Preludes to Revival — James A. Stewart

The Call to a Life of Prayer

Well, tonight being a Monday night, I never preach a sermon because I always like just to have a heart-to-heart talk with the Lord's people on Monday night, and I'm not preaching a sermon but just having a little chat with you this evening, and I hope that at the end of the meeting we could have a few minutes of prayer together.

Now you know, if I were on my deathbed tonight, and if you were on your deathbed tonight, you know what your biggest regret would be? Need I tell you? What would your biggest regret be? Your biggest regret would be that you did not take up Maxine in prayer.

Martin Luther says, I will be so busy today, I must pray two hours. But we say the opposite. I'll be so busy today, I can't even have five minutes before the Lord. And I think that if you have any regrets in heaven, my brother and I say if it would be that you are not a woman, not a man of prayer, and if there's anything I cultivate, if there's anything I desire more than anything else, I don't care whether I can preach, it never bothers me if I never preach again.

But one thing does bother me, I want to pray again. And I'd rather pray than preach. How marvelous that we can talk to God. Isn't it amazing that we can talk to God? Wonderful. And yet, we have the opportunity, and somehow we miss it.

The Healing at the Temple Gate

And so, tonight since it's Monday night, maybe for a little short time before we separate, to pray for ourselves and pray for revival. Now, I'm reading tonight, my scripture passage, or not the text, but my scripture passage is in Acts chapter 3.

And I'm reading from verse 1, Acts chapter 3 verse 1. A familiar passage. Now, Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer during the ninth hour. And a certain man, lame from his mother's womb, was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple, which is called beautiful.

Two-half ounce of them that entered into the temple. He, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked an ounce. And Peter, fasting his eyes upon him with John, said, look an ounce. And he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them.

Then Peter said, silver and gold have I none, but such as I have, good I be. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk. And he took them by the right hand and lifted them up. And immediately, his feet and ankle bones received strength.

And he, leaping up, stood and walked. And entered with them into the temple, walking and leaping and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God. And they knew it was he which sat for hours at the beautiful gate of the temple.

And they were all filled with wonder. I want to remember this. And they were all filled with wonder and amazement at that which had happened unto him. And as the lame man which was healed held Peter and John, all the people rang.

Oh, it would be wonderful if we could see people running, wouldn't it? All the people ran together and saw them in the port that is called Solomon. Still greatly wondering. And when Peter saw it, he answered and said unto the people, Ye men of Israel, why marvel ye at this?

Or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though by our own power of holiness we have made this man to walk? The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his son Jesus, whom he hath delivered up, and hath denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go.

But ye denied the Holy One and the just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you. Until the Prince of Light, whom God hath raised from the dead, And his name through faith in his name hath made this man strong.

Whom ye see and know, yea, the faith which is by him, hath given him this perfect silence in the presence of you all. And now, brethren, I want that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers.

The Holy God Who Revives the Humble

But those things which God before hath showed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath fulfilled. Now I want you to come particularly with me into the 59th chapter. The 59th chapter of the prophecy of Isaiah.

Or rather the 57th chapter of the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah chapter 57, and I'm reading two verses as part of my text tonight. Verses 14 and 15. Isaiah 57, verses 14 and 15. So take of brevity, and shall say, cast ye up, cast ye up, prepare the way, take up the stumbling block out of the way of my people.

For thus saith the High and Holy One that inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy. I dwell in a high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit. To revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite of the broken one.

And then, you need not turn to it, a text that you all know, Ezekiel chapter, or rather Exodus chapter 3, and verses 3 to 4. And where Moses says, I will now turn aside to see, this wonderful sight, the bush burning and not being consumed.

Now this evening, I want to speak to you on the preludes to revival. P-R-E-L-U-D-E-S, if you don't just get my accent. The preludes to revival. Now, what are the preludes to revival? I want to mention three tonight, that I have known in my ministry during the past 45 years.

First, an awareness of God. Second, a humiliation before God. And third, a holy wonder at the things of God. First, an awareness of God. Second, a humiliation before God. And third, a wonder, a holy wonder at the things of God.

And so, I have these two verses for you tonight. The one tonight is Isaiah 57, verse 15, and Exodus 3 and 3. Now, may I say first of all, three things about the word revival, or the experience of revival.

Revival as a Longed-for Blessing

Revival is, first of all, a wishful word. A wishful word. Oh, how many believers have said, oh, at the tea table maybe, or at the dining table, or in the prayer meeting in the church, oh, I wish we could see revival.

Oh, if only revival could come to my house. If only revival could come to my church. And many a godly pastor, many a godly deacon has cried out, oh God, please send revival. And many believers have said, oh God, will I have to go to heaven without seeing mighty movements of the Holy Ghost here on earth?

And do you know that tens of thousands of believers in America have been translated home to glory, and have never yet seen a mighty manifestation of the Spirit of God in the midst? How tragic. How tragic.

How disheartening. It's a wishful word. I couldn't agree. I was introduced to the Central Baptist Church here by that blessed man of God, Dr. R .E. Naber. God gave me a revival. I went to Knoxville for two missionary meetings, and the Holy Ghost comes down in these missionary meetings, and I had to be there three weeks, I think, in Knoxville.

And I had to turn hundreds of people away from all the churches, including the First Baptist Church. But I got a long-distance call from Dr. Naber, and he said, James, I'm a mentor to the Central Baptist Church, and this is the most wonderful church in the whole of Tennessee, and I want you to come and get to know these people.

Now, Dr. Naber was a holy man of God. And I can remember ministering at the Every Creature Conference with Brother Rhys Howells in Wales, in Swanston, Wales. The idea of Dr. Paul Rader and R .E. Naber, Mrs. Charlotte Stallings, had been invited, as well as myself, by Rhys Howells.

And when I told Rhys Howells, I said, James, tell these poor Americans, I had not been to America yet, I wasn't even married, tell these poor Americans about what God is doing in the continent of Europe.

And Dr. Naber and Dr. Rader asked me questions, and I told them, and Dr. Naber, I could see the tears began to cry. That precious man of God, and he said, oh, he said, Brother Stuart, he said, could I come, could I come, could I come?

He said, I would like to be in the midst of revival before I go to heaven. I said, Brother Naber, I said, I'll shine your shoes if you come, please come. And do you know that when God blessed him in Budapest, in Hungary, and he was in the midst of revival, never had anybody pray for revival, because you know, when revival comes, nobody prays for revival, you just praise the Lord, but revival is here.

And I can remember him all shaking, trembling, and then he said to me, James, James, he said, I am the most fortunate evangelist and pastor in all the world. Now he said, I'm ready for heaven. God has answered my prayer.

I've been in the midst of a mighty movement of God the Holy Ghost. And you see, you know, when God began to work in the Outer Hebrides Islands off my coast of Scotland some 15 or 16 years ago, partly through the ministry of my dear friend Duncan Campbell, you know, the news spread like wildfire all over the Earth.

And hundreds and hundreds of people came from all over the Earth to steal New Zealand thousands of miles away. And they went up to these little islands, with only a thousand inhabitants in some of them, they came to see revival.

And, you know, Mr. Campbell was invited, Presbyterian minister, invited to go to almost every, I think he had to go to every part of Great Britain. Just now he's in India. And even though he's retired, he's got invitations of June to the Millennium.

I have enough invitations to do me, the older I am, the more invitations I seem to get. You know why? It's not because I can preach. Oh, no, no, no, I'm the greatest preacher you'll ever have. It's not because I can preach, I'm invited to go places.

No, I have invitations from all over the Earth. Why? Just because I've been in revival. And these here pastors, these here men of God, they're on for revival. The California's long distance, the writer's letters from exterior New Zealand, South Africa, from India, all over, all over the spirit.

Tell us about revival. What happens when revival comes? Well, we learn to see revival. And I have seen hundreds and hundreds of men, strong men, deacons and elders and pastors, and evangelists, weeping with, Oh, God, would you send us revival?

Oh, I say it's a wishful word. And then, you know, I call also an elusive word, or the experience may be elusive. It's an elusive word because, you know, many times we think we're on the brink of revival.

Now, I was in a church not very long ago, and the pastor said to me, Brother James, we're going to have revival in that church. Now, that church was on the brink of revival, and he's going to have revival.

They're going to have revival in that church. I know they will. But many times we come to the brink of revival, and our hearts are lifted up and we say, Hallelujah, we're going to have revival in our church.

And then, suddenly, our hopes are dashed to the ground. Nothing really happens. We can explain everything according to the natural. Now, when revival comes, you stand up and you say, It is a Lord's doing.

And it's marvelous and all right. We couldn't have done it. No evangelist has done it. Not even our pastor could do it. It's the Lord's doing. And it's marvelous and all right. And then, many times, you know, we hear of a mighty, mighty outbreak of the Spirit of God, say, in some great city in America, and then we rush there, and then we discover it's a flash in the fan.

It's not the real thing. All that glitters is not gold. And they said it was revival. But when you arrive there and you go around the churches, you'll find the churches are just as cold and as different.

Even though they're evangelical fundamentals, they're just as cold and indifferent as they were before they had this passion meeting. And yet, it was all over the Christian magazine, revival has come to the city through a great evangelistic effort.

I say, it is also an elusive word. But, you know, it is also a much misunderstood word, this word revival. You see, many a Christian will say, and maybe you would say tonight, whether you represent this church or another dear church in this city, you would say, oh, Brother Stewart, if only the sinners in Memphis would get excited about the gospel.

If only we come rushing to our gospel meetings, oh, what a mighty revival we'd have in Memphis. Oh, no, you'll be gone. That's wrong. That's a wrong conception, you see. You see, revival can only begin with the family of God.

And revival can only begin with the people of God. You see, the unsaved, they don't need revival. You can't revive them. You know why? Because they're dead. They need a resurrection. And you see, what is regeneration?

What is salvation? Or we use the word conversion. What is that? It's a resurrection, a spiritual resurrection. In John 5, 24, we read, Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that hears my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but is fast, present tense, from death, from the state of death, unto the state of life.

That's the unsaved. They need a resurrection. They're dead and sane. You can't revive somebody that's dead. But you see, you can only revive something that's living. And the person that needs to be revived physically is a person that's half-dying.

And may I say, there's half-dying Christians, or half-dead Christians. They're more dead than alive sometimes. And they're the ones that need to be revived. And so, revival is a much misunderstood word.

Revival Begins with the People of God

Revival begins with the saints of God. And so, here in Isaiah, in this chapter here, Isaiah 57, especially verse 15, we discover a sovereign God chooses to show us the pathway to revival. And he also, as a sovereign God, approaches us with a challenge of revival in this mass.

God is saying to us tonight, do you want revival? Do you really want revival in your hearts and lives? Are you willing to let me revive you tonight? Are you willing for revival to come to your church?

Are you willing for revival to come to your city? Do you really want revival to come to your city? And do you know that God is serious about this question? I've been disillusioned so, so many times in my, down the years, when I discovered that many, many people who talked so much about revival and saying we want to see revival, when it came really down to the showdown, they didn't really want revival.

You know, they thought they did, but when it came to the showdown, they didn't really want revival. And they turned back. I don't really know what they did want. Maybe they did want themselves, but they didn't want God to step them through and through.

And God is saying now, God is serious, and you can't mock God. God doesn't want you to mock Him. A person often prays in our meetings, oh God, fill me with the Holy Ghost. And then I go up afterwards and I say, brother, did He fill you with the Holy Ghost?

He said, what do you mean, brother? I said, are you not the man that prayed that God would fill you with the Holy Ghost tonight? He said, did I? I said, you certainly did pray that prayer. Oh, he said, I forgot.

Now that's blasphemy. And when we say we want revival, we must be careful because we're treading on holy ground. We're coming face to face with the Holy God. And so, we see that, I want you to notice that revival begins with an awareness of God.

An Awareness of God's Majesty and Holiness

We see that here in Isaiah 57, in this verse. An awareness of God among the believers and among the unbelievers. Although revival begins with you, my brother, my sister, when revival comes, there's such awareness of God that even the unsaved people know God is around.

I've been writing a lot on the revivals in Wales and studying about revivals in Wales. One of my books will be published by the CLC just now. And I can think of a revival that took place in Wales 300 years ago.

And there may have been 40 ,000 people out in the field. Now, you know, we think we are great when we get 40 ,000 people here in America now with organized evangelism spending tens of thousands of dollars to get these people together.

In the olden days, in the Holy Ghost work, they had 80 ,000 in the open air without any advertising, not a dollar spent. And the thousands gathered out in the open air. And one preacher said to a dear man of God, another preacher who had taken part that day, he said, Oh, Brother John, did you not see the crowd?

Wasn't it exhilarating? Did you not see the crowd? And the blessed preacher, the blessed referrer said, No, he said, I didn't see the crowd. I only saw God. And you know, it's possible for you to hear a revival meeting and 10 ,000 people there and you'd be absolutely oblivious to everybody in that meeting, including your wife, including your husband, your children, or your loved ones sitting beside you.

Why? Because there was a will of God. I can think of, in 1904, the Welsh Revival, when I was speaking to the Evan Roberts family, because you know, it was a children's revival. It was a young people's revival.

Evan Roberts was an old man. He was 24. The rest were youngsters, 16, 17. And when I asked the dear Roberts about the revival times, and the people who took part in these revivals, because we know hundreds of them and thousands of people who took part in these revivals are almost all going to heaven now.

And they said, Brother Stuart, the deadest thing that we can remember down the years is the awful sense of the presence of God. And you know, I can remember quite easily in a European city, and when I was functioning, every night for weeks, I felt as if every sentence I was uttering was like a sword piercing the unsaved hearts and consciences.

And I knew without a shadow of a doubt that hundreds were being saved. And I can remember dealing with anxious souls far into midnight, many, many anxious souls. And then when I leave that building, there would be crowds outside saying, Mr. Stuart, haven't you a word of grace for us?

We say in broken English, haven't you a word of grace for us? Haven't you a word of mercy for us? Or tell me how I can be saved? And many would come and say, we went home but we come back. We can't sleep.

Or please tell us how we can be saved. And there's such an awareness of God. And you know, you remember Jacob. When he awoke from his sleep, here I am, all he said, this is none other than the house of God, the very King of Heaven, this is God's place.

And then you remember he said, this is a dreadful place to be in. That's what he said, this is a dreadful place to be in. Why? Because Jacob had an awareness of the very presence of God. And so, may I just say, notice with you in this verse, you have, first of all, the majesty of God.

Then you have the holiness of God. Then you have the transcendence of God. And then, of course, you have humiliation before God. Now, friends, I wonder, have you sensed this awareness of God? Think of it, the majesty of God.

Then think of His holiness and His transcendence. Think about God's part above every one of us. And think how holy He is. And then think of how majestic He is. You know, I was just saying to a theologian the other day, I said, if I were to teach in a theological family, if I were to teach in a Bible school, the first thing I would like to teach would be the attributes of Jehovah.

The attributes of Jehovah. And if there's anything that we need to emphasize in our evangelical circles today, it is our majesty of God and the holiness of God. And His transcendence part above everything.

And then when we have this kind of gospel music today to arrest and amuse and entertain the unsaved young people, oh, my friends, how far away this is removed from revival. How far. Oh, friends, you know the majesty and the holiness of God.

Humility and Removing Stumbling Blocks

And when there is awareness of God Himself, then, friends, the believer is broken down before Him. You'll notice there, in the previous verse 14, cast ye up, cast ye up, prepare the way, take up the stumbling block out of the way of my people.

And then God says there, I will dwell in the high and holy place with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit. That is thoroughly penitent. To revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the contrite one, of the broken one.

And then you say, God says, now when you're broken down before me, I'll come in and live with you and I'll revive you. But before God can do that, friends, before God can revive us, we must remove these stumbling blocks out of the way.

Are you a stumbling block to another brother and sister? Are you a stumbling block to a weaker brother and a weaker sister? Are you a stumbling block to the unsaved coming to Christ? I wonder this evening, is there any doubtful indulgence in your life?

Unholy compromise is something in your life? Maybe it's debt, money you haven't paid? You know, Mrs. Stewart and myself had a very strange experience this past winter. The Holy Ghost told me, I want you to go to Norway.

Well, of course, we were already going to Denmark and Sweden. But the Holy Ghost said, I want you to go to Trondheim. And Mrs. Stewart said, I said to my wife Ruth, I said, we're going to Trondheim. And of course, naturally she said, oh no, no, no, not in the wintertime.

You see, that's beside the Arctic Circle. And our last evangelistic campaign we had there, I almost dropped down dead, just because of the cold in my heart, because you could hardly be half a minute outside that you wouldn't keel over.

I said, no, the Holy Ghost said we must go. And my wife said, couldn't we wait till summertime? I said, we must go. And of course, she said, if you believe God wants you to go, you must go. Now, I said, what are you going for?

I said, we've got to see our dear brother. And I mentioned his name. And of course, naturally said, and go up all that way in the wintertime and risk your life just for seeing a dear brother. We can maybe wait till the summer and see him, in the spring at least.

But the Holy Ghost said, go now. Well, I'll tell you why I wanted to go. There were two young men, one a Norwegian and one a Russian, a Latvian, whom the Holy Ghost used to challenge me as a young boy preacher in Britain to the millions in Europe, without Christ and without home.

And this was a Norwegian. Young man then, my own age. Young man about seven feet three. And he challenged me with evangelization all the way up in the land of the Midnight Sun. And you know, we had been friends for years.

But through some little bit of misunderstanding, there was a coldness in my heart. A sudden coldness in my heart for this dear brother. And I loved him. And God had used him rightly with me in these Anderson meetings.

We had preached to tens of thousands in Norway. We had seen great revivals together. And we would preach sometimes seven times a day. And the only time we could rest would be maybe three o 'clock in the morning just to grab a sandwich in between the meetings.

We had seen God work. But a little bit of coldness in my heart. And you know, when we arrived at Trondheim, it was cold. It was just as if a big giant hand was crushing my head down. And I could gasp for breath and I was going to die in this fog.

Our dear brother met us at the train. And he said, welcome, James and Ruth, back to Trondheim. Well, you know, we had a holy fellowship. And we preached together. He'll tell you again, like the old revival sites.

And then we hugged and kissed goodbye. And we had no sooner left Norway than we got a word from his evangelist son saying, dear daughter, say to Mrs. Stewart, my mother wants to write to you and tell you that dad has gone home to glory.

He took a heart attack. Now you see, wasn't that good of the Lord to me? We rounded off 40 years of Christian friendship. Because he challenged me at 20 years of age. Wasn't that good, good of the Lord?

Now supposing I got that letter from his son. Oh, friend, I would have broken my heart. I'd have broken my heart. Broken my heart. Wept and wept. And neither my wife nor my children nor you could ever have comforted me.

Do you have a cold heart to somebody? Do you have any jealousy to anybody? If you've got a cold heart to somebody, there's something wrong. That's a devil. He should have a warm heart. Friend, I could tell you'd be astonished at the terrible things that hinder God from reviving his people.

The terrible things that hinder God from blessing his people. Here's the condescension of God. I would come in and dwell with you, him that hath a lowly and contrite broken heart. Think of the condescension of God as well as the holiness of God and his transcendence.

But you know what? I could tell you the most awful stories, the terrible ugly things in the hearts and lives of God's people that would hinder revival coming. But yet I could tell you just the most sinful things that would hinder revival from coming to a chance.

And when I was praying over this message this day, because we're very careful that we have God's message for every meeting, whether it's an old one or a new one. God said to me, the biggest hindrance to revival may be in Memphis.

It's just Christians with cold hearts. I've known churches with no immorality, no jealousy, no backbiting, no squabbling, delightful, lovely Christians. But they have cold hearts. And their cold hearts would hinder revival.

So the path to revival is an awareness of God and then a humiliation before God. You're broken down and you cry, Oh God, forgive me in repentance. Oh God, for Christ's sake, forgive me. And you seek to get right with God first.

And then you seek to get right with your druddering sister. You know, we have a group of believers in Eastern Europe and they have a delightful custom. I wish we had it in America. Every time any of these members cannot attend the usual services of the church, they telephone and write the pastor apologizing.

And giving the reason why they're not there. Isn't that a delightful custom? Oh brother, if that happened in America, we would really get the post office out of bankruptcy in the U .S. Oh yes, oh yes.

Holy Wonder and the Transformed Church

Just cold and indifferent to the things of God. Now that brings me, that brings me to the other prelude and that is a sense of wonder at the things of God. As Moses said, Now I'll turn aside and see this wonderful sight.

This is a supernatural sight. This bush burning and burning and burning and never being consumed. Now there's nothing about us to suggest that we've seen something wonderful and glorious and overwhelming.

There's nothing to arrest the unsaved. Nothing to challenge the unsaved in our lives. They don't see the arresting marvel of a New Testament church today. Because we are still mediocre. Our Christian life is so tepid and cold and miserable.

Our Christianity is so mechanical. Why you're just so bored to death and sophisticated. Do you know that you are a, ask any of the missionaries that you support from this group, and we're included in that number, ask any of the missionaries this question.

They'll back you, they'll back me up. You know, you do not know how you look in America. You are the most bored, sophisticated Christians in the entire world. I'll put you, I'll put Britain before you, the very Christians first and you second.

Now, you ask any missionary. You go to the mission field, go to the Philippines, go to Korea, go to Russia, where they don't have any of the wealth we have, where they don't have any of the buildings we have, and where they don't even have the great evangelical background that we have.

And yet you can see the arresting marvel of a transformed church. These sinful, ordinary, peasant believers filled with the glory of God and filled with wonder at the things of God, standing on wonder.

And when the missionary comes home, it's like a bucket of icy cold water, and he prays. He has to pray for grace to take him. Because there's a sophistication and a coldness and a deadness, and Christians look so bored.

Bored, absolutely bored. You know, I was in the church not very long ago, and I slipped in, into the Sunday school, and they were just closing the Sunday school down, and the pastor said, now, he started to say, now, don't forget, now, we have Donna Stewart with us this morning service.

And he started to blow me up, and I didn't like that. And then he kept on pleading with them to please remain for the morning service. Now, he didn't know I was in. But I thought, oh, God. I said, they come to so low a place.

There were maybe 500 there. But here was a man of God, and they're all supposed to be evangelicals born again. And here is the dear man of God has to plead with his own people to stay behind for the morning service.

And then my, I had a, my mind went away to Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Russia, and Bulgaria, and all these countries I know. Then I thought of my brothers and my sisters meeting secretly under sanctions of death, and meeting for hours, risking their lives just to have a holy fellowship, one with another.

Oh, friend. Where are we tonight? And I believe, friend, that the appeal to revival is a holy wonder of the very things of God. Yes. The world passes us by. And the average Christian life is a tame affair.

So monotonous. And the, the average Christian life is, doesn't have any, any, has no challenge at all to the unsaved. There's no even attraction to the unsaved. They say, well, we've got enough trouble to go home without you telling us about the Lord.

We were, as a reminder, preparing this message tonight about our little, our daughter Sharon, our youngest child. And she'll be soon 19, she's preparing to be a missionary. But you know, when she was a little lassie in a, in a school in England, where, a missionary school, for missionary children, she was witnessing to an unsaved little girl, you know, not in, it was a day school young lady, not one of the missionary studies, but one who came to the grammar school during the day.

And she was witnessing to her about 10 years of age. And oh, she said, Sharon, I don't want to be a Christian. It's an awful, it's an awful dull thing to be a Christian. And so she was telling her English auntie, as I say, she was staying with his family for a few years.

We, Mr. Stewart and myself, had the joy of letting her stay in that home for two or three years. And she said to her so-called English auntie, auntie, you know what that girl said to me? She said, you know, that Christian life is such a dull affair.

I don't want to become a Christian. And her English auntie said, well, Sharon, why didn't you tell us a glorious thing to be a Christian? And then Sharon said, oh, auntie, sometimes I think it's dull myself.

Well, she was 10 years of age. Sometimes I think it's dull myself. Oh, you know, I thought a lot of, a lot of older people, they're bored, they're sophisticated. The Bible's a dull book for them. They don't say, hallelujah, where's my Bible?

You know? Oh, yeah. The prayer meeting's a dull affair for them. Absolutely dull. It bores them to death to be in a prayer meeting. And, you know, many, many a Christian man would rather go playing golf than go to a prayer meeting.

Many would rather go hunting fish than go out fishing for souls. They have more enthusiasm catching salmon and certainly have catching fish for Jesus Christ. I know what I'm talking about. You know, I was invited for a week's meetings in a church in another state some years ago.

A very, very godly pastor. And I was walking down before God, before I went, crying to God for revival in that church. A wonderful, independent, fundamental, evangelical church. But, you know, we had arranged the meetings the wrong week.

You know why? Because the World Series was on that week. And Jesus Christ and the New York Yankees couldn't compete together. The New York Yankees won. There wasn't a man in that church that got excited about me.

All they got excited was about who was going to win the World Series. Now, friend, I was a sportsman. I don't mind a man getting excited about sports or excited about playing golf or fishing. But, my dear friend, if I get more excited playing football than winning souls for Jesus Christ, there's something wrong with me.

Come to say amen. Of course there's something. We were in a meeting not very long ago up north. And a dear, dear man in the church. And I never met a man that was so enthusiastic about golf. And, you know, golf started in my country almost 300 years ago.

And almost every village has two or three golf courses. So naturally I know about golf. And we talked about golf. But that man was more excited about golf than he was about the Lord Jesus Christ. And yet he was our leader in that church.

But if it was a golf engagement or a praying engagement, there's no chance for the Lord to get in. He would be up there golfing, not there praying. Now, friend, what's wrong with the Holy Wonder of the things of God?

You know, friend, the church began with the Holy Wonder. That's why I read in the book of Acts, the church began with the Holy Wonder. When the Holy Ghost comes down to be at Pentecost and the Church of Jesus Christ was formed, they were everywhere preaching the word.