To raise up a testimony you have to raise up a church here in the middle of this as a witness the Holy Spirit today clearly you know the city you love the city now I want you to do it that was the birth of Time Square church he came to New York and got back in the pasture it he was able to embody such a love of.
Christ for the individual one's a shepherd Angeles yeah he truly has a Shepards heart there's a hunger for God on the streets I know Jesus cares about our cities he sent us back into this city to reach many on these streets who don't know it but they're destined to be reached by the Holy Spirit and be in the ministry it's been estimated there are 50 to 60,000 homeless in the city they live in hovels like this and it's.
Especially devastating when it's zero ten below zero and Wendy my hope for the future of Times Square Church is that the testimony of Christ that's been established here will grow the love of God will increase and the passion and compassion for the souls of men will always be at the forefront of everything that we do as a church [Music].
I want I would love to to introduce a man of God we've been blessed that he came to Colorado spring I don't want to say anything more than this I love him with all my heart I love you going so much and I know you like that you don't like people to put you over there and a pistol and I'm gonna put you up there because you already have been and you are still up there as a man of God.
I said God has been here and he's here at this moment also I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for that blonde ladies sitting here in the front seat honey there are a lot of new people some of the balcony just stand up and wave with the people so they can remember you in prayer I'm a little nervous I haven't preached in months but we know the Holy Spirit is.
Here I want to talk to young pastors and young Christian workers whoever you may be here now and I have on many occasions young pastor say get kid could I have 15 minutes with you if just just to find out how God used you and they've read the book or seen the movie or heard a message and touch them and of course.
Couldn't do it's impossible but I'd like to take that 15 minutes with you right now I'm 79 years old been preaching for 58 years and I've seen a lot of things endured a lot of things but I just want to speak here I have no notes I have no prepared sermon but I'll have a heart I think that's ready to share a few things with you that when you leave here you'll find out that you're not just talking about the church we're talking.
About you and your heart yes yesterday when they were praying we were praying for one another young pastor and his wife asked for prayer and I said could you sum up in one word what you're going through and I said discouragement and weren't depressed but they were discouraged I want to talk to you about what happened to me when I got my heart so stirred I know I've already prayed.
For her blessing on this so don't think I haven't prayed about the message I want to get right into what I feel the Lord to have me share with you i pastored a little Church in pensive town of about a thousand people pastored little church of about a hundred people they were good people there were farmers they were miners and I loved them and I passed it there for five years but on.
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The fifth year especially it had been growing on me for quite a while I I
Would see the same faces no one was being saved and night we had nice little cottage next to the church and enough to live on and I I did what most of us do I had my devotional time and I read my Bible especially to get sermons and occasionally would just read for the.Sake of trying to get closer to the Lord's heart not an educated man I had one year bible school but my father I can't I came from the line of pastors and preachers I think I'm the eighth generation all the way back to the Civil War where one of my great grandparents died in the Civil War and came from alignment the preachers and my father taught me to pray to seek the face of.
God he said David there's only 24 hours in a day that's all he lied ahead and he prayed you could pray like Elisha and you can he said God always makes a way for a praying man I was taught to pray and in teenage years I remember praying and being so touched by the hand of God I would lay before frustrated before the Lord and it would try to get up and a hand would just I couldn't see it but.
Would just place me back down and that feeling was so exhilarating it's so incredible to have the hand of God just lay you back down and you start laughing and crying it's so it's so incredible the touch and I've known the touch of God I was called when I was eight years old into the middle now please don't think this is an old meant just rambling God allowed me to come to it to this place at this time to.
Share my heart I I got tired I got weary being a Pentecostal church and not seeing anything happened preaching to the same people for songs testimony meeting a sermon all to call and never see anybody at the altar and I came to the conclusion that this is.
Pentecost I don't want it all these years just in four walls and not seeing anybody of course we weren't going out to see anybody where we were not out of those restaurants and other places but I began to seek the face of God and when you begin to seek the face of God the devil will bring a conspiracy of interruptions and I'm telling this now if you set your heart to seek God if you set your heart to seek him devil is.
Going to put on you a conspiracy of interruptions you receive calls like you've never received before he would do everything to keep you from the prayer closet but I'm here I'm here this evening would you would you pray with me right now Heavenly Father you've given me a word I tell you somebody just bring me a chair from the side there please I've been going through a physical.
Just right here please I told pastor Carter once there may be a day come when he has to wheel me out in the pulpit in a wheelchair but I'll still be here I got a burden of prayer God stirs hearts when God wants to do something for a generation for a city or town he's.
Going to stir somebody's heart he's going to find a young man he's going to find somebody whose heart is being stirred and if you're going to wait for the Holy Ghost to dist or your heart sometimes he does that if you're going to wait to say I'll pray and I'll seek God I'll be a man of Prayer but I have to the Holy Ghost will have to do that no you can go through this book and you can hear from Elijah hear it from all the major prophets and the Minor.
Prophets and he said his heart to seek God or he fixed his heart on God there
Was a decision made and I made a decision I would seek God there were interruptions and if everything came along to try to keep me from my knees I believe you have to find a place alone at resting spot with God where you go there you know you will meet God there and that's a special place and God makes it a hallowed ground mine was getting in my car and going up.On on a hillside where my wife could see the car and I went into the woods and I said Lord I'm going to fix my heart I'm going to seek you I am not satisfied I've been to conferences and I would leave with this same discouragement nothing was happening and I want to tell you babies behind every successful pastor every one who's been using of God either in parachurch ministries or in.
Churches themselves you will always find a praying man you'll find a praying woman and I got in that car and I went out in the woods and I got my Bible and said Lord I'm not looking for a sermon now I'm looking for your heart and I stayed there for weeks and if anyone came to the house she would point to the car because I I believed then that I had to set aside air everything in my life there had to be something more than what I was.
Experiencing I wanted to see Pentecost I didn't want to have just people talking tongues and and and talk about their Pentecostal experience and give their little testimony which is fine and I don't belittle that but I see many many pastors around the world Greg and I or Gary and I I think our 60 countries and in the last six years and that discouragement is all over the world the.
The this concept of being Pentecostal and being a dude with power and anointing of the Holy Spirit and you see none of that happening you yearn for it and you see see it in spots you come to this place at least at least I did and if I were to sit down and talk to a young pastor and his wife I would I.
Would bear down on this the need to set a time and a place and where you say I'm Lord whatever it cost you have to do something in my heart I had a couple come from England at the Times Square Church a number of years ago middle-aged a church in London about 700 people and his church started dwindling it was down now up to about 500 took three months.
Off and traveled around the United States visiting revivals trying to find the key something just to staunch the the leaving of the people the diminishing of the the anointing and they had been to all the all of the miracle meetings they've been to negly mega churches looking for a key looking for elements that they can add to attract people they came backstage and he told.
Me said I've been here three months and travelled all over looking for for something that helped us bring revival and I can't understand what people are leaving the church and I hesitated I didn't have a word for him but and the Holy Spirit came upon me and I pointed to the wife and I said but dear I hear the Holy Spirit saying that you were once on fire for God and you once were a praying woman you were seeking the face.
Of God and God used you mightily to encourage your husband and they both began to weep and this especially that's it this is the first place we have felt the presence of the Lord and the need we just felt the need to get home and get back on our knees and seek the face of God I remember the anointing that came with that designated hours of Prayer where nothing nothing meant more nothing.
Was more urgent nothing was more needful in my life but to get back to prayer and I remember trying to stand up in front of our people and I break down and weep and I didn't know what the weeping was it was the Holy Spirit of course but I remember falling on my face and in the front the people and rolling under the seat and groaning and just crying out to God you see when you begin to seek God.
Just to seek his face you're not just for fasting and praying for someone item someone some the burden which is that's necessary and I believe in that but there has to come a time where just say Lord I have got to know you I have got to have the touch god I have to have something more than I have and I had a little prayer room in our little cottage just a very about this 8 by 10 or so and I would spread a.
Carpet remember it was green and I just said God I want to know why you're stirring my heart I want to know what this is all about are you opening a door what it is I didn't know and this has been told in the cross and switchblade but I I just want to share my heart with you on it and I said Lord you have to.
Tell me what's going on because I I'm broken I weep before you and you're opening the word because I took my Bible with me up there in the woods and underlined and just getting to know God just getting to draw close to him I wasn't praying for ministry I wasn't praying for anything but praying for God make me fruitful use my life you called me when I was a just a boy you know there's more to it than this this is not.
Pentecost at Pentecost there were thousands saved and and there was fruit and there was blessing of the Lord and I don't have it I've been preaching dry sermons and one day when I was there magazine Life magazine was on the day of my desk and the Holy Spirit said pick it up and read it the picture of seven boys and of course that led to my call in New York City and I find out that that every.
Time God wants to do something fresh in my life there's this same stirring and some of you young pastor down there's been a stirring you you've been to this conference and you you've been challenged and you stirring in your own heart but I remember what a great prophet said to me Leonard Ravenhill it was a dear friend and he was one of my partners and editor for magazine in modern Elisha and he I.
We were talking about what was happening in my life because he lived just a mile or so from where we lived he with rival Terry's and other great books agree he was a modern-day Elisha and I was telling him about this and the need this this urgency to pray in too fast and seek the face of God [Music] and he said David I'm a tucky I'm gonna.
Tell you what the real problem is in the Church of Jesus Christ preachers don't pray he said at the second time David I'm telling you whoever I go and wherever I preach I preach on this that preachers don't pray and the altars are filled and the confessions come that I haven't prayed some said I haven't prayed for a month some don't even believe that prayer works anymore because they don't see immediate answers.
No I've found that all over the world the preachers don't pray majority now is I said before every place you will find a thriving church where people are being safe you're going to find a man you find more than one but you'll find a man that's been on his face before God and that he has put that first there's this primary objective to lay before God and seek his face I'm speaking to some of.
You came to this conference and you are discouraged you came discouraged if I ask for show of hands would be many many dozens of hands raised there would be wives of husbands who are in the ministry that are facing problems despair and yet you you don't allow God to bring this thering in your heart and some of you that are here now we're.
Prayer warriors some of you older ladies you were prayer warriors you sought the face of God when they were when there were problems in the church you you prayed you prayed and sought the face of God and God answered you and now some of you can I say it lovingly are planted in front of a TV set watch ago American Idol and you know more about the contestants and you do about the working of the Holy Spirit in the church I'm asking you now well I'm here and I'm.
Pleading through the Holy Spirit because I know the Holy Spirit is on me I'm asking the mothers of Zion where are you on Saturday night before the service what are you watching and where is your heart and what about the coldness and what about just a little bit of time that you give for praying to pray for your husband and pray for the for the.
Church and this in your family where is the burden of the Lord I've prayed all my life all my ministers have been preaching for 58 years and I don't I seldom miss that they praying for all my children and having the burden of the Lord I was reading this morning I think it's the 11th chapter of Acts Paul goes down to Antioch.
He'd been to Jerusalem he said they added nothing to me there but he heard about what was happening down in Antioch there was a black man whose name was Simon and there were prophets and there were teachers and they were having prayer meetings so Paul Paul goes to Antioch and this story is very clear about how the man how men gets a call of God the Bible says isn't and they'd ministered unto the Lord they ministered unto the.
Lord they were they were simply giving their time and worship the New Living Bible said they worshiped they were I don't know how many days they were there but it said they ministered to the Lord first of all then it says that they fasted and they fasted again they said then they laid hands on him and the Holy Ghost sent them out they were sent by.
The Holy Ghost God blessed me over these years and I've known the hand of God that he stirred me again about 25 years ago I felt that same stirring I wonder how many of you know what I'm talking about when the Holy Ghost wants to do something and he starts stirring you up.
There's he he he gets into the nest and he pokes and and there there's some kind of divine dissatisfaction there's something that is yearning for more and it's not an ego trip it's not something that you want to do because you have your hands full now but God stirs on this then he began to stir my nest again I was preaching to multitudes and God was using me and but I felt as if stirring in my heart now I was holding Street meetings every every.
Summer in New York City on the streets because that was my favorite place to preach on the streets and I heard the Lord said go back to seeking my face again I had been praying at the time but this time it was a giving of yourself to prayer just giving yourself to prayer retooling your your schedule so that you make time to seek his face and this is what the Holy.
Spirit told me this morning if you do nothing else if nothing else has accomplished when you stand up there for the audience if nothing else comes out of the meeting but an urgency stirring to get back to fixing your mind and your heart and true prayer and ministering unto the Lord just ministering unto the Lord we get so tied up with getting a sermon whether it's a.
Series or some fresh word of the Lord but oftentimes it takes us away from the this commitment that I believe has to be made before God can be God can use a person and I feel that there are some of you now that are discouraged and you're downhearted because you have you you have done it in a measure you have prayed you sought the Lord and you fasted you said nothing has happened well what I'm talking about is having it.
