All Out Spiritual War — George Verwer

The Global Emergency Without the Gospel

In souls, half the population of the United States, twice the population of Great Britain, in North India today that had never seen even a gospel tract and knew nothing of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Oh might God open our eyes to the situation in the world today and might we realize that it's a desperate one, it's an emergency situation, since today when a man has an automobile accident, it's an emergency.

The sirens roar, the ambulance comes to pick up the wounded people, telephone calls are made, people fly here, people fly there, blood is given. We know what happens when there's a national emergency, the Red Cross moves in, the Boy Scouts move in, all different charity organizations move in.

Natural Disasters and National Mobilization

This past summer there was a national emergency in Yugoslavia. It was hard to believe but 10 ,000 people awake in Sofia, Yugoslavia and when that happened the army mobilized, the Red Cross mobilized, Boy Scouts were moved from Greece over into Yugoslavia to help, thousands of pounds were sent from Great Britain and from other countries to help in this tremendous state of emergency.

So it was in Iran not too long ago during the great earthquake, so it is whenever there's a great hurricane in America or a great national windstorm or a tidal wave in some country, a state of emergency is declared.

That's why they have in certain countries what's called martial law in which the country during a state of emergency can be completely taken over by the leader of the country and martial law goes into effect which means that leader of the country can do what he wants with factories and with business in order that the whole country might be aimed at conquering and winning during that national emergency.

We've seen it in Great Britain, we've seen it in America. War is a state of emergency. Being in the underground, having one's sense taken off the front of the yard that it might be melted down and used for war weapons and so it is whenever a state of emergency comes there's mobilization.

People begin to move, people begin to do something, people begin to take desperate action, people begin to do things that they would have never done under normal conditions, people begin to say things they would have never said, they go places they would have never gone, their sleeping conditions, they never slept in and they'd work hours that they would have never dreamed of working under normal conditions.

Communist Zeal and Peacetime Warfare

The communists believe that they're working in a state of emergency. They believe that their situation is worse. They believe that their situation is desperate and a recent article, not so recent any longer, which I quote in my book on literature it states that the communists are winning in World War III because they believe they're in it and what we call peace and they're moving out in a fantastic way, educating thousands of young propagandists and taking the communist poison to the ends of the earth.

So we see Cuba and we see countries moving into the communist revolution, swept into this so-called warfare, peacetime warfare that they carry on through bullets. I read the life of Lenin and I read the life of Marx.

It was like a knife in my side and a sword in my stomach as I saw their dedication and their fanaticism for the cause of communism and great leaders like Billy Graham have said that the church is being challenged today like never before for the communists have taken new testament principles, dedication, discipline, propagation and all the rest to spread forth their poison.

The Christian Calling in an All-Out Spiritual War

In that soft chair or that hard chair right there on the floor wherever you're sitting, wherever you're listening to this tape, wherever you're listening to my voice, you're in the midst of a crisis situation.

You're in the midst of what I believe is best described as an all-out war and when he does we'll never be the same. There's all the difference between a peacetime soldier and a wartime soldier. There's all the difference in the world between a young man with a submachine gun on the front lines of a battlefield and the same soldier back in peacetime with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth with a nice young girl in his lap.

All the difference in the world and to us as we look out at a lost and dying world suffering yes without bread but worse than that suffering without the gospel of Jesus Christ. Oftentimes I've given the illustration people that were dying downtown in the city where we live.

The Medicine Cabinet and the Responsibility to Act

Just imagine if the report came back to us and we heard that there were 10 ,000 people dying of a dreaded disease in the center of our city. In our little cabinet we had the medicine they needed. We had the vaccine.

We had the serum. We had just what they needed to save them but we said well I'm busy. Well tonight I've got this activity and I have a date with Sally Q and I have this and I have that. They can wait.

Let's not get excited about the situation. Let's not go overboard. Let's not get unbalanced. Let's not rush into things. Let's take it easy. We need more training. We need this. We need that and the 10 ,000 people passed into eternity and the medicine still stands in your cabinet.

Now that's the most ridiculous story anyone could ever tell. Insane man would speak like that. Only a man who was not thinking reasonably or logically would think of such a thing. Any normal human being would immediately go to his medicine cabinet and mobilize and move out down the street to help those people but not far from you was a storage house.

Asking, Seeking, and Knocking for God's Resources

Not far from you was a storage house there. There were literally hundreds of pounds of medicine stored up and you went down to the storage house. You knew about these dying people and you went to the storage house and you looked on the door and on the door there was a fantastic little sign and it says ask and ye shall receive.

Seek and ye shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you. This was written above the door of this big storage house in which the medicine was contained that the world needed. Tell me how much would you ask for?

How much medicine would you ask for? Would you knock on that door? Would you seek? Would you ask? Every regenerate man would do that. For God unto salvation and although sometimes we don't have much on our own shelf and there doesn't seem to be much potential in us and we seem to be weak and we don't seem to really have all that it takes to go out and to meet this crisis situation.

Across from us and right in front of us there's a huge storehouse. It's the storehouse of God's grace. It's the storehouse of God's mercy. It's the storehouse of God's love and above the storehouse is a great sign.

It says ask and ye shall receive. Seek and ye shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you. But we go to the storehouse and we look and because of unbelief, because we're self-seeking, because we're trapped into a self-centered life and because we're mainly interested in ourselves we fail to read the signs and it's blurry and dim and we're so interested in our own ways and our own plans and in our own projects and we're so caught up into naturalistic thinking and we're so caught up into the realm of unbelief and fear and building it into the reality of the promised land that we never enter into the warehouse.

We never take hold of the promises of God and they never become real to us. We read them and the man comes to the warehouse door and he shows us a whole list of promises, promises. He shows us promise after promise.