prayers, that you dwell in light unapproachable.
We do not wonder that Westeros had veiled
in flesh the godhead sea.
We thank you you dimmed your glory and
couched it all in the flesh of a
little infant child.
God contracted to a span incomprehensibly made man.
But Lord we thank you that because of
that we have boldness, not arrogance, not familiarity,
that we have boldness to come to the
throne of grace to find help.
And Lord we need help.
Our need is so great individually.
We need a vision, we need a faith,
we need of love, we need of courage,
we need of compassion for a broken, lost,
damned world around us.
A world without God and without hope.
Lord we know every human system is bankrupt.
We've tried them over and over and over
again.
We think of a Hitler who is going
to change the world, and Stalin is going
to change the world, and Mussolini is going
to change it, and yet all their empires
are in ashes tonight.
But Lord we bless you for the risen
Christ at the right hand of the Father
living to make intercession for us tonight.
And we come Lord conscious of all our
infirmities, our inferiority, our weakness, but we thank
you that you do not make this or
that demand on us except that we can,
believing in the finished work of Jesus.
We thank you tonight Father for all the
progress that has been made today in your
kingdom.
And Lord as we think of this crowd
of heroes in Hebrews 11, think of the
different kinds and think that even today in
this world, I believe this very day, people
have been martyred for Jesus Christ in Russia,
in China, in other countries.
Nobody will ever mark their graves, but Lord
these sparrows don't fall to the ground for
what you see them.
You see that weary woman somewhere up the
Amazon tonight, tired, afflicted, tortured maybe with bugs
and all kinds of things.
Bad food, bad environment, everything's bad except the
peace that's in her heart.
And for that blessed mystery fellow that again
has gone to some people who have never
yet heard the message of redeeming love.
We thank you again that old hymn says,
Dear dying Lamb, thy precious blood shall never
lose its power till all the ransomed church
of God be saved to sin no more.
Then in the nobler sweeter song we'll sing
thy power to save when these poor ransomed
tongues shout victory o'er the grave.
Lord we ask you for every ambassador of
the cross tonight.
We thank you Lord as you look from
heaven you can see them whether in Russia
or Mesopotamia or Bulgaria or Estonia or some
other countries.
We bless you.
I thank you for the word that we
hear about Romania where young people have been
stirred.
Thank you for the news from Africa there
from Kenya this week of the Nysa tribe
being visited by the spirit where people are
walking 20, 30, 40 miles a night to
hear the wonderful story of redeeming love that
you've opened the heavens upon them.
They don't get bored, they don't go to
sleep while the message is there.
The atmosphere is electric with the risen Christ
of God.
Lord we pray come to the valley of
the shadow of death in which we live.
Come to us with all our religiosity in
America, all our programs, all our schemes, all
our devices.
But Lord our clouds have no rain.
Our sky has no power.
Our word is so empty, ritualistic, so formalistic,
so neat.
Lord we pray soon you'll burst the wine
skins.
Lord rip them apart.
Let us see the glory our fathers saw.
Lord if we read a freshly storied Azusa
street of your workings and how the roots
of that revival went back to the Welsh
revival.
Lord we want to see this again in
this needy hour.
Lord we're convinced there are more lost people
in the world at this moment than ever
in history.
Dear God we pray for our young people.
They've never seen the glory of God.
They sit through a service and answer some
little questions sometimes, but they've never gone out
of the sanctuary staggering under the revelation of
God.
Staggering under the majesty of God, awed by
the splendor of God.
Lord we pray return prophetic ministry to those
who profess your name.
Lord we put signs outside of our churches
and they've got nothing to do with what's
inside.
Where is the power?
Where is the Pentecostal glory?
Where is the revelation?
Where is the prophetic word?
Where are speckers broken just so we could
hear them snap?
Where are the drunkards coming?
Where are women dragging their husbands to the
sanctuary to get them not just sobered but
saved?
Where are people losing their meanness and their
bitterness and their selfishness and their pride and
their covetousness and their childishness?
Lord we can't truthfully sing like a mighty
army moves the church of God.
It's not true.
But our hearts ache to see it.
We want to see a people Lord who
want to die literally to everything.
Every creature comfort.
Every honor the world has.
Every style.
Every system.
So totally hungry, hungry for God.
So captivated with God.
Lord you've told us in your word in
the last days your sons and your daughters
shall prophesy.
Young men see fish and old men dream
dreams.
And on my servants and handmaids.
You didn't say on the bosses and on
the millionaires and on the bishops and archbishops.
On my servants.
We think about you took servants Lord Jesus
in the days of your flesh.
Men that smelled of fish.
A man making out income taxes and you
took them and you taught them and you
allowed the Holy Spirit of God to come
on them and they went out and turned
the world upside down.
Lord as I read today there are supposed
to be 36 million people around the world
filled with the Holy Ghost.
And yet only 120 turned the nation upside
down.
And before very long people said these men
who have turned the world upside down have
come here also.
God God heal us of our impotence.
Heal us of our blindness.
Heal us of our coldness.
Lord put a craving hunger for your presence
more than anything we've ever craved for in
our lives.
Maybe some of these men once craved for
honors as sportsmen and that's gone.
Crave for success in business and no it
doesn't satisfy.
Lord we ask you to get us from
the very soles of our feet to the
crowns of our head vibrating with God.
With the love of God and the power
of God and the grace of God.
We thank you again for your holy word.
This lamp for our feet and this light
for our path.
Bless it to us tonight.
Make quickness for the psalmist said quicken me
according to thy word.
Do this now Lord.
As we open this book open our hearts
open our understanding.
And this faith we've spoken of kindred in
us tonight.
But I think of Wesley's cry 200 years
ago and you did it.
When he cried give me the faith which
can remove and sink the mountain to a
plain.
Give me that childlike praying love which longs
to build my house again.
Thy love let it my heart or power
and all my simple soul devour.
Enlarge in flame and fill my heart with
boundless charity divine.
So shall I all my strength exert and
love them with a zeal like thine and
turn them to a pardoning God and quench
their brands in Jesus blood.
Not again I pray intensify this desire in
my heart.
My dear Martha all the other precious folk
here don't let this section of Texas point
a finger of scorn in the last day
and say you are so busy running meetings
and other things you never saw the glory
of God you never precipitated that glory on
us.
Forbid it God.
Take supreme control.
We want to hear not only hear hearken
and obey and do the will of God.
Because your word says he that doeth the
will of God abideth forever.
Give you thanks in Jesus name.
Okay we're going to look in the epistle
of Paul.
Well I think he wrote the epistle some
people don't anyhow the epistle of Paul to
the Hebrews.
You know it doesn't matter what page you
wrote in the bible there's contention about it.
One guy says this the other says the
very opposite.
This is called the epistle to the Hebrews
but that's the title somebody put on it.
One man shatters that whole thing because he
says there's neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor
free.
The church is divided into Gentiles and Jews
and other people.
We're all one in Christ.
There's only one cross.
There's only one fountain filled with blood.
There's only one purpose for all of us.
We come to that a bit later.
Hebrews 11.
The general idea about this epistle is of
course it's a commentary on the first five
books in the bible plus the book of
Psalms which again is five books.
There are five books of Psalms in the
Hebrew.
But I don't think it's just an interpretation
of the tabernacle and the sacrifice and everything.
The supreme work of the Holy Spirit in
his chapter is to make Jesus Christ central.
He chose Christ as the beginning and the
ending, the alpha, the omega, the first and
the last, the center, the circumference, the light,
the life.
He's everything.
We've been mentioning that book to you that's
uh you can get one from brother uh
I don't think in his pocket.
It's a big book with 700 pages.
It was written in 1591.
I wonder how many books that are written
today will last 400 years.
Most of mine don't last 400 days.
I put them in the garbage except my
own.
But anyhow 400 years 1591 Isaac Ambrose wrote
on three words 700 pages looking unto Jesus.
Hebrews 12.
That's what it's all about.
And again I remind you you know 95
95 percent of evangelical preaching this coming Sunday
from Pentecostals to to who?
Presbyterians or Mennonites to Methodists.
95 percent of the preaching will be about
a man who lived 2,000 years ago.
After the 95 about three percent will be
about the Christ who's coming soon.
You know we do we're missing where he
is now.
He's at the right hand of the Father
waiting to bestow upon us more than you
could ever dream of.
But we're preaching a prophetic Christ.
We're preaching a historic Christ.
We're not preaching the Christ where he is
now.
Living to make intercession for us.
It doesn't matter how imperfect your praying is
or mine tonight.
He'll perfect it.
If it depends on our vocabularies we're sunk.
I remember I was preaching once in a
church I passed in England and suddenly it
dawned on me.
Is the destiny, the eternal destiny of these
people dependent on how I put words together,
illustrations, bits of scripture does it depend on
me?
Of course not.
There is a human responsibility.
God has ordained preaching.
But we're not going to manipulate people.
If I can manipulate you one way this
guy will manipulate that way.
It's the guidance of the Spirit of the
living God.
I'll say let's look at here Hebrews 11
and verse 1.
You know right right through the whole of
the New Testament, I haven't counted them, there
are over 300 references to faith in the
New Testament.
Only twice in the Old Testament is faith
mentioned.
Look that up.
Now faith is the substance of things hoped
for.
The evidence of things not seen.
Some say that's a definition, some say it
isn't.
Faith is substance.
What is substance?
It's sub.
What's sub mean?
Under.
A submarine goes under the marine, under the
water.
A subway goes under the road.
Sub stands.
What stands mean?
Stand.
So sub stands means under, stand.
You say then it means to understand.
No it means to stand under.
It means that whatever we believe God for,
faith can take hold of these precious promises
and put them underneath.
If we can't we've no claim.
We claim on the merits of Jesus Christ.
We claim because of his holy word.
Over and over again you find this wonderful
chapter.
Faith by faith, by faith, by faith.
We're going to take a character hopefully every
Friday night now.
But you know it's not only what faith
does that's visible, some of the most amazing
things are not even mentioned in this chapter.
I remember, you'll think I'm getting old, okay,
60 years ago I remember reading a book
by Dr. J.
H.
Jarrett in England and he called, he calls
Hebrews 11, the Westminster Abbey of the scriptures.
Remember they're all Old Testament characters in Hebrews
11, no New Testament.
Hebrews 11, why did he say that?
It's like Westminster Abbey because Westminster Abbey we
bury all the famous people.
There's a disc on the wall with two
profiles, one lit behind the other.
Somebody called them the two most famous brothers
that ever lived, John Wesley and Charles Wesley.
Go to another place, there's a place that
marked the place of, well right up by
the high altar there, of all the people
in the world who's buried there.
Who's buried there?
David Livingstone.
When they brought his body from Africa they
cut his heart out by his request.
Take my body into England if you like,
my heart is here and it's going to
stay here.
But there's a perpetual memorial there and all
through the Abbey, Westminster Abbey, there are marvellous
records of heroes and outstanding people.
Some are statesmen, some are lawyers, some are
poets, some are preachers.
I remember about 20 odd years ago I
mentioned Hebrews 11 and Westminster Abbey, link to
that I've done just now, a lady came
to me after she said, Mr. Renner we've
got the most famous visitors in America arrived
yesterday from England.
I said, well who in the world were
they?
She said, the Beatles.
I said, the what?
She said, the Beatles.
She said, don't you think they should be
buried in Westminster Abbey?
I said, yes today.
Why bury those guys in Westminster Abbey?
You know this, this, this chapter could boil
us over except when you realise all these
people like us, flesh and blood, they'd nerves,
they'd fears, they'd doubts, they'd emotions, and yet
somehow God Almighty got control of them.
These guys are somewhere up there.
You know, God's never behind anybody.
We talk about football stars and movie stars
and all the rest.
Dear Lord, the Apostle wrote about that 2
,000 years ago, not about movie stars, he
said one star differs from another star in
glory.
Do you think that John Wesley's going to
be the same as a dying thief?
The dying thief got that on the last
beat of his heart.
John Wesley was saved at 35, turn that
round it's 53, add them together it makes
88, that's when he died.
We were reading it yesterday, my dear Martha
and I, he left what, six, six silver
spoons.
Of course he's a good preacher, he had
a good collection of books, a faded Geneva
gown, six silver spoons, six one pound notes,
all worth five dollars each, don't give me
a great funeral, find six poor men, let
them be pallbearers and give them a pound
each for carrying me to my grave.
So he has six silver spoons, six pound
notes, a small collection of books, a Geneva
gown he preached in and something else, what
was that, oh I remember, I knew it
was something else, the Methodist Church.
Would you believe that's all he left?
Do you know he rode over a quarter
of a million miles over the roads in
England when they were infested with highway men?
He rode in the night, he sat on
his horse and if it was moonlight like
it is tonight, he'd be reading a Greek
primer or a Greek New Testament, jogging along
on the horse.
You know one night some guys jumped out
of the hedge with white coats on and
screamed at the top of the, and the
horse reared up so John got all of
it, stood in the stirrups and looked over
him and said, who are you?
And one guy had practiced this, he said
in a deep voice, we're the devil brothers.
Oh well he said, stand on one side
and let me ride on, I married his
sister.
Wasn't that rough going?
How in the world did he do all
his writing and all, everything he did?
Because one day he became totally committed to
Jesus Christ.
The message of justification by faith had been
lost in the dark ages.
How did it come to light?
Martin Luther.
God reached down into the middle of the
Roman church and found a man who defied
the devilish system and they still hate him.
After that John Wesley came and he revived
the teaching of sanctification by faith.
He didn't invent it, he taught it.
In other words we're to be holy.
As it says in the 12th chapter of
this epistle, as he which is called to
is holy, it says in 1st Peter, but
it says in this chapter here that God
has called us to holiness.
We're frightened of that word.
In one of these hymns Charles Wesley says,
to perfect health restore my soul, to perfect
holiness and love.
And that's what holiness is, it's not some
fantastic thing, it's perfect spiritual health, spiritual clarity
of vision, spiritual strength, spiritual understanding.
Yet this chapter which shocked me, these guys
are so far up there, one star different,
there's Abraham, there's Isaac, there's somebody else.
You know sometimes you have to turn a
thing around to find out the value of
it.
When I was in England I used to
think sometimes, well I remember, I did think
sometimes, but I remember mother calling me one
day, she said this is the third time
I've called you, get curled up in that
chair.
I hadn't been in that chair for two
hours.
I was up in Minnesota with, what do
you call him, Minnie, along the shores of
Minnie Tonka with Hea Water and his girlfriend
Minnie Haha.
I wasn't in that chair man, I was
miles away.
I used to get lost like that.
But again, when I think of all these
different people, the investments, you know nobody ever
had a bigger Bible than you have, forget
it.
The staggering thing about Hebrews 11, it knocks
me out every day I read it, and
I mean that God's my witness.
I read through Hebrews 11, these staggering men
and women, through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness,
obtained the promises, stopped the miles of land,
women received their dead, raised to life again.
All the devilish things, and not one of
them ever had a Bible.
Well in God's name, what are you and
I going to do when we stand before
Him?
If the world lasts another thousand years, it
won't last another thousand weeks I think.
But when I get there, I have to
face up to having the whole revelation of
God.
Phinney didn't have a bigger Bible than I
have, Wesley didn't have a bigger Bible than
I have, Spurgeon didn't have one.
But somehow they got nearer to the heart
of God, they got a revelation from God,
they got convictions by the Spirit, and they
laid their lives on the line.
Yes I can read these heroes of faith,
but when I come to this chapter, what's
it say?
Time would fail me to tell of Gideon,
of Barak, and so forth.
Then it says they subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness,
and obtained promises.
They had trials of cruel mockings and scourgings.
And some did what?
When the gate was opened, they said no.
They refused to be delivered, that they might
obtain a greater resurrection.
What do you make of that bunch?
There's no name.
Ten thousand tribulations they went through.
I persuade myself that every day I live
now, somebody dies for Jesus Christ in Russia
or China or somewhere.
We go about our business, of course we
have our hardship, sometimes you get a, you
know, you go to McDonald's and you don't
get a very good hamburger, and that's a
grief of course.
And sometimes you get a flat tire, that's
terrible, beyond bearing almost.
And yet others were imprisoned, tormented, suffering beyond
anything we can understand, even in this hour.
Well going back, let me say this.
When I was in England, I determined, if
ever I came to America, I was going
up the most wonderful place to see something.
That was up the, what do you call
it, the, in London, the, I mean in
New York, the Empire State Building.
Good night.
I went up and down those streets for
over three years, never get up there.
People go and they say, nobody knows how
many millions of photographs have been taken.
You know, when you get up there, anyhow,
if you stand here, it sways like that,
you know, it has to sway, otherwise it
would snap off.
People are there with cameras, they take a
north view, a south view, east view, west
view.
Oh there's, there's what, Stratton Island, there's the
Statue of Liberty, get all the pictures.
Everybody's there with cameras.
One day a guy got an idea, there
might be something better than that.
Do you know what he did?
He got a camera and laid on his
back at the door and he took a
picture from the ground upward.
I saw a picture of that, it was
very fascinating.
It looks as though the top, it stops
in heaven, you know, when you see the
size of the thing.
What is it, a hundred stories high, 110
or something?
From the top to the, looking down, is
one thing.
Laying back and looking up is something entirely
different.
Well if you look at this chapter one
way, you'll be staggered.
And maybe you'll be knocked back a bit,
you'll say, well that's out of my reach.
Well I remind you again, there were mortals
like us.
But supposing, instead of getting heroes of faith,
supposing you turn it round.
Oh well you've told us what Mr. Jowett
said, well let me tell you what Leonard
Ravenhill says, in case you ever hear him.
He's a bit crazy but he'll tell you.
Didn't I say this?
I say Hebrews 11 is a rogue's gallery.
A dirty bunch.
I wouldn't have put them in if I'd
written it.
You'd think I'd have put Moses in, he
murdered somebody.
You'd think I would have put Rahab, she
was a harlot.
You'd think I'd put Noah in, he got
drunk.
Look at the bunch.
Boy it's like having a bunch of deacons.
All the problems you have with them.
And yet God got each one of them
in his own place, in his own way.
And they all had one common denominator.
Let me tell you how valuable this thing
called F-A-I-T-H is.
As children in England we used to say
F, F, F-A-I-T-H.
Forsaking all I take him.
Very good.
Good definition.
Forsaking all I take him.
How precious it is.
Jesus is going down the round the corner
and he bumps into Peter and Peter backs
off.
He says, well Lord how are you today?
Fine.
He said, I've got a word for you.
So people come up to you.
I've got people come up to me.
I tremble sometimes, they get such weird words
about me.
I don't want to hear them.
If they're nice I do, but not the
other things they say.
So he says what?
Satan I've desired thee.
What else?
That I may what?
Sift thee.
Go on say the rest.
As wheat that I have, that your health
won't fail.
No, I prayed for you to prosper.
Huh?
I prayed for you to be successful.
Jesus fastened onto one thing.
Peter from here to eternity you're going to
go through hell sometimes.
I prayed for thee that thy faith fail
not.
Never mind your money, never mind your circumstances.
My faith looks up to thee.
What do you find the apostles saying?
Look in the epistle, uh first epistle of
Paul to the Thessalonians.
Let's see what he says there.
First epistle of Paul to the Thessalonians, okay
chapter one.
Now let me switch that over and go
to the second epistle for a moment, because
I'll be working back a drape I don't.
Second Thessalonians chapter 3 and verse 2.
That we may be delivered from unreasonable and
wicked men.
Now notice all men have not faith.
I've heard the greatest preachers in America in
the last 10 years say, come on now
you've got faith, use it.
The scripture says all men have not faith.
Well who's right?
Your preacher or what the Lord says?
No you.
There's a natural faith of course in natural
things.
You get in a plane and you don't
check the seat, you just sit on it.
How do you know he won't let you
down?
A pilot, oh they don't do it now.
They used to come in in the old
days and walk through and say good morning
sir, good morning madam.
They don't do that, they go in the
front now so you won't see them.
Then if there's any trouble you can't identify
them.
But they used to walk through and I
see this man say, excuse me a pilot,
oh yes look at my, oh I don't
care about those wings, you can buy those.
I want to see your pilot's license.
Oh it's in my delete, well I'm not
flying today, show me the pilot's license.
Show me the license.
I say, has this plane been checked?
Yes, well I want to see the certificate.
Have you got gas in it?
Yes.
How do you know?
I saw a man on the wing there
putting gas in it.
He used to do that, I remember he
used to watch through the window and they'd
gas the thing up.
I'm sure he didn't put enough.
We're going to New York, how long are
we flying?
Five hours.
He didn't put enough to get us halfway
there.
What do you do, stop and walk out?
Oh it's okay.
And then of all things, we're going north
and the plane goes south for about 10
minutes and you pull the bell and say,
hey this guy's going wrong, turn left and
let's go up that way.
You trust him, you don't know if he's
a pilot, he looks like your garbage collector.
But you trust him even if he is
a pilot, you don't know him, you don't
look at his license, you don't look at
the license of the plane, you trust, you
trust, you trust.
Natural money, natural things.
But we're not talking about that, we're talking
about something entirely different.
Look in Paul's letter to the Romans a
minute.
Take the chapter we all like so much,
Romans 12.
I beseech you therefore, by the mercies of
God, you present your body as a living
sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is a
reasonable service.
Let's go down to verse 3.
For I say, through the grace of God
given unto me, to every man that is
among you, not to think of himself more
highly than you are, but to think soberly,
according as God hath dealt to every man,
a what?
A measure of faith.
I don't believe every man has the same
measure of faith, that faith is a gift
of God.
There's natural faith in natural things, but natural
faith doesn't operate in supernatural things.
Faith is a gift of God according to
the measure of faith.
Look at verse 6.
Having then gifts differing according to the grace
that is given unto us by the prophecy,
let us prophesy according to the proportion of
faith.
So you see, this is very clearly set
forth.
You know, some people set off, God has
told me to do this, and six months
after the whole shebang is closed down.
I can give you a whole list of
ministries across the nation that start, God has
told us to do this, God has told
us to do that.
You go up to a certain city, there's
a, well, Aldo Roberts built a tower, so
this other guy has to have one.
It's half built, it's been there the last
20 years, and they call it his folly.
But they had a revelation from God to
build a prayer tower.
Well, it's good to build a prayer tower,
but not if you get people's money, buy
the millions of dollars and then leave it
abandoned.
There are so many of these things like
that.
We talk about seed faith, I don't find
it in the Word of God.
It's likened to a grain of mustard, the
smallest and it can become the greatest.
Well, let's go back now to Thessalonians.
First Thessalonians chapter three.
But now when Timotheus came from you unto
us and brought us good tidings of what?
Your faith and charity.
Now they got both, they had faith and
they had love.
Now go down to verse 10 in the
same chapter.
Now this is the amount, this man has
such extreme language, hasn't he?
Wasn't it in the ninth of Romans where
he uses one of the most awesome things
I'd ever read in the Word of God.
He says to his brethren, linking it to
that verse we sang a few minutes ago,
my zeal inspire.
What did he say in Romans there?
He said, I could wish myself accursed.
Literally, it means I'll be damned if need
be.
I'll be destroyed.
If destroying what I have will bring others
into the kingdom, destroy me.
This one has no half measures.
Spinoza talked about a God intoxicated man.
Do you know what?
The church never does anything when it's sober,
only when it's drunk.
A drunk man doesn't care a hill of
beans what you think about him.
I told you the first day of war,
1939, I was at the head church of
the Nazarene in Scotland.
We came out of the meeting, the whole
city was in darkness, streetcars had no light,
automobiles had no light.
The brother I was with said, Brother Ramiel,
I'm going in a building here.
You had to carry a gas mask, it
was given in a box with a tape,
you put it around your neck, carry it
on your shoulder.
Compulsory to carry a gas mask, instead there
was a raid.
He went in that room and I stood
by a lamppost.
And he said, stand by that lamppost so
when I come out I'll be able to
find you in the back.
So I stood there, a streetcar came up.
A Scotsman got off, his rubber legs wouldn't
hold him up, and he pitched forward and
put his arms around the lamppost and me
as well.
I was thinner than I am now, not
too heavy now.
And he said, I said, hey, he said,
hey, hey, what's your name?
I told him, ah, you're English, I had
no time for you, he said.
And he said, I'm Sandy MacTavish, can you
sing?
I said, no, I can't.
And he sang Maxwell Town Braids of Bonnie,
started singing.
Rolled his feet, can you fight?
I said, oh, no, no, I can't fight
for sure.
You can't sing, you can't fight?
Put his hand in his pocket and brought
a handful of silver.
Now when a Scotsman hands you a handful
of silver, you know he's drunk.
He'd never do that if he was sober.
Ah, he said, I want to talk with
you.
I said, I can't stand talk.
You can't talk, you can't fight, you can't
sing?
Ah, you're no good, he said.
If I'd met that man at nine o
'clock in the morning instead of nine o
'clock at night, he wouldn't have even given
me the morning, he wouldn't have said top
of the morning to me.
But he's intoxicated.
And it's only when men and women are
really intoxicated with the love of God and
the will of God that they're reckless to
do anything.
I don't believe faith is believing something you
can't prove.
Faith is having the grace to do the
thing God has told you and it looks
as black as hell.
It's a reckless abandonment to the known will
of God.
And right through the scriptures you'll find how
that goes.
Well let's go back again then as we
said to Thessalonians.
I'm praying night and day, that is 1st
Thessalonians chapter 3, praying night and day.
He isn't satisfied to say, you know, every
morning after breakfast I kneel down and say
a little prayer, oh bless those dear people
at Thessalonica.
He says, I pray by night and pray
by day, and I pray earnestly, I pray
with a sweat, I pray with an anxiety
for you.
For what?
It's already said previously in verse 4 that,
verse 6, they are faith and charity.
What's it saying here in verse 10?
Night and day praying exceedingly that we may
see your face and supply, might make perfect
that which is lacking in your faith.
Now go to the 2nd epistle for a
moment, 2nd epistle of Thessalonians, this chapter 1.
What is he praying for in that verse
we just left?
Praying night and day that I may see
your face and supply that which is lacking
in your faith.
Now look what it says in verse 3
of the 2nd epistle, chapter 1.
We are bound to thank God always for
you brethren, as it is me, because your
faith groweth exceedingly.
Not your faith groweth, your faith is growing
by leaps and bounds.
Faith that is going to be trusted is
going to be tested.
I used to say often to young people,
you know, I say look at my muscles,
my muscles are hard to find.
I never chopped trees down, I'm never athletic,
I haven't used my muscles, so they're not
developed.
I was in Miami airport one day, rushing
downstairs, I think the children arrived and I
was rushing, and here's the, what do you
call, escalator thing coming up, and just as
I went, I saw this big black head
coming, and I stood back, hi, it was
Mohammed Ali.
I wasn't going to get in his way
for sure, boy what muscles he had, boy
did he strut his stuff, boy everybody in
the airport, I went past and I went,
you know, very opposite that worm of a
guy.
Faith that's going to be trusted is going
to be tested.
Can you think of the excitement of a
man who spent so much time in prison?
Discouragement?
God help you.
He had a band of spiritual men, what
did they do?
They abandoned him.
Demas have forsaken me, having loved this present
world.
Alexander's gone off to something else.
Spirit-filled men deserted a spirit-filled man,
deserted the most monumental holy character the world's
ever seen outside of Jesus Christ, and then
you wonder why you get upset, something gives
you the cold shoulder, forgets you, ignores you.
Well at the opposite, not only is he
discouraged when all men, but look what he
says, all men forsook me, nevertheless what?
The Lord stood by me.
You say, I'm not getting very near to
God, you know why?
You've so many friends that's why, they take
your time off, come and sit in your
house, waste your time, get rid of half
of them, I'll leave you to choose a
half, husband get rid of his wife's friends,
wife get rid of her husband's friends.
Not a bit of a clearance, wouldn't it?
But he says, all men forsook me, and
you know what happened?
What happened when you take the scaffolding away,
you see the building.
Most of us have had theological scaffolding around
our thinking all our days, we've never seen
his glory, never seen his majesty, never seen
his broken heart, therefore we're not broken.
We think we're here just to glide along
and you know, help me in the hour
of temptation.
Brother, sister, if you're not known in hell,
you're not much good.
I tell the preachers that every time I
get a chance to preach to preachers, so
they never send me any thanks.
But if preachers are not known in hell,
they're known in guts.
Paul was known.
What did the demons say when they kicked
a fellow around?
They said, listen, Jesus we know and Paul
we know.
Can you think of anything more holy, more
wonderful in all creation?
That somebody says you and Jesus Christ are
the same?
The demons said we know when Paul moved,
we knew when Jesus moved.
Jesus we know and Paul we know.
But who are you?
The usurper.
Dear God, I'm trying to write a book
and the chapter I'm writing, some things about
preachers, I think they'll have the book publicly
burned.
I hope they do, it'll sell better.
Anyway, when all the facade is taken away,
when everything that we cover ourselves with, you
know, our ability, our scholarship, our ordination, everything,
when it's all taken away and I appear
naked in the sight of God, that's going
to be some mighty revelation.
But Paul not only was, didn't get discouraged
when they all forsook him and fled, but
on the other hand he says here, your
faith grows exceedingly and the charity of every
one of you that he mentioned previously in
the first epistle, chapter 3 and verse 6,
but he wants them to be of a
boundless charity, a boundless love.
Don't you think he's run to the extreme?
If he didn't get discouraged when all forsook
him and fled, he must have been awfully
encouraged when these people were going on in
leaps and bounds with revelation and with love
and with faith.
And that's what it's all about.
Our maturing in holy character.
I think the next week we'll give you
some of these.
I don't know whether I have them now.
I had an outline.
Are you going to run some off for
us?
I had one.
Okay.
I just, let me make a reference to
it.
Thank you.
We'll give you one of these next week.
We won't take an offering either.
Isn't that amazing?
Well, it's just, it's all tabulated out of
Hebrews.
I think it's, it's very wonderful.
I didn't do it.
I mean, I copied it, but I didn't
invent it.
You know, God wants us to bring us
into a glory that we don't know a
thing about.
What's it?
Isaac, Isaac Watts wrote the hymn, Jesus shall
reign, wherever sun doth its successive journeys run.
His kingdom stretch from shore to shore, till
moon shall wax and rain no more.
Blessings abound wherever he reigns.
The prisoner leaps to lose his chains.
The weary find eternal rest, and all the
sons of one are blessed.
Blessings abound wherever, wherever he reigns.
The prisoner leaps to lose his chains.
Then another psalm says, in him, in Christ,
the tribes of Adam boast more blessings than
their fathers lost.
Do you wonder that one of the old
saints, a century or more ago, said about
the epistles of the Hebrews, it's the hub
of the wheel.
All the epistles are joined by this mighty
central factor.
It's showing the supremacy of Jesus.
It tells about Jesus in the beginning.
But let's, this is what it brings us
into, if we follow on to know the
Lord.
It says in Hebrews 2.14, we're partakers
of flesh and blood.
Hebrews 3.1, we're partakers of the heavenly
calling.
Hebrews 3.14, we're partakers of Christ.
Hebrews 6.4, partakers of the Holy Ghost.
Hebrews 10.33, but we're partakers with the
martyrs.
Hebrews 12.8, partakers of chastisement.
Hebrews 12.10, partakers of his holiness.
Because he had no sin.
Well, you need a little bit of sin
to keep you humble.
Why not have a lot and be real
humble?
I never saw a sinful man that wasn't
arrogant.
There isn't one sin you can defend.
There isn't one sin will enrich your life,
your character, your personality.
They're all destructive.
The devil comes not but to destroy and
to kill, to rob us, to keep us
in bondage, clothe
in tears.
Say, dear God, did I walk so near
to spiritual riches?
So near to spiritual wealth?
So near to spiritual authority?
So near to spiritual power?
I was preoccupied with something.
Oh, there was a sale at Penny's that
day, so I forgot about my Bible.
I rushed down there.
I did something else.
You know, I pray for you daily and
myself.
We'll be more eternity conscious.
Let the other people go after chaff.
Dear God, most Christians live for trivia.
Won't stand up five minutes.
Let me quote this one thing, then I'll
finish here, or I'll go on talking too
much.
Anyhow, we'll get some of these for next
week.
You can all have one free as a
Christmas gift.
When I first came to America, I came
first in 1950, and for eight years I
commuted the Atlantic.
I went across it about 20 times.
But Sunday nights, I'd dash home to the
hotel, and there was a little box on
the wall, a little thing like that.
Just two stations, you know, in those days.
No national TV, no TVs, they hadn't come,
no radios.
You switched a button, you got on one
channel, the other.
I used to switch to this certain channel.
There was a church up on the west
coast of the United States in Portland.
I forgot my name.
And the preacher there would say, well, we've
just returned from Africa.
Thousands gathered every night.
Thousands were saved.
Thousands were filled with the Holy Ghost.
Okay.
We had a great service here last Sunday
night.
We had to put chairs in the aisles.
We had over 2,000 people.
10 people came forward to be saved.
20 came forward for the baptism.
8 came forward for healing.
It was a wonderful meeting.
Boy, that used to make my hair stand
up.
I'd like to be in one of those
services.
That fellow went on like that.
Had one of those powerful ministries on radio
in America.
Just a year before he died, he was
very sick.
His wife came in, as usual, at night,
give him a good night kiss, brought some
milk for him, and left it there.
When he went in in the morning, he
said, darling, call my pastors.
Call the deacons.
I want them to stand round the bed.
Well, he'd made a lot of profit, so
she thought he was going to prophesy, I'll
die, you know, 3 o'clock tomorrow afternoon
or something.
He said, dearie, when you left last night,
Jesus came and stood there right at the
bottom of the bed.
And he pointed to him and he said,
I know your works.
For 25 years you've been in this church.
You've seen signs and wonders and miracles.
You've been to Africa and taken photographs of
crowds.
You've had a great ministry.
I've something to say to you.
Your 25 years of ministry is wood and
hay and stubble.
Your life and mine is either wood, hay
and stubble or silver, gold and precious stone.
Wood, hay and stubble are above the ground.
That's the ministry people see.
Silver, gold and precious stone is secret ministry,
praying, weeping, traveling, doing works for God that
nobody knows a thing about.
And this man, he said, Jesus said, your
life for 25 years of wood, hay and
stubble, as God is my witness, I believe
I'll stand at the judgment seat and see
that Christ with eyes of a flame of
fire.
And listen, everybody's frozen tongue will melt before
him.
I believe I'll see the bakers, Jimmy, Tommy,
poor souls.
They spent 25 years building a ministry of
wood, hay and stubble.
Because it's all above ground, it caught the
eye.
It got rewarded.
And it's going to go like that.
It's going to burn like that.
Going back to this man, he said, darling,
Jesus himself appeared and said to me, your
life, your healing ministry, evangelistic ministry, is wood
and hay and stubble.
When I put my torch to it, you'll
just be knee deep in ashes.
And he said, I want all the preachers
to come.
They came in and he told them what
happened.
And he said, you know, I've been pleading
since I woke this morning, dear God, let
me live just one year as I should
have lived all my life.
I don't care about the obvious ministry.
Give me birth pangs.
Give me the secrets of the most high
God.
You can't publish them.
I want to lay up for another year,
no more wood, hay and stubble, silver, gold
and precious stones.
Silver is a type of redemption.
Gold is a type of devotion and worship.
Precious stones.
The priest had a breastplate like this, about
this side, a bit wider.
He had 12 precious stones.
There was the name of the tribe on
each stone.
And he went into where?
He went into the Holy of Holies where
nobody else could go.
You know, I want you, dear people, and
I want to, I want to go to
the Holy of Holies.
In the outer court there was daylight.
In the holy place there was a seven
-branch candlestick.
There was artificial light.
In the Holy of Holies there was no
light.
No light.
It was as black as black could be.
Unless the Shekinah glory of God came.
When that Shekinah came, it was brighter than
a thousand sunrises.
You see, this is a trouble with our
generation, dear God.
Why do you go to the church you
go to?
Oh, we have the best choir in town.
Oh no, we have the best young people
meeting.
Oh, we have the best this.
Tell me where is the glory?
But I asked a dear brother, precious brother,
flew in a plane, little plane, all the
way from Oklahoma to come to this meeting
tonight.
He's coming back next Friday night, God bless
him.
I asked him, I said, brother, when did
you last tiptoe out of the sanctuary?
You couldn't whisper to your wife.
You couldn't say a word.
You're overwhelmed.
The heavens parted.
You saw the glory of God.
The Shekinah glory came.
If it came once, we'd never forget that
if we lived to be a thousand years
old.
But it's only for the holy man to
go into the holy place.
The junior priest couldn't go there.
I reminded you before, that statement that Dr.
Krishnamurti makes, that in the second book of
Chronicles, chapter 26, you remember there's a, there's
a, what was the name of the priest
there?
Uzziah, Uzziah.
And he came through the outer court.
He came through the Gentile court.
He came through the women's court.
He came through the priest's court.
He came to the holy place.
Then he went to the holy of holies.
That man must have been demon possessed.
Why?
Because 81 men tried to stop him and
he tossed off 81 men.
He was determined that he would go and
do what the priest could do and God
said you won't.
And he struck him dead.
They put a leopard's rag on his lip.
But I use that, I say, well listen,
he said, let me tell you this, just
go back for a second.
That man, Julius Caesar's rival, what was he
called?
Pompey.
Pompey became more powerful than Caesar, so Caesar
sent him to what was called the holy
land.
When he arrived, they went in ships, they
had horses with, you know, with the, what
do you call them?
Curtains on them or whatever you call them.
And beautiful saddles and they had plumes in
their helmets and breastplates and the people gasped.
They'd never seen people like this.
When they marched through town, they said, what's
that building?
Oh, that's, that's the temple.
What's that for?
For God.
What?
We've a hundred, a thousand gods over in
Rome.
No, this is the God.
He put that ball of fire in the
sky.
He puts the stars in the sky.
He controls the universe.
He made the universe.
And that God comes in there?
Yes, he does.
So Pompey comes and outside, people remembered, when
they heard the news, Pompey has said he
is going to the holy of holies.
Two thousand people followed him and screamed, don't
go in, you'll die, don't go in, you'll
die.
He was determined to go in.
They remember that second chap, that second book
of Chronicles, chapter 26, where again, Uzziah went
in, he defied the priest, he went in
and the glory of God struck him.
Well, I quote it, I say now, that
man came all that way, look how far
he came, through the Mediterranean ocean and then
into what we call Israel.
Then he goes through the outer court, the
women's court, the Gentile court, the priest's court,
to the holy, holy place, until he gets
to the holy.
Young people come to our churches.
I went to a church not long ago.
They've got 30 acres.
Why?
We want our old football field, our own
tennis courts.
Dear God, do children go to church to
learn to play tennis?
God help the preachers.
Why can't they get them spiritual, so they
want prayer and revelation and the word of
the living God.
So I say, the young people come to
church now, they go past the basketball court,
they go past the tennis courts, they go
back past the baseball court, they get inside
the church, but there's no glory.
As I said to a man today, we
go to the house of God, we read
the word of God, we sing about God,
but where is God?
Often you go home, you can't eat your
dinner.
You felt the impact of eternity.
I'd rather have 10 people that want God
than 10,000 people that just want to
run a church.
I could go and join a church and
I'll be a co-pastor with 12,000
members and the guy will build me a
mansion.
Oh, that doesn't interest me, it's a hill
of beans.
I want to see the glory of God
come, so that our young people don't have
to be told to go, they just long
to get to the sanctuary where God is.
The glory of God fills the temple.
It's going to take that, in this critical
hour in which we're living.
Preaching isn't going to do it.
Big crusades aren't going to do it.
It must be the very presence of the
living God there, until we're broken and humiliated
and groaning and so broken over a rotten
world, that there's no contentment for us except
to see the glory and majesty of God.
Okay, let's, I better sign off here.
Well anyhow, that measure of faith you have,
it's got to be exercised but it's going
to go.
I thought twice about that hymn that came
to me as I was praying, Charles Wesley,
give me the faith which can remove and
sink the mountain to a plain.
Give me that childlike praying love which longs
to build thy house.
It's not talking about a gorgeous building, building
God's house, a place where God is comfortable,
a place where from sentences of conference it's
God, God, God, the will of God, the
purpose of God, the revelation of God.
I want that faith to be developed in
me and the only way it can develop
is by testing.
You go into the next chapter, what does
it say?
It says that the Lord will develop us
how?
Not by giving us creature comforts.
We're going to be tested in the areas
of patience.
Two difficult things.
One difficult thing is to find the will
of God.
There's only one thing more difficult, that's doing
it.
You have need of patience, it says in
the 10th chapter, to do the will of
God.
What was the will of God for Noah?
How much patience did he need?
Over a hundred years of it.
But God didn't tell Abraham to build an
ark.
They all had their different appointments, we'll see.
They needed faith to worship, Abel, there's faith
to worship, there's faith to work, there's faith
to witness.
And yet God takes us, as it were,
in a side room and says, look, I'll
show you how I made these men.
They didn't sit down and somebody have a
blackboard and teach them, they were taught by
the Spirit of the Living God.
They had no pocket Bibles.
Come on, do you and I know God
so intimately?
I mean, if you're driving down the road,
the Lord can say, pull off and get
up a side lane.
I want to speak to you right now.
I used to have a good memory, I
don't now.
I'd wake up in the night, something would
come to me.
I'd say it three times and when I
got up in the morning, I'd say it
like that, boy, I can't do that now.
As soon as anything comes, boy, I'm up
and out of bed.
Mother comes, how long have you been in
your office?
Darling, I've only been here a couple of
hours.
I didn't trust myself.
Is God going to be my secretary?
Is he coming, if I won't listen the
first time, is he going to come the
second time?
I'm his servant, he's not my servant.
He gives orders, I can't give him any
orders.
He's here to command this little span of
life I have, dear God, how short it
is.
When I see what these men did, Bob,
you call me this week?
I want to see you after me, just
for a minute, that's all.
Brother Jack here has a book, it's the
history of the Azusa Street revival.
I hope you all get it.
Do you know why?
Because the revival, 1904 in Wales, Evan Roberts
was corresponding with a man in California and
the fire in California began in Wales.
A man in Wales caught the blaze, he
went from there to the Cyclades Hills in
India and they had revival.
He went from there to China, they had
revival.
They said we're going to Korea and the
Chinese said, you'll never do anything in Korea,
they're so phlegmatic.
He had a bigger revival in Korea than
he had in China, so he went back
to China and he came back again.
But you know the background of it all
was praying.
I preached one day down in Lake Okoboji,
Okachobe is in Florida, Okoboji is in, I
know a bit of Indian history anyhow, it's
in Iowa.
And a young lady came to me and
she said, no, there's another one, a man
that came to me this time, and he
said, did you ever meet praying Hyde?
I said, no, I wish I had.
Did you?
He said, yes, at the Cyclades Hills in
India.
He said he preached and he said, I
said to him, sir, could I see you
in the morning, even for 10 minutes?
He said, well, yes, I'll be praying in
the back room in the morning, come at
10 o'clock.
And he said, I went and I knelt
to the side of him, he was kind
of soft, speaking softly, and he said, he
stopped, so I, I, me, you know, big
prayer warrior, I poured out my heart, you
know, told God everything I knew in five
minutes and shut up.
He said he started praying and I looked
at my watch and he said when he
started it was 10 o'clock.
He said he hadn't prayed many minutes, it
was, and he said, I said, oh no,
no, no, no, I'm not going to do
it.
Second time, third time, I'm not doing it.
Somebody put their head around the door and
said, Brother Hyde, you're speaking at three o
'clock and it's 15 minutes of three.
And he said, I said to myself, the
man's an idiot, we haven't been here half
an hour.
But he said he started praying at 10
till 11 to 12 to 1 to 2
to 3, 5 hours, and it went like
that.
He said it was awesome.
I wouldn't go to, at the end, he
milked my eyes.
He said it wasn't the volume necessary, he
talked as though he was kind of whispering
to God, talking to God at the side
of him.
But every revival there's been, has been laid
in prayer.
You can't have birth without travail, you can't
have birth without pain.
We've tried to do it by crusades, bring
in a special speaker, forget it.
I got an invitation today to go preach
to hundreds of priests, I said, no, not,
as far as I know, I won't.
If the Lord tells me, I'll come.
Because preachers are the key.
Those preachers need to get broken.
Forget numbers, forget the money, forget all the
other showmanship.
Are we robbing hell?
Is the devil afraid of us?
I'm not going to sing on what Christian
soldiers do, I feel there's a unity even
here, a passion for the lost, a burden.
It's getting terribly late.
I had a letter, just very, it's stingy,
I had a postcard yesterday from one of
the greatest preachers in America.
Dear Leonard, he said that the coming of
the Lord is near, then in capital letters
put, very, very near.
It's now the moment to be alerted in
a new way to storm the stronghold of
the devil.
Numbers don't matter, money doesn't matter.
What matters is we all get a new
quickening, we all get a new revelation, a
new priority.
I've never in my life been so awed,
if I can take one second, I talked
to somebody yesterday, you know, a few, remember
a few months ago the press said that
a boy had been living in a bubble
for a number of years, and at last
they'd taken him out of the bubble.
I'd been living in a bubble for about
six months, a bubble of the fear of
God, not cringing fear, His awesomeness, His majesty,
the failure of the church.
Come on, I'll go out on a limb,
why in God's name, I've got to be
honest somewhere.
Tell me where the Pentecostal church I'll go,
a church where you can open those doors
and say this is that, a church where
you know you can't take a person twice
before they'll get saved.
It'll tell you about that in the Zerzuzah
Street meeting.
A dear brother that came down today, Larry
there, asked me about the awesome presence of
God in the great revivals in England, those
little Pentecostal guys, they had no money, they
had no advertising, they had no hype, they
had no begging.
And yet when they walked in the meeting
and sat down, big strong men started to
weep, eternity came on them without opening their
mouths, weep to weep of excitement with a
choir of something and all kinds of junk.
Well I'm tired of all that.
I believe God is going to manifest this
power.
I think the big boys have had their
day, they've gone off now, off TV, there's
a chance for local churches to take over
where those guys, not where they left off,
but to show something better.
And there is a praying remnant in this
area, there's a praying remnant in this country,
and I thank God for them.
People who don't want to surface, people who
are the silver, gold and precious stones under
the ground, not showmanship on TV, I've led
so many millions to Christ, I've done this,
that's below me.
When the fire gets to it, it'll be
chaff.
We need to live with eternity's values in
view, faith to believe what we can't see,
but we know God manifested even for our
sinful flesh and blood.
I hear there's going to be a rally
or something tonight for young people, did you
hear about that, where is it?
In Lindale, after the ball game, after 11
o'clock, they should be going to bed
at that time, not going to a meeting.
Anyhow, somebody's going to witness to them.
My neighbour, what's his name, I've forgotten his
name, Jacob, he's preaching at Rose Heights Sunday
morning and Sunday night.
Dave Wilkinson opens his church in Times Square
this weekend.
I don't know where Joe Foss is, he'll
be troubling the devil somewhere I hope.
Let's believe God for them.
Doesn't matter who gets the glory, if God
gets the glory, I don't care a hill
of beans.
I'm sick of guys posting how much they've
done and what they've done, forget it.
There's an awful lot of flesh got to
be burned up before God's glory is coming
down, I'll tell you that.
Aren't we sinful, we're like little children, a
little girl boasts her dolly is better than
yours, this boy's bicycle is better than yours,
their dog is bigger than yours.
You know, the Christians are very much in
that silly game.
Let's tell God we've got an ache in
our hearts to see his glory, to go
to church, dear Lord, some mornings at 10
o'clock, come home at 10 at night,
that's what they do in Revival.
They don't run out for a coke and
a this and a that and the other.
God holds them spellbound.
When God is on a meeting, people don't
run home when the preacher says, well good
night, God bless you.
They dare not leave the sanctuary, they dare
not step out of God's holy presence.
We need to walk like that every day
of our life, in close communion with him.
With a consciousness we're right in his will.
You say my faith doesn't grow much, I'll
give you the answer very simply, faith grows
how?
Cometh by theology.
No, that's the reverse version.
Faith cometh by, faith cometh by hearing and
hearing by the Word of God.
Let's pray for Spencer, he's still up there
with the Indians.
Pray for his wife, the baby hasn't come
yet.
Pray for these other meetings.
I believe it's going to get harder and
harder to be a true Christian.
The church is getting more worldly and more
fleshly.
Let's sing a verse and if you have
to leave, leave.
I hope you can stay for a little
while anyhow.