Psalm 85, please, if you'll turn there in
your Bibles with me, Psalm 85.
Revival is coming and what it will look
like.
Father, I thank you, Lord, for your word.
I thank you, God, for your presence.
I thank you, Lord, that you have so
manifested your glory here today.
You always bear witness when what is about
to be spoken has emanated from your heart.
Give me the grace to speak this simply.
I thank you, Lord, for allowing me to
stand here in vulnerability to speak this word.
I thank you for the strength that overpowers
my weakness.
Thank you, Lord, that you're willing to give
us all ears to hear this day, Lord,
what you're speaking to your church.
Let the name of Jesus be glorified.
We ask it in your precious name.
Psalm 85, revival is coming and what it
will look like.
We're going to begin at verse 6 of
Psalm 85.
Wilt thou not revive us again, that thy
people may rejoice in thee?
Show us thy mercy, O Lord, and grant
us thy salvation.
I will hear what God the Lord will
speak, for he will speak peace unto his
people and to his saints, but let them
not turn again to folly.
Surely his salvation is nigh them that fear
him, that glory may dwell in our land.
Mercy and truth are met together.
Righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
Truth shall spring out of the earth and
righteousness shall look down from heaven.
Yea, the Lord shall give that which is
good and our land shall yield her increase.
Righteousness shall go before him and shall set
us in the way of his steps.
Now, we're beginning with these verses of Scripture
and I intend on ending with it at
the end of this message this morning.
Now, this is not really a message like
I'm typically used to speaking in this church,
but I want to share with you this
morning a personal journey, something the Lord has
been speaking to my heart for over 30
years, something that is very dear to my
heart.
I have watched God unfold it line by
line, little by little, piece by piece, brick
by brick, step by step.
I've come to know his voice.
I know that what he has spoken to
me is about to happen in our generation.
I was saved in 1978, filled with the
Holy Spirit in 1981.
I've written this down so that I get
the details right so that you understand what
it is I'm speaking about.
And from the time that I was filled
with the Holy Spirit, the Lord began to
speak to me about a coming day that
I would live to see a great revival.
A revival is something sovereign, it's supernatural, it's
born of God, it's a moment where God
just comes to his church first and he
subsequently, through his church, he touches much of
the nation, many, many people, thousands, perhaps even
in the hundreds of thousands or beyond.
The Lord spoke to my heart that I
would live to see a great two-year
period where Christ would gather many souls into
his kingdom.
He told me that this time would be
preceded by a fleshly, exuberant, and misguided attempt
to manufacture the presence of the Holy Spirit
by human means.
It would occur primarily among the Pentecostal and
charismatic elements of the church and would result
in the disheartening of some people towards the
true move of God when he does come.
I remember quite a few years ago before
coming to New York, I had occasion to
speak in a rather large conference.
Brother Leonard Ravenhill recommended me, so I ended
up on this platform and the Lord showed
me at that time, this is the vehicle
that I told you about that would usher
in a very fleshly move into the Pentecostal
charismatic churches.
I stood in the pulpit that day and
warned them that they were about to create
a calf that would do great harm to
the church of Jesus Christ throughout North America.
Needless to say, it was not a message
that was very well received.
Following this revival of the flesh, all of
North America would experience such a devastating economic
downturn that there would be no money to
maintain public areas such as parks and cemeteries.
Now, what the Holy Spirit had spoken to
me was so specific.
First, there's this charismatic Pentecostal move of the
flesh that would sweep a lot of the
Pentecostal churches, especially in the country of Canada
where I came from, and that has happened.
Following this and at the tail end when
it's all over, there'd be a devastating economic
collapse.
Now, you have to understand this is back
in 1981 that the Holy Spirit spoke this.
We were just moving into a minimal downturn
in 87, but probably a time of unprecedented
prosperity in North America, and I don't think
anybody would disagree with that.
Even coming to New York in 1994 and
in those subsequent years when the high tech
boom took off, the Holy Spirit would still
tell me this was a last call of
mercy.
You see in the Old Testament just before
the judgment of Samaria, there was an unprecedented
economic upturn.
Allegiances were made with foreign nations, and it
appeared in the scriptures like things couldn't get
any better, but it was a last call.
It was a last mercy call of God
to the nation.
I remember Brother David Wilkerson leaning over to
me one day and saying this recent boom
that we're experiencing as the high-tech surge
began, and more millionaires were made in a
certain period of time than in all previous
times of history in this country.
I remember Brother Dave confirming that word that
the Lord had spoken in my heart, that
this was the last mercy call of the
Holy Spirit to this nation before the true
judgment of God began.
It was so specific what the Holy Spirit
spoke to me, and he said, you're going
to live to see a day when parks
are overgrown and cemeteries are unmaintained.
It was that specific.
There'd be no money in the public coffers
to literally cut grass on the highways and
do things that you and I and our
generation became familiar with.
I don't think I have to convince you
that those times are here.
Budgets, states are broke all over the place
now.
We're starting to see the layoffs now of
teachers, firemen, policemen, and it's only the beginning
of what we're going into.
Nehemiah chapter 2, verse 3, Nehemiah standing before
the king, and this is the word that
the Lord gave me almost 30 years ago.
He said, why should not my countenance be
sad when the city, the place of my
father's sepulcher, my father's graveyard lies waste and
the gates thereof are consumed with fire?
In other words, the people have lost protection
and they've run out of options.
There are no, the gates, there are no
plans for the future.
Nobody knows how to get out of this.
It's stronger than, than we know what to
do with.
And folks, if you can receive this today,
what's about to happen and is happening today
in our borders is the mercy call of
Almighty God.
It is better that the rain stop for
a season if necessary to get the people's
attention one more time, just as in Elijah's
day.
If it's necessary is you and I have
got to make a choice as believers in
Christ.
Do we just come to Christ so that
we can live in personal comfort or is
there not, is there not something greater?
Is there not something more that we're called
to?
Are we not called to live as a
testimony of the keeping power and the glory
of God in this time that we're living
in today?
I drove by an old stone church when
I was still a police officer.
This would be around the same time, 1981
or perhaps 1982.
And as I drove by this old stone
church, I began to weep in the car
and it was a strange sensation to me.
I didn't understand why I was weeping.
Why would I even weep?
What did it really matter to me?
How many times that I'd driven by old
stone churches and it never meant anything to
me.
They were all over the place in the
community I was part of at that time.
But the Holy Spirit began to speak to
my heart that out of the ruins of
all that had once known his true presence,
he would bring his church back to life
again one more time.
Out of the Baptist, Methodist, Salvation Army, Pentecostal,
charismatic, Catholic, charismatic, out of all of these
places, as we heard today, there is a
body and the body has no denominational name
on it.
The body is simply the body of Jesus
Christ.
And the Lord is going to revive his
church.
Now I had a hard time believing that
because some churches in my community at least
were so utterly dead.
There were no more than museums.
And not long after this, I was asked
to speak, maybe a few years later, I
was asked to speak at the 100th anniversary
of one of these churches, these old stone
churches that had long seemingly lost its candlestick.
The presence of God was no longer there.
It was just gone.
And I was asked to be their 100th
anniversary speaker.
Big, big old stone church, huge steeple, tradition,
history, pictures on walls everywhere of those that
had once governed the church.
And I stood in the pulpit and I
looked out and I was thinking in my
heart, this place is deader than dead.
This is worse than Lazarus's tomb.
And as I stood there, the Lord says,
no, don't look as men see, look as
I see.
He said, look deeper, look farther.
And he was speaking this to me as
I was actually speaking in that church.
I mean, they had just put on a
skit that was atrocious.
It was hard not to just get up
and walk out of the place.
And yet I was supposed to be their
keynote speaker.
And I remember the Lord saying that don't
see as men see.
And he showed me a picture of an
old gas stove.
I don't know if anybody here is familiar.
Well, some are familiar with new gas stoves
and the burners seem to be off.
But if you look, there's a little crack
between the top plate and the oven door.
And if you look in there far enough,
you're going to see a blue flame.
You're going to see a pilot light still
on.
And the Lord said, now, if I can
use you in my hand, if I can
use you to skillfully reach down and just
turn that burner knob, this place will ignite
again.
If you will not judge these people in
your heart, if you'll stand in the mercy
of God, if you'll tell them what I
put on your heart to tell them.
And so I just obeyed God.
He gave me a word from the text
of scripture, just reached down as tenderly as
I could.
And suddenly that place ignited.
He gave an altar call for salvation in
a hundred year old church.
And the place was packed.
The altars were packed.
It just ignited.
And the Lord said, it's not, you think
it's out, but it's not out.
There's still a pilot light in many of
these places or churches that seem to be
extinguished all over the nation.
You'd be surprised.
There's a hunger there.
There's an ability to be stirred.
That is the key folks.
There are some churches like Sardis and revelation
who had all the exterior trappings.
They had all the worship.
They had the fancy preaching.
They had, they seemingly had it all, but
there was no ability in them to be
stirred.
So in reality, who's more alive, people that
are jumping and leaping in the aisles, but
can't be reached by the voice of God
or people who seem to be dead and
can be brought to life by the power
of the Holy Spirit.
I remember sitting in my police car in
a parking lot and the Holy Spirit came
upon me so strongly that I shook and
began to cry uncontrollably.
It's not something you really want to see
when you're driving by a police car.
You know, it doesn't, it doesn't really inspire
confidence, but I couldn't help it.
I couldn't control it.
I was shaking.
I was crying.
It was, it was so powerful, so utterly
impossible that I would live to see this
type of a sweep of God in my
generation.
Now you have to understand at that point,
when God spoke this to my heart, I
was not a preacher.
I had no speaking ability whatsoever.
I would panic standing in front of people.
And you know, my testimony, yet he spoke
this to my heart, told me that I
would live to see it and actually have
an active part in it, along with many
others that would be alive at that time.
He spoke to me that society will become
increasingly lewd, violent, and brazenly defiant of the
ways of God.
Does that not describe the generation that you
and I are living in right now?
Paul said to Timothy, this know also, then
in the last days, perilous times shall come.
Men will be lovers of their own selves,
boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,
without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent,
that means unable to receive and retain truth,
fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors,
heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure, more than
lovers of God, having a form of godliness,
but denying the power thereof from such turn
away.
For of this sort are they which creep
into houses and lead captive silly women, laden
with sins, led away with diverse lusts, ever
learning and never able to come to the
knowledge of the truth.
Now as Janice and Jambres withstood Moses, so
do these also resist the truth.
Men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the faith,
but they shall proceed no farther, for their
folly shall be manifest to all men as
theirs also was.
The Lord said to Timothy through Paul, there's
going to be in the last days an
unspeakable breakout of lawlessness.
It's happening, folks.
It's happening every day.
It's happening all around us.
It's on the airwaves.
It's in the media.
It's in our schools.
It's everywhere.
Folks, this is a perilous time.
We are living at the times that Paul
spoke to Timothy about.
I am absolutely convinced of it in my
heart.
I see it every day.
I read it in the news.
We're coming to that place where the prophet
Isaiah said there's perplexities among nations, people not
knowing what to do, not knowing how to
get out of the calamity that we're in.
There'll soon be a cry for a world
government.
I don't know if it'll be in the
next decade or so, but it surely is
coming.
And there's a religious spirit that has crept
into houses in the name of God and
taken captive people who are still living according
to the lust of their own heart, offering
redemption, offering freedom, when Paul says that they
themselves are the slaves of corruption, always learning,
always unlocking as it is some new corner
on truth.
But they are actually withstanding the power of
God.
They're standing against the power of God.
Remember when Moses came into Pharaoh's court, there
were leaders there that had sway and influence.
They were political men, really.
They wanted power.
They wanted access to power.
When Moses came in and Aaron cast down
the rod and it became a serpent, they
did the same.
In other words, they said, we too have
power.
We too know who the great God who
created the world is.
We understand these things.
But you remember that the serpent that came
from Aaron's rod swallowed up the serpents of
these other magicians as it was.
And Paul said, just as their folly was
exposed, so will it be in the last
days.
There'll be an anointing of God come upon
his church.
The church of Jesus Christ and the power
of God will swallow up as it is
all of this foolishness, all of this other
influence, all of these other players in the
kingdom of God.
Folks, very, very soon there's so many that
are going to be turning, looking for a
word of hope because what they've sat under
is going to have failed them.
When people start losing their jobs, what happens
to the theological perspective they've sat under where
you give me a thousand dollars and God
owes you a hundred thousand?
Where does all that go when suddenly your
job is gone?
When suddenly people can't pay their mortgages, they
can't pay their bills, they can't pay college
for their kids, they can't afford a car
payment, they can't pay their rent.
Tell me where does that theology go?
Gone to the wind, almost in a moment
of time.
There's a lot of people going to be
looking for truth in the days ahead.
Their folly will be manifest because the Lord
Jesus Christ is going to have a church.
Thanks be to God there's going to be
a church, folks, in this last hour of
time.
The Holy Spirit showed me that society will
tolerate this revival but only to a point.
Eventually laws will be passed declaring Christ-centered
preaching to be something which they believe to
be disruptive to social order or their type
of society which they have created.
Now you have to understand, folks, at the
time that God spoke this to me I'm
living in a country that is completely free.
You're free to speak about Jesus Christ, you
can stand on the corner, you can go
on television, there's no obstruction to the gospel
of Jesus Christ and the Lord's speaking to
be about a day where there's going to
be a two-year in gathering of multitudes
into the kingdom of God and at the
end of that two-year gathering laws are
going to be passed declaring the gospel of
Jesus Christ, among other things, probably focused against
anyone who preaches an exclusive message to be
something that is disruptive to social order.
In other words, the type of society which
they have created and believe is the only
type of society that men should be living
in.
I've not seen, the Lord did not show
me anything beyond this point.
That's where this vision, I guess for lack
of a better word, that he showed me
stopped.
At the end of two years when laws
start to be passed and the Lord says
the revival can't be stopped and it will
seemingly be triumphed over but it cannot be
triumphed over because it is my hand that
determines the beginning and the end of all
things comes from my hand.
Now there are some people here today that
are thinking how is it possible that revival
will come in such a Christ-rejecting and
even God-hating time that we're living in
right now when the whole of society seems
to be trying to push Jesus Christ out
the door and off a cliff?
How is it possible that there could be
a turning?
Now I want to remind you that on
the day of Pentecost the people of that
time, as they thought, had just rid themselves
of the man who claimed to be the
Son of God and his followers.
They had just killed the Son of God.
I don't know if it gets any more
evil than that.
They physically killed Jesus Christ the Son of
God.
Now we live in an evil time but
I don't know if it gets any more
evil than that.
Now the hearts of men never change.
People are still trying to push Jesus Christ
out of our borders but you cannot push
the God who created the universe out of
anything.
You can't put him out of a room
that he wants to go into.
You can't put him out of a school
that he decides to visit.
You can't put him out of a country.
Sir Isaiah said, heaven is my throne, the
earth is my footstool.
What kind of a house are you going
to build for me?
Where's the house that you're going to build
for me?
Who in their right mind can think that
you can push God out of anything?
What insolence, what foolishness, what stupidity to even
think that you can push the Spirit of
the Living God out of any aspect.
He is omnipresent.
How do you push air out of this
room folks?
He's omnipresent means he's everywhere at all times
until the day of course that his presence
is taken.
His church is taken from the earth but
he is omnipresent.
He's everywhere.
He's in this room.
He's in this room when we're not here.
He's out on the street when you go
out on the street after the service.
He's in the car park when you're waiting
for your car.
He's on the subway when you're taking your
train home.
He's everywhere.
So how do you push him out of
a place?
You can't push somebody out of a place
who's everywhere.
How do you do that?
You can't do that.
Imagine the surprise in that time when people
are wiping their hands and saying, well we're
finally rid of that Christ who is standing
and against our system.
He's standing against our forms of religion.
He's standing against our society, the direction our
country is taking.
We're finally rid of this Christ.
We're now free to do everything we want
to do.
And they're clapping, perhaps patting each other on
the back and saying if there are any
of his followers around here, well we'll teach
them a thing or two.
And then suddenly 120 people burst into the
marketplace.
Ordinary people.
Ordinary.
There are no royal among them.
There are no noble.
There are no mighty among them.
They're just ordinary fishermen.
Some of them were ex-prostitutes.
Some were the ex-lepers.
Some were the nobodies and nothings of society.
Now suddenly they're standing in the marketplace with
the glory of God so deeply upon them
that the people stand back and say, my
goodness, we thought we were rid of this
and now it's come back and it's even
more multiplied than it was before.
And yet we hear these people.
We see them.
God grip.
We see their countenances alive when ours is
cast down.
They're standing there alive and their mouths are
speaking words that we can understand.
Each one of us can understand what they're
saying.
There's a great plainness of speech given to
them and an ability to communicate with all
men.
And out of their mouths they're speaking of
the wonderful works of God.
Not only the things he has done, but
the things that he's going to do in
the earth.
The things he's going to do when the
earth is folded up and a new heaven
and a new earth are created.
And as they stood there and saw these
ordinary God grip people, 3,000 people looking
on this, 3,000 who'd been in a
crowd perhaps yelling, crucify him just days before.
Get this imposter out of our borders.
But when they saw the church, hallelujah, when
they saw the church, when they saw the
church rise, when they saw the church get
up, when they saw the church go out,
when they saw the church filled with faith,
when they saw the church God gripped and
filled with the Holy Spirit of Almighty God,
they beat on their chest and said, no,
what must we do to be saved?
How does one get a relationship with God
like that?
How does a people, how do a people
find hope in the midst of these terrible
times that we're living in?
And they were living in terrible times, just
like ours.
They were an occupied country.
Folks, there were all kinds of atrocities happening.
They developed a religion that was just compromising
the integrity of God.
In the midst of it all, 120 people
step out and change the whole known world
of their time.
120 people given to the work of God,
120 people who had opened their hearts and
sat in a place of obedience to God
and said, Lord, because I am convinced personally,
there was a bloodlust in the crowd.
I'm personally convinced that every man, woman in
that room felt that as soon as they
burst through that door into the marketplace, that
they were going to be sent to a
cross.
I'm convinced that they came to the place
of saying, Lord Jesus, you told us that
if we would follow you, we'd have to
take up our cross.
And we're willing to do it.
No matter how many days we have left,
let us live it to the glory of
God, for the honor of God and for
the sake of the lost who oppose their
own salvation and don't even know it.
God, what did they say in Acts chapter
five, I believe it is, or six, after
they were threatened, they gathered together when Peter
and John were threatened by the then ecclesiastical
authorities of the day.
And they got together and they said, Lord,
you are God, you made the heavens, you
made the earth.
You said to your servant, David, why did
the heathen rage?
Why do they imagine a vain thing?
Why do they imagine they can push God
out of the borders?
Lord, they've gathered together, says all of the
authorities that gathered together against your church and
against Christ, just as you foreordained that they
would.
But oh God, they prayed, grant now that
with great boldness, we may speak your word
by stretching forth your hand to do great
signs and wonders.
Let healing come in the name of the
Lord Jesus Christ.
That's the cry of the church.
Stretch forth your hand through me, Lord Jesus.
Stretch forth your hand.
Use my hand, Lord, to unlock prison doors.
Use my hand, God, as an anointing oil,
giving sight to the spiritually blind.
Use my hand to be the hand of
God's comfort to those who need to be
comforted.
Use my hand, Lord, to warn those who
need to be warned of a coming day
of justice and judgment in the earth.
Oh God, stretch forth your hand and heal
this generation and stretch it through me, Lord,
not through somebody else, but do it through
me.
That's got to be your prayer, beloved, today,
and it's got to be mine.
Oh Jesus, the son of God, stretch your
hand forth, stretch it forth, stretch it forth.
And whatever that means for my life, then
so be it.
Let that be what it means.
It's not Christianity within the context of what
we think our lives should be, but it's
Christianity in the context of what God has
called us to be and what he has
called us to go and what he has
called each one of us to do.
It's the laying down of our plans and
ambitions and inner desires and submitting it all
to the will of a holy God and
saying, Lord, whatever time I have left, it
all belongs to you.
Folks, I'm 57 now, and I have only
one desire, that when I cross that finish
line, I do it with my hands raised
in the air.
I do it not looking back with any
regret.
I've crossed that line saying, God, as much
as I knew how, I did it your
way.
As much as I could run, I ran
it your way.
As much as I knew, Lord, I let
the knowledge of God govern my life.
I don't want to finish this race looking
back with regret in my heart saying, if
only I'd done this, if only I'd done
that.
Especially those that are young today, I speak
to you, the younger ones, live your life
for the glory of God.
From this day forward, you stretch your hands
out to the will of God for your
life and ask him that the power of
the Lord may emanate through you, not for
evil, but for good to this generation that
we're living in.
As in Elijah's day, the people are going
to gather one more time because of their
need and to consider which people actually speak
for God and whose lives in reality are
a demonstration of the power that he promises
to his own.
There's a season coming where people are going
to stop in their tracks.
It's a short time and they're going to
consider.
And you and I, Pastor David has said
it before, the only Bibles these people are
going to read.
And people are not looking for some new
theory on God.
They're looking for somebody that has the reality
of an experience with God.
Somebody that has the power of God living
within them, as Elijah did.
And the hearts of the people can be
turned back.
Folks, it's really in calamity that people's hearts
will turn because most often in good times,
you can't get the attention of the masses.
Prophet Joel, I'm just going to read this
to you.
He cried out this particular cry.
He said, spare your people, O Lord, and
give not your heritage to reproach that the
heathen should rule over them.
Wherefore should they say among the people, where
is their God?
Joel said, God, why should it be said
about your people, where is their God?
Isn't there a time folks where we've got
to get some gravel in our gut or
something along this journey and say, why should
it be said about me?
Where's my God?
Why should people in my workplace look at
my life, people in my apartment, people I
meet every day?
Why should I be wringing my hands like
everybody else around me?
Shouldn't there be something solid in me?
Shouldn't there be a light in my eye?
Shouldn't there be some kind of assurance in
my voice?
Shouldn't there be some tenderness in my hands?
Why should people say about me, where's your
God?
Verse 28, now Joel is speaking a dual
prophecy.
Most who study this believe this, that he's
speaking about the days that were fulfilled on
the day of Pentecost when Peter said, this
is that which was spoken about by the
prophet Joel, but it also speaks of the
last days of time as we know it.
And afterwards, it shall come to pass that
I'll pour out my spirit upon all flesh.
Your sons and daughters shall prophesy.
Your old men shall dream dreams and your
young men shall see visions.
And also upon the servants and upon the
handmaids in those days will I pour out
my spirit.
And I will show wonders in the heavens
and in the earth, blood, fire, and pillars
of smoke.
I can't help but wonder if that's not
some form of a nuclear exchange.
The sun shall be turned into darkness and
the moon into blood before the great and
terrible day of the Lord come.
And it shall come to pass that whosoever
shall call on the name of the Lord
shall be delivered for in Mount Zion and
in Jerusalem shall be deliverance as the Lord
has said, and in the remnant whom the
Lord shall call.
In other words, the Lord says, I will
have a people.
And the people that are mine in these
seasons, through them, many will come to the
saving knowledge of who Jesus Christ is.
What will the coming revival look like?
Here's what it will look like.
Old men like Moses, standing fearlessly with the
power of God upon them.
You see through Joel, it says, it's not
something just for the strong.
It's not for the mighty.
It's not just for a select few.
It's all flesh.
It's everyone who calls himself and herself by
the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You'll suddenly see people rise up in this
last hour of time that have no name.
They have no reputation.
They have no ministry.
They've never preached a sermon their entire life.
And suddenly they show up.
They just show up in the power of
God.
The only reason Pharaoh didn't kill Moses is
because it was such an entertaining joke to
have this 80 year old man, his 82
year old or 83 year old brother come
walking in to the King of one of
the greatest armies on the earth, just saying,
let my people go.
It was an entertaining thing.
It was just a joke before it became
a contest of power.
That's what it will look like.
Grandmothers laying hold of the cross one more
time, speaking into a younger generation, getting a
hold of God and saying, let this generation
go that they may serve God in this
wilderness.
It'll be young people like David standing in
the power of God for what is right
and brings glory to his name.
Not cowering down under the voices that are
telling them you can't do this and you
can't do that.
And you can't mention this and you can't
sing that and you can't pray that.
There'll finally be young people rise up and
say, is there not a cause here?
Is everybody okay with this?
Did our whole nation go to hell?
Did all these young children in schools be
captivated by the power of darkness?
No, no folks.
The coming revival, you'll see young people standing
up, formerly bullies in the schoolyard.
You'll see the most unusual young people standing
up, no formal training, no, no resume.
They're not been the class valedictorian, but you'll
find them standing and the power of God
will be upon them.
And God will give them a wisdom and
a power and ability to speak that nobody
can stand against.
And everybody in between the young and the
old stepping into the marketplace one final time
filled with the power of God and given
to the work of God.
Isaiah 33, the prophet Isaiah speaks of the
time when the Messiah comes back to this
earth, particularly from the focal point of Israel.
But he talks about there being no galley
ship there.
There's no tower counters there.
There's no parade of human flesh in that
day.
He says the lame will take the prey.
The nobodies, the nothings of society, the people
who do not regard themselves in high esteem,
but something stirs in their heart and they
say, Jesus, if you are passing by, if
you are giving out the ability to do
good in this generation, I'm not going to
be passed by and they're going to press
through the crowd and one more time touch
the hem of his garment.
The lame take the prey.
Psalm 85, where we began, he says, the
Psalmist said, will you not revive us again
that the people may rejoice in thee?
Show us your mercy, Lord, and grant us
your salvation.
I will hear what God the Lord will
speak for.
He will speak peace to his people and
to his saints, but let them not turn
again to folly.
In other words, the Lord will bring his
church back.
He'll bring the Pentecostal, charismatic churches back.
He'll bring the Baptists and Methodists, but let
those who turn to foolishness not do it
again.
Don't use the power of God for some
foolish pursuit to not turn again to folly.
I speak specifically to the charismatic Pentecostal churches
of our generation.
The Lord will be merciful to you.
He's greatly humbled you because of the pride
of your heart and because you've refused to
theologically correct those among you who are going
astray.
And now he's shamed you in the sight
of the country and he's going to bring
you home, but don't turn to folly again.
Surely salvation is nigh them that fear him,
that glory may dwell in our land.
Mercy and truth are met together.
Righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
Now, our part is to determine I will
walk in truth and I will receive the
cleansing of the blood of Jesus Christ.
I will walk in truth and righteousness and
God's part is to meet me with mercy
and peace.
It's a phenomenal verse.
He said, mercy and truth are met together.
Righteousness and peace have kissed each other.
And it speaks to me about the prodigal,
that parable of the prodigal son, where the
son just gets up and goes home and
he throws off his pursuits and throws off
his lust-laden life and throws off his
wrong thinking about God and his father.
And he decides to go home and do
it in truth and live a life that
is righteous in the sight of his father,
only to be met by mercy and peace
along the way, kissing each other.
The Lord is going to welcome home his
church, his people in this generation from every
walk of life.
And no matter what you've done and no
matter how you've blown it, the arms of
God are open to his church in this
generation.
All denominations, folks, hear me clearly on this.
His arms are wide open to bring his
people home to himself now.
Truth shall spring out of the earth and
righteousness shall look down from heaven.
Now truth springing out of the earth speaks
to me about Calvary and the tomb.
The earth cannot hold the truth of God
when you and I decide to walk in
that truth.
And righteousness looking down from heaven speaks to
me about Pentecost.
When we decide to walk in truth, the
power of God is ours.
He will come to us, each one of
us.
Yea, the Lord shall give that which is
good and our land shall yield her increase.
Doesn't Isaiah say we are the planting of
the Lord, that he might be glorified.
Our land, this land shall yield her increase.
Praise be to God.
Righteousness shall go before him and he shall
set us in the way of his steps.
Our part, truth and righteousness, that's our part.
The willingness to be set in the steps
that God has for our lives.
The willingness to walk in the parameters of
the Holy Scriptures.
Not a foot to the right, not a
foot to the left, but right down the
center of what God speaks in his word.
The willingness to walk therein, that's our part.
His part is to give us the power
to do it because none of us have
the power in ourselves.
We have all failed and fallen short of
the glory of God in this generation, but
it doesn't have to finish that way.
The Lord is willing and wanting to visit
his church again.
I've just come back from Alabama last week,
a meeting with some pastors in Alabama and
I honestly have never seen the kind of
spiritual hunger in the ministry like is presently
happening in Alabama.
The pastors of all denominations in Alabama believe
that the Lord is visiting one more time.
Talk about a confirmation for what God had
given me to speak this Sunday morning.
They believe that the Lord is in a
sense passing by.
He will not force himself upon anybody, but
they're so willing.
They're willing now, it doesn't matter, Baptist pastors,
Pentecostal pastors, and everything in between all of
that gathered together and they say we're willing
to expand our borders, we're willing to stretch
the stakes of our tent, we're willing to
get over the fact that people are going
to clap their hands in our churches.
They said we're sick of the white churches
on this part of town and the black
churches on this part of town.
I told them, I said, if you're not
willing to do something about that, there's really
no point in us coming and doing anything
in Alabama.
It'll just be one big grand farce of
a meeting, then everybody will go back to
the way things always have been.
If you're willing to break out of that
box and some of the pastors know it's
going to cost them, and they were not
all pastors of the smaller churches, there's some
larger church representation there.
They said, no, we're in.
We're tired of this.
If God's going to revive our state, then
it's going to start with us.
And folks, it's everywhere now.
The Holy Spirit is moving now.
The invitation has come.
And my cry is, oh God, don't pass
us by because we've known your presence in
New York City so powerfully for so long.
Lord, don't let us sit here saying, well,
we've got that.
You know, we have that.
We've walked in that.
No, we haven't.
We haven't gone anywhere near where God wants
to take us in the coming days.
Oh no, the Lord is willing if we're
willing.
We're on the verge of a tremendous spiritual
awakening now.
It's going to happen in Alabama.
You're going to hear about it within a
year because they're willing to do it God's
way.
Everyone is willing to say, Lord, whatever it
costs me.
I know there's a pastor there that has
3,000 people in his church, but he'll
lose a portion of that because he's chosen
to integrate his church.
Some people are just not going to stand
for it.
Well, let them go if they won't stand
for it.
If any man says he loves God and
hates his brother, he's a liar and the
truth is not in him.
Hallelujah.
Oh, folks, let's do this God's way.
Revival is coming one more time.
And if you have the courage to say,
look, I'm just nobody, I'm nothing.
And I'm not necessarily walking rightly.
If you have the courage, the honesty, I'm
not walking the way that God would have
me to walk.
But your word says that you will set
us, righteousness will go before us and you'll
set us in the way of your steps.
So Lord, I don't want to be left
out.
God touched my life.
And don't let people go to hell while
the Holy Spirit is still here in me.
Lord Jesus Christ, I pray God, I pray
Father, you give us the courage to hear
these words and to go forward and to
allow you to become God in us.
Thank you, Lord.
Thank you for what you're about to do,
Father.
We give you the praise and the glory
and the mighty and holy name of Jesus.
What the Holy Spirit told me when I
was preparing this message is just these two
words.
I believe, I believe that I can change.
I believe that I can be brought to
where God wants to take me.
I believe that as on the day of
Pentecost, my life can be gripped by the
spirit of Almighty God.
I believe that I can be given abilities
and talents that I don't presently possess as
long as I want to use them for
the glory of God.
I believe, I believe that prison doors have
to open and let, let me go if
you're captivated today.
I believe that my wounded heart can be
healed.
I believe that I can have the treasure
of Christ revealed to me.
I believe that I can be given the
courage to stand in an impossible time and
to have words of comfort and faith when
all around me are standing and walking in
fear.
I believe that I can be taken out
of the fear of the box that I
live in and perhaps taken somewhere I've never
been before to do things that I've never
had the ability to do.
I believe in God with all my heart.
As God lives, I believe it.
I believe it.
I believe every word of it.
If that's in your heart today, I want
to give an altar call here and in
the education annex that you just step forward
in faith.
That's all it is.
And you and God know what that's about.
Whether it's just to get out of a
besetting sin, it's to get out of a
distorted image of yourself that you've carried around.
It's to get out of a non-caring
view of other people, whatever it is that's
in your heart.
That's where revival begins.
That we lay down what we know is
wrong.
One pastor got up and he said, pastor,
I'm assuming of report because everybody gave him
attention in the meeting I had with the
pastors.
And he said, pastor, what you're asking us
to do is not going to be easy.
We've done things a certain way for generations.
And he said, but one thing I can
say today, that it's right.
It's in the Bible.
It's right.
And it's time for us to make choices.
No matter what it's going to cost us,
we have to choose to do what is
right.
And folks, that's coming from the pastors in
Alabama.
They're making the choice to do what is
right.
They know it's right.
They know that the way things have been,
I've got to change it.
There'll be no revival.
And folks, this is sovereign.
This is something that God is.
And there are things in your life that
you know you have to do because it's
right.
Not because you feel like doing it and
not because there won't be a consequence to
it, but because it's right.
It's right.
That was a man who's probably ministered for
many, many years.
He might be coming close to the finish
of the course.
And the natural tendency would be to put
your feet up and receive the awards.
Not a really attractive thing to go out
as losing half of your church or whatever
will happen to him for what the Holy
Spirit is asking him to do.
But he said, it's just right.
It's just right.
And the time has come to obey God.
Oh, Jesus help us.
There are some things in some people's lives
today.
It's just what you're doing is wrong.
And you have to make the choice to
do right.
It's that simple.
And you have to believe that God can
give you the ability.
And that's what this altar call is all
about.
And the faith, the belief that God can
take you out of the box that you're
in, the view you have of yourself and
bring you in to a place of the
miraculous.
That's Pentecost.
It's coming out of that upper room, boldly
going into the marketplace and saying, let me
tell you what God's done for me.
Let me tell you what God's going to
do for me.
Let me tell you what God will do
for you if you will let him.
It's that simple.
Let's stand, please.
The Holy Spirit is drawing you.
Please step out.
Make your way please to the front of
the sanctuary where we'll pray together.
Balcony, you can make your way to either
exit.
Main sanctuary, just make your way down.
You hear what the Holy Spirit is saying
and you say, I believe and I'm moving
forward to it.
Let's do that as we worship.
Elder John Hernandez came to pray for me
before preaching today.
And he does this consistently, brings the word
of knowledge right into my heart.
He doesn't realize it.
It just does it.
It's a gift of the Holy Spirit that's
given him.
And today, as he was praying, he said,
Moses spent the first 40 years of his
life thinking he was something.
The second 40, finding out he was nothing.
And the third 40, finding out that God
can use nothing to do something.
If you and I have the courage to
say, Lord, I'm nothing, but I believe that
you can do something that brings glory to
your name.
That's see, without faith, it's impossible to please
him.
You must believe that he is and he's
a rewarder.
Whether or not you agree with the vision
that God gave me, it's a personal thing
that I shared with you today.
Whether or not you agree with that, you
must agree with the fact that he can
use your life for his glory, can make
a difference in this generation through you.
And so if you will just lift your
hands to the Lord and let's just pray
these simple words.
Lord Jesus Christ, I thank you, Lord, that
I am nothing and you are everything.
I ask you, Lord Jesus, fill me with
your Holy Spirit and use my life to
bring glory to your name.
Let the giftings of God and the power
of God flow through me in a way
like I've never known.
I yield my life to you, Lord, and
I ask that your ways become my ways
and your plans become my plans.
Stretch out your hands and heal through my
life that Jesus Christ might be glorified.
You've promised me that we would become fishers
of men.
So put the net in my hands.
Oh God, I thank you, Lord, that much
fruit will be born into your kingdom through
my life to the glory of your name.
I believe it, Lord.
I believe it, God.
I believe it.
Hallelujah.