Romans chapter 1, sorry, pardon me, Romans chapter
1 and verse 16 are the best known
of the verses.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ, for it is the power of
God unto salvation.
Well, you might ask, why should he be
ashamed?
Well, as far as I can find out,
Paul had never been to Rome when he
wrote to the Romans.
First of all, it was a city of
splendid architecture, intimidating.
It was a city where the king lived.
It was a city that always rejected the
alien.
It was a city that was competing almost
for the title of the most corrupt city
in the world.
Apart from Corinth, it had every excess, every
exercise in iniquity.
They threw off all restraint.
And Paul says, I am not ashamed of
the gospel of Christ.
I listened to some stuff on TV this
week.
Boy, was I ashamed of that presentation of
the gospel.
It's the most perverted, rotten thing I've ever
heard.
People in sin never, oh, I made a
mistake, I made a mistake.
No confession of sin, no humiliation for wasting
millions and millions of dollars and time and
lives, nothing of the kind.
I couldn't help but contrast it with this
glorious gospel of Paul.
Why is he so sure?
What is the gospel of Christ?
Notice he doesn't say they need a new
theology.
He says, he doesn't say, I want to
be the most wonderful preacher in the world.
I think he was.
You know, there was an Augustine in history,
about 340, I think.
And he was, he became, whether it's good
or not, he became the first archbishop of
Canterbury.
You know, you can tell a bishop is
straight up an archbishop as an arch, because
they overeat too much and get too fat.
But then there was another Augustine, Augustine of
Hippo.
Hippo was an area outside of Algiers in
Africa.
He was a good young man, a fine
young man, very religious.
But then he went to university, got corrupted.
He sank to every degree of depravity he
could go to.
But he had one of the greatest treasures
in the world, he had a praying mother.
Every time people came, have you heard of
my son?
Oh yes.
You never knew what a corruption he's gone
into.
He gets worse and worse.
Every time we see him, he's more depraved,
he's more violent, he's more reckless, he's more
sinful.
He wants to be an example of every
reckless sin that the devil can put in
a man.
He says, I want that.
I want to be the embodiment of evil.
And every time they said that, his mother
said, that's all right.
You have to go to the bottom before
you come up.
He'd become a Christian, he became a Christian.
He wrote that magnificent volume, if you haven't
read it, let me tell you, it was
a favourite of Dr. Tozer's.
He wrote it against worldliness and paganism, called
the City of God.
Well, I've said all that to say this.
You know, he said, if God would grant
me three wishes, these were what they would
be.
Number one, I would like to have seen
Jesus Christ in the flesh.
Number two, I would like to have seen
Caesar coming down the Appian Way when he
had all his choice captives, prisoners.
The kings and noblemen, they chained them to
the wheels of the chariot, they had to
run at the side.
And they galloped them through the city while
the people screamed and cheered.
He said, number one, I would like to
see Jesus in the flesh.
Number two, I would like to have seen
the triumphal entry of Caesar down the Appian
Way.
And number three, he said, I would like
to have heard the Apostle Paul preach.
Well, I'd change that to number two.
I'd like to have seen Jesus, I'd like
to have heard him preach.
I don't think I dare have heard him
pray.
I think even praying John 17 would crush
me.
I've heard people say, I'd like to have
been with Jesus in Gethsemane.
I sure wouldn't.
It would have killed me.
But to hear this Apostle Paul preach.
I can listen to any man if he's
as good as his theology, and Paul was.
He's there with a battered, bleeding, bruised body.
And you can take that phrase from the
marvelous poem, The Invictor, My head is bloody
but unbowed.
The man that bows the knee to the
father never needs to bow to any other
man, in any shape or form.
I don't care who he is.
And Paul never bowed the knee.
I think, who was the, uh, was it
Spinoza that talked about Bishop Brasney, I'm asking
you.
Was it Spinoza, pardon me, that wrote the
phrase, talked about the God-intoxicated man?
Thank you.
I'll give you zero as you go out.
I could have said that myself, why did
I ask you?
So there's two of us that don't know.
Anyhow, so I think it was Spinoza, he
talked about a God-intoxicated man.
This man is never, you know what, the
Church of Jesus Christ never does anything when
it's sober.
What was the first thing they said about
the men toppling out of the upper room?
They thought they'd been tippling in the upper
room.
These men are drunk.
What did that proud Roman that had never
heard the gospel in his life, Felix, Felix
trembled, didn't he?
When he heard the Apostle Paul, you'd have
thought, Paul would have been trembling.
But boy, the king is trembling.
I'll tell you what, if that man trembled
before Paul, what will he do when he
stands before Jesus?
Boy, sometimes I itch, you know, the right
way, to go home.
I want to see that judgment.
I want to see every rebel bow their
knee to Jesus.
Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Genghis Khan, Philip of Macedon,
tell me all the kings that ever lived.
All are going to bow their knee one
day to Jesus.
We sing a hymn sometimes, it's a good
English hymn, of course.
Crown him with many crowns.
What does it say?
It says he had many crowns.
Now let me check the bishop again.
Where did he get all those crowns, Brother
Bracey?
We'll talk about this next time we meet.
Get us both off the hook.
But he said he had many crowns.
What crowns?
Did he get a crown over death when
he died?
Did he get a crown over sin?
Did he get a crown over the powers
of hell?
He's crowned with many crowns.
The lamb upon his throne.
That's an excellent, wonderful hymn.
Here is a man and there's nothing breaks
him.
It doesn't matter where you put him, what
you put on him.
They whipped him, they lashed him.
What did he say?
A night and a day I was in
the deep.
What's that, 36 hours?
Holding on to a piece of wood in
the Mediterranean.
In weariness, in fastings, in painfulness, in perils
of the deep, in perils of my non
-countrymen.
And what did he say?
I think this man gave the devil a
headache all the ex-hedrons in the world
couldn't move.
Sure he did.
Why?
Because he said none of these things move
me.
Now get him straight, he didn't say none
of these things hurt me.
Of course they hurt him.
The more sensitive you are, the more deeply
you're wounded.
But they didn't move him.
Why?
Because he says to everybody, you know the
success of the Christian life isn't profound theology
and memorizing scripture, it's keep looking unto Jesus,
the author and deliverer.
If you look around about you today, you'll
be disappointed.
If you look inside, you'll be disgusted.
I thought I was right.
Bracey said I'm right for once.
Thank you.
So what do you do now?
You keep looking unto Jesus.
The Lord didn't ask you to look at
bishops or archbishops or missionaries.
He says keep looking unto Jesus.
And if you say I want to be
like Jesus, get ready to suffer and be
persecuted and rejected and despised.
You see this man had such a comprehensive
view of God, of the redemptive work of
Jesus Christ.
He believed John 3, 16, God so loved
the world.
He wrote to the Ephesians, Christ loved the
church.
But he said you know, want to know
something more marvelous than God loving the world
and loving the church?
He loved me.
And that dear saint that ended his life
up in a prison off the west coast
of Scotland, Samuel Rutherford.
How many of you know his hymn, The
Sands of Time are Sinking?
Bracey again, you're down.
Boy, you're getting all straight zeros tonight.
I've never seen a straight zero, but anyhow
you're getting them.
I've got to get some copies if we
can get them Martha.
The Sands of Time are Sinking is one
of the most amazing hymns ever written.
In it he says the bride eyes not
her garments, but her dear bridegroom's face.
There's a pillar, there's a rock and then
what looks like a chimney off the west
coast of Scotland.
It has some bars up about 10 or
12 feet from the base of the rock.
They put that old man in that prison.
Somebody rode over in a boat one day
to see him and said you've been here
so long, what a terrible place.
And then the wave came and splashed up
and the poor old man was there, wet.
And he said isn't this a terrible place
to be in?
Look at the slime running down the wall.
Oh there's a rat.
This is a terrible place for a saint
of God to be.
What is it like to be here alone?
He said friend when you're not here those
walls shine like rubies and diamonds and everything
else when I'm alone.
You see?
We want that but we don't want it
at a price.
The most difficult thing in the world is
to walk alone.
Great men walk alone, eagles fly alone.
Lions when they're hunting hunt alone and great
men walk alone.
Can two walk together?
Well two walk together except they'll be a
great.
The two are God and myself and he's
the manager, I'm just going on with him.
But this man, none of these things move
me.
Weariness, fastings, painfulness, a night and a day
in the deep.
Once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck.
And he goes on giving a catalogue and
he says but none of them move me.
But I'll tell you what moved him.
He said the greatest thing in the world
is not having your back whipped until its
flesh is torn like a plowed field.
It's not being stoned.
It's not being half starved in weariness.
And he said I know how to abound
and how to be abased.
How in the world he abounded I can't
find anyplace except he abounded in every situation
he was in.
What did he do it for?
Because he said Christ loved me and he
gave himself for me.
I used to think the motivation of his
life was in, is it the second or
first epistle?
I won't ask any more questions.
Either 1 Corinthians 5 or 2 Corinthians 5
.17 where Paul says what?
You can't remember the scripture?
I can't either.
Okay, something like that anyhow.
No, no, no, no, I'm not thinking of
that.
I'm thinking of 2.57 I think it
is.
If any man being Christ is a new
creation.
This man doesn't come loaded with guilt as
we think of guilt.
He's everything going his way.
He's a Pharisee of the Pharisees.
He's of the tribe of Benjamin.
He's of the seed of Abraham.
He has everything going.
His father was a Pharisee.
He was a Pharisee.
He argued once with a general or a
centurion in the Roman army.
And the centurion stuck out his chest and
said I'm a centurion.
And I paid a vast sum of money.
A corrupt politician got me my freedom.
Paul says I was free born.
He's the leader amongst the Romans.
He's the leader amongst the Jews.
And yet he did as we sing I
lay in dust life's glory dead.
In everything that came his way he said
there's death in it.
Well how did it happen?
Let me skip back a minute here and
then I'll come back to this chapter.
What do they say in Romans, pardon me,
in Acts chapter nine.
You know this story anyhow.
Acts nine verse three.
As he came near to Damascus suddenly there
shone round about him.
You know I like that word suddenly.
Why?
Why do you like the word suddenly?
For this reason.
The scripture says the Lord whom you seek
shall suddenly come to his temple.
No 24 hour notice.
The shepherds went out as usual to look
after their sheep and suddenly the sound of
a heavenly host.
And what happened?
They announced that Jesus had come.
A bunch of nervous men were in an
upper room and suddenly the Holy Ghost came
upon them.
And this man is on the Damascus road.
He's going down the Damascus road and there
inside of his garment he has a Roman
toga.
He has credential sign that he can liquidate
every Christian that he finds.
It says he goes down that road breathing
out threatenings against the Christ of God and
his church.
I think I read this once.
I'm going to read it again to you.
This is a statement of an atheist.
It was sent to me from India.
It's an atheist.
Listen what he says.
Were I a religionist did I truly firmly
consistently believe as millions say that they do
that the knowledge and practice of religion in
this world life influences the destiny in another.
If I did that religion would be everything
to me.
I would cast aside earthly thoughts and feelings
as less than vanity.
Religion would be my first waking thought or
my last image sleeping into unconsciousness.
I would labor in her cause.
I would not labor for the meat that
perisheth nor for the treasures of the earth
but only for a crown of glory in
the heavenly regions where treasures and happiness are
alike beyond the reach of time and chance.
I would take thought for I would take
thought for the tomorrow of eternity alone.
I would esteem one soul gain to heaven
worth a life of suffering.
There should be neither worldly prudence nor calculating
circumstance in my engrossing zeal.
Earthly sequences would never stain my hand nor
seal my lips.
I would speak to the imagination, awaken the
feelings, stir the passions, arouse the fancy.
Earth its joys and grief should occupy no
moment of my thoughts for these are but
affairs of a portion of eternity so small
that no language can express its comparatively infinite
littleness.
I would strive to look for eternity alone
and on immortal souls.
Everything that man says Paul did.
Everything.
There wasn't a moment when he wasn't conscious
of eternity, conscious of God, conscious that he
was in a world.
He wasn't here for a playground like PTO.
You know I used to say it means
pity the listeners.
I know what it means now.
It means polluting the listeners.
God help them at the judgment.
They've lost sight of eternity.
They never have that stupid thing.
Two nights ago in the in the national
news as they finished it they showed girls
with minimum bikinis on.
This is the PTO.
They said PTO ministry.
It may be but it's not God's.
Nakedness.
As naked as they dare be.
And yet that's supposed to be the Holy
Ghost brooding there.
I don't believe it.
People say is that Pentecost?
No it's not.
They're having a bad time right now.
The biggest church in Houston collapsed I believe.
A Pentecostal church.
The biggest church in uh what's further on?
Oh this way.
New Orleans collapsed.
Pentecostal.
People say is that Pentecostal?
I said wait a minute.
A Ford motorcar down the road knocked a
woman down and killed her.
Do you blame Henry Ford for that?
You blame the driver.
Some of the godliest men I've ever met.
We had a man in England.
Do you ever ever remember hearing of Donald
G?
You did.
A brilliant man.
A perfect English gentleman.
Apart from that a scholar and a magnificent
man in Christ.
When he preached my daddy would go 100
miles to hear him.
He lived at the same time as a
man just the opposite.
A boisterous I was going to say rebellious
fellow.
What was his name?
Ever-increasing faith.
Smith Wigglesworth.
Oh boy was he a brand plug from
the burning.
He was in a meeting as a lady
with a big fat tummy and he didn't
like fat tummies.
And he went down while he was singing.
He bawled in the rear.
Are you pregnant?
No.
He hits in the she said I've got
something there.
The doctor says it's a growth.
He says oh close your eyes and she
didn't.
The boy hit her in the stomach as
hard as any boxer could hit.
She said oh.
He says you're healed.
Well either she's healed or dead.
One of the two.
She was healed.
He did the most extravagant thing.
They were extremes.
They were like John and Peter.
I take that as real whole Pentecostalism not
the junk that's around today.
I don't care where you turn.
Immorality is rotting almost not every pulpit.
A man called me tonight and he said
I've got to deal with somebody in a
church.
The pastor's fooling around with a judgment.
He said oh well pray pray pray for
me tonight.
I talked with a pastor the other day.
A young man who's been out on the
road.
And he said I met a whole bunch
of my seminary friends.
He said almost every one of them is
divorced now.
He said they're just cracking up like mad.
Do you know why?
Because there's no fear of God in the
sanctuary.
Somebody said that Jimmy, not Jimmy's faggot, Jimmy's
mixed up.
Jimmy, Tommy's Jimmy, Jimmy's Tommy, Jimmy said this
week we have a replica of the upper
room.
Did you hear about that?
And he said what hundreds of people pass
through and they come out speaking in tongues.
He didn't say they were filled with the
Holy Ghost.
He didn't say they become revolutionized.
Was this man tasted the grace of God
man?
He had eternity in his heart and eternity
in his vision.
You couldn't tire this man out.
He worked on the superhuman or unhuman strength.
Holy strength, divine strength.
You expect people to give you up and
fail you, don't you?
If you don't you will.
But listen this man had maybe the most
wonderful team of evangelists the world ever saw.
What happened?
They all deserted him.
Listen, you say Lord draw me nearer and
nearer.
The only way he can get you near
is to separate you from other folk.
Some of your dearest friends.
Some will misunderstand you.
Some will misrepresent you.
Some will lie about you.
So what?
You said draw me nearer.
He said I'll do that.
Paul gets going.
He's seen signs and wonders and miracles.
What happened?
He says demons have forsaken me.
Not going into the sin of the world
but having loved this present world.
The men that were with him he out
preached them.
He out prayed them.
He out fasted them.
They said he's eccentric.
Well those are the people that are anything
for God.
God intoxicated men.
You can't see what the others are seeing.
You can't hear what the others are.
To use a common American phrase you're marching
to another drummer, an eternal drummer.
And this precious man says I am not
ashamed of the gospel of Christ.
Let me stay here a minute or two.
In this ninth chapter.
Suddenly I shined right about him.
Verse three.
A light from heaven.
And he fell to the earth.
I think he was on a horse.
He wouldn't be going to Damascus walking.
And he fell to the ground.
And he heard a voice saying why persecutors
thou me?
He'd never seen Jesus Christ.
Unless you accept the theory of some theologians
that that Saul was the rich young ruler
that ran away.
Yet the Lord caught up with him.
But he doesn't say you're persecuting the Christians.
He says you're persecuting me.
Every time you touch into another brother or
sister you hurt him first.
He's the head and your head feels pain
before your toe that somebody stamps on.
He says why persecutors thou me?
It's hard for thee to kick against the
pricks.
And at verse six says he trembling and
astonished said Lord why me?
No he didn't.
He said Lord what will thou have me
to do?
Verse seven says the men which journeyed with
him stood speechless.
It doesn't say they even saw the lights.
You know that's one thing I think that
riveted Paul to his task.
Nobody could divorce him from him.
Where had he been?
He'd been standing at the uh watching a
young man maybe not 20 years of age
stoned to death.
And the young man never murmured.
What happened?
The heavens opened and all the people who
crucified Jesus were there.
And they said oh he's done away with.
This young man says I see Jesus.
Boy that must have shot them through the
heart.
They said Jesus is dead.
Somebody smuggled his body away.
And this precious young man says I see
Jesus standing.
The scripture says he's sitting at the right
hand of the father.
So one preacher I think was an eccentric
Englishman said Jesus got so excited to see
this young man giving his death dying like
that patiently praying for his enemies that even
Jesus got jumped off his chair and said
come on come on heaven's open come up.
Heaven opened in for Jesus in the most
critical circumstances of his life.
And if you want heaven to open for
you get ready for something that's tough.
Anyhow they stood speechless hearing a voice but
seeing no man.
Jesus had vanished.
Then verse 10 there's a certain man at
Ananias.
A certain man at uh a certain disciple
Ananias of Damascus.
He saw in a vision.
You know I'm glad that man stayed to
pray.
If he didn't like everybody else and said
the prayers and run away God wouldn't have
found an heaven boy.
But he just waited a bit longer.
Prayer is two ways.
He unloaded on God and God unloads on
us.
People say well who does God unload on
us?
Otherwise why did he say my yoke is
easy my burden is light.
You know sometimes we run away.
We ask people pray for us.
I've got a burden.
I say I'm not praying for you.
Maybe you're asking me to pray God will
remove the burden he's put on you.
He's trying to get you somewhere.
He's trying to test your muscles.
All those extravagant things you said in prayer.
I lay in dust life's glory day.
Here's your chance to do it.
Well it means two days of vacation.
I'll miss or something else.
But he says you ask for it so
work it out.
This man says work out your own salvation.
He surely worked his out didn't he?
Listen the Lord said unto him arise go
into the street which is called straight inquire
of the house of Judas once all Saul
of Tarsus.
Isn't that nice?
Where does he go?
Into the city.
Where?
To a street called straight.
To where?
To the house of Judas.
Do you know what thrills me about that?
If Jesus knew his name and address he
knows mine.
If he wants somebody to come they come.
Some I wish didn't come but anyhow if
he sends them I put up with them.
I rough it smoothly but anyhow.
He knew his name and address.
There's where he's staying.
He's seen in a vision a man named
Ananias.
Let me jump down here.
Verse 19, 18 says immediately there fell from
his eyes and it had been scales and
he received his sight forthwith and a rosary
was baptized and when he had received meat
he was strengthened.
Then were sold certain days with the disciples.
Verse 20 straightway he preached Christ in the
synagogues.
Now listen this man's only just been born
again.
Just been filled with the spirit.
Just been liberated from the bondage of the
law.
Just had a divine transformation.
I don't believe in being filled with the
Holy Ghost without action.
When they were filled with the Holy Ghost
what did they do?
They went to the marketplace.
As I said to somebody yesterday yes those
Puritans were never fundraising they were hell raising.
What happened when they came out of the
upper room?
The whole city was stirred.
What's the next movement?
They were in another room praying.
As soon as a man gets filled with
the Holy Ghost he talks about a prayer
language speaking in tongues.
I don't believe it is.
I believe it praying the mind of the
spirit.
It may be speaking in tongues at times.
It's praying the wisdom of the spirit.
It's praying with the authority of the spirit.
Whether you speak in English or not.
I used to go to a prayer meeting
on Monday mornings.
How many have ever heard it?
Did you hear David Duplice say?
Do you know who he is?
Who he was?
He's an angel now or somewhere.
Well David Duplice came every Monday morning.
We used to meet with him and the
founder of Daystar Missions.
What was his name Martha?
Jack Winter and a whole bunch of other
wonderful fellows.
Boy we had some prayer meetings.
I'll tell you what you talk about praying
about anointing.
Once he got going you didn't know who
was who.
But I remember one day a fellow really
prayed with that and he was an Englishman.
I remember Jack Winter saying you know that
was wonderful hearing that fellow.
He put it this way.
I guess you'll understand.
He said he prayed in tongues in English.
Do you know what he meant?
He prayed with anointing in English.
They spoke in every language in the Holy
Ghost.
Now here's a miracle.
Straightway he preached Christ in the synagogues.
You remember in the 17th chapter of Acts
where he's at the intellectual capital of the
world?
Remember he began, he was born in the
ancient capital of the world, Tarsus.
He finished up in the military capital of
the world.
In between he went to the religious capital
of the world, Jerusalem.
He went to the immoral capital of the
world, Corinth.
And he went to the intellectual capital of
the world where the poets and Stoics and
philosophers were all gathered in the 17th chapter.
He doesn't pull any punches.
He says you worship strange gods.
I want to tell you one.
What an astounding thing.
It wasn't something that flitted in out of
his mind.
Do you know all you brilliant men with
your genius?
One day God has appointed a day.
Do you know why he doesn't pass judgment
on P.T.L. and others or even
on you and I?
Because he's appointed a day.
Nobody's got away with anything.
There won't be a thing missing from P
.T.L. whether it's 90 million or 900
million.
God has a document on it.
Everything, every word that's been preached there, every
action, everything.
I call it now the judgment seat.
I call it also the final checkout counter.
And again remember this, no case is going
to be settled out of court, either for
the pope or the prince.
Kennedy got away.
It's John Kennedy's birthday, anniversary today, 70.
What a family.
What about Teddy Bear?
He died with that girl in his car.
And for years they said he let her
drown.
He didn't let her drown.
She didn't drown at all because there was
no water in her lungs.
She suffocated.
She got her head up in the car,
breathed up all the air and passed out.
The man who investigated it said two years
from the death, I shall publish a book
that will shock the world.
He never published it.
It never will be published.
There was too much money paid.
That whole case is going to be tried
at the judgment seat of Christ.
There'll be nobody pope to plead for him
there.
Where did Jimmy Hoffa go when he died?
Hell, I think.
But anyhow, wherever his body went, it's going
to be played out in that great day.
All these mysterious, no mistress to God.
He won't need any book of reference.
Man, if he sees Sparrows fall to the
ground, if he knows the names of every
one of the billions of stars, and it
says that he does in the 40th chapter
of Isaiah, the Lord could stand here and
he could recite the name of everybody that's
lived from Adam till this moment, and who
will live till the judgment.
I think the only thing that's kept me
sane, I'm not quite, but I'm nearly, and
the only thing that's kept me sane is
this.
Shall not the judge of all the earth
do right?
Nobody's going to corrupt God.
He needs no memory.
He's the eternal God.
He's infallible.
He's immaculate in his understanding.
He's omnipresent.
He's witnessed everything that's gone on today with
one sweep of his eye around the world.
He's registered every emotion.
As the hymn says, crown him with any
crowns, whoever he grief hath known that wrings
the human breast, and takes and bears them
for his own.
Does Jesus suffer?
Yes, he suffers now, and he'll suffer till
he comes finally to sit on the throne
in the world.
Why?
Because it's the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Whoever he grief hath known, in Isaiah, doesn't
it report that?
It says concerning the Lord Jesus that he
was with them in their suffering, in everything
they suffered when they were whipped in Egypt,
he suffered with them.
Well, let's rush on with this.
Verse 20 says, straightway he preached Christ in
the synagogue, and all that heard him, what
were they?
Amazed.
Listen, he's on his own ground.
He's not a select company of preachers.
He hasn't chased around to see if there's
any apostles left.
He's in territory that's foreign.
It says in a sense he's a Jew,
but here he is with all these antagonists,
and yet in the midst of all of
them, all that heard him were amazed and
said, he's not this, he that destroyed them
which called on the name of Jerusalem, and
he came here with that intent.
Doesn't he say in the 26th chapter of
Acts before Agrippa, I went everywhere, I tore
families apart.
In my holy zeal, I tore families apart.
I chased them into strange cities, and these
people say he came here with a, he's
got a death sentence in his pocket, and
he can command death for all of us.
But they said, listen to him now, he
came hither with that intent, that he might
bring them bound to the chief priests, and
Saul increased more and more in strength.
Isn't that gorgeous?
You say, Lord strengthen me.
He says, well, bend your back, I'll put
a load on it.
You remember John Bunyan has a picture of
the celestial city, and on the way he
said there was a lion, and when he
saw it, he was afraid, and he discovered
it had a chain, and it could just
come near enough to lick his legs, but
not near enough to bite him.
He said, it's a type of the devil,
he gets very near, don't be afraid of
his roar.
And then he saw a big fire, and
he saw demons, and there they were throwing
buckets of water on the fire, trying to
put out the testimony of the individual, or
the testimony of the church, and he said
they were throwing water on furiously, and the
more they threw it on, the more it
blazed.
I couldn't understand it, water doesn't do that.
He said, I walked around the back, I
looked at the front, there were demons with
little buckets throwing water on, and at the
back, there were angels with buckets twice the
size throwing oil on.
So there you are.
You see, we're more than conquerors through him,
and the man that wrote this blessed epistle.
Let me just finish with a couple of
things here.
Let's go to Romans.
I think we're living, we mentioned this yesterday,
I think, in our meeting with the preachers.
I don't know how they got the message
through, but he says that their faith is
heard of throughout the whole world.
In verse 8, verse 10, he says, making
a request, if by any means now at
length I might have a prosperous journey unto
you.
Verse 11, I long to see you, that
I may impart unto you some spiritual gift,
to the end that you may be established.
Now again, remember, he's gone to this city
that didn't want him.
He was the greatest reject the world ever
had.
Nobody wanted him, and yet he was the
most anointed man I'm sure that ever lived.
That's why I say I'd love to have
heard him preach.
In verse 15, he says, so as much
as in me is, as much as in
me.
What was in him?
Do you think Paul ever preached anything he
hadn't done himself?
He writes in this very epistle in chapter
12, present your body a living sacrifice, be
not conformed to this world.
I don't like most translations, but if you've
read, is it J.B. Phillips says, instead
of not, instead of using the authorized version,
be not conformed to this world, J.B.
Phillips says, don't let this world squeeze you
into its mold.
That's what it's trying to do.
It got all the PTL and molded it,
it would pass now for Hollywood.
They lost track of something.
They got the extra gold and greed.
Oh Tommy, Jim says, I raised it because
I wanted people to see what God can
do for his people.
Do you think there's anybody rejoicing now in
what he's done?
Yesterday, I talked with a man and he,
I said, how's your family?
He has three sons like we have, and
he said, well the oldest one is going
on with the Lord.
He's doing pretty good, but the other two,
he said, they're complete cynics.
They said, Dad, is that Christianity?
Is that Pentecost?
I said, it isn't.
The man's lost his nut, lost his head,
lost his thinking.
He's got caught up, or sucked down, if
you like.
But you know, God's going to give an
answer to all that.
He's going to raise up pure men, poor
men, unlettered men, if you like.
Those men went into the upper realm, unlettered.
What did the world say about them?
Peter and John worked a miracle and they
dragged them up before the big shots, and
the big shot looked down and he says,
be careful, these two men are unlearned and
ignorant.
Oh boy, that's what we can't bear, isn't
it?
Just yesterday, a preacher said to me, almost
everybody in our denomination now has got a
doctorate.
Somebody said to one of John Wesley's men,
your church won't prosper.
He won't go on.
He said, why?
He said, you don't have a single doctor
in the whole range of your preachers.
Do you?
He said, no.
He said, our theology isn't sick enough to
need a doctor.
What have we got with all this wisdom
and all this learning?
We've got no way.
We're more carnal, we're more helpless.
God isn't wanting to put us on exhibition
for scholarship.
It's sainthood he's after.
And yet this man has such a comprehensive
revelation of God.
As much as in me is, what did
he have?
He had a colossal intellect.
He had an unbreakable spirit.
He had an unshakable faith.
My faith looks up to thee.
A joy unspeakable he had.
A faith unbreakable.
He's sitting in a prison, bloody, half starved,
cold.
What does he do?
Send a letter, a monthly letter.
Please help, send some food parcels, care packages
and all the rest of it.
No.
What did he say?
He says to other people, rejoice in the
Lord.
And again I say rejoice.
Look at the epistles that he wrote.
Somebody says, you know, Paul's in prison.
Why doesn't he get out?
Those big shots, you know, Dallas, the faith
gang.
They say if he'd had more faith he'd
never had a thorn in the flesh.
I'll tell you what he did.
They don't do.
They beg money.
He had a thorn in the flesh.
Sure he had.
His faith was so small.
Do you know how small it was?
It's so small he raised the dead.
Do you know how small it was?
He cast out devils.
Do you know how small it was?
He invaded all the heathen powers.
One man.
He didn't raise a million dollars.
He just lived in a living vital relationship
with God.
And because of that, of course he boasts.
The psalmist said my soul shall make a
boast in the Lord.
People don't.
They boast how big their radio program is,
how big the results are of our ministries
and so forth.
Paul didn't do that.
What did he do?
He boasted that my soul shall make a
boast in the Lord.
And he says very joyfully, triumphantly, I can
do all things through Christ.
You see, this man has such a comprehensive
realization of the redemptive work of Jesus.
In Jesus' name he cast out devils.
They did that before Pentecost.
But it's more than that.
He's willing to lie.
And in that great hymn I quoted, the
hymn writer says, it was a well-spent
journey though seven deaths lay between.
If I had to die and rise and
go to martyrdom again and another martyrdom and
a second and a third and a fourth
and a fifth, it will be worth it
all when we see Jesus.
Five minutes inside of heaven we'll all wish
we carried greater burdens, had greater zeal, had
greater love, had greater sacrifice.
What in the world is treasures?
I talked with our dear David the other
day.
If you've ever seen a saint walking, there's
one.
His walking with God is awesome.
And I said, David, these things don't matter.
I said, supposing you saw a woman with
a million dollar ring, wouldn't she be more
precious?
He said, Dad, these things don't make any
difference.
All that you can take off and put
on, the world can rob you of everything.
But my faith looks up to thee.
I can have a joy unspeakable, a faith
unshakable, a love that's indestructible.
Paul had them all.
That's why you can't fault him.
You may say, well, Jesus, oh, he was
a son of God and the son of
man.
He was a son of God.
Well, Paul says, listen, I can take everything
that comes.
I can do all things through Christ and
he did it.
So let's tackle the situation right here.
I mustn't take much time now.
Verse 15.
So as much as in me is that
colossal intellect, his spirit, his unbreakable spirit, his
love, his joy, his peace, I'm ready to
preach the gospel to those that are in
Rome also.
I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ.
It's the power of God unto salvation to
everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and
also to the Greek.
You see, there's no, he says, in another
place, there's neither Jew nor Greek, which is
race distinction, bond nor free, class distinction, male
nor female, sex distinction.
It doesn't matter what category you're in, the
blood can come, because sin is the same
in everybody.
But remember, God's holiness will never cover, God's
mercy will never cover over the sin that
his holiness has condemned.
He'll forgive us here, but not afterwards.
Why is he so zealous?
I'm not ashamed of the gospel.
Verse 18.
For the wrath of God is revealed from
heaven against all ungodliness and righteousness of men
who hold the truth in righteousness.
Now look at the people.
I'm going to skip down this quickly.
Who is he going to?
Verse 24.
Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness
through the lusts of their own hearts, to
dishonor their own bodies between themselves.
That's wrong living.
Now look what he said in verse four,
or verse 25.
Who changed the truth of God into a
lie and worshiped and served the creature more
than the creator, who is blessed forevermore.
In verse 24, it's wrong loving, living.
In that verse, it's the last one, 25,
it's verse, it's wrong living, wrong loving.
Then he comes down into verse 28.
Even as they did not like to retain
God in their knowledge, giving them over to
a reprobate mind to do these things which
are not convenient, filled with all and filled
with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness.
That's wrong being, wrong living, wrong loving, wrong
being.
These men were totally corrupt.
They were a new edition of sodomites.
He needs a gospel as big as that.
I think he wrote Hebrews and Romans.
Do you quote it tonight, I think, dear
brother?
Romans, Hebrews 7.25. He is able to
save to the uttermost.
We have a prayer meeting Thursday morning in
our house.
It's kind of private.
It's just for preachers.
But it's good.
I enjoyed it anyhow.
So, if your preacher can bear it, time
to come along.
It's a half past nine, just about two
hours.
Joe Foss was there yesterday, dear Joe.
People say to me, boy, there's some wonderful
ministries where you live, aren't there?
I say, yes, two big ones.
Oh, no, no, no, I wasn't thinking of
them.
Two very special ministries.
Who are they?
Gates of Life, run by my dear friend
there, Sonny James.
And down the back lane there, as I
call it, Joe Foss.
Joe said, I think it was a friend
of his, you were there, Gracie.
What did he say, a friend of his,
that chaplain?
And he'd been visiting a man who's murdered
six different people.
And he acknowledged before the judge.
He said, I did it.
I'm not going to plead for my life.
I did it.
They gave him a time on death row.
Then he was to die on a certain
day.
And Joe's friend, the chaplain, went in.
And he said the man was laid back
on a bench, relaxed, with a huge smile
on his lips.
The other men had been whining and pleading.
He said, I'm not going to plead for
my life.
And the chaplain said, are you going to,
did he say, are you going to plead
again or something?
Oh, thank you.
So you're right at the end anyhow.
He said, yes.
The chaplain said, have you any last words?
He said, yes.
Well, he said, say it.
What was he saying?
The wages.
Yeah.
With six murders on his conscience.
But now he's got right with God while
he'd been there.
They led him to Christ.
And he said he had a huge smile.
And he said, well, this is the last
word I'd leave to others.
The wages of sin is death.
The gift of God is eternal life.
And he said, they injected him and he
just folded up and passed away.
Those were his last words.
You think of that.
The psychologist is going to whisper some nursery
rhyme in his ear.
Here's a man says, listen, I've got the
answer for you.
There's one who died for you.
The dying thief rejoiced to see that fountain
in his day.
And there may I, though vile as he,
wash all my sins away.
I could keep you all night telling about
amazing characters in America.
None of them greater than Jerry McCauley, the
man that came to Christ in Sing Sing
Prison.
One of the vilest men that ever was.
When they buried him in New York, the
crowd outside was so big it was like
a royal funeral.
They opened the door.
There's the body of the old guy.
His eyes were sunk and his face wrinkled.
He drunk enough beer to launch a ship.
But every time he went to a meeting,
he would have a prostitute on one arm
or a jailbird on the other.
And as he lay in his casket there,
the preacher said some nice words about him.
They opened the door and a woman came
in with a white flower anyhow.
And she walked up to the front of
the casket.
And they said that tears were flowing so
much that by the time they'd gone past,
those eyes there were just puddles of tears.
And after the women walked in with their
white roses or white flowers, then they opened
the door and 25 men came in with
a red rose.
All very deeply dyed sinners.
The vilest of New York's underworld.
And he led all those 20-odd women
and those 25 men to Jesus Christ.
Because he said if he did it in
me, he can do it in anybody.
That's why Paul says, I'm the chief of
sinners.
If I'm the head of the gang, if
I'm the worst reprobate, he wasn't in sexual
uncleanness and things, but he hated Jesus Christ.
He hated the system.
The persecutor becomes a preacher.
He says, listen, God's done the miracle in
me.
And if he's done it in me, he
can do it in you.
He's able to save to the uttermost.
Whether at the lowest hell or you're in
the highest echelon of so-called rich and
famous people.
I've got a book here I'm going to
read.
It's written by F.
W.
H.
Meyer.
If ever you see it, buy it.
You'll have to buy it in a used
bookstore somewhere.
It's all about St. Paul.
It's the most moving thing.
And I've dozens of lives I'm going to
save St. Paul.
This is all in verse.
But he's a preacher.
God help us.
These young theologians come from the seminaries and
say to me, oh, my teacher was saying
this and I said, well, forget it.
Let me tell you something.
Oh, they say, you know, we aren't the
sawdust preachers now.
We don't go down.
We have a profession equal to doctors, equal
to lawyers.
I say, brother, preaching isn't a profession, it's
a passion and an obsession.
In God's name, if you can live without
getting in the pulpit, keep out of it.
But if you get in it, don't let
a 50 Clydesdales pull you out of it.
It's the hardest job in the world if
you're going to do what Paul did, carry
a burden for the last.
He doesn't say my eloquence gets me through,
my logic gets me through.
What does he say?
He says, I travel in birth.
Ask your pastor, does he travel?
Ask him how often he weeps in the
secret place.
Ask him how many people have really been,
but they're not being born again because nobody's
traveling, that's why.
This is what he has Paul saying.
This is about Paul's preaching.
Oft when the word is on me to
deliver, lifts the illusion and the truth lies
bare.
The desert, the throng, the city or the
river, melts in a lucid paradise of air.
Only like souls I see the folk there
under, bound who should conquer, slaves who should
be kings.
Viewing their one hope, hearing their one hope
with an empty wonder, gladly, sadly contented with
a show of things.
Then with a rush, the intolerable craving shivers
throughout me like a trumpet call.
Oh, to save these, to perish for their
saving, die for their life, be offered for
them all.
What do we sing?
I lay in dust, life's glory dead.
I get less confidence, I'm getting old and
muddled a bit since that stroke, I don't
speak too well, but I'm going to preach
as long as I can.
And I'll tell you what, the passion doesn't
get less, it gets deeper.
America won't stand another decade unless there's a
Holy Ghost revival.
The Russians won't destroy us, we'll destroy ourselves.
We'll destroy ourselves with AIDS and all these
other hellish diseases and all the corruption in
government.
And God's going to offer us mercy.
And we have to plead now in wrath,
remember mercy.
He is a merciful God, otherwise he'd have
burned us up today.
It's true of England and other countries.
But you see, we don't have these passionate
men.
Where in God's name are the men with
passion?
It's all so sweet and easy these days.
Oh, God loves you.
One of the big excuses some of the
preachers now, you know, oh you sin, of
course you do.
We're only human.
We're not human.
How can a man filled with the Holy
Ghost just be human?
The man who's just human is a sinner.
He loves his sin, he practices his sin.
He's not just human if he's a God
-filled man.
Read Romans 8, he says he's filled with
the Spirit of God, he's filled with the
Spirit of Christ, he's filled with the Holy
Spirit.
If he's really abandoned, why is he just
ordinary?
Why is the devil always trying to destroy
that man if he's not ordinary?
He's different in the eyes of the devil,
he's different in the eyes of God.
I'm through with this.
I expect at the judgment seat there's going
to be a judgment of believers, there's going
to be a judgment of sinners, there's going
to be a special judgment of preachers according
to James.
Be not many preachers or teachers, we shall
receive a greater judgment.
I expect to see preachers, brilliant preachers, well
-known preachers, charged with criminal neglect at the
judgment seat.
Why?
Because they do not preach the whole counsel
of God.
We're not just human.
We're not here just to be human.
We're here to be superhuman.
We're here to live.
Why do you say thy kingdom come, thy
will be done in earth?
It can only be done in earth as
the kingdom is done in us.
As we're subject to love and joy and
peace and longsuffering and gentleness and meekness, the
intensity of our love to God will be
measured by our intensity of our hatred for
the devil and human systems.
And they've all had their way and done
nothing.
We're on the edge of disaster.
We're on the edge of wrath.
And God's going to raise up some men
like this.
I believe lots of these young men that
keep coming in here, they keep writing to
me, I came the other Friday night, God
touched my heart.
That's my reward.
Not rewards, not offerings.
In fact, the offerings are the same every
week at this place.
Never there is a dime.
And I'm glad it is that way.
But you don't say, well, there'll be an
offering at the end.
Never has been, never will be, as far
as I'm concerned.
But you see, this is an unusual hour.
It's an unusual hour.
God wants unusual men.
It's a crisis hour.
Sin isn't normal anymore.
People don't, when those gay girls lying almost
naked, they say, oh, I don't feel embarrassed.
That's no compliment.
It's a shame.
They can be in a Christian camp and
not feel embarrassed.
And fellows are going past looking and pointing
at them and they're not embarrassed to say
it.
Where is our hatred for sin?
Let me say this.
A fellow called me yesterday from West Virginia.
Brother Raymond, I want to encourage you.
Good.
I said, that's great.
There's not much of that stuff about.
He said, we started praying in our church.
Young people get together, other people.
And he said, the Lord came and a
bunch of young men have really got quickened
by God.
I said, what's the proof?
He said, they've gone back to their offices
and businesses and they've been witnessing and they
brought Mormons into the church.
And the last few weeks, one or two
Mormons each week is getting saved.
Bless the Lord forever.
In this day, why?
Because some young men have been transformed.
You can't contain it.
Boy, I went to his tiny church.
You know what we did Sunday morning?
We carried the church organ in the street
where there was poverty.
And we had our streets Sunday morning.
Where did Jesus preach?
In a lovely church with stuffed seats and
stained glass windows, a massive choir and an
organ?
No, he didn't.
He didn't often get in the synagogue.
He preached in the street.
What do we do Sunday night after the
service?
We went back in another area, a poor
area, took the organ again and we sang
for about an hour and testified and preached.
And it was wonderful.
I thought, I got my first taste there
of a real concern for the lost.
And I'll tell you what it was.
It started through an American that went to
the Indians, David Brainerd.
And I said, well, God sends the same.
And I lay in dust.
I just started.
I got everything printed to start my own
business.
I took it to the altar.
I said, it's there.
I finished with it.
I didn't touch it.
I'm glad a thousand times over that I
have.
I have one thing equal with Dr. Talbot.
I finished school in the eighth grade.
If that's any congratulation, I helped you.
And he did.
And I've learned to love the Lord.
And I want to love him more.
And if I had a thousand tongues, I'd
preach.
Boy, you'd be here a long while if
I had a thousand tongues, wouldn't you?
I told that young man we'd pray for
his group.
They were concentrating on the Mormons.
Let's remember that tonight.
Jacob had a special request for prayer.
He has a difficult situation tomorrow to be
in with some other people counseling.
So he asked for prayer.
There are different groups around the country keep
saying, remember, oh, I'll tell you what, the
man, there was a man here a few
months ago, remember from Canada?
That big.
Church of England preacher.
They had to move up there about two
years or less ago.
And in that great church with its stained
glass windows and everything, people were laid everywhere,
slain in the spirit, he said.
But within 18 months, they'd all backslidden, gone
back to their drinking, gone back to their
dancing.
And he said this over the phone to
me this morning.
He talked quite a while.
And he said, you know, up here, he
said, these charismatics don't know a thing about
repentance.
They just think, he said, it's like Jim
Baker.
You just say you're sorry.
If Jim's sorry, why is he going to
try and build another one?
If he's sorry, why doesn't he take all
the money back?
He said, I want to tell you, I
love my staff.
What did the staff say last night?
One of the leading men said, why didn't
he love us when he was here with
us?
He was arrogant and unapproachable.
You see, the world doesn't forget that God
is going to move.
God is going to vindicate, not my preaching,
anybody else.
He's going to vindicate the passion of his
son.
One thing I'm through.
When they were needing young men to go
and offer their lives on the plantations down
in the Caribbean years ago, there were two
young men of the Moravians offered to go.
And as the ship was pulling away, somebody
shouted and said, you'll never come back again.
They went and stood on the slave blocks
down in St. Thomas.
It was the only way to get into
a plantation.
And these lovely golden-haired young Germans stood
on the slave block.
And when they gave them the money, they
said, give it to Pastor Spendelberg, and he'll
send it back to Germany to pay the
fare of somebody else coming out.
And when they said, these two young men,
remember, you'll never come back.
It's a one-way ticket.
And they just shouted back, may the lamb
that was slain, was it?
That's right.
Yeah.
They borrowed that from the, uh, yeah, the
covenants said that first, I think.
But anyhow, it was their language.
May the lamb that was slain, see of
the reward of his sufferings.
And they went and they put a chain
around their necks.
They put a collar.
And when the men turned their head, that
iron chain could cut their necks.
And they festered and died very often.
They put a rope around them.
And they put five men.
And the secret sign was, when they chain
you up to plow, get in the middle
so you can testify to each end, to
the one on the right and those on
the left.
You know what the sign was?
It wasn't just on their stationary, it was
the sign of the whole group.
They had a, an ox leaning forward.
On the right hand, they had an altar.
On the left hand, they had a plow.
It said underneath, ready for either.
Under the plow, it said service.
Under the altar, it said sacrifice.
And they said, we're ready for either, service
or sacrifice, live or die, it doesn't matter.
Do you wonder they had revival?
Do you wonder the Holy Ghost came on
their fellowship at 11 o'clock, Wednesday morning,
13th of August, 1727, the Holy Ghost came.
And a prayer meeting started that lasted for
100 years, it never stopped, day or night.
Boys and girls at eight and nine were
weeping and traveling for the salvation of people
they didn't know a thing about, except they
were black people who were slaves.
Revival lasted a hundred years, non-stop praying.
We want it for a weekend.
We want to be devout for a little
while, not too much, it'll interfere with our
plans.
You see, we're planning this, we're planning that,
forget it.
Get his plan and let's do it, whatever
it is.
So let's go with a holy hatred to
prayer, a holy hatred to the devil, and
a holy love for the Lord.
Let's remember these precious people who are asking
for prayer.
If you just pray for these in different
parts of the country, God knows where they
are, and pray for Jacob, I told him
we would.
Thank you, I'm sorry I took so much
time, but there you are.