Our Father, give us a vision.
Give us a vision of ourselves, our need.
Give us a vision of your Son, the
Lord Jesus, who alone can meet our needs,
whatever they may be tonight.
Speak, O God, for thy servant listens.
Speak a message to our hearts, through Jesus
Christ.
Amen.
It's a great blessing to see so many
young people here tonight.
As you probably can guess, I'm a little
closer to the younger generation than I am
to the older, somehow caught in the middle
with mixed emotions, especially when I see my
three children, and I wonder how it all
happened.
This work began by young people, 16, 17,
18, and 19 years of age, about 10
years ago.
One of the messages I used to preach
the most when I was about 16 or
17, 18, was on this text of Romans
12.
The Spirit of God has put it upon
my heart to again speak on this, one
of the most challenging texts in the Bible.
I haven't spoken on it for a long
time.
Look together with me at the first verse
in Romans chapter 12, remembering that this is
the Word of God.
The only reason I'm here tonight, really, in
the long run, other than Christ of course
Himself, is a deep, deep conviction that this
book is the Word of God.
My faith in this book has been attacked
many times, especially at university, and especially when
I was taking short-term courses in communist
universities of Mexico.
But through these years, it's just grown deeper.
This is the Word of God.
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies
of God, that you present your bodies a
living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which
is your reasonable service.
And be not conformed to this world, but
be transformed by the renewing of your mind,
that ye may prove what is the good,
acceptable, perfect will of God.
Have you ever come to that place?
Have you ever come to the place where
you presented your body, your life, as a
living sacrifice to God?
I believe, without any doubt, this is probably
the greatest desire of God, that His children
come to that place of absolute surrender to
Him.
That His children come to that place in
which they turn from their own ways, their
own will, and yield themselves completely to the
Lord Jesus Christ.
A man who has made a great impact
in the 20th century, who died just a
few years ago, a man named A.
W.
Tozer, who has written about 15 books, on
books I believe every Christian should read, made
this statement in his book, The Root of
Righteousness, or The Root of the Righteous.
He said, we can prove our faith by
our committal to it, and in no other
way.
Any belief that does not command the one
who holds it, is not a real belief.
It is a pseudo-belief only.
It might shock some of us profoundly, if
we were brought suddenly face to face with
our beliefs, and forced to test them in
the fires of practical living.
Many of us Christians have become extremely skillful
in arranging our lives so as to admit
the truth of Christianity, without being embarrassed by
its implications.
You might want to get that book and
read those words over many times, because they
are very penetrating.
He goes on to say, so wide is
the gulf that separates theory from practice in
the church, that an inquiring stranger who chances
upon both, would scarcely dream that there were
any relation between them.
An intelligent observer of our human scene, who
heard the Sunday morning sermon, and later watched
the Sunday afternoon conduct of those who heard
it, would conclude that he had been examining
two distinct and contrary religions.
And I think many of us have become
very conscious in these days of the great
gap, the enormous gap between what we sing,
and what we say, and what we believe,
and what we are.
And I think many young people are very
conscious of this gap.
One of the reasons I'm here in Britain
now is to take a tour of British
universities, speaking to many university students in this
country.
And I have discovered, especially among thinking Christian
students, that they are very, very conscious of
this enormous gap that seems to be widening
in the age of relativity, that seems to
be widening to an almost incomprehensible state.
And I believe that until we become serious
about the demands of Jesus Christ, we will
never really bridge this gap.
Until we understand that Jesus is not looking
for a crowd of people to drift aimlessly
in his tract, but he's looking for a
mighty minority who will say, Lord, here is
my life, my all, my talent, everything.
Take it, use it, as you want.
And until you come to that place in
your Christian life, you will never know reality.
Every year, about 1,000 young people from
all over the world come to our summer
conference and then take part in our crusades
throughout many different countries, working with missionaries, working
with the Church, especially the National Church, to
proclaim the gospel.
Now, we don't accept young people because they're
ready, they're spiritual supermen, they've proven themselves, and
all the rest.
We're known for accepting almost anyone.
If they're born again, they love God, they're
willing to follow the basic instructions that come
in our literature, we're ready to give them
a chance.
Because we're not a missionary society, but a
training program, an internship program, if I can
use an American word.
I'll probably use many more without knowing it.
But young people come and they go through
this literature and this training, they meet in
small groups, and then they go out on
a team.
I have a whole file of letters from
these young people and many more testimonies on
top of that about how so many of
them, when they came or just before they
came, felt that their Christian life was accomplishing
very little.
And it seems that a majority of Christian
young people are in this position, so much
so that many of them are not really
sure whether they're born again at all.
And a high number of Christian young people,
and I'm sure some of you are here
this way tonight, are not really sure of
your salvation.
You can't really say, I know that I'm
born again and that I have been saved
and that I'm on the way to heaven.
And the reason you're not sure is because
you know that your life is not manifesting
the fruit of the Holy Spirit.
It's not manifesting the basic things that you
hear about so much in the church, in
the Sunday school, or from any other Christian
activity.
And I meet so many young people who
are just drifting along, confused, insecure, worrying, filled
with doubt.
And unfortunately, there are adults in the same
situation.
And of course, a confused adult generation will
produce only a more confused younger generation.
And how my heart goes out that God's
people may know the reality of living 100
% for Jesus Christ.
Again and again, as we study the New
Testament, we read about this message of discipleship
and full commitment.
When they wanted to make Jesus king, you
remember, he had just fed them.
They were happy, they were full, satisfied.
Terrific, they said.
Let's make him king.
And it was at times like this that
Jesus would turn to the crowd and literally
startle them by saying, if any man will
come after me, let him deny himself, take
up his cross and follow me.
And when he said that, a lot of
them went away with long faces.
Who can bear these things, they said.
He speaks with such authority, they said.
And Jesus constantly amazed the people who followed
him with his outstanding statements concerning commitment.
In Luke 14, we have one of the
most difficult statements, perhaps, that Jesus Christ ever
made.
And most of us, when we read it
in our Bible, we simply pass over it
and, uh, well, I, to be quite honest,
I'm not sure what most people do with
this verse.
But I know they don't obey it.
You know, there used to be many great
men of God, and I think there still
are, who study the Bible with a pen
and they mark their Bibles.
But I believe we moderns, we 20th century
evangelicals, need to study the Bible with a
pair of scissors.
And then all these verses that we have
no intention of obeying, no intention of taking
seriously, we can clip them out and put
them in a scrapbook for the kiddies or
for someone else.
And this is one of the verses that
most 20th century Christians will probably want to
pull out of their Bible.
It's Luke 14, and it's verse 33.
It says, So likewise, whosoever he be of
you, that forsaketh not all that he hath,
he cannot be my disciple.
What are we going to do with that
verse, young person?
Right away, we say, well, that's for a
special little elite, super Christian-dedicated group who
perhaps are going to be called to live
in a tent in the middle of New
Guinea, eating who knows what.
I better not say it.
Some may be embarrassed.
But no, the commands of Jesus Christ in
regard to discipleship are for every believer.
And when Jesus said that we were to
forsake all, he meant what he said.
You say, well, how am I going to
do this?
Can't I have a house?
Can't I have a typewriter or any clothing?
Well, of course, different people need different things
for different ministries.
It's true, the missionary in New Guinea probably
will not need what the Christian businessman in
Bromley will need.
But this is, first of all, an attitude
and a reaction or action of the heart.
We come to that place in which we
present our body as a living sacrifice, and
if we present our body as a living
sacrifice, then automatically we will forsake all.
It's an attitude of the heart.
Everything goes over to God.
Your business, your home, your time, your talent,
your energy, your children, your family, your life,
everything is given over to God.
And from then on, you live on his
resources.
Many young people have never learned to live
on the resources of God because they have
never come to the end of their own
resources.
It's only when your bank account is dry,
spiritually speaking, that you're going to be able
to really learn to draw upon the bank
accounts of heaven.
You see, along with this great command concerning
forsaking all to be a disciple of Jesus
Christ is the great promise of Philippians, and
it must be all taken in context.
God shall supply all of your needs according
to his riches in Christ Jesus.
If you're working out in India, that need
will be, I'm sure, quite different than if
you're going to open a small shop in
your own town.
If you're going to open that small shop,
God is going to supply you with some
capital so that you can open the business.
And I believe that the constant separation of
the sacred from the secular is a great
mistake.
I believe that the man in business, the
man working in the factory, in the office,
in Britain, can be as committed, as spirit
-filled, as much of a disciple as anyone
laboring out in India, Hong Kong, New Guinea,
or anywhere else in the world.
And until the Church sees this, we're never
going to evangelize the world.
Because the missionaries go out to the field,
but the Church do not see their responsibility.
They're not able to put the two together.
The missionaries are considered some special little branch
of the Christian Church, and it becomes mainly
something that the woman's missionary circle gets involved
in.
And yet until the layman, until the businessman,
until the young people in the Church become
concerned about missions, concerned about world evangelism, and
realize that they are responsible at home as
the missionaries on the field, we'll never in
all the world get this enormous job done.
You'd think we could learn a few lessons
from some of the false sects.
Think of the Mormons.
The Little Mormon Church of the United States
now has more men missionaries than all the
evangelical churches of Great Britain, Canada, and the
United States.
That is no exaggeration.
They have 20,000 men on the march
right now.
They are the fastest growing group in the
British Isles.
They now have close to 100,000 converts
in Britain, despite the fact they preach the
toughest little message you could ever declare in
Britain, the forsaking of tea drinking, and the
fact that they're almost all Americans who can
understand.
And it seems to me that these facts,
and I could be here all night giving
you facts about the false cult and just
leave you your head spinning, but it seems
to me that these facts should somehow wake
us up to the fact that somehow we're
missing God's plan.
Somehow we've missed God's standard of commitment, and
because of that we're not as effective as
God would want us to be.
These Mormon young men sweep across the world,
banging on doors, winning hundreds, but how many
young men in this church have been out
on the doors for Jesus Christ?
How many young men in this church have
ever won a soul to Jesus Christ?
Of course it could be tonight that your
own soul is still not in the hands
of Jesus Christ, so to talk about going
out and winning another is rather ridiculous.
I'm always torn when I speak because I
so want to communicate this wonderful gospel to
any who may not know Christ, and yet
I know at the same time that God's
plan to communicate the gospel is not having
our weekly Sunday evening gospel meeting.
That can be part of it.
God's plan to communicate the gospel is that
every believer becomes a witness, every believer becomes
a soul winner, every believer becomes mobile and
reaches out to their neighbors and their community,
and then their contacts are brought into the
church, grounded, taught, and sent forth to each
other.
You say what an idealist this fellow is,
but I want to tell you I have
seen that method work all over the world.
I know a Baptist church in the United
States, and I don't set USA Christianity up
as the ideal.
In fact, if you ever heard me speak
to an American audience, you would probably think
what they often think, that I'm anti-American.
Actually, I'm not, but I like to speak
the truth.
Anyway, this particular Baptist church decided they wanted
to win men.
They decided that they were tired of seeing
empty pews, so they started a door-to
-door visitation program.
At the Wednesday night prayer meeting, where quite
a few began to gather, they would challenge
people to come Thursday for supper, an evening
meal and or tea, and immediately after that
they would go out in door-to-door
visitation, and God began to add to that
church.
All kinds of people went out, the shy,
the loud.
They went out together, and God blessed, and
that church now has a fairly good membership.
It's pushing towards 15,000.
Uh, not a bad membership for a church.
Now, I'm not expecting anything like that.
I realize the situation is different, but the
method absolutely can be used, and I have
seen it work in Britain.
And I challenge you young people who are
here tonight to give your body as a
living sacrifice to God, and then allow him
to use you to win others to Jesus
Christ.
And if somehow you've not yet come to
Christ, you've never experienced this reality yourself, may
tonight you determine to follow him and give
him your heart.
Whenever I see young people, excuse me, who
are not active for God, I just think,
years, years wasted.
I was converted just before I was 17,
and from the day I was converted to
this day, 13 years, I've never had one
day without the joy of God, without the
privilege of witnessing in some way.
Of course, I've failed, I've sinned, but you
know, there's immediate cleansing when we sin.
God says in his word, if we confess
our sin, he's faithful and just to forgive
us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
I know so many young people who are
Christian, but some sin has tripped them up,
some problem in their life is hindering them,
and they don't know how to deal with
sin.
In fact, I would say this is probably
one of the biggest problems we face.
We don't know how to deal with sin
in our lives as Christians.
Like the man who walked along the street.
This is only a story, but it illustrates
the truth.
And it was very windy and cold and
raining, and there was a lot of mud
puddles along the road, and he tripped and
fell.
And he fell right face down in a
big mud puddle.
Now, what would you do if that ever
happened to you?
Maybe it's happened.
Would you start swimming?
Would you lie in the mud puddle and
think, oh, how did I get in here?
What a foolish thing to do.
Why did I fall?
Of course not.
You would get up, and you would get
your clothing clean, and you would go on
your way.
And this is the same thing that should
happen when we fall into sin in any
way.
We don't start swimming in it, getting depressed,
getting discouraged.
Why did I do it?
Why did God fail me?
Or why did I fail God?
I know people who go for years discouraged
and depressed by sin, eaten away by regret.
And regret many times, regret for our sins,
is nothing more than a very, very subtle
form of self-love.
And when we sin, we think, well, now
a few days will have to pass before
I can really get on top again.
But that's saying that the victorious life is
the cross plus some time, the cross plus
some regret, the cross plus something you're going
to do.
No.
The cross is so powerful, the blood of
Jesus Christ is so effective, that we can
know instantaneous forgiveness of sin the moment we
repent and take the sinner's place.
And young person, if sin is holding you
back in your Christian life, some habit, something
that's not right in your life, may you
come to the cross tonight and experience this
reality.
Now the cross can be very unpleasant.
This same man, Tozer, once wrote this about
the cross.
He said, the cross will cut into our
lives where it hurts worse, sparing neither us
nor our carefully cultivated reputations.
This is the trouble with many of us
young people.
We have a reputation, and if we go
all out for Christ, we present our body
as a living sacrifice, we begin to witness,
we begin to mobilize for God, our reputation
might get a little soiled.
We may be called a fool, but that's
what God said, that we should be a
fool for Jesus Christ.
He goes on to say, it will defeat
us and bring our selfish lives to an
end.
It means rather that current Christianity has moved
away from the standards of the New Testament.
So far have we moved indeed that it
may take nothing short of a new reformation
to restore the cross to its right place
in the theology and the life of the
Church.
It was Adrian Ravenhill or Leonard Ravenhill who
said, the accent in the Church today is
oftentimes commotion instead of devotion.
And all kinds of Church activities will never
be a substitute for devotion to the Lord
Jesus Christ, which alone can produce this love
for people and this desire to spread the
gospel out to the uttermost parts of the
earth.
Who do you think it is, young people,
that are going to, that's going to evangelize
the world?
The older generation?
If you think that, you need to read
a little bit of missionary history, and you
need to listen to what the older generation
is saying, because almost all the people in
the older generation that I know involved in
missions are saying the answer lies in our
generation.
And if you and I, young people, do
not become serious about the commands of God,
the world will never hear about Jesus Christ.
And if you think this is something that
just a few odd people are getting involved
in, I only wish you could come on
one of our campaigns and see the young
people that God brings in from all over
the world, and to see a reality that
has come forth in their lives.
Quite a few of them converted through previous
crusades.
Over in Austria, one missionary told us some
years ago, he said, if you want any
people on your crusades, you'd better win them
to Christ yourself, train them, and then bring
them on your crusade.
And the harder and the longer we worked
in Austria, the more sense this made.
And that's just what the Lord did.
Austrian students came to Christ, just a few
of them.
They're now making up the nucleus of the
force that we believe is going to reach
Austria with the gospel.
It is literally amazing what happens when a
man presents his body.
God is reasonable, and he says that this
is reasonable service.
Let me just quickly give you a few
of these reasons why I believe that you,
all of us, should present our bodies, our
lives, absolutely to Jesus Christ.
If we're not yet born again, then tonight
we should come and surrender to him.
Some of the best Christians I know are
people who took the message of salvation and
the message of discipleship on the same night,
and bypassed many of their Christian friends in
service and in love to Christ.
I believe one of the problems is, is
that oftentimes our gospel preaching is watered down.
We tell young people, now believe in Christ,
and you're going to be happy, you're going
to have your sins forgiven, and you're going
to feel great.
But we don't tell them what Jesus told
people, that when you receive Jesus Christ, you're
entering into a revolution.
You're saved by grace alone, but the man
who's saved by grace becomes a revolutionary individual.
His life changes, his attitude changes, his time
usage changes.
And if you've never experienced any of these
changes in your life, even to the beginning
degree, then I doubt whether you've ever really
trusted Jesus Christ as your savior.
And so whether you're a person who has
never been born again, or a person who
is just drifting along in a lukewarm state,
God's message to you tonight is present your
body as a living sacrifice.
Yesterday in Holland, the day before that in
Switzerland, the day before that in the French
-speaking Switzerland, we were having meetings with young
people.
They were challenging them about spiritual revolution.
We were challenging them about giving their lives
to Jesus Christ.
And many of them stood to their feet,
to their feet, to commit their life to
Christ.
It was a thrill to see these Swiss
young people coming forward, signing decision cards that
at any cost they wanted to be a
revolutionist for Jesus Christ.
After the first night, many of the young
people went out into the streets.
And the next night, they brought people right
off the streets.
All kinds came in, hair down their necks,
and ditching their cigarettes at the doors, and
making lots of noise.
And they came in.
Some of them walked out during the testimony.
But when I got up to speak, somehow
God, in answer to prayer, quieted everyone.
And before I was done, 10 to 15
of these young people off the streets came
forward into the prayer room to give their
lives to Jesus Christ.
This is the answer to the dilemma of
our society.
This is the answer, young person, to your
problems tonight, to your state of confusion, to
your anxieties, to your lack of assurance, and
to your sin.
May you not hold back.
May you decide tonight to present your body
as a living sacrifice.
Why?
Because Christ gave his life for you.
This is the gospel.
Simple.
Never will change.
Jesus Christ died on the cross for your
sin.
When you receive Jesus Christ into your heart
and life, he forgives you of your sin,
and the Holy Spirit indwells you that you
may live the kind of life he lived.
To me, that's enough reason to give my
life completely to him.
I think it was C.T. Studd who
once said something similar, to if Christ has
given his life for me, then what, how
much, or what should I ever hold back
from giving to him?
We should give our lives completely to Christ
because he died on the cross for us.
Secondly, we should give our lives completely to
Christ and our bodies as a living sacrifice
because of the condition of the world.
Tonight, as we sit here so comfortably, I've
got one of the best meals I've had
all year in my stomach.
Beef from the Isle of Wight, I was
told, Yorkshire pudding.
I'll never forget it.
It was almost a traumatic experience, at least
after being in Nepal for four months.
Some of you have had it, well, quite
a few times a week perhaps.
Maybe not.
But as we sit here so comfortably, so
well fed, nice homes, clothing, millions of people
around the world are hungry.
Thousands are starving to death.
Prince Philip once said, half the world goes
to bed on a diet that would reduce
the average westerner to skin and bone.
How can we be content?
How can we be lukewarm?
How can we be lackadaisical when thousands are
starving?
And worse than that, half the world has
never had the word of God.
Half the world has never had its first
spiritual breakfast, has never seen John 3 16
in print or heard it in a sermon.
To me, that's reason enough to give my
life completely to Christ, to say, Lord Jesus,
use me wherever it may be, in London
or in Bombay.
The third reason why I believe we should
present our bodies as a living sacrifice is
because the word of God commands it.
Where are those Christians who will simply remember
the words of that old hymn, trust and
obey?
There's no other way.
Too many people are running around looking for
some special experience when God wants them just
to come in obedience.
And when we come in obedience at the
foot of the cross, he will fill us
with the power and the grace that we
need to live this kind of life.
God says it.
I believe it.
That settles it.
Is that your philosophy of life?
Oh, that more people would know the reality
of obedience.
Fourthly, I believe we should present our bodies
as a living sacrifice because Jesus Christ is
coming soon.
As we think of these men right now
whirling out into outer space to go to
the moon, it should bring us right to
our knees.
The Bible says in the last days there
will be an increase of knowledge.
Scientists tell us that we have advanced more
in the area of knowledge in the past
70 or 100 years than in the previous
3,000 years.
We are approaching the last days.
We do not know the hour nor the
time, but as we watch what's happening in
Israel, as we see the earthquakes taking place
across the world, as we see the various
signs of the times, we realize Jesus is
coming soon.
What are you going to be doing when
he returns?
Are you going to be involved in this
spiritual revolution?
Is he going to find you with your
life given over to him?
Or is he going to find you in
some half-hearted, lukewarm situation, not really knowing
his love and his fullness?
There are many other reasons why I believe
we should give our bodies as a living
sacrifice, but time does not permit.
Certainly these four and others that the Holy
Spirit is bringing to your heart personally as
you sit here are more than enough.
A few days ago in Switzerland and in
some countries we celebrated Ascension Day.
We remembered the Lord Jesus ascending into heaven,
and at that time just before he went,
he gave the command to go into all
the world.
He said we would be his witnesses in
Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of
the earth, and yet 50 percent of the
world has never heard.
Doesn't that speak to your heart?
Doesn't that concern you?
I believe everyone in this church tonight is
either a missionary or a mission field.
You have to make the decision, and you
could become a missionary tonight instead of a
mission field.
And after Jesus ascended, two angels came, and
you know what they said?
You remember?
Why stand ye gazing?
Do something!
This is, I believe, the word of God,
the word of the Lord to the church
today, to so many Christians who are standing
gazing, perhaps with a hymn on our lips,
perhaps with a Bible in their hand.
Needless to say, gazing, resting instead of moving,
giving, reaching, loving, winning.
Are you gazing tonight, lukewarm?
May God, even at this moment, enable you
to present your body as a living sacrifice
to Jesus Christ.
Let us pray.