?
That He justifies us, though we're a work
in progress?
Would you praise Him that with God nothing
is impossible?
Would everyone ask God to give me His
words in the Holy Spirit and us ears
to hear?
Oh, Father, how we praise You that by
the blood of Your Son we can call
You Abba, Father.
That we can come, Lord, to Your very
throne.
And, God, we come only in that blood,
only in that name.
Father, we know we can't worship, we can't
pray, we don't have an ounce of sincerity
or purity without Your grace.
But thank You, Lord, that we're not without
Your grace.
And it's in that grace, Lord, that we
come.
And, Lord, we're asking You tonight, just take
us to a whole new level of just
loving You, Lord.
And, Lord, just trusting You.
And, Lord, surrendering everything to You.
Lord, by Your grace that we're utterly dead
to ourselves that You alone may live.
Lord, take us to a whole new level
of faith tonight.
And, Lord, a new level of turning points.
So, God, we can see the breakthroughs in
our marriages and churches.
And, Father, help us not to get so
enamored with what needs to happen in America.
We miss our families and church.
Father, tonight, take us to deeper faith, deeper
love, deeper passion, deeper power, deeper surrender that
You alone may get glory, that the break
-in may finally come.
We ask it for Your namesake, for Your
pleasure.
God, we confess Your name's the only name
that matters.
And, God, Your kingdom's the only kingdom that
counts.
And, God, Your will is the only will
that really is any matter.
And, Lord, that we matter only because we
matter to You.
And I've been created in Your image.
We praise You.
We honor You.
We exalt You, Lord.
Take this time.
And, Lord, take us to a whole new
surrender to You that You get glory for.
We ask it in Jesus' blessed holy name.
Amen.
Well, 2 Chronicles 7, 14, as someone said,
it's the most quoted and least experienced passage
in all the Bible.
I hope that's not true, but it may
be.
But let me quote it in the spirit
of the Hebrew text.
It really would read in the context more
like this.
If my people, which are called by my
name, will desperately, in utter brokenness, humble themselves
before me.
It's not, God, we need You.
It's, God, we've got to have You.
And, God, we're undone.
And, God, we desperately need You manifest.
It's a desperate kind of humbling.
It says, if we will pray.
But it would really read more like, if
my people will fervently cry out to me
with utter fasting and tears, not just, Lord,
it's in revival, but that kind of prayer
that the Spirit of God gives.
We can't work it up or fake it,
but He says, that's what we have to
have, and He'll give it to us if
we want it.
And so, He'll even give us the want
it.
We can even ask Him to strengthen our
will.
Isn't that great?
Much of what we have is a will
problem.
If we wanted to pray more, we would.
We can trust God and ask Him for
that.
He can even do that.
My people will cry out fervently.
And then it says, and seek my face.
Well, that means to admit His face has
not fully turned toward us.
It's very important that as prayer members we
stay very humble.
And not start thinking we're further along than
we really are.
At the same time, we don't be discouraged.
We shouldn't be.
But folks, pride is a very subtle thing
to get a hold of us.
So, we must humble ourselves to admit, Father,
we haven't seen the breakthrough yet.
And we're not satisfied with mercy drops for
Your name's sake.
And Lord, we want to seek Your face.
That means intimacy, total surrender to Your Lordship.
Not just, God, fix our economy.
Or, Lord, God, don't let us be persecuted.
Boy, if that's our motive for revival, we
can forget it.
That's worthless, that's shallow.
In the early church, they rejoiced because they
were beaten half to death.
God can give us that passion and grace.
We have to want it.
And He'll give it to us.
And the remnant's headed there.
It's exciting.
So, my people will pray that way.
Seeking my face, my glory, my kingdom.
Not our comfort, not just our pleasure.
Or us to brag about it.
But then He said, and turn from the
wicked ways.
That would mean, God, go through me with
a fine-tooth comb.
Especially my motives.
Especially my inner meditations.
That unyielded self that will hide on us.
It's just, Lord, I want You to have
everything.
He said, then.
Which says a lot different than just saying
a little four-line prayer.
And so, what God is calling us to
is that passion of prayer.
And God's seeking heart that He gives us.
And that's what He's doing in this remnant.
And it's going to a whole new level.
Here's the good news tonight.
There's a little remnant of believers.
And not just in America, but especially around
the world.
And I tell you, in the last three
to five years.
I'm talking about the intercessors now.
I'm talking about people that do know God,
walk with God.
Listen.
It is altogether different now.
The time they spend has just exploded.
It's happened.
And many times they've got tears running when
they pray they never have had before.
And they're getting words from God.
They're not just hoping God will send revival.
They know He's going to in their church
because they've got a word and they believe
in God.
Folks, revival doesn't come from just hoping one
will come and saying, Boy, we need it.
It comes from having the kind of faith
where you really believe it by revelation.
And it's a word.
And that's where He's taking it.
That's what's happening in that remnant.
They're seeing breakthroughs in their marriages.
For years, they've seen their kids and grandkids
kind of struggle.
Some of them have them going the wrong
way.
Did you know we're in an epidemic of
ministers and Christian leaders whose families are being
spiritually slaughtered?
I mean, an epidemic.
It's not a little.
It's just an explosion among many intercessors.
But guess what?
In this little remnant, they're getting a little
better handle on some real warfare.
And I mean, they're seeing some mountains come.
They're seeing these kids change.
They're seeing their neighbors get saved, which is
really what it's about for the glory of
God.
It's not just praying.
Man, they're seeing the souls get saved.
They're seeing the mountains move.
They're seeing the marriages change.
And it's happening.
Tell me, are you in that remnant?
I mean, no hands or anything, but just
be honest.
Are you really there?
I mean, we can all go to conferences.
You know, we can all get up here
and give sermons.
What's the reality?
You got it.
You probably wouldn't be here.
And that remnant's growing, folks.
Well, he says, when you pray like that,
and it's God's grace in us, he said,
I'm going to hear, I'm going to forgive,
and I'm going to heal the land.
But let me look, if you will, to
Acts chapter 2.
I'm sorry, Acts chapter 1 and verse 4.
Acts chapter 1 and verse 4.
And being assembled together with him, he commanded
them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to
wait.
And, of course, we understand that didn't mean
go have a committee meeting or go have
a meal.
It meant go really pray together, united, really
seek God.
But not just pray and seek God, but
believe God.
That they were really believing God for something.
Look what verse 5 says.
John truly baptized with water.
You should be baptized with the Holy Spirit
not many days from now.
And they were believing God for that.
Of course, that hadn't happened to them yet.
If you're saved, he's in you.
He's come inside of you.
But the Bible does also clearly say that
to save people, we can really lose the
fullness.
We can really lose the full power.
We can really lose the full yieldedness.
Therefore, the Spirit gets kind of grieved and
quenched.
And it's subtle, but it's very real.
So he was talking about them not only
having the Spirit, but obviously walking in the
power of the Spirit.
Verse 8, he says, this is what it's
going to look like.
And it's a pretty good measuring stick.
It really is.
You know, we're really a generation.
We've got so many study courses, and they're
really good.
We've got so many ministries, so many tapes,
and really good stuff.
And this passage didn't exactly apply to this,
but I think it's kind of in the
ballpark.
It says, sometimes we can be ever learning
and ever coming to the knowledge of the
truth.
We can be ever talking and studying, but
not really moving into the real manifest presence
of God in our local churches.
That's where it really hits the road, not
at a conference, but at the local church
and in the family.
Well, he says, this is what it's going
to look like.
You'll receive power when the Holy Spirit's come
upon you, and you shall be witnesses to
me right here in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the
uttermost part of the earth.
Man, you talk about a miracle.
What was right outside those doors?
You know, sometimes, well, it's tough in America
today, boys.
Hard to reach people.
What was outside those doors?
The Roman soldiers who wanted to hang them
on a cross.
The Jews who wanted to kill them.
Every cult in the world.
Talk about a demon-possessed atmosphere.
It was incredible what they were facing.
He said, you're going to walk right up
to those Romans and those Jews.
You're going to win them to Jesus.
That's what he was saying.
You're not going to hide anymore, because they've
been hiding.
But he also, he wasn't telling them it
was going to be a miracle by the
minute.
He also said, many of you are going
to die.
Going to die.
They're going to kill your children.
Did you know that's what's happening in India
and places around the world?
I was with a bunch of men in
India about three years ago, and they were
from North India.
And they said they've already killed one or
two of our friends, and when we go
back home, some of us are going to
die.
They know who we are.
And you know what?
They're going to kill our children.
You know, it's one thing to give your
own life.
What about giving your child to be tortured?
You know what I saw in those men's
eyes?
It broke me.
It humbled me.
It changed my life.
I saw joy.
I saw determination.
And when I got back to the States
to my safe place, three months later, I
heard three of those men were dead, and
two others had to just leave their houses
and leave everything.
But, oh, the power of God in those
men's lives and ministries.
Folks, he's taken us to a kind of
joy that doesn't get shaken by the economy
or anything else.
He's taken us to a kind of power
we'll witness, and it works.
You know what happened.
The Spirit of God came, and they went
out witnessing, and the first thing they got
accused of was being drunk.
Anybody accused of being drunk lately?
They had so much joy and so much
boldness, so much power, but it wasn't long
that they realized these guys aren't drunk because
their words didn't hit them here.
Their words went straight here.
And that's what we lack today so much.
Well, yeah, we can be good talkers, but
it's not in talk, it's not in slickness.
It's real power.
Well, they had it, and the world got
reached.
That's what's happening in so many places around
the world.
And we ask the question, how did they
get that?
What was that?
We've got the Spirit in us, so where
is that?
Well, we want to talk for just a
moment about the one thing that has to
happen in us as individuals to go past
that barrier and really move into that next
realm where the Spirit of God explodes finally.
And that doesn't mean we measure everything by
experiences.
We'll go through valleys.
We'll go through times of warfare.
It's not all measured by numbers.
The folks ought to be there sometimes.
But we see these mighty moves of God.
We should never be satisfied that it never
happens.
And so here's what God is doing right
now in this remnant.
Let me give you one other Scripture that
illustrates the kind of prayer we're talking about.
What we're saying is in Acts they had
a type of prayer.
That 10-day prayer meeting, that's pretty intense.
And there's not just a prayer meeting.
Folks, it was a cleansing meeting.
You say, how do you know?
It doesn't say it.
Well, that's kind of what they did that
time of year in that type of thing.
But you know what they had to decide
in that 10 days?
They had to decide, we're ready to walk
out there and get our heads cut off.
They had to decide that because up to
that point they'd been hiding.
You know, now I believe in that 10
days they prayed, they sought God, they were
getting ready to surrender their whole heart, and
that's always the missing key to revival.
It's not just prayer.
It's always prayer and utter yielding.
That's it.
That's the big missing element.
But praise God is coming back.
Well, they had that, and God at His
point in time, He moved that suddenly moment.
They were totally different.
They went out.
They witnessed.
It wasn't fancy.
I jokingly say if you read Peter's sermon,
you know what?
He'd have flunked a preaching class at seminary.
There wasn't three points and a poem in
there.
Anyway, it's a rough old sermon, brother.
But the power of God was so that
a rough fisherman, 3,000, got baptized on
the spot.
You know how much power that was?
You know what those people were doing?
They got publicly baptized.
They were becoming a public enemy of the
Roman government, putting their head on the chopping
block.
That's repentance.
That's salvation.
We don't get that kind of power by
just studying Bible and doing conferences.
It's about a certain type of personal and
corporate prayer.
But we're going to see the personal for
just a moment.
James 5, 16.
You're very familiar with this passage.
Probably don't even have to turn to this
one.
The great revival passage, as a matter of
fact, at least the principle is.
It says, Well, I'm sorry.
It says, You know, that's a real big
little so that.
That so that means that the deep, deep,
deep cleansing and utter brokenness and humility doesn't
happen first, neither does it release the power
of God.
That's what it means.
But then it goes on to give a
principle about revival producing or any kind of
producing prayer.
It says, There's an implied word here.
The implied word is only.
It is only the effective, fervent.
That means anointed, impassioned, real spirit anointed.
It is only the effective.
You know, that would mean it's got a
lot of faith in it.
That means we're not just saying prayers.
We're believing.
It's effective.
It's strategic.
It's guided by the spirit.
You know, revival producing prayer is never general.
Never general.
You ever read the great prophets of the
Bible that within the prayers they prayed when
God did mightily?
Boy, they didn't say God send revival.
Man, they understood what God had to do
to send revival and they were praying those
things with God.
Their prayers deepened.
The prayers of Daniel, prayers of Nehemiah, obviously
the prayers of Jesus.
Did you know we see that in history?
Those men and women God used to birth
those mighty turning points when the spirit of
God did explode.
When you go back and read their prayers,
honestly they had about ten or twelve elements
in them.
Really, God generally does about at least seven
or eight things in his church to really
bring the manifest presence of God.
Do you know exactly what they are?
And are you praying those by the spirit
of God?
I'm not saying there's exactly eight.
I'm sure most of you do.
You're doing it.
But did you know we've done studies that
the vast majority of believers don't have any
earthly idea in the world how to seek
God's face?
They'll say God send revival.
They say it two or three times and
then we start looking at each other.
They don't know what else to say.
Well, these folks, when it says the effective,
that means we're really praying with the spirit
of God.
It's not just some general little flippant one
-line prayer.
It doesn't mean it's legalism or complicated.
But we're praying with God.
We're praying in real faith.
We've got the fervent anointing of God.
And obviously all that comes from the righteous
man, which means the utterly, totally yielded heart,
not just somebody that's saved back there somewhere.
And so this is where God is taking
us.
How is he doing it?
Well, he's doing it the same way he
always does it.
Folks get a, believers get a vision for
intimacy and surrender to Jesus.
They get a vision for Jesus himself, not
just some blessing, not just some answer, not
just some miracle, which is fine.
But they really want time with Jesus.
You know, first thing Jesus said when he
said teach us praise, he said shut the
door and go in your closet.
Now he was saying a lot of things
about the Pharisees and legalistic.
He was not about that.
But we see in the life of Jesus,
he always made much, much, much time to
be alone with the Father.
And we see that in this remnant I'm
telling you about of pastors and lay people
in this country.
That is the common denominator.
Over the past three or four years, God
has convicted them.
They've stopped short.
They're rushing God.
And they've settled for more average type devotions
rather than this fervent, effective, absolute yielded heart.
And what we're seeing there, they're realizing, is
that they've shortchanged the cleansing part.
They were quite a bit on the asking
part, maybe even pretty good on the praise
part and the petition part, even a little
bit on the intercession.
But that really absolute searching of the heart,
not legalism, but spirit-led, grace-based, biblical,
absolute search.
That's missing in a lot of lives.
You go back and look at Jonathan Edwards
and George Whitefield and Wesley and on and
on and on and on.
Men, I mean, really, really knew God.
And that was never missing in their quiet
times.
It's coming back.
People are understanding.
I've been rushing God.
We're the busiest society.
I'm sure Canada is a lot like America,
but we're the busiest society.
In fact, we're called the instant society.
Do you know why we're called the instant
society?
We invented everything instant.
Instant coffee, instant tea, instant soup, instant breakfast,
instant bank business.
We invented it.
Guess what else we tried to invent about
40 years ago?
Instant quiet times.
No muss, no fuss.
Read a scripture or two, read a devotion,
say a prayer, and you're done.
And I know this group right here, you're
doing a lot more than that.
But folks, most aren't.
And you know what?
Even many leaders, what's really being seen is
even many of us that have been intercessors,
the Lord's taken us to a whole new
level of cleansing.
Let me give you an illustration.
By the way, you know better than to
pray for experience, don't you?
That's a lot like praying for patience.
Be careful.
I didn't know any better.
Right when I graduated from seminary in 1983,
I prayed, Oh, Lord, give me experience.
What did he ever?
First church out of seminary was the most
horrible.
And this is not an opinion.
This is what history professors said.
This is the truth.
It was the worst moral and legal scandal
and disaster in the history of the entire
Southern Baptist Convention.
It was my first church.
Now, praise God, I didn't cause it.
It happened before I got there, okay?
I could have caused it, but I didn't.
But right before I went to this church,
when an associate pastor, minister of evangelism, about
to go to my first church, it was
in a very big, large southern city.
It was in a very high crime area.
I was scared to go, honestly, because it
was going to be a very tough situation.
Right before I went there, I turned on
the 6 o'clock news, and there was
that church on the 6 o'clock news.
It wasn't a publicity campaign.
They were leading a woman out of that
church in handcuffs.
Accused of child sexual abuse in the church
daycare.
This was 1984.
You hadn't even heard of such a thing.
Biggest scandal and most horrible thing in Memphis,
Tennessee.
And this church is now in a horrible
mess.
And three weeks later, they called, and they
said, We can't call a staff member.
To be honest with you, I went, I'm
glad you can't.
I was scared to go.
But then it kept getting worse every day,
and they called me back, and they said,
Would you still pray about coming?
I said, Oh yeah, I'll pray about it.
I thought, I'm not going.
But I prayed, and God said, You're going.
Folks, I hadn't been there six weeks.
That thing blew up like an atomic bomb.
They arrested the pastor that was there.
Accused of child sexual abuse.
Now a lot worse.
Now devil worship in the church baptistry.
And then they arrested two more people.
And I'm right in the middle of this
now.
Kid right out of seminary.
The legal bills started exploding.
This was a church about 200 or 300
on a Sunday morning.
Had a big billing debt.
Didn't have any money.
The legal bills started exploding.
The summit got to three million dollars.
It was just hopeless.
And they forgot to tell me the church
was divided right down the middle without the
legal battle.
I mean, folks, it was bad.
Well, it gets even worse.
Six months into this, I'm now their pastor.
I have no experience.
I have no idea what to do.
I'm scared to death.
So, we do have a program to get
our hands on.
We even started a good prayer ministry.
I mean, we tried everything.
Good stuff.
That church was dying.
Folks, this stuff, these legal battles went on
for five solid years.
I'm not exaggerating.
That church was on the 6 o'clock
news for five years, about three or four
nights a week, leading the former pastor out
of the church in handcuffs.
Now, what kind of chance is a church
like that?
Well, it didn't have a chance.
Neither did I.
I was so beat up and worn down.
And I was kind of moaning and groaning.
Lord, we've done all we can do.
We went to 10,000 people in six
weeks.
About 30, 40 little old people went door
to door.
10,000 people in six weeks and not
one person visited our church.
It was that bad.
Lord, we've done all we can do.
And, Lord, we've had a prayer ministry.
And, Lord, I've had a good quiet time.
And I'm just going to have to get
out of the ministry.
I'm just beat up.
That's when the Lord showed me what was
wrong.
And, you know, by human standards, I had
an okay quiet time.
But God showed me, you're stopping short.
You're rushing me.
And He said, what you're really doing, you
haven't embraced the absolute deep cleansing of your
heart.
And I thought I had, you know.
And you know what we're finding in a
lot of precious Americans, even some intercessors.
What we mean by embracing deep cleansing of
the heart and what God means are really
different.
And what we mean by absolute yielding and
what they understood in the great awakenings is
different.
But God's helping us come back to a
deeper yielding.
And, of course, have you ever noticed the
Lord is always right when He says something
to you?
And sure enough, He was right.
So He showed me this list of about
200 scriptures that was in some of the
great awakenings.
He said, pray through that one real slow.
I started that.
Folks, it wasn't long.
He started showing me attitudes.
People, I said I'd forgiven down deep, deep,
deep.
I really hadn't.
Selfishness, deep, deep, deep down.
I didn't realize was there.
And the Lord started doing the work.
And I was so beat up.
I was really beat up.
But the joy came back.
And the situation was worse than ever.
I mean, it was awful.
You know what?
They thought I was having a nervous break
down there.
I was up there so full of joy.
They said, Greg, you need to go see
a doctor.
I said, I'm not crazy.
Let me tell you what's happened.
And the Lord had become real.
See, folks, He don't need good situations to
give us joy or power.
But you're not going to get it in
shallow prayer time on the run or cleansing
that's about one and a half pages long.
Now, I'm not talking about legalism here.
I'm not talking about you've got to do
it every day or God won't fill you.
I'm not talking about that.
But we are talking about really, truly deep,
deep, deep yielding.
And that's where many are missing.
Well, the Lord began to do a work,
and then the Lord led me to ask
the people if they would change their quiet
times from the 10 or 15 minute kind
to really, and not legalism.
We said, shoot for 30 minutes to an
hour.
And again, don't get out of clock necessarily,
but just, and really embrace this deep cleansing.
And God had shown me if just a
remnant of your people would really go to
that level, He said, I can begin to
move in this church.
But if they won't, I'm not going to
do much.
Well, let me tell you what happened.
I challenged them to take their quiet times,
you know, 30 minutes to an hour and
really add absolute deep cleansing of every area
of their life and begin to pray for
souls.
There was a little woman in my church
named Polly.
She was about the quietest, shyest woman I've
ever known in my life.
In fact, she had a stuttering problem.
And she had a lot of pain in
her life.
She was a nice Christian lady.
She was kind of an intercessor.
And she prayed quite a bit.
But there was a level of absolute yielding
she thought she'd experienced.
She really hadn't.
You know what?
If we were really doing revival praying, more
of our churches would be in revival.
And again, I'm not saying that about you,
because your church may well be.
But what we're seeing, many have gotten content,
just pray for year after year after year
after year for revival, and it never comes.
There comes a point.
Some of it's timing.
But with many, there's a deeper level of
faith that He's going to take us to
and a deeper level of yielding and power.
A deeper level of fullness.
Well, Miss Polly, she heard about this quiet
time, and she realized, I'm not doing that.
She embraced this.
And the Lord started showing her things in
life over that month.
He showed her about 12 things in her
life, some attitudes, some things down deep.
And she was a nice lady, you know.
And then the woman began to change.
And she started saying things like, an hour
just flies.
Didn't even realize it's gone so fast.
She said, Brother Greg, she said, I didn't
know God could be that real to you.
She even said, I used to think people
that said God spoke to me were weird.
I thought they were hearing voices.
She said, boy, God speaks to you.
You know, I never could have said it
as well as she did.
She said, when you get your heart absolutely
clean, I mean, the real thing.
She said, you know what?
Your hearing clears up, doesn't it?
Folks, it really does.
God's holy.
We're under grace, but folks, that doesn't mean
sin's no big deal anymore.
Well, it kept getting better, and Polly started
seeing power.
I mean, she started seeing answers.
She'd been praying for it for 20 years.
And now, boom, boom, she was seeing some
incredible things.
But the biggest change, and folks, this is
where God's taking the remnant.
This is where He's calling us to go.
You know, with God, it's all about heart.
It's not so much what we know.
It's the heart.
It's the passion.
It's not the lips.
It's the heart.
Loving Him, loving souls, loving His presence, hating
sin, not because I might hurt from it
or might miss a blessing, but because it
grieves Jesus.
And Polly got the heart of God after
about three months.
She came to me one day, and she
said, Brother Greg, I've still got pain, but
I've got joy like I've never had in
my life.
And she said, Brother Greg, I've still got
problems, but I've got peace now.
She said, Brother Greg, it's so different.
She said, I've grown more in three months
than I've grown in 30 years.
This was an intercessor now, before this.
And she said, Brother Greg, I always knew
I was supposed to pray for lost people,
and I prayed for a few.
But she said, Brother Greg, now that Jesus
is just so real to me, she said,
I can't keep from praying for lost people.
She said, I've got 30 lost people I'm
praying for on every single day.
I said, 30?
That kind of convicted me, you know.
And she said, yeah, 30.
And then she said something that really spoke
to me.
She said, Brother Greg, I want to ask
you.
She said, sometimes when I'm praying for them,
I love them so much, I want to
see them saved so bad.
She said, sometimes I feel tears rolling down
my face.
She looked at me.
She said, I've never done that much before
about lost people.
She said, I do that about my problems.
But she said, Brother Greg, is that normal?
You know, I had to say to her,
probably for most believers, it really isn't, unfortunately.
But I said, it's real normal for Jesus.
Please don't stop.
She said, I'm not going to stop.
He's more real than he's ever been in
my life.
And then she came to me the final
month.
See, the reason I'm telling you this, this
is where he's taking us.
He's taking us to a new passion about
souls, about himself, about holiness.
Not legalism, but the joy of holiness.
And his presence.
And it's incredible.
But the fourth month she came and said,
Brother Greg, I've got to talk to you.
And remember, she's real shy and stutters.
And she said, Brother Greg, I'm scared to
death.
I said, what happened to your peace?
Why are you scared?
She said, well, Brother Greg, this morning in
my time with God, he told me I've
got to go witness to all 30 of
those lost people.
She said, I'm not certified.
I'm not trained.
I said, I don't care if you're trained
or not.
I said, can you read?
She said, yeah.
I said, take this little track.
I think it's Billy Graham's track.
Read these five scriptures real slow, one at
a time.
I said, when getting this one about repentance,
make sure they really mean they mean something.
That there's not some flippant little prayer.
She said, just read these scriptures.
I said, I thought the way you're praying,
that's it.
And you know what?
She said, well, I think I can do
it.
And you know, ladies and gentlemen, God wouldn't
let her not do it.
Over about the next six weeks, she went
to all 30 of those lost people.
One by one.
You know what?
I've been to most of them.
They didn't much want to hear me.
And some of them heard me preach, and
they didn't get saved.
But when that little woman went up to
them in the power of the Holy Spirit
of God, praying for them like she had
been for about two months.
And our church at that time was not
in revival.
And I want to tell you, he used
that little woman to start that church in
revival.
Not me.
He used that little woman.
And I'll tell you what happened.
She went to those 30 people.
And some of them were teenagers that she
knew and had a burden for.
And the people who went with her said,
you know, it wasn't very pretty.
She stuttered.
She'd have probably flunked this whole winning class.
But the power of God bestowed on that
little woman.
At 21 out of 30, got saved on
the spot.
And you know what?
I know what you might think.
You'd be right to think it.
Well, did they just say the prayer to
be nice to Polly or to get her
to leave?
That's not salvation.
I'll tell you what her fallout rate was.
It was zero.
I baptized 21 over 21 in about six
weeks after the little lady left with Jesus.
God used that little intercessor, that quiet, shy,
little beat-up woman, to bring our church
from just praying for revival to actually seeing
it.
Are you a Miss Polly yet?
We're not going to say 21 out of
30 every four months.
I'm not trying to put anybody on a
false guilt trip.
It's not always that fast.
But, folks, it's time to see the power
and some fruit.
We can't just be content just to keep
praying.
And praying that doesn't connect with souls and
neighbors and family, if it gets too general,
it's not quite in line with the Holy
Spirit.
He's both.
And you know what?
It's so exciting.
We're seeing God's intercessors, God's remnant, come back
to a surrendered heart.
And they're getting a joy.
They're getting a faith they never had.
Their faith is going deeper.
They're getting a power when they pray.
They're getting the tears back.
And they're beginning to see.
And, again, it's not all about just seeing
the result.
We have to pray sometimes for years.
Nothing wrong with that.
But tonight, can you see Brother Greg?
In that area.
That area.
And this is what he's asking us to
covenant to do.
And it's a covenant, not a feeling.
He's asking us to covenant.
I never will forget it.
Polly said, What do I need to do
to go deeper with God?
I said, You need to show up for
practice.
She said, You're starting a class.
I said, I can't help you.
I said, Would you set that clock 30
minutes to an hour early?
Get along with God and really embrace that
cleaning.
Don't think, I don't need it.
If I needed it, I'd just know it.
Maybe not.
She did that, and some people in the
church did that, and God's so moved.
Now, the second thing God's doing.
He's not only calling us.
This is exciting.
God's people really are praying those 10 or
12 things scripturally that God has to do
to bring revival.
I mean, they know exactly what they are.
They are praying them.
I'm not going to name them here.
I'm sure you know them, but if you
don't, they're on a little card back there
you can get right out of Scripture.
But really, there's about 10 or 12 things,
at least 8, that God really has to
do in this church to really bring the
mighty move of His Spirit.
And he says we're co-laborers with Him.
He wants to do it through our prayers.
It's all Him, but He wants our prayers
to line up with His mind and Spirit
and be specific and be strategic.
That's really happening.
I do conferences a lot, and I often
will ask people, how many of you believe
revival in spiritual ways?
I only hope for this nation.
Every hand will go up.
Then I'll let people bow their heads.
I'm not trying to embarrass anybody.
I'll say, how many of you in your
daily quiet time, man, do you passionately cry
out, plead with God, at least in 7
or 8 specific ways for God to move?
Now, be honest.
Don't raise your hand if you don't.
You know what happens?
Usually about 2 or 3 percent of the
hands can remain up.
Many have gotten stuck praying kind of on
the surface.
But the great news tonight, that remnant, man,
they've given God time.
Their prayers are now going deeper.
They're praying in the mind of God.
Not perfectly, but they understand the mind of
God.
They're praying with Him.
Am I describing you tonight?
Probably am.
But if I'm not, would you be willing
tonight to say, I want to become a
Mr. and Mr. or a teenage poly.
We're seeing teenagers take their prayer lives deeper.
You wouldn't believe what he's doing to their
lost friends and their parents.
Oh, God is so moving.
But it starts when we're saying, God, I
want to go to the effective, fervent prayer
of an absolutely yielded heart that really does
bring the flood like it did with Elijah.
And tonight, it's time to move toward the
flood.
We can't just keep year after year doing
conferences.
And we can.
And it's in God's time.
I don't know it's timing.
Doesn't mean anything's wrong.
But we need to make sure it isn't.
And that's what he's doing.
There's a second thing God's doing in his
remnant right now that relates to 2 Chronicles
7, 14, relates to James 5, 16.
It's in the area of united prayer, prayer
groups, prayer in families, prayer with husbands and
wives.
This is crucial and often omitted.
Prayer meetings.
Something happened in the 1950s.
A good question would be, what happened in
the 1950s that caused baptisms to start going
like this and morals like this?
What happened in the 1950s in the church
in North America?
Well, programs exploded.
Strategies exploded.
Education exploded.
Innovative methods, all that exploded.
Family stuff exploded.
You know, leadership materials, all that exploded.
All that went through the roof.
But what happened in the 1950s?
Prayer meetings.
Those prayer meetings basically left the church.
Now, what did Jesus say?
Matthew 21, 13, Mark 11, 17.
He said, My house shall be called a
house of strategies, committees, preaching.
Sure.
Called the house of prayer.
What kind of prayer was he talking about
when he said that?
Well, you just say prayer.
When you're at church, he was talking about
the corporate prayer of the temple.
The early church, we would all agree, they're
our pattern.
They're the example.
What kind of prayer did they have?
Corporate, continuous.
When the day of Pentecost came, they didn't
stop.
They just went into second gear.
Sure, they witnessed.
Sure, they preached.
Sure, they taught.
But they were constantly praying together corporately for
souls.
You know what happened?
When that hopeless church I told you about
in Memphis, and it was just hopeless, and
we were dying and all that, the turn
started when the people, the intercessors in the
church, took their quiet times even deeper.
They weren't content just to keep praying.
They took their cleansing even deeper, and then
God's Spirit began to move.
And the next thing God said to me,
He said, You're not a New Testament church.
You know, you never want to hear that
from the Lord.
How do you define a New Testament church?
Well, we would say by doctrine.
Yes, but that's not all.
It has to be by doctrine and practice.
It has to be both.
And if we don't have powerful united...
It doesn't mean they've got to be a
big number.
They may not be.
But if we don't have powerful united corporate
prayer in church, and powerful prayer groups united
together in church, and if husbands and wives
are not praying together at home, Jesus said,
My house shall be called a house of
prayer.
Obviously, that's the temple He's talking about, the
church.
But also, where is this temple now?
To us.
That would certainly mean our families.
So what we've seen in America is that
the devil duped the church into thinking just
studying about prayer or studying about this, that,
and the other, doing conferences about it, was
the same as in our churches and families
absolutely uniting together in corporate prayer.
And we weren't doing that in that church
in Memphis.
And so the Lord showed me, if you'll
call your people back and start one.
I said, Lord, they won't come.
He said, I don't care.
It's not their church.
You've got to decide whose church it is,
who we're going to please.
Start real prayer.
He let me start it with a prayer
group.
And I invited all 300.
By that time it wasn't 300, but five
years into this thing.
I told them, folks, we're going to meet
for about two and a half hours.
I said, we're not going to eat anything.
Boy, that made it real bad.
And I said, I'm not going to bring
you devotion.
What in the world are we going to
do?
The first 30, 40 minutes you're going to
be alone with God with scriptures laying in
search of every corner of your whole heart.
Then we're going to come out and worship
God together a little while.
Then, you know, the list of 60 lost
people we've been praying for for five years
and only four or five of them have
been saved.
We're going to pray for every one of
them name by name as the Spirit of
God leads us.
We're going to fast by the Spirit of
God, not legalism, not to brag about it,
but we're just going to obey Him.
He didn't say if you fast.
He said when you fast.
He said we're just going to obey Him.
And we're going to then pray for that
point the Spirit of God in our church,
His manifest presence.
And we weren't unified.
I'd done conflict resolution.
It was running out of my ears.
Those people weren't unified.
And the Lord said we're going to pray
for unity, real unity.
And so they began to do that and
after promoting it for six weeks and telling
them we're going to show you how.
You don't even have to pray out loud
if you don't want to.
It's going to change your life.
It's going to change your family.
It's going to be the most wonderful thing.
It's going to change our church.
Only 12 people showed up.
I didn't think we'd have 12.
So what God's doing in His remnant right
now, He's helping us to start prayer groups
and get real serious about it.
He said, well, you find one.
It may be only two or three.
It may be, or start prayer meetings and
they're doing it, especially at home.
Folks, if husbands and wives aren't praying together,
I'm not talking about praying at a meal.
We're not talking about just saying a little,
you know, now I'm going to lay me
down and sleep.
We're talking about really praying together.
And one of the things we're noticing is
that the families that really get back to
this and take it serious and really learn
how to recognize strongholds in their kids.
The Bible says we've got weapons, 2 Corinthians
10, 5.
That will demolish them.
That doesn't mean you put up with it.
That means they're gone.
Most people don't know what their weapons are.
Couldn't name them.
Not praying together.
There's a power in praying together that's this
unique.
He said when two or three are together
in my name, there's something that's, it's always
been all history revivals.
The remnant's coming back to this.
And those prayer groups are now getting deeper.
They're adding that cleansing.
And they're getting the tears and they're getting
promises.
They're getting faith.
And the power of God's being released.
It's happening.
They're not just praying forever.
They're seeing the breakthrough come in their church,
their local church, in their family, in those
lost neighbors.
When this bunch did this within four months,
I've never seen anything like it.
Number one, God did a work in us.
Tears started flowing.
People started getting promises, just like this church
has seen.
And it's incredible.
Within four months, 45 of the 60 had
been gloriously born again.
I mean the real thing.
Their list grew to about 190 of them
got saved within a year.
And I've never seen anything like it in
my life.
And we'd always done the outreach.
And we all always do that.
But oh, the presence of God.
And the manifest presence of God set it
on the church.
And I don't want to mislead you or
overstate.
This church didn't have sweeping revival.
It was a good mercy drop.
That's all.
And it was sure His grace.
We didn't deserve it.
Folks, He's pretty gracious.
If we'll humble ourselves to say, Father, I
want to go back to a deeper level
of uniting with others.
That's what's happening in God's remnant.
Has that happened in you?
I'm sure it has in many of you.
But if it hasn't, tonight God might say
to you, is there a prayer group you
could pray more regularly with?
Or maybe decide we're going to pray together
in our family deeper.
We're going to learn how to tear down
strongholds.
It's happening.
You know, Gallup Research did a poll.
A few years back.
You know, Gallup, they're not Christian.
They did this poll, and they found out
it's about one in two marriages end in
divorce.
That's no surprise.
But this group asked them to do another
type survey.
And you know what they found?
They found the families that really prayed together.
And again, I'm not talking about just said
a prayer at a meal.
I mean really prayed together regularly.
You know what the divorce rate was?
It was one in 1,256.
And I have to believe the one might
have been lying.
I don't know.
But folks, what a difference it makes.
It's not what we believe about prayer.
It's not what we study about it, what
we preach about it, what we talk about
it.
It's what we do.
It's the depth.
It's the real tears.
The real cleansing.
Praying those 10 or 12 things in the
power of God.
And it's happening.
It really is.
I'll give you one illustration that may encourage
you.
Because we are in an epidemic of godly
people with kids and grandkids being slaughtered.
There was a woman in my church named
Addie.
And I've seen men do the same thing.
But Addie's son Darren was moving away from
God.
He was 19.
He was in a nosedive.
He was just wrecking his life.
And she was so burdened.
She'd pray for three years.
Prayed her head off that Darren would be
touched.
And she was a nice Christian lady.
But again, she'd stop short of the kind
of quiet time we're talking about tonight and
praying with others the way we're talking about
tonight.
And she heard this message I'm bringing to
you tonight.
And it dawned on her I'm stopping short
in my quiet time, but I'm also not
praying with others in the kind of united,
fervent prayer that really does bring the breakthrough
and tears down the strongholds.
So she came one Sunday and she said,
I want to go deeper and I want
to make a covenant with God not by
my emotions, but by His will in me.
And she did.
And she committed extra time to God.
She embraced this deep cleansing.
She said, God, show me how to tear
down these strongholds in my son's life.
Lord, show me what my weapons are and
how to use them.
And she began to go deeper.
And over about seven weeks, every Sunday, she'd
come down to the altar.
And this was a nice lady, but God
had showed her things in her heart deep
down that were, you know, real deep.
People she said she'd forgiven down deep she
hadn't.
Began to show her unbelief in her heart.
You know, folks, Jesus said, It'll be unto
us according to our faith.
It's real easy to get the faith beat
out of us today.
It's real easy.
And you don't even realize it's happening sometimes.
But real deep in our heart, we're not
expecting God to break through anymore.
And Addie was there.
And so God showed her a lot of
things in her heart.
By about the sixth week, I saw her
face change in the prayer meeting.
And she'd stand up before and she'd cry.
She was so burdened for Darren, but her
face changed.
She had a big old smile on her
face.
And she said, Y'all keep praying for
Darren, but God's going to touch my son.
And boy, I had to ask her.
I said, Addie, have you seen Darren lately?
Because he wasn't saved.
And she said, Oh, I know he's not
saved.
I said, Addie, why are you so happy?
What's going on with you?
Listen to what she said.
This is so powerful.
And this is what God's done to bring
revival in local churches and in neighbors and
in families.
She said, Brother Greg, seven weeks ago, I
was praying hard, but there was some things
deep in my heart I hadn't yielded.
They were hindering the Spirit.
I didn't even know it.
And she said, Brother Greg, my faith wasn't
mountain moving.
She said it was less than it takes.
And then she said, God's shown me some
things about strongholds, but the biggest thing, she
said, Brother Greg, two weeks ago in my
time with God, God gave me two promises
for my son.
I don't know how, when my son's going
to be saved.
I think he's going to be a minister.
I thought, Boy, I hope you're right.
Well, you see what happened to her?
She was now praying with a word from
God.
Well, some prayers take years, even when you
get a word from God.
This was a nice quick one.
A month later, the church started at 10
o'clock at night.
The buzzer rang.
It was Darren out there.
He was nervous.
I thought, well, he's on drugs.
He looked awful.
He was pacing back and forth.
I went to the door and he ran
in.
So I got to talk to him.
I went down to my office and he
kept saying, I can't stand it.
I said, well, can't you stand it?
He said, I don't know what's the matter
with me.
I said, what's the matter with you?
Finally, I said, Darren, just stop.
What's happening?
He looked at me and said, Greg, I
don't know what's wrong with me, but for
the last seven weeks, all I can think
about is God.
I said, Darren, what do you mean by
that?
Because he'd get in trouble before and he'd
even pray the sinner's prayer and he didn't
mean it and nothing happened.
But that man was under conviction, folks.
I mean conviction.
He said, I've got an evil heart and
I can't change.
That man got on the floor and got
saved.
He got up.
You could see it.
His face was different.
Sunday morning, he ran down the aisle.
The church rejoiced.
God gave him those beautiful singing voices you've
ever heard in your life.
He's now one of the strongest deacons in
Nashville, Tennessee.
Two years ago, at his own expense, went
on a big, dangerous mission trip to Russia.
Last year, a big, expensive mission trip to
Germany.
Guess what happened last November?
He got ordained as a minister.
Precious intercessors.
Our God has not lost his power.
He's the same yesterday, today, and forever, just
like in 1904 in Wales.
He's the same yesterday, but we cannot be
content just to keep praying, unless that's what
he wants.
If we've done all we can do, if
we're a Miss Polly, then we're there.
We just wait.
And many are getting there.
But tonight, one other thing I share with
you.
What he's doing in this effective, fervent prayer
of an absolutely yielded heart, and this search
meal God, he's giving us joy when the
answers don't come.
You know, sometimes he has to say no.
Sometimes we're not going to see revival where
we are.
Somebody else may get to.
We don't.
Sometimes we're not going over a mountain.
We're going through it.
In fact, a lot of times.
Sometimes he doesn't remove all the warfare.
In 1994, I had a disease.
You get them a tick bite called Lyme's
disease.
They didn't know what I had.
I got mistreated.
It ended up doing devastating damage to my
neurological system.
In other words, it did real serious brain
damage.
People say, we can tell that.
But it wasn't the kind that make you
dumb, but it totally destroyed my energy.
They said, you're going to quit the pastor.
I'd been a pastor for 10 years.
And they were right.
I couldn't function.
And they said, you can't write any more
books, that's for sure.
And they were right.
Just right before I quit, I was begging
God to heal me.
And you know what God said to me?
Boy, I didn't want to get...
Of all the passages in the Bible, I
didn't want to hear this one.
It was 2 Corinthians 12, 9.
Paul was begging God to remove his thorn,
and God said no.
God kind of said the same thing to
me.
I was in awful agony, awful weakness.
I had no quality of life.
He said, I'm going to heal you.
But he said, I'm going to show you
something missing in your prayer time.
And you know what?
There I was.
We'd seen a touch of revival in 1989.
But by 1984, ever so slightly, I'd slipped
away from that deeper surrender.
Didn't even know it.
He said, I'm going to take you back
deeper.
And he said, I'm not going to heal
you.
But you're going to have more joy than
you've ever had.
And you're going to have a lot more
power than you ever had when you were
healthy.
That's 30 books ago.
And I wasn't a writer when I was
healthy.
I can't write anything, folks.
Listen, if God can use me, he can
use anybody.
I'm so unworthy.
Tonight, what he's doing, because there's going to
be times he's going to have to say
no.
There's going to be times the situation's not
going to change.
What he's after is joy in him and
contentment in him.
No matter what the bank account says or
what the doctor says or what the situation
is, folks, this is what he's after.
Because probably hard times are really coming.
But you know what?
God's remnant tonight is going deeper.
I'm going to ask right now with our
heads and hearts before God.
With every head and heart, just for a
moment, bow before God.
I feel led tonight to kind of share
two messages.
But I want us to have a time
between these to just reflect.
And then we're going to have a major
time to reflect toward the very end tonight.
But with your heart bowed before God, I'd
ask you to pray through this.
Are you in that remnant?
And I'm talking about what we say, but
I mean the heart of hearts, that in
your heart chamber, you and God, that you
can say that there's a passion, there's some
tears, at least some, for souls, for lost
neighbors, for the unlovely people around me, for
my church.
I hadn't given up on my church.
The enemy gets us to give up on
our immediate surroundings sometimes.
Maybe tonight you'd say, Brother Greg, I've heard
that no from God.
Brother Greg, God took my Isaac.
And your heart is hurting.
You don't know why.
But tonight, God is, you sense Him calling
you back to an intimacy, back to a
surrender, back to a cleansing.
And this is pretty black and white, whether
doing it or not.
Unless we think we're better than Jonathan Edwards.
Is that deep cleansing, that ever deepening cleansing,
as the Scripture calls it, is that happening?
Is that real?
Tonight, would you, maybe it is where it
needs to be, but maybe tonight you'd say,
I sense God's calling me deeper.
That's where the passion comes from.
That's where the greater faith comes from.
It's all His grace.
That's where the power comes from.
Maybe tonight you'd say, Man, we need that
breakthrough in my church.
We need that breakthrough in my family, my
kids, my grandkids.
We're seeing grandparents get a hold of this
and God's touching their grown kids.
Maybe tonight you've got a daring.
And tonight you say, Dear God, I'm not
content just to keep going along, rocking along
here.
Oh God, take me to a level that
there can be a breakthrough in your time.
Maybe the daring's your church.
Maybe it's your marriage.
Maybe it's an area of your own heart.
Maybe it's fear.
Maybe it's anger.
Maybe it's unclean thoughts.
But there's a breakthrough that's needed.
There's something that's held you back.
There's a foothold in your life.
And tonight you say, Oh God, make me
a Miss Polly, a Mr. Polly.
God, protect me from any way thinking I'm
further along than I really am.
Because with our Lord, it's all about heart.
It's all about the passion inside.
Not emotion, but deep spiritual passion.
This is not a guilt trip.
This is what He wants to give us.
Father, tonight, just water what's been said.
And Lord, if there are prayers that need
to be prayed for some darings, for some
churches, for some hearts, for some marriages, Father,
just help us cry out to You now
knowing You'll heal, knowing You'll give us a
new fire.
Lord, we can't work up what we've talked
about tonight.
But Lord, if we'll yield, You'll give it
to us.
Oh Father, help us hunger and settle for
nothing less.
I'm just going to ask, dear friends, for
these moments that if you need to pray
with your wife about someone, your church, a
loved one, or if you need to slip
to this altar, just talk to God about
a heart more on fire.
Whatever it might be.
If you need to testify, we're just going
to quietly wait.
There's something God's calling you to.
Talk to Him about it.
Just do it.
Don't be afraid.
There's hope.
There's a breakthrough.
Just talk to God.
We're going to have a few moments just
to quietly wait before God before I move
again into Scripture.