If you would turn there, the book of
Isaiah, and chapter number 6, please, in your
Old Testament Bible tonight.
Thank you for all of the singing staff
and counselors.
Appreciate everybody that has had a part.
Thank you, Brother and Mrs. Robertson, for working
so hard all week long, in the midst
of the tragedy of Brother Dole losing his
mother and then them having to go down
south.
As we've said, I appreciate everything that's been
done.
Appreciate them so very much.
Thank all of you for singing.
It was wonderful.
And we praise the Lord for what we've
heard tonight.
Isaiah, chapter number 6, we must get right
into our message tonight.
We've got a lot of ground to cover.
I'd like to ask you to stand, if
you would, please, out of respect for God's
Word.
I've thoroughly enjoyed myself the three services last
week, and then also this being the third
service this week.
I wish that you'd pray for me in
the morning.
I'll be going to Minneapolis, flying to Nashville,
Tennessee, and I'll be doing a count Thursday,
Friday, and Saturday in Tennessee, outside of Shelbyville,
Tennessee.
And then I'll be in two different churches
on Sunday, and then be flying back on
Monday to get ready for our revised schedule,
which will start Wednesday with junior missions.
And I'm looking forward to all the opportunities
that I have to preach in the various
teens and junior camps that we have this
summer at Camp Shittek.
Always enjoy my time here, my wife and
I.
We appreciate so much the privilege that has
been afforded us to be at this camp
for the past few years.
And I've had it an honor to be
able to preach this special service tonight.
Isaiah, chapter number 6, a very familiar portion
of Scripture.
Please look at verse number 1, if you
would, please.
Isaiah 6-1, where the Bible says, In
the year that King Uzziah died, I saw
also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high
and lifted up, and His train filled the
temple.
Above it stood the seraphims, each one had
six wings, with twenty covered his face, and
with twenty covered his feet, and with twenty
did fly.
One cried unto another and said, Holy, holy,
holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole
earth is full of His glory.
And the pulse of the door moved at
the voice of him that cried, and the
house was filled with smoke.
Then said I, woe is me, for I
am undone, because I am a man of
unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst
of a people of unclean lips, for mine
eyes have seen the King, the Lord of
hosts.
Then flew one of the seraphims unto me,
having a lying pole in his hand, which
he had taken with a tongs from off
the altar.
He laid it upon my mouth, and said,
Lo, this has touched thy lips, and thine
iniquity is taken away, and thy sin is
purged.
Also I heard the voice of the Lord
saying, Whom shall I sin, and who will
go for us?
Then said I, here am I, send me.
Tonight from Isaiah, chapter 6, I bring you
the simple message, Principles for Personal Revival.
Thank you very much.
You may be seated.
Let's bow our heads and hearts, and let's
pray and ask the Lord to bless our
time together tonight.
Principles for Personal Revival.
Thank you, Lord, for what we have heard
tonight.
Our hearts have been stirred, and our hearts
have been touched by the music from heaven
tonight, and for that we're grateful.
But Lord, we realize that the music just
kind of sets the pace for the atmosphere
of the preaching of the Word of God.
And so, Lord, we pray tonight that You
would help this congregation as they listen to
the message.
And Lord, that You would empty me of
myself, and You would fill me with the
blessed Spirit of God.
Lord, I would be a very proud, foolish,
and haughty preacher to stand in this pulpit
and try to preach in the flesh.
And so, Lord, I announce to these people,
and I announce to You tonight, humbly, that
I am nothing, I am a nobody, and
I need the aid and the intervention, the
guiding of God's precious Spirit.
So, please help me tonight as I preach.
I pray that I would preach the Bible
boldly, unashamedly, without apology.
But yet, Lord, when we leave, I pray
that we would not be stirred because of
song and sermon, but, Lord, we would be
changed because of song and sermon.
And I pray that You would use Isaiah
6 as a deep challenge to convict our
hearts.
And we'll thank You for what You'll do.
For it's in Jesus' name that we ask
it and pray.
Amen.
If you know much about your Bible, it
will not take you very long to figure
out that the book of Isaiah is not
only a very long book in your Bible,
it's one of the most fascinating books in
your Bible.
I believe it was D.L. Moody who
rightly said that the book of Isaiah could
no doubt be considered the little Bible of
your Bible.
You see, there are 1189 chapters in the
Word of God.
There are 31,101 verses and there are
791,328 words from Genesis 1-1 to
Revelation 22-21.
But of the 66 books of the Bible,
you have the first 39 books of the
Old Testament which would correlate with Israel's history,
if you will.
But then you have the 27 books of
the New Testament which begin with the voice
of one crying in the wilderness, a man
by the name of John the Baptist.
The Bible says in Matthew 3, verses 1
and 2, And in those days came John
the Baptist preaching in the wilderness of Judea
and saying, Repent ye for the kingdom of
God is at hand.
And basically, the 27 books of your New
Testament Bible deals with the subject, the central
figure of Jesus Christ.
The book of Isaiah is the same way.
As the Bible has 66 books, so the
book of Isaiah has 66 chapters.
You study your Bible, you will find out
they are broken in two parts as your
Bible is broken in two parts.
The first 39 chapters of the book of
Isaiah deals with Israel's history.
But yet when we have Isaiah 40, guess
who we open up with?
The same fellow that we open up with
in the book of Matthew, the man by
the name of John the Baptist.
And the Bible says in Isaiah 40, verses
6, 7, 8, The one that is crying
in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of
the Lord and make straight his path.
And so then the last 27 chapters of
the book of Isaiah correlate with the 27
books of your New Testament Bible.
It is a wonderful book.
He begins to preach through chapters 1 and
chapter number 5, and he woes just about
everybody in town.
But in chapter number 6, something turned around
in the heart and mind of Isaiah that
I would like to bring to your heart
and mind tonight.
As an evangelist, I greatly enjoy preaching on
the subject of revival.
The past five years that my wife Melissa
and I have been traveling in evangelism, we
have been privileged to be in many churches,
in many colleges, many schools, and many camps.
Now, there are basically two types of evangelists
that preach the Bible.
There are those who would major more on
evangelistic preaching.
Those who would, per se, preach more along
the lines of salvation.
And I do that a lot.
But if I were to fall on one
side or the other, I would be on
the other camp of an evangelist that more
than not doesn't necessarily always preach on evangelistic
messages, but more or less has a burden
and a fire, I guess, in my step
for the revival aspect, because I believe that
evangelism is a proper outflow when God's people
get revived and right with God.
But when we get to the book of
Isaiah, we see something very interesting.
Now, I still believe as a preacher that
Almighty God is big enough, He is holy
enough, and He is majestic enough to still
send America revival.
I realize we've come a long ways from
God.
I realize that we are getting a little
less free and a little less brave, if
you know what I mean.
And I realize we are losing religious liberties,
but I still remember that the Bible says
in Malachi 3.6, I am the Lord
and I change not.
Hebrews 13.8, Jesus Christ is the same
yesterday, today, and forever.
So I do believe that God is big
enough to revive America.
Now, I'm not foolish nor presumptuous enough to
say that He will revive America.
That's His plan.
That's His timing.
But I do believe that He can.
But you know what?
I also believe that God can revive a
home.
I believe that God can revive an individual.
I believe that God can revive a local
church.
I believe that God can revive a city,
a state, a nation.
I believe He can revive a county.
But I say all that to say this,
we hear much about revival in the day
and age in which we live, but we
see very little revival.
But can I please set your mind at
ease tonight?
Did you know if America never sees a
quaking, shaking revival from the sovereign hand of
God, if the local church in which you
attend or the churches that are represented here
tonight, if your local church never sees a
heartfelt, heaven-sent, Holy Ghost revival, if your
family never sees a real revival, if the
community of Shattuck and Barron and Bloomer and
the other towns around, if they never experience
community-wide revival, did you know according to
the pages of the Word of God that
you and I as individuals can experience revival
on a daily basis?
And here is a man by the name
of Isaiah who writes this book, who shows
that to us in chapter number 6.
There are three things that were affected and
three things that were completely dynamically changed in
the life of Isaiah when he had this
glorious vision of God.
We get right into the message tonight.
Somebody said that a short pencil is better
than a long memory, so you might want
to write these down.
Number one, I want you to see, first
and foremost, his sight was affected.
His sight was affected.
Say, preacher, what do you mean?
Look in your Bibles if you would, please,
as we study tonight Isaiah chapter number 6.
Verse number 1, notice what it says.
It says, "...in the year that King Uzziah
died, I saw..." Now, that's Isaiah.
"...I saw also the Lord sitting upon a
throne high and lifted up, and His train
filled the temple."
Now, the Bible opens with an interesting statement.
It begins talking about a man by the
name of Uzziah.
You study your Old Testament chronology, you study
history, and you will find out that Isaiah
and Uzziah were first cousins.
Obviously, Uzziah was the older of the two.
But yet your Bible says, and you can
tell just by the storyline in the Word
of God, that Isaiah had a great deal
of respect and admiration for Mr. Uzziah.
Nothing wrong with that at all.
But yet I believe the reason the Bible
tells us that Isaiah saw God after Uzziah
was removed is simply for the Bible fact
that Isaiah's eyes were fixed upon a man.
Isaiah's eyes were fixed upon King Uzziah.
As good a king, perhaps, as he was.
As good as a first cousin, perhaps, as
he was.
Because God had to remove the man-centered
idols that Isaiah had set up in his
heart and set up in his life.
I believe what we should do is simply
this.
I believe in modern-day Christianity, we should
worship God and appreciate man.
But I think in American Christianity, we have
flipped the coin, we have flipped the rules,
and we now appreciate God and we worship
man.
And we will never see God in all
of His holiness.
We will never see God in all of
His authority until we break down our man
-centered idols, get our eyes off of man
and fixed on Jesus Christ and be Matthew
6, 33 Christians.
And so the Bible says that in the
year that King Uzziah died, what did Isaiah
see?
Why was his sight affected so deeply?
I believe yours and mine would be affected
if we see what he saw.
Look in your Bibles, verse 1.
In the year that King Uzziah died, I
saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne
high and lifted up.
Now, the word throne in your Bible all
the way through, from Genesis 1-1 to
Revelation 22-21, it will not take you
very long to figure out, ladies and gentlemen,
that the word throne always has one connotation.
It has the idea of authority.
I believe the reason we have such weak,
spiritually anemic and carnal Christians filling the pews
of church after church is because we have
lost the ability to understand how authoritative, how
majestic, how holy and how righteous Almighty God
is.
And you know it's the truth.
The reason our churches are filled with teenagers
who can sit on the back row and
pop their bubble gum and they can put
their shoes on the back row and instead
of taking notes, they can pass notes and
they can laugh and giggle.
And the reason why we've got such a
lack of standards and such a lack of
morale and such a lack of convictions, I
believe, is because we have lost the real
meaning of the majesty of God.
But here's a man that saw God like
few people have seen Him.
He's seen Him, the Bible says, upon His
throne, His authoritative throne in heaven, and then
it even gave two more words.
It said, Hi, and lifted up.
Sometimes we have these silly little ideas, these
little silly southern gospel songs.
Put your hand in the hand of the
man that steals the water.
And we've got this idea that we've got
some little, small, insignificant, little bitty, tiny pea
on God, but nothing's further from the truth.
My Bible tells me in Genesis 1-1,
In the beginning, God created the heavens and
the earth.
And the earth was void, and darkness was
upon the face of the deep.
And God said, Let there be light.
Stepped off of His throne, He slipped on
the heavenly light bulb, and the Bible says
there was light.
He then began to raise the mountains and
lower the valleys.
The Bible says He flung the fowls into
the air.
He flung the beasts into the sea and
the beasts into the earth.
He made the lions, the tigers, the bears.
Oh my, but yet the Bible says there
was still something that was missing.
The Bible says in Genesis 2-7, Now
the Lord God formed a man out of
the dust of the ground.
The next time we thank ourselves to be
big shots, just remember you're a glorified mud
ball from the hand of God.
Amen?
And the Lord God formed a man out
of the dust of the ground.
And he breathed into his nostrils the breath
of life.
Get it?
And man became a living soul.
But according to the Bible, although he was
a living soul, most assuredly, he was a
lonely soul.
And God said, That was not found in
help meat.
He had all of the tigers, and He
had all of the dogs, and all of
the giraffes, and the hippos, and the pythons,
and whatever you call them things.
He had it all, but He didn't have
somebody to help meet his needs.
And so the Bible says that God performed
the first anesthetic surgery.
He caused Adam to fall into a deep
sleep.
And I'm sorry to tell you men, the
Bible never says we woke up from it.
But nonetheless, he fell asleep and God reached
down with His sovereign providential hand.
He pulled out Oriel from the side of
Adam.
And as B.
R.
Lincoln says, Adam provided the spare parts for
the first loudspeaker that God ever made.
But nonetheless, the Bible says that God reached
down, and He created a man, and He
created a woman in His own image.
Psalm 19, verse number 1, The heavens declare
the glory of God, and the firmament show
of His handiwork.
Day unto day utter His speech, and night
unto night show of knowledge.
There is no language where their voice is
not heard.
Their lying has gone out throughout the world.
The Bible says in Psalm chapter 8, David
said, I consider the work not of thy
hands, I consider the work of thy fingers.
But it is man that thou wert mindful
of him.
David said, I was sitting out on the
rowboat, if you will, and I noticed the
waves that God had made.
He said, I looked into the starry sky
above, and I noticed the stars that were
all in their place, and another one had
fell out of its socket.
He said, I noticed that everything was in
its proper order.
Everything was in its proper orbit, if you
will.
And he said, then I looked at myself
in the mirror, and I thought to myself,
David, who are you that God would see
fit to love, and to adore, and to
cherish, and to help, and humble himself down
to be the friend of something so minuscule?
And David said, I'll never understand that.
The Bible says in Colossians chapter 1, verses
16 and 17, and by him, speaking of
Jesus Christ, and by him, for him, and
through him were all things made, and by
him, for him, and through him do all
things consist.
Fancy New Testament word, you know what it
means?
It means held together.
And if it were not for the holy,
righteous hand of Almighty God, every atom, every
molecule, everything that we know tonight would completely
explode into oblivion, and I'm telling you tonight,
we've got a big God.
Now sometimes we act like we don't, and
sometimes we act like we've got a small
God, and we've got the Hollywood God, and
we've got the Charlton Heston God, if you
will, but yet I'm telling you, Isaiah saw
God as few people have ever seen Him
before.
He was high, He was majestic, He was
holy, He was lifted up, and I believe
in modern day Christianity.
The devil has caused us to swallow a
lie that we should closely follow the world
and bring God down to man's level, but
you know what?
You know why the devil wants God's people
to so-called be contemporary?
Because the devil knows good and well that
contemporary Christianity is not biblical Christianity.
And ladies and gentlemen, I believe with the
music, I believe with many of the things
that have happened in modern day America, I
believe we have taken a holy, righteous God
on His throne, and we've pulled Him down
to the common level of a man.
Let me tell you what I mean.
I saw a shirt just the other day.
I was walking through a shopping mall.
One of the worst things I like to
do in all this world is walk through
a shopping mall.
I can't stand it.
Every time my wife and I go to
a mall, I hold her hand and I
say, even so come Lord Jesus, I can't
stand to shop.
I've never liked to shop, and I'll probably
never will like to shop.
You say that's unspiritual.
That's fine.
You try it all the time, alright?
But nonetheless, I don't enjoy it.
I believe I've been to every shoe store
in the face of God's earth, and if
that's what my wife likes, I take her.
She likes this place down south.
I don't know if you have them up
here.
They're called Goody's.
There's nothing good about this place.
It's Batty's is what I call it.
And I tell myself all the time, I'm
going to buy a burial plot in the
basement of Walmart so my wife will visit
me about six times a week.
But nonetheless, I was shopping not too long
ago, and this guy won't buy me out
of shirt on.
Bothered the stew out of me.
Here's what it said.
Across the front, it had a great big
Budweiser slogan.
A great big Budweiser theme, like a little
ribbon.
And here's what it said.
For all that you do, this blood's for
you.
And on the back, it had a picture
of Jesus Christ open, bleeding, and bruised for
His people.
Now, I've got news for you, ladies and
gentlemen.
You don't tell me, and you can't tell
me, that we've brought God down to the
level of man when we can put Him
akin to Budweiser.
And I'm telling you, ladies and gentlemen, we
are weak and anemic in modern-day Christianity
because we do not so-called serve a
holy God as we should.
Hey, as I quite so last night, Joe
feared God.
He said, I considered His presence, and I
was afraid of Him.
When's the last time you were afraid of
the great holiness of God?
My Bible tells me He was high.
My Bible tells me He was lifted up.
Furthermore, keep reading in verse number one, look
what it says.
It says, and His train filled the temple.
You know, for a couple of years, I'd
preach through Isaiah chapter number six, you know,
difficult things, or I'd be giving it for
a devotion.
And every time I got to the word
train, I would just kind of glibly run
through it.
I would say that word train means glory
until I began to study my Bible.
It's amazing to me.
A lot of preaching would be fixed if
preachers would study their Bibles.
And so I went back into the Word
of God, and I found that it doesn't
mean glory at all.
The word train means exactly what it means,
exactly what it says.
You know, this lady, I performed my first
wedding not too long ago, I suppose the
first week of April, first night of April.
My wife's sister Melanie was fixing to get
married, and Melanie and Lee were there, and
we went to this great big Baptist church
in Chattanooga, and I just closed the revival
meeting on Wednesday and got there, did all
the things.
And my brother-in-law and myself were
going to be doing the wedding.
I was going to be doing the challenge,
and I was going to be doing, who
giveth this woman to be married to this
man?
And I was going to be doing the
verses, and he was going to be doing
the vows.
I'll be honest with you, I don't usually
get real nervous when I'm going to be
speaking in front of people, but I thought
for sure I was going to end up
saying something dumb and ruin the whole thing,
you know.
He kept putting it in my mind, don't
mess up, don't mess up.
I was scared I was going to get
up there and say, dearly bow-legged, we
are gathered here today.
And so, you know, I was nervous as
a cat, you know.
I didn't know what I was going to
say.
And so my heart just a-pounding, my
heart just a-beating.
And old Lee's standing up there, he's looking
at me, he's got a big old possum
getting on his face like this.
Boy, he's got that old necktie on.
Everybody's standing there, and they start playing the
march.
And the back doors fly open.
Boom!
Everybody stands up and turns around.
And they're all looking at the bride.
And she comes walking, she's got the veil,
she's got on the pretty white dress, and
she comes up.
You know what them bridesmaids do?
They follow behind her, and they grab the
train of her dress.
And they make sure it's fixed, they make
sure it don't fall, make sure it don't
get in the candles, and she goes up
in the poop of smoke right there at
the wedding.
And what they're doing is they're following her
around to make sure the train is in
place.
Now, some are longer than others, but that's
the same word that is used here in
Isaiah chapter number 6.
It's literally talking about the very garment of
a holy God.
And Isaiah said, this God was so big,
this God was so authoritative, He was so
majestic, that the very back half, the very
train of His garment, filled the entire temple.
Now, friend, that's not the message that we
hear in modern day Christianity.
We hear just about a little, small, insignificant
God.
But yet, I'm telling you, Isaiah saw something,
and it affected him.
I mean, it grieved him over his own
sinfulness, and he saw the holiness of God
like never before.
Did you know, in the 1700's and in
the 1800's, do you know why we had
the first great awakening?
Do you know why we had the second
great awakening?
Do you know why, at the turn of
the century, in 1904-1905, Evan Roberts and
Seth Joshua, 26-year-old young man and
a 28-year-old young man, do you
know why they saw a great revival in
Wales?
Do you know why George Whitefield and Jonathan
Edwards and all those men saw great moves
of God?
I'll tell you why.
They had one central message.
You read every message those men preached, it
was permeated with one thought.
The holiness of God.
The sinfulness of man.
The holiness of God.
The sinfulness of man.
The holiness of God.
The sinfulness of man.
And when we got away from preaching the
utter holiness of God is when we got
in trouble in modern day Christianity.
That's when the loose living came in.
That's when the modernism crept in.
That's when all of this fighting and all
of this fussing and all of this bitterness
and all of this wickedness got us all
when it began to creep in when we
got away from preaching the holiness of Almighty
God.
And Isaiah said, listen, I've seen something I've
never seen before.
Look in verse number 2 if you would
please.
The Bible says above it.
Above what?
Above this great throne where God is sitting.
Above this temple.
Above it stood the seraphims.
Each one had six wings.
With twain or with two he covered his
face.
And with twain he covered his feet.
And with twain he did fly.
Notice what they said.
And one cried unto another and said, Holy,
holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.
The whole earth is full of His glory.
Did you know if you go to Revelation
13 sometimes you will find these same angels
doing the very same thing around the emerald,
rainbow throne of God.
Now there are different angels in your Bible.
There are messenger angels.
There are angels that are sent to battle
or to combat if you will.
But there are two angels in your Bible
that are made primarily for one purpose and
that was for the purpose of worship.
One of those classifications or groups if you
will were the cherubims.
Do you remember the golden cherubims that was
on the Ark of God?
The mercy seat where the very Spirit of
God dwelt in the Holy of Holies.
But the others were seraphims.
Literally having the idea that they had one
main job and that one main job was
to flutter and fly around the throne of
God and the only thing they could say
from eternity past to right now all the
way to eternity future is holy, holy, holy
and they're doing the very same thing when
you get to the book of Revelation.
God is so holy that all these angels
can do around the emerald throne of God
is scream and proclaim the utter holiness of
God.
A thrice holy God.
And that's what these angels were doing.
And it moves the very heart of Isaiah.
He's never seen anything like that before.
The Bible says that these creatures, these seraphims,
had six wings.
And it's a lot different than the angelology,
the angel worship that we have in the
day and age in which we go down
to Wal-Mart and see some half-naked
little baby flying around with a diaper and
got little pink wings on, got a little
bow in his hand, something like that, you
know.
And we've been touched by an angel much.
And everybody's, angel, angel, angel.
That's not angels in the Bible.
These angels had six wings.
With Twain, the Bible said, they covered their
face.
A picture of humility.
With Twain, they covered their feet.
You study Middle Eastern cultures, you'll find out
that people covered their feet when they went
in people's homes.
It was the thing to do.
It was the custom.
It was a custom of humility.
Yet the Bible says, with two more, they
did fly.
And that's interesting to me for several reasons,
but let me share one and we move
on.
Here there were four wings that were used
in their humility.
Four wings that were used for the worship
of God.
But two wings were used for the service
of God.
You see, they had twice as much worship
as they did service.
And I believe what we have done is
sold ourselves short in modern day Christianity because
yes, we should serve God, but we've got
the cart before the horse, if you will.
And we've let that thing snowball and run
all the way down the hill.
And all we preach now is service, service,
service, service when we should have twice as
much worship as our service.
And then maybe our service will be more
effective than what it is.
And I believe worship is a lost art
in the day and age in which we
live.
Most people do not worship God.
Here's what they do.
They get on their knees.
They say, Dear God, please, I confess all
my sins to You.
I pray that You'd forgive me.
Bless all the missionaries on the far-flung
corners of the world.
And I'll read Psalm 117, shortest chapter in
the Bible, two verses.
I've done my duty to God and man,
and I'll have You no friend.
That stinks in the nostrils of a holy
God.
What's your worship like?
By the way, what your worship is like
will determine what your service is like.
Keep reading in your Bibles if you would,
please.
Now look at verse 4.
The Bible says, And the pulse of the
door moved at the voice of him that
cried, and the house was filled with smoke.
Have you ever seen a picture of the
temple that Isaiah is talking about?
I mean, we're not talking about a little
rinky-dink rat-tat building, friend.
We're talking about a big place.
And the Bible says, Because of the great
glory of God...
You remember many times in the Old and
New Testament God is likened to a consuming
fire.
The Bible says here that the room, that
the entire structure of this place was filled
with smoke as if they were in a
furnace from the very glory and the very
holiness of God.
And the Bible makes an interesting observation.
It says, And the pulse of the door...
The pulse of this place...
I mean, what's holding it up?
The Bible says that they moved at the
voice of these seraphims that cried day and
night, Holy, Holy, Holy.
Here these angels are declaring the utmost holiness,
the utmost majesty, reverence and fear for God.
And the Bible says the whole place shakes.
Now that excites me, but on the flip
side it also bothers me because modern day
we can get up and preach and preach
and preach and preach and preach.
Those angels can say God is holy and
the whole building shakes.
We can get in the pulpit and say
God is holy and you can't move most
badly with a ton of dynamite.
And I believe we become so cold, so
lethargic and so carnal we're rich and increased
with goods and have need of nothing, Revelation
3, verses 14-17.
And Jesus said, oh, no, no, no, there's
a whole lot of things you need.
He said, no, it's not that you're poor.
You're wretched.
You're blind.
You're miserable.
And you are naked.
Didn't you know what He said in verse
number 20?
The verse that most of us take out
of context and we always preach it to
lost people.
Behold, I stand at the door now.
If any man open the door, I will
come into him and supplicate him and he
with me.
And we always preach on salvation.
Is there a salvation application?
Oh yes, most certainly.
Because a sinner does have a responsibility to
respond to the convicting power to the knocking,
if you will, of the Holy Spirit.
But in Revelation 3, verse 20, He's not
talking to lost people.
He's talking to His people.
And He says, listen, these people were so
busy preaching.
They were so busy singing.
They were so busy praising, if you will.
They were so busy doing the work on
the church on the inside, they didn't even
realize that God was on the outside knocking,
trying to get in, open up the windows
of heaven, give them a blessing that they
cannot contain.
And I'm telling you, that's exactly where we
are in modern day Christianity.
We are working, working, working.
Our sight has never been affected by the
holiness of God.
And if we ever get a real good
vision of God's majesty, that will be the
day we quit messing around with this world.
The day you get filled with God's Spirit
is the day you will quit running your
mouth about this world's music.
The very day somebody gets a real good
vision of the holiness of God is the
day they will filter out their video cabinet.
The day we see God's holiness as we
should see God's holiness, not only will it
affect our sight, but number two, it will
affect our sensitivity.
Say, what do you mean it will affect
our sensitivity?
Look in your Bibles, if you would please,
now at verse number five.
Verse number five, the Bible says, Then said
I...
When is the word then referring to?
Obviously, after he saw this great vision.
Then said I, woe is me, for I
am undone, because I am a man of
unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst
of a people of unclean lips.
Why?
For by my eyes have seen the King,
the Lord of hosts.
Would you flip back to chapter number three
in your Bibles, please, to the book of
Isaiah.
Chapter number three, I want to take you
on a progression.
I want to show you something here.
Eight times in your Bible, Isaiah woes seven
groups of people.
Now, although there are eight woes, there are
only seven groups of people there because he
woes the drunkards twice.
And they probably need to be woed twice.
Alright, look what your Bible says.
Isaiah chapter three and verse number nine.
The show of their countenance doth witness against
them, and they declare their sin as Sodom.
They hide it not.
Woe unto their soul, for they have rewarded
evil unto themselves.
Chapter number three and verse number eleven, please.
The Bible says, Woe unto the wicked!
It shall be ill with him, for the
reward of his hands shall be given him.
Then you skip chapter four and go to
chapter five.
Chapter number five and verse number eight, please.
Isaiah chapter five and verse eight, where your
Bible and mine says, Woe unto them that
join house to house, that lay field to
field till there be no place that there
may be placed alone in the midst of
the earth.
In mine ears, said the Lord of hosts,
of the truth, many houses shall be desolate,
even great and fair without inhabitants.
Yet, yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield
one bath, and the seed of a homer
shall yield one ephaph.
Verse eleven, Woe unto them that rise up
early in the morning, that they may follow
strong drink, that continue until night, till wine
inflame them.
Chapter number five, verse eighteen.
The Bible says, Woe unto them that draw
iniquity with cords of vanity and sin as
it were with a cart rope.
Verse twenty, please.
Woe unto them that call evil good and
good evil, that put darkness for light and
light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet
and sweet for bitter.
Verse twenty-one.
Woe unto them that are wise in their
own eyes and put it in their own
sight.
Next verse.
Woe unto them that are mighty to drink
wine and men of strength to mingle strong
drink.
Eight times.
The prophet Isaiah with no doubt a sincere
heart for the things of God.
No doubt wanting his people to sense and
to see revival.
He opens his heart.
He opens his Bible.
He opens his mouth like the front door
of his house and he says, You people
need to get right with God.
Eight times.
He said, Woe, woe, woe, woe, woe, woe,
woe.
And I mean, he woe'd everybody.
But look what happened in verse number five,
if you would.
Then said I, Woe is me.
Not only was his sight affected, his sensitivity.
God began to melt him.
God began to soften him, squeeze the vice
grip as we preached on last night from
Job chapter number 23.
But did you notice in verse number five
what his response involved?
Number one, it dealt with himself.
Notice he did not say, Woe is you.
Notice he did not say, Woe is everybody.
When he saw God like never before, he
said, Woe is me.
And it's kind of like the old song
they sing.
Not my brother, not my sister, but it's
me, oh Lord, standing in the need of
prayer.
And here's a man who was utterly and
ruthlessly brutal upon himself.
He said, Lord, it's not their fault.
It's not this group's fault.
It's not this race's fault.
It's not this camp's fault.
It's not this college's fault.
It's not this church's fault.
He said, Lord, it is my fault.
It is me.
And his sensitivity caused him to have a
response that dealt with himself.
But number two, his response dealt with his
sin.
Notice what he said.
He said, Then said I, woe is me.
Why?
For I am undone because I am a
man of unclean lips.
Do you notice how he named his sin?
We're living in a day, you preachers know
this good and well, we're living in a
day when everything has just about been reclassified
and renamed in the book.
People say, well, I'll tell you what, brother
Locke, the reason I scream at my kids
and get mad and get all upset is
because I'm choleric or because I'm a sanguine.
No, because you're mean.
You need to be filled with spirit.
That's why you scream at your kids and
that's why you get mean.
Someone says, well, it's just an alternative lifestyle.
God called it sodomy.
God called it abomination.
Someone said, well, it's a woman's choice.
God said it was abortion.
In Psalm 127.3, the Bible says, well,
children are a heritage of the Lord.
And then people go on and they say,
well, it's just a habit.
And the reason so many people in our
churches are consumed with habit is because that's
exactly what they call them.
They say, well, it's a shortcoming.
It's good in the making.
It's just a hardship that I'm going through.
It's a habit.
But if we would see God's holiness and
a lot of His holiness, see our sinfulness,
we'd quit calling it a habit.
We'd quit calling it something stubborn.
We'd call it a dirty, rotten, filthy, wretched
sin in the eyes of God and we
would deal with it.
And if we're not willing to confess sin
and get right with sin, you can forget
about the subject of the Bible.
We might as well close our Bibles and
go to the house tonight.
Because God's interested in people that are sensitive.
God's interested in people that are willing to
fall upon their face and not just confess
their sin glibly.
But as the Bible says in Proverbs 28,
13, he that covers his sin shall not
prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall
have mercy.
So it dealt with himself.
It dealt with his sin, but notice also
it dealt with his surroundings.
Say, what do you mean?
Verse 5 again, please.
Then said, I will with me, for I
am undone.
He said, because I am a man of
unclean lips and I dwell in the midst
of a people of unclean lips.
For mine eyes have seen the King, the
Lord of hosts.
And not only did it deal with himself
and deal with his sin, but all of
a sudden, Isaiah began to see those around
him in a different light.
You see, the holiness of God has a
way of burdening God's people like no other
doctrine in the Bible.
And when he got this glimpse, I call
it the vision of decision.
When he got this glimpse, this vision, this
glory of God as Moses said, Lord, show
me Thy glory.
When he got this glimpse, all of a
sudden, he quit seeing those people as numbers.
He quit seeing those people as statistics.
He quit seeing them as names and as
faces and he started seeing them as people
and it overwhelmed him and he began to
see it burdening him and naturally an outflow
of this great burden as you read the
rest of the book of Isaiah and you
will find out that he preached with much
more vigor the rest of the book than
he did the first two chapters.
The first two chapters he was a little
overly zealous.
Woe to everybody but the electrician and the
plumbers in town.
But then, after he saw God, his message
was still a message of judgment, but you
see much more fire in his heart because
he now begins to look at these people
as never dying souls, as lost people for
some, as backslidden people for others and it
gave him a great burden for the community
that was around him.
And I believe when we get an old
-fashioned dose of the holiness of God, it
will burden us like never before for the
community around us.
And the Bible says that his sensitivity was
overwhelmingly affected.
Somebody asked me not long ago, Brother Locke,
what is one of the tell-tale reasons
we are not having revival in America?
Basically, what I think what they were asking
me is not really the reason we're not,
but how can I prove to them we're
not?
One simple way.
Because of the lack of sensitivity among God's
people.
If you'll be honest about it, most of
the people we shake hands with are heads
just about as hard as that little bit
right there.
God's got to bend us and God's got
to break us and God's got to put
us in the fire and put us in
the vice grip and one tell-tale reason
that we are not having revival and one
sure dead sign that we're not having revival
is the lack of humility and the lack
of sensitivity that we see in the hearts
and lives of God's people old and young
alike.
But seeing God in a new light has
a way of putting a hunger in your
mouth.
And you know what happened with Isaiah?
If you'll allow me to say it reverently
this way, it's almost like God stepped over
and just poured a great big heap and
spoonful of salt on his tongue and he
made him thirsty for the power of God.
He made him thirsty to want to know
more about God's majesty, to want to know
more about God's holiness and want to know
more and see what more he could do
and it burdened him deeply for those to
whom God gave him in the ministry.
And he said, Dear Lord, not only am
I in a mess, all of these people
around me are in a mess.
And that is why we have the next
few verses.
Sometimes we just use these verses at a
missionary conference or a Bible conference or a
Bible college or something like that and we
think to ourselves, Well, big deal.
That's what God said.
And Isaiah said, Well, here am I.
Send me.
Why did he say that?
Well, look at verse number 6.
Right after he has now been completely overwhelmed
with his sin, he's been overwhelmed that he's
the one that's most of the problem.
He's been overwhelmed with his surroundings and he's
seen these people lost and with a great
need.
Look what happens in verse number 6.
Then flew one of the seraphim, one of
these worshipful angels unto me, having a live
coal in his hand which he had taken
with a tongue from off the altar.
And he laid it, that great coal in
his hand, upon my mouth and said, Lo,
this is touched by my lips and that
iniquity is taken away and I sin purged.
Also, I heard the voice of the Lord
saying, Whom shall I sin and who will
go for us?
Notice, Then said I, Here am I.
Send me.
Number one, this principle of personal revival, his
sight was affected.
Number two, his sensitivity was affected.
God broke him.
But number three, his surrender was affected.
You know what happens in real times of
revival, whether it's national, local church, community-wide,
family, or personal?
All of a sudden, God begins to get
the will of His people.
And God now says with a bold, declaring
voice, Who will go for us?
Who can I send to this lost and
dying rebellious nation of people?
And after seeing what he saw, his heart
was so overwhelmed, so burdened, and so greatly
grieved for what he saw without hesitation, without
a breath, without a bat of an eye,
he threw up his hand and said, Enlist
me.
Here am I.
Send me.
Now, here is what I believe is a
great, great problem in churches by and large.
We have saved all.
We have saved all of our messages on
Romans 12, 1 and 2 for teenagers.
We've saved all of our sermons about surrendering
to be a preacher and surrendering to give
God your life and everything that you have.
We have saved in camps, in colleges, in
schools, we have saved all of the sermons
about surrender for teenagers.
And I've got news for you.
I think if a bunch of adults could
use a good, old-fashioned dose of the
surrender of their will to God's will as
well.
I know a family right now that I
went to Ambassador Baptist College with.
Name's not important.
But they were called to go to the
mission field.
I mean, they were on fire for God
as missionaries if there's ever been a family
on fire for God as missionaries.
So they came forward to the Bible conference
or the mission conference there.
They began to pray, Lord, I know you
want us to go here.
We've got a couple little kids.
We felt like you wanted us to pass
in the state, but if you want us
to go, we will go.
Went to their father.
By the way, they're still living in Shelby,
North Carolina.
Went to their father and said, Dad, God's
called us to go to the mission field.
He was a deacon in a fundamental Baptist
church.
You know what he said?
That's wonderful that God stirred your heart, but
you know what?
You can use your gifts and talents over
here.
You can use your gifts and talents for
the Lord right here in your local church.
You can use your gifts and talents at
Ambassador Baptist College.
You know what?
There is a missionary couple right now who
should be on the foreign field, but it's
not because of their lack of dedication and
surrender.
It was because of a lack of Mama
and Daddy's dedication and surrender who wasn't ready
to cut the apron strings and let Johnny
Jr. and Susan and the rest of that
crowd go to the mission field.
And I'm telling you, friend, like no other
thing, when we really see God as God
wants us to see Him, it will affect
our surrender.
Nothing will be too difficult.
Nothing will be too unreasonable.
That's why Paul said, it is your reasonable
service.
Two thousand years ago, He gave His life
for you and for me, and it's just
reasonable that tonight we give our lives to
Him.
And my Bible tells me that there's nothing
unreasonable that God will ask me to do.
Where God guides, He will provide.
And I believe like no other time when
we have a vision, when we have a
good old-fashioned dose of what Isaiah got
in Isaiah 6, it will break our hearts,
it will bend our wheels, and we will
be willing to do what He wants us
to do, go where He wants us to
go, say what He wants us to say,
wear what He wants us to wear, no
questions asked, because He is Lord, period.
Philippians 2, 5-11, let this mind be
in you.
Which was also in Christ Jesus, who being
in the form of God, thought it not
robbery to be equal with God, but made
Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him
the form of a servant, made of the
likeness of men, being found in fashion as
a man He humbled Himself, became obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross.
Wherefore, because of this, wherefore God also exalted
Him, and given Him a name which is
above every name, that at the name of
Jesus every knee should bow of things in
heaven and things in earth.
And the Bible says that every tongue should
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the
glory of God the Father, and those will
be the ringling, wrangling verses during times of
revival.
Whatever you want, you are the Lord of
my life.
Listen, I'm through.
Jim Elliot, you know, to be one of
the five missionaries who were slain many years
ago by the Indians, as they went over
and began to work with that Aborigine tribe,
they found that there was a little landing
strip where they could land, right there close
to the edge of the jungle, and they
could go in and begin to talk to
these Akka Indians, these people that have never
known the Gospel before.
And so they landed their little plane in
there several times, but yet one day they
told their wives that we're going to get
out and spend some time with these people.
They'd already talked with them according to history.
They'd already got out and talked with these
people before, but they were going to spend
a little more time trying to pick up
some of the language, a little bit of
the words and the dialect, and try to
get the Gospel to these people.
Well, you know the story as well as
I know.
They landed in, the five missionaries got out,
and I've seen some of the most horrid,
gruesome pictures in all the world just a
couple of weeks ago.
As a matter of fact, I was going
through a little album and somebody had this
life story about him that was written by
his wife who's still nationally known on the
radio and this, that and the other.
But nonetheless, I was flipping through some pictures
and one of the pictures was somehow they
had snapped a shot and the edge of
the picture is just smeared with nothing but
blood.
You can see the red all over the
side of the picture and the bodies and
the carcasses that are floating during the water
and we think to ourselves, what a tragedy
that these men gave themselves to Christ and
they said we will go out and we
will give you our lives even unto the
death and before they could ever share the
gospel.
All five were dead at four o'clock
in the morning.
We know the story well that their wives
eventually went in within the next few weeks,
within the next few months and right this
very moment, the very island in which they
were killed, there are five good Bible preaching
churches because those ladies stuck with it and
other people began to come and other missionaries
came in and love offerings were taken and
many people were saved and will be in
the kingdom of God because those five men
laid down their lives.
There were two missionaries that were flying over
that particular area about ten years ago.
One of the missionaries was going over to
help in one of these churches that had
been started years earlier and when they flew
by that little landing strip area where they
had dumped off that food and landed their
plane and got out where they were slain
with great excitement, he leaned over to the
side of the window and he said, lookie
there, sir.
He said, there's the bend of the river.
He said, right there is where Jim Elliott
died.
He said, I've read the books, I've seen
the video.
He said, I've stood in his life many,
many times and he said, there's the bend
of the river where Jim Elliott died and
the guy that was flying the plane kept
on flying and never even looked his way
and he said, no, sir.
He said, that's not where Jim Elliott died
and he said, sir, I don't want to
argue.
I don't want to get in the flesh
about this thing, but I've read many books.
I've seen the video.
I know this is where Jim Elliott died.
He said, right there, that's the bend in
the river.
Is it not?
And he said, oh yeah, that's the bend
in the river, but that's not where Jim
Elliott died and he said, sir, would you
please explain to me exactly what you mean?
He said, I was with Jim Elliott the
night he died.
He said, we were fixing to enter into
Bible college and a little old evangelist got
up in the pulpit of a little old
country backwoods Baptist church and began to preach
on Romans chapter 12 verses 1 and 2.
He said, the Spirit of God gripped Jim
Elliott's heart like never before.
He said, he went forward and knelt down
on a little altar and said, dear God,
tonight I give you my life.
Not some of it, but all of it.
You can have it even unto the death.
And he turned as he was flying that
plane and he said, sir, that is where
Jim Elliott died.
I'll tell you what we need.
If we're ever going to have a revival
in this camp, in your church, in your
family, in your life, you're going to have
to get to the place where you die
to what you want.
And until you do, you can forget about
living for what God wants.
Principles for personal revival.
Every head bowed, please.
Every eye closed.
No one's looking.
No one's talking.
Is your will dead tonight?
Are you willing to do, go, be, whatever
it is that God wants you to be?