In the months of July and August 1968,
just on a thousand young people and some
older ones too, gathered together in an empty
factory just outside Brussels for preparatory conferences, each
lasting about a week, before going forth into
Europe with the gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ.
This recording is of one of the many
messages which were given there.
Because many of those present could not speak
English, interpreters were there to translate to six
language groups in different parts of the auditorium.
This translation work has been extracted as far
as possible to make listening a little easier,
and consequently there are various unexpected changes of
tone in the speaker's voice, and also the
interpreters can sometimes be heard where they overlap
the speaker.
Nothing has been added to or taken from
the actual message itself.
Communicating this way is not the best way
to communicate truth.
That's why we had discussion groups and other
sessions, and I can only say that I
just pray that somehow through it all you
may catch a glimpse of what's on the
heart of God tonight.
Lord, you talk tonight about the world.
Of course it means the people of the
world.
God loves the people of the world, and
because he loved the people of the world,
he gave his son.
We have this poster here from 2 Corinthians
8, 9, speaking about him, Christ who was
rich, yet for our sake he became poor.
How true that is.
And God, we believe, does love the world,
all the people of all the world.
Again, tonight we've seen that prayer is our
weapon, and I can only say amen to
what Brother Mike Evans has said.
Now I'll just speak to you a little
bit about the target for prayer.
As we get on our knees to pray,
we realize priority, of course, is worship and
praise.
We've already spoken about this.
However, there's also, as we have had it
described in ministry, of intercession.
We begin to pray for others.
We begin to pray for the world, and
I hope that tonight in this brief message
I can set before you some of the
targets for prayer, some of the goals we
believe that Christ has given his church, and
dare we have any goals less than that
which Jesus himself gave.
If Jesus Christ said the whole world, it's
sin to remain in only part of the
world.
If Jesus said every tribe and tongue and
nation, it's sin not for us to think
in terms of every tribe, tongue, and nation.
If the Bible is true, then it should
be given to the world.
If it is not true, then it would
be better if it were taken from the
world.
And I believe tonight that God wants to
broaden our horizons.
In Acts chapter one, we have a very
famous verse.
It tells where we are to be his
witnesses.
It says that we are to be his
witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, and Samaria, and
unto the uttermost parts of the earth.
That means the most northern part of Siberia.
That means the most extreme part of China.
That means the most vast jungle of Brazil
or the Amazon.
It means the last tribe in New Guinea.
It means the last village in France.
It's the whole world.
How many of us can say tonight, I
thank God he's given me a vision of
the whole world.
How many can say that?
How many can stand and say, God has
given me a constant burden for the millions
of China?
How many can stand and say that?
God has given me a burden for Afghanistan.
God has given me a burden for Africa.
God has given me a burden for South
America.
God has given me a burden for the
Jews, for the Muslims, for the Europeans, for
all people, just as Jesus Christ taught.
I don't find many of those kind of
people.
If there are more than perhaps I've noticed,
maybe they're all introverts.
I don't know, but I haven't found many.
Then for the world vision, I would travel
a hundred miles to hear a man speak
who I knew had a vision of the
world.
And as I read my Bible again and
again, I'm impressed with this, this love of
God that must be spread throughout the whole
world.
You know, there are various kinds of visions.
When we're first converted and even before we
were converted, most of our vision centers around
ourselves.
Very few of us realize the tremendous importance
of ego involvement in our own life.
In other words, when it concerns us, it's
very important.
When it doesn't concern us, then it's not
important.
And as young Christians, most of us are
selfish.
God is just beginning to chisel in on
our selfishness.
Finally, somehow God gets through to some of
our hearts and we begin to see others.
We begin to see our next door neighbor.
We begin to see our own community.
We begin to see the need of our
own church, of our own family.
And in some cases we decide we're going
to do something.
And there are quite a few believers, thank
God, who at least have some of this
vision.
Then we get this greater vision.
If we grow and grow, we begin to
see our own nation.
The Englishman sees England.
The Swede sees Sweden.
The Spaniard sees Spain.
Oh, the American sees America.
It's usually mixed quite a bit with nationalism.
God bless America.
England stole that tune, you know.
Our religion gets very much mixed with our
politics and with our national feeling.
Our nation must follow God.
Our evangelists come on the radio.
Our nation must turn back to God.
We'll get the blessing if we turn back
to God.
But often it remains extremely selfish.
Our government's going to turn back to God
and then we're going to get a better
deal in the common market.
And many of our countries are filled, especially
America, with all kinds of Christ-centered so
-called politicians who say that America and Christianity
go together.
They are inseparable.
And unfortunately for many years, the curse of
much of British missionary work was that it
was linked with the British Empire.
And when that folded up, the missionary work
folded up with it.
Do you realize up until the last 10
years, in a large percentage of mission organizations,
they would only accept people of one nationality.
Nine years ago, God showed us very clearly
that there was no such teaching in scripture.
That any real movement of God must be
international and be completely open to whatever God
might want, whether he wanted many internationals or
not.
It had to be open to that.
In the last two years, all major missions
now have come to agree that internationalism should
be their policy in the last two or
three years.
And to think that the world is going
to be evangelized by British or by Americans
or by British and Americans is just pure
folly.
The Church of Jesus Christ in Brazil, for
example, is much larger, as far as I
can see, than the Church of Jesus Christ
in the British Isles today.
More people are coming to Jesus Christ in
the country of Mexico than in all of
the British Isles.
And there are many countries around the world
today that are non-English speaking, that have
a great and a large church that also
has something to say to the world.
If those of you on the continent think
that evangelical Christianity is dominated by the Anglo
-Saxon element, then it is only evidence that
you have failed to do much studying of
the subject.
I recently spoke in a convention in India,
and at that convention we had 100,000
Christians.
But 100,000 gathered in that convention in
India.
Unfortunately, due to economic problems, these countries, such
as Brazil, Mexico, India, and other countries with
large Christian populations, have not been able to
move out and evangelize like our wealthy friends
from the Anglo-Saxon element.
But that doesn't mean they don't have anything
to say.
That doesn't mean that in the future God
isn't going to use them in a way
that has been unthought of in missionary history.
That doesn't mean that as hundreds of Americans
came to Europe after the war, so hundreds
of Indians in days to come might go
to America to evangelize there.
Only God knows.
But most people stop at the end of
this vision of their own country, and never
do develop a world vision.
After all, what can I do in these
countries?
And because ego involvement is so important, the
fact that we can't particularly do anything ourselves,
or we don't think we can, then we
think those countries are unimportant.
Why aren't we crying to God for communist
China?
Because it's very difficult for our ego to
ever think of getting any satisfaction out of
communist China.
What are we going to do in communist
China?
So we think because we can't go there,
well, we sort of forget it.
And more people spend more time praying for
some little area, of course, right where they
live, where there might be 15 people, or
200 people, than they would for China, where
one third of the whole world lives.
And this is also because everything is so
linked with our feelings.
There is a very small percentage of people,
for example, today who are taking dope.
In terms of world population, extremely small numbers,
as they believe.
And yet in England today you can find
dozens and dozens and dozens and literally hundreds
of Christians who are getting called to work
among dope addicts.
Yet in all my time in England, I've
hardly ever met a man that came up
to me and said, I feel called to
China.
Or even the countries that are open.
There are more people working among drug addicts
in Great Britain than there are British people
working in the entire Muslim world, where one
seventh of the world population is.
Because we don't go by faith.
We don't use the common sense that God
has given us.
We go by emotion.
We see this man.
We see the effects of drugs on his
body.
We sense.
We want to help him.
So we do.
Or we try to.
And of course, because we operate so much
in the realm of feelings, most of us
never get out of our own culture.
There's about 1,000 Christian organizations in Great
Britain right now of small types and big
types, including little missions that need workers.
And in some senses to get out to
the farm field, you've got to get by
all those groups.
And many of them are doing good work,
but you can see how it's easy to
lose your vision of the world.
There's so much going on at home.
There are so many drunkards yet to be
reached in the United States.
And there's more people working among drunkards in
the United States than missionaries in all of
India, Africa, and the Middle East all put
together just among drunkards in the United States.
In Chicago alone, there are more than 50
organizations and missions dedicated to reaching drunkards in
Chicago alone.
And of course, it's very logical.
Just go to Chicago.
You see these people.
It touches your heart.
You get a calling into that work.
And so the vision for the rest of
the world becomes very dim.
The amount of money that goes out to
the rest of the world is always less
than 10 percent.
And if some of you determine to move
out to the regions beyond, your biggest criticisms
might come from your best friends.
You tell somebody, I believe that perhaps God
wants me to work in Turkey.
Turkey?
The job isn't done here yet.
Don't you see what's happening in Britain today?
What is that saying they always say?
Charity begins at home, my son.
And you'll hear all kinds of sweet songs.
You don't know the language there.
They won't appreciate your ministry.
And anyway, you're not trained really enough.
You work your 10, 20, 30, 50 years
and then think about Turkey.
I tell you, I could weep tonight for
the situation in Turkey.
33 million souls.
Less than 50 believers.
Practically no church at all.
Only a few mission societies.
Most of them with not more than five
people.
Only a handful of us who are out
there.
How many years has this continued?
Dale Roton has gone up and down England.
Back and forth across the United States.
Others of us have gone out back and
forth talking about Turkey, crying to God, speaking
to people about Turkey.
Very few go.
Very few even consider it.
And you just wonder sometimes how many people
really are, really are moving in the perfect
will of God in our day.
Sometimes you wonder.
Millions and millions and millions of Turks will
go out into eternity having never heard of
Jesus Christ.
And there's so many countries we could talk
about.
We think of the land of Persia.
We think of Saudi Arabia.
We think of all of North Africa.
We think of Afghanistan.
Fourteen or more million people.
Perhaps 10 believers in the whole nation.
Perhaps, no one knows.
We think of places like Pakistan.
East Pakistan has 50 missionaries among 50 million.
That gives each missionary a congregation of a
million people to take care of.
Doesn't that break into your heart?
Doesn't that want you to redevelop your priorities?
We don't have to go that far.
Talk to Brother Giovanni about Northern Italy.
There are more evangelical churches in Manchester than
in the whole of North Italy among 20
to 30 million souls.
Tell somebody that in Manchester they'll get offended.
Because until God brings a revolution into our
minds, the important place with us is always
right where we're standing.
We don't have a world vision.
We don't have a vision that Jesus had.
And because of that the church becomes sicker
and sicker and sicker.
I'm not saying we all have to go
to these places.
I am saying we are all to be
vitally intricately concerned about these places.
Ready to go.
Wanting to give.
Desiring to pray.
Desiring to spread the vision.
Hungry for nights of prayer for world evangelism.
Hungry for fasting and prayer for China.
Hungry for tear-stained maps and torn trousers
from praying too much.
This is our target.
This is declaredly in every way the target
of Operation Mobilization.
That the church of Jesus Christ might mobilize
and reach the whole world with the gospel
of Jesus.
We're not just setting that target high with
the expectancy of reaching half.
We're putting it high with the expectancy of
reaching all for the glory of God.
Because the word of God says it.
And we believe God is looking for an
army.
Oh many of you have heard the tape
by Billy Graham in which he speaks of
Ezekiel chapter 22 in verse 30.
And he said, I sought for a man
among them.
I sought for a man that was among
them that should make up the hedge and
stand in the gap before the land.
That I should not destroy it.
But I found none.
I believe the same is true tonight.
God is seeking for a man.
God is looking for men.
Looking for women.
To stand in the gap.
All kinds of gaps.
For all kinds of people.
In every country I've traveled in.
I've seen these gaps.
The need for men.
The need for women.
Of all kinds.
With many different abilities.
You see God is building an army.
In his army all kinds of people are
needed.
Not just theologians and preachers.
In his army he needs mechanics.
Because his army must move.
In his army he needs secretaries.
For his armies must communicate.
In his armies he needs cooks.
Because his armies must eat.
There are need for all kinds of people.
In order that this massive invasion planned from
the beginning of eternity might take place in
our generation.
Nine years ago we began to speak this
way.
There were a handful of us.
We were left there.
Idealists we were called.
Idealists.
Visionaries.
Useful enthusiasts.
Wait till they get married.
Wait till the children come.
Beloved our children have come and many of
them are already evangelizing with more zeal than
us.
And God over these past years has proven
to be running right ahead of us in
his burden to see that there are many
enemies.
Can I speak to you about a few
of them tonight?
I know you're tired.
I know you want to go to bed
some of you.
But there's a tired world that we're trying
to communicate to you about.
You're going to heaven.
They're going to hell.
This meeting tonight could be a revolutionary step
in your life.
Please listen.
Even as I speak to you.
India comes to my mind.
A land where I live myself six months
a year.
A land where I've traveled from one end
to the other.
A land where for hours and days I've
stood in the streets and traveled in the
trucks to reach a few more people for
Christ.
512 million Indians.
Do they mean anything to God?
Of course they do.
But do they mean anything to you?
That's another question.
If we could only have a world vision.
A vision of India.
Millions and millions and millions of people.
Every year more people are added to India
than live in the entire nation of Belgium.
We want to reach Belgium for Christ.
But in India we have a new Belgium
every 12 months added to the population.
In five years we've had another France added
to our population.
Oh and it's been in India almost five
years.
In that time we've been dropped right into
our laps.
Another nation the size of France right in
front of us.
What are we going to do?
Do you think we can do the job
with 15 trucks?
With a hundred men or a few more?
With a few thousand dollars going out there
every couple of weeks?
Sometimes we look up in the air don't
we?
We see a jet fly over our head.
A military jet.
Do you know what that costs that one
airplane?
That costs more money than all the missions
of Great Britain sent out to the foreign
field in any any month.
All the missions in the entire nation in
any five months really.
In the United States we spend more money
on chewing gum than we do on missions.
Recently I read about a church that spent
four hundred dollars a couple of thousand French
francs just to kill a dirty grass that
was growing in in the middle of the
good grass on their lawn.
When I think of India my heart just
just doesn't know which direction to go to.
Are we going to do anything about it?
And I want to speak to those of
you from the continent.
Time has come to stop thinking that America
is going to evangelize the world or that
England and America are going to evangelize the
world.
Time has come to realize that the church
in Europe is just as much involved in
this task or should be as any other
church in any other part of the world.
And in these lands in the Middle East
and in India we need Swedes, we need
Germans, we need Dutch, we need French, we
need an international army of fools for Christ
that will launch out and declare this message
of love.
Oh may God open our eyes tonight to
a lost world.
But what are those enemies?
Enemy number one the status quo.
Accepting the existing situation.
You know don't get excited.
Don't don't don't don't be extreme.
Don't go overboard.
Get a good night's sleep and it'll pass.
Absolutely if you after this meeting get it
all excited someone will say to you emotionalism.
As many so-called evangelists in the past
I have been accused of mass hypnotism and
right now I'm casting an emotional spell over
you and you're getting to think about India.
I keep saying India.
It's a slow hypnotism.
India.
And you're beginning to hear India.
So if you get excited about India someone
will surely explain in a way that George
Bellwether's powerful personality he cast a spell on
you.
You get some good sleep and get a
good meal in the morning and just forget.
Watch out for this emotionalism.
But our friends our critical friends are so
illogical on this point.
The same fellow will go to the football
cup and almost leap out of his seat
cheering for some bunch of clowns on the
ground running back and forth.
And I don't know about England but if
in America you told him it was emotionalism
he might poke you in the nose.
And you know we seem to be willing
to accept emotion and excitement in anything but
religion.
And we get excited about some of the
most ridiculous things.
But if you get excited over the fact
that 500 million people in India will be
in hell within the next 50 years you'll
be called an emotionalist.
I think the most logical thing in all
the world is for us to get emotionally
upset concerning the situation in India.
What would the world we live in be
today if some men had not got upset
in past generations about social evil and about
wickedness that prevailed in so many places.
And then of course we're told that we're
young as if we need to be reminded.
And that this will all pass off as
we grow older.
Well I hardly think that's so.
When I meet men like Richard Wormbrock I
hardly think it's all passed off in his
older age.
When I see men like Dr. Schaeffer I
hardly think that he gave up it all
when he passed 35.
When I meet with men like Oswald Smith
now over 75 who can hardly sit still
in terms of evangelism, I hardly think it
all passes necessarily when we become older and
mature.
Praise God for men around the world today
double our age who in many cases have
double our zeal and double the love for
a war and dying world.
Praise God for men like Buck Singh almost
70 years of age but burning out like
no leader on OM who's 21 and 22.
The status quo it's a curse.
Many of you will go back right into
that status quo.
A dinky little job making a winky dinky
salary to spend the rest of your life
doing winky dinky things when you could be
involved in the vision that Jesus Christ gave
to the world and to his church.
But we've been brainwashed.
Security, security, security.
Especially the girls.
Security, security.
We must get insurance.
We must get a husband with money.
We must get a home.
And all these things that we must get,
we must get because we must be secure.
And when we get it all we go
to the psychiatrist because we're still more insecure
yet.
Who are the people committing suicide?
The poor people?
The Indian villagers?
No.
People who have listened to this brainwash about
worldly security and who when they tried everything
in this world and who had everything in
this world discovered that basically they had nothing
and then went over the bridge or off
the tower to death.
These are enemies of world vision.
And then there's the love of pleasure.
Oh we're a pleasure loving generation and we
just don't want suffering.
Just the thought of the heat of India.
Maybe no ice cream for months.
And just all these things they just they
just don't attract us.
We are a comfort loving generation.
We want to be comfortable.
We want to be comfortable Christians.
And then later as we grow so-called
we want to be comfortable committed Christians.
But we don't want any uncomfort.
And so we build our life on a
sponge.
And it's an enemy.
Paul said endure hardness as a good soldier
of Jesus Christ.
Learn to love hardness.
Learn to enjoy the difficult way.
So many things I could say about that.
But then there's another enemy.
Intellectualism.
Education.
Nothing wrong with education.
I believe it.
But it has become a deadly enemy of
world vision.
Though I am not against seminaries, I believe
that most seminaries are the most destroying factor
within the religious world.
A survey has shown that very few theological
students are going out to the mission field
anywhere anymore in the world today.
We must get education.
We must get another degree.
You can't be used in the mission field
without a degree we're told.
Poor Buck Singh.
Never got his degree.
He's only won 300,000 souls.
Imagine what he could have done with a
degree.
And our parents make it very clear what
they have planned for our lives.
And some of us know that they might
even have a nervous breakdown if there were
a change in those plans.
And the pressure becomes very great.
We never stop to consider that the whole
of the souls are still going to hell.
We get so quickly involved in our own
little home situation.
And it's easy.
Off to college we go.
Going to get that degree.
When we get that degree, we discover that
it's not really respected that much and we've
got to get another higher degree.
And now basically if you don't have a
Ph.D. in the 20th century, most people
don't think anything of the rest.
And you watch.
You write it down.
Within five years there'll be a new degree.
It'll be the super Ph.D. degree.
The drive for status and to be top
rat never ends.
And to such people the world is very
unimportant.
I praise God that in a few places
there are men with such pursuits who at
the same time have a vision for the
world.
And this is a wonderful thing.
But now we better do a lot of
praying before we presume that that's our ministry.
You know I'm not at all against education.
But if it isn't balanced out with world
vision, a life of prayer, a life of
love, a life of brokenness, a passion for
souls, and all these other things, to me
it's worthless.
This has become a great enemy.
We're even studying missions more than ever before.
Leaders at Urbana, the greatest missionary convention in
the world, have said there's greater interest than
ever before and less candidates than ever before.
And it's true.
And then there's another enemy, our immorality, our
loose living, our inability to control our sex
life.
Maybe a young man was looking to the
mission field, learning to reach the world for
Christ, but he couldn't control his body.
And along she came.
And I've seen the most zealous young men
just drag right down into absolutely nothing because
they couldn't control their physical passions.
And the same is true with so many
girls.
God had called them to be a missionary.
God had given them a vision of a
certain country.
God had put a passion in their heart
for people.
But perhaps in a time of loneliness, perhaps
in a time of frustration, along came the
young man.
He had no vision.
He had no passion for souls.
But he was a nice fellow.
And you'd be able to change him.
Why, when you got married, he lived with
you.
He saw your zeal.
He saw your passion for the world.
Surely he would say, honey, or darling, whatever
word you use, let's go to the mission
field.
It doesn't happen that way.
Your vision begins to dim.
Domestic things begin to choke out the vision.
Children come.
Think of taking your children to India?
What are the national health privileges out there
in India, my friend?
What will happen when my child gets mumps
or measles?
And mother comes along and assures you that
your thinking is very clear on that point.
You couldn't possibly take the little one to
India.
And soon the prayer map falls off the
wall and you put up a picture of
the kiddies.
And if I had the time, I could
present a few dozen other enemies of the
world vision.
Unfortunately, I've had personal contact with too many
of them.
But I believe with all my heart that
through Jesus Christ, we can triumph over every
one of these enemies.
That with a shield of faith, as it
says in Galatians or Ephesians, we can stop
every single fiery dart of the devil.
12 years ago, I used to ask a
question of myself.
It was 12 years ago when I was
17 years of age.
I began to preach this exact same message.
And I began to ask myself this question.
I said, is it possible that 10 years
from now I can be just as excited
about Jesus Christ?
My friend said, it's not possible.
When you get older and when you have
a family, you must become more logical.
You just can't be all involved in the
work of God.
You just can't be eating, thinking, drinking Jesus
and world evangelism in the Bible all day
long.
And anyway, you get used to it all,
so you can't possibly get as excited about
it as in the first or second year
of your conversion.
You become mellow with the years.
And when you become 30, you round out
into a balanced Christian, even keel light.
And you realize that these things you were
once so excited about, after all, God can
take care of those things.
You get a broader view of God.
You realize that God doesn't really need you.
Your family needs you.
But God can take care of the rest
of the world.
He can't take care of your family, but
he can take care of the rest of
the world.
We get so illogical when we defend our
status quo that we could literally fill a
joke book with it.
But I close with this testimony and I
challenge any OM leader who's known me over
these years to rebuke me and just cut
me into the ground on this.
And I just, I just say this, I'm
as excited about this thing and more so
than I was 12 years ago.
I can't get off how tremendous living for
Jesus Christ is.
I'm thrilled at the very thought of the
world and what God wants us to do
in it.
I'm thrilled at the very plan of seeing
this ocean-going ship carry 50, 60, or
100 vehicles into continents to reach millions of
people every day and every hour with the
gospel of Christ.
And if God can do what we've seen
in the past 10 years, what more can
he do now in the coming 10 years?
The world is the limit.
And I just pray with all my heart
that somehow by his spirit tonight, you'll become
excited about what Jesus has told us to
do.
You'll become excited about your faith.
You realize how tremendous it is to be
saved, how wonderful it is to be an
ambassador for Christ, how terrific it is to
throw everything else to the wind and just
launch out, depending absolutely on the living God.
You begin to see a vision of the
whole world.
China will become important to you.
India will become part of your daily thinking.
Africa will be something that you begin to
want to know about.
Islam will be something that you'll want to
begin to understand.
The fact that 50% of the people
of the world are going to bed hungry
tonight will bring a choke to your heart
and a desire in your feet to do
something at any cost.
And the result will be, Lord, here am
I.
Use me in your vision of the world.
If it's behind a typewriter, praise God.
If it's underneath a vehicle, praise God.
If it's on an ocean going ship, praise
God.
If it's out in the streets with the
tracks, praise God.
If it's preaching to thousands of people, praise
God.
If it's humbly witnessing to one little child,
praise God.
If it's teaching the children of those who
go forth, praise God.
If it's adding up the sums in the
accounting office, praise God.
It doesn't matter what part it is, but
whatever you do, get some part in this
task that Jesus has given to us.
Don't be found on the sidelines.
Don't be found behind the scenes without seeing
what's going on.
But get involved, spreading the vision, giving to
the vision, going with the vision.
God will show you as you step out
without any holding back.
He will show you your part in this
great task of world evangelism.
And because of it, our generation will hear
the gospel.
You believe that tonight?
Leaders, do you believe that?
Old timers, do you believe that?
Newcomers, do you believe that?
Our generation shall hear of Jesus Christ.
I believe.
May God help my unbelief.
Let us pray.
Our heavenly Father, it's easy to say these
things, but we tremble at the very thought
of what's involved.
Oh Lord, take our lives for world evangelism,
for world vision, for others, Lord, for an
unselfish commitment of outflowing power to an endless
world.
Lord, you know our hearts.
You know our home situations.
You know our office situation.
We commit it to thee.
Take us, use us for your glory.
In Jesus' name, amen.