Well, thank you for the word that you
shared to us this morning, brother.
It was precious.
And thank you for the very lovely testimony.
I do bless God for each one of
you.
It has been a wonderful joy to be
here, and it's hard to believe that I've
only got one more meeting tonight.
But I have been very grateful to be
part of this fellowship, and just to be
part of you and get to know some
of you, it's been very precious.
Thank you for that.
I don't know if this is loud enough,
but if it is, forgive me if I
drop my voice in my old age, but
you perhaps will have to put it a
little bit louder.
I don't know how many people here have
come from far, but I believe there have
been people who've travelled up to four hours,
and some of them have done that twice,
two days in a row.
And it's been very thrilling to meet people
here who've said these things, and thank you
for the sacrifice that so many of you
have made to come so far to these
meetings.
I think quite a lot of them in
their own churches today who have been travelling,
but bless you for all those of you
that have travelled from far.
I really appreciate that.
My wife and I have received so many
letters from America that we can't answer them,
and I was sharing with people last night
who have written to me and to my
wife, who I know I didn't write back
to.
But I do thank God for the wonderful
love of the Christians of America.
And I think there are quite a few
of you here who receive our newsletter, become
conscious of that, who've written to Jenny and
asked for the little newsletter that you can
pray for us.
And I bless God for those of you
that do pray for us, with all your
hearts as you do.
We're conscious of people's prayers from all over.
And I do bless the Lord for the
many, many people who write.
We have hundreds of letters, you know, from
America.
You must appreciate, I don't know how it's
possible that so many people write, but I've
said to my wife long ago, I know
we'll never be able to keep up this
correspondence.
So I do thank God for the much
fruit.
I think Mr. Keniston, Benny Keniston, has had
such a vision for Tate to be spread,
and I think that's where so many started
writing.
Other people, too, from the Heartstrife Revival, and
also the Men's Conference, and these tapes, and
to see the wonderful way God met with
people through messages that were brought just once.
And then I just left it there, but
I didn't realize that God was going to
take, especially this charity work, and spread over
these tapes all over America and other countries.
We've had letters from China, and I don't
know how many countries have received these tapes.
They've been spreading all over, people who met
with God.
And I have spoken to a lot of
you.
It seems you've heard all my messages.
So I'll have to go and really work
out some new messages.
I cannot believe how many people have heard
messages I've preached once, and we've just got
literally hundreds and hundreds of letters about one
particular message.
This is spread all over America, and all
over Canada, and many other countries.
So I do thank God for the tapes
and the videos that it seems they use.
I don't know too much about videos, but
I've seen people spreading those.
And I do bless the Lord for all
of you who have been praying for me
since you've heard these tapes and the messages
that I've preached.
And a few times I've been to America.
It's a wonderful ministry, the tape ministry, and
I thank God for all of those of
you who've in some ways had those tapes.
And God bless you as you spread them
also.
My wife writes about 50 letters a week,
you know, that's the best she can do.
And I try, I won't tell you how
many I try to write, but I've said
to the Lord I just cannot write to
all these people.
But I do thank you.
I've had so many phone calls from America
also, and that's something that I really appreciate,
is the folks who phone from all over
America, all to the other side of the
world, to say that somehow they got a
tape and that they've met with God.
I've been touched how God can use these
messages again and again, over and over.
I can't tell you how many of your
ministers across this country phoned and said, I've
lost everything.
Everything I ever had is gone for years,
and I've so found a walk with God
through this message.
And I had to phone you just to
say thank you.
And I, I just want to thank those
of you that have spread the tapes, because
I know that it wasn't only one church
that spread it, and that Bible school of
two years ago.
But it seems people just take them and
spread them on and on and on.
And I have become so aware that God
just never lets a message once be preached.
It goes on and on and on.
I do pray for all the fruit of
these tapes and all the messages that have
been spreading.
God will keep it under the blood of
Christ.
I was conscious through the night that there
was deep dealings with God here.
And I, I know that it's not easy
to stand up and testify and pour your
heart out through things.
But I believe with all my heart that
many of you, as you knelt and sought
God as I watched you and saw how
the tears were flowing down your eyes, down
your cheeks, I knew you were having dealings
with God, that between you and God were
very sacred.
And I believe with all my heart that
your lives, by God's grace, as you sought
God to change them, will be changed.
And I think we need to pray for
each other that whatever God has done will
be kept under the blood of Christ over
these nights, and work out and on and
on and on.
I know I preach differently.
I know I preach a standard that I
tremble more than anyone else who listens.
But I do thank God that I know
the fruit is there through his word, and
will never return unto him void.
So bless you for letting me be in
your pulpit these few days.
And I know that it will work out,
I have no doubt it will work out,
the things you've sorted out with God and
asked God to do in your lives.
I wonder if I can ask you just
to bow for a moment in prayer, please.
Father, thank thee for all these dear people,
and I know they love thee.
From the youngest boys here I see in
their eyes, and I ask them, is Christ
in your heart?
Do you love him?
And I do thank thee, Lord, for the
love for God from this people that are
gathered here.
I thank thee for the oneness, and the
family atmosphere, and the care, and the compassion,
the prayers for each other.
But above all for the example of the
believers here, and there are so many, so
godly, who are an example to the younger,
so many of the younger examples, already at
their young age.
And thank thee, Lord, for such a witness
as this building, and this people who gather
and love Christ.
I can understand, Lord, it must bring great
glory to thee in this area, having such
a people.
O keep them true, Lord, keep them faithful
to thee, and keep them winning the world
for Christ with their lives more than their
words.
O bless them now, Lord, and thank thee
for these few nights of meetings that thou
hast given me this great privilege to be.
I know I'm nothing, Lord, thou dost not
need to remind me.
I know that I am the least of
all thy servants, and I marvel at thy
grace that thou hast kept me, and allowed
me into the purport of God so many
times, in so many places.
But I do bless thee, Lord, that I
can ask thee to wash me now in
the blood, fill me with the Holy Spirit,
cleanse the atmosphere of this building with the
blood of Christ, and hold us under the
blood of Christ safe from all the powers
of darkness.
And come stand now, Lord, in the purport
of God with me, and take me up,
and speak to the depths of all of
our hearts, as only God can speak, in
mercy.
Take this request, O Lord, and glorify thy
name.
In Jesus Christ's name we ask these things.
Amen.
And as we went home that night, there
were many of you that started taking the
riches that God wants you to have, and
applying to your lives, embracing them.
And I hope it goes on repercussions through
the rest of your lives, in your home
especially, until you are wealthy indeed of the
things God holds out to you.
But in Proverbs chapter 14 and verse 12,
we read these words.
There is a way which seemeth right unto
a man, but the end thereof are the
ways of death.
Even in laughter the heart is sorrowful.
Oh my, that's tragic.
That's tragic.
If you think you're enjoying life, but you're
not.
But outwardly, you're even trying to convince yourself
you're happy with what you're about, with what
you're doing.
But down in the heart, there's sorrow.
It's possible.
If a man tells a lie to someone
else, it is tragic, but it is lying
to himself.
You've got to go far to find a
more tragic man.
A man who can be laughing, but his
heart is sorrowing.
The end of that mirth is heaviness.
It always ends up with heaviness again.
Who is he speaking about?
The backslider.
In heart.
So find, so be filled with his own
ways.
The backslider.
In heart.
You'll find this word backslider spoken of so
many times in the Old Testament that it's
tragic.
It's tragic how much backsliding went on with
the people of God.
It's tragic, no matter what God did, how
much backsliding came about.
And God speaks with grief about the backslider
in heart again and again and again through
the Old Testament, which was not written for
them.
It was written for us, this side of
Calvary, for God to speak to in his
own way.
To sow his grief and his dealings with
such people.
Every verse ever mentioned in the Old Testament
was not just for us to know it
happened, but for God to speak to our
hearts.
Nothing was written for history, including these words
about the backslider in heart.
Those who in laughter can be sorrowful while
they're laughing, and everything they do ends up
with heaviness.
Heaviness, no matter how much they laugh while
they're doing it, but they go back to
it, and that's the backslider.
Tragic.
What is a backslider?
Oh, the tragedy of the backslider.
It's much more difficult for a man who
is backslidden to find vital reality with God
again.
It's much more difficult for a man who
is backslidden to ever find vital reality with
God again than it is for an unsaved,
godless, wicked person to find vital reality with
God.
That's a staggering thought, but it's true.
It is much more difficult for a man
who is backslidden to ever find vital reality
with God again than it is for an
unsaved man in wickedness to find vital reality
with God.
But this is the greatest shock of all
about a backslider.
This is the greatest shock of all concerning
a backslider.
There are three things that have to be
done to backslide.
There are three things that have to be
done consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently to become a
backslider.
To consciously backslide spiritually, there are three things
that have to be done consciously, carefully.
You can't just easily backslide.
It's not easy to backslide.
There's no such a thing as you suddenly
find by mistake you're backslidden.
You know.
You know when you're backsliding.
And you have to consciously, carefully, deliberately, consistently
do three things to consciously backslide spiritually.
That's the tragedy of a backslider.
That's what makes it so tragic.
Firstly, the first of the three things that
you must do consciously, carefully, consistently.
Firstly, if you enter into your day without
soaking yourself in the word of God, you
will backslide.
And yet, people do it.
If you enter into your day without soaking
yourself in the word of God, you will
backslide.
You will backslide.
Don't doubt it.
If you enter into your day without soaking
yourself in the word of God, you will
backslide.
I went to Bible school about thirty years
ago.
And in this particular Bible school, the emphasis
was very much on the spiritual, not on
the academic.
The academic was there and revered across our
land.
But somehow your spiritual walk was all they
were concerned of.
You got eighty, ninety, a hundred percent results
in your examinations that didn't impress anyone.
If it didn't work out in your life,
they were grieving over you, and you knew
it.
They wanted to see the results of all
this reaching you academically working, or they wouldn't
even accept you into their work.
So you got the highest marks.
Somehow they plunged us into preaching.
It was a sort of Bible school that
didn't allow you to sit down there and
just take all lectures in.
From the day you arrive, they put you
out and say, now go preach.
They had this idea, you know, that the
River Jordan comes into the Galilee, and Galilee
still stays fresh and life-giving because it
flows out.
The Dead Sea has everything coming in, but
nothing flowing out.
That's why it's dead.
So you've got to give out.
Everything you take in.
So right from almost the day we arrived
at this Bible school, we were giving out.
Thrown into open-air meetings, standing on the
street corners.
Should have seen a Presbyterian do that.
To stand on the street corner was something
for me to tremble about.
But we were told to preach.
We were given opportunity in churches and schools
and prisons, anywhere.
And I remember, time and again, all these
opportunities were given to us.
And it was lovely.
I preached many, many, many times.
Then something happened to me one day at
this Bible school.
I came to a place where God really
had me in a crisis.
A crisis where I knew I had to
have a personal Calvary.
And I was in desperation corner with God.
I remember the spot, kneeling before God.
When I walk there these days, through that
same Bible school, I slow down past that
room, because it's sacred ground to me.
With what God did, I never, ever recovered
from that day to this.
Of what God did to me on my
knees, when I absolutely surrendered to God with
my whole being.
Oh, I was saved.
I was preaching.
But I came to a place here where
I had a personal Calvary with God.
And God was able to take control of
me, and anoint my life.
Well, the first time I ever preached, after
that moment with God, was a few days
later, about three days later.
The first time, though I had preached many,
many times before, the first time was in
a reformatory, I think what you people would
call a correctional school, I'm not sure, where
they send young boys that are too young
to go to prison.
Many of them murderers, many of them have
done terrible things.
So they're too young to go to the
prison, but there they put into these reformatories
that we call.
We had a very, very large one, one
of the largest and perhaps the largest in
our nation, where boys of terrible backgrounds, of
terrible things across their names, were all put
together.
I think more bad came in those reformatories
than any good that could come to them
through the years.
It was a breeding for a life of
criminal activity.
But they sent young people to preach who
had Christ in their hearts.
And here we were from the Bible school,
and we were told to go.
And I had been going, and had a
little group of about ten young fellows, the
younger ones.
And I arrived there this day, and this
fellow turned to me and said, listen, I've
got something difficult for you to do today,
but I want you to go, not to
these little fellows that I've been giving you,
I want you to go to this one
big cell.
All of them, I think, are murderers.
They're the elder ones, but the fellow who
was supposed to be speaking has not come.
You're going to have to go.
Now, I said, but I don't think I'm
ready for that.
I was just a young student at this
Bible school, hadn't had all that much experience,
and I said, I don't think I'm ready
for that, to be honest with you.
He said, no, you don't say no to
me, young man.
You go.
God will help you.
Well, I trembled as I thought of these
fellows.
This warder opened this big steel door, and
then he shocked me.
He shut the door, and was on the
other side.
I just heard this bang, and heard this
echoing of this big steel door, and I
looked, and he was the other side.
He hadn't come in with me.
So I turned around, and there were facing
me about sixty boys in a circle, waiting
to be preached to by a man who
they had been expecting, and they looked at
this young fellow coming along, and all they
saw was fear.
So they started laughing.
Terrible when people start laughing, you see, when
you preach, you know.
I hadn't opened my mouth, and they were
laughing at me, roaring with laughter as they
saw the fear in my eyes.
When that door shut without the warder, I
was along with these fellows.
Well, I stood there while they were laughing,
and I began to try and bring out
to them about the gospel of Christ, but
they laughed the louder.
So I said, listen, there's a hell.
How can you laugh at someone who comes
to warn you of hell, and judgment of
God, who tries to bring you to be
saved for eternity?
How can you laugh?
There's a hell, there's a judgment coming.
Don't you know that?
Anyway, one of the fellows grabbed with his
arm another fellow, and rolled him on the
floor, and held him down, and screamed, yeah,
he's going to hell.
If anybody's going to...
they all started laughing as these boys started
to romp on the floor now.
They were just screaming with laughter.
Well, I tried to talk a bit more,
and then suddenly, I could never put into
words, suddenly I became conscious that Jesus Christ
came and stood beside me.
I'd never known that before.
Suddenly I became conscious of a boldness in
my heart, and a compassion.
I wasn't, in any way, groaning and weeping
over the humility of being laughed at.
There was something of a compassion to these
boys laughing that I'd never felt in my
life before that moment.
Suddenly, I saw these boys in their sin,
and I began to cry out.
I find myself weeping and calling out to
them in a way I never knew to
speak before in my life.
And I wept, but there was something of
a consciousness of God that I'd never known,
never ever experienced, never thought would ever happen
to me.
It was like Christ took me up and
spoke for the first time through me.
I was just aware of God, and I
wept as I looked at these boys.
Within about five or six minutes of speaking,
conscious of God, for the first time conscious
of anointing upon my life, I looked out
in the whole room of boys.
There was not one that was not weeping
within minutes.
No more laughing.
There was a sobbing.
There was some that was sobbing so loud
that I stopped preaching, and I realized God
had come.
And then I said these words, those of
you who have courage, and it will take
you more courage than anything you've done in
your life.
Those of you that have courage, I want
you to come forward and kneel, and in
front of all of them, give your life
to Christ.
It'll cost you in this place to do
that, but do it in front of them.
Those of you that are weak, with no
courage, who are cowards, you won't come to
Christ.
I know that.
But I want any of you that have
courage to come to Christ now, in front
of everyone.
Six boys came forward.
The rest sat looking, tears flowing down their
eyes, but they wouldn't come.
The six boys knelt on their knees.
Two of them couldn't pray.
They just groaned like they were in agony,
sobbing, sobbing in agony of conviction of sin.
The others I helped to pray, and those
that couldn't pray, I just prayed for them.
Well, I went back to the Bible school,
and a few days later, the principal of
this reformatory contacted our principal of the Bible
school, and said there was a young fellow
that came here and preached the other day,
from your Bible school.
And six of the boys responded when he
preached, and asked God to save them.
And he said, I have never in my
life, and I have been here for twenty
-something years with reformatory work, I have never
ever seen such a transformation as these six
boys.
These boys are the worst in the whole
reformatory that came to God.
Somehow the worst, those that feared the most
in this whole reformatory, came forward and prayed
with that boy, that student.
And the transformation in their life is so
real, that this whole reformatory has gone into
silence.
There's a silence full in the whole reformatory.
I want you to bring that boy, and
I'm giving him the whole reformatory to preach
to.
Well, I didn't know what happened, but principal
came in my room, and I was studying.
It wasn't lecture time, he said, get your
Bible, you're going to preach.
I got my Bible, we went into the
car, and he was driving to the reformatory.
And he said, this principal is letting you
have the whole reformatory, there's hundreds of these
boys.
Well, I sat there, and I thought for
a while, I said, but sir, I don't
have a message.
So he looks at me, the principal says,
that doesn't matter, God will give you one.
So we sat in silence, I thought, well,
that doesn't sound too helpful to me.
I don't have piles of messages, I'm a
young student, who hasn't done all that much
preaching.
Anyway, I didn't know what I was going
to preach, when he suddenly arrived there.
We got out the car, and we're met
by some of the warders, and the principal,
and some of the teachers.
They stopped all the lessons, they stopped everything
of the school.
And they made me stand there, and all
I had was my Bible.
Well, I looked out at these boys, and
the same broken heart just suddenly came into
my heart, that I'd felt looking at those,
I would say, eighty boys, that first time,
a few days before.
And God said something to me, that I
shall never ever forget, turn to Isaiah 53.
It's the Holy Spirit in my heart.
You don't know what to preach, brother, just
turn to Isaiah 53, I guarantee you, God
will use it.
I turned to Isaiah 53, and I read
it.
I didn't have a message, I read Isaiah
53.
And here and there, I just put a
little sentence in, little sentence in here and
there, but just, Isaiah 53, a few minutes
later, I looked up at these boys, and
they were sobbing.
I couldn't believe it, when suddenly it was
like wailing, going across the whole place.
Just Isaiah 53, God whispered to my heart,
you don't need a message, my word is
all you need.
I learned it that day.
I learned the power of the word of
God, when God anoints his word.
You don't need wonderful illustrations.
You don't need great homiletical exegesis.
You don't need to have training.
You just need the word of God, and
it needs to be brought in an anointed
way.
With a heart that's broken for the souls
you're speaking to, and suddenly those words become
life.
Well, hundreds of them responded, literally hundreds.
I didn't know what to do, nor did
the principal of a Bible school.
How do you pray with hundreds of people?
We were taught to pray individually, but here
were hundreds, even of the staff, even the
warders, weeping, sobbing.
So I said, all right, let's all kneel,
and you pray this after me.
And I prayed the sinner's prayer.
Well, God helped me to get follow-up,
to get Bibles, to get from all the
Scripture gift missions, boxes, and I would order
and phone, and take along everything I could,
to just give to all these boys some
form of follow-up while I was still
there.
Years went by, I'm talking about a number
of years, and then God did something peculiar.
They started walking up to me in the
streets.
I'll never forget the first one, this young
fellow with his wife, and a baby, and
this fellow said to me, are you Keith
Daniel?
I said, yes.
He said, you won't remember me, I was
one of those six in the reformatory, of
the first that ever came to God, when
you preached.
And I said, but that's wonderful.
And you're out of the reformatory now?
Oh, yes.
Many of them are out, most of them
are out now.
And I said, are you still walking with
God?
He said, yes.
I said, did you have your quiet time
this morning?
He said, yes.
I said, you've never backslidden?
He said, no, no one backslid.
I said, no one?
No.
Not one backslid of the whole reformatory.
Everyone knows that.
I'm surprised you don't know.
Everybody speaks about it everywhere.
Not one single person backslid.
Everyone is following God to this day.
I said, but can that be true?
I haven't been near there for years, all
these years and years.
Oh, you see, we're inclined to say, if
it isn't me, they're not going to make
it.
We take our eyes off God, who saved
them, who knows how to keep them.
I had to learn a lot of lessons,
you know.
I said to him, not one, not one
in the whole school backslid.
How can you be sure?
He said, but everybody knows it.
We're all sure.
Everybody knows there is not one.
I know of not one that backslid.
Every one of them is following God, sir.
And then he looked at me in my
surprise, and he looked surprised at me.
He said, do you know why no one
backslid?
Do you know why not one is known
to have backslid of all those hundreds?
I said, you tell me.
He said, because you stood up, sir, and
you cried these words the last meeting before
you left.
You held up the Bible, and you said,
this is your source of survival.
This is your source of survival.
This, if the devil could keep you from,
he would do anything, for this is all
he worries about.
His greatest priority every day of your life
to the day you die would be to
somehow to keep you from this book, from
soaking yourself in the Word of God as
the greatest priority of your life every day.
But if you somehow can keep the devil
from keeping you from this book, and if
every day of your life you soak yourself
in this book as your greatest priority every
day of your life to the day you
die, you will never backslide.
You said that, sir, and we believed it.
Everyone believed it.
And no one backslid.
I was blessed, you know.
That first fellow was one of then hundreds
who came up to me in streets, or
phoned me, or walked up in meetings.
And everyone said the same, no one's ever
backslidden, and they're not going to, sir.
Oh, I was blessed by that.
I was blessed by that.
In that same reformatory, there was another incident
that shook my heart.
One day they let me into a certain
cell, a ward, where there was probably about
fifty boys.
But they said these boys were very, very
problem boys.
They had emotional, some of them bordering on
mental problems.
And they were, the most of them, murderers.
Some had killed their fathers.
Oh, the terrible things to have heard of
what was going on in that particular place
that special care was taken to them.
But they allowed some of the other boys
who had been saved in the full meeting
to be there.
And I was preaching, and there was this
young fellow, he was a very short fellow
for his age.
But he began to weep.
He began to weep so loud that I
tried to go on preaching, but in the
end I knew I couldn't.
He was sobbing, he was in pain.
It was like he was in pain, like
it was inflicting pain upon him to carry
on preaching.
I had to stop.
He was groaning and weeping.
So I sat him down, and I started
to speak to him.
And I found that he didn't understand one
word of English.
He spoke what we curl Africans, and had
come from a part of the country where
there was no English heard.
And I said to this other young fellow
there who was saved, well ask him why
was he weeping if he couldn't understand anything
I was preaching.
And so this fellow asked him, and this
boy said, that's why I'm weeping.
I don't know English.
I can't understand English.
I don't know anything.
I don't know how to speak one word
in English properly, he says.
But every single word this man was preaching
in English, I understood it as it was
my own language.
And he said, I knew it's God speaking
to me.
That's why I'm weeping.
I knew God was speaking to me.
Every word.
Oh brother, I don't know what you understand
about tongues.
I think that's about the closest I've come
to understand what tongues is.
I don't understand a lot of other things.
I wasn't speaking in another language.
I was speaking in my language.
And this boy understood in his own language
every single word as if it was his
language, and he knew it was another language
being spoken.
Oh God knows how to reach a heart
that's in desperate darkness.
He knows what to do.
Even if it's another language being preached to
him.
Well this boy came to Christ.
He was the only one in that meeting
that came to Christ.
He gave himself to God by the help
of this other African boy that had been
saved, that was there to help him.
Well I gave him follow-up.
The first thing I gave him was a
nice Bible that I had my hands on.
And I told him, now soak yourself in
the book now.
Just make sure.
Burn your bridges behind you now.
Get on your knees.
Open the Bible.
Doesn't matter what the cost.
Let them know you've made your stand for
God here.
Well they phoned me about a week later.
And the principal led me down into this
room and said, this boy needs to see
you and you need someone to help you
to interpret.
And there sat this boy who couldn't understand
English.
The last time I'd seen him I'd given
him a Bible.
And his face was bleeding.
And his body.
And he was sitting there silently weeping all
alone in that room.
And I sat with him with his other
boy, who came with me to interpret.
And I said, what happened to him?
Well, he did what you said, sir.
He got on his knees with the Bible.
And that's the last thing he should have
done.
Oh, I wish I had more wisdom those
days, you know.
I used to make mistakes.
Telling them to go and burn the bridge
behind them.
Make their stand openly.
I was wrong.
I was wrong there.
Well, this boy, it seems they had beaten,
they kicked him.
They kicked him as he was kneeling in
his stomach.
And they kicked him on the floor.
They hurt him so badly it was terrible.
They took the Bible and ripped it to
pieces and threw it around the room like
a ball.
Throwing it to each other and ripping it
as he tried to stop them, weeping.
Then they punched him down and kicked him
again.
Well, I looked at this boy and I
said, well, what are we going to do
now?
He says, I want another Bible, sir.
Can you believe that?
That's all he wanted.
I want another Bible.
So I looked at him and I said,
all right, I'll get you a Bible.
I went and got him a Bible.
And then I said, you know, I don't
think it's too wise to get on your
knees again with the Bible in front of
you.
Maybe you need to get under the blanket
and take a torch.
But don't invite persecution.
I don't want to come and see you
like this again.
Somehow, don't bring it on you anymore.
Try and do it without inviting persecution.
You don't need to do that to prove
you're a Christian.
Well, you know what the boy did?
He went into the bathroom, into the toilet.
You and I might think that's a stranger's
place, but he spent hours in the toilet
with the Word of God.
It was his only place of safety.
And he soaked himself in the Word of
God.
He soaked himself in the Word of God
daily.
Every moment he could find it was the
Word of God.
And you know, that boy never backslid.
To this day, he walks with God.
I can't tell you who he became in
my country, between me and him, what God
made of him.
But that boy never, ever backslid.
Nothing could keep him from the Word of
God, you see.
Nothing could keep him from the Word of
God.
And he never backslid.
He was determined nothing would keep him from
soaking himself in the Word of God, no
matter what the cost.
Now, tell me, what excuse do you give
God that you don't soak yourself in the
Word of God?
The one thing you know you will backslide
for if you stop.
What kept you from the Word of God?
You were never persecuted for having a Bible
along with God.
What reason do you want to give God
as to why you backslid, if it is
the reason you backslid?
And tell me, nothing would keep him from
God, from God's Word.
What reason do you want to give God
as to why you neglected the Bible?
And you knew it's the reason you backslid.
What good reason can you give?
Nothing would stop him.
I want another Bible.
He spit with blood on his face.
I want another Bible.
The Word of God is your source of
survival, beloved.
Your source of survival.
There are three things that have to be
done to backslide.
Three things that have to be done consciously,
carefully, deliberately, consistently to become a backslider, to
consciously backslide spiritually.
Firstly, if you enter into your day, if
you enter into your day without soaking yourself
in the Word of God, you will backslide.
You will backslide.
If you enter into your day without soaking
yourself in the Word of God, you will
backslide.
A young fellow of about 20 years of
age lay dying with a tumour in the
brain.
And he called for me.
A message got through to me.
His name was Richard Dionne.
I had known him in my unsaved days,
in all our wickedness.
He had been there.
And now he lay dying.
So I made my way to this boy's
house.
Saved.
I was saved.
Never seen him since I was saved.
His parents wouldn't allow me to see him
for three days.
I just heard him choking and groaning and
crying in pain.
It was about two days before he died
that I was there when I finally did
see him.
They led me into his room, and he
was sitting up, and he looked so frail,
so terribly frail, I could hardly believe it
was the same boy.
But he wanted to see me.
His parents said he has to see me.
So I kept coming back until they let
me in.
And then he said, I heard you've been
saved, Keith.
And I wanted to hear it from your
lips.
Tell me how you were saved.
I want to hear.
So I told him.
The tears came down his face as I
shared with him how God had saved my
soul.
And then I said, when were you saved?
He said, I always was saved.
When I was with you, I looked at
him.
He said, Keith, I was what you call
a backslider.
You wouldn't know about that yet.
I was backslidden.
And believe me, when you're backslidden, you can
do evil things—things like Samson did, and David
did.
Terrible things can happen in a backslider's life,
though you once knew God.
Oh, I knew I was in wickedness with
you, but I was backslidden.
And then he said to me, do you
know how God spoke to me about my
backslidden state?
It isn't through this sickness that I got
right with God.
I was combing my hair one night when
I was to meet you.
We were going to go to sickness, all
the boys.
And I held my knee, keeping the door
open while I was combing my hair, and
the mirror reflected back, looking back into the
shelves of the cupboard.
And on one of the shelves, as I
was combing my hair, I saw through the
mirror, there was my Bible.
And I looked at it, and why I
looked twice was because it was covered with
dust.
And as I looked at this Bible covered
with dust, my heart broke.
My heart was broken.
I said, oh, oh, look at my Bible.
I was convicted, just looking at the dust,
this white layer of dust on my Bible.
And God said to me, that's why you
backslid.
That's why you're backslidden from me.
You neglected that book.
I didn't come out to meet you that
night.
I didn't leave the home.
I began to weep, and took the Bible,
taking the dust off, and went on my
knees, sobbing, and opened it, and began to
soak myself in the Word of God again.
And I got right with God that night,
and stayed right, righteous and nice.
Well, he died.
I think it was two days later, but
I'm so glad he shared that with me.
I treasure that God said to him, that's
why you backslide.
That's the reason you backslid.
You neglected the Bible.
Do you know, I saw a man one
day stand in the pulpit, and he held
out the Bible to the congregation.
And he said, this, this, friend, is worthless.
I wouldn't have said this too easily years
ago, but I have to be honest now.
And I'm wanting to be honest here.
This can do nothing for you.
Don't waste your time with this.
It's worthless.
I've proved it.
And I have to be honest now.
Don't waste your time with this.
It's meaningless to you.
It's a waste of time.
Well, people were getting uncomfortable, as this man
was holding out the Bible, and saying, this
is worthless.
This can do nothing for you.
Don't waste your time with it.
Well, then he opened the Bible, and he
said, but this, oh, this will make you
holy, brother.
This will make you walk with God, sister.
Tell me, you have a big Bible.
Is it open?
It's no good having a Bible beside your
bed, if it's mostly closed.
Is your Bible mostly open, sir?
Or mostly closed?
How much of your life is this book
open?
Virtually?
Permanently?
You can't backslide then.
One of the greatest theologians I ever met
in the world.
You pick up the IVP commentary, you'll find
about a third of the most popular evangelical
commentary in the world today is written by
this man.
And he stood with me as he was
talking of the love we have for the
Word of God, and he opened up his
Bible, and he had written in the front
of his Bible one sentence.
And I tell you, normally if you take
the Bible, the beginning, the openings of the
Bible, what a man wrote and dared to
put in between the covers of this book
to add to the words of God and
to put something must be very precious to
him.
The only words this man who was regarded
in Oxford University and many others as one
of the leading theologians of our day, the
only words he had dared or found fit
to write in the front of his Bible
were these words.
Simple, but I never forgot them.
Sin will keep me from the Bible, but
the Bible will keep me from sin.
Sin will keep me from the Bible, but
the Bible will keep me from sin.
Listen to this.
Let it burn in your heart.
There are three things that have to be
done to backslide.
Three things that have to be done consciously,
carefully, deliberately, consistently to become a backslider.
To consciously backslide spiritually.
Firstly, if you enter into your day without
soaking yourself in the Word of God, you
will backslide.
You will backslide.
Secondly, if you enter into your day without
deep, unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you
will backslide.
Can I repeat it?
If you enter into your day without deep,
unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you will
backslide.
You will backslide.
God says these words in the Bible, pray
without ceasing.
That's a staggering statement.
How is that possible?
How is that accomplished?
Why did God call us to such a
high standard?
Pray without ceasing, God says.
I find a verse in the Old Testament
that's the equivalent to that verse.
Pray without ceasing.
I don't think any of you would be
able to guess what that verse is.
Enoch walked with God.
That's the same thing.
A man who lives fulfilling what God says
in the New Testament to you and I.
Enoch walked with God.
Do you know what the literal meaning of
that is?
As you look right into the Hebrew word
and look at everything that Hebrew word says
and its truth, for our English language is
limited sometimes to one word, where there are
four or five of the Greek and four
at least of the Hebrew words that bring
out the full meaning.
So we have one word in our translation
of what can be applied forward.
But the full, without taking any chance, without
adding anything to the words, Enoch walked with
God.
Enoch lived in deep, habitual prayer and communing
with God.
Habitual.
There's something of forming habit here with the
discipline of communing with God.
It's prayer.
Deep communing with God.
I wrote a book years ago.
This first little thing I wrote and sent
it out and found suddenly it was all
over our land and other countries.
Far further than I thought it ever would
go.
One of the chapters, and I only wrote
the scriptures, it's just scriptures upon scriptures all
put together.
I'd like you to listen to these few
words of this one chapter.
Abraham, my friend.
Isaiah 41 verse 8.
Imagine being called the friend of God.
Not just someone who is saved, but you
become a friend of God.
Do you honestly believe that's not possible?
You're his child, so only are you his
friend.
Who in here does God say, Abraham, my
friend?
Who does God say that of here?
The friend of God.
He was called the friend of God.
James 2 verse 23.
When Abraham was 90 years old, the Lord
appeared to Abraham and said, I am the
almighty God.
Walk before me and be perfect.
You know what the literal Hebrew is?
Live in habitual fellowship with me.
Walk.
Live in habitual fellowship with me.
There's a discipline here.
Be blameless.
The word perfect means.
Genesis 17 verse 1.
Noah was a just man and perfect in
his generations.
Noah walked with God.
Noah was a just man, blameless in this
evil generation.
He walked in habitual fellowship with God.
This is the literal Hebrew.
The full meaning of the Hebrew.
Habitual fellowshiping with God.
Enoch walked with God.
Enoch walked in habitual fellowship with God.
Again, you can go to any commentary, any
Hebrew expounding exposition of any commentary in the
world and it will tell you this is
the literal meaning.
He walked in habitual fellowship with God.
Our fellowship is with the Father, with his
son Jesus.
1 John 1 verse 3b.
If we say we have fellowship with him
and walk in darkness, we lie.
We do not the truth.
1 John 1 verse 6.
He that saith he abideth in him ought
himself also so to walk even as he
walked.
1 John 2 verse 6.
Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not.
No one who abides in him, who lives
in communing and habitual fellowship with him deliberately
and consciously goes into habitual sin.
That's bringing out every part of what the
Greek can say.
According to the greatest theologians in the world
today, who are evangelical.
1 John 3 verse 6.
This I say then, walk in the spirit
and you shall not fulfill the lusts of
the flesh.
Walk and live habitually in communing with God,
enabled by the Holy Spirit.
And you will not fulfill the cravings and
the desires of the human nature.
According to the man who wrote most of
our commentaries today.
Well, most of the most loved commentaries.
Praying always with all prayer and supplication in
the spirit.
Ephesians 6 verse 18.
Abide in me, Jesus says.
I in you as the branch cannot bear
fruit of itself except it abide in the
vine.
Vitally united to the vine is what it
means that word abide.
No more can ye except ye abide in
me.
I am the vine, ye are the branches.
He that abideth in me, I in him,
the same bringeth forth much fruit.
Without me, that is severed from me.
If you read in the margin, the Hebrew
says, cut off from me.
Cut off from vital union with me.
Cut off from vital union with me is
the literal translation.
If you take the literal words, you can
do nothing.
Nothing can be done for you.
If a man does not abide in me,
he doesn't abide in me to habitual fellowship
and prayer in me.
He is cast forth as a branch.
He is eventually, he finds everything going wrong.
Tragedy comes upon your life spiritually.
If you abide in me, vitally united in
me and to me through habitual prayer and
fellowship with me, my words abide in you.
You shall ask what you will and shall
be done unto you.
There is something vital here about abiding in
Christ.
Enoch walked with God.
He lived in habitual, deep communing with God
through prayer, enabling him to walk with God.
This is the true meaning, the full meaning.
We have our country has one man that
stands out in our history as our greatest
prophet.
His name was Andrew Murray.
Andrew Murray was revered across the whole world
and is to this day as one of
the three foremost writers in the Christian world.
He is always among the three top writers
of all the sales of Christian literature.
Andrew Murray is one of the top three
for years and years through the ages.
His writings are loved by the godly.
Andrew Murray of our land.
Oh, he was loved, this dear godly man.
He was the only man we honestly had
a true revival in South Africa through.
When he was young and heard from the
pulpit as his father read Charles Finney's writings
of the Council of Revival here in America,
Andrew Murray fell on his face, weeping in
front of all those hundreds of ministers in
such a way that revival was to break
out in our land such as would turn
the history of South Africa Oh, the history
of our land turned to this one man,
Andrew Murray.
God was with him in the most remarkable
way.
And the preachers of America and England, the
greatest names, you have their books, all refer
to Andrew Murray as the one to whom
they sat at his feet.
He was so godly when he dared to
venture from South Africa to the great conventions
of England.
For twenty years later, people were saying, godly
people, one of your greatest preachers in your
history said, it's like going to deadness.
For twenty years later, we came.
It was like a dead convention after Andrew
Murray had preached, for no man brought the
presence of God into our midst like that
man did.
He was revered by the godly of the
godly.
He still is in the most remarkable way.
In our land, he was so revered that
I don't know of any president or prime
minister that was so revered as a religious
man was.
After God had used him that thousands and
countless thousands across our land had turned to
Christ.
In the early days of our land, in
his old age, he had a pulpit in
Cape Town, where I live, the most revered
pulpit in our land.
I've had privilege of preaching there again and
again, trembling knowing this was Andrew Murray's pulpit.
But he would walk from that massive church
that holds thousands and thousands.
And as he walked out of the door
onto the street, Adderley Street in Cape Town,
the whole street stopped.
That didn't happen for a president, sir.
In our land, whenever he walked out, in
their hundreds, men would just stop, the traffic
would stop, people would stop, it's Andrew Murray.
Drunk people would stand and take their hat
off as he passed, everyone knew it.
There was a reverence shown to this man,
a reverence such as was shown to no
other man in our history.
People from overseas who were visiting South Africa
would stand and would point, there he is,
that's the Andrew Murray the whole world talks
of.
He so shook the world through his life
and his writings and his preaching.
One day he was walking down the street
from this massive church, and as he walked,
the crowds were stopping.
Everything became a standstill, there was just this
silence as he walked, and the hundreds just
came to a standstill.
And he was oblivious to it, he didn't
seem to notice people would do that.
And as he walked, suddenly, with everybody watching,
in their hundreds and hundreds, in silence, looking
at him with reverence, suddenly he fell.
In his old age he fell and went
onto his face and his body.
His hands didn't protect and he went down
into the paving, it was cobblestones, and smashed
his face into the ground.
In his old age, oh, the people panicked.
They ran, in the hundreds, all around, where
this man had fallen.
The closest to him was an English speaking
policeman, a traffic policeman.
And he got to him first and lifted
him up, slowly, to help him up.
Eventually he got him on his feet.
There was no one speaking, there was this
deathly silence, deathly silence, all just looking.
And the policeman said to Andrew Murray, why
did you fall, sir?
Why have you fallen?
Are you sick?
Are you faint?
Why did you fall?
And he held this frail body of this
godly man as he asked him the question.
And Andrew Murray was reluctant to speak and
said, I'm fine now, just leave me, I
want to go on, leave me.
And the policeman said, no, I cannot leave
you, sir, I will not leave you, you
will fall again.
Why did you fall?
Are you ill, sir?
Are you faint?
Why, I will not let you until you
speak to me.
Why did you fall, sir?
And everybody was waiting in the silence of
hundreds of people, all just looking.
And Andrew Murray shook the world at what
he said.
He shook the world at what he said
to that policeman.
I think the world needs to be reminded
of what shook the whole world those days,
for that statement spread across the Church of
Christ to every nation on earth.
Andrew Murray looked in the eyes of this
policeman who wouldn't let him go unless he
had an answer as to why he fell,
and the tears poured down this old man's
face, the tears.
And he said, the reason I fell, just
for a moment, sir, just for a moment,
I lost the consciousness of the presence of
God.
It was such a shock to my being
that I fell physically like this.
That is why I fell, sir.
It was so foreign to him for so
long in his life that a moment of
losing the consciousness of the presence of God
made him collapse, head first.
You talk of Enoch walked with God.
You ask me, what does that mean?
Andrew Murray walked with God.
Do you think Enoch was the only man
God wanted to pray without ceasing?
Do you think prayer without ceasing is unattainable,
it needs all explanations?
How can we pray without ceasing at our
work?
How can we pray when we're occupied with
other things?
Oh, beloved, God doesn't make us confused in
our minds.
He doesn't hold us guilty of anything.
But there's something about your busiest moment that
you can be commuting with God.
When I'm sitting in a room full of
people, I'm more talking to God with all
the voices going.
I'm more talking to the Lord about what's
being said than anybody else I speak to
in the room.
You don't have to cut yourself off from
God in your busiest moment.
You can be doing it with God.
There's something about the practice of the presence
of God, Brother Lawrence says, that enables you
in your busiest moment to have the consciousness
of the presence of God with you always.
But it's a discipline at first and becomes
a habit, becomes an habitual state of life.
Tell me, this is the university of the
school of God.
This is the highest attainable level in God's
school.
But do you honestly believe God doesn't want
you to attain what Enoch attained?
Do you honestly believe Enoch was needed to
be unique and no other man could attain
what Andrew Murray attained?
When will you ever, will you ever apply
your life?
And it will cost you, sir.
It will cost you.
But will you ever apply your life?
Will you ever walk with God as Enoch
walked with God?
It's up to you.
It's not up to God.
It's up to you.
It's your choice.
It's a deliberate conscious choice of putting God
first, foremost.
Entering into the day in a way you
cannot walk with God unless you enter into
the day.
Seeking God in such a way that you
don't get up when you're finished with the
quiet time and leaving behind.
You've only had a quiet time in truth.
If you can get up and open the
door and as a result of the time
with God, it enables you to walk with
God, not leaving behind.
The quiet time is worthless if it doesn't
enable you to get up and enable you
to walk with God through the day.
You didn't have a quiet time.
It has to be the most nurtured, vital
thing in life to get you so in
touch with God that you stand up to
walk with God through the day.
And you don't leave Him behind.
You're now in touch with Him.
You don't stop communing with Him.
You walk out the door talking with Him.
You walk down the street communing with Him.
You sit in the crowd communing with Him.
In your busiest moments, you still have thoughts
going up to Him and words to Him.
It doesn't mean that you aren't full-time
speaking, that you're not tenderly in touch with
God.
Will it ever be of you, sir, lady,
that God will ever write against your name
what He wants to?
What He found He could write against Enoch
and Andrew Murray.
Will He ever find it of you?
Will that ever be said of you, sir?
You can.
If you strive to attain the university level
in the school of God, you can learn
to walk with God.
You can walk with God.
There are three things that have to be
done to backslide.
Three things that have to be done consciously,
carefully, deliberately, consistently.
Never forget this, not one day of your
life.
If you forget everything I ever preached this
few days, forget them, but don't forget this.
There are three things that have to be
done consciously, carefully.
It is careful you're not doing it by
mistake.
Deliberately, you know you're doing it.
You know you're choosing other things.
You know you're filling up your life with
other things that will keep you from this.
You allow it to happen.
You will become a backslider.
There are three things that have to be
done carefully, consciously, deliberately, to consciously backslide
spiritually.
Firstly, if you enter into your day, if
you enter into your day without soaking yourself
in the word of God, you will backslide.
If you enter into your day without soaking
yourself in the word of God, you will
backslide.
You will backslide.
Secondly, if you enter into your day without
deep, unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you
will backslide.
If you enter into your day without deep,
unhurried, communing with God in prayer, you will
backslide.
You will backslide.
And finally, if you enter into your day
without being determined to witness to every person
you can, you will backslide.
If you enter into your day without being
determined to witness to every person you can,
you will backslide.
I won't expound on that.
I'll leave that between you and God.
Let's stand, please.
Father, we don't get right with thee by
doing these things in a discipline.
But when we are right with thee, we
stay right.
And it reveals the right with thee by
doing these things.
But as much as we all long to
say that it doesn't need discipline when we
are right with God, we soon find out
it's the greatest discipline in life.
For it seems everything in this world cries
out to keep us from these three things
daily at many times of our lives.
Help us, Lord.
Help us to remember these three things, to
hold them in our hearts, and to guard
that we never, ever, ever enter into our
day without being determined to do these three
things with all our heart.
And I know, God, that if we do
that, we will never backslide.
We will never, ever backslide.
We will eventually, like Enoch, walk with God.
And our lives will stagger the world.
Keep these words in our heart, Lord.
Keep these words burning in our heart as
we go through our days till the day
we die.
Let these words echo daily and confront us
daily as we rise from our bed.
And help us, help us to have the
grace to fulfill them.
Now bless us, Lord.
We've had much of meetings.
And I know, I know, Lord, that there
is so much being done in so many
hearts here that the devil will never, ever
take away these three things.
These three things are applied now.
Please protect all that has been said in
every message.
And find it coming back like a vengeance
to us, as if we're sitting in a
meeting.
Years from now, as if we write in
the very meeting, the whole message is coming
back into our heart as if we write
there again.
Lord, never let us lose these things.
All that was from God's heart, please let
it come back.
Circumstance, circumstance, in our homes, at our work,
when we're confronted with enemies of persecution.
Whatever, Lord, bring back, bring back the promises
of God to the bruised that read, to
the smoking flax.
Bring back all the mighty healing promises of
God for when we're wounded.
Help us to keep that open book, to
be healed by the promises.
Help us, dear God, through life, to reject
what the world thinks makes us rich, and
only to embrace what God says makes us
wealthy and have true riches.
Help us to be so disciplined as to
become wealthy in God's eyes in this lifetime.
Oh, please do it, Lord, that we will
consciously reject anything and everything that would keep
us from the true riches, and never be
tempted to take up the riches that men
think make them rich, men without God.
Oh, do it, Lord.
Do it.
The things we thought of last evening with
my dear father's life.
Thank you for the memory of my father.
Thank you for the example he was to
me and to so many.
And thank you that I could share his
life, though he's gone so many years, to
be with God, that his life still speaketh.
Oh, I bless thee that I could have
shared that last night.
And if it was just that he threw
down those cigarettes that he smoked sixty a
day to make one man say, I'm throwing
them down.
Thank thee, Lord, that we could have remembered
how he threw them down.
If it was just the way he wept
for souls, in a way, few weep.
Not because he was dying, but because he
was dying without a soul to sow God.
But may God heal him, and make him
one of the greatest soul winners our country's
ever known.
Thank thee we could have remembered it and
shared it last night.
Thank thee if it makes anyone in this
building look at their lives and begin to
weep for others, not for themselves.
So that God, in his holiness and his
obligation to answer their prayers, will take them
up and bring the world to God through
them.
Thank thee for the many other things we
looked at, Lord.
How he became crucified.
How he had a personal Calvary.
And how it brought my mother to weep,
not just to be stunned by the change
of his life.
So that she saw someone totally different in
the home.
If there's any here, Lord, that through that
would come to a place of personal Calvary.
For last night as they knelt, so many,
the most it seems, knelt before God, weeping.
God, if it was just to bring that
out in their lives.
Oh, we bless thee.
We bless thee that Christ may be seen
in them from now onward.
Whatever it was that God spoke, Lord, through
these past meetings, let them come back upon
us through the rest of our lives with
such a vengeance that we will never be
able to escape what God said to us,
but just fulfill it till our dying day.
And this message too, Lord.
Oh, please help us.
Help us, Lord, to do these three things
determinedly, consciously, deliberately, carefully, and not to do
determinedly, consciously, deliberately, carefully to not do them.
We have the choice, Lord, and we know
when we're not doing them.
We know when we walk from the home
without meeting God.
We're so conscious of it, we wouldn't be
more conscious if someone hit us with a
hammer on the head of what had happened.
Help us, Lord.
Help us to not neglect the things we
heard this day.
To throw our lives into them and never
to backslide like those boys who were murderers,
who never backslid.
Never backslid.
Not one of them.
Because they took to heart the things that
were cried out to them from a broken
heart.
Oh, keep us under the blood now.
Keep us deeply under the blood of Jesus,
safe from Satan and demons and evil people,
and fulfill thy will in our lives as
we leave, as we have fellowship over lunch
and go to our homes.
God, fulfill thy will in our lives and
through our lives, over and above that we
have asked of thee and wept last night
and the other evening for thee to do.
God, fulfill it above that we thought thou
would ever do.
By thy grace, Lord, let things happen so
in our hearts that we will receive spontaneously
in our lives, without effort, so much of
what we trusted God to do, but kept
spontaneously because of the things we do do,
the quiet time especially.
Oh, bless us now.
Bless us richly with the presence of Christ
as we eat, with the presence of Christ
beside us as we leave this place.
Help us to start now practicing the presence
of God.
Help us to start now walking with God.
With deep, habitual fellowship and prayer, communion with
God until the discipline becomes a habit, until
it becomes a way of life, until one
moment without it will make us fall on
our faces.
We're so conscious of God and that can
be ours.
Help us to strive for it, not to
settle until we, like Andrew Murray, like Enoch,
walk with God in this world, more than
we walk with anyone else or conscious of
anyone else in our lives.
Help us to find this walk for thy
glory.
Bless tonight, the last service.
We know there are many who have to
go back now, who've come from far, but
all that can come to this evening, bring
and give us a goodly ending, Lord, of
this series, with the voice of God penetrating
our heart.
Take in thy mercy, this weakest of all
thy servants, this basest of all thy servants,
and in mercy prepare me.
Give me a word from the heart of
God that will burn forever in all the
hearts of thy people who are here tonight.
We ask these things in the name of
Jesus Christ, God, Saviour, King of kings, Lord
of lords, the name that every knee shall
bow to and confess that he is Lord.
Every tongue shall confess it.
O God, we praise thee for Jesus, and
we ask all these things in his glorious
name, and for his sake.
Amen.