This is a prayer meeting at the end
of July 96.
I'm going to be sharing prayer requests, and
then when I do that, I hope you'll
turn your tape off and spend time in
prayer.
It says, we'll turn the tape off here
and spend time in prayer.
That's the real purpose of this tape.
Of course, if you're listening while you're driving,
you can still pray, but I don't...
I recommend you don't close your eyes.
Okay, thank you.
Let's pray together.
Father, we thank you for bringing us together
again here tonight.
Lord, our hearts ache over the suffering, especially
in Africa, but also in other parts of
the world.
Loved ones of people who have been blown
to bits or murdered or crashed in airplane
accidents are crying out tonight, and we want
to cry out with them and for them.
We want to reach out to suffering people.
Sometimes we think we have problems, and then
we look across the world and realize our
problems really aren't that big.
We want this little prayer meeting tonight to
really count for eternity, so help us to
not somehow just be passengers listening to other
people pray, but help us to be participants
really going forward and believing you and trusting
you for great breakthroughs.
We know that prayer works, and we thank
you for that tonight.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
I'd like to just read a quotation about
Sudan, as we have continued to pray for
that country, and I hope, I really hope
each one of us could just consider ourselves
an ambassador for Sudan.
I was just thinking today, in fact, I'm
writing the International Update, and I mentioned that
this is the 40th, 40th summer, never been
a single summer for 40 summers that we've
not had teams out in evangelism.
And now you've mentioned that it's 40 years
that the war has been going on in
Sudan, just like two different planets.
And I don't understand, but I just believe
that we should at least try to increase
our concern for Sudan, our prayers, our letter
writing, anything that we can do to help
in that situation.
The average person is still rather ignorant of
what is going on there, and it's a
very distant thing to them.
They can't, just the average person, the different
countries of Africa, that gets confused in their
minds.
They get very, they feel often very overwhelmed
as to what they can do.
Now here's an example of something positive.
It's just interesting that this came in my
post that I was going through on the
way here from the house.
Sudan, this is dated July 25th.
United Churches Prevent Bloodbath in Rank, a place
called Rank.
You've heard of that place?
You ever been there?
Look at that.
There it is.
We have just heard that united action by
churches in Rank, an isolated area in northern
most part of southern Sudan, about 12 hours
by bus from Khartoum, prevented a massacre back
in February 1996.
The Sudanese government is continuing its attempts to
turn the country into an Islamic state.
One of their strategies is to convert pupils
between 6 and 12 years of old in
school.
The region's government representative asked the churches to
open their doors for Islamic teaching.
When the churches refused, he threatened to use
force, to which they replied, so use force.
When the officials arrived with the army, he
found members of all the local churches around
the building.
Because a military action would have caused bloodbath,
he thought better of it and withdrew after
arresting some of the leaders.
They were released one week later.
The Rank churches celebrated this as a great
victory in the face of permanent persecution in
Sudan.
The source name and address, of course, has
been withheld.
So let's right now go to prayer for
Sudan.
I think it's just good to form little
groups of 4 or 5.
Those listening to the tape, you can pray
however you want.
But let's pray for Sudan.
Let's remember this war.
Let's thank God for this victory, but realize
that oftentimes it doesn't always work out like
that, and people are killed again and again
and again.
Let's pray.
Well, we know that verse about angels in
heaven rejoicing over one person that comes to
Christ.
So you can imagine what's been happening, what
happened over Minneapolis a little over a month
ago.
Some of you may have heard about this,
but I was talking to someone on the
phone, actually son-in-law of Billy Graham,
and he said he'd been to Minneapolis, and
this is a person that's been in these
kind of campaigns for years.
He's actually one of the advertising companies that
does a lot of Billy Graham's work.
And he said it's just absolutely amazing what
was happening in Minneapolis, and it was beyond
any crusade almost he had ever imagined of
a citywide campaign.
In fact, one night so many stood up
to believe in Christ.
That Billy Graham, here's a man with Parkinson's
at 77 years of age, still just going
so strong.
But Billy Graham was so surprised by so
many, tens of thousands standing up, he thought
they misunderstood.
So I told him to sit down, and
gave him another shot about Christ, Savior, and
Lord, and then gave the invitation again.
Still I think 11,000 or something professed
faith, made some kind of a decision.
I heard that on the phone, and then
this came on email.
United States, Minneapolis.
The Billy Graham crusade drew 350,000 people
to the Metrodome on June 19th to 23rd.
Please pray for the follow-up, which is
currently ongoing.
Over 33,000 came forward, about 40%, 40
% of whom were new believers in Christ.
I was present at every meeting.
Awesome is all I can say.
God did a fantastic work Saturday evening.
Billy invited the youth to come forward to
accept Christ.
Over 10,000 were counseled that night.
Many thousands were stuck on the floor in
the aisles, concourses, as counselors couldn't reach them.
Billy asked the youngsters to sit again, which
they did, and rise if they were truly
dedicated to know Christ, is what I just
referred to, and suffer persecution.
Thought that would get a few, I guess,
to stay seated.
This man who writes this said, I counseled
seven people outside in overflow, which had 10
,000 people.
Sunday evening had 25,000 people outside that
couldn't get in the Metrodome.
We stand in awe.
They are following up youth in local malls.
Needless to say, we are excited and anticipating
more of what God will do.
It does seem, and the last thing I'm
interested in is exaggeration, but it does seem,
as there has been an increase of prayer
in the states, through many different movements, I
think especially of the prayer summit movement in
the northwest, very serious movement where leaders are
gathering for days, just praying and getting right
with the Lord.
I think of the outbreaks on different university
campuses more last year than this year.
I think of the report that came from
another town in California where they showed this
very, very blunt, straightforward drama about heaven and
hell.
Thousands and thousands, night after night, were coming
to Christ.
At the same time, we have a new
book by Jim Engle called World Missions in
North America, A Cloudy Future.
We have this very strong statement by another
outstanding Christian, that surveys show that church growth,
as far as statistics, church growth, statistics and
church growth are two different things, because the
church is always growing.
Just to make up for the people going
to heaven, there's a lot of people.
But as far as statistics, church growth has
leveled off in the United States.
But there's a lot of prayer, and it
does seem to me something is happening in
this huge country that has so many believers,
and we know so many sleepy believers together
with many committed believers.
The whole Promise Keepers movement is just a
phenomenon.
20, 30, 40,000 come seemingly wherever they
have one.
Many of you know about the special leaders
meeting in Atlanta.
So I'd like us to have special prayer
for the states.
I'd like us to focus on the Olympics.
For some who hear this by tape, the
Olympics will all be history.
I've been running my own Olympics the past
couple of weeks, so I haven't watched much
about Atlanta.
But whenever I see a little bit, even
on an airplane TV, they just get a
little summary.
It just makes me want to commit my
life more to God's Olympics, Hebrews 12.
We're running the race, looking on to Jesus.
At the end of the day, so many
people in Atlanta right now are disappointed.
There's only a few winners, mainly all losers.
I can relate to that.
There's only a few winners.
And of course, this bomb with two people
dead has brought a cloud.
It's interesting what the newspapers say about this.
Of course, far more people got killed in
automobile accidents in connection with getting there.
But two people killed by a bomb, that
gets this massive publicity and brings a cloud.
In fact, at the same time, probably a
couple hundred more Tutsis and Hutus just slaughtered
each other.
It gets just a little tiny line in
the newspapers.
It's sometimes a struggle to see that.
But there's at least 100,000 people witnessing
for Jesus.
I'm mega understating here because that's not including
local Christians.
But I've heard there's at least 100,000
have come parachuted in on Atlanta to witness
for Jesus.
One of my prayers is, Lord, don't let
people get hardened and turned off if they
get six different tracks and five New Testaments
walking between their house and the Olympic event.
That somehow these who are witnessing will be
sensitive, also that the reports will not get
exaggerated, and that somehow the Lord will be
honored.
I was reading an article.
One of the very leading men in the
whole organization of the Olympics.
Imagine what a task that is.
He's a very committed Christian.
So there's a lot to pray for in
Atlanta.
There's a lot to give thanks for in
Minneapolis.
And I'd like us to just really cry
out to the Lord now for the states,
if we could include in that prayer for
the ports that the ship's coming to next
year.
San Diego, Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, and also
Canada.
Two ports in Canada, one in Vancouver and
another in a little tiny place where Susan's
from.
What's that little place they're going to?
Sounds like an Indian village.
It was.
Good.
But again, we're having a real struggle in
the lineup work.
There's a shortage of finance.
Churches in the states don't easily grasp what's
this about, a ship coming into their port.
So let's pray for finance.
They're trying to get local committees and local
churches to carry the whole budget.
And each budget for each port is a
lot of money.
I'm not sure I would want to be
in the shoes of these lineup people attempting
what they are attempting.
Things are beginning to move.
Let's pray for Bill Drake who will be
having a lot of concerts in connection with
this.
I will be coming into Vancouver.
I've been in most of the port cities
in the last months but I'm coming into
Vancouver just one day.
We've got all kinds of aspirations for that
day, but that's on the 20th of August.
But let's pray for all those ports and
any lineup people, please pray for them by
name.
Remember Dave Hicks is still very much involved
in this.
Lloyd Nicholas carries a big load of the
responsibility.
He was over there when I was there
some weeks ago.
And then just keep in mind that if
things don't continue to function technically on the
ship, it will never get there.
It's totally different than any other kind of
lineup because as we saw in Belgium a
few months ago, it gets very interesting when
the ship cannot sail.
And considering two years of preparation, it will
especially have interesting vibrations in the United States.
So let's pray for Ilan Alba who Mary
shared with us today and we just welcome.
Mary Brinkley here.
Is this the first?
She popped in on this occasionally, but this
is it.
Oh, you were here when I wasn't here.
But we just welcome Mary back after many,
many years of doing other strategic things.
We won't put her on the spot too
much right now, but she was mentioning today
that Ilan and Joyce are really under a
lot of pressure along us too with the
engine room as both their children seem to
be not well.
The one case it's preventing them from getting
good sleep at night.
I wouldn't want to be going down in
the engine room on a ship with only
a couple of hours sleep under my belt.
So let's cry out to God for that
as well.
Again, let's pray in our small groups.
Feel free to change groups or you can
wander outside if you want.
I think it's raining a little bit.
What a blessing to come up to the
office this afternoon and just see all this
scaffolding.
It's a sign that something's happening here, isn't
it?
Well, we hope even more is happening right
here in this meeting tonight.
The workmen have stopped.
They've gone, but this is a time to
pray.
So let's pray for the United States and
those things that I've just mentioned.
And with much thanksgiving, especially for those ones
that came to the Lord.
Help me somehow as I tend to share
a few things that are on my heart
that this may minister.
To all of us, we thank you for
your word.
Thank you for the phenomenal open doors you're
giving us across the world to minister to
others, to encourage others.
Lord, we need grace to know how to
respond.
We really believe that as a fellowship, you're
bringing us into a whole new day of
having a much, much, much larger influence on
your body throughout the whole world.
It's a little bit scary.
So give us grace as we know Satan
is going to try to derail the whole
effort.
We really need your wisdom and grace.
In Jesus' name, amen.
In God's providence, I've had the privilege of
speaking to more people in the last 12
days than in the previous three and a
half months.
And yet, the things you remember are not
generally the standing in front of large audiences
but the individuals that come up to you.
And often, some of the first people that
get to you when you finish speaking.
Because when you're speaking, you may appear to
be somebody, but you're just the same as
anybody else.
One mouth, one nose, two eyes.
And the moment you finish speaking, there's a
tremendous sense, often a weakness, even though there
may have been a big response.
And then people come with their personal needs.
One man was really after me there in
Finland and needed $10,000 on the spot.
And somehow, I guess he thought, me being
an American, that I would be able to
help him.
My friend, Osko Butnik, had already warned him
that he probably wouldn't get too far, but
we did have some prayer.
More than that, people come with all kinds
of difficulties, whether it's Koreans in Wheaton, where
I just was, or people in Finland, Singapore,
wherever it may be.
People are very, very similar.
I believe the similarities.
We don't often hear any messages about similarities.
Have you ever heard an orientation session how
people are similar?
They're always constantly being told how different we
are.
And I know in my marriage, one of
my great mistakes is going around the world
emphasizing at times how different my wife and
I are.
I always get to laugh, and that loosens
people up so that you can get the
message through.
But the fact is that my wife and
I are more similar in many ways than
we are different.
But nobody wants to hear about that.
They might not believe it anyway.
But people do carry enormous burdens.
20% of all the people in Finland
don't have a job.
20% unemployment.
Very different Finland than I went to 20
-some years ago.
Mexico, it's 25%.
Moldovia, I read in one of our articles,
we have teams going into Moldova.
Moldovia is pronounced.
80% unemployment.
How does a country function with 80%
of the people don't have a job?
It must be unusual.
I know as I go around, people think
my great burden is to talk about world
missions, but it really is just far more
to talk about Jesus.
And I'm reading a tremendous article that I
had Graham pre-read for me, and he
highly recommended it, so now I'm reading it,
about revival.
And this article has given me a little
more courage to try to openly call people
to come back to the Lord or to
seriously search their own heart and make sure
they are repentant of any sin so that
they are a clean vessel in God's work.
I'd like to read a couple of scriptures,
especially in Acts 4.31, because it's my
prayer, maybe a bit idealistic, but it's my
prayer as we press on in prayer tonight
that every one of us in this room
could know the fullness of God's Spirit as
we pray tonight.
And I really believe it's a great mistake
that we give the idea that the Spirit
-filled life is just for a very select
few or just on certain occasions.
And the whole Spirit-filled life, I believe,
is being derailed more than ever through this
overemphasis on special experiences.
Now, don't misunderstand that, because I'm in favor
of God giving people special experiences if it's
kept within balance.
But it's a great mistake to think that
the only Spirit-filled people are those that
have these very special experiences that we can
tell about, we can take pictures of, we
can describe.
My experience in working with many people who
overemphasize experience is that most of them, within
a few years, are backslidden.
Some of them, not even Christians.
We must never let any experience, no matter
how precious it is, and I've had some
very precious experiences.
I got criticized for being pro-Toronto Blessing
because in the leaders' meetings in Singapore, I
mentioned, look, in the early days of O
.M., we had people knocking on the floor,
praying on the floor, what's the big deal?
Well, you should see the letter I got
from somebody about that.
We're now promoting the Toronto Blessing, which isn't
really too accurate.
But I know this.
The blessing must never get priority over the
blesser.
And the blesser is God Himself and His
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
And how tragic it is that we have
churches that one minute are just being tied
away in tremendous enthusiasm, and the next minute,
in total disaster and split.
I've just heard another one.
I don't go around looking for these.
I mean, I've been in England.
I've been in Finland.
But this woman who sings as a backup
singer with Noel Richards, she just came up
to me backstage, and we started talking, and
she said, do you remember coming to my
church?
And fortunately, I did.
And she said, well, it's just all split.
And she shared how a good percentage of
all the people just all left.
They felt the pastor was this and that,
and this poor guy.
They had been holding stuff against him for
years, and they finally got all together and
marched out and left.
Now, I remember being there.
We're good friends, actually, of Dave White's.
It's Adrian's church.
And I remember being there and the enthusiasm
and the worship and the praise.
How can it be one minute we're praising
God, the next minute we're cursing our brother
or our sister?
Do you think God ever knew we might
get into that?
Have you read James?
Those exact words are actually taken from the
book of James.
And what does it say?
These things should not be so.
It's a terrific justification of our sin.
One of the things that makes me nervous
about some of the emphasis on grace, even
my own emphasis, which I'm trying to keep
balanced, is that as we emphasize grace, we
are not excusing sin.
But we are pointing out God's solution to
sin.
We can never take sin lightly.
If sin and our sins are responsible for
nailing the Lord Jesus Christ to the cross,
how dare we ever take sin lightly.
Acts 4.31 is the passage I want
to read.
After they prayed, the place where they were
meeting was shaken.
They were filled.
They were all filled with the Holy Spirit,
and they spoke the word of God boldly.
What is one of the clear signs of
the fullness of the Holy Spirit?
It's to speak out with boldness about the
Lord.
And I trust most of you are doing
that.
And if you aren't, then I would just
encourage you on that day when you're attempting
to speak out, when you're attempting to evangelize
or share your faith, to right there have
an Acts 4.31 experience.
Right on the spot.
And ask the Lord to give you boldness
to speak.
Turn to Ephesians 4.
Ephesians 4.
Billy Graham quite often emphasized the need to
be filled with the Spirit.
And he speaks often from Ephesians 4 and
Ephesians 5, specifically more Ephesians 5.
Verse 15.
Be very careful then how you live, not
as unwise but as wise, making the most
of every opportunity.
Wow.
That's almost better than the old translations in
redeeming the time.
I don't think people know what that means,
redeeming the time.
Making the most of every opportunity.
Because the days are evil, therefore do not
be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will
is.
And I tell you, that is one of
my cravings these days.
I want to know what the Lord's will
is for my ministry, for OM, for my
life, for time.
Each capsule of time, each minute, each hour,
we only get it once.
My wife and I finally got to see
the film Nixon.
How many have seen the film?
I'm a Nixon character.
I was at the Billy Graham meeting in
1957 when Richard Nixon was introduced as Vice
President of the United States and led in
prayer.
And I thought, praise God, this guy's a
Christian.
And I voted for him when he ran
sometime later.
And I've read a lot about him ever
since.
And this film, done by this guy Stone,
who's an amazing film producer but is not
famous for always exactly coming out with the
truth, according to some people I've read, has
done an awesome task in producing a two
-hour film about Richard Nixon.
I read the reviews before I saw the
film and it indicated that it painted him
a little worse than maybe he was.
But I think of how Billy Graham became
such a very close friend of Dick Nixon.
And there's a whole book written against Billy
Graham called The Parable of Righteousness.
300 pages against Billy Graham.
When you get famous, you get this kind
of blessing.
Some of you get difficulty with one line
written against you, right?
Chuck Templeton, he used to be with Billy
Graham in the 50s.
I remember hearing Chuck Templeton speak.
Turned from Christianity and is a very, very
popular man in the media in Canada.
He did some of the chapters in this
book against Billy Graham.
One of the big criticisms against Billy Graham
was that he became such an intimate friend
and so caught up in the White House
and caught up with Richard Nixon.
It's amazing, a film, even a two-hour
film.
They have to leave out 98%.
They can only cover.
And, of course, they can just about tell
you and say to you whatever they want
to as media people.
Though I'm sure a lot of that film
represented the truth, though maybe not the whole
picture.
It just comes to my mind, what if
someone had ever really reached that man, Nixon,
with the gospel and seen his life changed?
Brothers and sisters, you and I know it
is not enough to get decisions for Christ.
You probably, most of you also know that
I'm still extreme in not wanting to say
that people who make decisions are converts.
Because we know a major percentage of people
who make decisions are not converts.
They're not disciples.
They don't become real followers of the Lord
Jesus Christ.
Yet we continue to propagate that myth.
Often a decision is the beginning of a
search that leads to conversion.
Sometimes a decision is, at the same time,
an actual conversion.
Praise God, the more the better.
Well, that was a rather depressing experience, watching
that film.
But I think of how Billy Graham has
somehow managed to just keep going.
Imagine the disappointments that Billy Graham has had.
His own daughter last year went through a
divorce and was quickly remarried.
That doesn't always get in the newspapers.
I sat with her former husband, I tell
you.
He's got a very, very important business and
a very interesting man.
And I was sitting before a man that
was just broken.
Just broken.
Let me just read the rest of this
because otherwise it would go too long.
Do not get drunk on wine, verse 18,
which leads to debauchery.
Instead, be filled with the Spirit.
Imagine comparing the filling of the Spirit with
drinking a glass of wine.
A glass of wine in many countries is
a very, very common thing.
It's not saying here you can't drink wine,
by the way.
Sorry to disappoint some of you.
It says don't get drunk with wine.
But it's just so interesting that this is
being filled with the Spirit, which we think
of as such as the ultimate spectacular experience.
I know people have been trying to be
filled with the Spirit, and they use other
terminology, for years and years.
I've met people that have tried to have
a particular gift of the Spirit for 5,
10, 15 years.
Rolling, crying, screaming, holding their tongue out.
All kinds of things.
Trying to get a particular gift of the
Holy Spirit.
And here in Ephesians 5, it's compared to
having a glass of wine.
Or being drunk with wine.
You can go out to London tonight and
find a few thousand drunk with wine if
you look around hard enough.
The Spirit-filled life is for everyone.
Belonging to a team in a family like
this, for me, is tremendous reality.
Because when you're on the road preaching and
blowing out of town 12 hours after you
preach, there's an element of unreality.
You're not living with those people.
Praise God, thousands made commitments to missions.
Thousands came to Jesus.
But what if I had to go live
with these people that come forward in my
meetings?
I live with them for a year.
Well, I don't have that privilege.
I've got this privilege.
Come back here and you've got the same
thing.
We know each other.
We've seen one another's weaknesses.
We get bored with each other at times.
There are probably times we don't even want
to particularly see a particular person.
How many of us can say as the
Apostle Paul, write to someone on the team,
I'm longing to see you?
I didn't get any letters from Susan Priestley
in Vienna.
I'm longing to see you.
Actually, I did get some fairly positive vibrations.
That was a poor illustration.
But we're family and we become accustomed to
being together and praying together and coming and
going.
And now we're just getting the dates for
the ICT retreat.
Oh, big deal.
We've had how many of these over the
years?
Some don't even want to come.
They make that pretty clear.
And then the Christmas party.
And as I was talking to Vera to
get a date for the Christmas party, he
said, well, we'd better contact the Square Dance.
The Square Dance group.
She said, well, is that what people want?
Brilliant question.
I don't know.
That's what I want.
How many want to have the Square Dance
at the Christmas party?
Raise your hand.
Okay.
Square Dance.
Anyway.
Barn Dance.
How many want to have a Barn Dance?
Miscommunication.
Okay, carry.
As long as there's ten of us.
But what I'm trying to say by all
this is that the bottom line, whether we're
on this team or whether we're on the
road, whether we're feeling good or not feeling
good, whether we're bored or not bored, whether
we're gung-ho for AD2000 and Acts 13
Breakthrough 2000 and Global Action, all these things
that get presented here.
Sometimes with very little response, actually.
The bottom line is that we're all still
supposed to be filled with the Spirit every
day.
The last passage I wanted to read was
from my Bible study this morning or yesterday
morning.
2 Corinthians.
I haven't read this much lately, so I
never want to overdose people on this.
It gets them depressed.
The final warning in 2 Corinthians 13.
I was reading, again, some prosperity literature.
It is amazing the propaganda that proper prosperity
people are making.
I think of a particular magazine where, as
far as I know, the editor of the
magazine and the people behind that magazine are
not that in favor of this heavy, heavy
kind of extreme prosperity and yet full-page
ads.
Why, does it have money?
OM, I don't think, has ever ran an
ad once in that magazine.
It's a specific Christian magazine.
I've been getting it for years.
It's not my favorite, but it's a good
magazine, relatively speaking.
It has a full-page ad.
I just wonder what these people do with
so many passages.
Because I've been studying, and I know most
of you have for years.
With me, it's 40 years plus, and I
see so much about suffering in the New
Testament.
And this passage is just one of many,
and it's about the apostle Paul in 2
Corinthians 11.
Did I say 13?
I'm sorry, 11.
It's not far away.
What anyone else dares to boast about, I
am speaking as a fool.
Imagine the person saying this.
I also dare to boast about.
Are they Hebrew?
So am I.
Are they Israelites?
So am I.
Are they Abraham's descendants?
So am I.
Are they servants of Christ?
I am out of my mind to talk
like this.
I am more.
I've worked much harder.
I've been in prison more frequently.
I've been flogged more severely.
I've been exposed to death again and again.
Five times, I received from the Jews 40
lashes.
Five times, 40 lashes.
Minus one.
Three times, I was beaten with rods.
Once, I was stoned.
Three times, I was shipwrecked.
I spent a night and a day in
the open sea.
I have been constantly on the move.
I have been in danger from rivers, in
danger from bandits, in dangers from my own
countrymen, in dangers from Gentiles, in dangers in
the city, in dangers in the country, in
dangers at sea, in the dangers from false
brethren.
I've labored and toiled and have often gone
without sleep.
I have known hunger and thirst.
I've often gone without food.
I've been cold.
I've been naked.
Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure
of my concern for all the churches.
And believe me, for Corinthians, it's obvious that
the churches had plenty of problems.
And when we think sometimes that we have
a lot of problems and we're getting under
the burden, we should turn to passages like
this.
And I think it really ministers.
Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure
of my concern for all the churches.
Who is weak?
And I do not feel weak.
Who is led in sin?
I do not inwardly burn.
Heavy temptation, Paul must have faced.
If I must boast, I will boast of
the things that show my weakness.
The God and Father of the Lord Jesus,
who is to be praised forever, knows that
I am not lying.
In Damascus, the governor under King Aretas had
the city of the Damascus scenes guarded in
order to arrest me.
But I was lowered in a basket from
a window.
Can you imagine that?
Have you ever had that experience?
Maybe we can have that into our training
program.
I was lowered in a basket from a
window in the wall and slipped through his
hands.
We know there's a number of other passages
just in Corinthians with a similar emphasis.
And yet the same person who writes all
this tells us in Ephesians that we are
to be filled with the Spirit and to
go on being filled with the Spirit.
I don't know if any of you are
feeling down tonight.
That's a favorite expression, isn't it, from numerous
people.
I don't know if any of you feel
dry.
Many times I sometimes ask people how you're
doing spiritually.
They say so often I'm not really getting
time in the Word like I would like
to.
I often feel like saying I always have
to be careful because I can be so
hurtful.
That's not the question I ask whether you're
in the Word or not.
Do you think you have to be in
the Word of God every day to be
spiritual?
You don't.
Because once you're a believer the Spirit of
God is in you, the Word is in
you.
You need to make sure the Word is
coming out.
Now I personally do get in the Word
of God every day.
Don't misunderstand me, and I believe that is
an important part, but it's the means to
the end.
The end is becoming Christlike.
The end is walking in the Spirit.
The end is a victorious life.
The end is the Spirit-filled life.
The Word, prayer, certain kinds of prayer, because
worship is an end in itself, isn't it?
But certain kinds of prayer, defensive prayer is
all the means to the end.
So somehow if you're in the fast lane
and you miss that time with God, you
should just cry out to the Lord driving
to work or wherever you're going.
Say, Lord, I wish I'd got that time
with you this morning.
Help me maybe get some time later on.
But I acknowledge your life in me.
I acknowledge your life in me.
I've missed my quiet time quite a few
days in my life.
Probably less, a small percentage, but enough to
at least be able to testify as far
as I know, days that I've missed my
quiet time have been often better than days
when I had the quiet time.
So there's something to throw a wrench in
general public thinking.
Even my friend Billy Graham once said and
promoted some superstition that when he misses his
quiet time, sort of things all start going
wrong.
Well, I believed that for many years.
I don't believe it anymore.
I don't think Billy Graham does either.
And believe me, I'm known for being either
a little bit fanatic about people having their
quiet time.
So don't misunderstand me.
What I'm trying to say is with or
without quiet time, with or without nice feelings,
with or without a lovely, friendly, beautiful atmosphere,
with or without all of our needs provided,
we should be living victoriously in Jesus.
And if we on OM, with all the
food we have, all these conferences, all these
books, all these films, all these seminars, some
of us have been in Bible columns until
the verses were popping out of our eyes
and ears.
If we can't live somewhat victoriously, I would
question whether the whole thing is really true.
But of course, I don't question that.
Therefore, I believe we can live victoriously.
We often laugh at Billy Jones.
How old is Billy now?
Is he 85?
84.
We often laugh at Billy Jones.
And we need to understand this man's background.
He was a boxer.
I mean, he was saved from a very
rough life.
And he came into it.
And it's true.
Billy's extreme and he and I have tangled.
As far as I can see, he was
moving for a while into sinless perfection.
And Billy, if you're listening to this tape,
God bless you.
I'll get another letter.
I've had many over the years.
But isn't it amazing that as far as
we can see, and we got Pauline to
testify, Billy Jones has lived relatively joyfully, victoriously
all these years.
And especially maybe to people who don't particularly
fancy Billy or he's not quite their style
of person, then the message should be even
stronger.
Because if Billy Jones, an ex-boxer, I
won't say anything else, can live victoriously every
day, then what about the rest of us?
It's possible.
To live victoriously, joyfully, filled with the Spirit
every day.
Doesn't mean there won't be downs.
It doesn't mean you're not going to have
all the emotion that can happen.
My final thought is, how would you like
to be sitting in the seat of that
TWA flight?
I just read a little more about that.
And it seems that the bomb blew up
in such a way that a chunk of
the front of the plane took off and
for several seconds people in the economy section
were looking straight out into the sky before
that thing went down.
How many of you are ready for a
TWA experience?
As I got that news and had to
get on a jumbo jet out of Singapore,
I said, Jesus, I'm ready.
And if a guy like me, a coward,
a scaredy cat of airplanes, if I can
be ready, we all can be ready for
TWA.
Anyway, the fact of the matter is an
OM team was almost on that plane.
Koreans were booked to go that day in
that plane to Belgium via Paris and they
decided for some fluke to go a day
later.
I wonder how OM would have handled an
entire team wiped out in a TWA flight.
I wonder what mood we'd be in tonight
as I came back here.
But I will tell you, if the Koreans,
who actually want to be the biggest players
in missions by the year 2000, if they're
not ready for a lot of martyrs and
a lot of deaths, they better not do
it.
Two dear missionary sisters last week were just
killed in Eritrea.
And it's usually not some special glamorous way.
It's usually automobile accidents.
Two wives who's in the press.
Well, praise God we're not as those without
hope.
Let's pray.
Lord, we believe from your word that the
spirit-filled life is our privilege through the
indwelling of the Holy Spirit in us.
And we come from different churches and different
terminology.
Some speak of fulfilling, some speak of baptism,
some speak of anointing, some speak of all
three plus more on top.
But Lord, we want this reality and we
believe it is ours daily through all that
you have done on the cross and through
the gift of the Holy Spirit living in
us.
Deliver us, Lord, from our excuses.
Deliver us from extremism.
Deliver us from anything that somehow is hindering
us from really running the race, really rejoicing
in the midst of the pain, rejoicing in
the midst of the heartaches.
Maybe not always outwardly as that can be
maybe offensive in certain situations.
We certainly wouldn't just be sort of rejoicing
at the memorial service of the two killed
in a bombing in Atlanta a couple of
days ago.
But in our hearts, there can be by
your grace the perpetual filling and flooding over
of your Holy Spirit.
We thank you, God.
There is a place for weeping.
There is a place for sadness.
We are extremely sad about the situation among
the Tutsis in the Hatu.
We are extremely sad, Lord, for the loved
ones of that horrendous TWA bomb attack.
Our hearts grieve.
We feel the anger against terrorism and against
extremism and injustice and unrighteousness.
And yet at the same time, by your
grace, we believe we can be spirit-filled
people.
And we know we'll all of our life
be learning what that actually means in terms
of the finer tuning and the complex things
that come down life's road.
I have an affirmation service, but that's what
we're going to do right now.
We're just going to affirm Dick and Hilary
Wyatt in the ministry at Mana House because
a decision has been made that they're going
to be staying on there for longer term.
Some of you may realize before Dick and
Hilary got into the picture very much, we
had another couple we were interviewing, British man
just about to leave the Air Force, but
based in the States, married a woman from
America and they have a daughter.
They have not been able to see a
financial breakthrough.
I talked to them again on the phone.
They understand that we can't just keep that
door open for them.
If they do come, it probably won't be
until January and it won't be into that
particular part of our ministry.
So we were able to, in the last
one or two days, give the news to
Dick and Hilary that we accepted their willingness
to stay on and press on there.
So I'd like you to come up and
we want to just pray and pray for
the ministry at Mana House.
Dick and Hilary, please come up.
Chaco, come on up.
Chaco's been the one negotiating all this.
Let's just commit them to the Lord.
Let's have someone else.
Let's just really pray for them.
This is such a strategic ministry.
Let us not think of Mana House as
some little attachment to the team where we
shunt tired o-amers to get some grub
and a bed.
This is a ministry.
And in our day and age, it's the
hospitality ministry that often cuts more ice than
the printed page.
That's hard for Mr. Book Pusher to admit.
But even in my original book on the
subject of literature, one of the key chapters
is about love and that if we're not
reaching out in love to people, then we're
not going to see the breakthroughs.
So sometimes they have a lot of people.
There was 20 there last night, I believe.
Not 30.
30.
That must be the record.
And other times, we hope they will have
times when they're there a little bit on
their own because it can be very, very
intensive.
So, Chunko, you pray and then I'll pray.
Praise the Lord.
Father, we thank you.
We especially want to thank you for Dick
and Hillary.
Thank you, O Lord.
I'd like to do something later on with
Mary and even with Neil, her husband, who's
one of the pastors here at the fellowship
that meets in this building.
I would like us just to, again, publicly
thank the Lord for calling Mary Brinkley back
into our team.
She was with us for many years.
I could start sharing a lot of things,
but there's not time.
It might be an embarrassment to her, but
I would like Mary for you to come.
And Drina, let's just commit Mary.
She's going to be around for a couple
of weeks, then going off and then coming
back, something like that.
But today we had an hour and a
half, two-hour session just speaking together about
the future.
And I'm excited about Mary's ministry in our
midst.
So please, Mary, come up.
And Drina and John Wilkins, please come up.
Let's pray for Mary, even for these days.
A lot of orientation.
OM has changed a little bit.
How many years ago when you left?
88.
So it's eight years ago.
And anyway, let's pray.
Drina, you start, and then John, then I'll
pray.
Father, we do just thank you for hearing
and for marrying me.
My name is Naeem Shahbaz, and I'm serving
the Lord in Pakistan.
I have about 100 church members.
Praise the Lord.
The Lord is working very powerful in Pakistan,
and I can say that there is a
revival in Pakistan.
When you will go in the places where
the mostly Christian peoples are living, you will
see that many young girls and boys, they
have all the Bibles, and they are going
here and there.
Every person you will see with a Bible.
And I think this is a great privilege
for me, especially I read a book, No
Turning Back, in Pakistan.
And today when I came here to see
my brother, Brother Howard, he told me that
there is a prayer meeting, and you can
see there, so this is a great privilege
for me.
And I'm very glad that I have seen
today a very great servant of God who
has burdened not just for England, but for
all the world.
And I'm very happy to see you, because
you know I'm a pastor, and often I'm
looking for a very local area, but I'm
looking that you are thinking for all the
world, and it will be a new way
for me also to pray for other people,
especially the people who are suffering, especially in
Sudan.
I have heard, and my heart was broken
when I listened that Christian people are persecuted
there.
We are also sometimes persecuted in Pakistan, especially
when we minister to the Muslim people.
But we know that while you are praying
and many people are praying, one day Lord
will do a mighty work in Pakistan.
Because the things which are impossible for us,
all the things are possible to God.
And OM team is working there, and I
know one of my friend is working with
OM team.
Last year he offered me to come in
Mali.
There was a campaign, and he said to
me that after that campaign we shall go
to preach in the mountain areas where the
very strict Muslims live.
I said, no, I'm busy.
In fact I was busy, but I didn't
know that that man, he will be beaten
there.
Otherwise I would have gone with him.
When he came back, somebody told me that
his face is very, very, his structure of
face has changed.
I said, what happened to him?
He said he was preaching the Gospel among
the Muslims, and the Muslim people, they began
to beat him.
But thank God he came back and he
was alive.
We need your prayers for Pakistan.
This is my request, especially for Pakistan, for
the conversion of Muslims, because, you know, Muslims,
during my ministry I preached among the Muslims.
Many Muslim people, they came to my church
for prayers, for healing, and the people who
are demon-possessed, and after that they confessed
that Jesus Christ, we believe that Jesus Christ
is the Son of God.
But they have a problem, they cannot confess
before the public.
If they will confess, they will kill, anybody
can kill him, anybody can.
So this is my request, that you please
pray for my country, that the Lord open
the hearts of the political leaders, and the
Lord may open the hearts of Mawlana's, Muslim
Mawlana's, Muslim priests.
When their hearts will be opened, then many,
many thousands of people, I believe that thousands
of people can come to Jesus, thousands of
Muslims.
And please pray for my family and for
my ministry here.
Thank you very much.
Tell us about your family.
You have a wife and children?
Yes, I have just one wife.
And for children I have two daughters and
two sons.
What are their names?
Catherine, she is eight years old, and David
is seven years old, Anthony is four years
old, and Caroline, she is one and a
half years old.
Thank you.
Andrew and Mike, please come.
Let us commit our brother again to the
Lord and the ministry, and pray for him.
I am based on the west coast of
Kazakhstan, with a small team of OMers, and
we are young and we are inexperienced, and
God is working in that place.
And just sitting here just has emphasized to
me just the privilege that I have had
just to witness what God is doing there.
And so the city that we are in
is a city of about 150,000.
It is quite a young city, and it
is populated about 50% Kazakh population and
about 50% Russian population.
There are three churches and one mosque in
the city.
The three churches are generally targeted towards the
Russian population, and the vast majority of believers
in the city are Russian believers.
In terms of the Kazakh population, there is
a small cell group which has been operating
now for just under three years, and within
that cell group there are about 15 Kazakh
believers, and the rest of the Kazakh population
would call themselves Muslims.
But let me just say that from that
small cell group, even in the last, say,
four months, we have just seen incredible ways
that God is working amongst that group of
people.
And the family that initiated that group was
a young guy who at the age of
19 was converted by reading more than the
carpenter when he was in prison.
And so he went home, and his mother,
who was quite a devout Muslim, also became
a believer.
And then this family have become the core
of this small cell group, and from that
it's just reaching out from there.
And I'll just give you a testimony of
one lady that has just began attending the
cell group, maybe, say, a month or so
ago.
She came because she believed that her niece
was getting involved in some cult group, and
so she came saying that she didn't believe
in God, that she was an atheist, and
she just wanted to dispute everything that was
being taught.
And basically within the space of...
She attended the Wednesday night.
We have a Wednesday night study and then
a Sunday church service and then a Wednesday
again.
From one Wednesday to the next Wednesday she
went from claiming to be atheist right through
to a full conversion experience and just gifts
of the Spirit and prophecies and just amazing
testimony this woman has got.
And so, yeah, God is really at work
there.
In the last summer we've seen the baptism
of nine new Kazakh believers.
That's just in the last three months.
Out of a group of 15, just in
the last three months.
So the main point, I think, is that
we have two men in the group.
It's predominantly women, and so we really need
some men leaders within that group.
Amen.
Thank you very much, Sue.
Let's pray in our small groups.
I'd like to just say a word about
Finland and have a little time of prayer
for Finland.
I've just come from there.
I was there for about four days at
a youth conference sponsored by the Finnish Lutheran
Mission, which is a group that really we've
been linked with for almost the beginning of
OM in Finland.
A number of their leaders were involved in
OM back in the mid-60s.
So one of the encouragements going back to
Finland was to meet people in fairly significant
ministries who were greatly helped and challenged when
they were on OM so many years ago.
They had a couple thousand at this conference.
I think there were different people at different
times, so I'm sure they had more, but
usually you were talking to an audience of
a couple thousand.
And it was one of these kind of
things, a big variety with a heavy emphasis
on music.
It was really almost like a cornerstone music
festival.
Noel Richards was there leading worship.
An amazing musician was there from Australia that
I don't think we've seen the last of
in OM, named Steve Grease.
He's just won a major award in the
States.
He's not known, never been in Britain ministering.
He'd like to, but he's sort of a
country rock singer.
He was a truck driver, and God dealt
with him.
All of his songs he's written himself.
I've been listening to his songs again today.
Just some amazing songs.
Just a very real kind of person.
He made a great impact.
There were many others.
Some of the meetings I spoke to weren't
the main meeting.
They were smaller meetings.
One was out on a boat.
So I talked about the ship ministry.
On this boat outside of Latvia, a big
lake.
Finland has how many lakes?
Somebody said 100,000.
Count the little ones.
Serpa says 60,000 at least.
Can you imagine that?
One lake for every dozen people or something
like that.
There's a great sense of struggle among Finnish
Christians right now because of a number of
factors.
So humanly speaking, missions is not on an
uphill.
It's going down.
The other very large Finnish mission society, sort
of more official, older Finnish mission society, has
had many missionaries returning and not going back.
At the same time, it would be difficult
to say that I spoke to a more
responsive audience.
Finns don't easily jump out of their seats
and start cheering.
They're known to be serious people.
Even when this rock singer was going really
strong, most of them remained seated.
That is unusual.
But there was quite a crowd that slowly
came forward and joined as they do in
these kind of concerts, including me.
But whenever the invitation was given, two nights
I wasn't speaking or giving the invitation, I
was speaking before that, huge numbers came up,
both to believe on the Lord and then
to recommit their lives.
I had the main message on the Saturday
night.
On Sunday, I had 11 minutes at the
last session.
But the minister had to go off because
his wife was ill with cancer, quite serious.
So last minute they came to me and
said, Are you able to take more time?
Do mice eat cheese?
Then they hit me with a tougher one.
They said, We'd like you to give the
invitation, which is always a bigger challenge in
my book than speaking, to pull that in,
especially through interpretation.
Often when I give an invitation, I just
have people stand.
They say, We want you to call forward.
I said, For what?
Missions.
I always have a struggle with that because
I know some respond emotionally.
It can be a misfire, but I took
it from the Lord, and I guess about
200 came forward to commit themselves.
We put a strong emphasis on being His
witness.
We received support in Finland.
I think the thing that really hit me
after that is everywhere on the stage, and
the man who organized all this after they
came forward, he came to me and says,
What do we do now?
I said, What do we do now?
There was nothing really organized.
There were no counselors.
So we spoke to them a little bit,
and then Little Richard led us into closing
chorus, and the conference was over.
I'd like you to really pray that somehow
this project that's not been going very well
called Operation Support Breakthrough, some of you are
the few that have even heard about it,
that somehow that could get off the ground
more.
It is often that a number of key
books are published that are connected with this
project in various languages, and they are going
out, but it's so small compared to the
need.
In my dream, I have a definition.
I have a dream that Steve Chong would
be if you were there when he spoke
at the ship thing.
It's a matter of definitions, but I have
a dream.
You can probably say you have a vision.
That whenever we have meetings like this, everybody
can get a packet of materials.
Is that asking too much?
When young people lay their life on the
altar, willing to be a missionary, we can
give them a packet of maybe one or
two cassettes and a book.
What do you do next?
That's why we call it Support Breakthrough.
We may change the name on that.
There's specifically books that will show them God's
place in God's teaching about money and how
to raise money.
Because if they don't learn that, they're not
going into missions in most cases.
I remember in South Africa, I could give
you case after case where we have a
big response.
They're not given any literature now.
If they have the initiative to go to
the book table, there are books available.
We had our books available there in Finland.
Let's pray for Finland, but let's focus especially
on these young people.
A couple of hundred have made decisions in
connection with recommitment and maybe salvation.
A couple of hundred who responded to the
missions challenge.
Let's pray for the churches of Finland.
A church growth movement has been born through
Dawn and is led by a very interesting
ex-OMer who I had lunch with because
on Sunday morning I went to a little
OM reunion.
It was like a black-and-white movie.
There was Frank and Anneli Deeds, and there's
Oskala Tuopi and his wife, and some other
old-timers.
We had a nice time together.
Then this brother, Kari Torma, is that how
you pronounce his name?
More or less.
He was one of the first Finns to
get involved with us.
He is now the leader of the Dawn
movement.
They want to plant 4,000 new churches
and quite a few Finns.
Churches are behind that.
Some are not behind it.
They're opposed to it.
Finland is dominated by the Lutheran Church, and
a high percentage of them are more conservative
and more evangelical.
It doesn't mean they're all alive, but it's
not like many other parts of Europe.
So there's a lot of potential, and we're
so grateful to God that we have at
least one Finn on the team.
Finland is providing quite a few wives.
This has been a secondary ministry, pioneered by
Anneli Deeds, who got Frank, or Frank got
her, and John Brown is a Finnish wife,
and Randy Jury and Tyrone is a Finnish
wife.
Of course, whenever you go to a church
meeting in Finland or even a youth congress
like this, four out of five people are
women.
So we do need to pray for more
Finnish men to get mobilized and to get
into missions.
They have a lot of books in Finnish,
but some of them don't get very wide
circulation.
They have a great passion and interest in
Afghanistan, and a number have been laboring in
Afghanistan.
And I think there are people that when
we get them to the mission field, they
often make really good missionaries.
So let's pray for Finland.
I was with Asko Alajoki and his wife
Maria.
I'm in Asko Matika and his wife Maria.
Don't get the Askos mixed up.
Next year, the same conference is in Helsinki,
near where they live, nearby the airport.
And it looks like they may have part
of the responsibility for that conference in the
future.
We actually now only have about 40 Finns
on a year or longer term program, according
to Asko Alajoki, the OM director there.
So let's pray.
Of course, there's people that are come for
the summer.
But let's pray that we may see some
more launching out.
Let's go back to our groups, pray for
the land of Finland, especially in the light
of these prayer requests that I have shared.
Amen.
I'd like us just to spend a little
time in prayer for Korea.
And Koreans, I just say that the time
in Wheaton was quite overwhelming.
I got in there from Singapore on Monday
afternoon and had to speak at the plenary
session of the Korean American group.
Fortunately, that was in English only, right on
that Monday night.
And Graham Jack arrived.
Even as I was speaking, he just arrived
and got the balloon blown up, which they
just thought was terrific.
But there are a couple hundred Korean Americans
and for the first time, they had a
separate parallel conference.
And this shows the change that is rapidly
taking place among Koreans, is that we're now
dealing with a generation that speak English.
And they are very, very different from their
moms and dads.
So one prayer request is for Korean Americans.
They are slower in getting into missions than
the Koreans have been.
But they're now moving big time.
And they have English.
And we know the struggle many Koreans have,
two or three years to learn English.
So the Korean American challenge, we told them
that.
And I think we're going to see a
lot.
They were there for about, I wasn't there
the whole time, but it's a more or
less four or five day conference, a serious
missions event.
Over 2,000 were at the overall conference.
And I can only say, the Koreans seem,
of all the nations I go to, the
Koreans seem the most serious about world missions.
Just amazing.
This one meeting I had when I was
the main speaker, they had three other missionary
reports before me.
Each one was a sermon.
They were half an hour to 45 minutes.
I was sitting there on the platform.
The meeting finished at midnight.
I preached somewhere around 10 or something.
And I stayed there to the end.
But nobody seemed, this was in the big
Wheaton College auditorium, the same place I had
several months ago spoke to all the Wheaton
students.
But no one seemed to be that disturbed
by the length of the meeting.
And he then got up and exhorted them
to please make sure they're there at 6
.30 in the morning for their prayer time.
I must confess, I didn't make that as
jet lagged as it was.
So that was an exciting time.
They had an amazing array of speakers.
It was really a humbling opportunity to have
a main plenary session with them.
A project, Operation World in Korea, took a
long time.
And I remember being last May in Korea
and saying when I bought all these copies
of Operation World, can we get 500 of
these, I said to somebody, over to the
States?
And again and again we'd get these reports
that they weren't there.
They weren't there.
And praise God they arrived in time.
In 10 minutes we sold 150 copies of
Operation World in Korea.
And these are all leaders, mainly all leaders
and missionaries.
But isn't it an example of, in the
area of literature and other areas, the importance
somehow of planning ahead, of somehow seeing what's
down the road there where we need to
be getting literature, we need to be getting
something published.
Actually serving as senders is available in Korean.
We did use that a little bit when
we were there last May.
So pray for the Korean situation.
500,000 Koreans alone just in Southern California.
The big delegations of Koreans at this conference
came from really all over the place.
And the leader of this conference, we were
together after that meeting, it was about midnight,
and he heard what happened with all these
Operation Worlds.
He said I'd like 1,000 copies for
next year.
It seems to me they're having this, trying
to have this every year.
It's quite amazing.
Some of you know I leave for Friday
for Korea.
That is the Urbana meetings of Korea, student
meetings.
And they're expecting about 4,000 students.
And a lot of them want to get
going.
They want to get trained.
They want to get going.
So I have two of the main evening
plenary sessions.
I'm the only foreigner that speaks in the
evening.
They have a number of foreigners speaking in
the morning.
So I really would appreciate prayer, especially around
next Thursday, Wednesday and Thursday.
And then I have two, I'm purposely staying
two Sundays because they have these big, huge
churches, including Pastor Oak's church, where I have
the opportunity of sharing.
So let's pray for those churches.
And then I'm staying an extra three days
now because the door is open to speak
to 1,000 Christian businessmen on the Sunday
commissions.
Up to now, the business community in Korea
is not into missions in any large way.
There are exceptions.
They are into their churches.
They're into their own businesses.
And yet, if we don't see a breakthrough
with business people, a lot of this vision
for Koreans to go, especially career people, is
not going to happen because at the end
of the day, the money, a lot of
it comes into the churches, has to pay.
The churches have huge staff.
They have buildings.
They have a lot of expenses.
Only a small amount of money is going
into missions.
Again, there are a few exceptions.
We've got to see business people catching the
vision and for bigger giving.
I don't know if you realize that not
that many business people have a vision beyond
their tithe.
Most think many don't have that.
Most think, you know, a tithe, that's where
it's at.
But, you know, if you've got millions, what
is a tithe?
R.G. LeTourneau said the tithe, live on
10%.
That's what he said.
And as many a man and woman around
the world could easily live on 10%
of the income, not you or me.
So let's pray for this visit to Korea.
Let's not think of this as just, as
some of you know, my wife is not
going with me, and I can tell you
myself, I don't, surely don't want to go,
but I am going.
From there, I go to the ship for
a couple of days in southern Japan.
I've never been to Japan in my life.
Then a quick one-day thing in Anchorage,
which seems to be really taking off in
Alaska.
Then out of Vancouver for one day and
back here to go to the Bangor Convention
in Northern Ireland.
And then I'll meet you in the General
Council.
So I have a more challenging couple of
weeks.
Rather than pray in small groups, let's pray
as one body for Korea.
Especially remembering the Koreans that we have already
on OM.
Some of them don't find it so easy.
We've got to realize the key for Korea,
I think like most places, is first equality.
There's got to be equality.
And yet we, as a movement committed to
training, we need to be creative on how
we can be better and more effective in
training Koreans and empowering them, developing them for
the kingdom.
It really is quite amazing to see the
growth of the number of Koreans in OM.
We've been privileged often on our team to
have some Koreans, but we're not in that
mode right now.
We don't have any Koreans on the team,
so you can pray about that as well.
Okay, I'd like to just briefly share about
Singapore and pray for Singapore and for Joshua
Project.
Joshua Project really is the big focus of
AD2000 right now.
There are a lot of things going on
in AD2000, different tracks and task forces, things
networked into it.
But the burden of those who especially are
committed to the unreached people was that of
all the things AD2000 is involved in, that
reaching the unreached people will be the priority.
And that's what Joshua Project represents.
Now you can go out to a meeting
where Joshua Project's being presented and they'll give
you a folder with all 2,000 people's
groups listed in it.
Now, there's still controversy about numbers of people's
groups.
That's not my burden to get involved in
that controversy.
But being in Singapore about 12, 13 days
ago really showed me that some people, they
really do grab onto this Joshua Project.
It's something they understand.
The idea, first of all, is to pray
for these 2,000 unreached people, then to
get them all sponsored by churches, adopted by
churches, then to send, if you're able, research
teams out there, and then to send church
planting missionaries.
And I'd like you to especially pray for
the Methodist Church in Singapore.
Pretty well evangelical.
The leader of missions in the Methodist Church
was greatly impacted at Jekoia.
You know, sometimes we, some of us, we've
been to a lot of these conferences.
We don't even particularly want to go.
And I've even heard people say, well, what's
the use of these things?
But I can tell you, there's a lot
of people who don't have the daily, weekly,
monthly exposures and missions that we have in
OM.
And when they go to this kind of
conference, it completely changes their life.
And the impact of that, when they go
back to their own country, you cannot measure.
And when I saw what was happening in
the Joshua Project in Singapore, and that opened
the door for me.
One of the biggest meetings I've had among
Singaporean leaders was because I was pushed by
Louise Bush as a Joshua Project speaker.
And they actually asked me to speak about
Acts 13, Breakthrough 2000, which we attach to
the Joshua Project.
But it was a very encouraging meeting.
But I was mainly there for the Wesley
Methodist Church.
They have 4,000 going to their four
services.
And this man who is responsible for missions
among the Methodists in Singapore, he has presented
the challenge that every Methodist church adopted people's
movement.
So this weekend that I was there was
their missions conference.
We had many different sessions.
But in the main Sunday morning service, and
you seldom see this now in the States,
much less in England, the whole Sunday morning
service was missions.
I was the speaker.
And they adopted the Yi people.
I'd never heard of them actually.
The Yi people of China.
And apparently it's a significantly large mountain group,
not only in China, but some of the
surrounding countries.
And there's not much work among them.
So this church of 4,000 members adopted
this group very seriously.
They had documents out, elders coming, signing, and
special prayer.
They're now getting ready to send workers.
It was quite encouraging that one of the
women from that church just back is working
with O&M, with David Greenlee.
And she gave her testimony at one of
the meetings.
And I think she may stay with O
&M in the future.
She's from this huge church.
Many business people.
But this one woman picked me up at
the hotel.
I'm staying in this hotel as a gift
from another friend who happens to own the
hotel.
And she was on the missions committee.
And as she was driving me to the
meeting, I just felt I'm going to talk
to her about money.
And I said, she was, obviously she had
a well-paying job.
And I said, look, has the Lord given
you the vision to really put some of
this money into world missions?
I don't always do that.
Don't get the wrong idea.
And she said, well, I'm working on that.
In other words, she's thinking about it.
And after the meeting that night, she wrote
me a check for 10,000 Singapore dollars.
If you don't think that helped make my
day, you obviously still don't understand me.
That's okay.
Hang in there.
So let's pray.
She said to me, very few business people
have a vision for giving big money to
world missions.
They reinvested, reinvested, reinvested.
And as some of you know, one of
the passions of Mr. Wei is to get
other people to get money.
And he is bold.
When he gets the opportunity, he's bold as
a lion.
He's flying to be with me in the
business meeting in Korea.
He's coming out to Seoul.
Also, my friend Ernesto Wong from Vancouver is
going to be with me.
So pray that we may make an impact.
But let's pray.
I had a great time with Rodney.
Just back from Love Australia and Love Asia.
I've never known so many love events going
on in history.
There must be 20 different love events going
on.
Some of them quite small.
But this looks like that's the way it's
going to be in the future.
These little congresses and training sessions literally all
over the whole globe.
And then people launching out in evangelism.
So I had a great time with Kenneth,
Bong, and Rodney.
They would appreciate prayers.
They just long to see more workers going
out from Singapore.
I went up to Malaysia very briefly.
Some of you know, a man up there
recently gave a large gift to the ship.
I had a very good time of fellowship
with him, but we won't go into more
detail.
But remember Daniel Ho, leader of the work
in Malaysia.
Well, I think we'll bring our meeting to
the end now or we're getting near the
end.
So if you can stay around, have a
cup of tea with us.
We have our little hospitality squad when they
hear me hinting.
They move into action to prepare some tea
and coffee.
And to those of you who have had
these prayer requests, by cassette tape, the Lord
bless you, and don't hesitate to keep sending
us your prayer requests.
By the way, they had this prayer day
in South Africa and 27,000 people came.
Now they're hoping for many more people.
It turned out to be the coldest day
in Pretoria in years.
Completely a free day.
Snow came in some places.
And they still had 27,000.
I keep forgetting my goal is every permitting
to have a book of the night and
then give that book away free.
But sometimes I forget.
But as I walked in the room, I
saw the book so well organized.
There's the book written by a brother with
O.M. in South Africa who is one
of the leaders in that day of prayer.
O.M. is very involved in that.
Change your world through prayer.
And that's the book of the night.
You can have one free at the table
right there under the Joshua Project poster.
And since we like to do things in
pairs, just like married couples, we have this
other book.
What Happened to the Fire?
How many of you have read this or
read a good part of it?
Good.
This is an amazing book.
This is a book calling for the rekindling
of the blaze of the charismatic renewal written
by a leading charismatic teacher.
And it really does have a lot of
balancing skills.
It's stories that to me just speak of
integrity.
I love integrity.
So I encourage you.
I'm just so happy.
We're trying to get more copies of this.
I'm so happy that they've arrived.
Lee Grady's What Happened to the Fire?
If you don't have one on your team,
you can write to us.
Change your world through prayer by Benny Mostert,
South African.
Two free books for everybody here tonight, except
our visitor, Zan, to take at least three.
You can go to the other room and
get those.
Okay.
Let's pray in our final session for Singapore,
Malaysia, workers, finance.
Let's give thanks.
Many, many, many in the Westland Methodist Church
make commitments of their lives to missions through
the conference that I've just come from there.
But again, the follow-up is a big,
big challenge.
Over 400 churches now in Singapore.
And things are picking up at such a
momentum.
There's a new church registering every week in
Singapore.
It's a phenomenal potential for the kingdom.
Let's close in prayer.
Father, we thank you for this time together.
We thank you that all over the world
there are people who are committed to the
ministry of prayer, who have come to discern
what faith is all about.
And when we think of the barren acts
of Peter in prison and how the church
was gathered together praying, we long for that
reality in our own churches, in our own
lives.
Father, we're committed somehow by your grace to
spread this vision and to be somehow, each
day, filled and controlled by your Holy Spirit.
We pray in Jesus' name.
Amen.