There's nothing too hard for thee, dear Lord.
There's nothing too hard for thee.
With thee is all the power and love.
There's nothing too hard for thee.
Thy name is El Shaddai, the God who
is enough.
Every home here at this family camp has
somewhere in it or related to it a
tragedy, a need so enormous that only someone
who made the world is powerful enough.
Someone that died for lost men is loving
enough.
Someone that conquered sin and death and hell
is victorious enough to solve the problems that
are represented by us here tonight.
And so we're asking that our eyes will
be turned away from all else and fixed
upon the Lord Jesus.
We hear that little song, turn your eyes
upon Jesus.
Look full in his wonderful face and the
things of earth will grow strangely dim in
the light of his glory and grace.
May we see no man save Jesus only.
In his name and for his sake we
ask it.
Amen.
Turn please to John chapter 17.
John chapter 17, most important scripture.
When I was at the tabernacle in New
York the first year, I was led to
the Lord to bring a series of messages
on the prayers of the New Testament.
There are seven Pauline prayers and I was
then proposed to relate the seven prayers of
Paul to John chapter 17 and advised the
congregation that I would be bringing four messages
from John chapter 17.
That seemed like a good number, a safe
number.
Message 37, I was down to verse 23.
And I received an anonymous letter from one
of the men of the church who had
written to me with his name addressed and
the typewriter still had that bad key in
which this anonymous letter said, Dear Pastor, don't
you think there is some other place of
blessing for us than in John 17?
Well, I had to agree that 37 messages
on that first 23 verses was going a
little far.
But I still find it extremely difficult to
begin anywhere in this other than with the
first verse and then to just talk about
it.
But I'm going to tonight take a chance.
Bear with me.
Verse 18, and I want to conclude with
verse 23.
As thou hast sent me into the world,
even so have I also sent them into
the world.
And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that
they also might be sanctified through the truth.
Neither pray I for these alone, but for
them also which shall believe on me through
their word, that they all may be one.
As thou, Father, art in me and I
in thee, that they also may be one
in us, that the world may believe that
thou hast sent me, and the glory which
thou gavest me I have given them, that
they may be one even as we are
one, I in them, and thou in me,
that they may be made perfect and one,
and that the world may know that thou
hast sent me, and hast loved them as
thou hast loved me.
Now, it's the two words that I want
you to see initially are in 23 first
and 21 thereafter.
That the world may know, that the world
may believe that thou hast sent me.
Earlier today I left a drink of water
on my hands, a little warm, but adequate.
Back in 1952, I was at Mercado Baptist
Church in Macon, Georgia for a missionary conference,
and the pastor invited ten of the Southern
Baptist pastors from Georgia with whom I had
conferences scheduled for the next ten, twelve months
to come so that we could have a
day of seminar on how to prepare for
a missionary conference.
Well, these pastors had arrived at about 9
.30, we'd gone into session, they'd served lunch
to us there in the church, and it
was now approaching three when I had promised
that they would be free to go back
to their churches.
And I said, now, are there any other
questions that you'd like to ask before we
close?
And one of the brethren said, yes, brother,
he did.
Here we are, eleven Southern Baptist churches taking
on the support of faith missionary missionaries and
getting a personalized view of missions and the
local church supporting missionaries.
This could become a movement.
Tell us, this is 19, the year happened
to be, excuse me, 1950, not 1952.
This is 1950, and here we are starting
in.
What's going to happen in the next fifty
years?
Suppose this catches on like a prairie fire.
What's going to take place in missions in
the next fifty years?
And I said, I don't know, and I
don't think anybody else knows, because I don't
know that the question has ever been asked
before, and obviously if it's never been asked,
oh boy, there you go, that's a quick
return on a suggestion.
Thank you, brother.
I'll have to use it, I can't see
anything.
And it's a big glass, too, with a
windmill that runs by water, apparently.
Some folks come by slow freight.
So I did what every busy executive does.
When I got back to the office, I
asked my secretary to do the research for
me.
I said, I want you to take four
questions, world population in 1850, and then find
out the world population for each ten years
to 1950.
And then I want to know the number
of Christians in the non-Christian world.
And then I want to know the number
of missionaries, and I want to know the
amount of money spent for missions from 1850
to 1950, because all we know about the
future is what we've learned from the past.
And I told her she could use as
much time as she thought she needed, she
could go to New York if she thought
that was necessary, she could telephone, she could
write for material.
I had to have an answer by late
September in order that there could be this,
be prepared for the meeting.
Well, I went to the meeting, and I
must say she had done an excellent job.
She gave me a graph, as near as
we could get the information, from 1850 to
1950, and then we used the highest ten
-year period as the average, projecting out from
1950 to the year 2000.
And do you know what we discovered?
When I went back to that group of
pastors, do you know what I had to
tell them, if I was to be honest
with what I'd learned?
That the half-century from 1950 to the
year 2000 was going to be statistically the
half-century of greatest failure in the history
of evangelism in the history of the Church.
There would be nearly twice as many that
had never heard the name of Jesus Christ
by the year 2000 than there were in
1950.
Now we were going to have to run
to stay in place, that the amount of
money for missions, as compared to the increase
in giving related to the increase in worldwide
inflation, would cross by 1970, so that we
would never have more money for the missionary
task than we had in 1970.
Actually, we were wrong on that.
That year was 1967.
Ever since then, the increase in giving has
not kept pace with the increased worldwide inflation
spiral.
So we have less money to use now
than we did then, even though the amount
is larger.
Because of the enormous inflation value and devaluation
together, we'll never have more money for missions
than we had in the year 1967.
The volume of dollars will be greater, but
the buying power will be less.
And I had to confront them with that,
offer it to them.
You can imagine that they felt as heavy
as you felt and as I felt.
And it drove me back to the Word,
before the meeting and ever since the meeting.
And I finally had to conclude that even
in spite of our having such marvelous means
of communication and transportation as we now have,
with all of the means of radio and
with geostationary satellites and so on, you know,
however much you broadcast to a country, it
doesn't make any difference at all if it's
not in the language that people understand and
if they don't have some means of receiving
it.
And so the consequence of it is that
I had to say in spite of all
of the tools that are ours that did
not belong to our fathers, this is the
case.
As I say, it drove me back to
the Word.
And to ask God to guide me and
direct me and lead me where, Father, in
thy Word is the answer to this problem?
And I have read the answer to you.
You've heard it.
This is the high priestly prayer of the
Lord Jesus Christ.
He is praying to us, telling us here
what he is praying for us today.
There's only, do you realize that this prayer
that John has recorded in his gospel was
uttered the night, the eve of his crucifixion?
I'm sure you realize that.
But it wasn't recorded, they didn't have a
tape recorder then.
It was prayed either in the upper room
or in the garden and John did not
record this gospel until at the earliest, 85
A.D. and possibly as late as 95
A.D. and our Lord Jesus ascended into
heaven, according to our calendar, in 30 A
.D. That means that it was 55 years
after the prayer was prayed, minimally, or as
much as 65 years after the prayer was
prayed, that it was included in this gospel.
How did he have a good memory?
We've had prayer offered here tonight.
Is there anyone here that would indicate you're
willing to give us a verbatim record of
the prayer that was prayed before the meal
this evening or in this service?
No, of course not.
We don't memorize prayers.
Neither did John.
How did he get here?
Our Lord said, when he, the spirit of
truth, is come, he will bring to your
remembrance all things whatsoever I have said unto
you.
Why was it to wait until John recorded
it?
Mark's gospel was first.
Possibly because, if it had been included in
the gospel of Mark or Matthew or Luke,
someone would have said, well, that was just
for the early church.
Well, now 65 years have gone by, two
generations have passed, and it's included.
And I believe there's a very real reason.
The Lord Jesus Christ wanted you and me
to know what he is praying for us
tonight.
This is his prayer.
This is what he's praying.
You see, he has an unchangeable priesthood that
continues ever.
And this is what he's praying.
And the reason it's included, so that you
can know what your Lord is praying for
you.
Now, it's important to understand that.
He said, Father, neither pray I for these,
in whose presence the prayer was offered, alone,
but for them which also which shall believe
on me through their word, for the family
camp at Camp Perkins.
On the 30th of July, 1988.
He's praying for you.
This is what he's praying for you.
And the result of this prayer being answered,
is that the world will know that the
Father sent the Son.
And the world will be able to believe
that the Father sent the Son.
Do you see the importance of it?
Everything else has failed.
And yet we still have the commandment demanding
from our Lord, preach the gospel to every
creature.
However, tonight there are more creatures to be
preached to than there have ever been before
in the history of our planet.
And we have to run to stay in
place.
And our brother and sister have laid upon
our hearts tremendous burden that the Lord of
the harvest will thrust forth laborers into the
harvest field.
Well, I think then, in the light of
these facts, that it's extremely important for us
to go back again and find out exactly
what it is that our Lord is praying
for us tonight, and to start praying with
Him.
You know, as the word says, if we
ask anything according to the will of God,
He hears us.
And we know that if He hears us,
we have that for which we pray.
What could be more perfectly the will of
God than that which your Lord is praying
for you tonight?
Doesn't that make sense?
If that's what He's praying for you, and
you start to pray with exactly what He's
praying, isn't that perfectly the will of God?
How could it be other?
Now what is His prayer?
Father, that they all may be in union,
they all may be one.
Oh, how our liberal brethren have loved to
seize on that.
And to say, now there is our mandate
for a horizontal amalgamation to bring all Christians
together in one great hodgepodge, which, and they
don't go that far, say, we can run.
But you know, and I know, that when
people are anxious for that kind of an
amalgamation, they've got ambitions for leadership in it.
And they'd like to see them all come
together because they don't like the idea of
a hand with fingers on it, each one
of which has a different task to perform.
They'd like to see all those fingers grow
together so they'd have a club.
Now that's not what we're talking about.
We're not talking about horizontal amalgamation at all
because that's not what the Lord talked about.
We're talking about what He talked about.
And He's very explicit.
He explains it.
He said, Father, that they all may be
in union, as I am in union with
thee, and thou art in union with me.
It's not a horizontal amalgamation.
It's a reciprocal indwelling.
He said, he that has seen me has
seen the Father.
I am the Father of what?
He is living in the Father, and the
Father is living in him.
And He is saying, Now, Father, in the
very same way that I have lived in
you, and you have lived in me, I
want them to live in me, and I
want to live in them.
And when that happens, the world will know
that you sent me, and the world will
be able to believe that you sent me.
And the whole function of the pastorate, of
the evangelist, pastor, and teacher, apostles, prophet, evangelist,
pastors, and teachers, is the perfecting of this
maturing of the saints into the work of
the ministry until we all come into the
unity of the faith under the measure of
the stature of the fullness of Christ under
a mature man.
It's the very thing Christ is praying for
here.
Then He's saying, Father, if they will just
live in me the way I lived in
you, and you will live in, and I
can live in them the way you lived
in me, then it's going to happen, and
the world will know, and the world will
be able to believe.
Now, I began reading with verse 18.
As thou hast sent me into the world,
in his lexicon, Thayer's, gives us the meaning
of the little Greek word, kathos, translated here,
as.
Here are some of the renditions.
Just as, accordingly as, in the same manner,
in identically the same way.
How do you like that?
Well, take your choice, or put them together.
In just exactly the very identical same way
that the Father lived in the Son, and
the Son lived in the Father.
The Son wants to live in us, and
us to live in Him.
And He prefaced it all by saying, in
just exactly the very same way that you
sent me into the world, Father, I have
sent them into the world.
Now, how was the Lord Jesus sent into
the world?
Well, you know what it was, don't you?
One Mary, the chosen vessel, one cell in
her body, was quickened, made alive, by divine
life, by the Holy Ghost, not by male
sperm.
And that being which was born of her
was Emmanuel, God come in the flesh.
And we are told, in the Scripture, that
in Him dwelt the fullness of the Godhead
bodily.
Now that means that in the babe Jesus
was the Father and the Holy Spirit, that
He is the Son, the inseparable Trinity.
If He is God come in the flesh,
then so the Father is there, the Holy
Spirit is there, in His nature.
Now He's joined to humankind, He's very man
of very man, said the council of Nicaea,
very God of very God.
In dwelt by the fullness of the Godhead
bodily.
And yet, at the age of 30, before
beginning His ministry, our Lord Jesus down on
Jericho's banks is baptized.
Baptism to us is the picture of death
and burial and resurrection.
With us, it's death to sin and the
right to rule.
Reckoning ourselves to be dead indeed unto sin.
But with the Lord Jesus there was no
sin.
To what could He die?
Only one thing, the right, oh listen, I'm
glad it's on tape, I won't be misquoted.
The right to act in His essential deity
as Son.
He did not die to His Sonship.
He died to the right to act in
His deity as Son.
And He accepted the limitations of His humanity.
And at Jordan He presented His body to
the Father.
And John said, I saw the Holy Ghost
come upon Him.
And at Nazareth He said, The Spirit of
the Lord is ebbing upon me.
He didn't say He's in me because He's
been in Him from conception and birth.
He said, He's upon me.
This was a closing.
Why?
F.B. Meyer, in a book that every
pastor ought to have and every thoughtful layman
ought to have, my judgment, that Christ's life
was a self-life.
It's the record of the messages delivered at
Carnegie Hall in New York City in 1887,
which was the year that Dr. Simpson left
13th Street Presbyterian Church.
He was in support of the ministry of
Dr. Meyer.
They were friends.
And on page 87 in this little volume,
as I recall its page, F.B. Meyer
says this, We must remember that everything done
by Christ in the three years of His
public ministry was done by the Father through
the Holy Spirit.
It was not done by Him as the
Eternal Son.
Because He could have done it as Son,
but if He had done it as Son,
He never could have said, As the Father
sent me, I sent you.
And so He accepted the limitation of His
humanity, presented His body to the Father, and
everything He did in His ministry was done
by the Father through the Spirit.
How about us?
We too are born of the Spirit, indwelled
by the Spirit.
If we are His, for we are not
the Spirit of Christ, we are not of
His.
And we are to experience the fullness of
Christ taking up His lasting dwelling places, the
place in our hearts through faith.
And He wants to cover and clothe and
immerse and submerge our blood-cleansed personality so
that He has the same freedom to live
in us and through us that He gave
to the Father to live in Him and
through Him.
He presented His personality, His body to the
Father, and the Spirit of God clothed Him.
And He said, as you recall, over and
over again, 47 times, we are told, I
have encountered the Myself in the Gospel of
John in one way, form, or another.
I do not speak of Myself.
I speak as I received commandment of the
Father.
I do not do the works.
The Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth
the works.
I can do nothing except say that which
I see my Father do.
He accepted the limitation of His humanity.
And now His prayer is, O Father, in
the very same way that I lived in
You and You lived in me, I want
them to live in me and I to
live in them that the world may know
that the Father sent me.
And the world may be able to believe
that the Father sent me.
Oh, what happens?
I told you last evening about my friend
Tommy Titcome was the Lord.
But I didn't tell you about the time
that a smallpox epidemic broke out in the
Yoruba tribe.
And Tommy went to the Lord and said,
Lord, what am I going to do?
The elders are asking me what you're going
to do to help in this.
And the Lord Jesus, by the Holy Spirit,
said, You get the drums.
Send the message out.
Because they tell you that was the communication
system.
They didn't have telephone.
They had drums.
You have the drums.
Send the message out that anyone that moves
in on the mission compound will not get
smallpox.
Now, how do you like that?
If you don't think that's show and tell,
I'd like to know what is.
Huh?
And that night the drums carried the message
out.
The little field man of Egbe says that
his God has told him that anybody that
moves in on his mission compound and lives
there and stays there until the epidemic is
over will not get the disease.
And so it was that the people came
until there was hardly room for another family
to put up a little grass shelter for
them to stay there.
But do you know something?
Even though they'd been exposed, even though the
contagion was spread, there wasn't one person that
moved onto the compound and stayed on the
compound that got smallpox.
Is it any wonder that hundreds of thousands
of the Yoruba people came to O'Brien?
There was a great drought among the Yoruba
people.
They planted when the early rains came.
And it sprouted and then it was dry
and it died.
When the rains came, second rains came, they
planted, sprouted, it died.
They only had a little seed left.
They couldn't plant once more until they were
sure.
And it was dry and dry and drier.
Finally the elders came and said, what are
we going to do?
The people are saying, doesn't God care?
Doesn't God know that we're going to starve?
Isn't He interested in us?
And we told them, yes, He's interested, but
we don't know what He wants to do.
But He implied to me, we do think
that it is time for you to ask
God to send rain.
And Tommy said, what promise do you have
from the Lord that He would send?
What do you have from God?
And one of the elders said, why Elijah,
a man of like passions, prayed, and it
didn't rain, and then he prayed, and it
rained.
And we're sinners saved by grace washed in
the blood of God's dear Son.
We'll pray.
And they did.
So the drums carried it out, the message.
The Muslims have prayed to their God for
rain and no rain.
The pagans have sacrificed to their gods and
no rain.
Now the Christians are going to ask their
Jesus for rain.
We'll see whose God is the Lord.
Well, went to prayer meeting that night.
Went to the timing, set a meeting, there
it all comes to church.
By this time, they had a church that
seated about 3,000 people there.
And just a kind of a harbor with
a big tin roof over it.
Every one of those people came with their
rain hats.
Along the wall was piled high with rain
hats.
This was a big hat let the rain
run off.
And it was woven grass that let the
rain off the back so they could put
this on and go covered around the shoulders
and they wouldn't get wet.
And here the walls were piled high with
rain hats.
They went to prayer.
About a half an hour after they started
to pray.
They didn't ask anymore.
They already asked.
They were thanking God.
They were clapping, if you please, but they
were doing it with words.
Just thanking the Lord that His rain was
coming.
And Tommy said, one of the brethren was
praying and he heard, boink, one drop hit
the tin roof.
And then he heard, blink, blink.
And he said, in less than 30 seconds,
the thunder of the rain on the roof
was such that they couldn't hear themselves pray
much less hear or hear themselves sing.
They just stood there and every one of
them praised the Lord and worshipped the Lord
and rejoiced in the Lord.
It rained all night.
And it rained all the next day.
And it rained all the next night.
And it rained into the afternoon of the
second day.
And here came the elders trudging up.
And they said, we thought of that other
part of that about Elijah.
He prayed and the rain stopped.
Don't you think every time we ask the
Lord to stop it, in like this it
could go on forever?
And so they asked the Lord to stop
it until they needed more.
Is it any wonder?
Well, Tommy was 83.
He was with me for missionary conference.
And he was going back home, back home
to Yorba Land for his last visit.
He talked to me about it every day,
how hard it was going to be to
go and how hard it was going to
be to leave.
And he kind of hoped that while he
was there the Lord could take him home
so he could be buried for the people
he loved.
Well, he went back and he ministered in
all their large churches and their areas.
Came the final Sunday and he was going
to speak in the town of Egbe where
he'd come that first time with a pack
on his back.
Now there was a church building that seated
between four and five thousand, I was told.
A company of people.
What Tommy didn't know was that as he
preached that morning there weren't being services being
held all over the rest of Yorba Land.
You see, the word had gone out.
Come in.
The Yimgo Egbe's leaving.
We'll never see him again.
Let's be there.
Some started way off on Saturday morning, walked
all day Saturday and Saturday night to get
there.
Others had their service and walked in the
closer one.
Tommy was at the missionary's house.
Had dinner.
Had fellowship.
Had prayer.
He told about the old days.
And unknown to him they had quietly pushed
a truck up to the back door and
they put a sofa, a chair on the
back of the truck.
Now the people had all been told make
no noise.
The Yimgo Egbe doesn't know that we're here.
He came out from the house and there
he saw all that could gather into the
area around.
He saw them down the street.
There were over nearly 30,000 believers that
had gathered.
Here was one of the men that had
been the warrior calling for his death those
12 days they'd been in the hut.
Here was one of the people who had
been with him inside praying and waiting on
the Lord.
He came out.
The African men picked him up.
Set him down in the chair.
They didn't start the motor.
They put some ropes on the front.
There was Yemen on the side.
And they just slowly drew the truck.
And then upon seemed to be spontaneous maybe
there was a queue.
Nearly 30,000 voices in unison sang in
the Yoruba All hail power of Jesus' name.
Let angels prostrate for him.
Bring forth the royal flag and crown him
Lord of all.
That's what the Lord Jesus is praying for.
That's what he's asking for.
And he can live in you the way
the Father lived in him and you'll live
in him the way he lived in the
Father.
And if that happens the world will know.
And the world will be able to believe.
And one day that company of those that
have been redeemed will perform the Lamb upon
the throne saying all hail the power of
Jesus' name.
Why can't we try it his way?
We've tried everything else.
Everything else.
You're the key.
You're going to have to say Lord Jesus
I don't understand all the implications of this.
But I present my body and my brain
and my heart and my life.
And I want you to live in me
the way the Father lived in you and
I want to live in you the way
you lived in the Father so that the
world will know and the world will be
able to believe.
Here's my blood ransomed life.
Use it any way you want.
And then whatever like the servants at Cana
whatever he sayeth unto you do it.
Do it.
Let's pray.
Father Jesus this family called the Christian Missionary
Alliance has the world upon its heart.
The founder of this little movement said there
isn't ever missions without revival and there's never
revival without missions.
They're handmades linked to each other and where
goes one must go the other.
And so Father Jesus we're crying out to
Thee tonight that Thy Spirit will take this
pure simple clear word of Thy dear Son
His prayer plant it in our hearts and
move us to permit Him to live in
us in every way He chooses and pleases
that the world may know and the world
may be able to believe.
Oh our lives may not be like Tommy
Tidcombe's but if you can take a Tommy
Tidcombe and do it you can take us
and use us in a greater fuller way
than we've ever known before.
And what we're asking Father is that out
of these blood ransomed lives the greatest possible
glory to the Lord Jesus Christ will come.
We ask it in His name and for
His sake.
Amen.