from the message, but you know what each and every one needs.
And so God, I just pray that you would speak to each heart as you know,
that only you can know our thoughts and you know what we need.
But God, I just pray that you would please just stir us up and fire us up.
We're about to start our soul-winding marathon tomorrow,
and we need your power, dear God.
And so I just pray that you would speak to our hearts through the sermon tonight
and use us in a mighty way over the next few days and for the rest of our lives,
and help something tonight stick with us and sink down into our ears.
In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.
All right, now looking at Matthew chapter 9,
this kind of goes together with chapter number 8.
I was telling you last week how the format of the book of Matthew is,
it starts out, it tells a story, and then it has some preaching from John the Baptist.
Then it has another story, then it has Jesus preaching,
and it has another story, and then it has Jesus preaching again.
And it'll be usually one or two chapters of story, one or two chapters of preaching.
Well, Matthew 8 and 9 form kind of a duo here of one long story,
and the same theme is kind of carried throughout these two chapters.
Chapter 10, we get into something a little bit different.
But in chapter 8 and 9, I talked last week when I was talking about chapter 8,
I covered most of chapter 9 because I was referring to the fact
that there's this theme throughout chapters 8 and 9
of Jesus singling out certain people that he has chosen,
certain disciples, multitudes are thronging to him.
He's constantly, and I showed you this over and over again, this pattern,
where he's constantly sending the multitude away
so that he can just be with his disciples.
If you remember, the multitudes saw Jesus and they marveled,
and then it turns around and says, Jesus saw a man.
He saw one person, Matthew.
And what he's teaching us is, look, there are many people who follow Jesus,
but there are a few people who are going to be the great soul winners,
the great disciples that are going to follow me for life.
And he said, I'd rather invest my time in this one man, Matthew,
in these 11 men, these 12 men, than to invest my time in a multitude
that's here today in John tomorrow, is what he's trying to teach us.
And then the other theme we saw was faith, praying with faith,
knowing that whatsoever, it says,
for if we know that he hear us whatsoever we ask,
we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.
Praying, believing that you have the things that you're asking for.
Praying by faith, everything in the Christian life is by faith.
That's what we talked about last week, and that spilled over into chapter 9.
Now, I want to show you something totally different tonight in chapter 9.
Look at verse number 1.
And he entered into a ship and passed over and came into his own city.
So here he is in his hometown, and behold, they brought to him a man,
sick of the palsy, lying on a bed.
Now, if we know this story from the book of Mark chapter 2, I believe it is,
where it gives a little more detail.
These four men carried this man.
It says that he was born of four men.
Four of his friends are carrying this man on a bed,
and they carry him to this preaching service where Jesus is in a house preaching.
And he's preaching in a house.
It's so packed that the doors are jammed up, all the windows are jammed up.
They can't get anywhere near Jesus.
So what do they do? They climb up on the roof.
They tear apart the tile roofing,
and they actually tie ropes to this man's bed and lower him down
into the middle of the service where Jesus is preaching.
Now, that's what we're looking at here.
Look at verse 2. It says,
And behold, they brought to him a man, sick of the palsy, lying on a bed.
So there we see they're bringing the bed, just like we saw in the book of Mark.
And Jesus, seeing their faith, said unto the sick of the palsy,
Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee.
So immediately he doesn't heal his body.
The first thing he does is tells him, your sins are forgiven.
He said, I'm going to save you, is the first thing I'm going to do.
And behold, certain of the scribes said within themselves,
this man blasphemeth.
And Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said,
and by the way, let me point out in another gospel,
it quotes a little more of what they were saying.
They said, this man blasphemeth.
Who can forgive sins but God only?
Hey, they were right.
They just didn't realize that who they were dealing with was God.
And so it says,
And Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said,
wherefore think ye evil in your thoughts?
For whether is easier, to say, thy sins be forgiven thee,
or to say, arise and walk.
And here's my text verse of my sermon tonight.
But that ye may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins.
Then saith he to the sick of the palsy,
Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house.
Now let me explain this a little bit,
because this is kind of the premise for the sermon tonight.
He's saying, what's easier?
To heal the physical need?
You know, to pull money out of my wall and give somebody money?
To go down to Mexico and build houses for poor people?
Is it easier for me to open up a soup kitchen?
Is it easier for me to take care of the physical needs of healing the body
and taking care of the material needs of people?
Or is it a harder thing to say, thy sins be forgiven thee?
He says, that's the great work.
He says, that's the great calling.
And notice he says, the only reason that I'm going to heal this man.
He says, that you may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins.
He says, the reason that I'm going to heal this man
is so that you know that I have power on earth to heal people.
Is that what he said? No.
He said, that you may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins.
Because that's the great reason why Jesus was here.
He healed a lot of people, but he said, I came to seek and to save that which was lost.
He said, I am here to seek and to save that which was lost.
He said, I didn't come here to be some kind of an example.
I didn't come here to be some kind of a healer.
I didn't come here to be some kind of a celebrity with multitudes strong in me.
He said, I came to reach the loss and win them to Christ.
Now the Bible, we just heard on Sunday morning in the sermon,
that he left us an example that we should walk in his steps.
The Bible says, but brethren, as he is, so are we in this world.
Remember Jesus said, as long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
But then in Matthew chapter 5, he said, ye are the light of the world.
And so Jesus was the light of the world while he's in this earth.
You know who the light of the world is right now? I am.
You are. You are.
Everybody that's in this room tonight, that's come out on a Wednesday night.
Why did you come here on a Wednesday night?
Because we're here to start our soul winning marathon.
We're here for our anniversary of this church, which is about one thing, winning people to Christ.
Why are we so one dimensional? Why are we so focused on that one thing?
Why is it that we're so imbalanced, that we're just so interested in winning people to Christ?
Well, because that's why Jesus came to this earth, to seek and to save that which was lost.
Look, I'm going to preach on sin, because your sin is what's hindering you from running the race that's set before you.
The only reason I preach against sin, you want to know the big reason?
Is because we need to lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us,
then we may run with patience the race that is set before us.
Not just to live a clean life for the sake of living a clean life,
but to live a clean life to get the power of God, to be holy in the sight of God,
to be a vessel that he can use to do his great work.
Why do I learn the Bible? So I can be a better soul winner.
Why do I come to church? So I can learn how to win souls.
So I can get excited about winning souls.
I can have somebody stir me up and prod me and push me to get fired up about soul winning.
That's why I come to church.
But look, understand that though.
The purpose of healing man was to show everybody around that he had power on earth to forgive sins.
Now look at verse number 8.
It says, But when the multitudes saw it, they marveled and glorified God,
which had given such power unto men.
You see that? It accomplished its goal because he looked at it and he said, wow.
They said, I am impressed by this power.
With the power to heal somebody? No.
The power of pardoning a sinner, a wicked sinner.
Pardoning them so they'd be a child of God.
So that they could go from being a child of the devil to being a child of God.
So that they could go from being an ungodly sinner condemned in the sight of God on their way to hell
and be translated into the glorious kingdom of his dear son.
That's the power of God, my friend.
People talk about the power of God.
And it's like some charismatic service where people are falling on the ground.
We were talking about this on Sunday night.
People ecstatic speaking, glory to God, something's happening.
Something's happening all right, but it's not the power of God.
It's the power of the God of this world, Satan.
And so we're not talking about rolling down the aisles.
We're not talking about being some holy roller.
We're not talking about being some kind of a snake handler or these people that do all this weird stuff.
We're not talking about laughing hysterically and slobbering and barking like a dog.
When we talk about the power of God, we're talking about one thing.
We're talking about the power on earth to forgive sins.
That's what the Bible says.
Now look, if you would at verse number 1 of chapter number 10.
While you're turning, actually look at chapter number 9 at the end here.
He says, but when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them
because they fainted and were scattered abroad, a sheep having no shepherd.
Then saith he unto his disciples, the harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few.
Now let me ask you something. This multitude that he was looking at?
Remember, this is his great big church, right?
This is his great big crowd.
They weren't even saved, a lot of them.
You know what I mean? A lot of them weren't even saved because that's what he's saying.
He's saying, look at the people in my church.
The harvest is plenteous, but the laborers are few. Isn't that crazy?
So in Jesus' church here, they weren't saved people.
And he says, look at these crowd of people.
They're not going to be here tomorrow because a lot of them aren't even saved.
The Bible says in John chapter 6, he says he knew who believed on him and who didn't believe on him.
It says he knew those that did not believe, and what happened?
They started leaving. In John chapter 6 verse 66, they started leaving.
And he already knew they were going to leave.
He predicted that because he said he knew who it was that believed on him.
That's what the Bible says, exactly those words.
And so it says here, the harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few.
He says, good night. Look at all these unsaved people.
They want the gospel. I mean, they want something.
I mean, they're here. I mean, here they are. They came to hear me. I'm Jesus.
But they want something, but there's nobody to win them to Christ.
I mean, where are the laborers? Where's the soul winning?
Where are the people that are going to guide these people into all truth?
And so he says, pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that he will send forth labors in his harvest.
Pray to God that somebody would please go out and reach all these people that are just waiting for the gospel.
But look at this. And when he called on him as 12 disciples.
So what he's saying is, look, I've only got 12 people at this point.
And later on in his ministry, you'll see that he has 70 people that he ordains.
And this story is played out later on. First he ordains 12 apostles and he sends them out.
Then later he ordains 70 apostles. And so there's the 12 and then there's the 70.
So there's growth there. And obviously he had a lot more followers than this.
These are the sold out crowd. These are the on fire preaching soul winners that had the power.
Now look at this. He only has 12. Not really a phenomenal number.
Not really a huge amount. You know, this is early in his ministry.
He has 12 people that he's going to ordain, to send out, to be soldiers, to knock on doors.
And it says, when he called on him as 12, so he's saying, look, pray that we get more people because 12 is not enough.
But in the meantime, he says, he called on him as 12 disciples. He gave them power.
You see what I mean? That's what they needed.
He says, look, I only have 12 people. I don't have a big crowd.
I wish that this whole multitude would get ahold of what I'm saying, would believe on me, would get fired up about serving me.
And then we'd have 5,000 soul winners. Wouldn't that be great?
That they could go out and just turn this world upside down. But he says, no.
These people are like sheep not having a shepherd. But he says, the 12 that I do have, I'm going to give them power.
Because if I can give them power, then they can do something great for God.
Look if you would at John chapter 20, chapter 20 verse 22. I want to teach you something quickly here.
Wednesday night is kind of a Bible study where we teach through some of these things.
Look at John chapter 20 verse 22. And I want you to see this concept.
Because a lot of people have messed up doctrine about this subject of the Holy Spirit.
And so I want to show you this doctrine from the Bible.
John chapter 20, 22, let me set the stage for you. This is Jesus in the upper room.
He's just, he's arisen from the dead. Thomas is not there. This is the Sunday following his resurrection.
Exactly one week later. Thomas is not present. He shows up among the disciples.
And he's in the upper room. This is what he does. Verse 22.
And when he had said this, he breathed on them and saith unto them, receive ye the Holy Ghost.
Now, here's the thing. This is what I want to teach you doctrinally about the Bible.
Now, of course, in the Old Testament, people were not indwelled by the Holy Spirit upon salvation.
When people got saved, they were not indwelled by the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament.
Now, in John chapter 7, I just thought about this passage. I'm just going to turn there quickly and read it for you.
You don't have to turn there. But it says here in verse 39,
But this fakie of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive.
Who's going to receive it? Doesn't believe on him. Those that are saved.
For the Holy Ghost was not yet given. You see that? The Holy Ghost was not yet given.
People were not indwelled by the Holy Spirit at this point.
And it says because that Jesus was not yet glorified.
Now, the glorification is talking about when he rose from the dead and he had his glorified body.
He didn't see corruption and he arose a victor of the dark domain and all that stuff.
And so here he is in John chapter 20. He breathes on them.
And now they have the Holy Spirit for the first time.
This is the comforter that he promised that he was going to send them.
He says, I've been glorified. I've been up to heaven and back. I've sprinkled the blood on the mercy seat.
And he says, receive ye the Holy Ghost.
And at that point they were indwelled with the Holy Spirit.
Now, here's the thing. Most people believe and most people think and most preachers will erroneously preach
that the day of Pentecost was when the indwelling of the Holy Spirit began.
It's not true. It started right here in John chapter 20 when he breathed on them and said, receive ye the Holy Ghost.
Now, nothing in the Bible is coincidental, incidental, or accidental.
And so God chose to put this in the final gospel, this account in John, so that you go right from John
where they're indwelled with the Holy Spirit. You flip over, boom, you're in Acts chapter 1 and 2.
You're going to see something totally different about the Holy Spirit.
Now, in Luke, it gives this account. I don't have time to turn there because we're going to have a little bit shorter
sermon tonight and there's a lot to cover, but in the book of Luke at this exact same point where he's in the upper room,
it doesn't say he breathed on them and they received the Holy Ghost.
It says that he opened their understanding of the Scriptures.
All of a sudden, and the Bible talks about it in Luke 23 about the two men, how it was like scales fell off their eyes.
He opened up to them the Scriptures. I mean, they understood the Bible.
You see, throughout the Bible, there's two words used for the Holy Spirit.
One of them is the Holy Spirit and one of them is called the Holy Ghost.
Now, a lot of people think it's the same thing because in the NIV, it just takes it out, ghost and just the Spirit.
But you'll notice if you study this, every time it uses the word Spirit, it's talking about the internal manifestation.
It's usually talking about the internal manifestation. It'll talk about the fruit of the Spirit.
It'll talk about love, joy, peace, on something that is good as faith, meekness, faith.
And then it talks about Holy Ghost. It's talking about the outward manifestation.
Because these come from two words, inspiration, like spirit, like inhale, and ghost, like a gust of air.
And exhale is the two words that it comes from. And so those are two different words.
And whenever God's talking about the Holy Ghost, he's usually referring more to the outward manifestation, the power.
Whereas when you use the word Spirit, you'll notice he's talking about the fruit of the Spirit.
He's talking about being filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in songs and hymns and spiritual songs.
It's more of an internal that it's dealing with.
Because there's an internal aspect of being filled with the Spirit and there's an external aspect.
Now look, it says he breathed on them and said, receive the Holy Ghost because he's breathing out.
And he's giving them power because look at the next verse.
Whosoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them, and whosoever sins ye retain, they are retained.
He's saying, you're in the driver's seat, pal, whether these sins get forgiven or not,
because I'm sending you out to be the preacher. I'm sending you out to preach the Gospel.
I'm giving you power on earth to see these people saved. Now where does the power come from?
Look at Matthew 28. Keep your finger there in John 20.
Look at Matthew 28 and you'll see just how consistent the Bible is and how clear God makes this point.
Matthew 28, verse number 18.
And it says in Matthew 28, 18, And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying,
All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore.
He's saying, go because I have this power.
Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.
See, that's the power of God right there, the Holy Ghost.
Now look. Look at John 20 again.
Here in John 20, the disciples are indwelled by the Holy Spirit for the first time.
That's when their understanding is opened and they understand the Bible.
See, unsaved people can't understand the Bible.
They can read it all day long and Dr. Fatbottom in some university somewhere studies the Bible until he's blue in the face.
That's it, because he's not saved. He doesn't have the Holy Spirit guiding him, teaching him the Bible.
The Bible says, Ye need not that any man teach you, for the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you.
And he says, The Holy Spirit will teach you of all things.
So that's what we see in John chapter 20, but now look over at Acts chapter 1.
Just flip the page.
This is later. This is about, I believe, 43 days later.
On the day of Pentecost.
They've already been indwelled by the Holy Spirit back in John 20.
They've already had their understanding opened so that they could understand the Bible.
They already had the Holy Spirit living inside of them, but it says in verse number 4 of Acts 1,
And being assembled together with them commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem,
but wait for the promise of the Father, which saith he, Ye have heard of me.
For John truly baptized with water, but ye should be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.
So he's saying the Holy Ghost is going to come upon you.
Now, what does the word baptism mean?
The word baptism means immersion. That's what it means.
When we baptize people, we immerse them under water.
Now, there's a false doctrine called the universal church.
And in this false doctrine, people teach that when you get saved, you are immediately baptized by the Holy Spirit.
And you're part of the church.
You know, this universal where everybody's a part.
Everybody who's saved is part of the church.
Now, look, that's not true.
We've learned many other times that church means congregation.
It's a congregation of people.
Am I congregated with some believer over in the Philippines?
No.
There's no universal church.
That's a false doctrine to try to get everybody who believes on Jesus unified and yoked up together into one big church.
The word Catholic means universal.
The Catholic church, the universal church.
And so this doctrine of being baptized by the Holy Spirit upon salvation is a false doctrine.
It's just not true.
Because what God is saying here, you have to take the Bible literally.
He says you're going to be baptized by the Holy Ghost.
Well, look what happens in the story.
It says in verse number, let's see, I'm going to go down to where it actually happens in chapter number 2.
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind.
And it filled all the house where they were sitting.
You see that?
And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire.
And it sat upon each of them.
Now is a pawn on the outside or on the inside?
On the outside, it's upon them.
And it says, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost.
And began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.
We read down into verse 9, 10, and 11 and God lists 17 concrete foreign languages that they were speaking.
They weren't jabbering and falling out and everything like that.
Here's the point.
Bear with me in this because I'm trying to paint a picture for you here.
In the book of Acts, chapter 2, they were baptized with the Holy Ghost literally.
Because it says that the Holy Ghost filled the room where they were.
They were immersed in the Holy Spirit.
They were surrounded by the Holy Spirit.
The result was the Holy Ghost being upon them.
Now they already had the Holy Ghost indwelling them.
Now they have the Holy Spirit upon them.
And he says that's the power that you need to win souls.
That's the power you need before you're going to go ye therefore and teach all nations.
Baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost.
He says you must have the power of the Holy Ghost upon you.
Now remember back to the Old Testament.
Think about men like Samson.
The Spirit of the Lord came upon him.
And the Spirit of the Lord was upon him.
Think about King David. He was anointed with the oil by Samuel.
And it says that the Holy Ghost came upon him.
Think about Saul.
When Saul met Samuel and Samuel prophesied, he said you're going to meet three men.
He said they're going to give you three loaves and a bottle of wine.
And he says when you meet them, he says God is going to give you another heart.
And he's going to make you into another man.
And he says the Holy Spirit is going to come upon you.
And you're going to prophesy. You're going to preach.
And what happened? Saul came down.
He meets these three men. He gets the three loaves.
Which is the exact same three loaves that you can read about in Luke chapter 11.
When it talks about asking our friend the Holy Spirit for three loaves.
But you'll see those same three loaves.
And he asks them. He gets the three loaves. He gets the bottle of wine.
And the Holy Ghost comes upon him.
And he becomes another man. He starts preaching.
And he prophesies.
And they say that Saul also among the prophets.
Now look. You'll remember later on when he disobeys God twice in two major ways.
And made excuses about it.
The Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul.
Okay. Did he lose his salvation? No.
Because the Bible very clearly records that Saul went to heaven.
He committed suicide and went straight to heaven according to the Bible.
Because he went and Samuel literally appeared.
And don't tell me it wasn't really Samuel because the Bible says it was Samuel.
It says, and Samuel said.
And I think the narrator of the Bible knows whether it's really Samuel or not.
And Samuel said, tomorrow you and your son are going to be with me.
Now where's Samuel? Is he burning in hell?
No. Samuel is in heaven.
He said, you're going to be with me tomorrow.
Saul.
And he said, you are going to die tomorrow.
And he ended up committing suicide. That was the way that he died and he went to heaven.
And the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul.
Back when he disobeyed God the second time.
And back when David was anointed king.
The Spirit of God left Saul.
Now look.
Was that the indwelling of the Holy Spirit? No.
Because the indwelling of the Holy Spirit did not exist according to John 7 39.
The Holy Ghost was not yet given.
He hadn't been glorified. The Comforter had not come yet.
What was that that left Saul?
What left Saul was the same thing that can leave me, it can leave you, or maybe we don't even have it.
That's the Holy Ghost upon you.
That's where you have the power of the Holy Ghost.
See, the Holy Spirit indwells every believer.
There's no one who's saved who doesn't have the Holy Spirit living inside of them.
And they can understand the Bible.
But does that mean that they've received the power from God?
Now, let me prove it to you from the Bible.
Look at Luke chapter 11.
You say, well, that's wrong doctrine.
Okay, well, let's see what the Bible says.
You see, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
And if the Holy Ghost came upon preachers in the Old Testament,
if the Holy Ghost came upon people in the Old Testament and gave them power to fight,
gave them power to preach, gave them power to do God's work,
then the Holy Ghost comes upon people now.
We just have added to that.
See, God didn't replace the Holy Ghost upon you with His Spirit shall be in you,
it says in John 14.
He didn't replace it.
He added the Holy Spirit in you.
You can sell out the Holy Ghost upon you.
Look at Luke chapter 11, and I'll show you.
In Luke chapter 11, verse 13.
If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children,
how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?
He says, if God's children ask Him, He will give them the Holy Spirit.
Now, look, they already have the Holy Spirit inside of them.
But what we're talking about now is the power.
Now, I'll look at one last verse, and I'm going to preach to you now.
Look at one last verse, 2 Timothy chapter 3.
I have to teach this to you before I can really preach the sermon
because I want you to understand this doctrine,
that every believer is indwelled by the Holy Spirit.
That's why every believer does not need anybody to interpret the Bible for them.
They can pick up the Bible for themself.
I don't care who they are. I don't care if they got saved yesterday.
They can pick up the Bible for themself, read the Bible, and understand it.
Now, they're not going to understand everything. I don't understand everything.
But the Holy Spirit will teach them what they need to know each day as they read that thing.
And the Holy Spirit will teach them because He indwells them.
But does that mean that every soul winner has the power of God upon them as we preached a few weeks back?
Does that mean that they have the Holy Ghost upon them?
No, it doesn't mean that at all.
Look at verse 1 of chapter 3 here.
This is the day we're living in. Let's read about 2006, shall we?
This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come.
For men shall be lovers of their own selves,
covetous, boasters, proud blasphemers, disobedient to parents.
Think about the lack of respect for authority in the day we live in.
Authority is almost nonexistent. Think about the blasphemers.
Think about the Da Vinci Code and this filthy garbage they come up with.
Think about the covetous. It's all about everything.
Everybody's just money, money, money, even preachers.
Disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection,
truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent.
It means they can't control their body. They can't contain themself.
Fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded,
lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, and here we go,
having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof.
You see that? Having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof.
I'm telling you tonight that I'm sick and tired of this powerless, lame,
limp-wristed, weak Christianity that doesn't have the power of God.
Now look at this verse number 3, 5, and then it says,
For of this sort are there which creep into houses and lead captive silly women laden with sins,
led away with divers lust. Look what they're spending their time doing,
these powerless preachers, these powerless Christians, these powerless soul winners
who deny the power of God. Look what they do.
Ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.
You know, they sit around, they go to their Bible study, they go to their church,
and they're learning and learning and learning and learning, but there's no power there.
They don't have power.
Look, I'm not interested in a Christianity, in a godliness that has no power.
When I get on my knees and pray for something, I expect God to do something.
I don't just pray and chant some little rosary and go through little beads or something.
Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.
And would you please help Uncle So-and-so to get saved?
And would you please pray for all the missionaries? Amen.
That is not prayer. Prayer is where you get on your knees and you ask God to do something,
and there's power with God.
Look, if I thought I didn't have any power with God to get my prayers answered,
you think I'm going to waste my time praying?
I could go out and make money. I could go out and read the Bible.
I could go out and do something worthy of my time.
I want to pray with power.
Do you think I want to go out and knock doors in the flesh?
Let me tell you something.
If I go out and knock doors and the Holy Ghost is not upon me,
if I go out and knock doors and I don't have God's power with me, nobody's getting saved.
Jesus said, without me, you can do nothing.
He says, I am the true vine. You're the branches.
He says, if you abide in me, you'll bring forth fruit.
He says, without me, you can't do nothing.
You must be abiding in me. You must have my power upon you.
He says, don't even waste your time unless you've got God's power.
You say, how do I get God's power?
Here's what I'm going to do.
I'm going to sit around and I'm going to wait until I know I have God's power.
I'm not going to go soul winning until I have God's power.
Part of the way that you get the power is by going.
He said in...
I'm slipping my mind right now.
I'm trying to remember.
I had a scripture on that, but just believe me, it's true.
What was the verse that says that?
Oh yeah, here we go, back in Matthew.
That's what I was thinking of.
Matthew chapter 10.
Here's the 12 men that have already decided to follow him.
And he said to them, if you follow me, I will make you fishers of men.
Not maybe.
He says, everybody who follows me ends up being a soul winner.
He says, if you follow me, I will make you to become fishers of men.
So here they are.
They followed him.
12 people took him up and said, yes, we will follow you, Jesus.
We're not going to make excuses like those other two guys in chapter 8.
He says, we will follow you.
And then Jesus says, okay, you guys going to follow me?
You guys want to go soul winning?
Yep, we're going to go soul winning.
They show up for soul winning time in chapter 10.
Here they are.
He says, when he had called unto him, he said, he didn't go to them.
He said, come here.
It's soul winning time.
Who wants to come?
Who's going to follow me?
Who wants to be a fisher of men?
12 people show up.
See, 5,000 people showed up for church.
12 people showed up for soul winning.
And these 12 people show up, and then that's when he gave them power.
He didn't give them power until they came, did he?
Not until they.
Okay, did he give the 5,000 power?
No.
Did he give all these other people power?
No.
Later, their 70 soul winners shows up.
He gives them all power.
He says, I give power to those who want to preach the gospel because that's what the power of God is for.
He says, otherwise you don't need the power of God.
You've got the indwelling spirit.
You can understand the Bible by yourself.
You don't need the power of God for that.
You don't need the power of God to sing a song and to do all this stuff.
He says, you need the Holy Spirit's power.
All power is given unto me.
Go ye therefore and teach all nations.
He says, but ye shall receive power.
And here's, I didn't even read this, but here's the key verse, Acts 1-8.
But ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you.
Again, the external, where the Holy Ghost is upon you.
But you shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you and you shall be witnesses unto me,
both in Jerusalem and in Judea and in all Judea and in Samaria and unto the othermost part of the earth.
He says, I'm going to give you power to be a soul winner.
Listen, my friend, soul winning is not me going out and spinning my wheels
and knocking a bunch of doors and handing out all the literature like some kind of a vacuum cleaner salesman.
This is a spiritual work.
And I'm going to tell you something.
A lot of people question, are all these people really getting saved?
Well, I can tell you about one that had some evidence that we just wanted the Lord a couple of weeks ago.
Virginia's son, he's reading his Bible every day.
Is that good enough, scoffers?
Is that good enough, critics?
It's probably not good enough for some people because unless people get saved, baptized, joined the church
and dressed right the next day, they must not be saved.
No, if they believe on Jesus Christ, they're saved.
And people say, are all these people getting saved?
Well, I'll be honest with you, I'm sure that not all of them are.
I'll guarantee you that there are people that we talk to, that we give the Gospel to,
and we preach to them and they pray a prayer and they did not believe on Jesus.
They were just, you know, just going along with the show.
But let me tell you something.
When I go out soul-wanting, I'm going soul-wanting by faith.
Now, do you think that God is just up in heaven laughing at me,
watching me go around and pray with a bunch of people that don't really get saved?
I mean, isn't that stupid? I mean, think about it.
I mean, here I am, I'm fasting, I'm skipping meals, I'm on my face begging God,
Oh God, give me power! Oh God, give me power!
No, wait a minute, people, I cried!
Where is the Lord God of Elijah?
I want God's power!
And then I go, I knock doors, so I can just be putting on some kind of show or something.
Now, man, I pray for God's power on somebody's front lawn,
and I march through the door, and I want them to cry!
Woo!
And God's thinking, they didn't even get saved.
And what kind of stupid thing is that?
It's maybe how God answers my other prayers, but I guess he didn't answer that prayer.
He just sent me out to go around chanting with a bunch of people.
That's stupid.
And you know what? Yes, there are terrors among the weak.
Yes, there are people who don't really get saved.
Yes, there are liars and fakes and fogs, but you know what, my friend?
I just believe by faith that God has given me power.
And if God has given me power, and I say,
The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord.
In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.
And every time I get out of my car to go soul winning, I quote the same verse.
Whenever I go by myself and I go with other people, I don't do this.
But when I get out of the car by myself, every time I go soul winning,
which most of the time I go soul winning by myself,
I open the door, I shut the door, and I say,
But we have this treasure on earth and vessels,
that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us.
See, I'm acknowledging God. I'm saying, God, you have the power.
All power is given unto you, and I'm just doing the go.
And so when I acknowledge God, in all thy ways acknowledge him,
and he shall direct thy paths.
And so I stand at the four corners of the crossroads there,
and I can go this way, or I can go this way,
or I can go this way, or I can go this way, and I say,
God, you have the power, and God leads me to go the right way,
and God leads me to the person that I'm going to win to Christ.
He doesn't lead me to some joke. He doesn't lead me to some phony thing.
He leads me to win people to Christ. That's power.
That's the power of God, my friend.
And you say, well, I don't feel like I have power.
I pray, and it's like, hello? Is anybody out there?
That's the way my prayer life feels.
You want to get some power? Go soul winning. Be a soul winner.
You'll get power. God will give you his power. Why?
Because he doesn't want you going out there on your own.
He doesn't want you going out spinning your wheels.
He doesn't want you going out to some joke.
One, two, three, repeat after me.
Oh, just pray this prayer, and you'll go to heaven.
Ask Jesus to come into your heart and ask him to be a part of your life.
No, he says, look, don't go soul winning with some stinking little ABC repeat after me.
He says if you go soul winning, you must have power.
So since you have taken the step to be a follower of Jesus Christ,
let me undo you with power from on high so that you can have the power of God to be a soul winner.
You see, part of the reason why we live in a day of powerless Christianity,
part of the reason why the average independent fundamental Baptist church, the spirit of the Lord, has departed,
and I'm not talking about from the salvation of the individual.
I'm talking about in the sense of Saul where God's spirit has left and the church is dead as a doornail.
Part of the reason why, well, the answer is in 2 Timothy 3 right here, this list.
I think it could be summed up in one word, though, because there's a big list of reasons why.
Here's the word unholy. See, he's the Holy Spirit.
You live an unholy life. His power won't be there.
But anyway, the pizza's here. Let's pray.
Dear Jesus, thank you so much for power.