This message is one of the Times Square
Church pulpit series.
It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times
Square Church in Manhattan, New York City.
Other tapes are available by writing World Challenge,
Post Office Box 260, Lindale, Texas, 75771, or
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For thus saith the Lord God, the Holy
One of Israel, In returning and rest shall
ye be saved.
In quietness and confidence shall be your strength,
and ye would not.
But ye said, No.
For we will flee upon horses, therefore shall
ye flee.
And we will ride upon the swift, therefore
shall they that pursue you be swift.
One thousand shall flee at the rebuke of
one, at the rebuke of five shall ye
flee, till ye be left as a beacon
upon the top of a mountain, as an
ensign on a hill.
And therefore will the Lord wait, that he
may be gracious unto you.
And therefore he will be exalted, that he
may have mercy upon you.
For the Lord is a God of judgment.
Blessed are they that wait for him.
For the people shall dwell in Zion at
Jerusalem.
Thou shalt weep no more.
He will be very gracious unto thee at
the voice of thy cry.
When he shall hear it, he will answer
thee.
When he hears your cry, he will answer
thee.
Hallelujah.
We thank you, O God, for your precious
Word.
Your Word is our lamp, it's our strength.
And I stand as the shepherd of this
flock to humble myself before you, Jesus.
And I ask for a special touch from
heaven, the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
Let me speak as a shepherd does to
his flock.
Lord, I'm only one, but I ask you,
Lord, to use this vessel this morning.
Sanctify me, purge me, let me speak the
pure, holy Word that will produce life.
O God, we thank you for your presence
here this morning.
You were here since we opened the service,
and you're going to be here all day.
Now, Lord, apply the Word to our hearts.
Holy Spirit, bring forth unction, bring forth an
anointing.
Let the Word heal us this morning.
Let the Word strengthen us.
Let the Word reprove us and rebuke us
if it must, only to heal us, that
you may be gracious unto us.
I pray, Father, in Jesus' name, amen.
Why God waits to answer.
Now, I've read to you from Isaiah chapter
30.
Don't turn there, but it goes back to
chapter 29.
This is during the reign of Hezekiah in
Jerusalem and Judah.
The prophet Isaiah is contemporary at this time
along with the prophet Micah.
These were the two prophets that spoke during
these times.
If you want to know how the times
were during this period that we're discussing this
morning, you read the whole book of Micah,
and you get the picture of how Jerusalem
and Judah are under judgment at this time.
And Isaiah is sent by the Spirit of
God to Jerusalem and the inhabitants there and
God's people, and he's got a two-pronged
message.
First of all, he warns of a horrible
warfare that was coming.
And second, there was a promise of God's
deliverance that they would simply trust and obey.
The prophet Isaiah stands before God's people in
Jerusalem, and he gives an awesome prophecy.
He said, you're going to be going through
a great test of faith, and this is
all in the 29th chapter, and I'm paraphrasing.
He said, there's looming before you a great
test of faith.
You're going to wake up one day, he
said, and look out over the walls of
Jerusalem.
You're going to see the Assyrian army surrounding
you, and he said, within one year it's
going to happen.
You see, God always warns his people.
He always warns us.
And the prophet Isaiah tearfully is standing before
the people, and they're really being judged at
this time for an apostasy.
The city of God, the place of his
anointing, where his fire fell on the altar,
was going to come under an attack.
They would be besieged, and there's going to
be such a besiegement that there would be
towers raised against them, where there would be
bridges made so that they could go from
their towers right to the top of the
wall.
They're going to be battering rams, battering the
walls night and day to try to tear
down the walls of security.
These battering rams were going to be an
attempt to crush every protecting wall.
They were going to go through the bread
of adversity and the water of affliction.
The prophet said, your trial is going to
become so heavy, you're going to be humbled
to the very dust, you're going to lay
prostrate, and the only strength you're going to
have left when this battle is over is
just a bare whisper.
You're just going to be able to whisper.
All your strength is going to be gone.
Now folks, this sounds very familiar to me.
It sounds like the same kind of warning
the Holy Spirit has given to us in
the New Testament.
It's a warning that we as God's people
in the last days are going to go
through spiritual warfare, that the devil is going
to come.
You wake up one day, and you're surrounded
by enemies.
You wake up one day, and you find
yourself in a battle for your life.
You find the devil coming with his battering
rams, and his towers, and bangs, and he
hits, and everything out of hell comes against
you.
And there are people sitting among us here
this morning in the balcony, main floor, around
me, surrounding me, and you don't know who
they are.
I don't know, only the Holy Ghost does.
He's the mind reader, and he knows exactly
what you are going through this morning.
He knew that all week, and he prepared
a message for many of you.
Some of you are visitors God sent you
here this morning to deliver you, to bring
you into new realm of discovery in the
Spirit.
He's going to help you this morning.
If you just say right now, Holy Spirit,
open my ears to hear.
If you're sitting here this morning, and your
mind is wondering, bring it to captivity, every
thought and obedience of the Lord Jesus, because
the Holy Spirit is faithful to his flock.
He is faithful to his people.
Folks, we serve a loving Heavenly Father who
wants nothing more than to deliver his people.
He's called a deliverer.
He is a deliverer.
That's what he has in mind for you
this morning.
Suddenly, some of you have been cast into
the trial of your life.
You're being tested in your faith.
Well, some of you have been so overwhelmed,
you've literally been crushed and humiliated, and you
get up each day, and you wonder if
you can go on.
There's a doctor in this church, fine man
of God, and just recently he was sued,
and taking a stand for the Lord, and
going through it, and he said, Brother Dave,
every day I wake up, there's something new.
There's something worse.
There's always another evil report.
I am being battered.
I'm at my wit's end.
I got a letter.
You know, we receive thousands of letters from
our mailing list that our messages are sent
all over the United States and around the
world.
And this week, a letter came to me
from a sister in the Midwest, and she
said, Dear Brother David, I attend a Holy
Ghost-filled church.
I've grown more in the past two years
than in all my past life, but for
the past six months, I've been going through
a fiery trial of my faith, and I
don't think I can take much more.
Why does everything have to be so hard?
I have met the devil face to face,
and it seems like he hits me in
some different way every day.
Every day, there's another evil report.
He's been robbing me financially.
He's trying to discourage me, so I'll quit.
I've become so weary, it shows on my
face and now in my attitude.
Every day just brings more pressure.
Why can't things settle down for a while?
I bind Satan.
I praise the Lord all times, but it
seems to be to no avail.
I know the word is true.
I'm listening all day to godly tapes, but
I can hardly make it through the day
anymore.
I'm so tired trying to be strong.
I'm at my wit's end, and I really
don't know what's happening.
And we get letters like that from all
over the world, people going through the test
of their life.
The prophet Isaiah sees this message from the
Lord.
He hears the voice of the Lord, and
he said, even though I warned you of
what's going through, even though I have warned
you, I'm telling you that God, if you'll
trust him, is going to bring you through
miraculously.
God is going to deliver you.
You're going to be surrounded by armies.
You're going to have battering rams battering at
your walls.
You're going to go through such a test.
It's going to bring you finally prostrate on
your face in the dust, where you can
only whisper.
But I'm telling you now, you don't have
to do anything about it.
You're going to just trust the Lord, and
he's going to carry you through.
And one day in his time, every enemy
will be gone, and it'll be just like
a bad dream that passes away.
He gave in chapter 29, there are eight
verses.
The four first verses of chapter 29 are
all woes, what you're going through.
Folks, hasn't the Holy Spirit warned us that
we're going to be in spiritual battles?
Hasn't he warned us that we're going to
go into a fiery furnace?
He said, think it not strange concerning the
fiery trial, which is to try you, as
though some strange thing has happened to you.
But he said, what's happening to you is
common to all of God's people.
But God will in his own time, in
his way, make a way of escape that
you may be able to bear it.
Even though he warns us, he said, in
the last days, we'll be persecuted.
We will be tried.
And just when you think your strength is
going to fail, when you're lowest, when all
seems hopeless, at the peak of your crisis,
Bible says, God will take over.
You read Isaiah 29, verses 5 to 8.
And oh, what tremendous promises are given here.
Moreover, the multitude of thy strangers shall be
like small dust, the multitude of the terrible
ones.
In fact, in Hebrew, those very important people
who come against you shall be as chaff
that passeth away.
It shall be as an instant, suddenly.
Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of
hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great
noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame
of devouring fire, and the multitude of those
that come against Jerusalem, her Ariel, even all
that fight against her and her munitions, and
that have distressed her shall be as a
dream and a night vision.
And here's a wonderful promise.
God says, the multitude of your enemies shall
become like fine dust, the multitude of the
ruthless, like the chaff shall blow away.
The Lord will visit upon your enemies, is
what he's saying, with thunder, with earthquake, with
great noise, with storm and tempest, and a
devouring fire.
And you know what the prophet is saying?
Very suddenly.
When you think it's hopeless, when you think
you can't go another step, suddenly, suddenly, the
Lord shall come with thunder, and lightning, and
earthquake.
The Assyrians who have schemed to destroy you
will themselves be put to shame, and that's
all through chapter 29, and also the first
part of chapter 30.
He said they're going to wake up into
a delusion.
They're going to have empty souls.
The devil's plans and schemes will fade away
like a bad dream.
God will lift you up out of the
despair, and everyone who's come against you, who
has warred against you, shall be consumed with
his voice.
They will no longer distress you, and the
dream will pass, and you will come into
his glory, and you will come into the
increase of bread, the scripture says.
Your bread will be increased.
It means the blessing of God.
Folks, we today have even greater promises than
they had.
Scripture makes it very, very clear that we
live in a time of greater promises.
For he has obtained a more excellent ministry
by how much more he is the mediator
of a better covenant, which is established upon
better promises.
We have all the promises Jerusalem had, and
we have all the promises of the New
Testament.
Yes, God has warned you.
He has warned me.
He's warned us all that there are times
that come that are going to test the
very righteous, and I'm going to tell you,
and I want you to hear me well.
The more righteous you are, the closer you
walk to Jesus, the hungrier you are for
him, the more you seek his face, the
more you are going to be tried, and
tempted, and tested as no other Christian.
Dear sister on our mailing list, send us
this note.
Dear Brother David, I feel led of the
Lord to send you these encouraging words from
Brother Frangipani's book, The Three Battlegrounds, and I
want to read just a paragraph, and here's
what it said.
In these closing moments of this age, the
Lord will have a people whose purpose for
living is only to please God with their
lives.
Do you know there are people like that?
Their only purpose for living is to please
God.
Do you know the price that kind of
person is going to pay?
In them, God finds his own reward for
creating man.
They become his worshipers.
Oh, thank God for worshipers.
If you are a true worshiper, watch out.
They are on earth only to please God,
and when he is pleased, they are pleased.
The Lord takes them farther and through more
pain and more conflicts than other men.
Outwardly, these people seem to be smitten of
God and afflicted, yet to God they are
his beloved.
When they are crushed like the petals of
a flower, they exude worship, the fragrance of
which is so beautiful and rare that angels
weep in quiet at their surrender.
One would think that God would protect these
who worship.
He would guard them in such a way
that they would not be marred or broken.
Instead, they are marred and broken more than
any other men.
Indeed, the Lord seems pleased to crush them,
putting them to grief, for in the midst
of the physical and emotional pain, their loyalty
to Jesus Christ grows purer and more perfect.
In the face of persecution, their love and
worship toward God becomes all-consuming.
Folks, that's the purpose of suffering.
That's the purpose of being tried, that God
may bring us to a place of sweetness,
a place of rest, that we can come
to this, he said, in quietness and confidence
shall be your security, that you're secure because
you have been tested of the Lord and
you didn't murmur, you didn't complain, you didn't
quit, but you grew in Christ.
It produced the nature of Christ.
It produced the beauty of Jesus in you.
That's why some of you are going through
it.
You can't understand it, but Pastor Dave, never
have I loved him more.
I've studied, I've wept, I've cried, I've prayed,
I walked circumspectly before God.
Why am I going through the trial that
I'm going through?
Some of it is financial for some of
you, some of it's children, some of it's
family, some of it's physical.
I don't know what you're going through today.
Is it your father, your mother, your brother,
your sister, your children?
Is it just your own physical pain?
What is it you're going through?
I don't know, but he does.
But he said that's common.
That is not to be considered something unusual.
And if God doesn't deliver you immediately, I
can tell you one thing, he'll give you
all the grace you need to see it
through.
There was a persistent woman who cried night
and day for justice and a vengeance.
She kept coming to the judge.
And the judge said, because she bothers me,
I'll answer.
But the Lord Jesus himself, and shall not
God avenge or protect his own elect, which
cry unto him night and day, though he
bear long with them.
I tell you, this is Jesus speaking.
Jesus, I tell you that he will avenge
them speedily.
Nevertheless, when the Son of Man cometh, shall
he find faith on the earth.
God said, make sure you understand that the
Lord will fight your battles.
The Lord will do it.
Now, beloved, Jesus was the fulfillment given to
all the prophets of the promise.
You read about the promise all through the
Old Testament.
That was Jesus.
That was the Messiah coming.
It was given to all the prophets.
I want you to go to Luke, please,
the first chapter of Luke.
Really, something could give you great encouragement.
It's one of my favorite passages of Scripture.
Luke 1, beginning to read verse 68.
You should read this every week or every
time you're downcast.
Luke, first chapter.
Luke 1, beginning to read verse 68.
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel.
This is Zachariah speaking.
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for
he hath visited and redeemed his people, and
has raised up a horn of salvation for
us in the house of his servant David.
Who is that power of salvation, that horn?
Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Hallelujah.
As he spake by the mouth of his
holy prophets, which have been since the world
began, that we should be saved from our
enemies, and from the hand of how many?
All that hate us, to perform the mercy
promised to our fathers, and to remember his
holy covenant, the oath which he swore to
our father Abraham, that he would grant unto
us that we, being delivered out of the
hand of our enemies, might serve him without
fear, in holiness and righteousness before him.
How long?
All the days of our life without fear.
All the days of our life, God dealing
with your enemies in your household, your enemies
on the job, your enemies on the street,
demonic powers, principalities and powers of darkness, whatever
it may be that comes against you, the
Lord says, I will deliver you from all
your enemies, so that you live out all
your days in peace, and rest in the
Lord.
I want you to go to Isaiah, back
to Isaiah 30, the 30th chapter of Isaiah
again.
You see, God comes to Jerusalem with these
wonderful promises.
He said, if you'll call on me, I'll
hear you.
You'll hear a voice behind you saying, this
is the way, walk in it, when you
turn to the right or to the left.
He said, if you'll simply call on me,
I will hear you, and I will answer
you.
He said, I will deliver you, and I'll
handle all your enemies.
But the scripture makes it clear that Israel,
or rather that Jerusalem and Judah, did not
listen to the prophet, did not listen to
the word of God.
And the scripture says they panicked, and they
did not consult the Lord, but they had
their own committee meetings.
They met in private, and they said, who
sees it?
God doesn't see it.
And they counseled among themselves, and they did
not call on the name of the Lord.
They didn't seek the guidance of the Holy
Spirit, but they turned to the arm of
the flesh.
They got on swift horses and sent ambassadors
to Egypt.
They went to Zohar and to Hanes, and
they sent their ambassadors on swift horses, and
they turned to the arm of the flesh.
Look at chapter 30, verse 15, if you
will, please.
Woe unto them that seek deep to hide
their counsel from the Lord, and their works
are in the dark, and they say, who
seeth us and who knoweth us?
Chapter 30, no, that's chapter 29, 13.
I want you to go to chapter 30,
verse 15 again.
This is chapter 30, verse 15.
For thus saith the Lord God, the Holy
One of Israel, in returning and rest shall
ye be saved, in quietness and confidence shall
be your strength, and you would not.
Now, folks, look at me, please.
This is the Prophet Isaiah standing before the
people.
He said, the Assyrians are coming within a
year.
And he said, all you have to do
is stand still and see the salvation of
the Lord.
All you do is cry out to the
Lord, and he will come and deliver you.
And while they're gathered around you, while all
this turmoil is around you, you're going to
have your mind at rest and peace, and
that's going to be your strength.
That's going to see you through if you'll
just take my word.
But he said, you would not.
You would not listen to that.
You wouldn't take it.
They panicked.
And they said, no, we want to see
action.
The Lord works too slow.
Oh, isn't that just the way we are?
God has made us great and precious promises
whereby we're made partakers of his divine nature.
You know the hardest thing it is for
a Christian or a child of God to
do is to stand still and see the
salvation of the Lord?
We want something to happen.
So we get on our swift horses, just
like Israel, and we run down to Egypt.
Egypt is flesh.
Egypt is man-made methods.
You see, the Bible says that the Holy
Ghost is our comforter.
And rather than accept that and rest in
that, we run to our friends.
We get on the telephone.
We look for some human comforter.
Who do you run to in your brattle?
Who do you go to?
Who hears your ear?
Do you run to the Lord, or do
you really pick up your phone?
You say, I've got a good friend.
This friend asked me, this friend will help
me out.
The Bible says Jesus is our healer.
And rather than rest on that, we run
to our doctors.
We run to our hospitals.
We run to our experts.
We really don't trust the Lord.
You and I know that.
When we are in battle, when we're in
trouble, we run to some counselor.
We have Christians now that just...
Go to the Christian bookstore.
Look at all the people lined up on
the how-to books.
How to find happiness.
How to solve your loneliness problem.
There must be 10,000 books on how
to overcome loneliness, written by lonely people who
don't know what they're talking about.
They're trying to solve their own problems.
God said, if you will seek me, your
ears shall hear word behind you saying, this
is the way, walk in it when you
turn to the right hand and turn to
the left.
All God said, Israel, or Judah, Jerusalem, Judah,
will you just lean on me?
Folks, I'm telling you, we don't do that.
Somehow this has to get into your heart.
I've stood in this platform, this pulpit, this
past year, especially, I've been looking back over
the messages I've preached and the notes.
Folks, I have preached more on this subject
than any other subject this past year.
Brother Carter has stood here and others have
stood here trying to get us to believe
God, not to lean on the arm of
the flesh and to rest in his promises.
It has been coming at us time and
time again, and God must know, he must
know, and I know he does, that many
of us have been grieving him.
Because I can preach the kind of message
I'm preaching this morning about distrusting his word
and leaning not on the flesh, but leaning
on his word and his promises.
And people come up to me and say,
brother, that was a good word.
I can meet him out on the street.
Boy, that was good.
Boy, the Lord touched me.
That's Sunday by Wednesday.
The trial is raging around them and you
thought I hadn't said a word about trust.
Everything they heard Sunday morning or Sunday night,
they've forgotten.
And they're on the telephone, they're in panic,
they're on their swift horses running to Egypt.
I'm telling you, that wounded the heart of
God.
God was wounded, he's grieved, because rather than
being in a secret closet pouring out their
hearts, they're down sitting in the council rooms
with the Egyptians who were heathen, worshiping idols,
and they're pouring out their hearts to these
Egyptian lords.
These very Egyptian lords that God once wounded
and destroyed.
The posterity of these people, and here they
are with their seed sitting down in these
council rooms saying, look, the Assyrians are coming
against us, we're going to be in the
battle of our life, we are weak, we
can't stand it, we will pay any price
if you come and protect us.
What does, how does the heart of God
feel when his own children, having all these
promises, turn away from him and run on
swift horses to the camp of the Egyptians
and they're unburdening and unboosting themselves to these
men.
And God said it's a shame.
He said they can't help you.
And the prophet is incredulous, he can't believe
their blindness.
He said you've lost your discernment.
Woe to the rebellious children that go down
to Egypt and have not asked at my
mouth.
And they go to strengthen themselves in the
strength of Pharaoh and to trust in the
shadow of Egypt.
And the prophet comes along and he said,
you know why you don't hear the word
of God?
For the Lord's poured out upon you a
spirit of deep sleep and he's closed your
eyes.
This is the end of side one has
been a test so many times trying.
Every battle has been a test.
He's tested you and tested you failed and
you failed and you failed.
And here they are at an ultimate test.
Folks, I want to tell you something.
If you've never heard anything ever preached in
this pulpit before, listen now, listen to a
pastor who's learning.
I'm sorry I had to wait till I'm
this age in my 60s to learn some
of these lessons.
But you can preach this gospel all your
life, you can talk about faith, you can
preach it, you can preach about trusting the
Lord, but I don't want to tell you
it only comes through trials.
It only comes through test.
And I wish I had learned in some
of the former tests that I wouldn't have
to be tested so severely at this time
in my ministry, in my age, that I
would have to go through such severe testing
till I finally learned this lesson to just
step back and trust God and call on
his name and let him take care of
everything.
I have learned in a time of slander
and abuse to stand still and see the
salvation of God and not try to defend
myself or the house of God.
I used to be a fighter.
There was a time 10 years ago before
I came to New York, you ever touch
me, you came near me, you pick yourself
up off the street.
Bless God, I'm a prophet.
I didn't say that, but I felt it.
You touch me and you're dead.
No, that's all gone.
And you know why?
Because in the test, you're not to retaliate.
You're not to take the battle in your
own hands.
You don't sit around questioning, is God doing
this or the devil doing this?
It don't matter.
If he's chasing you, he said, blessed are
you, whom the Lord loves.
He said, well, God, you must love me
an awful lot to test me like this.
But some of you are not there yet.
You're still fighting.
Somebody talks about you on the job, start
a rumor.
You're going to start another one.
You're going to retaliate.
You're going to get even.
That's not the Christ way.
The test you're going through, are you going
to sit around?
When do you stop complaining and say, oh
God, where are you?
Why are you doing this to me?
Lord, I've never loved you more than I
do.
Why, why, why, why, why?
That's the only word some of us get
out of our trials.
And the hardest thing to do, and I'm
telling you this, and it's the only way,
is to rest and stand still and say,
God, teach me the lessons I want to
learn.
Open my mind, open my heart.
There's so much that he wants to teach
us.
You say, well, Brother David, I've been walking
with God for 30 years.
Well, folks, I've been walking with God longer
than that.
And as a pastor, I'm still learning.
You're going to learn too.
Forget how long you've been walking with God.
I know people who've walked with God 50
years and they're still babies.
Have learned hardly anything.
And they don't understand why the Lord keeps
testing and trying them.
Hallelujah.
God was greatly offended when they panicked and
rushed down to Egypt.
God calls it outright rebellion when we refuse
to rest on his promises.
Woe to the rebellious children that take counsel
but not of me.
They've not asked it in my mouth.
They depend on horses and they trust in
chariots because there are many, but they look
not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither
do they seek the Lord.
Beloved, all through the word, we have been
warned that we're going to go through this
and that God tells us that if you're
a true worshiper, you're going to be tried
more than anything else.
But the truth is the majority of God's
people do not rest on the promises.
They don't.
Now, God saw this feverish activity going on.
He saw them rushing down to Egypt.
Can you see their ambassadors and their princes?
They've got swift horses and they're all excited
they're going to work out their own problem.
Go ahead, get on your swift horse.
The Bible said the horses that are following
you are just the swift and you can't
outrun your problems.
There's no place on earth you can outrun
what you're going through wherever you go.
It's still there because the horses the Bible
said after you are swift as your horses.
Just about you think, well, that's all over.
You turn around.
There it is.
Still following you.
No, you can't outrun your problems.
And these men panic.
They're trying to outrun their problem.
Look now with me.
Here's the heart of my message.
Verse 18, chapter 30.
God looks down at it and he says,
and therefore will the Lord wait that he
may be gracious unto you.
I'll wait.
Look at me, please.
God says, okay, you don't need me right
now because you're so busy doing it yourself.
I'm just going to wait.
I want to be gracious.
I want to hear you.
I'm ready.
I have a plan.
I'll do it my time and way.
I'm testing you to see if you're just
sitting right and rest, get off your horse.
But he said, and this is the reason
why God has not answered many of you
because you're still so busy trying to work
it out, figure it out.
And Lord said, okay, I'm going to wait
until you exhaust all your human effort.
I'm going to wait until you completely are
exhausted and say, well, to whom shall I
go?
That's where he wants you, where you are
hopeless in the flesh.
There's no man, there's no woman, there's no
program, there's nothing on the face of the
earth is going to help you.
And you say, all right, God, I quit.
I resign.
You do it.
David said, I cried unto the Lord with
my voice and my voice unto the Lord.
Did I make my supplication?
I poured out my sorrow before him.
I showed before him my trouble.
When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then
thou knewest my path.
God said, come on to me now and
pour out your soul.
Tell me what you've tried.
I understand.
I've followed you.
I've watched you.
Lord said, wait, I'll wait till you're exhausted.
I'll wait till you're tired of trying to
figure it out.
And you just fall back and say, God,
it's absolutely beyond me.
I can't fight it.
I can't do anything about it.
I can't change it.
I can't.
My finances, my family, Lord, it's there.
It's been thrust upon me.
I have to just endure it.
But, oh, God, you're going to have to
give me strength.
You have to figure this whole thing out.
And the Lord said, let's go on.
Hallelujah.
He said, I'm going to wipe away your
tears, the next verse, for the people dwell
in Zion at Jerusalem.
Thou shalt weep no more, for he will
be very gracious unto you.
He was very gracious unto thee at what?
The voice of thy cry.
And when he shall hear it, he will
answer thee.
The first message, it was the second message
I heard Pastor Carter preach.
When a cry becomes a prayer, is that
it?
And that's when I got on my car
phone and called him to come down here
and preach, which led to his being here.
And I know he preaches this, and I
know how diligently I preach it.
But folks, somehow by the Holy Spirit, it
has to find its mark today and change
us as a people.
God cannot build a strong church on people
who are not convinced that God is on
their side, that God sees and knows all,
and that he alone, by faith, to those
who call and cry to his name.
Folks, I don't do anything anymore.
Anything that comes my way, you know where
I go?
I don't get on the phone.
I don't call Pastor Carter.
I don't call any pastor anywhere on the
face of the earth.
I don't even sit down and talk over
with my wife.
I love her, but I don't take my
problems to her.
My wife, I love her, but she can't
touch that space in me.
She can't help me there.
She can't touch that spot.
And so I go into my study, and
I shut the door.
Or I go out, get in my car,
and go to Pennsylvania, and go up on
a mountain, and I'll spend three or four
hours just walking and crying my heart out.
I unburden my whole soul.
I tell him everything.
I weep, I cry, and I say, God,
you said, and I use this very verse,
you said, when I cry, you'll hear me,
and you'll deliver me.
And I'll tell you, after, when I come
out, when I come out of that secret
closet, or when I come away from that
walk with God, there's something inside of me
that can settle on this, and quietness and
confidence is your strength.
There is strength that comes.
God reassures you.
Then you're not looking to the arm of
flesh.
You don't have to call anybody.
You don't have to talk it over with
anybody.
That doesn't mean you're a law to yourself,
or that you're just a loner.
But then when you come out, you're talking
faith.
You're talking God's on the throne.
You're trying to figure anything out.
But folks, God has waited and waited sometimes
on me, and He's going to stand by
and wait.
You can pray for eight hours a day.
You can seek God with all that you
are in the flesh.
You can read chapter after chapter after chapter.
You can read whole books.
You can read the whole Bible.
But if you don't have faith in His
promises, in His Word, nothing's going to happen.
For the Egyptians shall help in vain and
to no purpose, and they shall be to
you a shame and a reproach.
You turn to the flesh.
It ends in nothing but shame and reproach.
But oh, I love this.
He will be very, not just gracious, but
very gracious to you at the voice of
your cry.
And when He hears it, He will answer
thee.
All right, before I close, now go to
chapter 30, verse 20 and 21.
The Lord give you the bread of adversity
and the water of affliction.
How many of you going through that right
now?
Bread of affliction, water of trouble?
Raise your hand.
Am I preaching to myself?
I said, how many of you being tested
and tried?
Raise your hand.
Quit hiding.
Well, there's still some of you hiding.
I'll tell you what, if this doesn't apply
to you today, get the tape by Wednesday
at will.
Verse 20, and though the Lord give you
the bread of adversity, who gives it to
you?
The bread of adversity, the water of affliction.
Yet shall not thy teachers be removed into
a corner anymore, but then I shall see
thy teachers.
And folks, do you know what this is?
This is revelation.
This is, who is our teacher?
The Holy Spirit.
These are revelations of the Holy Spirit.
We never, won't be hidden to you anymore
because you're trusting in the Lord.
They're going to be revelations of the Holy
Spirit.
The Holy Spirit's going to guide you now.
He's going to lead you through.
He's going to tell you how and what
to do.
Sometimes you just say, stand still, don't do
anything.
And then he will give you direction.
There'll be a revelation of who God is,
who Jesus is.
And you'll be standing there, but you won't
be standing still.
You'll be learning.
There'll be a process of learning.
Your teacher will not be hidden anymore.
Nothing will be hidden from your eyes.
You'll be learning.
Verse 21, and thine ears shall hear word
behind these saying, this is the way.
Walk in it.
When you turn to the right hand and
when you turn to the left, he said,
I'm going to make your path clear to
you.
You're going to know and understand.
And folks, I don't have time.
You go through the rest of the chapter
and it's all about how God's going to
bless you and prosper you in the, in
the spirit of Christ, in the glory of
God, how he's going to lead you and
give you the bread of increase.
Hallelujah.
He's on the throne.
He's not going to fail.
Some of you need a baptism of faith
this morning.
You need to quit figuring things out.
Some of you haven't slept good for a
long time.
God wants to give you a Holy Ghost
sleeping pill today that you can go to
bed tonight and rest and say, Lord, Lord,
you take it from here.
Will you stand please?
Now, beloved, look my way.
I've been in the ministry long enough to
understand that God doesn't speak like this unless
he has reason.
He knows what he's doing.
The Holy Ghost knows what he's doing.
If I'm convinced of anything, it's that.
And he's trying to accomplish something in your
heart.
First of all, I want you to know,
if you're going to seek God with all
your heart, you've got today to settle this
matter.
You're going to be attempted.
You're going to be tried.
You're going to be tested.
You're going to be persecuted.
How many understand that now?
The closer you get to God, the more
fierce it can get.
I'll tell you what though, the Lord won't
keep you in that condition.
He comes to deliver.
But do you understand now the reason why
he waits to answer?
He's waiting for you to quit figuring it
out.
He wants you to quit running around trying
to solve your own problem.
He wants you to just give him simple
childlike faith and say, Jesus, everything I'm in
right now is beyond me.
And I know some of you need strength.
It's not that you doubt the Lord.
It's not that you have any intention of
ever leaving or wounding him.
But in their flesh, you're weak.
Some of you have only been saved a
year or two maybe.
And you don't understand.
It may be that everything's going well, but
something inside, the enemy comes at your faith.
He comes at you.
He comes at your family.
He comes with worry.
He comes with fear.
And those are the battering rams of the
enemy.
Fear, guilt, condemnation, and so many things.
He just batters and batters and batters.
What are you going to do?
Are you going to stand on his word?
He said, I'll make a way of escape.
I will.
I'll keep you from falling and I'll present
you faultless before his throne with exceeding joy.
I will.
And that's what faith rests on.
Oh God, you do it.
I'm telling you, I stand here now because
he's brought me out.
He has delivered.
He brought me into his banqueting house and
his banner over me is love.
Hallelujah.
God wants to bring everybody in this church
this morning out of your pit of despair.
He wants you to walk out of here
with a song in your heart, joy in
your step, having committed everything to him, casting
all your care upon him because he cares
for you.
I want, first of all, the first invitation
up the balcony here on the main floor,
those first that are going through a severe
attack.
You'd have to say, I'm like the children
of Israel.
The enemy is surrounding me.
The battering rams are on me and I
have just been tried and tested as never
before in my life.
I'm really going through it, Pastor Dave.
I want you to get out of your
seat first.
Balcony, go to either side of the stairs
and come down any aisle.
I want to pray that God this morning
give you a great victory, that he'll lift
this burden from your heart today.
If you're backslidden, if you're not right with
Jesus, come and follow these that are coming.
Say, I need to come back to my
first love for Jesus.
Maybe you've never been right with God.
Come and make it right right now.
God will deliver you.
Please move close and move in close because
there'll be a lot of people coming.
All right.
You that are standing here that came forward,
Holy Spirit just spoke something to my heart.
I don't think we realize how serious and
how what a storm some of you are
going through.
I want to ask a question I feel
the Holy Spirit to ask.
And this is not to be showy or
anything else, but to show how serious it
is for some of you.
How many of you have gone through it
so badly lately, the enemy has even whispered
to your heart, there's no purpose in living,
you might as well take your life.
Raise your hand, please.
Raise it high.
That's what I thought.
That's why the Holy Spirit laid it in
my heart.
Have you been coming here for how long?
Nine months?
God's going to give you a great deliverance
this morning that'll never come again.
Isn't the Lord wonderful that he knows what
you're going through and he prepares a precious
word just to lift you out of that.
It reminds you how much he cares.
Huh?
Isn't that wonderful?
Now I'm going to come against these lying
spirits.
I'm going to speak the word of faith.
I'm one of his shepherds.
He's anointed me for this.
And I want you to know, I want
you to believe the Lord, but I want
you to believe with me that as I
pray, God's going to break the hold of
this lying spirit that's trying to bring you
down.
The devil only holds you through lies.
Once the lie is broken, once it's exposed,
he has no power.
He has no authority.
Hallelujah.
I want you to just lift both hands.
You don't have to go way up.
Just, just, that's, Lord, I surrender.
Father, in Jesus' name, I come against every
prince of power and power of darkness.
I'm asking you, Father, to bind and rebuke
every lying spirit, every lying spirit that has
come against the children of God and those
who've been cold and backslidden, those who are
going through trials and temptations.
You're the great deliverer.
And I speak the word of faith right
now that you break these chains.
Every demon power, you're commanded to depart in
Jesus' name and go your way into the
abyss.
Go your way.
Break these chains, Father, by your Holy Spirit.
Break this chains.
Break the power of these lies.
As we begin to praise you, come now,
Holy Ghost, encourage a spirit of encouragement to
place the lying spirits, to replace the spirit
of the devil, the spirit of God, and
the spirit of encouragement.
Now, just tell him you love him right
now.
Worship him and let the spirit of God
come upon you.
Holy Spirit, fall upon this church because we
trust in the living word of God.
Lord, we've taken your authority now over all
principalities and powers of darkness, the lying spirits
of hell that would deceive.
And I speak against every thought of suicide
that is here this morning, that those thoughts
never return.
Not one should be lost to this demon
of suicide, this demonic influence.
In Jesus' name, I bind that spirit.
I bind it in Jesus' name.
And that spirit is bound.
And you're commanded to never return to harass
these minds again.
Put a wall of fire now, Lord, around
about and be the protection of these, your
children.
Hallelujah.
I want everybody in this church, we're going
to sing that again.
Whom shall I fear?
We have no one to fear.
Nobody to fear.
The Lord is with us.
He's with you.
He wants to deliver you.
Rejoice in it now.
This is the conclusion of the tape.