Well, it's nice to go to a church where people know the Bible, and I enjoyed talking with Dan and some of his cohorts that he's been training here a little by little. I had a chance to meet with some of them last night, and anyway, for the privilege of talking with Jay and Darrell and Dan, and you know three of his disciples here, almost like Peter James and John. Anyway, after everybody left last night, I got all three of them together and I asked them, I said, you know your Bible, and so yeah, we know the Bible, Dan's and taught us the Bible. So I asked Jay, I said, Jay, I said, what do you like best, Old Testament, New Testament? You know, I like it all. has taught us the New Testament, the Old Testament Hebrew and the Greek. So we're great. I said, we'll tell him to tell me a little bit about something in the Bible. He said, well, what do you want to know? He said, I know the Bible. I said, well, tell me the story of the good Samaritan. He said, all right, I'm going to do that. So he got up and sat near watching also. He says, there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, who went down to Jericho by night, along Stony ground, and the thorns came up and choked him half the death. He said, what shall I do? So I shall arrive and go to my father's house. So he arose and climbed up into a second more tree to see what he could see. The next day Solomon and his wife Gamora came by, and they carried him down to the yard for Moses to take care of him. As he was going through the eastern gate of the yard, his hair got caught in the land. Many hung there, 40 days and 40 nights. And afterwards he was hungry, and the ravens came and said, I was really impressed with James. As he go on, James, tell me some more. They said, well, the next day, the three wise men came by, and they carried them down the Ninevah. And when they were going into the streets of Ninevah, they called Delilah, sitting up on the wall. They said, chuck her down, boys. So how many times were we chuck her down? Seven times? He says, no. Seven times seven. So, four hundred and ninety times, they chucked her down, and she burst the sunder into And they gathered 12 baskets full of the fragments that remained. And in the resurrection, who's wife will she be? I was really impressed. And that's when Darryl and Dan spoke up and says, we know he's young, but he really knows his father. So I do want to say I'm thankful to meet some of the people here that really know their father. But Dan is caught in real well on lines, you know. But, you know, that says a lot of your dust about the way some people get the battle all mixed up. Just get it really all mixed up. Well, take your Bible and turn to the book of 2 Corinthians in chapter 4. I want to tell you why I refuse to quit. You see, everyone of God's children was served the Lord with all their heart, all their life if they just wouldn't quit. causes people just to quit. Now see, one through trusted crisis you're saved, you're having eternal life. You're going to have them when you die. But we're not there yet. There's a lot of things God wants us to do with our life. So in 2nd Corinthians in chapter 4 and verse 1, the apostle Paul is speaking, so therefore sin we have this ministry as we have received mercy, he says, we fain't not. What he means is as soon we have a ministry that God given to us like this, we don't quit. We don't quit. He says in verse three, if our gospel is hit, it's hit to them that are lost. And they'll never hear it if we quit. Now in verse seven, we have this treasure in urban vessels. What treasure? The knowledge of how to have eternal life. that the excellence you have the power may be of God and not of us. Now the devil will be with any can in your life to give you the quest. Well Paul says in verse 8, we are tremble on every side, but we didn't quit. He says we're perplexed, but we didn't quit. We're persecuted, but we didn't quit. Cast down, but we didn't quit. This is the reason we didn't quit is because if we quit, there's lost people that will never hear the message. That's why we can't quit. There has to be something on the inside of you that's stronger than anything on the outside. Something that motivates you to continue serving the Lord and doing right and being faithful when it seems like everybody else just wants to kind of drag their feet and not be involved and just play Christianity. Majority of Christians are not truly dedicated to the Lord. Luke was in verse 16, but which cause, the cause, we think not, we don't quit. He says, though our outward man perish, because the older we get, you'll find that out. Yet the inward man is renewed day by day. In verse, we put our light affliction, which is but for a moment. Now this light affliction, but for a moment, talks about everything you could possibly face in your lifetime. Whatever it is you can face in your lifetime, it's only for a moment and it's a light affliction. And he says, that's no reason to quit. God left this here and gave us all the tools we need to be found safeful. Moreover it is required and assured that a man be found safeful. verse 18 tells you the reason why we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal and that's what you look at that will cause you to quit. But if you look at the things that are eternal you won't quit. Now take your Bible looking chapter 11, chapter 11. Now remember if you want a good you of what it's like for the Christian life. Many people think the Christian life is supposed to be all of better roses. It is a warfare, it's a battle. Now you and I will never come close in our lifetime of having to face and go through the things the apostle Paul went through. The Paul says, having this mystery I beused to quit. When you talk about think, what happens when you think you pass out You ain't good in nobody when you think. Even in the book of Hebrews in chapter 12, it makes the statement. He says, faint not when thou art rebuke. It means just because God has to rebuke you until you know on something, don't mean you have to quit. Don't quit just because you didn't get your own way. We heard that last night. Just because you don't get your own way, and God doesn't answer all of your prayers the way you think that He should have. or everything didn't happen in your life, like you think you should have don't quit serving God. God hasn't done anything wrong to you. Has God done anything wrong to you or to me? No. Now people will, yes they will, but don't bring God for what people do. Now notice what he says here in 2nd Corinthians in chapter 11, and you'll notice there in verse 23. He says, Are they ministers of Christ? I think of the fold. I am more. And labor's more abundant, but I didn't quit. And stripes above measure. But I didn't quit. In prison's more frequent. But I didn't quit. Death off. But I didn't quit. Of the Jews five times received I 40 stripes, say one. No worse. He got beat five times with a cat and nine what happened to Christ happened to him five times. And that means a cat of nine tales that had little pieces of broken pieces of glass or metal in them and it was put into their back and then rift it across their back and then rip them open. And he said, I had that happened me five times but I didn't quit. How many of us in this room have had that happen to us? One time. We've never even had nobody fucking stone us. Only thing that happens to us is somebody it's mad at us. And we don't witness to some people because we're afraid of being offended. They might have, well I don't want to offend them. You don't want to worry about offended them. You don't want to be offended. And because of fear, fear of what somebody will say or do. The Apostle Paul says, look what happened to me. And I didn't quit. In verse 25, Christ, what I beaten with Rodge, and that doesn't mean he was racing over here at the end of half of five hundred. He said, once I was stoned, that doesn't mean he was drunk. But he said, I didn't quit. Thrice, I suffered shift, but I didn't quit. Not today, I have been in the deep, but I didn't quit. Journey's often, but I didn't quit. Heralds of water, enraugers, and countrymen of heathen, city, wilderness, in the scene, false weapons, but I didn't quit. Verse 27, in weariness and painfulness, in watching's often, but I didn't quit. In hunger, and thirst and fastings off and cold and mages, but I didn't quit. Besides those things that are without that which come upon me day, they care of all the churches that I didn't quit. Who is weak and I am not weak? Who gets offended? And I don't get mad, I don't burn. These are better than quit. You see, a lot of Christians just can't… I'll always show that you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen. And some people have no business in full-time Christian work work when they cannot handle it because it's a warfare. But it is the will of God for every one of these children to serve the Lord full time. Now, you may have a full-time job, but you're still in full-time Christian work. Every Christian is in full-time Christian work. Even though you may work a job, two jobs, but even while you're there, you're still on the other end. You're in a ministry. I didn't always understand this. And often wonder why some people quit and some people didn't quit. And I was growing up, I wanted to be encouraged by people that I saw and people that I looked up to and had a little respect for, though they may not have all been the way that I would have liked to see them be. Anybody in here ever heard of a guy named Oliver B. Green? Anybody ever heard of Oliver B. Green? He used to be on a radio all over America. Evangelist Oliver B. Green out of South Carolina. Well, he used to come down to our church in 1961-62, I remember him coming there, after his Georgia. All of a big ring could scare you to death, they could get you saved and lost in the same service. And you wouldn't know when you were saved and you didn't know when you were lost, but he could so stir you that make your emotions up and just tear you up, but the guy could really hold your attention. and they could tell story after story and what did you be right there. Well, that's what I had gone to Tennessee Temple. I heard that Dr. Oliver D. Green was coming to Tennessee Temple, and he was going to be preaching at a certain church at Bernchetta, knew them. I thought, Betty, I got to go here. So I got off work a little bit earlier, and I got better than the kids, and we went to the church. But the problem was we got there a little late. The church was already packed. the choir was packed. There was no room anywhere in the church. They didn't have their condition. They had three windows on each side of the site and they were open and they were 30 deep on each side. The four year was packed and they were packed outside the front door. People were just standing because they wanted to hear Dr. Oliver V. Green. When I got there late, I told him, I've got to get in. I'll see you after the meeting. I watched how they used to do it at the Cape marked blue light special how they would use their elbows and get to a crowd. So I started and I worked my way into the back door. When I finally got into the back door, I could see that I had to see over the people and that's all I can't stand. I got to get down, I got to feel. So I finally worked my way until I got into one side of the aisle over there and the preachy got up there and introduced after all of the big green and says, I'm sorry, there's just not enough room to try to find a place to sit anywhere you can. And so everybody was trying to find a place, but there's just no places left. So we've got all of our big ring, he got a file of his chair, he walked up to the platform and when he got here, I started down the aisle. I was walking down the aisle, here I come, I was 22 years old. And everybody in the whole church stopped and watched me come down the aisle. Doctor, I'll ever be green, watch me come down the aisle. He had no idea he'd give the invitation yet. I came down the out, walked right up on the platform, walked right up there, and the only street left was the one he just stayed there. So I walked up there, and I shook, now, on the platform, usually I would have never done that. I wouldn't know, but I would sit there and watch all of these green teeth look at me, the pastor looked over at me, and then he smiled at me, and they're like, I took the man in his word, find a place in you where you can. That was the only place that had one left. I got the best sleep in the house. And I watched as he preached and how he had those microphones there and he'd put his hand right between those two microphones. I just knew he was gonna hit one on one of these hands. He was gonna hit it, but he never did hit it. And I'd watch his sweat pour off his forehead. He was hot in summer. And I mean, there was no air condition in there. But I used to think, man, I wanna do like that. I wanna be the answer someday. I had no idea how thankful it would work out in my life, but you've got to have little dreams, little visions along the way. Back in about 1980, 1981, I'd already then had to church her for about eight years. I told Betty I said, we're going to take a vacation so we got to, I had a van and got a trailer. I had three motorcycles we put on and we didn't know where it was going, but any road will do. We're just going to drive. And we grow from color when all we're down in the Texas, down to El Paso, Texas. And we're like, let's just go into Mexico. So we went across the border in the Mexico, we got in the Mexico, went over a thousand miles in old Mexico, down this decision I ever made. You were the wife and two kids, and nobody knew where we were because I'd never told them I didn't know where I was going. So we're down in Mexico. Anyway, after almost getting killed a few times, we came out down the south end of Texas, place called Far Texas, Far Texas, the AGRR, Brownsville, Mission Texas, McAllen, came up and up. I'm going to go by a place and see Dr. Lester Rolloff, anybody ever heard of Lester Rolloff? Lester Rolloff? Nobody's ever heard of Lester Rolloff. He has what they call the Rebecca Holmes, a girl's home, down in Corpus Christi, Texas. And I thought, I'm going to go see this man and see this great work. I've heard about it for years. The family altar program on the radio drove in there in the van and they had a big sign of celebrating their 60th birthday. I wanted to know what it's like to grow old. Somebody he has a quick and all these years didn't quit. Still going strong. I wanted to be encouraged. I'm now acting to be encouraged if I find out what moment they see another guy, what keeps him going. because a lot of people don't keep going. So when I grow up in there, this man walks up to the man and says, my name is Lester Rolloff. What can I do for you? And I said, Dr. Rolloff, I've heard about you for years. I'm already going things like that, but I would drop by and just see how things are going here. He says, everything's going terrible. He says, everything's messing up. He says, the state's trying to close me down. Police is calling me on the phone. They want me to take their kids here at the Rolloff homes that then they church as they won't give me no money. That's how to help take care of these kids. He says, and we don't have any water. The ladies in the earth, they can't take showers. We don't have water to cook the food with. He said, everything's messed. Everything's wrong. And so I listened to him about 15 minutes and I never got out of the van. I made a U-turn and I had it out. And I thought, now this is the giant in the face. This is one that everybody all over the nation knew about. That's the role of. Anyway, I wasn't too encouraged, so I ended up, and I was going to go by and see another guy I've heard about. His name was Dr. W.A. Chryswell. He was the president of the Seven Vagis Convention, had a big first Baptist church there in Dallas, Texas. I am going to go see what he's doing and have that man pray for me. I always wanted people to pray for me and I wanted to see how they're doing and I want they didn't quit. They're still serving the Lord. So we went there on Sunday at Wednesday night, they had a dinner for everybody. On a Wednesday night, they had a dinner for everybody. It was a Wednesday night. They had a free dinner for everybody on a Wednesday night. The church was packed because they had a dinner on Wednesday night or everybody. So anyway, we enjoyed the meal, and after we go with our told guests, I'll see you later. I've got to go see this guy. So I went to his office and the secretary says, I'm sorry, he's a very busy man. He doesn't have any time. He was 80 years old. He had a big huge ministry. I mean a huge ministry. Their offerings, that Sunday, was over $1 million. That was just their Sunday offering. And I said, man, I just wanted to have work for me. She said, hey, he's a very busy man. He doesn't have a gun. I said, man, could you just ask him? All right. So she went into his office. He's got just a minute, just a minute. He's very busy. Just then. So I went into his office. I'm young. And I walked in and he says, what can I do for you? And I introduced myself to him, told me I have to put Colorado at the time. And I had a church up there. I just got started, and next thing you know, he told me, he says a ministry is just so hard. He says, so rough. He says, I'm so tired. He says, I've got so many burdens. We've got so many problems here. We've got so many people. He says, we've got to build buildings. And we've got all this money we have to raise. so many people, he said, and he went up to my 15 minutes, telling me, ah, part of the time he's having. And then the man got out of the seat, walked around to the edge of his death and he got him his knees. He says, some, would you come over here and have a word of prayer for me, because someone went going wrong there. I went over there and I put my hand on Dr. Chris Wolf's shoulder, and I prayed for this man. Now, his gospel, I have no I don't know anything about it, all I know is that I believe the man loves the Lord that has been paid for all these years and I just wanted him to pray for me. I wanted to see these giants in the Lord and what they're having to face as they get older. But you see, everything they had to face, they didn't quit, they didn't stop just because they're having a bad day or things were rough and things were hard. You and I, if we serve in the Lord, everything's supposed to just work out real smooth. When you read about the Apostle Paul and think what he went through, that's not smooth to me. Would you like to walk in Paul's footsteps? But that's what happened to him. I always wanted to have something like that. I wanted to mention it, but I thought as I got older, things would get easier. Did you know as you get older, they don't get easier? They don't get any easier. You're still battling with everything else and then now you battle because you get an old You battle an old age The bodies start to wear them out everything starts wearing out all the parts. I Used to drive down a highway And look at those old folks sitting in a rocking chair trying to get it going and wonder Anything got anything better than dude and sitting on a rocking chair. I mean, yeah, I was young energetic man You know, now it's not so bad, it's not bad at all. I'm looking forward to it now. Did you realize that now my ministry has expanded? I used to be able to talk to my agent under. My agent under. Does I get older? My agent under. Do you have my ministry's increasing? My agent under. Now I can sit around and talk to some people about how many stars do you have? You don't get 100 stitches. I got 125 stitches. you want to see my stitches? And what's your day like? Well, I go to the doctor on this day, then I get my prescriptions on this day, and then I have to check with my medicator on this day, and then I have to go back to the doctor on this day. See, I never had to worry about that before that. They didn't want to hold the whole new world. But it don't matter, as you get older, there's problems. And one thing I want to look at whether it It was, let's roll off, it was 60 years old, or that guy who was 80 years old, it don't matter. You're going to face things, but the thing is, you don't quit serving God. I don't care how hard it gets on how many problems you have. You got problems? So what? Everybody else does, too. You know why I stopped having pity parties? Nobody would come. Everybody was having their own pity party. And I found that nobody really cares about my pity party that I wanted everybody to feel sorry for me. Don't you feel sorry for me? Just a minute, I don't feel sorry for me. Nobody knows to where I go through. Oh, shut up, they do too. They do. Get a life. Get a grip. I mean, call this true. I remember, Dr. Curtis Hudson, I was preaching with him down in South Texas, short conference and then in Tonyo. We did it about three times, and this last time he got a call from his dad is, he's Not from his dad his dad tied and he had to leave and drive home in a rainstorm all the way from Diner and standing from you Anyway, he did the funeral for his dad. He died as bone cancer for about three months before that his brother had died And Curtis had never checked himself because he was a he was a hidden image of help. I mean look happy We played golf together and he looked he looked great. He felt great didn't have a pain but his wife, Kitt, tell him, Curtis, you need to get checked. So he went down there in the Florida, decided to go to the doctor. He said, your doctor's office and the doctor tells him, says, you know, you got cancer. You got six months to live. This is Curtis Hutton, who is the editor of the Civil War that took over for John R. Rice. He says, As I said, he said, I was stunned. He told me, he says, I never thought this would happen to me. He says, my dad and my brother have a different lifestyle. He said, I served God. I love the Lord. And I have a different lifestyle and I do right. I honor him, I do everything right. He said, I don't smoke, I don't drink, I don't do anything to him, he sings well. He said, I'm asserting God. He said, I never thought it would happen to me. I went by to see him one day in Tennessee. He always told me when I come through there, it's not when we go pay him a call. We did. At this time it didn't. He was sitting on the back porch with a bowl of oatmeal about this big. Not this big, this big. And I looked over the corner and he had a big old basket full of carrots, and I thought it was for his horse. He had a couple of horses. I said, those are the horses. He says, no, they're from me. He was eating oatmeal and carrots trying to reverse what's going on in his body and doing whatever he could do because it was too late. Dr. Hayden gave him much time to live. He wanted to get another year and a half out of it. He was 58 years old when he got it. He was 60 years old and he died. He passed away. Now, I don't worry so much about why God takes a certain individual. I do wonder why he left me. Well, I'm still here, but God has left me here. me here. These are decisions that you will never understand. But just because you know the Lord and you love the Lord and you're serving God doesn't mean things are not going to happen in the life that you cannot explain. You've got no answers for. But regardless of what you do or you don't, you are to be found faithful and you're not to quit, you're not to lose hope, you're not to fail, you don't quit. Just keep serving the Lord. I want you to take your Bible and turn to the book of James in chapter one. James chapter one. That was my introductory remarks. James chapter one. Look there now in verse two. Verse two. He says, my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into diverse temptations. Know in this that the trine of your faith work at patience. When that patient have her perfect worth that you may be perfectly complete and in dire, wanting, lacking, nothing. If any of you like wisdom, let him ask of God and give it to all men liberally, and that bread it's not, he shall be given him. But let him ask in faith nothing wavered, for he that wavered is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. And let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord, because the double-minded man is unstable in all of his ways. My brethren, tell them all joy when you follow them different testings. You see, God is going to test you from every angle. When you dedicate your life to the Lord, expect God to interrupt your schedule because he's going to. It's not going to be the way you think it's going to be. You may have a plan for your life, but God has one too. And sometimes the two don't mix. So God is going to change things around. And God is going to bring things into your life. Is God free to work on you, in you, through you, in the way he wants, well, that's you complain about it? Or do you dictate to God how things have to be? Lord, if you want me to serve you, you better do this and this and this and this. Or do you take a blank piece of paper and you sign your name on it and say, Lord, you're free to fill it in any way you want. What most priests want to do is they take a blank piece of paper and they fill it in the way they want their life to be and they say, Lord, would you sign this on the bottom? They don't work that way. So God says that things happen and He does it because He wants us to learn how to pray, how to go to Him and ask Him, talk to Him. One of the best things I've ever learned how to do in my whole Christian life is learning how to talk with the Lord. Nobody can walk through light hold in your hand. There's something you have to learn how to walk with God on your own. Nobody can do it for you. Nobody can make God real to you or precious to you. the decision that you have to make. When he makes a statement here, if any of you lack wisdom, meaning and you do, let him ask them God. Wouldn't it be a shame for me to give my wife a million dollars and there's no stores? Have a big shame. And if there's a million dollars and no stores, there's no place to spend it. Wouldn't that be frustrating? That's as bad as frustrating as a ball hitting hippie. You've got to have something. You know what real frustration is is when you see your mother log one over the cliff and your new cat like you just don't know what to do. But the Bible says, why would God give you wisdom if there's no problems to solve? The only reason you need wisdom is there's something that needs to be solved. So God has he sends us problems and these problems lets us know what we're lacking in. Some things that we don't know yet. And when you think you know it all, I got no excuse for you, he ain't through it you yet, because he's going to send something down the pipe that will knock your socks off and you won't know what to do. And God will have to work on you. Now he makes the statement in James chapter 4 in verses 1, 2, 3. He said, you have not because you asked not, and then he says you asked and you received not because you asked to miss, but you can make consummative on your own lust. So he says, you have not because you asked not, just because God knows what you have made up before you asked, doesn't mean you're going to get it. You still have to ask. You be surprised how much more you could have had if you would only asked. things in your life probably didn't have to happen. It happened because you didn't ask God for something. And you could have it. You just didn't do it. And God knows that you were weak in certain areas. So he says a problem that tests the very area that you were weak just in so that you could go to him and get wisdom. The reason you come to the church and learn the word of God is because you see the preacher knows that he needs to have a, you got to have a big well. So as you come to church he's putting some water of the word water in your well. And then when you get thirsty down the road, you can always draw out some fresh water for yourself. Some Christians are so shallow, they don't have any water in the well. But you come all the time, and every time you hear the word of God, you're putting water into the well, and you put water into the well, and there's things that are going to come down the road. And you'll be surprised all the sudden verses will start coming out and reminding you, inverses, that you never thought you would remember. And the Holy Spirit brings those things to your remembrance. The water of the Word put it into your mind, and you'll be surprised what God will do for you. Now take your Bible and turn to the Book of Exodus in chapter 13. Exodus in chapter 13, learned this because it's so important. And that is always realized that Christians are on a journey. this journey is from childhood to adulthood. Whenever God took the children of Israel out of Egypt, they had a place to go. They were coming out of Egypt to the land of promise, the land of Canaan, true? Or God sent Moses, and God was going to guide Moses, and the children of Israel was to follow Moses and he was going to lead him to the promised land. So God is telling Moses where to go and you'll find out in your Christian life, going from childhood to adulthood to get there into the train lies the word of God and you'll find out there's going to be some detours, some dead ends, some draw holes, that you've got to go through to get where God wants you to go. Now, notice what it says here in the next edition chapter 13. It says chapter 13, looking for verse 17. And it came to pass when Pharaoh had left the people go, that God led them not through the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near. For God said, let's prevent the people don't repent when they see war and they return to Egypt. So did God, did God need them the shortest way? No. He says there was another way that was shorter, but God had a reason. Don't always think that you're going to find that God takes the shortest route in your life. God lets you sometimes have to take detours. And then buried rather than his photo home around, we're always having detours. I wish it would just be on one road, go straight to the place where I got, but you had to turn here, you had to turn in, and somehow there's real detours. I remember when we first got the motor home down in Florida, a friend of mine, no longer able to drive it, so he sold it to us, and I hadn't drove the motor home, hadn't even seen the motor home. And so I really didn't know what it was like, I think he outside of it one time. So I didn't wait, I'd go down here, he just became, we started to thing up and drove around the box. He says, I think you're ready. And he says, well, let me ask you this now. Let me give you a scenario. If you're driving up this hill and you come up behind an 18-wheeler and you start to pass. And I'll be holding it right even with the 18-wheeler and another one comes parallel and over the power of the hill. And there's a cliff on the left-hand side and you came back up because another 18-wheeler then pulled up behind other. He says, you came back up, you came, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? I said, I'm going to wake up, Betty. He said, what are you going to wake up, Betty, for I said, she ain't never seen a wreck like we're going to have. In your Christian life, you'd be surprised if you don't let the Lord lean, guys, you'd be struck. They ain't nobody seen a wreck like you've been fixing to have. If you ever try to push in a rope, that's the way your life becomes when you don't let the Lord lead you. It's like pushing a rope. Everything gets all tangled up. But you can get one into that rope and just start walking and that whole thing will straighten out. I've had to say, well, when I get my life straightened out, I'll get back to church to start serving God. No, no, no, no, you don't get it. You can't get your life straightened out until you get left with the Lord and serve the Lord and do right and follow the Lord. Then your life will straighten out. people never listen to me, they never learn. I remember one time I was over there in Athens, Georgia. And I wanted to go down to the Bible bookstore because I knew they had books in there that I could sit down and read and I'd take my little sack lunch and I'd sit in the corner and I'd get these novels about the missionaries and I'd sit there on the floor and I'd read these missionary books and eat my lunch It was the fastest half an hour of my life and sometimes I would forget. Sometimes I'd sit there and I'd have tears in my eyes. I'd read about missionaries who wanted to fool in countries and so forth and then I'd sit there and say, man, I want to do that. Now I wish I could do something like that, but I knew I'd dropped out of high school. I hadn't finished that school and I didn't have a high school education. I hadn't been to Bible college. I didn't know there was Bible colleges. I didn't know how God led all this stuff. I was just so confused and the guys that run the place that they have to come and get your times off, you gotta go and next day I'll be right back down there, I'll do it the same thing again, but I'd read these things and I said, and I'm dreaming, and I could see me putting in church after church after church, all over the mirror, and I'm talking about, I was only 19, 20 years old, I'd only been, say, the year, two years, but I had a vision, I've said to you, and I dream, because you've got to have a dream, you've got to have a vision. Something that you see, because my biggest problem was this. I didn't know God had a will for my life. I didn't know that. I just knew that there was something that I wanted to do for him. He's in save me, gave me eternal life on his child. I'm going to him and I wanted to do something for God. But I didn't know what to do for God. I didn't know what, I don't have no talent, no ability. What can I do? And so I got very That's one of the reasons why I wound up in the living in Thai station a year and a half after an embeddy got married. I was a gypsy before and I was still a gypsy just to remove wherever I wanted to. And I was very unkind at times for people and rude. And I came home one day and I said, the guy lied to me on the job. He promised me a tense and an outrage and didn't give it to me. I quit. You know what a white kid you don't want to do that. I did, though. I came home and put the map of the United States and laid it on the hood of the car. I said, where do you want to go? I said, let's go to California. I'm not in Florida. Just the long way. Just like that brother that lives in Louisiana, I tell people to go to Louisiana. Let's go. So that's how we made down the stations. Lot of prayer. I got in the car and took off. Now I'm out there in the 3-4 Louisiana. I couldn't find a job. One night I told Betty I said, honey, it's the more I won't have to just go over to Dallas and see if I can find something and I had enough money that we paid enough for them to have there provided we can have two weeks in the apartment. Didn't have any, didn't have any groceries, didn't have nothing. I couldn't find a job and so I said, I'm going over to the Dallas so I got in the car the next morning. They didn't, kids are mocking me. I got in the car and I cranked up the motor and I said, they're not looking at me. And I thought, man, where am I going? I don't even know where I'm going to. I don't leave my wife and kids here. Man, I felt like a dog. I felt ruined in the snake. And I said, oh Lord, you've got to find help me find something. So I turned the motor off, and I told dad, so I don't give it one more day. That day, I found the job as MLBAC turning company. And what I learned at that turning company is what got me to Bible college and paid my school bill. I learned how to do some things, and so close my life could have been so different, just with little decisions, and in one night, I was still so frustrated, I went out behind the house, and it was my baby, we were a January baby, and I laid out the air on the ground on a blanket, and I had a peak coat on, and it was dark outside, and I looked up and snow was falling on my face, and I had to have a talk with God. I didn't have anybody showing me what to do, telling me how I'm supposed to do things. I don't know what I'm supposed to do. And I laid there and I talked with God and I was so heartbroken. There's nothing wrong with my wife, nothing wrong with the kids, there's nothing wrong with the job, so that was miserable. I didn't like the idea of just getting up and going to work, coming home and watching TV, even going to bed, get up the next day day, and then day-on-day, isn't it? I just got to be more delicious, got to be more polite, but I didn't know what it was. I really don't have anything I want to live for. It's a terrible place to be. Because I lay there and pears flowing down my cheek. And I told the Lord, I said, Lord, I know that one of these days, when I'll get to heaven, I'm going to stand at the judgment of the Christ. And Lord, I said, don't you point your finger at me and say, Yankee, why didn't you do with your life, what I wanted you to do? I wanted you to do. I should look at the own reason I didn't do it because I don't know what to do. I don't know what your will is. I don't know what I'm supposed to do in my life. Remember, I wasn't raised in church. I hadn't heard it all my life. I didn't have Christian parents that taught me this. I was a hungry inside. There has to be more to life than just living for making money and supporting yourself and paying bills. What's the purpose of life? kind of the greatest prayer in your whole life there has to be a settlement in your mind where you know what is that ultimate purpose by which God wants me to live but when you nail back down and you're just going to serve the Lord with all my heart regardless of what it may be and regardless of where it may lead then you get that done and then you make all of your little decisions as it relates for that main decision. But if you don't have a goal, any road to do, anything will do. But when you want certain things in your life, only certain things can get you there. And I told the Lord, I said, Lord, I got two kids in the house, and I said, well, I speak English to them. I tell them to do this, and do this, do this, do this. And I said, may do it. I said, what can't you speak a language I can understand? I had no idea what fasting was. Didn't know what I didn't know it was in the Bible. All I know is that I didn't want to eat and I really didn't care to live. But I'd go in the house and I'd sit down and I'd read the Bible just trying to flip through it. And all of a sudden I came across the 19th song and says, How of all shall a young man cleans his way by taking heed according to thy word? The entrance of thy word give us light. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet in the light unto my statue. So I found out it is the will of God to know the word of God so you can know the will of God. I've got on to the rescue mission there in Sri Gauravid Ganon and I would hope that somebody wouldn't show up so I get a chance to talk and once in a while that happened. In the man to rescue mission he told me he says you need to go to Bible College. I said I didn't know that we're Bible colleges. He says yeah they've got I said, where? He says, Tennessee Temple, Chattanooga, Tennessee. I says, all right, I'll go. That's how I made my seat. I went home to Old Betty, called her for bad. So as I'm bringing Betty and the kids by, they're going to stay with you for a while. I'm going to Tennessee Temple and Chattanooga. But he doesn't mind that he gets to get to. I left with $35 from 34 Louisiana. By the time I got ready to go on my own up there to Chattanooga, by myself. I had $15 left in my pocket. No job. I went up there and it was on a Wednesday night, Holland Park Baptist Church, Dr. Lee Robertson, president of the school. There are a lot of people there on the Wednesday night, and after the service was over with, I walked up, and Dr. Lee Roberts was standing up there at the podium, and I'm standing the way down here. And I looked up at him. I said, my name is Yankee Yarmer and I told him to come here, that I come here to go to Bible College, and they said that you might have a place I could stay. They told me that they had their own rescue mission, so I went to the rescue mission and I stayed there with the drunks and the wine nose off the street and I stayed there for about three months. And a lot of nights I went to bed crying because I had no, I could not see the future. I put everything was so dark, it was so bright. I couldn't see anything out there, I couldn't see where it was all leading to. And so I would wonder how God is going to work things out. You know what I was doing? I was learning how to walk with the Lord. It got so dark. Faith is born in despair. And buddy, I was in such despair that I didn't see any way how God was going to get me out of the mess that I always seemed to get myself into. And so one night they had a guy got a third and sung a song. It was called the Haven of Rest. We sung it the other night. The Haven of Rest. That's why we sung that song. Because I still remember that song after all these years. That was back in 1964. And so I heard and sing that song. And it was the first time I've ever heard it. The Haven of Rest is my ruin. And I sit back there with those drunks and rhinos and off the street, and I cried tears just to running. I didn't have another young man, my age, that wanted to do what I was doing. It's great when you've got somebody you can go through with somebody else that are the same age and you can share those in. But I didn't have that. And I didn't know what was going to happen. My wife and kids in another state, here I am, I don't have a job and I'm living in a rescue mission. And then I came by shining Monday and it said, the will of God will not lead you, was the grace of God cannot keep you. Is there a trust in God? The will of God will not lead you, was the grace of God cannot keep you. Of course, I was questioning whether or not God will lead me anything. I really didn't know. I was just doing the best I could with the nails that I had. Little bit, I understand that it would be long before I went to Florida. Florida Bible College, I didn't go to Miami, Florida. When I got down there, and I decided to go to Boba College, the Florida Boba College, I finished summer school at Tennessee Temple, and I had an heck of a pen to cite us, lost my job. Two kids got sick with barnacle pneumonia. Why have I been to hospital for two weeks? Had no hospitalization, no job, no money. And then it was in the first semester and I had no money to pay my school bill. I went outside and Betty had a clothesline outside the house there, and I hung my hands on both of those clotheslines, and I looked up into the starry sky and I talked to God. I had lessons on how to pray, but you know, I was getting lessons on how to pray. You see, you don't really learn to pray, but as I lay me down to sleep, I pray to Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray to Lord my soul to take. A man, John, then shot a roof to kill the hand. Chicken Dad, fruits to cry. Ain't you satisfied? That ain't going to cut it. I went out here and I talked to the Lord and I cried. And I said, Lord, my kids are going to be well soon. And I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know how long I'll pay the school bill. And I said, Lord, I'll never stand in a pulpit and tell anybody to feel ever meet their needs if you can't meet mine. If you're not going to build for me, then I'm not going to tell anybody you're doing. I said, your reputation is at stake. I said, your testimony is on the line. I never thought mine was. I was just trying to remind God, just trying to remind. And I find that, man, I should never play some of the things that I played. But it was too late. I mean, I didn't know any better. I was just hurting. And I hated to go and get my kids. Because I didn't know how I was going to tell the man. I didn't have the money. And I thought, Lord, I don't want him to know that I go to Bible college. You know what? Because I was ashamed. I was ashamed to walk in there and face the guy and I can't pay my school bill and I'm certain God. I beg God to create the heavens of the earth and it has a cattle in the thousand heels and I thought, why can't you sell some of those cattle? But I went down to the hospital to get the kids and I walked into the office and the man who looked at me, the first thing out of his mouth, you go to that Bible college down the road, don't you? I thought, who told? I never knew who told. I don't know how to work here. I never told anybody. I never told him. And he looked at me and he says, we need blood. Most of us need blood. He said, we know that it's hard for young guys to go to a bottle of school and wipe in two kids. He says, do you think it's possible that those students at the Bible College would be willing to donate a pint of blood and will knock off $25 on your school bill for every pint's blood we get? I said, how much do I owe $10,000? So I knew at least 40 people would go down there. I said, can I use your phone? I called Dr. Sanford for his office. Dr. Sanford was just about to go in to chapel. And I told Dr. Sanford what was going on. He says, consider it done. They'll be down there. And so I told the man, and I said, they'll be down here to do it. And he said, man, we're so thankful. I thought God had failed me. that he hadn't hailed me. There's always in the nick of time, his nick of time. I wish I could retract how I thought when I was after hanging on that clothesline and how I thought God you'd fail me. You let me down. And I'm so ashamed to go see that man. See, God is always working behind the scenes. And he does things that you and I don't always understand how things are going to work. Take your Bible look there in chapter 14. It says in verse 3, for Pharaoh will say of the children of Israel, they are entangled in the land. The wilderness has shut them in. Who was leading them? God. What did he lead them into? A dead end. Didn't God know he was leading them into a dead end? Yes, he knew that. He knew there was a death red sea as Pharaoh's army come in behind them and yet God led them there. Well, what was they supposed to do? Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. Just just trust the Lord. See what He wants to do. And it says, Diner in verse 13, and Moses said unto the people, here you not stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show to you this day for the Egyptians whom you have seen today. You will see them again no more forever. The Lord shall fight for you and you shall hold your peace. In the last part of verse 50 says that they go forward. You see a bullback usually is running full steam as fast as he can, and that quarterback will take a throw-run and put that ball right in his gut, and he's running as fast as he can before there's a hole made. If he waits until he sees the hole, there won't be no hole. He has to run, trust in his line that's going to make a way so he can split between us. You and I are supposed to run the race, believing that our Heavenly Father is going to make a way when we don't see how he's going to make a way. That's when you're living by faith. Trusting God. You see, the devil is going to do everything he can to hit you to quit. Quit serving God. Quit church. Let little things happen. Just make a mountain out of a mobile. You know what a mountain? They don't get between a mountain and a mowhill, more dirt, all of this. The god has a way. Look there next to this in chapter 15. It's in chapter 15, look at verse 22. So Moses brought Israel from the red sea and they went out into the wilderness of sure. And they went three days and the wilderness found no water. Who led them there? God did. God led them through detours and dead ends and draw holes. There's been times in my ministry where it seems like I had had an abundance of hardest. I mean just a lot of people trust in Christ's Savior. And I've also had time when it seems like there's a drought. I'm just as faithful, Christ the God will just as much, try just as hard, do everything right that I know to do, but some things you can't may happen. But you just stay faithful. We just keep serving the Lord. But don't quit. Don't quit. Just don't stop serving God. Don't get mad at God, and then in verse 23, when they get fine, what is the water's word bitter? So in verse 24, the people murmured against Moses, and what shall we drink? And they cried unto the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree. When he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet. There he made for them, they stabbed the nutrients, and there he proved them, he touched them. All of our trials were better until you put the tree, Christ and the midst of it. Did you know if you take everything in your hands and put them in the God's hands, it won't be lovely for you to see God's hands and everything that you have? Some people never see God's hands in their life because they never put anything they have in the his own hands. Learn to walk with God and trust the Lord. That will surprise you and do more for you and your Christian life than anything else in the world, and Christ ought to be more real to you than the clothes you have on your back. Nobody can make God real to you. Nobody can make him precious to you. Nobody else can make you want to study the Bible. Nobody can make you want to witness all that comes because that's a result of you loving God. If you love him and you want to serve him, then all these other things will take care of themselves and it will work. But sometimes it seems like in your Christian life that God turned out all the lights, lost all the doors, closed all the windows, and four walls are moving in on you, and it seems like the salin is brass. You ain't been there yet. You will be. There will be times when you don't know what you're going to do about your kids, or the grandkids, or your job, or your help. living in a society where there's so many unknown things that can change so quickly. Your situation today can be drastically changed tomorrow and you don't know what you're going to do. What are you doing? You don't know what to do. Maybe you just have to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord and see what God's going to open up for you. And these people, when it seems like everything's just a dry hole, seem like it's there and no fruit, nothing happening, and God will come through just be found, safe, from trust in the Lord. Let me give you this for I close. I had a man that lived in Georgia. When I told Betty, Dad, that I was going to go to Bobba College, he took me out to see a man. The name was Mr. Massey. Mr. Massey was an old farmer. He was a tall man. He was a big man. He must have milked cows from the time was three years old. His hands were huge and he had big hands. I mean whenever you do what you know he does and milked themselves. Well I'm talking about he gripped my hand and liked to crush every bone in my hand and he was an old man that his dad took me out there to see him. Oh, run down house. We walked in there and my father-in-law looked at him and says, Mr. Massey, this is Yankee, he wants to go to Bible college. And I was scared to death to go into Bible college. I pictured myself in a little attic. I candlelighted for books from the floor, always to the ceiling, all of the room, And I could see me sweating it out, you know, in the late hours of the night. I don't know why it was kind of light. I stayed out at pictures of Abraham Lincoln. I don't know what it was. And I was going back in time, and I thought, how am I ever going to do this? And I wanted somebody to pray for me. But I was scared to go to Boba College. I didn't have a job. I don't have too many things. And so he says, Yankee wants to go to Boba College. And I just want you to pray for him. People will not talk and let's get it done. And I'm standing there in the living room. And he got down on his knees in Mr. Jackson, that he's dead. He got down his knees and I'm still standing there. Next thing I know is, oh God, what's this young man? And I had my head done. I didn't pray. I didn't pray. I was listening. I've never heard nobody play like this in my life, but bless this young man And he sounded like he's talking to God it sounded so real I was scared open my eyes. I thought I'd see God He prayed for at least half an hour, so I mean he prayed. He's serious. I've never heard nobody pray like that man When he got through and he says in Jesus name man And when I got up I could have walked into the dim of lions with Daniel. Nothing hard, man. I am invincible. Nothing could stop. That name didn't pray for me. I mean God is on my side. Well I walk out there, I was on cloud nine. After about six months I call my father. I'm sure I need to go see Mr. mass again. And I did. I went to go see him again all the way from Florida, went up there and said, I had to go see him again. You'd be surprised just because somebody can get along with the Lord, and it's just not, you know, some great big man. I was in Florida there and I had, I don't remember where David was, but trying to stand behind the street, they didn't that seat belt like that. Should always stand behind from the seats, you look like you're in the room. I'm driving, she's been running, but they're right. And so, I'm driving, all of it, you just start to flutter. Just rain and so bad. And I'm driving behind some car. I can't see, I can't see, I got the wipers on, so I can't see. They're going, they do it, don't do them, they're going. I said, I can't see, I can't see. And I didn't know there's a, I parked the car, is it funny, I can't see. I don't know whether they're slow down, or if somebody gets me from the, I didn't know what to do. I wonder what I'm going to do, huh, in the little train of Stenky Hannes, is that why don't you ask God to stop it from raining? I ain't walking into that one. So as I ask the Lord to stop it from raining, they don't stop raining. Now, how's that name healer? I'll swallow that. You pray. But she says, Lord, stop it from raining in Jesus' name. Amen, and stop it. Not another drop of the windshield. She expected it. She expected it. Little child, I think. He said, I don't work that way. Let me take you this. I was in Minnesota. My son Eddie, now about 19 years old, big, little young to the man. But we're up in Minnesota and they were talking about all the bears that they killed. Fair hunting. One guy didn't kill the 150 bear. That was the test time. Since then he didn't kill another hunter. And so Eddie said, and he says, daddy, God wants me to see a bear. And they kept talking about him and daddy. God wants me to see a bear than I. Here he is. And I says, can you now take this to a place where there might be a bear? So we can check that. We're in the dumps. So we got in the back seat and there's a couple they took this down the road. Went into this dump and then they put on the right lights and see if they could see some bears into the trash. They garbage all the dumpsters. No bear. I said there's no no bears here tonight. It is. God wants me to see a bear tonight. I said there's another dump. And they said about 20 miles away. 20 miles. You don't mind or you? No. So they grow, is it dying time? This is after the service at night. It's like getting through the night and knowing I'm tired, and wearing a worn, and driving another 20 miles. Turn on the lights. I look ahead, and I say, there's no bears tonight. Not no bears tonight. God wants me to see a bear tonight. So we started back home down the road. I held him in the lap, and they turned over, look at me. God wants me to see a bear tonight. All of a sudden, the guy driving the car, Jim Paget, slammed on the brake gun. So there's a bear! And right in some of us, right in some of our headlights, was the bear going down the road. And he jumped up and he looked so, and looked out to the windshield and he seized the bear. He got big smiles in the safe. And then the bear turned to the right, went up a little hill, went into the woods. He looked at me and said, I told you God wanted me to see a bear tonight. I'm 66 and a half years old. It's never happened before, it's never happened since. I drove all over those Minnesota roads. I would just up there for a month, never show up there. But that night I did. You say, God doesn't do that. You don't know everything God can do. God delights in child life faith. Just for us to trust Him. You'll never see God get you out of anything. If you don't let God get you into anything. So sometimes He's going to put you on a teethor or a dead end or a jojo. But that's only because you're on your goal to get where you're going. So your main prayer has to always nail down what's your goal in life. What's your purpose for living? And then there's points in time, God will bring things into your life that will make you really pray. You see, there's the natural everyday prayer we ask for God's blessings and protection and those things like that, which is great. But there has to come a few calamities along the way that you didn't plan on to drive you through your knees, to pull the rug after Monday. so that you can see that God is a God of provision only because you become a child of need. God knows what He's doing. Trust your Heavenly Father. Love Him with all your heart. Now, if you're here tonight and you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, you're as lost as a homebower when the end of a soup bone. You're not going to heaven when you die. That can all be changed. All that you have to do, look up here, you've never seen this before. Learn how to do this. This is you and me, this is sin. We all have sin on us. God says that He loves us. He hates our sin. And because we've sinned it, we're all condemned. And the pain of this eternal separation from God in a place called hell. God doesn't want us to go to hell. He wants us to go to heaven. To go to heaven, we have to be perfect as righteous as God and nobody's perfect. Nobody's good enough to go to heaven on them. God says, because of sin, we can't get in. So no man can save himself, it's impossible. This in represents Jesus Christ, he's the Lord, he's God in the flesh, came into the world because he loves us. He hates our sin because it separates us from them. who had no sins and half to die. He took our sins and he died for us. It came back from the dead. The payment for sins already been made, but this payment is not put to your account until you believe he did it for you. In the very day, the very moment, you believe that he did this for you, that he paid for your sins, he puts this payment to your account and you go to heaven because you pay for all of your sins. They're all paid. See, the law can't touch you because it can't condemn a death man. When Christ died and you accept his death as your death, then you died. So as far as the law is concerned, you met the demands of the law. You paid the death in full. Of course, Christ did it for you. But God sees as you paid it. And you get to go to heaven because of what Christ did. And he says, you'll never be condemned anymore. No condemnation to those that are in Christ. snooze in all over the world. You see, if I offered you my Bible and you accepted, what would you have? If I offered you my tie and you accepted, what would you have? When would you have the tie? What would you accept it is? If I offered you my wallet and you accepted what would you have? If Christ walked in here right now and offered you eternal life and And you accepted what would you have, eternal life. Now, if it's eternal life, how long would it last? Well, if it lasts forever and all you send your pain, where would you go when you die? So can you know you're going to heaven before you die? Of course, that's the best news in the world. No tricks to that. Say, going to heaven, that is free. Now, what you have, when you get there, depends on what you do for him. Let me get in there, depending about what he did for me, best news I ever heard. every head, bottom, every eye goes and no one looking around. If you're here tonight and you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, would you right now just talk to the Lord and say something simple like this? Or, I know, I'm a sinner. I don't understand at all. But I believe Christ died and paid for my sins and I'm going to trust Him to take me to heaven whenever I die. When God said, if you believe He did it for you, it saves you. save you means he saves you from hell saves you from the penalty of your sense that you had to pay means it gives you eternal life and you become this child means you get to go to heaven when you die so doesn't that make sense to trust crisis your only hope of going to heaven especially you can't earn it you can't work for it it's a gift I'm gonna ask you just a moment to raise your hand raising your hand doesn't save you just let me know that what I said made sense to you and you say, yes, that makes sense to me. And preach, I like you to pray for me and close it. Now, if you've already done that before, you don't have to do it again. But why not write down the kindness of this moment? If you will, trust Christ's Savior. Let me know by not blip at hand. Just rip it up very quickly and put it right back down. Say, yes, pray for me. I'll trust Christ as my Savior tonight. And preach, I like you to pray for me. Which is, rip it up very quickly. Yes, God bless you. You can put it down. If you trust Christ as your Savior tonight, God saves you tonight, as your eternal life, and He'll never cast you out and never lose you. You're anyone else? Anyone else? You that have already trusted Christ as your Savior. Have you ever had that journey that burning desire inside of you that want to do something for the Lord? God has a will for you. It's found in His Word. You've studied the Word to know His will, So that you can do it and you've been facing something lately that's causing you to be maybe a little upset But God because you don't understand and maybe you get a little bitter put out with God Maybe don't want to be as faithful as you ought to be You're worried about things you ought to be trusting Lord for What is the last time you literally? There's some crying between you and God Have you ever done it? Let the Lord be real to you talk to him If you hear tonight and you say, I needed that message, that was especially for me, and pretty much I'd like you to pray for me. I'm not going to have you phone. I've been embarrassed. But would you have found my school? You want special prayer tonight. Would you just sit at the end of your prayer quickly and do a roughing down? Yes, God bless you and you. Yes, there's hands on over. Yes, God bless you. I appreciate that. I follow what you do. Thank you so much. For the free gift of eternal life and the individual and the indication that they would to trust your Savior, your parent-peat of internal life. They become your child. And if you're never cast them out, never lose them. In fact, I also pray especially for these that indicate by effort that hand it, for they're your children, they know they go and they have them when they die. But probably they may be struggling about a thousand things that nobody else may even know about. Maybe personal things, something on the inside of them, something may have happened years ago, that maybe he has to deal with something they're going through right now, some heartache, some pain, some person of whatever it is, Lord, I pray that they would just look to you. They don't have to understand at all. Don't see how you're gonna get them out of it. It doesn't matter. Just don't quit, just don't quit. Not pray for all of it. You'll bless each one of them and strengthen them. Grant their prayer request. We ask so much that you bless this church for getting this wife and all that they may hear to teach people, and this is a good body for laborers. Just watch over and protect them, and put a hedge about them, and use them in a great way, and Christ and reprise. Amen. Thank you.