This morning we are going to meditate on
another aspect of prayer which I shall call
the ministry.
Perhaps it would be best to use the
word intercession.
The ministry of intercession, it is the most
hardest kind of work.
For you draw apart and there's no one
to applaud.
As there in your bedchamber, perhaps, you bow
the knee and call upon the Father of
Light in behalf of others.
I am coming more and more to believe
that it is the greatest of all ministries.
The Savior, by word and example, gave
credence to this fact.
For he was wont to arise early in
the morning while yet dark to take himself
to some lonely mountain retreat for prayer, for
meditation, for communion.
He spent whole nights in prayer.
It seems that before the choice of the
trial, the night was spent in prayer.
All was done in prayer.
The Son can do nothing of himself but
what he seeth the Father.
Well, that's prayer.
That kind of dependence, utter upon the Father,
but what he seeth the Father do, this
the Son doeth likewise.
You will recall his word as he took
himself to Bethany.
He must have been praying on the way.
For as he arrived there at the grave
and called forth one who already stank, he
said, Father, I thank thee that thou hearest
me, that thou hast heard me, and I
know that thou hearest me always.
For the sake of these I said it,
that they might believe.
The apostles, naturally, having been at school with
the Master, the Lord, proceeded
in the same manner.
We have the proof of this in the
sixth chapter of the book of Acts, the
fourth verse.
Where the apostles, refusing to give themselves to
the ministry, attending tables.
Now, praise God for those who attend tables.
But the apostles here said, no, we will
give ourselves continually to prayer.
There are those whose duty it is to
attend tables.
And at that time the deacons were appointed,
seven, that they might look after this matter.
But we will give ourselves continually to prayer
and to the ministry of the word.
Now, surely there is a divine order here.
First things first.
Not, of course, that we are to neglect
any duty.
Are there not twelve hours in the day?
You know, that word from the Savior's lips
has been bringing comfort to my heart.
I get excited and rush.
No, now wait a minute, there are twelve
hours in the day.
And if you'll walk with the Lord, there'll
be plenty of time.
There'll be plenty of time for everything.
No, we are not counseling anyone to neglect
duties that must be looked after.
But here it is.
First things first.
We will give ourselves continually to prayer and
to the ministry of the word.
Now, the great things that we have here
in the book of Acts, this mighty movement
of the Spirit.
Well, prayer seems to have been the key.
We read there in the fourth chapter of
how that when the apostles prayed, having been
threatened, the place was shaken where they were
assembled together, and they were filled with the
Holy Ghost.
And they spake the word of God with
boldness.
They had been filled, but there are many
fillings, brethren.
There may be one baptism.
We'll not go into this, but there are
many fillings.
And this dream.
Why, what we have here in the book
of Acts is nothing more nor less than
the river of water of life, clear as
crystal that proceeded from the throne and from
the Lamb, invading the nations.
And it seems that prayer opened, was
wont to open the, well, what do we
call these, where there's a dam, the doors,
the compartments, opening them that the floods, there
might be a flood tide of blessing.
Now, without this, in a sense, the Lord's
hands are tied.
We read that the Savior himself could do
no mighty works, you will recall, because of
their unbelief.
And, of course, there's no more clear-cut
manifestation of unbelief than prayerlessness.
Now, let us look into some of the
reasons why this statement may be made, that
there is no ministry so great, so fruitful,
so effective, so freighted with the blessings of
God.
For the children of men, like the ministry
of prayer, in the first place, when we
bow the knee, and, of course, we're not
always able to do that, in recent years
there was a time I couldn't pray except
on my knees, and now I can't pray
except I'm sitting down, because I'm getting old
and I get tired right away and I
can't pray.
It isn't the posture, it's the spirit.
There are bedridden saints who spend their time
in prayer.
They cannot kneel.
But, I like to put it that way,
when we bow the knee to call upon
the Father of light, in the blessed name
of Jesus, our capacity to do good is
multiplied.
A hundred times, would you say, a thousand?
I would say ten thousand, perhaps a hundred
thousand.
Now, that's no exaggeration.
For now, it is not simply man at
work.
It's man at work by the throne of
grace.
It's man drawing upon the bank of heaven.
It's man releasing the riches and the power
of God.
Well, he says, Call unto me, and I
will answer thee, and show thee great and
mighty things which thou knowest not.
You pray, and I'll work.
Call unto me, and I will answer thee.
Jeremiah 33.3. I
think I shall take you back to the
days of Zinzendorf.
We don't hear much about Zinzendorf.
And yet, he was one of the great
fathers of missions.
Perhaps the father, in the sense of the
father of the modern missionary movement, the modern
missionary age.
Count Zinzendorf, of Germany.
Herrnhut, Germany.
This takes us back to the Reformation age.
Perhaps, I should say, post-Reformation age.
The Count came to know the Savior at
a very early age.
And he came also to a full surrender
at a very early age.
He was walking through a museum.
Not sure of the city there in Germany.
Leipzig?
Well, that's not too important.
One of the great cities of Germany, going
through a museum where the works of art,
the great works of art of Christendom were
on display.
And when he came to that work, the
Savior on the cross, and read the words
at the foot, This I do for thee,
what dost thou do for me?
It brought about a crisis.
And there he made a full surrender to
the Lord Jesus for the great task of
missions.
The Count threw open the doors of his
county to persecuted Christians.
It was an age of persecution.
You know about St. Bartholomew's night.
You know about John Hus.
It was an age of persecution.
Why, Luther would have lost his life, surely,
had he not been snatched up by those
princes and hidden away in a castle.
The Count sent forth the Circular to Protestants
all over Europe, saying, Come to my county
seat.
I throw it open as a refuge for
Christians.
And they came.
1717, I'm quite sure is the date.
And then the Count's agony began.
The cause of it?
Strife.
That was an age of polemics.
You know, Luther refused to give the right
hand of fellowship to Calvin.
Slight difference of viewpoint regarding the elements in
the Lord's Supper.
We don't do that today.
Praise God.
We're not quarreling today over these matters that
are on the fringe.
We are keeping to the center.
And there's freedom regarding these matters.
Baptism.
The mode.
Government.
The mode.
Traditions.
Names.
Sources of sustenance.
Well, here we are representing almost every viewpoint.
I'm an ecumenical impressionist.
Neither gave it up this morning.
Here we are representing every viewpoint.
And yet we're one in the body, Brother
Ely, looking to the head.
I say the Count's agony began.
The voice of controversy over these secondary matters.
Oh, the Count did so want to see
these believers welded together into one great body,
one great movement for missions.
But it was not an age of missions.
The Protestant Church was dead as regards missions,
giving itself to polemics.
So the Count spent whole nights in prayer.
And others were drawn in.
That sort of thing is contagious.
And at his side gave themselves to prayer.
The answer came, the Count gave it out
that there would be a communion service.
And here they were.
And in that hour, as they were partaking
of the emblems, that glory of God was
manifested in such a manner that it was
overwhelming.
It was more than flesh could bear.
They were prostrate.
And you know, when they arose, they were
a different people.
In that hour, God's clock struck, and it
was the dawn of the great missionary age
of modern times.
Protestantism turned right about faith.
It gave itself in.
Now, the world missions.
Do you know what happened there in that
little village of Germany?
I wonder why these things are not more
fully at the disposal of the Church as
a whole.
Do you know what happened in that village?
They formed a prayer circle.
These, called in the history of the Church,
Moravians.
They formed a prayer circle.
They went on for ten years, and they
prayed with the clock, brethren.
The flame of intercession never went out in
ten years.
Of course, taking their turns, a group at
midnight, another group at one o'clock.
Otherwise, it would not have been possible.
Burdened, these dear ones, for the evangelization of
the nations.
I used to have a book.
I loaned it.
I don't have it anymore.
The history of the Moravians, and their theology,
and their hymnology, all cross-centered.
Then you know what happened?
In twenty-five years, one hundred missionaries went
forth from Herrnhut, Germany, to all parts of
the world.
Why, these Moravians will want to sell themselves
into slavery.
You heard that story down in the West
Indies, that they might win slaves for the
Lord Jesus.
Iceland broke out up there.
Here in America, I must tell you this
story.
The Wesleyan movement really grew out of this
awakening.
We may have some dear fellow Christians here
of the Wesleyan movement.
But not all Methodists know this.
Just at that time, John Wesley decided to
go to America to evangelize the Indians.
He stumbled onto a Moravian there in the
colony of Georgia.
Right away, the Moravian, Do you know the
Lord Jesus Christ?
Yes, and later on he confessed it wasn't
true.
But you know what happened to him on
the high seas as he came to America?
There was a great storm.
Wesley says that the British voyagers were in
a panic, and he among them.
Then he remembered, down in the hold of
the ship Moravians.
He had observed that when there was need
of a humble service, it was a Moravian
who would do it.
So he thought, I'm going to go down
and see how the Moravians are in this
storm.
He found them singing hymns of praise.
No fear?
No fear, they said.
Well, you know, Wesley returned to England defeated.
Then it was a Moravian who led him
to the Lord.
Peter, wasn't it?
Peter Bandler, German.
John and Charles.
I read the story of Charles' conversion.
How many hymns sprang from his heart?
I think it runs up into four, five,
six thousand.
This Moravian just hewed Charles down, more or
less like Samuel when he hewed down Agog
from his religious pride.
Brought him right down to the rock.
Then he began singing.
Still singing.
And John, that night on Elders Gate, as
they were reading Romans, and his heart was
strangely warm, as our Methodist brethren tell.
You know what John did?
He went over to Germany.
He went over to Germany to learn from
these Moravians, brethren.
And he wrote back to Britain and he
said, I have at last found a church
in which you breathe the atmosphere of heaven.
The class gatherings of the early Methodists, he
learned these things from the Moravians.
And it was there, the spirit, oh, this
flood tide of blessing began to invade Britain.
And behind it all, the count on his
knees.
The count in an agony of prayer.
Zinzendorf, whose heart was broken as he looked
out upon these Christian people broken up into
clashing groups.
And who could not give up like Jacob
of old, I will not let thee go,
except thou bless me.
And there it was that the whole Protestant
movement turned right about face, and modern missions
began.
Is it not true that when we bow
the knee to call upon the Lord, our
capacity for good is multiplied a hundred thousand
times?
Yes, call unto me, I will answer thee.
I will show thee great and mighty things
which thou knowest not.
Now, we turn to a second reason why
we may say, without fear of exaggeration, that
this is the greatest of all ministries.
Well, you know what I read the other
day?
This man said, I'd rather teach one believer
to pray than ten to preach.
Yes.
This second reason is to be found in
the fact that when the Christian bows the
knee to call upon the Father of light,
from whom cometh every good gift and every
perfect gift, he is freed from the limitations
of time and space.
And how very limiting they are.
Here I am in Edinburgh, Texas, at the
Rio Grande Bible Institute.
Well, I'm limited.
I can't do anything for folk right now
in Mexico, or in South America, or in
China, except as I bow my knee.
I can rise above the limitations of time
and space and reach out a helping hand
to Christians in China.
I'm still praying for Watchman Neal.
I don't know whether he's alive, but you
don't know quite what to do about those
things sometimes, over there in China, twelve years
in prison.
You know, the Savior in the upper room
prayed for all who should believe through the
Word.
Why, he prayed for you and he prayed
for me.
Twenty centuries have gone by.
You know, in Ephesians, Paul bid us pray
for all the saints.
Nothing like that to liberate one from any
narrow sectarianism.
Pray for all the saints, Paul said.
Well, could one's feeble prayer right here in
the Rio Grande Bible Institute mean anything to
Christians over in Japan?
Well, Paul says it.
And you know how tremendously exhilarating this is?
Especially, you know, when you get over that
half-century line where Brother Ehler now finds
himself on his birthday.
Because, you know, your strength begins to wane,
and then comes the realization.
Say, if I'll just give myself to the
ministry of intercession, I can be more fruitful
than ever.
Pray for all the saints.
Take time.
We heard the song this morning, take time
to be holy.
Take time.
Never, never is time so well spent.
There's a little book entitled Prayer and Missions
by Helen Montgomery.
One of those old books.
One dear pastor says, whenever a new book
is printed, I read an old one.
Pretty good advice, brethren.
Pretty good.
Modern, trash.
When a new book is printed, I read
an old one.
Get back to some of those great Puritans.
Yes, brethren.
And in this book, Helen Montgomery goes over
the history of the Church.
And she points out that the great movements
for the evangelization of souls in the spread
of the gospel, these great movements have all
sprung from the same source.
Someone in the ministry of intercession.
Someone burdened for souls.
Yes, brethren.
Someone crying out like the prophet of old,
O that thou wouldst reign in the heavens
and come down.
That the mountains might melt at thy presence.
Mountains of pride.
Pride that's holding up blessing and revival here
in America.
And I recall one circumstance that Helen Montgomery
refers to amongst so many in this book,
Prayer and Missions.
She tells of a dear one over in
India, T.V. Emery, who went to evangelize
a certain village, and with her a deaconess,
Indian.
And when they arrived at the village, they
observed almost immediately a multitude about them.
And as they gave out the word, why
they never saw such attention.
Souls hanging on every word.
And then T.V. Emery turned to her
companion and said, I think someone is praying
for us.
And the deaconess said, that's what I've been
thinking.
Well, three weeks later, T.V. received a
letter from a dear one across the seas.
One of those mothers in Israel.
What the Church owes these mothers in Israel.
Who said, you know on such and such
a day, and it was the day never
to be forgotten in the village, I spent
three hours in my room calling upon the
Lord for you and the work there in
India.
Why did there come the winds of God
from heaven to sweep that little evangelistic bark
to its desired haven?
Across the seas, a mother in Israel on
her knees, calling upon the Lord.
For this dear one in India.
That's why the winds of God swept that
bark to its desired haven.
I was pleased to observe, to hear down
in Mexico City the other day, that the
Wycliffe missionaries advised the candidates, now you go
out and get your own support.
Wycliffe gives no support, an opportunity to serve.
That's all.
And get your prayer partners, your prayer supporters.
Now that explains what happened through one dear
Wycliffe who has become a world figure.
May the Lord keep her humble, it's so
dangerous to get up there in the upper
brackets.
Mary Ann Slocum.
I walked into a great convention up here
in America some time back, church convention, and
the first thing I saw there was a
picture of Mary Ann Slocum.
Didn't belong to that particular brotherhood either.
Who's Mary Ann Slocum?
Well, a Wycliffeite down there among the Telltales,
whom the Lord has used in such a
peculiar way.
I had the privilege of being at her
side some time back, flown in to meet
with the Indians there to whom she ministers,
congregation of five, six, seven hundred.
I've told her four.
Mary Ann and her native Garb at my
side to interpret.
Now, the other Wycliffeites say they don't understand.
Oh, some of them have struggled for years
and still without converts.
Well, there are two things.
One dear missionary said, I didn't like it
too much.
I walked into Mary Ann's hut one day
and the first thing I saw there, a
placard on the wall, I am crucified together
with Christ.
Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ
liveth in me.
Her sweetheart, also a Wycliffeite, had the privilege
of having him in our home for a
week some years ago.
Taken home just like that, the night before
the wedding up in Philadelphia.
And then Mary took this text.
Her heart was broken.
I am crucified together with Christ.
And then one day she told me the
secret of it all.
You know, I have a praying father.
He's a shipbuilder.
Gone home to be with the Lord now.
And I send him the list of names.
And I know that early in the morning
he's going over the list, praying for these
Indians.
I have a praying father.
So, you see, I didn't so much Mary
Ann.
It's this one.
It was this one back in Philadelphia, a
shipbuilder, who knew how to draw mightily on
the bank of heaven.
You know, I'm so thankful I can talk
to you about this this morning.
I see quite a few heads here.
We have a lovely saying in Spanish.
El pena condas.
He now combs white hair.
Mine isn't white, but I'm older than all
the rest of you.
I'm a great grandfather.
And I have a lot of fun with
my friends, telling them it's the only greatness
I'll ever know.
But as I said the other evening, you
know, to know the age of a horse,
you have to look into his mouth.
You know what we did, wonderful friends?
That is, strength continues to wane.
We can minister via the throne of grace
as never before.
How enriching.
Call unto me and I will answer thee.
We can go over to China.
We can go to South America.
We can go to Africa.
We can girdle the globe.
Paul says, pray.
He was saying a
testimony, writing of course.
I never knew Hudson Taylor, though through his
writings, very intimately.
He was traveling over Canada.
He came to know a gentleman there in
one of the churches, Christian, who questioned him
regarding a certain mission.
And then Hudson Taylor said, I said to
this gentleman, how do you happen to know
all these things regarding that mission?
Oh, he said, missionary charge there, intimate friend.
When he went to the field, he said,
now you're going to do the praying.
I'll go.
I've been doing the praying.
He writes and tells me all that's going
on.
I'm praying about all these matters.
And Hudson Taylor said, then I knew why
that particular mission was flourishing.
Kind of lays a responsibility upon us, doesn't
it, brethren?
What are we going to do about it,
brethren?
We can be missionary intercessors.
There's a third reason.
You know, the only place where you can
laugh at difficulties, impossibilities, I should say, is
on your knees.
Yes, you can.
You don't wonder that Abraham gave that child
a promise.
The blessing finally came.
He believes.
How does that word go in Romans against
Hope, didn't he?
Is that the way it reads?
Yes.
You don't wonder that he gave him that
lovely name, Isaac.
Laughter.
So every time he looked at Isaac, he
had to laugh.
Laughter.
The only place where you can laugh at
impossibilities.
And the moment you get away from that
place where you meet with the Lord, you
know, these difficulties can get so big.
Especially at night when you can't sleep, the
devil begins to fan the thing and it
gets so big.
You say to yourself, that can never be
solved.
I'm licked.
But he's a liar.
We're going to say it again today, the
devil's a liar, God loves me.
I was told only the other day that
that great missionary father of the Mohammedans in
Arabia in his closing years would take his
cane and every time the cane went down,
the devil's a liar, God loves me.
You'll meet that in this age in which
we live.
This darkening age.
There is a place where you can laugh
at impossibilities.
You know, I feel tempted to tell you
about C.T. Studd.
I'm a little afraid, though, when I get
started on C.T. Studd.
Great father of mission.
His dad was converted over in London in
the days of Moody.
A wealthy tea grower estates over in India.
And he was lured in by a friend
who tricked him.
This friend invited him to the races.
How much have you put on my horse?
I haven't put a cent.
Why, the race is on Thursday.
Will you go?
Studd said, I'll go to the races if
you'll go with me to hear Moody.
He tricked him.
He closed.
Well, Moody came along and sighed to Studd
on his knees.
He said, Studd, do you believe?
Is it that simple?
Of course it is.
Thank you.
And then out of this grew, oh, wonderful
thing, his son C.T. He won his
sons for the Lord.
C.T. was one of the great athletes
of Britain.
Gave it up.
Went to India with those seven in those
days, Hudson Taylor, opening up China for the
gospel.
And there in Shanghai he met Priscilla.
Isn't that her name, sister?
You Britishers, you know.
Know more about this than we do.
She couldn't see it at first, but C
.T. said, I know I have the mind
of God.
And they married.
Seven years, no, I've forgotten how many years
in China and then India.
Finally, C.T. came home to Britain licked
in the scent.
He said he was a walking drug store.
He had all the tropical diseases.
His wife, sick of bed and heart.
He passed that line, brother here, that we
referred to this morning.
And he was walking one day, it was
either in Glasgow, I think it was Glasgow,
Liverpool up there on the street to the
city.
And he looked into a window and there
was a sign, cannibals hate missionaries.
And he laughed as he went down the
street to see C.T. And then he
stopped and said, I wonder, what does that
sign mean?
He went back and talked to the tradesman.
Why have you put that sign in your
window?
Oh, he said, I travel over the heart
of Africa.
I know of a tribe that's never received
a word.
Nothing, nothing.
Someone ought to go out there.
Stud went on his way, of course, turning
it over in his mind.
It became a burden.
He said, this is a pretty picture.
This tradesman knows more about the needs of
tribes than I, the missionary.
And the burden grew.
Someone ought to go, said the tradesman.
And C.T. appealed to the great mission
boards in London, the London Missionary Society, none
so honored.
Why, they laughed at Stud.
No mission board would send out a walking
drugstore to the heart of Africa.
Man, along in years with all the tropical
diseases, and then one day Stud couldn't bear
it any longer.
Very well, I'll go along with Jesus.
And he did.
A lad went with him, alone as regards
mission boards.
Alfred Buxton later lost his life, World War
I, walking the streets of London home on
furlough in a bomb.
When they reached a telegram for Alfred from
Papa, Alfred, we want you to come back.
This heart of Africa, these cannibals, Alfred.
C.T. said to his companion, I can't
counsel you now.
Alfred said, I'm going with you.
I don't remember just how to trek down
the Nile, or up the Nile, I should
say, and then on their bicycle.
The heart of Africa, the destination.
The second day, C.T. came down with
fever.
And he said to Alfred, Alfred, doesn't it
say there is anyone sick, call the elders.
Well, you're the only elder.
Anointing him with oil in the name of
the Lord.
We have no oil.
That gasoline will do, and that bicycle lamp.
And Alfred had the privilege of kneeling beside
the sick missionary.
Anointing him in the name of the Lord,
and praying for him.
The next day they were on the march,
and they reached the heart of Africa, the
little hut.
C.T. always giving the laughter, he baptized
it Buckingham Palace.
And then after some weeks, he left Alfred
alone.
He said, we're going to have to establish
the home base.
Oh, I forgot to tell you, he'd hardly
left London when his wife got up out
of that sick bed.
Her husband's exams, and for years she was
the home base.
She saw her husband one week in 14
years.
But I'm getting ahead of my story.
C.T. had to return to London.
Alfred was left alone, and when he returned
after something like two years, he had a
whole mission underway.
The language already reduced to writing on the
march.
But C.T. had a way of laughing
at impossibility.
Now I'm getting back to my point, am
I not?
Always giving the laughter.
They said to him one day, of course,
the recruits, they came, C.T. you'd better
go back to London and get some teeth.
And C.T.'s answer was, the Lord wants
me to have teeth.
He'll send a dentist down here to look
after me.
Well, of course they laughed.
But it wasn't the same laughter as C
.T.'s. And one day his daughter, you know
one of his girls married that modern missionary
statesman, Norman Grubb, the head of WIC, Worldwide
Evangelization Crusade.
That also grew out of C.T.'s obedience,
for when he got to Egypt, the Lord
said to him, this is going to involve
the whole world.
The daughter went down to the river's edge
one day.
Ah, where these bloody things are taken.
And up the river she saw a canoe.
Why, that looks like an Englishman.
And as he drew near, a voice, can
you tell me anything about C.T. Studway?
He's my father.
And the canoe drew up alongside.
And out stepped the dentist.
The Lord has sent me down here to
give your father teeth.
Brethren, I wouldn't dare say this if this
weren't history.
Only C.T. later on kind of used
the upper plate for an inkwell, he said.
And he said that they kind of hurt,
and they were usually out.
But when some English magistrates, you know, there
of that neighborhood appeared, right, and the natives
couldn't understand C.T. without teeth, and then
suddenly with teeth.
He could slip them in quickly.
There you have C.T., brethren, always laughing
at difficulty.
And then there's a final reason.
You know, the only service you can render
that's perfect.
Fred, that brings us back to what we
were saying on the way from the port.
And I think you said it.
There can be a lot of self in
preaching, but there isn't much room for self
in praying.
Hmm?
You just go to your chamber, pray for
someone far, far out on the firing line.
There isn't much room for self.
The only service you can render perfect, because
practically everything we do is slightly tainted.
Maybe I should take out that word slightly.
Oh, self is a hundred heaven monster.
Yes, he was crucified together with Christ.
But the devil knows how to wake him
up.
When you pray, you can render a perfect
service.
Because, you know, we come back again to
the promise, call unto me and I will
answer thee, and I will show thee great
and mighty things.
Oh, what the Lord does is perfect.
Now, your prayer may not be perfect.
We know not what to pray for, Paul
says.
In the Spanish version, the Greeks, we don't
know how to pray.
Both are true.
The Lord knows how to work, and how
to do a perfect work.
You know, a problem comes and we decide
to appoint a committee.
And we get together and discuss it.
And you know, often what takes place is
something like, what happens when the cat gets
in the grandmother's yarn?
And you know, the harder you pull on
that, the worse it gets.
Until we come to our wit's end.
There's a little poem out on wit's end
corner.
Psalm 107.
When they were at their wit's end, they
cried unto the Lord, we read, in the
midst of the storm and in the cloud.
Yes, he knows how.
He knows how.
You know, I think I'll close by referring
again to Stubbs.
When he was over in Shanghai, his brother
came to visit him.
And C.T. was burdened for him.
One bring that brother to the Lord, and
the Lord wrought.
The brother came, and his brother went with
him on a trek into the interior of
China to help him in his work.
And one day the brother said, C.T.,
I'm so glad you never said anything to
me.
C.T. answered, well, you know, I know
you.
I wasn't going to say a word to
you.
I know you.
I was telling it all to the Lord,
Jesus.
Ah, so glad you didn't say anything, C
.T. Now, of course, there are times when
we must speak.
But C.T. said, I know you.
I knew I didn't dare say anything.
I was telling it all.
He knew how to do it.
I will make the fishes of men.
While he who filled the nets of the
disciples after they'd been fishing all night and
had caught nothing.
So friends, we're being called this morning to
enter the ministry of intercession.
Wouldn't it be wonderful of all these dear
ones who are preparing for the foreign field,
if they were to find some of their
prayer partners, missionary intercessors right here.
Oh, friends, I was going to close with
C.T. Studd, but you'll forgive me if
there's one point more to mention.
Some years ago, Mrs. Siegel, no, she wasn't
with me at that time.
Poor Mrs. Siegel, she has to hold the
home base.
She's holding the fort.
I did so want to bring her along
this time, but there's a Cuban family that
any minute a telegram may come.
Been for months trying to get out of
Cuba.
There, no, she was with me in Buenos
Aires ten years ago.
Our most trying missionary experience.
I'm not going to go into detail.
But about a year prior, up in a
missionary convention, Winona Lake, you know, is a
great place for missionary conventions.
There's where Billy Sunday used to hold for
it.
At the close of the convention, a little
slip of a woman stood up.
She said, is there anyone here who would
like to have me, some, or a lot
of missionaries, pray for the missionary?
Is there someone who will say, I got
up there quick at the close of them?
That so startled me.
Never seen anything like that.
Mrs. Camden of Roanoke, Virginia.
This is ten years ago.
And so we spoke, and I'll be praying
for you.
Then we wrote one to the other.
And when this great crisis came in Argentina,
friends, listen, one day a letter came from
that little, frail mother in Israel.
I've reached the throne!
I was able to touch the throne!
Situation licked, right?
I've been able to touch the throne for
you in this crisis.
And it came a great victory there, a
great victory in that seminary.
You know, it looks like God is not
going to let us have great victories alone.
It wouldn't be good for us.