And we're here to talk about what's referred
to as the Toronto blessing in my Bible
studies lately And I want to lay a
few foundations before we get into the specifics.
I Have been amazed at the phenomenal emphasis
on wisdom Especially in the Psalms But also
many other places in the Word of God
there's a great emphasis on wisdom and on
knowledge and when we come to some of
these complicated areas that top Theologians are fighting
over I Tell you we need a lot
of wisdom as we attempt to try to
understand and make right decisions in our own
lives Satan is a roaring lion seeketh whom
he may devour and we know that one
of Satan's great strategies is to attempt to
bring disunity among God's people And we don't
overemphasize this here on do loss and in
the ship ministry, I hope not but Satan
Constantly tries to bring disunity to this ship
within departments within cabins within families and As
we face a new challenge of something Unusual
going on in the churches.
It of course does affect us Here on
the ship some on the ship have been
into meetings where these things are happening Some
people have already heard this is happening back
in their home church if you're British Because
the main country in the world where this
is happening is Great Britain, you know You
cannot be just ignorant of what is going
on And this is why I think it
is good that we're discussing this now.
I believe as we talk about this There's
going to be a number of other biblical
principles that may be life principles.
I'm always looking for life principles Life principles
from the Word of God I can base
my life on And I'm amazed of how
many people don't seem to go for life
principles things that are big things that you
can build upon a couple of life principles
that really have helped me in my own
spiritual pilgrimage is That God is working in
different people in different ways And we got
two Thousand years of mega history to prove
it.
I've had the privilege of living in about
50 or 60 countries Visiting and ministering in
thousands of churches and fellowshipping with thousands of
Christian leaders and I am amazed to see
God moving on one hand and someone like
Billy Graham and On the other hand someone
like Benny Hinn people who would appear to
be So unbelievably different I doubt if they've
ever had a conversation though they both live
in the United States Maybe we could organize
that So God is God is working in
different people in different ways Number two and
It's encouraging to see a few people taking
notes That's I had heard there were several
serious people on the ship and this is
a real Encouragement to me, but forgive my
cynicism I have to often repent of it,
but you know after 40 years in the
ring you do You know like rocky for
you might have been punched a little bit
start to feel it but God is working
in different churches in different ways different churches
in different ways Linked with that is the
simple proof of history that these different churches
are not going to easily change and copy
the church down the road It might change
a little Especially if the people down the
road are grace awakened people.
I know how to win friends and influence
people I Have such an impact in this
movement that when I told people to read
Dale Carnegie's book how to win friends and
influence people a Fair number decided they would
never read that book no matter what That's
what you call a sort of normal rebellious
spirit, and it's It's difficult to know how
to handle it But I perhaps should just
say that I would warn you against reading
Dale Carnegie's book how to win friends and
influence people It's a secular book.
It's probably got some New Age twitches in
it there's a real possibility that you could
you know develop a decent personality and this
could lead to all kinds of friendships and
Communication complications people beginning to like you and
the whole thing could get so unbelievably Confusing
so you probably don't want to read how
to win friends and influence people just press
on and be your good old obnoxious self
fortunately you might find at least one person
crazy enough to marry you and Maybe that
somehow she's read the book and you'll be
able to or he be able to make
it through life Anyway that used to be
a required book among leaders, and it's a
secular book.
It's in many different languages God is working
in different people in different ways.
God is working in different churches in different
ways number three Anything that is interdenominational as
operation mobilization and many many other groups Whitcliffe.
Oh and F.
I Could list a whole group of groups
are faced with some very special difficulties That
people are not faced with when they're all
going to the same church.
They're all signing the same doctrinal statement one
of the men who gave quite a lot
of money to log us to has now
hired somebody to handle his giving and They
seem to be rather Narrow they've sent me
a four-page small print doctrinal statement and
They're very discouraging to read that Realizing they
want to mainly give to people who have
the same doctrinal statement Four pages they've got
everything down you know about the second coming
about almost the temperatures in hell every Detail,
and I don't know how you know I
don't know how we're going to relate to
that organization anymore, and it's very disappointing to
me and This group which of course I
won't tell you what country they're from are
going to have difficulty relating to anything That's
sort of international or interdenominational because you can't
have that finely tuned doctrinal statement and be
Interdenominational it just it just will work you
may call yourself interdenominational, but in fact you're
creating your own Denomination Another thing I hope
that we can just put as a bottom
line principle Is that the road that we
have taken these between 30 and 40 years
depending if you want to go back right
to my conversion?
and what God did in that high school
of Respecting people who are evangelical who are
biblical whether they're evangelical or even your charismatic
evangelical That's the big term.
They're using in England now.
I Just had breakfast with Clive Calvary's the
head of the evangelical Alliance boy.
He says you know charismatic evangelical They want
to emphasize the work of the Holy Spirit.
They want to emphasize evangelical doctrine But as
we think about this We we are faced
with many many many challenges, and we have
to face our own limitations But we do
have 35 years of seeing tens of thousands
of people come to Christ And would be
a lot more except we have chosen to
work in the countries where up to now
not many are coming to Christ We don't
measure things Always by that, but of course
we're looking for fruit.
We have about a hundred ministries hundred ministries
that trace their birth back to OM and
we have Thousands of people who are in
ministry in all well just such a wide
range of different groups I don't want to
go into detail about this But I think
God has honored our sort of middle road
position of majoring on the majors And as
we face new controversy in the church, whatever
it is we want to look at our
roots We want to look at the word
We want to look to the Lord and
get wisdom, and we're not all going to
agree This is probably even the uniqueness about
my talk tonight.
I'm not going to try to get all
you do agree I'm gonna make some effort
to keep you living together and love and
harmony And when you get off OM which
comes very quickly You you will have of
course more freedom probably than when you're here
Now that may not be true if you
belong to a church That is very strong
authoritarian leadership You may discover that you don't
have so much freedom.
I Have so many letters coming from people
who are in authoritarian churches their whole books
now written about manipulation in the church and
The last thing we want to ever have
in OM.
I can't say we've never failed is any
kind of manipulation and And I think it's
a terrible thing if we manipulate people at
the same time There may come at times
a fine line between persuasion we must persuade
people and Of course the world if you're
out there talking to somebody that if he
dies he's going to go to hell the
world says you're a manipulator But you believe
from the Word of God that you're a
persuader Well, I am convinced that unity comes
in the midst of diversity and And some
of you probably in the next year or
two will be in a meeting Where the
the Holy Spirit is working in unusual way
and you will have some kind of unusual
experience in which you feel the grace of
God in a greater way or the love
of God in a greater way or the
power of God and we would never want
to despise that experience and As we look
at this particular Phenomena that's taking place.
I believe we need that kind of wisdom
now.
Let's give a little bit of history about
this Experience there's masses being written about this
five books came out just like that You
know we get a missions book about every
once in a while a new missions book
come out but we had five books on
this subject within months, and they are selling
and The books that I've looked at and
the articles that I've read point out that
this goes back quite a way There's a
bit of controversy and that some are saying
this started with a man an evangelist from
South Africa known as God's Holy Ghost bartender
Rodney Brown Other people are claiming it started
with Wimber Other people are claiming it started
with Benny Hinn but certainly one of the
places where some really hot things have been
happening in the last couple of years is
Argentina and There have been amazing Emotional outbursts
in Argentina when I was there I preached
in a little church after I preached half
the people left They moved the chairs out,
and then they moved into using some of
my good friends choruses Marcos wet those choruses.
I will tell you they are dynamite I
was listening to one of those choruses on
Lagos to and I got dancing over the
back of the ship it's almost fell overboard,
but It was that music if you don't
know anything about Marcos wit in Latin America
Well, it's too bad because I'll tell you
they know how to sing they know how
to dance.
They know how to leap they know how
to jump and There have been phenomenal outbursts
and there have been also a lot of
conversions So things were happening in Argentina a
couple of years ago.
Of course we can go back before that
and And this different kinds of more emotional
blessings Slaying in the spirit that kind of
thing has been going on for years, but
usually it's been somewhat unnoticed or it's been
confined to certain kinds of churches and a
lot of people a lot of God's people
haven't been that aware of it Benny Hinn
certainly popularized some of the more intensive Benny
Hinn's method was blowing The spirit and though
you may be skeptical Some of our people
have gone to these meetings and they've seen
things that are they're just there Holy Spirit
and whole the whole choir who knocked right
off the chairs on to the floor It
brings quite a response from the congregation.
I can assure you unfortunately Benny Hinn had
some heretical things in some of his books
so that brought a big storm and Benny
Hinn and Had a visit by a few
Christian leaders He was also very much into
prosperity And as far as I can see
Benny Hinn made some changes and That way
that was encouraging The reason this is called
the Toronto blessing is because in a Vineyard
church at the end of the airport in
Toronto Canada things really started to happen Now
apparently some of the people from that church
went somewhere else in the States Where Rodney
Brown was and these things were happening No
need to mention the churches, but then they
went to vineyard and and it just took
off Maybe it's because it was at the
end of the runway, but it just it
just took it just took off and soon
People were hearing about it in Britain and
people were going over there now Let's just
drop back a little and say there's a
lot of Christians Who have been praying for
revival intensively for a long time Several revivals
major revivals were prophesied for Britain for four
years ago three years ago the big Wimber
meetings didn't happen a lot of agony a
lot of confusion came by that and Some
disunity because when people says thus saith the
Lord, it's gonna happen They all gathered in
Docklands for these big meetings special people flew
in and it didn't happen Didn't mean God
didn't work there, but they certainly didn't see
major revival in Britain There have been some
big prayer meetings in the National Exhibition Stadium
For a number of years have been more
and more books about revival So that builds
up a tremendous spirit of hope and expectation
Which is good, but if it doesn't have
balance it also can be Dangerous now some
of you know my own conviction that revival
is always plan B At plan a is
that from the moment our fair conversion when
the Holy Spirit enters in us we walk
in Jesus We grow in Jesus.
We keep short accounts with God and we
walk by day It's when God's people get
cold and backslide bitter whatever Then they need
revival If you've been around om for very
long, you know, we often talk about personal
revival That's that's our inheritance in Jesus And
then we talk about corporate revival may be
in a church.
It may be in a group of churches
It may be in a nation as a
student of revival now for about 30 years
Mike and I just listened to another whole
series of tapes of revival a great Bible
teacher I Have just an enormous struggle with
this subject because if revival is where it's
at why Does it happen so seldom?
What kind of a God do we have?
Now we got these people begging and begging
and begging for revival fasting and praying I
remember when I first arrived in London this
group is fasting and praying for revival year
after year after year after year This is
30 years ago Never happened Now some of
you know that I struggle probably with more
than most people with with various and sundry
doubts but my own conviction and this isn't
necessarily om's official policy is That teaching about
revival.
I'm not talking about Toronto blessing now in
background teaching about revival needs a lot of
balance and we need to get into the
New Testament and See what the New Testament
teaches about revival rather than just telling stories
out of the Hebrides I know more about
the Hebrides revival I think that most people
one little tiny tiny part of Great Britain
books are written about it tapes are written
about it They're still talking about it, but
in fact it was combined to those islands
It never hardly spread anywhere else and by
the time I got to the Hebrides a
few years after the place was as dead
as Any place on planet Earth, so I
say to myself.
What is all this about on the other
hand these stories when you hear them?
You you you some people go completely cuckoo
and the only thing they're interested in is
revival Where to me the New Testament clear
clearly teaches we all are obligated to live
for Jesus Christ With or without these great
revivals The Holy Spirit lives in us.
That's big and We get this emphasis of
the Holy Spirit coming down or the Holy
Spirit coming in And I'm not saying we
should never emphasize that it's complex But I
think the more important emphasis you are a
temple of the Holy Spirit He lives in
you and the potential I tell you is
big Maybe because I discovered that at 17
years of age and have experienced it every
day ever since that I'm biased Forgive me.
I still pray for revival I Praise God
when that little Asbury revival hit I remember
sitting in Bangladesh listening to the tape about
the Asbury revival It was a couple of
years Maybe you're too wonderful things happen, and
then it went does that mean God disappeared
from Asbury College for the next 20 years
No Could it be that revival is more
God's rescue program for sleepy Saints and Slimy
Saints forgive the terminology, but when we get
into sin.
That's what it's about and We need to
get back a little more closer to plan
a Linked with this as I look at
the lives of hundreds and hundreds of men
and women of God Many of them have
never had these earth-shaking Mega emotional experiences
many of them have never had many have
so It's just back to my first principle
God working in different people in different ways
and In in the end of the day
it is a mystery God's working is a
mystery Maybe you could look with me at
the Bible to the 11th chapter of Romans
This is so minister to me.
We have the 12th chapter that we and
no M preach until your ears hurt But
in the 11th chapter of Romans, I believe
you have a very important verses leading up
to chapter 12 Look at this Romans 11
the last few verses it's called God's matchless
wisdom or the depth of the riches both
of the wisdom and knowledge of God how
unsearchable are his judgments his ways past Finding
out for who hath known the mind of
the Lord who hath been his counselor Who
at first given to him it shall be
recompensed unto him again For of him and
through him and to him are all things
to whom be glory forever.
Amen.
Hey, that's That's powerful.
That's spiritual me.
I Guess I'm sharing this because I feel
there is a danger and let me just
understand Let me just say this that men
and women who are very committed to the
Toronto blessing.
They're right in the middle of it I've
read their works They including say Gerald Coates
are putting out tremendous warnings I was at
the American the British Conference of Evangelists probably
half the people there have been in the
Toronto blessing and They had some of this
happening in in one of the evening meetings.
I Couldn't see it from where I was.
I just had prayer with a brother next
to me God would give us whatever he
had for us But I wasn't there in
sort of the ring and I didn't want
to be a spectator and just go looking
So I went to my room and and
prayed there But these men and women who
are in this most of them now are
Writing articles as fast as they can't warning
people of all the dangers and all the
problems because Even when people have had a
real encounter with the Holy Spirit It's always
just no matter what one more step one
more step.
Maybe a big step It may be the
most emotional step the person has ever had
in their life, and they will surely never
forget it But it's still one more step
You remember in Toulon one of the evening
meetings when I shared right here The Spirit
of the Lord seemed to move in an
unusual way we can't measure many many people
came forward here was just completely full quite
a few were weeping some were sitting on
the floor and Though the Toronto blessing Would
seem to be that much more high-powered
Making this look like just something very calm
though for some omers what was happening up
here seemed to be Pretty pretty intensive compared
to what goes on in their church.
We have people from churches that have never
had an altar call They've never had people
going forward weeping much less crying laughing or
grunting or anything else along that line And
it's something we've got to we've got to
respect and we've got to keep in mind
From Toronto just to pick up the story
a little more it spread especially to Holy
Trinity Brompton a big Anglican Church in central
London now it spread to other places, but
it was Holy Trinity Brompton that hit the
press major Press coverage in Great Britain imagine
that the major newspapers Soon there were queues
lines of people trying to get in Holy
Trinity Brompton for the Sunday evening service Now
this church like many Anglican churches is already
in the charismatic tradition They already have leaders
who are trained in that tradition in that
way of doing things and so They were
in a sense prepared It's not like this
suddenly happening down in a church the other
end of the road where?
They've not had this kind of manifestation I
certainly haven't heard of anything like this happening
at all souls laying and laying in place
John Stott's great church There's some discussion about
it But it's a different kind of church.
It's a different ethos and so far Last
I heard nothing had happened.
They're not that far away It also came
very heavily into Ick this fellowship.
That's when OM people Got involved because the
number of OEM errs go to Ick this
fellowship and one OM woman who was actually
in the process of leaving OM came to
me and shared how God had done something
very precious in her life and It just
seemed to be a blessing to her helping
her through a lot of hurt and a
lot of crises What are some of the
manifestations?
First of all people just seemingly under the
power of the Holy Spirit though some of
course who are against this deny this People
just collapse and they sometimes remain seemingly unconscious
for five minutes ten minutes even longer On
the floor they usually make a space in
the churches so they can handle these things
now sometimes it seems to happen spontaneously other
times people have hands laid on them and
In that case sometimes they get a catcher
they get somebody behind them when they lay
hands on them so when they pass out
So there's somebody can catch him because in
fact people have been hurt Over the years
like I say these things aren't new in
certain kinds of churches some of your own
churches So they've learned over the years how
to catch people How to handle these situations
I remember in a church because I preach
in every kind of church you could ever
imagine After the meeting and after I preached
a lady walked up boom she collapsed right
in front of me and sort of passed
out and I Wanted to help her I
didn't know what to do.
She's very large lady I didn't want to
attempt to get her lift her up But
an elder quickly came to my rescue and
he said leave her alone.
She does that every week Just get on
and do something else I Found this a
little difficult, and I am not exaggerating My
experience in that particular situation That by the
way was a great special meeting in the
city of Manchester organized by a friend of
mine Last time I saw him.
He said well.
I mean that's all dried up.
That's all over.
We close that that's finished I Think this
is a one of the other things that
some of us are struggling with we seem
to live in days of such tremendous Instability
we seem to have so many unstable people
so many hurting people They are vulnerable.
They are vulnerable to Emotional manipulation, I'm not
saying all of this is emotional manipulation, but
surely that is a problem And I fear
that if it's not handled carefully in the
church That the end of the day a
lot of people are going to be hurt
and a lot of people are going to
be disillusioned Because usually with this come all
kinds of promises of revival of blessing we've
been through this again and again in so
many countries people promising things that never come
and Then nobody really coming up and being
honest and saying well.
Maybe we did get it wrong.
I Loved Amy Wilkerson.
He's a friend of mine, but he claimed
25 years ago this was going to happen
within the next few years and it did
not happen and A lot of people were
confused.
He also went into a lot of confusion
in his ministry He later said on tape
which most people never heard that he had
maybe the timing rule The first thing that
was going to happen was a complete collapse
of the German economy That was going to
be one of the first things the German
economy has been going on Strong ever since
though in the last couple of years there
certainly has been a slight a slight dip
But nothing what we're talking about in this
in this book So we forgive us with
a teaching of a W Tozer in we
OM leaders tend to have a little bit
of reverent skepticism about Some of the things
people are claiming and it's one of the
things that scares me the most about the
movement I'm part of 80 mm.
We are already being criticized by very godly
people Because we made claims certain people have
made claims and when you get there It
wasn't true when I was with you in
Dubai a brother came to me And he
said I have gone to Kuwait because I
was told of a hundred or two hundred
Muslims that have come to Jesus And they
need pastoring when he got to Kuwait.
He could not find him because they did
not exist.
It's a serious thing It's a serious thing
integrity is important men and women of the
Word of God another one of the manifestations,
that's Extremely controversial is laughing Again I Can
see some positive things I more easily see
positive things and some of the people I
fellowship with you may doubt that but I
fell Ash pretty interesting crowd But I know
that one woman Who laughed?
Uncontrolled laughter when interviewed had not laughed for
two years She had suffered child abuse.
She had suffered other heavy stuff Heavy stuff
a sexual arena she had not laughed for
two years and to me It's it's I
can't say I know this is for sure
But it seems as almost like God just
pulled the cork and healed her and just
let her laugh Some people would say well
if they're coming forward in this great group
and some are crying and some are laughing
is tremendous noise It's not such a problem
because you can't you really it's just bedlam.
You can't even hear what's going on The
problem is when a guy is expounding the
word this is happening expounding the Word of
God and somebody in the audience Just starts
uncontrolled laughter Now I find it difficult to
preach when things start happening little babies start
crying, but I've learned to handle that People
start staring at you.
I don't know if you've preached in those
situations where people try to cast a spell
on you know I Mean I've had a
lot of interesting experiences, but Uncontrolled laughter while
you're trying to preach that has become very
controversial Now I was in a church where
the Toronto blessing was happening in a small
way.
It was actually a United meeting It's actually
a missions meeting One of the house group
movements is a tremendous time those people responded
to the message as much as any group
I've ever ministered to And when one person
started to laugh Two stewards were on her
or him.
I can't remember within seconds they had her
out the door and They let her laugh
in the maybe they got laughing rooms, but
hey They let her laugh so though that
group that group is very strong on Freedom
and wanting God to blow the place apart
you should hear some of the things they
say from the pulpit about being free but
they Didn't want that going on at that
particular time But certainly the uncontrolled laughing There's
a book about that now There's also books
against it That is a hot issue.
That is a hot issue and And We'll
perhaps get on to back to that Later
on or maybe in the question answer time
there are some reports of healing there haven't
been a lot Those are traditional things that
happen in Pentecostal charismatic churches and other churches
There are some reports certainly Of things happening
that I don't think any of us would
disagree with Let me read from a relatively
balanced article in the one of the British
Baptist papers, I thought this was very Positive
because I think we've got to look at
some of what people feel are positive results
How we are to assess this is by
David coffee one of the leaders of the
Baptist Church in Britain How we are to
assess the accounts of the extraordinary manifestations of
the Spirit of God at work in some
of our churches Through the so-called Toronto
blessing many many people by the way feel
it's so unfortunate such a Blessing is named
after some city Canadians of course are having
massive Discussion over it a very high percentage
of Canadians right across the nation don't know
anything about it That much except a little
that they've read because it is limited to
a relatively small number of churches so far
in Canada We have now had the opportunity
to receive reports from a wide range of
opinions across the country There's no doubt in
our minds that God has been at work
Whatever Baptist may personally feel Whatever questions they
may want to ask the evidence is that
There are many Christians in local churches who
have been touched by this blessing there is
the evidence of Semico get some water here
churches Where repentance and reconciliation has transformed the
life of a fellowship To that we could
only say praise God to communities where the
lapsed have been restored backsliders I mentioned in
the beginning They've been restored three churches where
conversions have been recorded For congregations who have
experienced times of refreshing from the Lord Then
those who testify to a new hunger for
God fresh concern for others And it goes
on to talk about some of the other
things that have taken place I think most
Christian leaders would acknowledge that if there is
just that special emotional experience and Touch of
God or infilling or whatever you want to
call it and nothing happens after that no
life is changed No fruit no witness, then
then what really would be the purpose I?
Think they would be in a majority Would
would agree with that.
It's just that once this gets going Sunday
after Sunday How do you how do you
handle it?
And believe me some Christian leaders right now
on under phenomenal pressure knowing how you know
what is the next step?
We were involved in world missions Or be
you know crying out to God for workers
Rather than being negative.
We are trying to ask Lord is this
gonna bring a new army of harvesters?
into the mission work You know if God
has to do some kind of mighty kickstart.
I think of this thing sometimes as Jump
-starting I mean we know a lot about
jump-starting Oh, you know and because there
are so many vehicles Don't start properly you
have to push them.
I never forget the day.
I discovered that a diesel truck only has
to be pushed a few yards, and it
will often jump-start quicker than a petrol
vehicle and Could this be one of God's
sort of jump-start?
Programs in answer to prayer so many people
backslidden so many people Wounded so many people
hurt so many people through divorce So many
in our churches have been through divorce and
broken relationships.
They're hurting people the vulnerable unfortunately sometimes the
good as well as bad and Is this
is this one of God's rescue programs?
I'm not telling you that don't go writing
to your church George Verwer said this I'm
asking you a question that you have to
wrestle through yourself But could it be now
we know That if there are some authentic
things going on Immediately Satan is going to
try to copy or bring what's the word
I want Counterfeit thank you Satan Immediately does
that and people in this movement?
They are concerned about counterfeit.
They are concerned about people just copying Seeing
somebody else seemingly fall down laugh and Seemingly
getting blessed man.
They want to get it as well.
They're standing there.
Nothing seems to happen.
They fall down anyway I Tell you I'm
the kind of temperament And if you follow
my early years of my Christian life to
get a blessing from God.
I did some really strange things You know
the idea of operation mobilization came to me
after being arrested by the KGB Coming back
for a day of prayer in Austria.
I was on the top of a tree
I Mean I could have launched a complete
tree climbing movement at that time that could
have Rapidly spread maybe across the world and
thousands of Christians would be climbing trees And
getting this George Verwer treetop blessing and who
knows what could happen I?
Think most of you know the story of
the lady who got the leap Experience she
was into leaping and Once she leaped and
just got zapped she felt by the Holy
Spirit And it changed her life, and so
she beat she got into a teaching ministry,
and she taught the theology of the leap
Now I have a difficulty when people system
make systematic theology out of special times of
unusual Activity, and that's what I fear in
this and I fear that the very churches
Who are in this are gonna split?
I'm not so worried about the church down
the road that isn't in it.
They got other problems I'm worried about them,
too.
This is I'm worried sometimes about OM But
the churches where this is happening already some
people are getting tired of it the things
that happened and Relationship complications still go on
lust and other problems still go on Do
you think these things happen in a vacuum
that everything else stops?
While these special times of blessing go on
no life goes on complications go on And
one of the things that's happened is When
churches have experienced a lot of heavy emotion
Satan tries to set them up for immorality
One of the most famous pastors in the
whole of Argentina has just been caught living
in massive adultery It has shaken the church
in Buenos Aires People are hurt people are
disillusioned imagine the thousands of people go to
that church They once one minute they think
they got the most spirit-filled pastor and
the greatest man on earth the next moment
He's exposed for massive adultery and immorality That
is spreading Has been spreading long before people
were ever talking about this That will not
go away through spiritual crises It will go
away as people learn to discipline themselves as
people learn to deny self as people develop
the kind of witness that Lois Mowdy talks
about in that book the snare And our
burden is to give every one of you
a copy of the snare before you ever
leave Om I just had lunch with Lois
remember her she preached some of you remember
her at the conference in Debron Just had
the privilege of meeting her husband and being
with her in Colorado the new edition of
her book is out in the United States
And I think we need to understand and
a lot of the leaders in this they
do understand this They would say amen to
what I'm saying right now these things do
not happen in a vacuum It must be
followed by discipleship by training by the discipline
life by the crucified life by intercessory Prayer
and all the aspects of Christian living that
are outlined in the Word of God somehow
those of you who may be More critical
or more skeptical than others at least for
your own personal situation, please Be slow very
slow To judge people who have been blessed
in these meetings of course we can always
find negative things That's true everywhere But I
want to believe I'm wrestling in attempting to
believe that the positive in all of this
Is going to outweigh the negative and my
experience is that we're two or three people
are gathered together Sooner or later.
There's a mess.
That's a verb or proper about the word
or two or three are gathered together Sooner
or later.
There's a mess, but our great God He
knows how to work in very messy situations
and I believe that through this We can
get a bigger picture of God We can
get a greater understanding of the mystery of
God.
Why why does he work this way?
well, I Was reading in the Psalms this
morning?
people people shouting show shout unto the Lord
I get in trouble when I Probably in
some of the churches before he started shouting
I would be accused of being extreme Clearly
in the Word of God we have examples
of people winning prostrate Adam you're toser.
He was known for laying prostrate Alan Redpath
a great evangelical leader describing toes are laying
prostrate on the beach Lake, Michigan We say
well, that's all right Well shouting those.
All right, it's laying prostrate is all right
Then why you know, why is it so
wrong if someone breaks down and falls on
the floor in their church and starts weeping?
or if someone else somehow Gets triggered off
emotionally and some other kind of expression comes
out And the other thing that may help
you Understand all this Seldom Is there any
spiritual activity without human activity?
I am convinced personally some of this is
just Human activities just flesh and blood.
We're human beings.
We are subject to emotional Things I know
of my own life when my mother died.
I went into the woods and I screamed
I Wept I made sure nobody could hear
me, but I was just in an emotional
tornado Now I know other people when their
mothers die.
They don't cry Different cultures responded for away.
I Remember hearing one of my first stories
about Italy.
I don't know if it's true But among
the Catholics in Italy, I hear when the
group funeral they just go very emotional it's
not true and it'll jump into the grave
and Here is such an interesting thing Great
Britain known to breathe the nation of such
stiff upper lip Unemotional people I was just
at a funeral.
I was at a funeral with British people
hardly anybody I was crying and the woman
was very you're on me the XOM ship
girl right at 40 of cancer I Mean,
I was trying to be real English You
know looking around Chris.
I mean, I didn't know her that well.
It wasn't like being married to her or
something and And finally I walked away from
the coffin and this other So I'm a
woman black girl, and I've been with for
some years hardly ever see We came up
soon as she started talking to me I
just started bawling and here's this this black
girl trying to comfort George Verroon bawling Personally,
oh, I believe it's good to cry And
I'm a little more happy perhaps about the
crying that will laughing But I will tell
you in my own life.
I have experienced at times uncontrolled laughter I've
never really thought of it.
We've been from the Holy Spirit When I
still actually do have my droughts But suppose
it is just human weakness just human weakness
high-level emotion human weakness Like when you
see some of these films and you have
uncontrolled laughter or uncontrolled weeping In one sense,
it's no big deal.
It's no big deal We shouldn't You know
think Satan is getting in.
You know, this is this is what's happening
with the people who are strongly critical the
devil is getting in and all kinds of
heavy stuff is coming out and There is
gonna drag the evangelical church in Britain back
into a cold war Now, how do we
handle such things on the ship?
Are we gonna now have an invitation and
we're gonna just pop the cork and Get
everybody up here and just see you know
See what we can do We got some
pretty strong guys here that could do some
pushing and and it works better Actually, if
you hold your leg out in front of
them as you push But I personally don't
think that's God's timing for this George Verwer
visit to the ship I can tell you
When I go out on the ship at
night and look at the stars even as
I did tonight and just worship God I
Get blessed you can give it any name
you want that do last blessing But when
I go out on the deck and look
at God and his creation and his power
sometimes tears come to my eyes You and
I don't want to wait until we get
to some church Where this is happening and
maybe that's going to be the cure-all
to all of our problems I think God
wants to meet us But it's clear from
all that's happening around the world.
God is meeting different people in different ways
and I think it's good that the average
person in OM Would like to study things
a little more would like to talk to
people the best place for this kind of
very contraventive controversial high explosive activity the best
place is in local churches Preferably your own
local church Now of course if you come
from a local church that is against all
this You've got a much bigger problem Then
if you come from a church where they're
gung-ho into all this and some of
probably in this room a high percentage of
your churches are not into this and It
would be very very disastrous If somehow when
you get back to your church you start
Propagating something that you're unsure of yourself and
give the idea that basically you pick this
up when you were on operation Mobilization we've
already had letters Asking us why have we
allowed our young people to be exposed to
this kind of unbiblical extremism We have letters
already from churches, and if we don't act
wisely we are going to be getting a
lot of letters in the months to come
Probably more logos too as they head to
the British Isles and to Europe I don't
know certainly probably won't find too much happening
in Djibouti I Might just say that the
people who are very much against all this
have put out articles showing that the exact
same phenomena is happening in non-christian religions
and in cults It's it's powerful It's powerful,
and I don't think on this ship and
an OM an interdenominational movement We're ever gonna.
You know all agree on this issue, and
I think we need a little time and
I think we need to understand that when
this kind of thing does happen it's so
much better if it happens in a person's
local church where there's a right supervision the
right follow-up and Start to try to
promote this on our ships I think would
would be a hindrance a real hindrance to
what God is attempting To do if it
happens and of course even talking about it
like tonight people will tell critics will say
And I'll be criticized for this message Critics
will say even talking about it like this
begins to build up Expectation it sets people
up for the next step well That's the
risk if you went to theological college you
would be studying these issues We cannot protect
you even though some of you are quite
young we cannot protect you from all the
different things that are going on in the
Christian world and I hope you'll keep that
in mind and If churches Who send their
young people on OM think that we can
protect them from being exposed To all kinds
of different churches all kinds of different things
years ago We had big controversy about baptism
some people went on the ship they wanted
to get baptized by immersion They found a
local church willing to do it boy soon
We got letters from here and there OM
is leading our people into getting baptized They
call it re-baptized if they're from places
like Finland and Norway and they get really
uptight About these things and we try to
find the middle road.
We have never scored a hundred percent Let's
pray Brother Costas McCrease what a privilege to
have you here I'm humbled you sitting there
listening to me go on and on come
up here and lead us in a spirit
-filled Prayer all these young people some are
leaving within the next few days some in
six months some in a year and We're
praying God is going to bring many many
more people to the to the ship Amen
Just lead us in prayer loving Jesus We
thank you for your mercy When you look
down from heaven and you saw us And
you pitied us and you had love and
compassion for us When we lifted up our
eyes In faith and put our trust in
you This was the most radical thing that
ever happened or will ever happen again in
the life of Jesus Help us to build
on that Lord Jesus and help us to
allow you to form your image in us
Help us to walk with you that when
people see us they can say Jesus went
by here May we represent you Lord Jesus
with our life and our walk Help us
in our homes to be better husbands Help
us in our homes to be better kids
Help us in our churches to be faithful
Help us Lord Jesus to carry out the
command To go into all the world and
preach the gospel to every creature Jesus did
not tell us Too many other things you
gave us a simple commandment, and if we
don't obey on that Lord Jesus.
What's the use of all the rest?
Help us to be faithful in that Help
us to go Because our flesh doesn't want
to go Because our own nature doesn't want
to go we don't want to suffer we
want the good things of life We won't
comfort.
We don't want suffering.
We want a self.
We don't want to give up a self
Lord Jesus We want to to live for
ourselves Lord Jesus.
We we confess this tonight before you Lord
Jesus This is my flesh every day I
have to battle that and I have to
look to you Lord Jesus to ask you
to help me to live for you To
be like you and someday to be able
to say like Paul Be like me as
I'm I'm like Jesus.
Oh God may our life point to Jesus
Help us to be real disciples Help us
Lord Jesus to keep in the centrality of
the message and of your command Help us
not to turn right or left but straight
your eyes and Faithful to the end not
counting the cost not asking for anything But
just give everything to your precious hands Lord
Jesus Bless us tonight and may these not
be just a time of pleasure for ourselves
But even a time of suffering a time
of giving up and time of of denying
oneself for Jesus With all the pain it
might cause Thank you for the times in
my life that I said Jesus I Give
you everything Thank you Jesus May I repeat
his alter experience time and again in the
years to come until I meet you face
to face And ask this in your wonderful
name.
Amen