Okay, we're going to take some thoughts on
the 51st Psalm, Psalm 51.
Have mercy upon me, O God, according to
thy lovingkindness.
According unto the multitude of thy tender mercies,
blot out my transgressions.
Watch me throughly, blot out my transgressions.
Watch me throughly for my iniquity, and cleanse
me from my sin.
For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin
is ever before me.
Against thee only have I sinned, and done
this evil in thy sight, that thou mightest
be justified when thou speakest, and be clear
when thou judgest.
Behold, I was shapen in iniquity and in
sin, did my mother conceive me.
Thou desirest truth in the inward part, and
in the hidden part thou shalt make me
to know wisdom.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be
clean.
Wash me, and I shall be whiter than
snow.
Make me to hear joy and gladness with
the bones which thou hast broken, may rejoice.
Hide thy face from my sins, and blot
out all my iniquities.
O God, create in me a clean heart,
O God, and renew a right spirit within
me.
Cast me not away from thy presence, and
take not thy Holy Spirit from me.
Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation,
and uphold me with thy free spirit.
Then will I teach transgressors thy ways, and
sinners shall be converted unto thee.
I suppose at some time, many of you,
at least if you know much about music,
you've been thrilled if you watch Leonard Bernstein
conducting the New York Philharmonic, or some other
thing that he did.
But not only is he one of the
world's supreme conductors, he also is a, in
his own right, a concert pianist, and a
very brilliant pianist.
A friend of his was over in Europe,
and when he came back he went to
see Mr. Bernstein in his apartment there in
New York.
And the man was flourishing a piece of
paper.
And he said, Leonard I want you to
play this piece of music to me.
I bought it in Europe, it's over 200
years old, of age.
It was written by one of the great
masters, and I want you to play it.
Well then Bernstein said, I'm sorry I can't
do that.
He said, you can't?
There's not a piece of music in the
world that you can't play.
But he said, I can't play that.
I've never seen it before.
But you can sight read it, you can
play it.
He said, I can't.
He said, this music was composed by one
of the greatest composers in Europe.
He composed it up at one of those
giant organs in a great cathedral.
Well that's just the point.
This manuscript is 200 years of age.
It was written 2,000 miles away from
here.
I can't get down at the piano and
translate all the cadences.
If I sat up there at the side
of that man while he made that massive
organ, made that great building tremble, if I'd
seen all the cadences he put in it,
the expressions, then I could feel with a
man I might somehow, I might somehow be
able to translate it.
But I'm handicapped.
To the same degree, this scripture here that
I read tonight was written hundreds, thousands of
years ago.
In your book, whatever version or perversion you
have, it's on paper, it's printed in black
ink, and yet it wasn't written like that.
It's punctuated in good English because some of
the greatest masters got this old King James
Version together and it's immaculate in its interpretation.
In the version that we have, again, it's
punctuated with periods and with commas.
But actually this is not written in ink,
it's written in blood.
It's not punctuated with commas and periods, it's
punctuated with groans and sobs and tears.
It's a very wonderful psalm.
It's a monologue.
There's nobody in it, not even Bathsheba is
mentioned.
This man is loaded with guilt, he's tormented.
Every time he hears the cry of a
baby, he remembers the baby that was birthed
to Bathsheba.
Every time he looks out of his castle
he sees a soldier standing there.
And he says, my sin is there before
me.
And you see when there's real conviction of
sin, a man is as honest and as
deliberate as this man was.
This wasn't some emotional decision he made in
a meeting while the organ was whimpering and
somebody was singing.
He's come face to face with the offspring
of his lust, his desires.
And notice what he says, have mercy upon
me.
He isn't praying for the sins of Israel,
that they might be forgiven for all the
wicked, vile things that they've done, for failing
God, for destroying enemies.
He says, have mercy upon me, O God.
According to the multitude of Thy tender mercies
brought out my transgressions.
Wash me solely from my iniquity.
Cleanse me from my sin.
I acknowledge my transgression.
My sin is there before me.
You know, most of us are experts at
confessing other people's sins.
The holdup of revival is in somebody else.
Whereas actually the holdup of revival is in
me, is in you as a person.
But listen how he, how he says this
again.
Have mercy upon me, O God.
According unto the multitude of Thy tender mercies
brought out my transgressions.
He uses three different words for sin here.
In the first verse he talks about transgressions.
In the second verse he talks about iniquity.
In the second verse he talks about sin.
He has three different words for sin.
He has three different words for cleansing.
There are three major prayers in this amazing
psalm.
The first is a prayer of a penitent,
heartbroken, crushed man.
A man haunted with guilt.
A man lashed with a tormenting conscience that
burns more fiercely than its scorpion.
I've been bitten with scorpions more than once.
They're terrible things.
And yet there's something there, the conviction, which
is totally unknown to our generation.
We don't know anything about conviction of sin.
We've lost sight of the awesomeness of sin
because we've lost sight of the holiness of
God.
You see this man is conscious.
He's borne down.
There's no help anywhere else.
Have mercy upon me, O God.
You remember the apostle Paul writes in his
image, he says, God is rich in mercy.
And the only reason you and I are
here tonight is because of the mercy of
God.
When him writer says, I have long withstood
his grace, long provoked him to his face,
would not hearken to his call, grieved him
by a thousand falls.
Depth of mercy, can there be mercy still
reserved for me?
Can my God his wrath forbear, me the
chief of sinners spare?
As you were singing tonight, I'll sing with
a glittering crown on my brow.
I was singing with Jesus staggering up the
hill with a cross on his back.
His back wasn't bowed because of the cross.
His heart was broken because he was carrying
a billion sins up there to the cross.
Your sins, the sin of the whole world
was upon him at that moment.
And he's going there to that terrible crucifixion.
You see, Paul here, pardon me, Paul here
reminds me of a statement he made in
his epistle.
One of the greatest statements he made, though
he made hundreds.
And he says, if any man, being Christ,
any man, anywhere, at any time, whether he's
a Jew or a Greek or a barbarian,
an intellectual, an ignoramus, a king or a
commoner, a prince or a prostitute, if any
man being Christ, he is a new creation.
You see, we're living in a day of
the most shabby, cheap interpretation of salvation the
world has ever known.
A very famous preacher said a while ago,
talking to a more famous author, that the
moral desolation of America or England, the moral
desolation and the spiritual stagnation is due to
one thing.
And that one thing is, we've lost sight
of the rapture.
That's nonsense.
All those men who have been guilty of
those horrible sins are being flashed on every
newspaper in the world.
Not by guilty men in jail, but by
professing Christians, by spiritual men.
God help us.
And the world mocks at them.
They become a standing joke, they tell me,
in clubs.
All over the country, men who are supposed
to walk in holiness, guided by the Holy
Spirit, filled with the Holy Spirit, energized with
the Holy Spirit.
And they have done more to damage the
Pentecostal testimony than all the liberals and the
opposition in the world.
But it is also the fact that some
of my dearest friends I know in this
world are spirit-filled and tongue-speaking people.
They know God intimately.
They fast, they weep, they pray.
But Paul has no despair in his message.
Time and again, fellows have called me on
the phone and said, what do you do
about the situation now?
The world is falling apart.
These Pultic giants are falling.
What are you going to do?
I don't know if you ever read a
poem by, what was it, F.
W.
H.
Myers?
F.
W.
H.
Myers, St. Paul.
How many have read it?
You haven't read it?
You won't find it, it's not in print.
Oh, one lady has, good.
It's a fabulous thing.
But one phrase in that thing comes to
me almost every day.
He says this, God will forgive thee all
that thy despair.
There is no despair in the vocabulary of
the Christian.
Jesus didn't promise us a life without difficulties,
he promised us a life without defeats.
That we can be more than conquerors through
him that loved us.
A few days ago we listened to a
tape by a woman, I forget, was it
Margaret Rose?
Pardon?
Darlene Rose.
I'd like to meet that Darlene, Darlene.
Darling Darlene.
She was three years in a brutal camp,
down in the South Seas, in the Japanese
invasion.
The women were raped, they were tortured.
They had the rottenest food.
They were fed worms, worms were fed.
They had to eat everything that came.
And this is repulsive.
Well, why would you like to do it?
She said, if you vomited, an officer stood
over you and made you gather up that
vomit and eat your own vomit.
There was every considerable indecency, and yet her
faith never wavered.
She came out strong, she came out, she
didn't say, why me?
You see, when you do that, it's a
sign of your weakness.
How many believers today can say with Paul,
I glory in tribulation?
Not you glory when you get a new
car.
You glory when you go to a full
gospel business banquet or something.
That's why they call them full gospel, they're
always eating.
But, well listen, how many of us glory
in tribulation, in necessities?
It's so easy to give God what you
don't have, isn't it?
I hesitate to ask people to sing, well,
the whole realm of nature, mine.
Dear God, you won't even give him his
own day.
Some of the preachers were preaching this morning.
They were talking about the mission field.
This afternoon they were at the TV watching
the infield and the outfield.
And as soon as this gets over and
it's football, they'll be talking about the sheep
in the morning, and they'll be watching the
goats in, no, no, they'll be watching the,
what, the rams in the afternoon.
Before you offer to give God the whole
realm of nature, try giving him an extra
hour of prayer every morning before you get
up.
Prove it, you don't convince God with your,
your very charming words.
You've got to put it into practice.
But go back again here.
Here is a man on one hand, he's
got the stain of murder.
What did he do?
Well, I'll tell you what he did.
Read the story carefully, and it's in what,
2 Samuel 11.
And when you read the story, you discover
this.
That all, every battle that David fought, he
won, until he got messed up with Bathsheba.
After that, he lost every battle.
When his baby was born, he cried, he
prayed, he fasted, he wept all night, but
that didn't save, it didn't save the baby.
Every battle was lost after he got involved
with that woman.
What happened?
He took another man's wife and committed adultery.
And then he killed her husband to cover
that.
What happened?
What he sowed, he reaped.
He came home to his castle one night,
and as he went in, there was a
body.
And he says, whose is the body?
Turn it over.
It's my son.
Who killed him?
His other son said, I killed my brother
because he violated my sister.
He sowed adultery, he reaped adultery.
He sowed murder, he reaped murder.
You know, some of the strangest things happen
in our days.
When I was a boy, if anybody was
gay, you meant they were frivolous, you know,
joyful.
Never had a burden in their life.
Now, the vilest, rottenest, filthiest, dirtiest sin in
the country, is called gay.
In God's name, what's gay about it?
I'm not for Caesars.
I read when a man said, if you
were to take a man and sit him
on a red hot, on a hot stove,
it's not more painful than the agonies of
AIDS.
Suddenly, they're discovering that sin is a very,
very painful thing.
And whatsoever a man sows, that he reaps.
So David has condemnation on him, he has
guilt on him.
And if he'd known it, he might have
sung, Other refuge have I none, hangs my
helpless soul on thee.
But he knew that God is a God
of mercy.
Do you remember later, he wrote to him,
what did he write, a psalm?
He says, he lifted me up from a
horrible pit.
He not only lifted him up, he set
him up.
He put me on a rock.
He not only lifted him up and set
him up, he tuned him up, because he
said, he put a new song in my
mouth.
And Paul says, if any man anywhere, he
may be the most twisted man you know,
he may be the vilest, the dirtiest, the
most polluted, the most rebellious, he may have
sinned against men and against God, and yet
if Jesus Christ comes into his life, in
a moment, he's changed.
His hideous record, his hideous record is cast
away into the sea of God's forgetfulness.
I remember a teacher telling us in Sunday
school in England, that's quite a few years
since I was in Sunday school, she talks
about a man who couldn't keep quiet, like
these precious fellows here.
Give them some chewing gum.
Now I guess, how many of you have
been in jail?
Have you been in jail?
What's the amen for, that you're out or
you've been in?
You see, that's why they're so happy.
You've been sitting in a stuffy pew all
your life, putting a measly dollar in the
offering, and singing, Jesus loves me, let the
world go to hell, he loves me.
These guys have been what, from a horrible
pit, eh?
Fetters, he broke every fetter.
He drives up the lust, he drives up
the greed, he drives up the hatred.
Well, this guy was always rejoicing.
They got a new pastor in the church,
and they told him, be careful, be careful,
there's one man, and if you send him
about redemption, he'll shout, hallelujah, oh, blow the
place up.
So this young guy out of seminary went
around to see this fellow.
No, he said, oh, the man's coming to
see you tomorrow afternoon.
So the man came, and he happened to
have a college friend with him, this, this
young preacher.
So he said to this very disorderly kind
of rebel, you know, he said, listen, I
want you to go in my office here,
and, uh, I may be half an hour.
Anything you want to read, read it.
And, uh, be quiet, because my friend's not
used to your enthusiasm.
Well, they'd been sitting about 20 minutes, and
this fellow exploded.
You know, I believe in the exposition of
the scripture when it's explosive.
We need more than exposition, we need explosion.
We're living in the most critical hour in
American history, or world history.
So anyhow, this guy suddenly exploded, shouted hallelujah.
So the starchy preacher went, said, my friend,
what are you shouting about?
What are you reading?
Oh, he says, I'm reading the Encyclopedia Britannica.
Well, he said, I've read it a hundred.
And you're praising the Lord, reading the Encyclopedia
Britannica?
He said, yes.
He said, why?
He said, I've just been reading about the
ocean.
It's about six miles deep across, uh, somewhere
outside of the Philippines, wherever that is, he
said.
And then there's another place where they can't
fathom the depths of the ocean.
Hallelujah!
He said, for what?
He said, because Jesus cast my sins beyond
the depth of the sea, and if the
devil tries to get them, he'll get drowned.
Maybe his theology wasn't very good, but boy,
it's true.
You see, him that cometh unto me, it
doesn't say him that cometh with a checkbook,
him that cometh with a degree.
Listen here, you preacher boys, if you don't
know, I'll tell you something.
Unction does not come with decrees or diplomas.
It comes by a close, intimate walk with
God.
You know, we're living in a tragic hour.
This week, I was reading about one of
the greatest men in history, and particularly Scottish
history, a man by the name of John
Knox.
He was born in 1505.
That's before I was born.
1505.
He became one of the great men.
Do you know why?
Because like all great men God has used,
he had a patmos.
He had to flee out of Scotland for
14 years.
He was a prisoner in Holland, and it
was there God revealed himself to him.
You ask God to reveal himself to you,
and he starts manipulating to get you on
your own, and you scream.
Oh Lord, take this away, don't do this.
He was answering your prayer.
You talk too much.
All of us do.
I do anyhow.
Anyhow, 1505.
But one historian said, the day that John
Knox was born, Scotland was born again.
You know what he meant?
I think you do.
But Knox became one of the most outstanding
preachers in the history of Scotland.
That...
I'm trying to make my connections here.
The largest house in England is not Buckingham
Palace, it's Blenheim Palace.
Winston Churchill's grandfather, Randolph Churchill, lived in it.
It's nice.
I'm sure you wouldn't like to clean it,
ladies, with your vacuum cleaners.
It had 365 rooms.
I think it's to let for the summer.
Some American evangelist will rent it, I'm sure.
365 rooms.
But it was the name Randolph.
In the time of John Knox, there was
a British ambassador to Scotland because the nations
were divided.
And the ambassador was called Randolph.
And Randolph said this, the reason the Reformation
lived, it lived because John Knox lived.
This is what he says.
When John Knox addressed an audience of people,
he was more powerful than 500 trumpets.
You see, we say, we teach, Christ is
the way, the truth, and the life.
We're heavy on the way, we're heavy on
the truth, we're not so heavy on the
life.
But he's life.
Jesus did not come into the world...
Jesus did not come...
Shut up a minute.
Jesus did not come into the world to
make bad men good, he came into the
world to make dead men live.
All men are not bad in the sense
we think of them as jailbirds.
And yet, you know, the brilliant boys, the
boys from the best universities, did that, what
they do.
In the stock market they were, in the
trading.
These clever boys, these boys with degrees, these
boys studying in universities in other countries.
And yet there's corruption in them.
Let me go back a minute there.
And say, what did this man say?
He said, when John Knox talked to a
congregation, it vibrated with life.
They spelt life then L-F-Y.
I was reading that over and over again
this morning, about two o'clock.
He had life.
Our nation is dead.
In trespasses and in sin.
And theology isn't going to save it.
Rallies are not going to save it.
We need a prophet in every pulpit today.
Why do we graduate men?
Just because they got big heads and shrunken
hearts.
We need men alive, to carry life.
He came that we might have life.
So here is a man sin-stained.
Here is a man crying, have mercy upon
me, O God.
According to the multitude of thy tender mercies,
blot out my transgressions.
And thank God he doesn't say, listen, you
sinned a year too long.
You just overdid the sins.
I can only forgive a thousand sins for
each person, and so you guys have ten
thousand.
He didn't say that.
He said, if any man be in Christ.
Jesus says, command to me all the labor
and the heavy laden, and I'll give you
rest.
And it's wonderful, he takes us just as
we are.
There was a man who came from Ireland,
a number of, oh no, I'll change that.
The great revival of 1859, there was an
outstanding character in Scotland by the name of
North.
What was his first name?
Thank you, who said Brownlow?
Good for you.
Brownlow North.
His grandfather was, what, Lord North.
In fact his grandfather had a picture, you
know, in these big homes they have pictures
of the Lordship doing this, and he has
a staff of honor in his hand.
It's given to him when he receives his
knighthood, or when he receives the position of
being the Lord of that particular group.
So this lady came and looked to the
picture, she said, that's Lord North.
And you see the staff in his hand,
that's a North Pole.
Wasn't quite right.
But Brownlow North became incredibly wicked.
He had access to society.
He stained the path with corruption.
He stained it with blood.
He stained it with every perverted thing you
can imagine.
And then like lots of men did at
that time, and still do, he went to
Gay Paris, he went to Paris.
And there he went from bad to worse
to worse, until even the vilest men rejected
him.
His people in Scotland heard, they cut funds
off, they weren't going to let this man
live in this state.
But he went down and down and down
in corruption.
He got marvelously saved and became one of
the outstanding preachers in the 59 Revival.
They put a sign over the street in
Scotland, Brownlow North will be preaching.
And they mentioned the auditorium.
So as a man went in, he wrote
on a piece of paper, and he said,
give this to Brownlow North.
Because when he starts preaching tonight, I'm going
to expose him to these people.
He's a fraud.
He's a leper, a moral leper.
He's a diabolical personality.
He has debts he'll never pay.
He's left women in distress.
He has a track record the devil would
blush to own.
I'm going to expose him.
So they gave this slip of paper, and
Brownlow North let the preliminaries go.
And then he stood up, and he says,
I have a notice here from an old
friend.
And he says, I remember you in Paris.
And he said, he's given me a catalogue
of my sins, and I know them without
him telling me.
But he doesn't know this, that when I
left him in Paris, I sank further, I
fell through the bottom.
There wasn't a man on God's earth as
corrupt.
And one day I stood by the river
Seine, and I was just going to jump
in, and suddenly I was stopped.
Do you wonder his favorite hymn was, In
loving kindness Jesus came, My soul in mercy
to reclaim, And from the depths of sin
and shame, In love he lifted me, From
sinking sands he lifted me, With tender hands
he lifted me, From shades of night to
planes of light, O praise the Lord he
lifted me.
And here is this man now testifying.
You see, a man with an experience is
never at the mercy of an argument.
Some of you poor guys, all you have
is theology.
But listen, you were as bad in the
sight of God as the worst man down
the road.
You were dead.
You rebelled against him.
You don't have to do outward sin.
What do you do to go to hell?
Nothing, just go.
It takes no effort.
It takes no courage to be a sinner.
I don't know a sin that's profitable, do
you?
So there's one end of the scale.
You get this man, he's a ball of
corruption, he's vile, he's polluting every sense of
the word.
At the other end of the scale, you
have a man entirely different.
When I tell the story of a man
explosive, when I sat in the Methodist church,
a cross was bleakly from us.
There was a big fellow there, the biggest
man I think I've ever seen.
He had a hand like a shovel.
He was an amazing guy.
And his favorite hymn, it was great when
our own pastor was there, he knew what
would happen.
It was just like putting a match to
gunpowder.
The preacher would say, we're going to sing
the hymn 325, and can it be that
I should gain an interest in the Savior's
blood?
Died he for me who caused his pain?
For me who him to death pursued?
Amazing love, how can it be that thou,
my God, shouldst die for me?
Then the next stanza is, Long my imprisoned
spirit lay fast bound in sin, and nature's
night, thy night, diffused a quickening gray.
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light.
My chains fell off.
Well that was too much for that old
boy across the aisle.
Every time he exploded, my chains fell off.
And he waved his hands, and the visiting
pastor almost passed out.
But you see he'd been lifted from a
horrible pit.
Well he's like the other fellow.
Now here's a young man.
He had a very godly mother.
And I'll tell you what, you women had
better put extra work in with those children.
Don't buy those stupid TVs.
Let your TV be the babysitter.
One of the greatest women in history was
Mrs. Wesley.
She had 17 children.
That's not why she was great.
Most of them had 15 and 16.
But one day she got a copy of
one of the greatest books ever written, written
in the 1500s, by a Scotsman, Henry Scougal.
And he has a book called The Life
of God in the Soul of Man, which
is the best book outside of the Bible,
I think.
She got a copy, and she gave a
copy to Charles.
Charles gave it to his brother John.
John passed it back to Charles.
Charles was going through the university, and there
sitting in the window, reading another book with
a young man, and this enthusiastic young preacher,
Charles Wesley said, Hey George, George, you need
to read this.
It's super.
In the present edition, which you can buy.
It's a good brother of the front, sales
addition.
And on the front it says this, I
did not know until I got this book
what real Christianity was.
Signed by who?
George Whitefield.
The man that set America on fire.
George Whitefield.
Like Charles Wesley, like John Wesley, a gentleman
and a scholar.
Men who already knew the Greek New Testament,
they could tell you the Hebrew.
And yet they were dead, they were not
alive in Jesus Christ.
And you know what John Wesley said?
It was about a quarter to nine on
the 24th of May, 1738.
While somebody was reading the preface to the
epistle to the Romans, he wasn't even reading
the book.
He was reading, he was reading Luther's introduction
to the book.
And John Wesley says, I felt my heart
strangely warmed.
Somebody said he had an epileptic fit.
Well if he had, I hope a lot
of you have tonight.
He became a new creation.
Christ lived in him.
He became the spark plug, if you like,
again of the revival.
John Wesley, Charles Wesley, and George Whitefield.
But listen, these were men of impeccable morality.
They didn't smoke or swear.
They didn't drink.
They were very good men.
They passed off in English society as being
the supreme model.
You know, people make excuses about sin today.
Even, even godly people so-called.
That even a gentleman wouldn't do 50 years
ago.
Never mind preachers.
A young man came to my office last
night.
I hadn't seen him for weeks.
He'd been on a tour through the schools.
And he said, Brother Lane, when I got
back, my mail was this height, he said.
That's what you call evangelistically speaking.
I had a stack of letters so high.
So he brought some.
Here is a girl.
I'm 15 years of age.
I've just met a young man.
I believe I love him with all my
heart.
I believe he loves me.
And I consider marrying him.
But I don't like to tell him I've
already, she's 15 years of age.
I've already had sex with five other men
before I knew him.
She says, of course I love the Lord
and I have dear Christian parents.
But where in God's name have they been?
Listen, mother, your influence may be greater than
mine on your children.
Everybody knows Charles Haddon Spurgeon.
Do you know at nine years of age,
his mother used to bring him round the
fire before he went to bed and read,
there's a book called, what was it, Joseph
Alleyne's Alarm, Alarm to the Unconverted.
Written about 1634.
It's one of the greatest books ever written.
Can you imagine a nine year old child
sitting there while his mother read that to
him?
What do you youngsters do?
You say, I'm going to the other room,
look at Channel 5, or some other thing.
The church needs to be improved drastically but
our homes need to get, I don't want
to get the Bible back in school just,
I want to get the Bible back in
the home.
I don't want to get prayer back just
in the school, I want to get prayer
back in the home.
I thank God for a home where the
Bible was read and where my daddy prayed
for us before we went to school.
This man prays the prayer of a sinner,
have mercy upon me oh God.
In other words, nothing in my hands I
bring.
There's nothing you can barter to get salvation
from the Lord.
You can bring your virtues, thank God you're
not as other men are, I thank God
I'm not as other men are.
These precious fellows have been saved, they gave
us some hideous memories, you can't erase the
memory.
It's like knocking the nail in the table,
this boy did that in the dining room
table.
When daddy came in he said, oh look
at the nail.
And he said, well daddy, he pulled it
out.
Well daddy said, now take the hole out
of the table.
And you've had memories that maybe haunt you
a long time.
But listen, sometimes those things keep us humble.
We remember the pit.
This man says, the Lord lifted me up
out of the horrible pit.
Bless the Lord oh my soul.
And all that is within me.
Well if you have carnality within you, it
can't praise the Lord.
There must be purity of heart.
Nonsense this business, you'll be carnal till you
die.
There's no such biblical teaching, that teach, men
teach it, the carnal Christian.
There's no such thing as a carnal Christian.
If a man is carnal, what does it
say?
To be carnally minded is what?
Sickness?
Weakness?
Death?
You can't have carnality, and be alive in
Christ.
All that is within me, praise his holy
name.
Except one little black spot in there, which
is where the devil holds stronghold.
Not on your life.
Anybody got a quarter?
Have you got a quarter?
No quarters, they all went in the offering.
Oh look, my good enemy is coming.
Bless you, thank you.
Praise the Lord, hallelujah.
Here you go.
Yeah, I'll give you it back.
Oh, don't worry about it.
Oh, thank you.
Anybody else want a lonely one?
Not far from my home in England, there's
a town called Huddersfield.
Outside of the town of Huddersfield, there's another
small town called Marsden.
And a young man went there, I read
his story recently, and he went there about
more than a hundred years ago.
And he bought up all the land, and
he started building, building mills and other things.
And he bought up every bit of territory,
except right in the middle of all this,
these houses, these mills and things that he
built, there was a quaker.
Those dear old quakers, we don't have any
anymore.
We've lots of people quaking, particularly when the
stock market goes down.
Anyhow, one day, Sir John Marsden, Sir John
Marsden was in a place, they were giving
some honour, and he said, well, I, I
own all this countryside.
He was a multi, multimillionaire, he was a
sterling millionaire.
And he was boasting about this, then one
of the friends said, a fellow said, just
a minute, what about that farm right in
the middle of all your territory, that old
quaker?
He won't sell that.
He said, he will when I go see
him this week.
No, he won't.
He was born there, his father was born
there, his grandfather was born there.
That old house is more than 200 years
of age, he won't sell it.
He will when I make an offer.
So, instead of having these things, they had
sovereigns, solid gold, worth about $10 each.
And he goes along and he sees John,
John sees the other old John outside in
the garden, he says, John, they all was
thee and thou, you know, I want to
make thee an offer, I want to buy
thy house.
No, no, no, he said.
And he made him various offers, he said,
no, no, no.
Finally he said, look, I'll get golden sovereigns
and I'll put them side by side, right
along the front of the house, down the
hedge, round the back, up the side, and
then I'll cover all the ground that's yours,
I'll cover it with golden sovereigns.
You'll never spend that money.
You'll have vast wealth.
Now, you'll sell it.
No, no.
You won't sell it for all of, you
won't sell it for golden sovereigns.
Yes, yes, I knew you, I knew you
would.
No, wait a minute.
He said, don't lay them side by side,
stand them up like this.
Wouldn't that be wonderful?
Stand them side by side.
Oh, I can't do that.
Well, you can't buy my property.
Brother Hitches, good catch.
Are you going to tell me that Jesus
didn't die for something more than to forgive
our lousy sins?
Let me read to you.
See what it says here in Colossians chapter
1.
Colossians chapter 1, verse 21 says what?
Isn't this you?
Come on now, put yourself in this.
And you were sometime alienated and enemies in
your mind by wicked works.
You didn't have to do the wicked works,
you were enemies in your mind.
You denied God the right.
You didn't keep his Sabbath, you didn't keep
his commandments.
You haven't worshipped him in spirit and in
truth.
And so you were alienated by wicked works.
Sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by
wicked works.
Now after he reconciled in the body of
his flesh through death to present you, present
you what?
Holy.
Jesus didn't die to save us from hell,
he died to save us from sin and
from sinning.
Christianity as far as I know, and I'm
not a smart guy, as far as I
know, Christianity is the only religion in the
world where a man's God comes and lives
inside of him.
Isn't that what the word of God says?
Christ in you.
That makes that silly theory that you have.
I heard one of the greatest preachers in
the world use it.
He said, you know, the apostle Paul, great
and wonderful as he was, yet he finished
up in Romans 7 where he said, O
wretched man, it is not I but sin
that dwelleth in me.
That's a lie, he didn't.
He finished up in Galatians 2.20, it
is not I but Christ liveth in me.
You can't have an indwelling Christ, an indwelling
sin.
And Christ is in your heart if there's
pride and envy and grief and covetousness and
lust.
You see, we don't have a message of
victory to a generation that's used to sinning.
We buy sin, we sell it, we advertise
it, we love it.
People give their lives for it.
But you see, when it comes back like
a boomerang, you find that people say, well,
sin's different these days.
Is it?
Ask the man who's got AIDS if it's
different.
You read Bob Shuler or some other clown.
He says, oh, you're full of goodness, let
it all come out.
Well, lots of guys did and they got
AIDS.
Lots of girls did.
What happened?
They got into sin.
There's something in there you can't control.
Do you know what?
God can't control it.
What does it say in Romans 7?
It says there's something there.
There's no law of God against sin.
People come to the altar.
I want you to pray with me.
About what?
Oh, I've got secret lust or I've got
this.
I won't pray with them.
Do you know what?
Lots of people are going to meetings and
folk are trying to cast out demons and
it's not a demon at all.
It's the old nature.
They're trying to cast the old nature out.
You can't.
It goes to the cross.
It's to be crucified.
I use this.
I say, here's the water level.
Here's a man standing up in that water
and if I baptize him, immediately he goes
under the water.
He can't talk to the world above.
He can't see the world above.
He's not interested in the world above.
If you're really baptized into Jesus Christ, not
just in water, that's an outward sign of
an inward world.
You'll remember the place.
Again, get this, hold it tight.
There are two classes of people in the
world, not blacks and whites, not rich and
poor, not intellectuals and stupid people.
Just two kinds.
Those who are dead in sin and those
who are dead to sin.
Those where sin has no dominion.
You have dominion over it.
The indwelling Christ has come.
You see, that's why this man prays.
And it is a prayer, I remind you.
Let me go a minute over to Titus
before I go on.
In Titus chapter 2, people say you can't
do anything to get saved.
Well, look at this verse.
In Titus chapter 2, verse 11 says, The
grace of God bringeth salvation.
It is appeared unto all men, teaching us,
this is what we do, denying ungodly and
worldly lusts.
We should live soberly, righteously and godly, in
this present world.
Looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You see what it says?
We should live righteously and godly or holy.
What, when we get to heaven?
No, in this present world.
We're supposed to be the light of the
world.
You say, I work in an office, it's
very difficult, I'm the only Christian.
Where do you put street lamps?
Do you take them out of the streets
and put them in the city park?
You put them in the darkest places.
Why did God put you in that office?
Because he wants a light there.
It's so dark.
People say it well today.
I heard somebody in a report recently say,
We don't understand the rebellion amongst young people
in America.
It's so dark.
People say it well today.
I heard somebody in a report recently say,
We don't understand the rebellion amongst young people
in America.
We've got the best homes.
No, no we haven't.
We've got the best houses.
But houses are not homes.
Beautiful California, what?
The street gangs there kill one person a
day.
In fact, they killed more than 365 last
year in the one town alone.
America, of the five industrial nations, America has
the highest teenage pregnancies.
Why?
Because the light has got blurred.
Because the light has gone out.
The sin is exactly the same.
The wages of sin is still death, but
the gift of God.
Did you notice that?
Not the gift from God.
It isn't as though God has something called
life, and he gives you eternal life.
It's the gift of God.
God comes to take up residence in you.
It's the gift of God.
Again, not the gift from God, but the
gift of God, which is eternal life through
Jesus Christ our Lord.
And so again, if this miracle happens, if
any man being Christ, he is a new
creation.
But notice too, in this 51st Psalm, he
says, purge me with hyssop, and I shall
be clean.
You see, he uses three different words.
Wash me, that's like washing the surface of
something, then cleanse me, and then he says,
purge me.
One of the greatest Hebrew Christians in history
was Dr. Eidersheim.
You may know his book, he has a
wonderful book, a lot of wonderful books.
Dr. Eidersheim says, there is no way at
all, where you can take that Hebrew word
and translate it into English.
It strains English too much.
Purge me.
In one of his hymns, purge me.
In one of his hymns, Charles Wesley says,
he's reaching for what?
Well, he's a penitent man, alright.
But he's reaching for something beyond that.
Purge me from every sinful blot.
My idols will all be cast aside.
Cleanse me from every sinful thought, from all
the filth of self and pride.
Give me a new and perfect heart, from
doubt and fear and sorrow free.
The mind which was in Christ in part,
and perfect holiness in me.
As dear Wesley said, justification is sanctification begun.
There's a progressive revelation of God.
There's a progress in holiness.
So he says, purge me.
Do you know what the Hebrew actually says?
According to Dr. Idersheim, one of the greatest
Hebrew scholars, they say, he says that word
purge is U-N unhinge me.
Unhinge me from sin.
Divorce me from it.
Don't just take the fruits of sin, take
the root of sin.
You say you preach sin as perfection, no.
I don't believe that a man, of a
man, in any state of grace, I don't
believe in his inability to sin.
I believe in his ability not to sin.
Greater is he that is in you, than
he that is in the world.
It's easy to read that.
It's Romans 8 what, 37?
Greater is he that is in you, but
wait a minute.
I've been around a few years.
I've been going to meetings 75 years at
least.
But, and I preach around the world.
I've never heard anybody preach on a threefold
infilling, indwelling of the Spirit of God.
And yet it says in Romans 8 and
what about verses 9, 10, 11 check them,
the Spirit of God is in you, the
Spirit of Christ is in you, the Holy
Spirit is in you.
Come on.
You see, we're so used to sinning we
just kind of permit it.
Sin is not normal.
It's abnormal.
If sin is normal then Adam was born
and he wasn't normal.
What did Jesus say to a bad woman
that came?
Go and sin less?
Is that right?
What did he say?
No more.
What does Paul say?
Awake to righteousness and sin not.
Thy word have I hid in my heart
that I might not sin against thee.
If you have the indwelling word and the
indwelling Holy Spirit, I'll tell you what, when
temptation comes you'll hate it because God hates
it.
You'll feel the strength of God there.
They sing a hymn in England at the
Keswick meetings about the Holy Spirit.
Our blessed Redeemer, ere he breathe this tender
last farewell, a guide, a comforter bequeathed with
us to dwell.
He came sweet influence to impart, a gracious
willing guest.
You talk about the Holy Ghost.
The word ghost is a corruption of the
old English word guest.
The Holy Spirit comes as a holy guest
and he'll stay till you offend him.
And you can accept the Spirit, you can
grieve the Spirit.
What is he going to do?
You can accept the Holy Spirit or resist
the Holy Spirit or what's the other one?
And the final one, thank you, is quench
the Holy Spirit.
Oh, I don't believe that.
I don't care whether you do or not.
The word of God says so.
But you see, if the Holy Spirit comes
that hymn goes on to say he checks
each thought, he calms each fear, and he
speaks of heaven.
The holy guest.
Mercy, this last four weeks our house has
been terrible ever since this Swaggart affair particularly.
Do you know we've had 30 30 guests
one week, 33 another, 35 another, 40 one
week.
Coming from all over the nation, asking questions,
they're puzzled, they're problems.
I have a sand glass in my office,
I don't always use it.
And I discovered that, you know, these sand
glasses when I turn it, it runs for
exactly 20 minutes.
And if I remember, I don't always, I
say when a guest comes, I say, listen,
watch this thing.
When this thing runs out, you run out.
Your time's up, 20 minutes that's all you
can have.
If I was a psychiatrist, I should charge
them all a dollar.
I tell you what, with the wisdom I
have, I should charge them $10.
But anyhow, apart from that.
It's one of the favorite verses of John
Wesley, and he shook England, remember he didn't
have teams, he didn't have TV, he didn't
have media.
What did he have?
He had men like himself that prayed and
sweat.
While he was preaching they were praying.
An anointed man.
His favorite text was this, he preached it
everywhere, particularly because the Church of England was
so frozen.
His favorite text everywhere was Romans 8, I
think it's verse 16 there, the Spirit beareth
witness with our spirit.
When the congregation sings that great American hymn,
I love it.
Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine.
I feel like saying, hey, wait a minute,
we're not going to sing.
Let's start with the first man here.
Do you have assurance?
How do you know you have assurance?
That's the secret of the Christian life.
I have assurance.
I don't need the witness of the Spirit,
maybe just to tell me that I'm born
again, just to tell me that I can
be sanctified.
I need the Holy Spirit, but dare I
do it?
What does Paul say in Romans chapter 9?
I've preached with some of the greatest men
in the world, I've prayed with some, and
I remember the men I've prayed with more
than the men I've preached with.
But listen to Paul in Romans 9, he
said, I call the Holy Spirit of God
to bear witness that I lie not, that
I could wish myself a cursed.
Come on.
The prayer life is a thermometer of your
life.
The prayer meeting is the strength of your
church, not the Sunday morning congregation.
Everybody goes to church in America Sunday morning.
The Sunday night service is a test of
your preacher.
Maybe you don't even have a preaching service,
but that's the test.
But the strength, the thing the devil fears
is not when we meet together and clap
our hands, it's when we pray, when we
intercede, when by faith we pull down strongholds.
I'd love to have heard Paul preach, dear
God, would I?
Preaching Romans?
I'd love to have heard him pray.
I'd love to have heard Jesus preach the
Sermon on the Mount.
I couldn't have heard him in Gethsemane, it
would have killed me.
Because it's his custom to go and pray
all night.
The Word of God says that the Christians
are the salt of the earth, praying people
are the salt of the church.
I know men now in my neighborhood who
pray three, four, five hours a day.
Nobody knows them, they don't want to be
known.
But Paul says, I call the Holy Ghost
to their witness.
I could wish myself a curse.
It wouldn't be too bad, it wouldn't strain
that word actually, he said, I could wish
myself damned if need be, for my brethren.
You see, basically, Christianity is sacrifice.
If there's no sacrifice in your life, it
won't be fruitful.
It's based on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
And it's based again on us, it's alright
to sing, I'm going to wear a crown
of thorns.
It's alright for him to leave the glory
of heaven, to come down to a wicked
world like this and die for us.
But don't ask me to die in order
to get there.
But that's what he asked for.
Jesus didn't ask you to live for him,
he asked you to die for him.
If you die, the other part, while you
walk in light, will be so transforming.
So quickly now, he prays a prayer of
a sinner, have mercy upon me O God.
Blot out all this hideous record.
Stop this burning fire of guilt.
Put to death this lashing scorpion in me
that accuses me of my past.
Take care of it.
And God answers his prayer.
So when he's prayed the prayer of a
sinner, then he prays another prayer here.
Watch this crazy one.
Make me to hear joy and gladness of
the bones which thou hast broken, may I
rejoice.
You see, three times he mentions brokenness in
this chapter.
A broken and a contrite heart.
Notice what he says, the bones which thou
hast broken.
Did you ever break a bone?
I jumped out of the burning hotel in
1951.
I hit the deck, brought my back in
three places, this leg in three pieces, my
feet were broken.
I lay in the snow at half past
three in the morning.
That's, preachers should be in bed, not sleeping
in the street.
But I jumped out of the burning hotel.
A guy comes around the corner, hey what
are you doing here?
My first reaction was to say, playing tennis,
what do you think I'm doing?
He says, why don't you get up and
go?
He said, something could come around the corner,
you'd get hurt.
I said, hurt?
My back's broken, my legs are, oh no,
he said.
Oh, is that so?
I put his hand under my neck at
the back here and under my legs, he
lifted me up and he laid me in
about eighteen inches of snow.
I don't know if he was trying to
deep freeze me or what.
And he left me there.
But you know when he lifted me up,
boy, everything in my body screamed.
But I'd always been taught like a good
Englishman you don't, you know, you don't howl.
So I bit my lip on the inside,
so much so I bit part of the
lip away on the inside.
I was all bloody and messed up.
It was agony when he lifted me.
I was far better there, in my broken
condition.
I laid there for half an hour, shivering.
It was fifteen below zero anyhow.
It was a horrible morning, a horrible day,
a horrible night with this burning hotel above
us.
Half an hour afterwards, the ambulance men came.
The next thing I knew, I was in
hospital.
They picked me up, put me on a
stretcher, put me in the ambulance.
I never felt a thing.
Why?
Because they're skilled.
They knew how to do it.
You know, sometimes we go to people, we're
so zealous we're worse off when we start,
when we finish with them than when we
found them.
There's a way to handle people who are
dead in trespasses and in sin.
Anyhow, when I'm out of relationship with the
Lord, he said, it's like a broken bone.
And God broke the bones.
I insulted him.
I, I, I withstood him.
I grieved the Holy Spirit of God.
Dear Lord, how long do you meet a
prostitute or somebody, and the Holy Christ is
looking down, and the Holy Ghost is looking
down, and a man can't break down and
weep and cry and scream to God?
There's something wrong.
So he prays the prayer of a sinner.
Have mercy upon me, O God.
And look at verse here.
Verse 60 says, I was desirous not, behold,
I desirous truth in inward parts.
In the hidden part thou shalt make me
to know wisdom.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be
clean.
Wash me, and I shall be whiter than
snow.
Make me to hear joy and gladness, for
the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.
Can you imagine a broken bone rejoicing?
Hide thy face from my sins.
You see what he does?
This man writes the most amazing things ever
written about human experience.
In this verse he says, here it is,
I'm crushed with guilt.
I'm unclean.
I'm vile and full of sin.
So what?
Hide thy face from my sins.
Do you remember that Psalm 139?
What does it say?
Search me, O God, and know my heart.
Try me and know my thoughts, and see
if they have any wicked way in me.
You see, one of the agonies of lost
people, according to the sixth chapter of Revelation,
in the final days, when all the multibillionaires,
what have you got?
When Jesus comes and they see his face,
what do they do?
They call for the rocks and hills to
fall, and hide us from the face of
the wrath of the Lamb.
Your option tonight is to accept the blood
of the Lamb, or meet the wrath of
the Lamb.
And so what do they say?
Hide us from the wrath of the Lamb.
When they see his face, what in the
22nd chapter of Revelation it says, one of
the glories of the believer is to see
him face to face.
Didn't blind Fanny Crosby, the American hymn writer,
write that?
And I shall see him face to face?
When she said, the first face I ever
see will be the face of Jesus.
Well, let me rush this through here.
Catch me not away from thy presence, I
deserve it, but don't do it.
Take not thy holy spirit from me.
Why?
Why did he say that?
Oh, you say he doesn't do that?
He doesn't?
Take not thy holy spirit from me.
Why?
Because before him there had been a king
by the name of Saul, the most handsome
man in Israel, head and shoulders above everybody
else.
The spirit of the Lord came upon him,
and the word says he received a new
heart.
The word said he prophesied.
So he was born of the spirit, he
was filled with the spirit, he prophesied, he
died a suicide.
He died crawling up to a dirty witch,
asking her to help him out of his
trouble.
He'd seen that king degenerate, instead of going
at the head of armies, marching or riding
a horse, he's groaning on his foot, begging
a woman to be in touch with the
underworld.
And in the spirit of the former person
up, and he says don't take thy holy
spirit from me.
I tell you that's a terrible thing.
I met my precious Irish wife in a
little town called Eccles.
It's seven miles outside of Manchester.
She was supervising one of the largest hospitals
in England.
The night supervisor, and God wonderfully led us
together.
But one night I preached on this psalm
in a tent.
I don't think there were fifty people there.
And as I closed it I said look,
I'm making no I'm not going to ask
you to come, I'm not going to sing.
I said if you have leprosy within, if
you had cancer and I had a cure,
would I have to beg you?
No you'd run.
Well you've got a cancer, it's called carnality
if you're a believer.
It should have died at the cross.
It didn't.
But God can put that thing to death.
And I said some of you once had
the witness.
You remember when this book was sweetened and
honey in the honeycomb.
Some of you fellows remember that.
You say well brother Raphael I'm like those
folk in Revelation.
I've lost my first love.
That isn't in the Bible.
You can't find it in any Bible under
heaven.
I've lost my first love.
I left my first love.
You deliberately gave priority.
I'll tell you how much you love Jesus.
Before you go to bed tonight, check the
bottom line.
How much time did you spend with TV?
That's your idol.
Do you wonder Wesley says purge me from
every sinful blot.
My idols all be cast aside.
Cleanse me from every sinful thought.
From all the filth of self and pride.
Yes, everything can be purged.
Okay.
So a woman came from the back of
the tent.
Boys are boys.
I should have had a camera.
She was the ugliest woman I've ever seen.
I've seen some ugly women I'll tell you.
I've never seen a woman like her.
She was about six feet tall.
Big shoulders.
Half bent.
And she comes to the front and she
started sobbing and she sobbed and sobbed and
sobbed.
I guess I stayed there 15 minutes or
longer.
And finally I said lady I want to
help you.
I remember she said my name is Mrs.
Shepherd.
I said well what's your problem?
She said Mr. Abner.
And boy did she cry more.
Tonight for the first time in 40 years
I heard the voice of God.
Hallelujah.
40 years ago I was an officer in
the Salvation Army.
I had a wonderful prayer life.
I had a sister working with me.
We were working in a slum area.
We saw people converted.
We saw God do miracles.
Living flesh and blood miracles.
Not just physical, moral and spiritual.
But she said I got jealous.
My friend could lead meetings better than I
could.
She could somehow get a meeting going.
She prayed with more fervor.
I got sour about it.
But let me tell you something.
Everybody backslides.
I don't care what they commit.
I do care.
But whether they find out in adultery or
stealing money or some other crazy thing.
They all start at the same place.
They start by neglecting prayer.
You talk about these big shots that have
gone down the drain.
Do you know what?
Do you know what they are?
Apostates.
They've been preaching the baptism and a hundred
Wait a minute.
According to G.
Campbell Morgan, an apostate is not a man
who continues to teach wrong doctrine.
He's a man who comes up to the
true light of God and backs off from
it.
He doesn't go to a holiness meeting.
Why?
Because he's so full of anger.
So full of pride.
So full of grudges.
He's so negligent in his devotion.
He hasn't worshipped Christ for a year maybe.
So this precious woman says, tonight the Lord
spoke to me for the first time.
Forty years ago I was an officer in
the Salvation Army.
Before we went to the meeting at night
my partner said to me well I've got
the hymns for tonight.
She said, I've got the hymns for tonight.
Well I'm having my hymns tonight.
You had yours last night.
And we argued.
We went to the meeting.
And she said, when I came out she
said, my friend said, would you ask forgiveness?
She said, sure I won't.
You're in the wrong.
It was my turn to have the hymns.
I hate you.
And this is what she said, you know
there were those straw hats.
She said, I went and I took that
straw hat.
I tore it up.
I put it on the open fire in
the house.
Then I took off my tunic and I
cut it up.
I put that there.
I burned that.
Then I took off my skirt and I
put the scissors through the skirt in strips.
I put it on the fire.
And when my clothing was burning.
When my, when my what do you call
it, my bonnet was burning, she said, and
my clothing.
I got my Bible.
I tore it up, page by page and
said, there's nothing in it.
All I could see were her faults.
I couldn't see mine.
And she said, Mr. Ennett, that's forty years
ago.
She said, listen, after that, I went to
hear the greatest preacher in the world at
that time.
And remember he, William Boone, the founder of
the Salvation Army was preaching at the same
time that, that the great Baptist preacher was
preaching in London there, F.B. Meyer.
Dr. Clifford was preaching in St. Paul's Cathedral
and packing three thousand people there.
You could go up the road, you could
hear Spurgeon.
You could hear the Prince of Preachers as
people said at that time.
That was, that was Parker, Joseph Parker.
That, that was a man for you.
They slipped him a piece of paper on
Thursday.
I'll be through in about five minutes.
They slipped him a piece of paper at
his Thursday mid-day meeting.
I noticed Gregory, John Gregory has a mid
-day meeting now.
Somebody slipped him a piece of paper.
On the piece of paper it says, the
Sultan of Turkey is massacring the Armenians.
That was 1915.
Ask Demos Shikabi and he'll tell you the
whole story.
I know Demos, I've talked with him.
Do you know why they left?
All those wealthy people left, Armenia, do you
know why?
Oh boy, it wouldn't happen in a Baptist
or Methodist church, it wouldn't happen in a
Pentecostal church these days.
A little boy, twelve years of age, stood
up and he said, I've had a revelation
from God.
Our nation is going to be plundered.
Blood will flow in the streets.
Get out of the country as quick as
you can.
And people got out of the country.
Well, they slipped a note up to Parker
and the big church was crowded.
Fellows came from Parliament to hear this man.
He thundered.
He was a brilliant guy, a fearless guy.
In London they have posters about 30 inches
high.
There's a spring in front, it's like chicken
wire.
And they take a sheet of paper and
put it under there.
And all over London at night it said,
Parker damns the Sultan of Turkey.
And before that congregation he said, I've just
heard the Sultan of Turkey has, the Sultan
of Turkey has ordered the massacre of the
Christians, the Armenian Christians.
And he lifted his hand in a thundering
voice.
He says, in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy
Ghost I say, God damn the Sultan of
Turkey.
Do you know anybody that dare damn Gorbachev?
Do you know when he signed that last
treaty in America with Mr. Reagan?
Do you remember what he did?
Mr. Reagan signed it and just nodded his
head.
Gorbachev stood up and flourished his, but I
signed this, he said in the name of
the Eternal Man.
That's a slap in our Christianity.
I hear he's told a famous preacher in
this country, you can come to Russia anytime
you like and preach.
All the cities are open to you.
Everybody says that's an answer to prayer.
Is it?
Or is it an insult?
Does he say, what's your gospel done for
America?
Your jails are filled, your courts are filled,
your divorce courts are filled.
Your gospel hasn't done anything for you, so
it won't affect my country.
See that's why I say we need it
today.
We need somebody like John Knox, who they
said once he spoke, he stirred the congregation
more than 500 trumpets.
I'd like to see somebody go to the
Southern Baptist Convention, a guy that's been in
eternity for a month before he dared open
his lips and stand and say something.
Not a guy that will keep in the
narrow channels of Baptist theology or Pentecostal theology.
We always choose a man that won't rock
the boat.
I went to a church once, they said,
you won't rock the boat will you?
I said, that's why I came.
They said, what, you're going to rock the
boat?
I said, yes, I'm not going to sink
it.
You see, lots of people, sure they don't
march on Washington elsewhere, do you know why?
They're trying to save America.
I'm not trying to save the American ship,
I'm trying to save the crew.
What good is a ship?
Unless we have a holy, a divine intervention
in America, we won't last another decade.
We're not going to murder a million babies.
I told a guy in my office, I
said, listen, you blast to those girls, tell
them, that baby that was pulled out of
your belly, you're going to see it face
to face at the judgment seat.
And the baby's going to see its mother
face to face at the judgment seat.
He said, I believe that.
I said, well listen, everybody you bring to
the altar, you tell them to come and
repent.
You see, you can get them to the
altar, you can't get them to the cross,
and further you can't get them on the
cross.
If you just bring them to the altar
and leave them unborn, you'll be charged with
their spiritual.
You'll be charged with a holocaust when you
get to the judgment seat.
It's a more faithful thing to handle people
who are trying to be born again to
the Spirit of God and deliver babies.
You see, we've got so far from the
new birth.
The new birth is a miracle.
Okay, let me tell you this and quit.
So this day lady, we stayed with her
half an hour.
Do you know when she got up, my
goodness, she looked as though she'd used all
that miracle stuff you ladies use to try
and get rid of wrinkles, and it only
makes it worse.
Her face was radiant.
She said, this is the first time in
40 years I've felt the joy of the
Lord.
You know, the less joy of the Lord
you have, the more entertainment you need.
Entertainment is the devil's substitute for joy.
You won't have time to watch those dumb
harlots on TV.
As Dr. Torson used to say, their faces
like angels and marbles like alley cats.
This whole corrupt system.
See, everything outside of Christ has corruption on
it.
Don't care whether it be with politics, or
science, whatever in the world it is.
Science can't do too much.
I was in hospital about three or four
years ago.
And I'd had some pain in my head.
So they said they're going to take a
brain scan.
I asked Martha what that was, so she
told me.
So they took it, then they came in,
the next morning, the doctor came in, he
said, Reverend, we took a scan of your
brain.
He said, don't worry, there's nothing in it.
I said, thank you.
You see, science can take a picture of
my brain, it can't take a picture of
my mind.
It can take a picture of my heart,
it can't take a picture of my affections.
You can have a heart transplant.
What do you do?
Do you take all the sin in that
man and put it in another man?
No.
It's something very difficult for that.
And yet, God who knoweth the heart.
Acts 15, 8 and 9, reporting the coming
of the Holy Ghost, said what?
Peter's telling them what happened in the house
of Cornelius.
God who knoweth the heart.
After all, that's one problem the world has,
it's a heart problem.
The heart is deceitful of all things and
desperately wicked.
The heart, who can know it?
Created me a clean heart.
He said, it doesn't say, Lord, help me.
He says, Lord, created me a clean heart.
Come on, what's that thing you've been to
the altar with time and time again?
No, I won't help you if you come
here.
You say, I've got secret lust.
You say, I've got pride, I've got temper,
I've got anger.
You don't need to come to the altar,
you don't need to take it to the
cross.
You need to deal with it specifically.
Lord, you know my laziness.
Do you know the crying sin of the
church tonight is laziness after God?
Five minutes inside of heaven we look back,
we'll be embarrassed at how poorly we walked
on this Christian life.
Here this is God's will and testament.
Everything that you need for life and victory
is in this book.
You don't need a psychologist and psychiatrist.
If those boys are so burning with compassion,
why don't they go up the Amazon unarmed
and help the people up there?
Not pray on weak little old ladies that
go to church and then the doctor says,
oh go see my friend the psychiatrist.
So what?
Poor psychiatrist is in a mess.
Who does he go to?
His wife?
Listen friends, if there's no answer at the
cross, there's no answer at all.
Paul says knowing this, that our old man
is crucified with him that the body of
sin might be destroyed.
You see just like that man that boasted
I own the whole of this countryside and
his enemy said, accept that little spot that
the Quaker won't sell you.
Does somebody say, you say my whole life
is easy to God, I had victory and
somebody says, why do you have such a
vicious temper?
Why are you so proud?
Why are you so negligent in your spiritual
life?
Dear Lord, all over the country, everywhere you
go now, health clinics.
Do you know what holiness is?
Health of soul.
Charles Wesley says in one of his hymns
to perfect health, restore my soul.
To perfect holiness and love purge me from
every sinful blot in one hymn.
In another, refining fire, go through my heart,
illuminate my soul, scatter thy life through every
part and sanctify the whole.
My steadfast soul from falling free, shall then
no longer roll.
While Christ is all the world to me
and all my heart is love.
It takes the miracle of the blood of
Jesus Christ, God's son to cleanse us from
what?
From what?
Some of our sins.
All.
Well is that where we are?
What's the thing that's haunted you?
Even since you were saved, there's been lethargy,
laziness after God.
There's been pride, you've been erratic, sometimes doubting,
sometimes trusting, sometimes joyful, sometimes sad.
Sometimes you have victory over the world, the
flesh and the devil, sometimes you've got victory
over you.
But that's not what Jesus died for.
He died that we may be the habitation
of God, and I'm through with this.
I read of a man who'd been to
a certain part of China, and somebody he'd
left a bible with someone.
When the man came back into America, another
man said to him, well yes, I'm a
Christian.
He said, you are?
Are you a Christian?
Yeah.
I've been round your country, I've seen the
great mountains, I've seen the Grand Canyon, I've
seen some of the greatest sights in the
world.
But you, you are the most amazing thing
I've ever seen.
The man said, mean amazing thing?
He says, yes.
He said, I've read the Quran, I've read
the Vedas, I've read a dozen sacred books
of other religions, but I've read nothing like
this.
Because it says there in the epistle to
the Ephesians, that you are the habitation of
God.
God is in control of your mind, of
your spirit, of your desires, of your emotions.
You see, if we set off every morning,
going into a wicked world, and it wants
to trip us up and cast us down,
if we went out every morning saying, I'm
covered with the precious blood, I'm hanging on
to the promises of God, I have the
internal power of the Holy Spirit of God,
we'd be more than conquerors through Him that
loved us.
No one in the world doesn't know what
we've got.
Dear God, people have been singing in church
today, that lovely hymn, what if it were
today.
They're talking about the second coming.
They're singing, what if it were today, and
they're planning divorce tomorrow.
You know, I don't believe any Christian couple
ever get divorce.
If they get divorce, their backs living.
A fellow comes to pray with me every
Tuesday morning, his daddy and mummy have just
celebrated a 72nd wedding, isn't that wonderful.
72nd!
Dear Martha and I have only gone 50,
not quite 50 yet.
Cheer up Martha, we've got the others.
If a man can be true to his
wife all these years, can't he be true
to God?
By the power of the blood, I'm a
debtor.
You say I'm not in debt, I hate
debt too.
Paul says I'm a debtor to the whole
world.
He was loaded with religion, he was an
upright man, he was a righteous man, he
kept the law blameless he said, and yet
one day he met Jesus on the road.
You see the trouble is most people only
meet the preacher.
If you meet Christ, it's a very different
thing.
And there on that Damascus road, he met
Christ, and a miracle took place in his
life.
And he could say the life which I
now live in the flesh, I live by
the faith of the Son of God, who
loved me and gave himself for me.
Now because we love him, we're going to
keep his commandments.
If we keep his commandments, we'll love each
other.
If we keep his commandments, he'll love this
world, he will have priority.
If we love him, we'll pray, intimacy in
prayer.
You see, it's all predicated on this thing.
My heart is not a divided heart.
Christ is there in soul control.
I can remember now, 30 seconds, I went
to a meeting.
I was a youth leader in the church.
And I went to the meeting, and I
heard about the life of victory.
I went to the altar.
A man came with his Bible, as they
did, and they should do when people come
to the altar.
And he said, well Len, what do you
want?
You're the youth leader.
You lead the open air meeting.
What's wrong?
I said, I know this.
I'm terribly jealous of somebody else.
I've got envy.
I've got other things.
And I said, sin has dominion.
It has some power over me.
I said, I want Romans 6-7 to
be really my life.
He said, you mean Romans 6-6?
I said, I don't.
He said, you do.
You mean Romans 6-6.
Knowing this, without all man is crucified.
I said, no.
I want Romans 6-7.
He that is dead is freed from sin.
I said, I want to die at this
altar.
Die to my ambitions.
Die to my own plans.
And I got lots of them.
And I said, there are things, there's a
defilement I want God to take out.
I'll tell you what it did.
Justifications alters my relationship with God.
Sanctification alters my personality.
It's still working on me, but there's a
crisis experience in my life that I never,
ever will forget.
I went through torment there.
Everybody in church.
Len Raven at the altar.
You see, we don't, we don't, we shouldn't
see ourselves as Scotsman says, as others see
us.
All I need to see is not as
my friends see me.
That friend likes me.
And so it's prejudiced with liking me.
This man doesn't like me, so he hates
me.
I'll take pretty good care of myself.
I need to see myself as God sees
me.
Created me a clean heart.
The secret lust for power.
It's not always lust for flesh.
It's lust for power.
Lust for money.
Lust for preeminence.
Paul talks about a backslider.
He had a team of spirit filled men
and yet they backslid.
Demas hath forsaken me.
He didn't say he's gone into the sin
of the world.
Having loved this present world, he saw a
peak he could climb and still be a
good man.
And he forfeited it.
The anointing.
The anointing is hard to get and it's
hard to keep.
It means walking very, very closely with the
Lord.
You can't find in the Scripture where some
of the disciples were saved.
I can find over the whole field with
the Holy Ghost.
It's amazing isn't it that the children of
Israel all got out of Egypt.
They perished in the wilderness.
They didn't make it to the promised land.
They got away from slavery.
They got away from tyranny.
They got away from starvation.
And they died in the wilderness.
And some of you are dying in the
wilderness.
There's one thing you won't yield.
Maybe it's your career.
The Lord may take you to a foreign
country.
So what?
Isn't it better to be there in the
will of God than anywhere else?
Creating me.
Again, He doesn't talk about others.
You say He sinned against Bathsheba.
I don't know He sinned with her.
But He's talking about me.
I've got to get rid of this problem.
You've got to get rid of that pride,
that lust, that laziness, that greed.
Yes.
Where's my pianist?
Can I see it?
Do we have the What's the hymn I
want?
When Peace Like a River.
Do we have that?
Would she have the sheet for it?
Can I sing that?
Stand and sing When Peace Like a River
Attendeth Thy Way.
When Peace