He Will Soon Rejoice in His Love — Carter Conlon

The Prophetic Word for Struggling Believers

This message is one of the Times Square Church pulpit series. It was recorded in the sanctuary of Times Square Church in Manhattan, New York City. Other tapes are available by writing World Challenge, P .O. Box 260, Lindale, Texas 75771, or calling 903 -963 -8626.

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Hallelujah. I'm bringing to you a prophetic word today, and it's a prophetic word for a certain type of person. It's a prophetic word for people who we are living in a very decaying time. All you have to do is read the newspaper to be really aware that this is a very decaying time.

The very fabric of society, especially tragically American society, founded on the word of God, seems to be just falling through the fingers of the nation. And we see an anti-God spirit, especially in much of the Western world, rising up.

An indifference to God, a flaunting. My daughter was telling me last night that she was walking home this week and saw a derogatory t-shirt about Jesus Christ that shocked her. She said, I never would have believed that anybody would have the audacity to say this type of a vulgar thing about the Son of God.

Open rebellion now to God, open hatred of Christ. And in the midst of the decay, this message is to those who are struggling. You're a struggling Christian. You do want God. You do love God. Yes, it's so hard.

We're in the midst of a society that is inundated with false religious practice and even a lot of confusion, even in the Christian community. But you're hungry for God. You want God. The word that the Lord has given me and it's come through the time of prayer and fasting this week is that he will soon rejoice in his love over you.

He will soon rejoice in his love. You're going to see that day. It's not too far away for you. We're going to go through some things about Zephaniah's writing. I pray that you hear the tenderness of the Holy Spirit in me calling you to him.

I'm believing God to demolish strongholds and lies of the devil. Every lie at the end of me trying to tell you you can't come back to God or you have to settle into some form of struggle and you can't get free.

That's a lie. The devil is the father of lies. And when he speaks a lie, he just speaks of what he is. He cannot tell the truth. He's a liar. And so if the devil is accusing you, then you know it's a lie.

If you if you are smart, you know it's a lie. Hallelujah. Let's pray together now. Now, father, we thank you, God, thank you today for your presence. Thank you for your power. I thank you for the anointing of the Holy Spirit.

Thank you, God, that you are doing something in this church. God, you are doing something among your people, Lord, that heaven is aware of. God, make our hearts aware of it today. We ask you, Lord, to open our hearts to the truth of what you're doing.

I ask you for an anointing of the spirit that transcends all natural ability. I ask, oh, God, that you speak to the people. Lord, it's got to be your voice. My voice is worth nothing. It's got to be your voice.

And Holy Spirit, I'm asking you to quicken the words that you put on my heart and let there be freedom. I ask that every demonic oppression be broken. I ask that strongholds of the enemy be absolutely devoured by the word of God, by the presence of Jesus Christ.

Lord, you said the anointing, the mark of the anointing is that every prison door had to open. And those that were weak were given strength. Those that were blind were given sight. Those that were bruised were healed.

You said the poor in heart would have the treasure of Christ in heaven preached to them. God, I don't want any other anointing but that one. I ask you, God, for the anointing that causes the kingdom of God to advance and the kingdom of darkness to suffer great violence.

Father, I thank you for this. I yield my body to it. I yield my mind to it. I yield my heart. I yield everything I am to it. I ask only Jesus that you be glorified. You be glorified in this house. Animate me, Holy Spirit.

Give me the passion that I need or give me the tenderness that is required. Whatever you need, whatever you want. Let your voice, let your very heart be animated through me today. God, I back away and I ask for the grace to disappear.

I ask God that you come, you appear, you speak to your church. Lord, this is too late an hour for any any carnality. It's too late an hour, God. We need to hear from you, Jesus. We need your voice to override every other voice.

We ask you to come, Holy Spirit. Cast down every imagination. Cast down everything that exalts itself above the knowledge of Jesus Christ. I ask you, God, to cast down the banks of the enemy that have been built against people's lives, false concepts of God, false ideas about future security.

Lord, cast them down that truly your people that you're calling to may come and find you to be a high tower and a refuge in times of trouble. Lord, you want to rejoice over your church today. You want to rejoice over us with love.

Help us to understand what that is. Help us to enter into it. Oh, God, help us in our pursuits not to miss this. God, it's so simple. Just open it to our hearts today. Father, I pray, God, that I may speak it clearly in Jesus name.

Zephaniah and the Coming Day of Reckoning

Amen. Now, Zephaniah is one of the final prophetic voices raised up of God before the final stages of captivity and judgment that came to Judah, which was the southern kingdom of Israel when the Babylonians came in and began to take them over.

Hard to fathom, hard to believe that God's own heritage. These are the same people that came out of or at least the descendants of the people that came out of captivity in Egypt had the history of victory and power, just like the Christian church does today.

We've got wonderful histories and stories of God's marvelous delivering power. Yet there is a a deep encroachment of other loves and pursuits, other concepts of God began to get a hold of the nation and finally brought the nation in general.

Now, obviously, there are always a people who are true to God, but the nation in general was brought to a place where they were virtually rejecting the Jehovah God's lordship over them. The whole form of worship had been created, which ultimately God had to do away with.

And he did away with it by basically sweeping away the society of that time. And we'll find that throughout history continuously. God will come a society in itself begins to it may have been founded even on truth, but that society begins to reject that truth and curse the God of that truth.

And God, in his mercy, comes and just sends that society into a very difficult place. He did not judge Judah by eliminating them from the face of the earth, which he could have done. He judged them by removing them into another place, took away all the comfort, took away everything that was familiar.

In other words, he pulled the spiritual carpet out from under his own people, allowed them for 70 years to go into Babylonian captivity. And in that place began to reckon with them, began to reason with them.

And of course, we know that years later they began to return under Zerubbabel, Nehemiah and Ezra to rebuild one more time the kingdom of God. Zephaniah had a cry from the heart of God. It was not only for his generation, but when you study the book of Zephaniah, there's an agreement among those who study it as scholars that it was a cry right down to our generation.

And in a day that is soon to come, when God comes in Christ to judge the whole earth, the day of the Lord is quite frequently referred to in the book of Zephaniah. This is a day of reckoning. It was a day of reckoning in Zephaniah's generation.

But there is a day of reckoning coming, beloved, for all of the world. The Bible tells us that that day is going to come suddenly. If I let me just read to you first Thessalonians, chapter five, verses one to six, Paul says,.

But of the times and seasons, brethren, you have no need that I write to you, for you yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. The day of the Lord will come suddenly when they were when they shall say peace and safety.

In other words, there's going to be a sense that we're winning the battle, that finally we're finding peace. Of course, that peace is without the knowledge of God. Then sudden destruction comes upon them as prevail upon a woman with child and they shall not escape.

But you, brethren, are not in darkness that that they should overtake you as a thief. You're all children of the light and children of the day. We are not of the night. We're not of the darkness. It'll come suddenly.

I remember seeing some of the film footage of September the 11th before the towers were attacked. And there was a news commentator who was on at the time and he was saying this is a lovely day, a wonderful fall day.

Everything in the city seems to be going on normally, just as it always has. And people are heading to work. Others are on their telephones and all people are preparing for the business, the order of the day.

And all of a sudden, suddenly everything changes. The suddenness of it was shocking. The suddenness of it caused even news commentators to to blurt out sometimes even profanity. They were they were so taken aback by the suddenness of this calamity and the sudden destruction that came to institutions, for example, in America that were considered such bastions of safety.

Who would dare even attempt to touch the Pentagon? Who would dare even attempt to infiltrate or cause damage or destruction? And it was almost inconceivable to the mindset of this country, as it is with many people in the world, that there could be a sudden destruction come.

And fortunately, the scope of that destruction was limited, but it was a foreshadowing of a day that is to come when the whole world, Isaiah said, is going to be turned upside down. There's going to be a shaking.

Peter, the apostle, said that the elements are going to be on fire. I remember seeing a documentary by Mr. Oppenheimer, who was instrumental in the development of the atomic bomb. And the very first time they set it off in a specific desert area, he said we were terrified that when we would explode this nuclear, this atomic device, it was not even nuclear, it was atomic.

He said that we knew that it had the capability of setting the very heavens on fire. And if the elements were set on fire, we weren't sure exactly where that would lead to. We had created in our hands, he said, a device that was capable of destroying life.

On the planet Earth, as we now know it. And of course, now the tonnage and the explosive power of the weapons that are all over the world today and who knows even in what hands in some instances now have a much greater capability.

Peter said a day, a sudden day comes when even the elements are on fire and everything as we know it begins to be burned. The scripture seems to bear witness to an incredible heat coming and touching the Earth as we move into the last days of time as we know it.

We're not in darkness. Now, a person who's in darkness has in his heart that Christ is delaying his coming. Christ is and Jesus himself warned about it. They're going to say it while he's he's delaying his coming and they will just begin to carry on with life as it is and not be concerned that there is a day there is a day coming.

It's a sudden day. It's a day of reckoning. It will come and try the whole Earth and everybody that lives on it. Zephaniah spoke prophetically about the social and the spiritual conditions of his day, and he also spoke about the spiritual and social conditions of our day, because the the tendencies of humanity to fall away from God are are common.

It doesn't change because one generation changes into another. The heart of sin is still the heart of sin. Indifference to God is still indifference to God. It may take on various political or cultural additives to it, but it's still indifference to God.

Perilous Times and the Faithful Remnant

And Zephaniah talked about a condition. And as he was speaking about this condition, he was speaking right through the court of time, right into our generation, perhaps into New York City in the year that we're living in today.

And these are conditions that preceded the judgment of God in his day and will be prevalent when Christ judges the nations of our day. They will be. Prevalent, Peter, not Peter, rather, but Paul says to Timothy, perilous times are coming, men are going to be engrossed in a self-love, there's going to be a self-consumption come upon society, upon the world.

They're going to be writing off family as God has defined it. Natural family affection is going to be gone. The affection of a husband, a wife, a child, the family, as God defined it, is going to come under incredible attack and the natural affection will be put away.

There'll be a despising come into the hearts of people towards those who are truly righteous in Jesus Christ. A Jesus revulsion will begin, as it is in the last days. You'd be hated, Christ said, for for doing good.

He said a man's enemies are going to be those of his own household. It's going to be difficult days ahead as nations begin to turn away in an incredible lawless rebellion against the word of God. We're living at that time.

Remember that the scripture says we're not children of darkness. This should not overtake us as a thief. We should be aware of the hour that we're living in. It's not just coincidence that television is becoming more vile, more violent, more sexual, more in your face, more anti-God.

It is not just a happenstance. America is on a horrible moral slide away from God, a terrible, terrible rejection of the truth that founded and made this country one of the greatest that the world has ever known.

It is atrocious to see what is happening now. But I thank God with all my heart that even in the midst of this, there will always be a remnant people. There will always be altars filled with young people.

And as I'm told, the literally thugs coming to Christ on Friday night. But thanks be to God, Paul was a thug and Paul came to Christ and became a mighty man of God. There will always be a remnant. There will always be.

Christ will never leave himself without a testimony. There will always be people when you least expected that God will touch and they have nothing to lose. They're aware of the rot that's all around them.

They know what it's done to their lives. They let go of all of it. They begin to embrace Jesus Christ. They begin to walk in the power of his love and strength. God does in them the miraculous, the absolute miraculous transforms their mind, transforms their heart, puts within them abilities that they have never possessed and could never possess apart from the spirit of God.

The scripture says when they looked on these men, they were amazed because they were ignorant and unlearned men. But they had to take note that these men had been with Jesus Christ. They could not understand the wisdom and the power by which they spoke because the touch of God had come on their lives.

Zephaniah was prophesying to Jerusalem and the southern kingdom of Israel, a nation founded on the principles of obedience to and worship of the Lord God. And now idolatry and mischief were rampant. Chapter one, verse five, talking about the coming day of judgment.

Scripture is telling that God is going to judge those who worship the host of heaven upon the housetops and then that worship and swear by the Lord and that swear by Malcolm. So there was rampant idolatry, but there was also this horrible mixture, even among those who professed to be people of God.

They were swearing by the Lord, but they were also swearing by Malcolm. Now, commentators tell us that Malcolm, in this case, was a pseudonym for Baal. They were swearing by God, but they were also swearing by a love of prosperity.

They were worshiping the gods, as it is of the people that were all around them. And verse six is and them that are turned back from the Lord and those that have not sought the Lord nor inquired of him.

So here are God's own people, by name at least. And there's a horrible mixture among many of them, and many have turned back and they're not seeking God anymore. I pray, God, that is not your testimony here today.

I pray, God, that it can't be said in heaven that you are a church attender, but there's nothing in you that really seeks God anymore. God says, no, I have to I have to pull the carpet out because I love you.

I'll have to pull the carpet out from underneath you. I've got to take your security away. It's the only hope that you will ever call out to me again. Again, in chapter three, verse one, he says, woe to her that is filthy and polluted to the oppressing city.

He's now talking about Jerusalem. She obeyed not the voice you received, not correction. She trusted not in the Lord. She drew not near to her God. She not her princes within her are roaring lions. I talk about leaders, secular leaders that are supposed to look out for the the welfare of the people have become greedy.

He called them evening wolves and they know not they're so insatiably greedy. They don't even leave anything for the morning, devour everything that comes their way. Verse four, he says, your prophets are light and treacherous persons.

Their priests have polluted the sanctuary and have done violence to the law. The likeness here in Hebrew means they have no weight and they have no weight of God in them, but they're carried by every wind.

We have prophets today that boast about being carried by wind and they stand in pulpits and say we can hardly wait for the next wave. In other words, they're actually giving by their own testimony, their likeness away.

We have no direction. We're just waiting for the next wave and we're just enjoying the ride. They're light and they claim to speak for God and they're misleading the people of God and her priests have polluted the sanctuary and they've done violence to the law.

My prayer constantly and I prayed last night, oh, God, please don't ever let me do violence to your word in this pulpit. Violence means dealing treacherously. They they take my word and they treacherously deal with it.

They ignore the parts that require obedience and they speak about only the blessings. They ignore sacrifice and hardship and only talk about health and success. They're treacherous dealers with the word of God, treachery in the house of God.

God does not call it misguided. He calls it treacherous, treacherous. They're light. They're carried with winds. They don't open the book. They don't give the people the full counsel of God. The prophets in the Old Testament say they say to him that despises me, it shall be well with you.

They tell people we are delivered to commit these abominations. It's amazing. They they make people comfortable as they're backsliding and turning deeply and more farther away from God. Oh, beloved, you make sure I don't know where you're from if you're visiting today, but you make sure that you're in a church that opens the book in its fullness.

Talk. We talk about the grace of God as much as any other church does in America. But we also talk about the justice of God. You have to have the full counsel of God to begin to understand. You can't even lay hold of the covenant until you understand the fear of the Lord.

Proverbs says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy is understanding. There is no wisdom, no understanding, no Christian growth until you and I understand the full balance of the word of God.

Verse five says the just Lord is in the midst thereof. He will not do iniquity every morning. He brings his judgment to light. In other words, God's been there all along. He always has a voice. There is a voice.

It might be in the in the minority. Zephaniah was there in a day of a nation going into judgment. Isaiah was there in a day of his nation at that time going into judgment. So was Jeremiah. So was Daniel.

So was Ezekiel. And they're always a voice. There's always a voice. And if there isn't a preacher, there's an inner voice. There's always a voice. God will always speak to you when you open the Bible and say, Jesus, I want to know you.

God, come and help me to understand my life and where I'm going. There is always a voice. God says I rise up in the midst. I will not do iniquity. I will not mislead you. The Lord says I will not do you harm.

I will guide you. But the unjust knows no shame. Zephaniah said a day has come when there is no ability to blush over sin anymore. It doesn't matter what is preached. And even among the many people who come to the house of God, there is no longer an ability to blush.

The adulterer can sit there in his adultery and praise God and lift his hands. The thief can raise his hand, say, oh, how I love the Lord. There's no ability to recognize sin. The whole standard of God, the whole concept of God has become perverted.

And you see people in the house of God incredibly debauched lives, lifting their hands to the Lord. And that to me is more tragic than any naked billboard I'll ever see on on Broadway. You want to see evidence of the judgment of God is when people are living in willful sin, can raise their hands and and be under the misconceived idea that they are in God's favor.

Divine Judgment Against False Security and Idolatry

Chapter two, verse 11, the Lord says, I'm going to starve the gods of the earth. I'm going to famish all of the gods of the earth. And men shall worship him, everyone from his place, even all the isles of the heathen.

Lord says something is going to happen and all false gods are going to be proven to be powerless. And I thank God for that with all my heart. I remember when the towers came down in New York City, I was shocked by the number of preachers who just didn't have an answer.

Their God is if what God had they been serving, what God are they listening to? What gospel are they embracing when a nation comes into such distress and they're not able to stand and give the people an answer?

They're not able to say this is what the Lord is doing. This is what God is saying to stand and just shrug your shoulders and then say to the people, well, follow me, I'll lead you to Christ. But they have no answer in times of their God is their concept of God is starving and powerless to help anyone.

Verse 12, he says, the Ethiopians also shall be slain by the sword. Now, the Ethiopians were never the enemies, the direct enemies of Israel, but they were allies to Egypt. And God spoke through this and said, you may not be a fornicator, you may not be a thief or a murderer, but if this is your entertainment night after night, if this is this is what you sit before, you are an ally with that which I hate and there will be a justice of God have to come into your life because of it.

Verse 13, he says, I'll stretch out my hand against the north and destroy Assyria. I'll make Nineveh desolation and dry like a wilderness and flocks will lie down all the beasts of the nations. And actually, Nineveh today, the name Nineveh means fish port or fish city.

That was a place of water in abundance. God said, I'm going to make it a desert. And archaeologists today was reading a report on this area of the world, saying Nineveh is exactly what God said it was going to be.

Nineveh is a desert. There are just heaps of sand where these mighty cities once stood. And in the few ruins that are left of that part of the world, there's a bird that God said would lodge in the windows and it gives a mournful cry.

One commentator said that is only exceeded by the cry or the laugh of the hyena. It is a mournful, plaintive, almost a cry that speaks of judgment that has come to this place. You see, the point is just this.

What God says he will do, what he says he means. God says, I'm going to dry it up. God will dry it up. God says there's going to be these plaintive mourning birds sitting in the windows forever. It will never be inhabited again.

That's exactly what happens. One commentator said he was shocked, an archaeologist rather, as he stood on the borders of all these mighty towns that are listed in chapter two that were the enemies of Israel and saw the utter total devastation and read the scriptures and tried to picture in his mind what these cities must look like and how they must have stood and how they exalted themselves against the knowledge of God and against the people of God.

The sin that they committed in verse 15 says this is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly and said in her heart, I am. I am there's only one that can call himself, I am. There's only one that always was, always will be and always will be involved in the lives of those that are his in the future, always will be in control.

This is the city that dwelt carelessly and said, I am. I have the power of God. I have the right to select and choose my own destiny. I, I have been here. I will stay here and I will be here. They took the place of God and God says, no, that's not going to happen.

I'm going to take this pride and I'm going to debase it and I'm going to turn this place into a wilderness. And the only thing that will be found there are mournful birds. And he said in shepherds that feed their flocks in the caves at night.

And today it is exactly the way God said it was going to be. Now, in Zephaniah chapter one in verse 10, the Lord says, here's how the judgment is going to come. This was a careless city. He said it will come to pass in that day that there should be a noise of a cry from the fish gate.

This was the first sign the judgment had come. The whole city was ignoring the word of God. There were light, treacherous prophets that were saying, God, there will be no judgment. There's just wonderful days of prosperity ahead.

But the first sign was the fish gate. Now, the fish gate was the place of commerce. This is where this was a fishing area. This is where people brought in their fish from the sea. This is where money was exchanged or where the value of their currency for God.

It's a meeting where some national or international trade took place. And he said, the first thing that's going to happen is there's going to be a cry in the fish gate. I can't help but wonder if there's a cry in the fish gate in America today.

We've been hearing it. There's something is wrong. We were proper doing everything to bolster our courage and prop up our towers. But something is wrong. There's a cry in the fish gate. And he said, and then everything and a howling from the second.

And that means everything associated. The first God says the economy is going to be touched and then everything associated with the economy is going to begin to falter. And there's going to be a cry, a cry from the financial sector, then a cry from all the people who lose their jobs because of it.

A cry for the distress that comes because of the difficulty coming into the city. And there'll be a howling from the second and a great crashing from the hills. And what the commentators describing the battle that began to take place when Babylon invaded Jerusalem talked about the first bits of the army coming to the fish gate and the noise that was created there and the howling in subsequent gates, knowing that the the time of prosperity and peace was gone.

Remember when they say peace and safety then comes on them sudden destruction. And then a great crashing from the hills. In other words, they were using catapults from the mountains and casting great stones against the walls, the security, the whole concept of security is now under attack.

And the people in the midst of the city are are beginning to panic. And in verse eight, he says, I in that day of the Lord's sacrifice, I will punish the princes and the king's children and all such that are clothed with strange apparel.

The word in the original text means one who comes from another family and is not a lawful heir. Remember that Jesus gave the parable of the wedding feast and there was a man that came to the feast and he said to him, friend, how did you get in here not having a wedding garment?

And he was speechless. People who have professed perhaps to know God, but there's been no relationship. They have a righteousness, but it's not God's righteousness. They have a church attendance, but they don't have a life that is governed and guided by the inward presence of Jesus Christ.

They've never received the covering of their sin by faith. They're strange children. They were singing the songs of Zion, but they really don't belong there. They have no heart for God and God's heart obviously is not in them.

And then he said they will go through Jerusalem, verse 12, and search it with candles and punish the men that are settled on their leaves that say in their heart, the Lord will not do good and neither will he do evil.

Now, settle on the leaves is a term used for winemaking, winemaking, for example, when they made wine in the Old Testament, they put it in a bottle, left it to sit for a while and all the impurities in that wine would settle on the bottom of the glass container.

Then the winemaker would come and he would pour that out into another container, leaving the leaves, as it's called, in the sediment, those impurities, leaving them in the bottom of that bottle. Then he would pour it into the next and the procedure would just simply continue, sometimes for a very lengthy amount of time until that which was left was virtually 99 percent pure.

And he's talking about a people who have settled on their impurities. A people who have just, they're no longer wanting the dealing of God. They say, well, I'm just a, I'm immoral, that's just what I am, that's what I'll always be, God has to understand that.

Well, I'm a thief, that's what I've been, that's what I'll always be. I have a gossiping tongue, well, I'm given to anger, that's just who I am and people around me are just going to have to learn to live with it, God loves me anyway.

And all these impurities in this earthen vessel that now is the spirit of God are settling down where God wants to deal with them. But rather than being poured out, they're settling on this corruption and they've made peace with this corruption.

And there's no desire to have this corruption dealt with. And Jesus said this false security produces a wrong theology that says he will neither do good for me nor will he punish me. He hasn't delivered me, well, he won't punish me either.

It's up to God to do whatever he wants to do. And I want to tell you the reason why they're settling on this evil. They're settling on this evil because they are not being poured out for the kingdom of God.

Beloved, the kingdom of God is a continual process of God's life being infused into us and then poured out to us, to others. When we are Christ, we begin to do the work of God. We begin to walk as God would have us walk.

We begin to touch our society as God would have us touch it. We are poured out. If you're not being poured out, there's a great danger that you're going to be settling on your own internal corruption.

Jesus said in Matthew 4, 24, he said, take heed what you hear in the measure that you give out or that you meet. It will be measured to you again and to you that hear more shall be given. Jesus said, take heed what you hear.

The Life of Christ Poured Out in Transformation

The gospel of Jesus Christ is a gospel about yielding our bodies as a living sacrifice for the purposes of God. It's about the pleasure of allowing the life of Christ to be poured through us. And as that life is being poured through us, we're constantly praying, Jesus, I don't like the kind of love that is coming out of me.

I ask you, God, to pour that, let that be removed from my life and let it be purified by your love. Change me, God, transform me. Beloved, that cry never goes away in the true child of God. That is the mark of a child of God.

Our lives are being poured out for God's purpose and for God's glory. And as we're being poured out, the purity of Christ is starting to override all of the inconsistencies and all of the sediment. All the on Christ like things within us are beginning to pass away.

That's why the scripture says he becomes a new creation. The old things pass away and all things become new. I become like Christ as I choose to be poured out for the purposes of God. That's how the life of God comes into me.

It doesn't come just through Bible study and prayer. That's a wonderful thing. But if you don't, if you're not poured out, all you become is aware of how evil your own nature is without God. And then make peace with it and let it settle in.

It becomes part of the very fabric. God says, I'm coming into Jerusalem and I'm going to search it with candles. Proverbs says the spirit of the Lord, the spirit of man is the candle of the Lord searching all the inward parts of the belly.

The historians tell us when the Babylonians invaded Jerusalem, that the priests and prophets were hidden in sewers and caves. And they went in with lanterns and they hauled them out and they slew them mercilessly.

And I believe that should be our cry. Oh, God, whatever found a lodging place in me that is rotten and religious and has no life. Search it out, Holy Spirit. Search it out of me, oh God. Get it out of me.

That's why David cried, search me, oh God, and know my heart. Try me, know my ways and see if there be any wicked way in me. God, it's our desire that our lives be poured out for you. It's our desire that we represent Christ in a darkened time and see a generation without hope come to the life.