I want to just share just a few
thoughts and bring this to a close that
I'm working on which eventually I'll be sharing
with leaders probably in Kathmandu.
OM is always dealing with a whole number
of different major subjects all of it geared
to try to make this a work that
will glorify God more, that will be more
effective, more efficient, more spiritual.
This is the work that some of us
have day and night because we're concerned with
the level of spirituality, we're concerned with the
level of reality that there is in OM
and in the work of God.
One of the things we've been talking a
lot about lately and it will be the
main focus in the next area of the
youth meeting is forward planning.
It's a word that I guess has come
into use just in the last couple of
years but other similar words have been used
from the beginning, planning ahead.
We as human beings, especially in the English
language, we have one upmanship we play in
language that when a group of people are
speaking something we want to say something that's
different.
It's got a good factor.
I try to engage in it all the
time even to the point of ridiculous.
But it also becomes very confusing for people
who don't have English as their first language
because they just get to know what we're
talking about and suddenly a new word is
popped on them without definition.
So we talk about forward planning, we mean
planning ahead.
Perhaps it would incorporate into it in a
little more thought through and systematic way.
Now it's important to understand why this has
become so big.
It's a big drum that Alistair Hubbard has
been beating since he stepped in the door
because of course someone like Alistair came in
as a, originally as a paid consultant into
OM at a very, very low fee, almost
in some ways partly a gift of his
time because he loves Christ and partly, he
was brought in by the board of trustees,
totally unique in almost in all its history.
Now I think it's good for you to
know he is the acting managing director of
STL.
He is now in and also a consultant.
Now this is an emergency measure because we
have no one for that job.
Alistair is there in God's providence.
Mike Wheat and Dave Brown, he was appointed
as co-deputy directors.
In other words, Alistair is only here three
days a week, they're here the whole week,
right under Alistair.
Dave Brown is moving out of London Road,
long story, because of his new responsibility.
Is it true that your whole team is
going to go to London Road or is
that still the aim?
It's pretty well planned out.
It's good to know that.
We'll all be under one happy roof.
People like Philip Morris and Neil and everybody
else all functioning together.
But anyway, one of the reasons a man
like Alistair Hubbard was brought in during the
time of financial crisis, gets into this is
because he sees a movement like OM that
does all these different things.
It's going on all over the world, but
doesn't have the money to do it.
So forward planning is very much linked with
budget.
If you got this much money, you can
do this much work.
OM traditionally has had this much money, and
has done this much.
A traditional OM is Philip going ahead with
a type setting of the Hindi Bible in
Delhi without any money.
That's the old-fashioned way that people like
Alistair Hubbard would like to stop, much less
why we own.
Or at least have a guarantee that there
is this money coming.
Very, very few people can grasp what budgeting
has done for OM.
Nobody knows the number of ulcers that have
been created, the number of friends that have
gone their different ways.
But there had to come, there had to
come.
When OM was bordering on being out of
control, especially the ships a couple of years
ago, this had to come.
And it came after a lot of discussion,
prayer, meetings, etc.
But as I was thinking on this subject
of planning ahead in the work of God,
I just came up with these few points.
How do we do this in the work
of God?
We're not a secular corporation.
We have not a guaranteed income.
We have to face that reality.
Even if we have pledges and promises we
have seen in OM, that is no guarantee.
And the bottom line problem in OM, there
are a number of them, but one of
them is we've got one third of the
people in the movement who are short of
a minimum support level.
In fact, on the do lots, if everybody
just sees basic support, there will be no
bills.
The whole thing, according to Roton's figures, will
be completely covered, including the ministry, including the
fuel of the ministry, everything, if all the
people on that ship saw their support.
However, support has always been a goal within
OM.
It isn't something that just falls out of
a tree.
It's a goal that we work toward.
And I think coupled with a lot of
dynamic faith, there has been a lot of
down-to-earth common sense and flexibility without
which OM would have never got this far
so that we could even have men like
Alistair Hubbard who would even look at us
and sit down and talk with us about
our problems.
But I've just listed these few things that
you may want to pray about because you're
planning ahead in your own life.
How do you get God's plan for your
own life?
It's actually got many similarities.
And one of the things we failed to
do with OM people in the past, we
did it to a degree, an area of
failure, is to really clearly teach them the
problem of finance in terms of their whole
future.
And just how big that would be when
they left OM, how big the financial question
would be to go to Bible college, to
get into an established mission that wants $25
,000 a year, or $15,000, whatever.
So this is relevant, I think, to all
of us.
And I can only just give you my
outline.
The first thing is seeking the face of
God.
This is the thing that makes us totally
different than the secular company down the road.
And the moment we lose this, we've lost
it all.
And you can go through, I can give
you dozens of verses, seeking the face of
God.
And a lot of the plans that God
gave to us in OM came actually in
permeates.
And they were visions, they were God-given
ideas.
And perhaps we ran into trouble when we
presumed that, of course, any idea we got
in a prayer meeting was from God.
Or we fell into other dangers that I
haven't had time to talk about.
Maybe we didn't realize as much importance of
the human factor.
I remember, let me touch on that later
point.
Number two, walking day by day in the
Spirit.
I don't think there's anything more important than
our personal holiness.
And as we walk in the Spirit, He
leads us.
He guides us the next step.
He may show us a five-year plan.
He may only show us a one-year
plan.
We're all different.
But He will definitely guide us as we
go step by step in the Spirit.
And that needs to continue to be the
great emphasis on OM.
It's not what we are doing, it's what
we are.
It's our life, the first chapter in the
old leadership manual.
And then number three, reading and research.
I'm concerned that in the last couple of
years, some decisions have been made in OM
without proper research.
This is why, even in this financial issue,
I am just reading and I am getting
feedback from the widest range, probably the widest
range of Christian leaders that I've almost ever
been consulted on this subject.
And it is really amazing what we're learning
from that, because these people, I think of
the wife of one of our board members
in New Jersey, typed up three pages.
In fact, the feedback from without OM is
six times better than anything from within OM.
It's actually a bit of an indictment that
many people within OM are not even giving
feedback.
I guess we're just, because we have the
general counsel and people spoke verbally, they don't
feel any written feedback.
It's necessary, though I did urge them at
the general counsel to still give written feedback.
And there has been some good feedback from
within the work.
So reading and research, the facts are important.
A lot of the visions God gave me
in the early days, and the reason that
a lot of the visions came to me
in the early days because there weren't too
many people.
It was only being born.
We weren't even sure.
We weren't even sure that it was going
to come, anything at all.
But a lot of the burden and vision
for Iraq and for Turkey and the Muslim
country came in the Moody Bible Institute library,
reading books that I wasn't even required to
read.
And I feel sad that we've had to
put the research department of this team on
the back burner and then it fell off
the stove.
There's a lot of unofficial research going on
here.
And the amount of information that this team
is generating and circulating throughout the work, which
is almost completely taken for granted because OM
is not an information conscious organization.
There's no budget for information within OM to
any great degree.
There's a budget for free literature.
That's a section of information.
And of course, if there's any movement into
information, I can assure you it's operation mobilization.
What a task if we can systematize this
and organize it in a better way.
There will be a day when this team
or some other team will have a full
-blown research department.
One of the reasons I'm not pushing that
now is because so many other missions have
it and we need to take what they
have, not duplicate it, and get it out.
That's more argument.
Distribution.
We were the ones that took all this
information that Patrick Johnson had, which was going
almost nowhere, and made it public to the
Christian community.
But that doesn't mean we don't continue in
this area.
And in forward planning, research, homework is absolutely
essential.
Before we can really intelligently discuss this subject,
we have to research how has OM done
forward planning for 28 years and then see
what we want to change, what we want
to keep.
In fact, this kind of research in OM
has to be done on a national basis.
There's no sense talking about an international conglomerate
that has done forward planning because OM has
not functioned that way.
And even to this day, if you think
the area leaders are leading OM, you don't
know what's going on.
The leadership muscle in OM is on a
national basis.
And if we want the national people to
do anything, we have to get on our
knees and we have to persuade.
And we discovered already, the simplest decision we
made on an area level, the national leaders
have done it without us being able to
do anything because they are the ones that
have to carry it out.
We can't force anybody in Switzerland or France
or Turkey to do what we decide.
It has to be persuasion.
There are a few exceptions, we think.
Number four, faithfulness in what God has given
us at our hand to do.
We're wrestling with an awesome problem in OM.
How much time do we give to discussion,
philosophy, forward planning, argumentation, all this kind of
thing which is going on twice as much
as ever in the history of OM.
And how much time do we actually give
to work, W-O-R-K, actually going
out and doing what we decided we were
going to do a year ago.
This is an awesome problem because you can't
do both.
If I give five hours to discussion, I
cannot give five hours to work.
In five hours of work, even on a
financial basis, I might generate $20,000.
Five hours of discussion, I might generate a
room full of hot air.
You know, as a hyper pragmatic, where my
heart is.
And for any days that I spend in
discussion, there's much crucifixion.
And that's what I need.
So I am fully in favor of these
meetings.
But it's not easy when you think of
even a September conference, all the things we
could be doing around the world instead of
being in Belgium.
But on the other hand, if we don't
sort out what we do in Belgium that
month, which is my most intensive month of
the year, then a lot of what we
may try to do during the year is
going to come apart.
So we need both.
It's not one or the other, it's both.
But being faithful in that which God has
given us is one of the best ways
to lay the foundation for planning ahead.
Number five, sharing our vision and our burden
with others.
One of the first things we did in
regard to the ship vision was begin to
share this vision out and get feedback, what
they think.
OM is not a movement that is operated
basically on high level laser beam communication.
We got this vision, let's go.
I did get that kind of idea and
vision in some cases, but the next step
was share it with the saints and get
ready for a shutdown.
Eighty percent of all my visions over the
years have been shot down.
And praise God because it's crazy enough as
it is.
One of the things some forward planners fail
to realize is OM has already created, we
already planned and created more than we can
handle at present.
And very few of those fields are willing
to back down on anything.
And they have the clout.
So how do you get any of these
fields to suddenly close things down?
India has been the easiest field to get
to close some things down, but it already
was to start with almost the biggest field.
What about the man who's just surviving?
I just read a three page letter from
David Zion on it to the financial management
department.
They put the loving gentle screw on you
financially and I will tell you what David
Zion has written.
It's brilliant.
The little people in OM easily get walked
on because they're dealing with a very small
budget.
One hiccup in Bangladesh is enough to put
them into the pool seven days a week
to keep the sanity.
So that's an important thing and we have
to work on that.
Number six, really counting the cost.
This is another thing we've always done, but
never enough.
I launched out in 63, no 62, and
in those days a lot of the strategy
and policy just came from my head.
And I had a little more authority than
today, not to the extremes that people think.
But I announced 50 million pieces of literature.
Can you imagine?
I thought I calculated this.
Empire State Building calculations, some of you have
heard the old tapes.
We're going to distribute 50 million pieces of
literature.
Can you imagine that?
We had only 10 months to organize it.
And we were nothing.
62, we were next to nothing.
Three months down the road, I continued to
count the cost.
And I thought, you know, you're blowing this.
No way.
50 million pieces of literature.
Some of it, I was living in London
at the time.
I'd already started distributing.
The first million went out to London before
the summer campaign began.
I was looking for every kind of escape
to get to this huge figure.
Then I changed the publicity, and I've got
both pieces of publicity, to 25 million.
That's a big change, right?
50 million to 25 million.
And so in forward planning, there has to
be the counting of the cost.
But there also has to be the grace,
the humility, even the willingness to lose face
in terms of your announced, God-given plan.
I wondered if old David Wilkerson would be
willing to face up to what he wrote
in The Vision, most of which, that was
15 years ago it was written, most of
which has not come to pass.
Though he definitely communicated that this was a
vision straight from God, and it would happen
within the next few years.
Now he did incorporate a little bit of
apology on a tape.
I wrote, but my acceptance of him as
a prophet getting direct revelations has never been
very, very high, though I do love him
as a weak, struggling, often confused dear brother.
I think we have to at times really
eat a lot of humble pie in leadership,
especially if we are the visionary, pioneer types,
because we are the types who one minute
lead the troops into a tremendous victory, and
the next minute lead them right down a
dead-end street.
And we love to talk about the victories,
but we don't like to talk about the
times we led the troops down a dead
-end street.
That's why I believe in corporate leadership, not
one-man leadership.
Just bear with me a couple of more
minutes.
Number seven, moving forward by faith.
This is a danger in O.M.'s present
move, that we are going to lose the
ability to move forward by faith.
Everything is going to be neat and tidy
and budgeted.
I think there's a way we can have
all this and still move ahead by faith,
but I'm working on that, and it's going
to be discussed on an area level.
So you're not totally out of order there,
Philip, moving ahead by faith.
But if we can carve the missing money
a year from now out of your extra
expenses you use for whatever you use money
for, that might help.
Number eight, learn by our mistakes.
I've already touched on that, but it's incredibly
important.
And number nine, to just face the variety
of ways that God works.
Now, why was David so scared?
He was hopeless on a bicycle.
This wasn't the first person he'd ridden over.
The big problem in this case was, who
was the last person that he'd ridden over
related to?
And we had to go out, so about
two hours later, and rescue his bicycle.
Me, creeping along ahead to see if the
police were anywhere.
It's all a question of who he was
related to.
And you know, Satan, when he attacks you,
does it with fear and trembling.
Because of who you're related to.
If only you could see yourself as Satan
sees you.
With God Almighty dwelling in you.
God himself declaring that he is your father.
This is such an anchor of the soul.
In Hebrews chapter six, we read that we
have an anchor for the soul.
And the kind of illustration that Paul is
using, if he is indeed the writer, is
something like this.
You imagine you're sailing a little boat, and
you've gone aground on a sand bank.
The tide has gone out, and you've gone
aground on this bank.
But the tide is going to come in
again.
But the problem is the wind is blowing
in the same direction as the tide.
And as the water rises, you're going to
get smashed more and more repeatedly onto that
sand bank until the boat is destroyed.
What does a sailor do under those circumstances?
He throws out an anchor against the wind.
So as the tide comes in, as the
boat lifts up, it isn't smashed on the
bank.
You have an anchor in your Christian life.
God has given you the security of making
you eternally his child.
Christ is the anchor for your soul within
heaven already.
And although you may be accused by Satan,
and although you may find yourself in difficult
circumstances, you have absolute security in your relationship
to God.
I don't know whether any of you have
ever had a lawyer to work for you.
You get involved in some legal wrangle with
someone, and you're going to be accused of
this and that, and so you hire a
lawyer.
It's the most wonderful feeling in the world,
practically, to say to your accusers, Go see
my lawyer.
I'm not even going to discuss matters with
you.
You go see my lawyer.
We read in Scripture that we have an
advocate, a lawyer, Jesus Christ the righteous.
One who represents you before God in heaven.
Who makes out your case.
One who has never lost a case yet.
It is important for these people in Luke
24 that they know that they are secure
in God's relationship with them.
It is so important for these people in
Luke 24 that they know that they have
the relationship with God.
And when they see the future, that they
know that God is their father.
The second person we meet is in verse
12, and that is Peter.
Peter arose and ran into the tomb, and
stooping in, stooping and looking in, he saw
the linen cloth by themselves, and he went
home wondering at that which was come to
pass.
Now what a failure Peter had been.
Do you ever get discouraged at yourself?
The way your mind wanders in the prayer
meetings.
I have sat in worship meetings, some of
the most tremendous worship meetings, and all the
time I've actually been scoring some of the
most brilliant goals ever seen on a football
pitch.
You can get discouraged because you fail in
the same way again and again and again.
Peter had come out with so many bold
words, and then finally ran away.
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not
want.
Mary Magdalene could say that He leads me
beside still waters.
And Peter could say He restores my soul.
Peter is a saved man, a converted man,
and yet as we come across him here
in this chapter, he needs his soul restoring.
He too must be discouraged and fearful.
What is the problem with Peter?
It is simply this, that he was immature
and he thought he wasn't.
I've been pondering spiritual immaturity in recent days.
It's so like babies.
Not so many of you have had babies
so far as I know.
At least half of you I'm sure haven't.
But you know, babies sleep a lot.
They spend hours and hours just apparently doing
nothing very much.
Not much sign of anything happening at all.
And then when they do wake up, they
have all kinds of uncoordinated actions.
And it sometimes seems with young Christians that
they go through long periods, months in their
lives, where very, very little happens.
And then suddenly they do the most bizarre
things and then go back to sleep.
We have people like this on OM all
the time.
You're praying for them that there might be
some signs of spiritual growth and six months
later they seem to be the same as
when they came in.
And then suddenly they wake up and do
something crazy and then go back to sleep
again.
Another thing with babies is that they dirty
their nappies, their diapers, for the benefit of
the Americans.
I can remember getting my daughter, my oldest
daughter, lovely little blonde haired, sweet thing, dressed
up to go and see grandparents.
And she was washed and bathed and powdered
and smelled like only a clean baby can.
We set off in the car.
And just about five minutes before we got
there, the pong was something else.
I was so proud to be taking this
little thing and ooh.
I carried her in at arm's length and
gave her to her grandmother.
It's the way they are.
Immaturity.
She's nine next Sunday and she has learned
to behave a little better.
Because you give the young time and food
and fresh air and forgiveness and they will
grow.
It's practically inevitable that physically a young baby
will grow.
But spiritual growth is a battle every day.
It is not automatic.
Just because you're on OM that doesn't mean
to say you're necessarily going to grow spiritually.
There are some people who can go through
months of this kind of thing and stay
the same as when they came in.
Spiritually immature.
The immature person seeks primarily its own happiness.
It's looking first for its own happiness.
The immature person.
The immature person always seeks to receive rather
than to give.
They want to avoid discipline rather than to
welcome it.
And we need to have day by day
a sense of how far we need to
go.
And yet a total confidence in the God
who can restore and remould and make us.
I'm amazed reading Philippians chapter 3.
The Apostle Paul saying, I've got so far
yet to go.
This is only four to five years before
his martyrdom.
It's thirteen years after he has started the
church in Philippi.
And yet he's hungry to grow.
He wants to go on with God.
He wants to hear God's voice speaking to
him.
How many days do we go through an
OM conference and this be true of us?
It's easier sometimes to dodge the meetings.
Slip out of the prayer meetings.
Forget our Bible.
Do you come to this tent anxious that
you personally might hear the voice of God
speaking to you?
Are you hungry to know God more deeply?
The Apostle Peter is a save man.
But he needs the restoration of his soul
when we meet him in Luke 24.
Do you remember that verse in John chapter
10?
And verse 9.
Jesus says, I am the door.
By me if any man enter in he
shall be saved.
And he shall go in and go out
and find pasture.
What does that mean?
Does that mean he goes in and out
of his salvation?
Well it can't mean that because it would
mean you'd only get food when you're on
the outside.
You have two needs perhaps in your Christian
life.
The need for security.
And the need for feeding.
Jesus says there is a sheepfold.
And I am the door.
And if you want security you find it
through me.
You go into the sheepfold through the door.
And if you want to be fed from
the word of God you find it through
me.
You come out through that same door to
the pastures where Christ will lead you.
Jesus says I am the door.
I will meet your needs.
And if you find security and pasture you
will be saved.
And so the Lord meets with Peter privately.
We can see reference to that in Luke
24 verse 34.
He restores his soul.
He leads him in the path of righteousness.
And then there are two more characters in
Luke 24.
These unnamed disciples.
Walking quietly on the road down towards the
village of Emmaus.
And we see their story between verses 13
and 35.
Walking home full of despair.
Shattered expectations for them too.
All the hopes that they had.
Christ it seemed was going to be the
answer to every need that they had ever
experienced.
And they expected all Israel to turn to
him.
And the politicians and the soldiers and the
priests ganged up and they got rid of
him.
And these two men are walking home.
Yea though I walk through the valley of
the shadow of death thou art with me
says Psalm 23.
Jesus comes in on a side road.
Walks with them as they tread along in
despair.
Asks them what they are thinking about.
Shares with them in their sorrow.
And the Lord begins to expound scripture to
them.
God in every crisis of your life is
going to bring you back to scripture if
you are to be brought unscathed through the
problem.
God is going to bring you back to
scripture with the problems at this conference or
problems may be on the team or when
you get home after this conference some of
you.
Some of you may well face death or
bereavement within the course of the coming months.
We have had people go all the way
out of the field and then be summoned
home because one of their parents has died.
Yea though I walk through the valley of
the shadow of death the good shepherd will
draw alongside me and anchor my heart in
scripture.
And though I walk through the valley of
the shadow of death the good shepherd will
draw alongside me and anchor my heart in
scripture.
Between verses 25 and 27 the Lord says
these words.
Foolish men.
Slow of heart to believe in all that
the prophets have spoken.
Slow of heart to believe in all that
the prophets have spoken.
Verse 27.
And he began from Moses and all the
prophets and he went through all the prophets
interpreting to them in all the scriptures the
things concerning himself.
How is the Lord going to be shepherding
you in these days?
Through his still small voice that you hear
in your own heart as you read his
word.
Six months ago I went through one of
the most traumatic experiences probably of my life.
And my wife was taken into hospital with
cancer.
And we were wondering just what the future
was holding.
She was going to have an operation and
the result of that operation would let us
know whether cancer had spread throughout her body
or was simply in one local place.
And it seemed like days and days before
the medical people could give us any answer.
And God spoke through one verse that became
an anchor for my heart in those days.
The Good Shepherd drew alongside me.
I was having to travel 160 miles a
day because of the work that I was
then involved in.
And time and again this scripture was coming
home to my heart.
I was having to prepare to preach the
gospel in a university in Britain.
Most of the time my mind just wasn't
on it.
God was bringing me back to these verses.
There is no temptation, no test, no trial
that has taken you.
But such as man can bear.
Who decides that?
God decides how much you can bear.
You feel you're getting to the end of
your resources.
God says you will not be allowed to
come into a test that He has not
already gauged for you and measured for you.
God is faithful.
He will simply not allow you to be
tested beyond what you're able to bear.
That may speak nothing to you tonight but
I tell you that was a tremendous encouragement
to me last February.
There was absolutely nothing that I could do
except throw myself back on God.
When my wife was finally brought out of
the hospital.
She could hardly walk.
She was brought into a room of some
Christian friends of mine.
She was going to stay there.
I had to go back to the university
and finish the mission that night.
She was given a cup of coffee and
a Christian magazine to read.
And the first article she reads is about
cancer in women.
And one of the very first things they
said was that with that particular cancer two
thirds of women are dead within five years.
There she is just out of hospital.
Reading this in a Christian magazine.
God allows some pretty heavy trials sometimes.
And yet God is the one who measures
every test that you ever come to.
He wants to anchor your confidence in Himself
and His word.
Turn back to Psalm 42.
Let me give you a quick example.
In Psalm 42 the psalmist has got four
problems.
This isn't going to be a long Bible
study just a series of notes you can
look it up afterwards.
His first problem is that God seems so
unreal.
My soul is panting after God.
My soul is thirsting after God.
When shall I be able to come and
appear before God?
God seems so far away to him.
And in verse three he is being taunted
by his enemies.
And in verse four he is looking back
to when things were so much better in
his past.
Do you remember times when things were better
in your Christian life?
The psalmist says I remember how I went
with the congregation.
I led them to the house of God
and they were such singing and rejoicing.
They were high and happy days.
And now in verse six he finds himself
in exile.
His fourth problem.
In verse five the psalmist simply talks to
his soul.
Have you ever learnt to do that?
Soul what are you doing?
Soul did I hear you right soul?
Are you grumbling and complaining my soul?
Soul is that a trace of discouragement I
hear?
Soul what on earth are you moaning about?
Soul why are you discouraged?
Stand to attention soul.
Put your shoulders back.
Come on soul.
That's the kind of way he talks.
Soul why are you gloomy?
Put your hope in God.
Have confidence in him for the future.
He begins to talk to himself.
Now they do say that talking to yourself
is a sign of lunacy.
It may well be.
Except under these circumstances.
You Christians are to learn to talk to
yourself.
That doesn't mean wandering around the corridors mumbling.
Or getting on the telephone.
Hello soul I didn't want anyone to think
I was a lunatic soul.
I just wanted to tell you to get
a little bit discouraged.
But that is the beginnings of the improvement.
Telling himself to take right and biblical attitudes.
And then he talks to God.
Because God is your father.
And you can go to God with anything.
Some of you don't know where to go
at the end of this conference.
And you are becoming almost paralysed by indecision.
Go and talk to God about it.
Some of you are angry with God.
Or upset with OM leaders.
Go and talk to God about it.
There have been hundreds of OMers over the
last 20 years complaining to God about OM
leaders.
You're not the first.
You may have complaints about the conditions or
about something else.
Go and tell God he knows well how
to deal with that problem he's been dealing
with it for so long.
And as he talks to himself and talks
to God he finds in the last three
verses, four verses that his confidence returns.
I have this written in a little card
in the front of my Bible.
Every problem a person has is related to
his concept of God.
If you have a big God you have
small problems.
If you have a small God you have
big problems.
It's as simple as that.
When your God is big then every seeming
problem becomes an opportunity.
Is your God big enough?
Have you been allowing God to speak to
your heart through his word?
Have you got these days, day by day
that which is fresh from the word of
God for your own heart?
These disciples who are being spoken to in
Luke 24 are going to have to go
through prison some through crucifixion.
They're going to have to face emperors and
princes.
They're going to have to face prison.
They're going to have to face persecution.
The Lord is teaching them from the very
beginning every day to have their experience anchored
in his word.
And then let's look at the next paragraph
in Luke 24.
Verses 36 to 43.
And what is the next verse in Psalm
23?
Thou preparest a table before me in the
presence of my enemies.
Here we find the disciples sitting terrified.
There are enemies all over the city.
And these people are talking in whispers behind
locked doors.
And the Lord comes.
Can you imagine him coming up to the
door?
I imagine him like this.
He raises his hand to knock on the
door.
And then he thinks, no I won't do
that.
Because if I did on the door three
of them would have heart attacks two would
go up the chimneys, four out the window
and the rest under the table.
And so he just steps through the door,
into the room.
Because the Lord knows his sheep.
He knows what would scare them.
He just appears in their midst.
Oh these moments in our experience when the
Lord appears in our midst.
Those times on the team where you sense
God speaking.
Those moments when you're on your knees before
your open Bible when it just seems as
if the page is glowing with the presence
of God.
Those times in
Evangelism where it just seems as if everything
you say goes right to the heart of
the person you're talking to.
And you almost look around the room to
see where the Lord is because obviously it's
not just you talking but he's around somewhere
at work.
During these closing chapters of the four Gospels
the Lord appears and disappears again and again.
Why does he do that?
Surely to get them used to the idea
that he is actually there all the time
even though they can't see him.
But these disciples are terrified and afraid.
They have a disbelieving spirit.
And so the Lord says well have you
got any food?
And so they give him a bit of
fish and he eats it and he spits
out the bones.
Puts the bones on the side of the
plate.
They have never seen a ghost eating fish
and chips before.
Your imagination is improving translator.
This is an amazing scene.
There is Jerusalem full of enemies.
There are people who want to see these
disciples crucified just as Christ was.
They're afraid of what's going to happen to
them in the next few days.
And Christ is gone.
They're left alone.
And then he appears in the midst of
this city with all its enemies.
He just comes and joins them.
Times when we've been witnessing in Muslim areas
in India perhaps.
Felt the hostility.
Times when believers have been meeting in Eastern
Europe.
Known that practically every home in their village
is full of people that would like to
see them persecuted or imprisoned.
Times when we are in the presence of
our enemies and the Lord Jesus comes.
The shepherd comes to see how his sheep
are getting on.
Comes to demonstrate with his word and his
presence that he is sovereign over everything.
And then how does Psalm 23 go on?
Thou anointest my head with oil and my
cup overflows.
And here in the next paragraph of Luke
24.
We find the Lord promising an outpouring of
the Holy Spirit upon his people.
He opened their mind to understand the scriptures.
He gave them a command to take the
gospel to the end of the earth.
And then he promised them his power from
on high.
One of the biggest dangers you face in
your own strength.
Going to a place the Lord has not
sent you.
Going in self confidence.
Going without an ear tuned to hear the
shepherds voice.
The Lord is about to send them out
empowered from on high by his Holy Spirit.
From this moment on they are going to
be his slaves.
Are you a slave of Jesus Christ?
So that he can do with your life
what he wants, not just this coming year
but for the rest of it.
A slave is not like a servant, he
is a possession forever.
Unless he is set free he will die
in slavery.
Slave is a person who has no rights
whatever.
It is your master who chooses the place
where you stay.
The apostle Paul would arrive in a town
like Philippi.
Slave of the living God.
And yet here on the living God there
is no business in this town.
The apostle to Europe and yet he had
no sense that he deserved the best accommodation.
If his master chose for him to be
put up in the local prison then that
was good enough for Paul.
Because he was a slave, he had no
rights no choice.
He was there to get a job done.
And you my friends have been given a
job this year.
And it is not just for this year,
it is until the Lord comes back.
Every single one of us is to be
involved in world evangelism.
Don't think you can come here and play
the conference and then give God a year
or two of your life and go back
to what you always planned to do a
kind of materialistic...
I don't know what.
God has called us to be fishers of
men.
This summer I was fishing.
With my children.
We went on holiday.
We bought ourselves for a few francs a
little nylon line with a hook on the
end.
We found a little bit of of a
dead fish on the ground and we cut
out bits of it and we attached it
to the hook.
And we dangled it in the water.
Useless.
We stuck a bit of a prawn on
the end.
We might have stuck live worms on the
end.
And I was getting more and more frustrated
just dangling this line in the water.
My children were expecting me to pull up
fish.
My wife was expecting me to bring something
home to cook for tea.
And there were about 200 fishermen on this
jetty, this pier.
And they were all catching fish except me.
The man who was fishing next to me
offered to give me some of his dead
ones.
And I was just dangling this line in
the water.
And yet there are people, Christians around the
world today and that's all they ever do.
I will make you fishers of men if
you follow me, says the Lord.
I will so work in your life that
I will enable you to fish for men
and women.
And whether you work in a garage or
whether you work in an office or whatever
you do you are to be involved in
drawing men and women to Jesus.
What is the use of simply drowning worms?
Oh, the delight of that first little fish
that we eventually caught.
It was that long.
It was so gross.
And it actually so outstretched.
As I saw more and more fish to
be caught I thought it was so outstretched.
To which the outstretched means again to fish
them.
God has here this time outstretched again inside
the water there each and every guy out
he comes again.
And that's all.
He becomes like a slave.
As he's trying to make him.
You simply can't pay your debt you have
to become a slave.
Or you become a slave in battle.
Captured by the enemy and led away into
battle.
Or you become a slave voluntarily out of
love.
All three of those are true of us.
We have debts to God that we cannot
pay.
We give ourselves to him in response.
God has captured you in battle.
For some of you the struggle may have
been a very long one.
But there came a moment, maybe even in
this tent maybe earlier this summer when you
surrendered your whole future to Christ and became
his slave.
But the only sure way in which this
slavery can continue is if you fall in
love with the slave master.
And you'll hear Christ saying I haven't called
you servants I've called you friends.
The Lord anoints our head with oil and
our cup of joy runs over.
And then these men were in the temple
continually blessing God.
Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all
the days of my life.
And I will dwell in the house of
the Lord forever.
These disciples went back to their Jewish community.
No new techniques.
No one had taught them much about literature
evangelism.
They hadn't had any standardized test or driver's
meetings.
And yet because God was now real to
them they moved amongst the Jews overflowing with
reality and praise.
Expecting the Lord to appear beside them and
to work at any moment.
With something fresh from the scriptures flowing through
their own lives.
A tremendous sense of security in their relationship
to God.
Knowing that Jesus was the one that could
meet and restore their souls failures and sinners
though they all were.
These were transformed men.
They hadn't just learned from techniques on the
outside they were totally different on the inside.
Because Christ had become their rock.
And they had a richness of soul that
came from feeding on his word.
They could walk through a valley of pressure
or the valley of death quite untroubled because
they knew the shepherd walking alongside them.
What began to happen to these men?
They began to shepherd others.
They began to influence person after person.
Thousands of Jews were shortly to be following
in the footsteps of Christ.
Drawn by the lives of these Christians.
And these gathered in the upper room before
long found themselves in the positions of being
shepherds.
They had to teach and they had to
feed.
They had to walk with those in trouble.
They had to reassure and comfort.
As they began to walk with Jesus they
became increasingly like him.
And as you go on through the second
book that Luke wrote you can see these
men becoming increasingly like Christ.
As the truth of Psalm 23 gets hold
of their own lives.
That's the whole goal of the Christian life.
God will put you in situations that are
designed for the one purpose of making you
more like himself.
Every gift that God has ever given you
is designed for the same purpose.
That's why people give gifts so often.
That's why fathers give gifts to their children.
It's to somehow make the children more like
themselves.
Some of you remember your father giving you
your first football.
Your mother wanting to pay for you to
have piano lessons.
My wife giving my three year old son
a fully equipped mechanics tool box.
Because she comes from a long line of
Scottish engineers.
She wants this little boy to grow up
in the same kind of way.
I'm frantically trying to get him to read
so that I can give him other things
to get into his life.
Why?
Because parents want to direct and steer their
children in a likeness to them.
And God the Father is no different.
He's given some of you very creative gifts
of organization.
He's given some of you gifts of preaching,
solid truth.
He's given some of you tremendous abilities to
get alongside those that are hurting and to
draw out the hurt.
Why has God given you these gifts?
So that you can become like himself.
Jesus is the chief shepherd.
And he wants these eleven remaining disciples to
be under-shepherds.
And you can find at the end of
Peter's first epistle he's passing on the same
charge to the next generation.
Send the flock of God which is among
you, he says.
Peter was given the job of looking after
the sheep.
Feed my lambs, tend my sheep.
But he looks in 1 Peter chapter 5
ahead to that day when the chief shepherd
shall be manifested.
I'm ready.
How are you getting on with your shepherding?
Helping those in your discussion group.
Is God during this conference giving you a
heart of compassion, a heart of service for
those in the countries where you're going to
go in the months ahead?
Is God dealing with your heart here at
this conference?
It is impossible to love other people unless
you first know truly and deeply how much
God loves you.
We need to allow God to deal with
us deeply during these days so that he
can prepare us for that which lies ahead.
He wants to put challenges before us.
He wants to put difficulties before us.
You may have to learn at this conference
to get right with someone with whom you've
already clashed.
And to learn to ask their forgiveness.
Because God wants to deal with you in
that area here, because you should see the
people he's got lined up for you on
your team.
God wants to teach you to pray for
the people that you bump into and you
work with and you deal with during the
day here at this conference.
Because he wants to make you like himself.
To grow up to be like him.
Be perfect, he says.
Even as your father in heaven is perfect.
It all comes back to who you're related
to.
God has put his spirit within you so
that you should grow up to be like
himself.
It is interesting watching the children of OM
leaders grow up.
I can remember being out in Kathmandu in
1969 and one of George Verber's sons was
at school out there and the headmistress asked
to see his parents because this little boy
who was only 6 years old was running
a large scale financial racket in the school.
He was buying and selling from one pupil
to another and making enormous piles of money.
Obviously he gets these skills from his mother.
And just as it is inevitable that you
grow up like your parents physically so God
is wanting to work through his word and
through his spirit and through circumstances to make
you like himself.
Embrace every risk, every challenge and ask God
during these days to keep your heart soft
that you might grow more like himself.
Let us pray.
Amen.
Lord God we thank you for your word.
We thank you for the revelation that Jesus
is in glory praying individually for each of
us.
That that likeness to him might be formed
in us.
That the gold of our faith might be
utterly purified.
Oh God we pray that day by day
we might be truly hungry to know you.
Lord we we are immature.
Lord we are sorry for the ways in
which you must be.
You must just long for us to grow
up.
Lord we know that you don't expect babies
to behave like grown-ups and yet we
wish that we were more pleasing before you.
We thank you that we are secure in
your family.
That you watch over us as a good
shepherd.
That you come alongside and make your word
real.
Lord we pray in this year ahead may
we increasingly grow like yourself and may our
closest team friends recognize it.
In Jesus name.
Amen.