1 Corinthians, chapter 10, the thirteenth verse.
There hath no temptation taken you, but such
is common to man.
But God is faithful, who will not suffer
you to be tempted above that ye are
able, but will with the temptation also make
a way to escape, that ye may be
able to bear it.
I want to speak tonight on the subject
of resisting temptation.
I believe this is a subject that will
be of great interest to both O.
Emmers and the visitors and other O.
Emmers who are here with us tonight.
And last week, you remember, if you have
a memory or can remember that far back,
that I said that I would speak on
the subject of how to resist temptation.
We hear these messages on victory and on
the sufficiency of Christ, and we hear messages
on sin and the kind of life we're
to live.
We hear messages on the wiles of Satan
and his subtle plan to destroy us and
to attack us.
And so tonight I feel very much led
to speak on how we can overcome the
attacks of Satan.
And I'm convinced that God has called us
to a life of victory.
I'm convinced that we have a power available
to us beyond anything Satan can even begin
to think about.
We must never compare the power of God
with the power of Satan.
Human power, that's different.
But we can never compare our God with
Satan.
There is no comparison between God and Satan.
God is so beyond Satan that there is
no comparison.
This is why it was the atrocity of
heaven for this one to ever think that
he could aspire to be God.
Now, as we turn back in the book
of Genesis, we see Satan in his first
vicious attack upon man.
In Genesis chapter 3, we see the temptation
of Eve in the garden.
I know some of you must be thinking
about your final exams tomorrow.
But you know, your final exams are not
near as important as getting the heart of
even this one message.
So just throw all that out the window.
When you don't pass the final exam, it
doesn't mean anything anyway.
That's with O.M. Unless you're really bad,
we might call you in for a word
of prayer.
The third chapter of the sixth verse.
And when the woman saw that the tree
was good for food, and that it was
pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to
be desired to make one wise, she took
of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and
gave also unto her husband with her, and
he did eat.
Now, notice the three things, three appeals, three
avenues of attack that Satan used on the
woman.
First of all, she saw that it was
good for food, the lust of the flesh,
the lust of the flesh.
The epistle of John has almost a parallel
passage.
For all that is in the world, the
lust of the flesh, the lust of the
eyes, and the pride of life is not
of the Father, it is of the world.
Here, we see the first thing.
Good for food.
Second thing, pleasant to the eyes.
The lust of the eyes.
Third thing, to make one wise.
Satan even said that they would be as
gods if they partook of this fruit.
This is, or this presents the three main
avenues of temptation that all of us will
have in the days to come.
The lust of the eyes, the lust of
the flesh, the pride of life.
Once, a great man of God spoke to
me, and he said, George, he said, I'm
going to be rather blunt.
He said, you know, there's three things that
knock many men out of the ministry.
He said, sex, money, and pride.
Actually, the wrong use.
And this is exactly what came upon Eve
and is also referred to in the epistle
of John.
Now, we should not be surprised when we
are tempted.
However, we at the same time must never
say that that temptation is from God.
Verse 13 in James 1.
Let no man say when he is tempted,
I am tempted of God.
For God cannot be tempted with evil, neither
tempteth he any man.
But every man is tempted when he is
drawn away of his own lust and enticed.
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth
sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth
forth death.
Do not err, my brethren.
So temptation is from the evil one.
And he, Satan, is going to tempt you
in days to come.
We speak about the warfare in Noam quite
a bit.
But you know, the real warfare is within.
The real warfare isn't an outward warfare.
The real warfare is within.
One of the best chapters in that book,
None of These Diseases, and if you haven't
read that book yet, well, I mean, you're
just missing a classic, just a classic.
But it has a chapter toward the end
of the book called Two Souls or Two
Beasts, Alas!
I think souls, somebody can remember the words,
In My Breast.
Anyway, it speaks of these terrific forces within
us.
And all of you have experienced this.
Some people try to deny it through their
various methods, but it sits there.
You cannot deny it.
And, of course, we see this very clearly
in the book of Galatians.
If you look with me, book of Galatians,
chapter 5, verse 17.
For the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and
the spirit against the flesh, and these are
contrary, the one to another, so that ye
cannot do the things that ye would.
And we realize, oftentimes, our enemy has been
described as the world, the flesh, and death.
We have a real enemy.
When you see disunity coming into your team,
you see jealousy coming in, you see arguments
coming in, strifes coming in, you can be
sure it's the world, the flesh, or the
devil.
Always those three.
And Satan has at his command that whole
host.
Alan Redpath once said on a tape that
I heard, he believed there were many demons
for every believer in Jesus Christ.
And although we do not believe that a
demon can enter into the life of a
believer, they can influence, and tempt, and torment,
and attack in many, many, many ways.
And so we are going into a real
warfare, and there will be real temptation to
real sin.
The whole thing is reality.
And it's as real as going out and
driving down the highway at 100 miles an
hour, trying to go through London.
And it's, to say the least, impossible.
The life we have been talking about night
after night, the message we have declared, the
principles of the New Testament, are completely impossible,
completely impossible, because of the temptations and the
forces of darkness that are against us.
There's no hope, apart from Jesus Christ.
Your only hope against temptation is Jesus Christ.
And oh, I praise God for what that
brother said to us the other day, who
spoke just five minutes.
He says many of us in our Christian
lives become too subjective.
Correct me if I've got this mixed up.
But we're interested in principles, and policies, and
rules, and regulations, instead of being objective, and
being caught up with the personality, the deity,
the greatness, the wonderfulness, the loveliness of the
Lord himself.
And this is a real danger.
In any movement, that stands for strong principles.
And mind you, I believe we've got to
have principles.
We've got to have obedience to all of
Scripture.
We can't just say, over here, oh yes,
Jesus, Jesus, my all-sufficient one, and then
not obey the Bible.
Because the Lord himself said, you say unto
me, Lord, Lord, and do not that which
I say.
At the same time, we realize that we
can only live this life in the power
of the indwelling Christ.
And if you become preoccupied with Jesus, and
you become a greater worshiper of Jesus, I
guarantee you, you'll be a disciple.
He is the King, Jesus Christ.
And if you want to resist temptation, you
want to stand against the wiles of Satan,
you want to be faithful this year, you
want to live the kind of life you
know you should live, then the answer is
none other than the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is not a greater study of the
discipleship manual.
It is not even a greater amount of
verses memorized.
It's Christ.
And, oh, I believe this with all my
heart.
And I know that as we stand against
Satan, in Christ, we have a victory.
Now, in Ephesians, next book over from Galatians,
Ephesians, we read about how we can stand
against temptation.
Temptation.
It says in verse 16, above all, taking
the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be
able to quench all the fiery darts of
the wicked.
Now, one of the things you must learn
this year is how to appropriate the promises.
Now, there's a promise, one of the greatest
promises in the Word of God.
Look at it.
Take the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall
be able to quench a good number of
the fiery darts of the wicked.
Thank you.
All the fiery darts.
And this paints a glorious picture of victory,
doesn't it?
The shield of faith.
And we read about all these other things
we have in our armor that we can
stand against temptation.
We read of the breastplate of righteousness.
We read of the helmet of salvation, the
sword of the Spirit.
Yet, in another place, instead of listing all
these things, it simply says, put ye on
the Lord Jesus Christ.
It's the same.
This is where we get in a lot
of trouble theologically when we strain at words
and we think there's contradictions when it's just
a different way of expressing the same truth.
Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Take the shield of faith, wherewith you can
stand against the fiery darts of the devil.
Young person, friend, I wonder how many of
us are really standing on this promise tonight?
Ready all year to uphold that shield of
faith.
How does this work?
In the daily routine.
Suppose you sit down at your desk, and
some of you will be sitting at desks
a lot, typists, invoice girls.
Some of you have a lot of letters
to write, a lot of other work.
Suppose you go and you sit down at
your desk, and as you sit there, you
just feel, you don't want to do that
work anymore.
You've been doing that for four months.
Not one person has said one single word
of appreciation in four months.
Except when you made a mistake, and then
it wasn't appreciation, it was depreciation.
And you begin to start to think, and
thinking, you know, gets in a lot of
trouble.
Especially when we're not thinking with the mind
of Christ.
What am I doing here anyway?
Not getting any salary?
I've got no money in the bank, I've
been here four months, and I haven't got
one penny.
In fact, I went to the treasurer the
other day, and asked for another pair of
shoes, and she looked at me with a
glare, made me never want to go back
again.
She's not supposed to do that, but it
happens.
And you begin to think of all the
problems.
Not even a very decent desk, doesn't even
have drawers, made out of some boxes.
And the chair isn't a health chair, and
your back hurts.
And you just wonder whether that leader really
has any concern for you at all.
Doesn't seem to anyway.
So you sit down.
Now at that point, you are wide open
for every possible temptation.
In many different realms.
Jealousy, pride, bad attitude, oh, so many things
can overwhelm you.
What happens when you sit down in that
same situation you put up the shield of
faith?
Faith says, those letters you typed over the
past four months count for eternity.
Immediately you praise God.
Faith says that you are all brothers and
sisters in Jesus Christ.
Faith believes the best.
You begin to think about how perhaps that
leader has been working maybe way on into
the night, maybe corresponding, maybe doing something that
the headquarters might keep going, or any number
of other things.
In any case, you think positively.
Or if there is someone that truly is
a problem and you truly see that, you
know, they're not what they should be, faith
says they're going to change.
Faith says, I believe through my prayers at
this desk the situation's going to change.
Faith says, I'm going to be a revolutionist
for Christ right from this desk.
Every letter I type, every prayer I pray,
every look that comes out of my eye
is going to radiate the Lord Jesus Christ
and from me, around me, by faith, a
fire is going to burn.
What a difference.
You know, all we need in our headquarters
is one man ablaze for God.
That's all we need.
You don't need the whole headquarters.
One man ablaze for God.
One man with his shield of faith up
24 hours a day.
One man with this kind of spiritual optimism.
One man with this kind of faith and
foresight and love is all we need in
any headquarters and it will spread.
It will spread.
For some people it will spread faster than
others, but it will spread.
And all we need is one girl in
the office with a shield of faith and
with a flame of God in her heart
and with reality pouring out of her life
and it will spread.
I want to tell you this reality that
is ours in Jesus Christ spreads like wildfire.
That's why this movement has grown so fast.
We never wanted it to grow.
We never planned any kind of an organization
or movement.
We tried to stop it.
Trying to stop this movement was like trying
to put out a blazing fire with a
water pistol.
Couldn't do it.
You know, many of us tried to get
away many times.
You know, most of us who are leaders
wish we weren't leaders.
We realize we're young and we'd rather just
go and submit to someone else.
The fire has been lit.
And perhaps it is true that within OM
it's only a minority who really have this
fire, who really are ablaze.
That's all we need.
A burning, blazing, spiritual minority will always grow
and grow and grow and grow and grow.
When we have to worry is when we
don't have any left.
When we have to worry is when we're
all cold, depressed, each one looking at the
other, each one dropping the shield of faith
on the floor, each one considering the other
brother's problems, looking into their own problems.
Down the drain we go faster than we
could ever imagine.
Put the shield of faith up where you
can stop all the fiery darts of death.
What if you're from a sinful background?
We're all from sinful backgrounds.
But what if your background has really been
bad?
You're only four years old in Jesus Christ.
You're five years old in Jesus Christ.
Before then on the Saturday nights it was
the nightclubs.
It was the jazz band.
It was the girls.
It was the drink.
And now you're in this work.
Saturday night comes around and you're in a
small headquarters and you couldn't think of anything
as dull compared to your previous life.
Half the people are working overtime.
You scratch your head and wonder what kind
of a crazy lot.
Don't they ever stop working here?
And you're bored.
You're bored stiff.
You got a longing for the jazz.
Longing for the lights.
Longing for the old ways.
Longing for all those things.
What's the only hope?
Shield of faith.
The Lord Jesus Christ.
Faith at that moment goes up.
And by faith you realize that this is
the way.
The feelings are so important.
So important.
And this will be the thing this year.
Brothers and sisters, that will trap you and
kill you spiritually.
Trust your feelings.
Faith goes up.
Says this is the better way.
Faith says, what is this life?
Will soon be past.
Only what is done for Christ will last.
Better go back to my desk.
Back to the prayer closet.
Back to my Bible.
Faith says or confirms what the Bible says.
The way of the transgressor is hard.
Whatsoever man sows actually reap.
And you realize by faith that these things
of the world do not satisfy.
You don't have to taste them again.
You don't have to go back and see
and prove it.
You know by faith from the word it
doesn't satisfy.
What did the psalmist say?
I'd rather be a doorkeeper in the house
of my God than to dwell in the
tents of iniquity.
I know what I say in OM.
I'd rather be a philist.
I'd rather be a book packer.
I'd rather be the tea server.
I'd rather be the toilet cleaner.
I'd rather be the shoe shine in OM
than to dwell in the nightclubs of iniquity.
I'd rather be in the headquarters where everybody
was perhaps even defeated on that particular weekend
than be in the tents of iniquity.
There's no comparison.
Sometimes I can be pretty severe on Christians.
And you think I'm severe on others you
should see how severe I am on myself.
And yet there's no comparison between even a
Christian who's who's spiritually low and a man
who's in the world completely conquered, controlled and
manipulated by the devil.
That's what we have today.
We have a manipulated generation.
Oh my.
The shield of faith wherewith you can stop
all the fiery darts of the devil.
And young people I want to tell you
you know, you must realize this work is
not glamorous.
It is not an adventure.
Within one month after you get out of
here it will be a grind.
And I want to tell you you get
out in India and it might be an
adventure for the first seven days but when
you start going seven hours a day on
the doors every day in the same environment
the same heat traveling in the same trucks
with the same leader and the same books
and the same everything there's no adventure.
There's no grind.
And if you don't have that shield of
faith which dies to feelings and stands on
the promises of God you'll go down.
This work you girls are going into in
the offices.
Yes, we're here now.
What a fantastic difference.
Think of the girls going to Bolton.
Can't quite compare this conference Kenway Mrs. Aiken
to the Bolton headquarters.
All girls Operation Depression.
And if anyone isn't praying for Mrs. Aiken
they better dedicate their lives tonight.
When a boy walks through the door you
better be careful.
No glamour.
Maybe you don't even get a report.
All the leaders forget to send the reports
or some other thing.
And there you go day after day.
You wonder what you're doing here.
How did I get here?
I'm from Switzerland and here I am in
Bolton, Lancashire.
I can hardly breathe.
Soot collects in the back of the throat.
My worst sickness in my life I think
outside of Mexico was in Lancashire.
And I had all kinds of, well I
won't even describe it, several months.
Wonderful weather.
And you're going to get there and you're
going to discover there's no glamour.
Routine.
Invoices.
Books.
Shield of faith.
Stand against every dark.
My greatest cry to God this year that
these headquarters will be alive.
I know that if the headquarters are alive
here we'll feel it in you.
I'm convinced that as you here in Bolton
and in Bradley in your routine jobs and
standing by the stuff and doing the invoices
or sending out the receipts or opening the
mail or sending out the prayer letters or
any of those things I'm convinced as you
go down we go down.
As you get depressed we get depressed.
You think those of us who go out
in the fields are some kind of different
people we're the same as you.
And these headquarters have a God-given responsibility
and the visitors here tonight and the prayer
partners have this God-given responsibility of prayer.
And you can't pray with a groaning heart.
You can't pray when you're complaining about your
work.
You can't pray because you don't like your
job or when you don't like your job.
That means the shield of faith.
Here you are.
Wake up after your third month at Bolton.
The very building can give you depression.
It looks like it's leaning over sort of
a leaning tower of northern Britain.
Northern England.
And you go down the rickety old stairs
and you look at the same faces across
the breakfast table.
Then you go to your office and look
at your same old typewriter that's got about
six different keys that don't exactly work the
way they should.
And you do the same job.
And you think, well, what is the purpose
of all this?
Why am I here?
I get no salary.
I get no reward.
No one's shown any appreciation in the past
three weeks, three months or how long ever
it might be.
The shield of faith goes up.
You realize that little thank you note you
might send might melt somebody's heart.
That letter you type out might be a
man's crisis experience.
That book you post, that paper you mimeograph,
whatever it does, faith says something's going to
happen.
Faith says the revolution goes one step forward.
Do you live this way?
I do.
Every day is another day in which the
revolution that Jesus Christ began goes one more
mile forward.
And every man has his part, whether he's
working on the mimeograph machine, whether he's giving
out tracts, working in the book room, scrubbing
the floor.
Every inch counts in this revolution against sin,
Satan, self.
And it's thrilling to just be a small
part of it.
The revolution of love that Jesus Christ came
to give.
Many of us have heard the tape by
Billy Graham given in 1957.
He tells about speaking or he speaks about
the communist who in communist China made this
statement, I would gladly, gladly give my life
that communism might be spread one more mile.
We only move in the regions beyond to
the extent that you move in the offices.
That's right.
Somebody writes a letter into one of our
offices.
God has put it upon their heart.
Perhaps to give.
The letter comes into the office but you're
depressed that morning.
And when you're depressed or discouraged, not active,
not activated by the spirit of God, you
can do ridiculous things.
You're not even conscious of what you do.
You sit down at your desk.
Somehow that letter got on your desk and
you're a bit, just a bit not the
way you should and the letter gets pushed
off into the waste can.
The person waits.
Perhaps the check was there.
Maybe they're going to give a hundred pounds
to the work in India.
They never got the reply.
You were sitting at your desk.
Oh, what unimportant work.
You were sitting at your desk.
Oh, if I were only in India this
year, I could really be doing something for
God.
The teams in India were phoning me in
Bombay.
Look, George, we can't go another day.
We don't have any more food.
And I say, well, look, we're waiting.
There's money coming from Bolton.
Just hang on another day.
Go to sell some books.
We haven't got any books.
Well, we'll get some books up.
How long?
Well, it'll take about two weeks.
The phone gets clapped down.
You're sitting at your desk.
Unimportant work.
The letter in the waste can.
The lady waiting to write the check.
It all ties in together and I can
tell you of literal stories that have happened
like that.
All kinds of things get lost.
All kinds of things get misplaced.
All kinds of problems occur.
All kinds of confusion.
All kinds of difficulties when one individual is
not on the job, the shield of faith.
That's right.
And if we don't see this in O
.N., the devil will crush us.
If you think that George Verwer makes or
breaks this work, or Jonathan McCrossie, or George
Miley, or Frank Dietz, or any one of
us, you're so mistaken.
You will make or break this work.
One mistake on your part is enough to
bring a collapse on our part.
We're all together in this great battle.
And unless we learn to put up that
shield of faith, wherewith we can stand against
all the fiery darts of the devil.
Unless we put on the Lord Jesus Christ,
how would he approach that job?
Have you ever asked yourself that question?
Secretary?
Mechanic?
How would Jesus do your job?
I tell you, if you began to ask
yourself that, you'd have a major revolution.
How would Jesus tighten that bolt?
How would Jesus change that tire?
How would Jesus type that letter?
How would Jesus mimeograph or duplicate that stencil?
How would Jesus answer that letter?
How would he approach his work in the
morning?
We sometimes forget, don't we, that Jesus was
a carpenter.
We sometimes forget that he spent a large
part of his life in routine work, sawing
boards.
Our Savior, the Son of God, the Lord
of Lords, the King of Kings, putting nails
in, sawing the boards, making chairs, perhaps building
a building or a house.
Jesus Christ.
And you sit at your desk or you
sit out in the shop, wherever it might
be, thinking your work is insignificant, accepting the
lies of Satan, that you're no good.
Isn't that one of the key attacks of
Satan?
Isn't this what he throws at young people
today?
You're a failure.
Has Satan ever told you that?
You're a failure.
You're worthless.
You can't accomplish anything.
You're no good.
Maybe someone criticizes you or corrects you.
Immediately you go in.
I'm a failure.
I can't accomplish anything.
One of the greatest lies of the devil.
He is the accuser of the brethren.
The accuser of the brethren.
Do you know how we're not failures?
Only one way, by faith.
When Satan comes and tells me that I'm
a failure, I learned this game of his
a long time ago.
As soon as he comes and says I'm
a failure, I say that's right, Satan.
Thank you.
I appreciated that reminder, but I want to
warn you, I'm complete in Jesus Christ.
And in him, I am able to make
a monkey out of you.
Praise God.
Through Jesus Christ, we can stop Satan.
We have a sure protection.
We have a robe of righteousness.
In Jesus Christ, Satan cannot touch us.
I meet Christians, they think that the devil
is coming in on them.
In the first place, well, I don't know,
I could be wrong in this, but I
don't see where the devil is omnipotent, nor
omnipresent.
And it's probably just one of the devil's
helpers that's coming in on you, not the
devil himself.
He's probably off on somebody a little more
important than you.
But anyway, we get the point.
We won't argue over the words.
But all how we get overwhelmed sometimes instead
of simply taking our place in Jesus Christ.
We are complete in Him.
We can resist temptation.
You're going to be tempted to quit.
You're going to be tempted to give up.
You're going to be tempted to do a
lot of things that perhaps you never dreamed
about.
How can you stand against it?
Shield of faith.
Someone then immediately says, well, that's good, shield
of faith, but I don't have any faith.
Or very little, it seems.
Then we come back to where?
Come back to the Word.
To the Word.
How would you like to have this conference
all year long?
You can.
And better than this.
Word of God.
Every day you have your own conference.
Four of you.
Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and you.
And I'm convinced the only way I'm going
to get through this year is a daily
conference with those three.
Daily meeting.
I really believe in committee meetings, but they're
the three when I want on my committee.
They really encourage me.
And I believe that we need to really
realize without daily worship, daily praise, daily communion,
we're not going to have the daily victory.
Because faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by
the Word of God.
May God grip us.
I received a letter today from our office
in New Jersey.
A young man came about a year and
a half ago named Bill Helyer to New
Jersey, and he wanted to come across to
Europe.
And he was unable to come.
He had no support, had no money, his
church wouldn't back him.
And we, at that time, our financial state
and everything else, we couldn't take him.
He went back to California.
I guess his Christian friends, well, I don't
know what they said.
Uncle Sam took him.
And I just got the letter.
He's dead.
He's killed in Vietnam.
And it's because the church has little faith.
It's because men like this are missed and
go the devil's way.
Not because of him.
That a man has died in Vietnam instead
of being in Europe with us, even tonight.
You see, the church didn't think it was
so important The Christian friends didn't take any
notice.
And they probably thought it wasn't their job
anyway and maybe never bothered to ask.
But Uncle Sam, in Vietnam, and the Chinese
communists took much notice.
He's dead.
And this is what is happening tonight.
Because our shield of faith isn't up.
Because we won't live by faith.
We won't trust God.
We won't stand against the enemy.
We won't believe God for finance.
We're missing.
We're missing men.
We're losing them.
Losing them to the cults.
We're losing them to the sect.
We're losing them to the military.
We're losing them in every different direction.
And then we sit back and have the
nerve to think that our job isn't important.
Or that prayer is a secondary thing.
I think of many who are here tonight
as guests and as visitors.
And you think that we're going forth and
it's important work.
These young people from Ohio, they're going out
to reach the world for Christ.
They're going out to accomplish great things.
You don't realize how important your part is.
How many of our visitors, night after night,
how many of our visitors who are here
tonight and have received our prayer letter have
ever gotten down just as we have to
get down and prayed, What is my part
in this invasion?
What do you want me to do?
You're sending him out to France.
You're sending her out to Austria.
You're sending him out to India.
You're sending that group over to do maintenance
in Belgium.
What is my part?
Oh God, where do you want me?
What do you want me to do?
I believe unless those who stand by the
stuff are just as desperate, just as concerned,
just as burdened, just as much, putting up
the shield of faith, Satan will do what
we've seen happen again and again.
How do we resist temptation?
Putting on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Putting out the shield of faith, devouring the
Word of God, which builds, builds, and builds,
and builds that faith.
Many young men are, even Christian young men
are going out to Vietnam, a war that
no one seems to be able to explain.
When they come back, if they're wounded, they
get a medal.
They lose a leg, lose an eye, lose
an arm, lose two legs and an arm,
and they get a medal.
We call in America Purple Heart.
Medal of high esteem.
Name will be in the paper.
Many, many things will take place.
Your hometown will have a parade.
They'll put you in the back of a
Cadillac and drive you around.
And all the people will wave.
Christians will come out and wave also.
If you go out in Operation Mobilization for
Jesus Christ, and you hurt your toe, you're
going to get it.
You'll be called a fanatic, extremist, not taking
care of the temple.
A whole list of things will be thrown
your way.
If you come back from the mission field,
wounded, maybe an emotional wound.
William MacDonald once said to me, what appear
many times to be tragedies are merely battle
scars.
A man might come back from the mission
field, knocked down, his mind perhaps near its
end.
We look, oh, what a tragedy.
Oh, my.
Oh, what a failure.
Oh, what a mess.
Oh, this, that.
What appears to be a tragedy, what appears
to be a wound, could be a battle
scar.
Young people, we must realize we're going out
in real battle.
We're going out in spiritual Vietnams.
I'm deeply concerned the way some of us
are approaching our fields.
Oh, we're going to Austria.
Yes, yes, going to Austria.
What are you going to do?
Well, we're going to witness.
And we're going to play in the church.
Huh.
Italy, Spain.
And we don't realize tonight, young people, what
it's going to cost to make an impact
in these countries.
We don't begin to understand it.
We don't begin to understand what it's going
to cost to see Zaventem function in revival.
What it's going to cost to see Bromley
and Bolton function the way God would have
it function.
How much we're going to have to throw
into it.
How much we're going to have to suffer.
How much prayer is going to be involved.
How much exercising of faith and putting up
the shield of faith is going to be
involved.
In all these places, we're just naive.
We don't realize what we're going to do.
Deeply burdensome.
I always think of the story of Iwo
Jima.
I haven't told it in a long time.
Most of you haven't heard it.
So I'll tell it tonight because it stunned
me.
I read this book called Iwo Jima.
Not Hiroshima.
That's another thing.
Iwo Jima is a little island out in
the Pacific Ocean that was controlled by the
Japs in World War II.
A worthless chunk of ground.
If there was ever a worthless piece of
rock, it was Iwo Jima.
Some years ago, you probably could have bought
it for a hundred dollars.
But the Japs invaded that little rock and
that's what it was, a rock seven miles
by five miles.
Seven miles by five miles.
And the Japs had infiltrated that little rock
and they were down in the ground.
They were in the mountains.
They were everywhere.
Everywhere.
The Supreme Commander of the United States gave
the word, this island must be taken at
any cost.
And they moved toward Iwo Jima.
Tens, tens of thousands of men.
Dozens of ships.
Dozens of aircraft.
You say, this is fanaticism.
This is crazy.
Insanity.
The Supreme Commander had given the word.
Doctors, lawyers, brilliant men, educated men moved toward
one little rock in the Pacific Ocean.
Millions and millions of dollars of bombs were
dropped on the island before they ever moved
in.
Millions and millions and millions and millions of
dollars.
Hard-earned dollars.
Talk about wasting money in God's work.
Oh, millions to drop bombs, kill people.
One island, the Pacific.
And then they moved in.
When I read that book, I shook.
I shook.
I don't know anything about war.
I want to tell you from the bottom
of my heart, I'm such a baby.
I'm so untested, so unproved.
I've never hardly suffered that I read a
book like that.
And the only thing I can say, God,
is there anything like that ahead in Christ?
Well, I mean, I can't do it.
It'll be a miracle of God.
And there those young men moved in on
the beaches.
I think there were 25, I forget how
many, tens of thousands moved in to this
one little island.
The author described the beach as being red
from the blood.
The water turned red.
It was like blood red coming up upon
the beaches as thousands of men were just
destroyed in the first wave of men that
landed on Iwo Jima.
Doctors, lawyers, brilliant, trained men whose mothers and
fathers had sweat, had worked to put everything
into them, who had wives and children and
families and uncles and aunts waiting at home,
hoping, hoping that they might return.
They never did.
7,000 men never lived to tell the
story of that island.
Their blood ran across the beaches.
They fought inch by inch, hour by hour,
against the enemy.
Finally they made 50 yards up the beach,
then 100 yards up the beach.
One day when I was in Washington, D
.C., I stood by the famous Iwo Jima
War Memorial as a picture of four men
holding a flag on the top of the
famous mountain in Iwo Jima.
There were 20,000 casualties and 7,000
killed to take that island.
This is reality.
This is the world we live in, a
hellish place where all through history men have
killed, slaughtered.
Iwo Jima is mild compared to some of
the things I could describe to you by
Genghis Khan, Hitler, Mussolini and other men earlier
in history who made even Mussolini and Hitler
look mild.
We only know them because they're in our
century.
And you say there's not a warfare and
you say as we as Christians must not
be fanatical and we must not go overboard.
How can you be so trite?
How can you be so naive?
This world that we live in is torn
by lust and hate and fear and Satan
who's inspired every war from the beginning of
history and Satan who is the one to
blame for those 7,000 men and 20
,000 casualties and the casualties are worse than
the death.
Have you ever read any books on war
casualties?
Men that come back with half a face?
That's right.
And half a mind?
And half a body?
Men who have no legs?
Some of those men lived without arms and
legs suffering beyond anything.
And here we sit operation mobilization.
We've had our one week or one month
training conference.
We've memorized a few verses.
We've listened to a few messages.
We've raised our hands and dedicated our lives.
We're going off to Austria.
We're going off to Italy.
And the Bible describes Austria as a spiritual
stronghold, a spiritual Iwo Jima and the devil
is huge, don't you think?
Hundreds, thousands of demons and devils and people
possessed by devils and every possible thing is
embedded and entrenched in Austria.
And there you go, little soldiers.
And you're still debating whether you should be
disciplined.
You're still debating whether you should be ready
to suffer.
You're still wondering some of the principles of
discipleship, going marching off to Austria.
Then one year from now you'll come marching
back and you'll wonder why very little happened.
You'll come marching back and wonder why no
church was planted, why very few souls went
on, because you didn't realize what you were
doing.
You were going into a spiritual Iwo Jima
and young people and adults, if it took
millions and millions and millions of dollars of
bombs, hundreds of ships, hundreds of airplanes, or
dozens of ships and dozens of airplanes, if
it took 7,000 deaths and 20,000
casualties to take that little island in the
Pacific, what is it going to take to
win Austria or Italy or Spain or Paris
or India or even any segment of any
one of these countries for Jesus Christ?
You say, well, you're being very dramatic.
I'm not.
I'm being realistic.
Or else my Bible was lies and my
history books that I've studied for 14 years
are also lies.
We have been called into a spiritual conflict.
It's a life and death battle.
It's heaven or hell for millions we face.
It's dying or be killed.
Oh, may we realize what we're going into.
There will be temptations.
We will face an overwhelming enemy.
And the only hope is putting on the
Lord Jesus Christ.
You cannot afford to go from here without
knowing that Jesus Christ is your life.
Jesus Christ is your protection.
Jesus Christ is your captain.
If we move up these spiritual beaches with
any other captain including George Verwer or any
other human being, we will be destroyed.
And the casualties and the deaths, spiritually speaking,
will be worse than Iwo Jima or Normandy
or any other battle.
Let us face reality tonight.
We're going into a battle.
A warfare.
Real enemy.
Real spiritual strongholds.
There's only one way to win.
A real relationship with Jesus Christ.
Do you have that?
Have you put on the Lord Jesus Christ?
Are you holding up that shield of faith?
Are you ready to go back into that
headquarters in Bolton or Bromley just as if
it were the communication center for World War
II?
That's right.
Or Iwo Jima.
Or Vietnam.
Or Dunkirk.
Or Normandy.
Or Palermo.
Or any other battle in history.
Are you ready to get up in the
morning realizing?
Warfare.
Are you ready to go into your office?
Warfare.
Are you ready to walk down the street?
Warfare.
You say, how can you live this way?
I say, it's the only way to live.
Any other way is handing everything over to
the enemy.
I believe this with all my heart.
I'd be glad to go on all night
and prove that this is true.
We go into a real warfare.
A spiritual Vietnam.
A spiritual Iwo Jima.
And if we don't have that shield of
faith up, dying to all those ridiculous feelings,
so quickly lead us this way and that
way.
So quickly bring the jealousies.
So quickly bring the envy.
So quickly bring the disunity.
So quickly bring the strife.
So quickly bring every form of nonsense.
If we don't hold up that shield of
faith and stop all this, we'll never raise
that flag as those men did.
Let us pray.
Oh Lord, we realize we can resist temptation
with a shield of faith.
With the word of God.
By putting on the Lord Jesus Christ.
We know, God, as we go into this
warfare, we are not ready.
We cannot do it.
It's all impossible for us.
But through Jesus Christ, all things are possible.
And we by faith tonight put on the
Lord Jesus Christ.
We make no provision for the flesh.
Praise God.
Praise you.
We go forth to spiritual strongholds.
Like Austria.
Like Italy.
Like Spain.
Like Turkey.
Oh God.
And Iwo Jima, if there ever was one.
Persia.
India.
Not in ourselves.
Not with our own captains.
But in your strength.
With you as our captain.
And we believe victory is ours.
May we live in the light of it.
Oh God, please help me.
In Jesus name.
Amen.