The Church in Bondage — James Robison

Revelation Through the Holy Spirit

And he does build his Church on the rock of revelation, where he makes alive in our heart and in our spirit what he has written. It is not additional revelation, it is not something he adds to, but rather it is the revelation of what he has already said, which, as you well know, many of his own covenant people did not understand what he had written.

And so he took what was written in the sacred scrolls and scripture and wrote it in the hearts of his people. And that is the ministry and the work of the Holy Spirit to guide us to all truth. And we have no need that anyone teach us.

We have the unction of the Holy Spirit within us, and he will teach us. And that is found in the second chapter of 1 John, as in the fourth chapter you find the warning that you must discern the spirits, for there are many false prophets who have gone forth.

And so you are going to have to be able to discern the spirit of those who are speaking and teaching. And we have not been trained to do that. We have been trained to simply sit down and listen to men.

And when men become our source, then we do not have the protection of the heavenly angels, but rather we become vulnerable to the unholy and evil angels. And we find ourselves assaulted by the enemy. And he says as Isaiah spoke, lie down, your tormentors have said, lie down that we may run over you.

And you have been laying down and you have actually become like a smooth street for them to run on. You find in the Old Testament that when God's people did not walk in the word, when they did not walk in their covenant relationship in obedience to what he said, and bear in mind that it is the nature of righteousness to heed the word of God.

We do not obey the word and thereby become righteous, but because righteous Jesus lives within those of us who have been born again by the word of God, it is the nature of the living and righteous Jesus to fulfill the law.

So it is our nature to do the things which he has written and to keep the law. When we do not do it, we become vulnerable to the enemy. And the enemy not only comes against us, which he always does, even when you walk in righteousness, the enticer and the tempter will come, he will call, he will entice, he will accuse you, he will seek to distract you and to deceive you.

But you have a shield of faith that quenches all of these fiery darts of the wicked if you have put on the whole armor of God. Now then, when you disregard the need for the armor, when you do not live by the word of God, when you do not do the word, not only hear it, but do it, when you do not live by faith, but rather by sight, then you not only become vulnerable to the fiery darts of the wicked, but God himself will send the enemy against you, for he has appointed him to judge, he has created him to correct, and you will find yourself being overwhelmed by the power of the enemy, whom God himself sends against his people who do not bring forth fruit.

Bearing Fruit and Abiding in Christ

You must bring forth fruit. You must allow the Holy Spirit to live through you, and you are to be abiding in him as one of the branches, bringing forth the fruit of love and joy and peace, all of the aspects of the nature and character of Jesus.

You are to be fruitful and multiply. This is pleasing to the Lord. When you don't do it, then the Lord says, I'll pull down the hedge, I will cause you no longer to be watered, no longer to be pruned, but rather to be trampled ground.

I will even cause death to open its jaws, and Jerusalem and all of her splendor will descend into the mouth of Sheol, or the grave, or Hades, into death. He says, I will whistle to the nations, to the enemies, and call them to come.

I will send my army among you, the locusts and the creeping things, and they will devour, they will devour. You will be overgrown with weeds. You will be overtaken by the work of the enemy, and no longer a fertile and fruitful field.

So God is serious about his Word, and you and I are to be doers of the Word. When we do the Word, when we walk in a covenant relationship, we're able to hear God, we have a relationship with him, we have fellowship with him, and the key to you living in faith, the key to you overcoming the enemy, the key to being in a high power, the key to having the rear guard and the shield of faith, and the armor of God is to abide in Christ, in his Word, in his name.

That is positional, that is a lifestyle, and when you do it, you not only see the enemy coming, you recognize how he operates, and you stop him in the name of the Lord Jesus, and you live as an overcomer.

Spiritual Warfare and Victory in Christ

Now that's the way God intends for his people to live. That's the way God wants you to live. And you've got to understand that your battle is not with flesh and blood, you're not wrestling with men, you're not wrestling with your own flesh, you are wrestling with powers and principalities of darkness.

You are in a battle in the spiritual realm with the powers of deception, destruction, the powers of darkness. And when you recognize where the battle is, and you get in the right fight, you will no longer find yourself struggling with your flesh, but you will find yourself doing battle with the enemy that Jesus Christ came to equip us to do battle with victoriously.

The battle's already been won, it's a fixed fight, folks, and if you'll recognize who you are in Christ, you can do battle and win. Now the Lord wants to capture your thoughts. He wants to move you into a position tonight and keep you abiding there where every thought is captive obedient to Jesus.

He wants his word to prevail in you. Now this means that you're going to have to overcome a lifetime of living by your senses and living in response to symptoms and sounds or words of men. You're going to have to silence all of that, and you're going to have to tune your spiritual ear to hear the voice of Jesus.

And when you hear him say to you, rise and be healed, when you hear him say, you're an overcomer, that problem cannot overcome you. I have already overcome it. I came for this reason, not only to reveal the works of the enemy, but to destroy the works of the devil.

And so you can live victoriously, not without a battle. He does not deliver you from the battle, that's heaven. He equips you to fight the battle. He delivers you from the bondage of the enemy and enables you to fight victoriously, and that's exactly what God wants to do.

Micah and the Covenant People

Well, I want you to open your Bible to the Old Testament, to a book that some of you may not be too familiar with, but we're going to see some beautiful truths that the Lord has for us right now today.

Micah chapter 1, M-I-C-A-H, Micah. It's in the latter part of the Old Testament. Right before Nahum, and right before Habakkuk, and Zephaniah, and Zechariah, and Malachi. Micah. Jonah, Micah. The book of Micah.

Now it is a shame that we today so often feel compelled to make very clear that truth is always truth, and that if God spoke to people at any time in history concerning their deeds, and it was sin for them to rebel, and it was sin for them to go into idolatry, even religious idolatry, that it is still sin today.

It seems unnecessary, and yet essential. Tragic, it ought to seem unnecessary, but yet it seems essential. Now we explain that what God said to Israel, He is also saying to those of us today who are in covenant with Him.

And we need to understand that we, the believers, the descendants of Abraham, the children of righteousness, the children of promise, those who are born again by faith, we are Israel. We are the covenant people, and we are the descendants of Abraham, and God has a word for us.

He tells us in 1 Corinthians 10, concerning the Old Testament and Israel, that these things were written for our instruction, and they happened to Israel, even in the Old Testament, as an example for us.

In 1 Peter chapter 1, we find Peter referring to the prophets who were inspired and carried along by the Holy Spirit, and this is a very important statement. He said that these prophets who prophesied in their own day, knew they were not serving themselves, but us.

They were serving us, the New Testament, the new covenant people, those of us who would enter into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. And so they were writing for us. It is not an exaggeration, it is not improper, it is not improper interpretation to say to you that that which God said to Israel has an application to us today, nor is it an exaggeration or an improper statement to say that much of what God wrote in the Old Testament, which we have perceived to be God speaking only to the nation Israel, is in itself improper interpretation when in fact God was not even speaking in that instance on numerous occasions to the nation Israel, but rather to the covenant people who entered into the eternal and everlasting covenant, those who were born of the Spirit, the descendants of Abraham, the daughters of Zion, the children of the living God, through faith in Jesus Christ.

So God is speaking to us. God is not interested in receiving an award from the Christian body or the Jewish body for having written an accurate history book. He's not interested in being your class historian, although he wrote a historical account that is as accurate as God himself.

It is scientifically, geographically, archaeologically, chronologically accurate. It is the Word of God, the infallible, forever settled, inerrant Word of God, which he always watches over to perform, which will not return to him void, and which God says heaven and earth will pass away, but my Word will not pass away.

This Word, my dear friends, is a Word for us today, not simply a history of Israel or God's dealing with the first covenant people Israel. It is a written, recorded, eternal revelation of God's dealings with his people.

It is God expressing his nature and his character, revealing himself to man, and desiring to reveal himself through those who believe him. Now, this is a war manual as well as a love story. This is a book telling you how to go to war with the right enemy and always win.

It is a book written to tell you how to always triumph in Jesus Christ, how to overcome the world, because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world. You do not have to be overcome. You ought to, in Christ, become overcomers, priests and kings and ambassadors and ministers of his grace, witnesses of his life.

This is the will of God for us. This book was written for your own edification. It was written that you might grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus Christ. Jesus and Paul and the apostles taught us concerning Christ himself from the Old Testament, from the Psalms, from the law, from the prophets, both major and minor.

So he is revealing himself to us. He is speaking to us today through his word. And in the book of Micah, we find God speaking to us even today. Beginning in chapter 1 of Micah, beginning at verse 2, "'Hear, O peoples, all of you.

Listen, O earth, and all it contains. Let the Lord God be a witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple. For behold, the Lord is coming forth from his place.'". There are many references in scripture to the enemy coming forth from his place.

God sending the enemy in judgment. Now God says, I'm coming forth and I will come down and I will tread on the high places of the earth, the high places. The mountains will melt under him and the valleys will be split and like wax melting before the fire, like water poured down a steep place.

All this is for the rebellion of Jacob, the covenant people, and for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the rebellion of Jacob? Is it not the world, Samaria? You've become worldly. You've become a harlot.

You've gone back to the world. In Jeremiah chapter 2, you find God referring to his people again being in bondage. And he said to his people, "'Have you not done this to yourselves? Thy forsaking the Lord your God and returning to Egypt to drink the waters of the Euphrates and the waters of Assyria.

You've turned back to walk away I told you not to go.'". This is exactly what the church has done today. We have turned our back on God. We no longer depend upon the expression of the supernatural God through his people, but rather we turn back to the manipulative skills of the arm of the flesh.

We are trusting in numerous warriors. We're trusting in our programs. We're trusting in our training. But we do not have the manifestation of the supernatural God that demands to control our lives. So we have actually brought the defeat and the despair and the depression on ourselves.

And God says, I'm going to trample down the high places. The high places, the lifted up places, the mountains and the hills. In other words, God says that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, they're not fleshly, but they're mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, to the tearing down of the high and exalted speculations of men.

God says I'm going to tear down every high and lofty thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. I'm going to smash your idols. I'm going to level the exalted places of the earth. God's going to bring them down.

We have spent years building high places. We have spent years exalting what we think, exalting our positions. And we are going to find that everything which can be shaken will be. And only that which cannot be shaken will remain.

And that which cannot be shaken is the word of the eternal living God. God is going to tear down the exalted high places. Verse 6, I will make Samaria a heap of ruins in the open country, planting places for a vineyard.

I will pour her stones down into the valley, and I will lay bare her foundations. In Ezekiel chapter 13, there is the reference where God says He's going to tear down all of the walls that we built and dobbed with untempered martyr, where the prophets had received a vain vision and where they prophesied after vanity and after their own ego.

God says I'm going to tear down the walls and I'm going to reveal the foundation that you built on. It was not me, but you built on your own spirit of divination. You built on your own ideas. Paul said, for of a foundation can no man lay than that is laid which is Christ Jesus.

Now if any man build upon this foundation, what are you building? God says I'm going to test what you build, how you build. I'm going to test your method. I'm going to test what you're doing, whether it is wood, hay and stubble, or whether it's gold, silver and precious stone.

And I'm going to test it with the intensity of the fire of my presence and my judgment. My dear friend, when persecution, when the release of the adversary comes, those who are walking in the righteousness of Christ will be strengthened and purified by the persecution and by the affliction that comes.

Because Paul said to the Thessalonians, you've been destined for it. I told you it would be this way. Jesus said all that live godly will suffer persecution just as Paul did. He said that you're going to be persecuted like the prophets were.

But when you are, bless those that curse you. Leap for joy. They did the same thing to the prophets. You need to expect it. And this persecution will purify the believer. The more separated you are unto God, the more intense the persecution and the greater the purification of the believer.

If you're not suited up in Jesus, if you're not walking in the Spirit, then the fury of the fire, the fury of the enemy will burn up and consume the wood, hay, and stubble. God says, all of her idols, verse 7, will be smashed.

All of her earnings will be burned with fire and all of her images I will make desolate for she collected them from a harlot's earnings and to the earnings of a harlot they will return. This means that we are producing the works of the flesh rather than the works of the Spirit.

Healing, Prayer, and the Problem of Unanswered Requests

Many people ask the question, why aren't our prayers answered? Why don't we have power with God? Recently in my own home, we've gone through a tremendous battle with a serious problem as far as we were concerned because two years ago the Lord revealed to us that we have living in us healing, Jesus.

Now, if there were no scriptures in the Bible concerning healing, if there were no promises, which there are so many, that it would literally take us hours simply to read them if we did nothing but read the scriptures, both Old and New Testament.

You will find that three of the four Gospels, one half of the passages and the verses in those three Gospels deal with the healing ministry of Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ told us to go. And in his name to heal the sick.

This is the ministry of Jesus through the body of Christ, through you as a believer, not through some special person who may be caught and trapped into merchandising the gifts or the expression of God's power.

This is the tendency the church gets into. But rather we're all to go and do the works of Jesus. We find that Jesus Christ lives in us, that through his shed blood, we not only have the remission and forgiveness of our sins, but we also find that there is healing.

And if there is ever to be healing, it's in the blood. If it's grace, if it's a gift, if it's a blessing, it's in the blood. If it's not in the blood, it's works. If it's works, it's flesh. If it's the law, it's death.

And my friend, if we return to the flesh, then we're subjecting ourselves as bond slaves again to Satan and not to God. So if healing is ever to be yours, it is in the atoning finished works of Christ, whether you receive it now or in heaven, it's still in the blood.

And my dear friend, you can appropriate now the finished works of Calvary and you can have healing right now. It's yours in Jesus Christ. It is yours right now. Don't get hung up or caught up on why something doesn't happen or why didn't this happen.

The best answer so often is simply, I don't know. I don't know.

But we have it. It's ours.

Now that's the fact. You say, but if we don't see it, what's the problem? The problem is still on our end. God still wants to show us some things we're not yet hearing. I don't understand. I pray for some folks, they don't get well.

I don't know why, but I'm not the judge. It's not for me to even know the times or seasons, which the Father puts in his own power. It's for me to do the ministry of Jesus. It's for me to wait on the Lord.

And I know that God said through Isaiah that the whole land mourns because of the curse. It's like a curse over this entire country. Let me tell you something. Our nation right now groans because of the curse of a disregard of the very Word of God.

We have a disregard of the sanctity and sacredness of life itself. We walk in and wish to be a healthy people when we are murdering millions of little innocent, unborn babies in the wombs of their mother.

And then we wonder, why does this nation stagger because of the curse? Because we have disregarded the Word of God. Somebody says, we're not under the effect of the curse anymore. Jesus became a curse for us.

Now, wait a minute. Don't stretch Scripture into non-reality, into untruthfulness. Sure, Jesus became the curse, but he also became sin. He became sin for you. He became sin. But is there still sin in the world?

Can you still sin? You can rebel against God. You can clench your fist in the face of holy God and say, my will, not yours, and then act upon your own rebellious, self-centered, self-indulgent appetite.

But he still became sin for you. And if you appropriate the finished works of Christ, you can overcome the tempter and overcome sin. You don't have to let sin reign in your mortal body. But it does in many of you.

And so does the curse. You see, only in the revelation do you find that the curse is done away with and that there's no more curse. There is still the effect of the curse. We walk in covenant and obedience.

We receive the blessings of the Lord as a people. Listen, many times innocent people suffer because of the sin of the community of believers. When Achan took the accursed thing into his tent, 36 innocent men were killed when they went out against a small nation of Ai right after they had smashed the walls of Jericho by the word of God.

Yet one man in that body of believers took the accursed thing into his tent. 36 widows were made. 36 little families had no more father. 36 women no husband. 36 innocent warriors perished. Why? Because God is more serious about His word than you ever imagine.

It is a fact. Your sins and my sins affect others. The sins of parents affect the children. God said to the third and the fourth generation. We don't believe that. We don't take God serious. But God said it and God meant it.

It's a fact. Well, my friend, many of you are suffering right now. Many of you are suffering in your own body because of the sins of someone before you. And that's going to have to be dealt with. You may ask how?

Through Christ. Through renouncing the effect. You say, how do you do that? By repenting. How do you repent? You agree with God. I've been affected by the sins of my ancestors. That's agreeing with God.

All repentance is is agree with God. Call it what God calls it. Call it sin. Call it the curse. Call it rebellion. Call it what God calls it. Get it under the blood. Acknowledge it as sin. Acknowledge the need.

Agree with God. And deal with it in the name of Jesus. That's the only way you're going to overcome the effect of it. Obviously, we don't understand all that's entailed. We don't understand all that's involved in leading people through deliverance and walking in victory.

We don't understand what it is oftentimes to not only be filled with the Spirit, to experience a work of God in the Spirit. We don't know what it is to walk in the Spirit. It's one thing to say, I've been filled with the Holy Spirit.

It's another thing to walk in the Holy Spirit. We've got to learn to do it. We've got to learn to live victoriously. Well, when you fight violence, when you find yourself in a war with a problem, then you must go to the Word of God and search the Scriptures.

If there were nothing in Scriptures concerning healing, no promise of healing, there is enough in Scripture concerning the power of prayer, concerning the promise of God to answer your prayers and to give you the desires of your heart if you delight yourself in the Lord, to know that if there were no promises concerning healing, the promises concerning prayer would enable you to deal with any disease known to man.

God has given you power in prayer. Jesus Christ said, be it done to you according to your faith. If you can believe, nothing, nothing shall be impossible. My dear friend, the promise of God is absolutely eternal.

We don't know what it is to live by faith because we're compelled to live by sight. We found ourselves in a battle. Our little 11-year-old daughter began to go through something that was as significant and would have been devastating to her little character and personality had God not built into her very strong character.

She found herself in the same type of battle our son found himself in when he was 12 years old and his entire body was covered with the effects of acne, infectious acne, the severest possible type. It seems to attack the body like cancer attacks the body and yet it's a very visible thing, not as damaging and as destructive in the end result as cancer, but it's as difficult to deal with.

And yet our son in the name of Jesus began to believe God like no one would ever see and to take care of that stuff. I can tell you that after a few months of battling and the Lord changing his own little character and strengthen him as a man of God, he so dealt with that stuff that it was gone.

He has typical teenage problems with his complexion, with ordinary pimples and oily skin like any kid has when he's going through that change in his teenage years. But acne is gone and it's a beautiful, beautiful testimony of what God did and I thank the Lord for it.

But our little girl had something come up on her lip. We don't know whether it was the beginning, started by an injury, but nevertheless there was a huge growth that came on her lip and it was a very unsightly thing.

It was cellular, modular, and the fact that it appeared to be a rapidly growing little tumor and it got bigger. It became like a cigarette ash actually hanging out her lip and then ultimately it got to be more like a bulb, like a small marble on her lip and it was one of the most unsightly things you've ever seen.

She couldn't walk in the room, everybody not stare at her. I mean she knew that. She's a very pretty little girl and she knew everywhere she went everybody was staring at her. Now this becomes a very, very devastating thing for a little girl and you can imagine what it did to Betty and to me.

So we prayed with her and I mean we really prayed. We had other people pray for her. We spoke death on that little growth and we commanded it to go and we would see changes in it but it didn't go away and so she consulted two different doctors and one of them was a medical doctor and the other was a dermatologist and they both said we won't touch it.

It's got to be removed. It won't go away. The dermatologist said it won't go away. It's got to be removed but because of where it is, because of the cosmetic effect, we recommended she go to a plastic surgeon to have it removed and that was set up because the plastic surgeons were so busy she couldn't get in for about three or four weeks and so here she is with this ugly thing on her lip going around with it and she finally gets in to see the plastic surgeon and as many doctors, which we just figured he'd take it off right then and she'd come on home and we'd thank the Lord that God used a doctor to help deal with a need in her little life.

Well, he didn't take it off. He set the appointment for June the 6th. So here she comes home with this stinking old ugly growth still on her lip and mother and daddy are just pretty well wiped out. We want it to go away.

Well, I was out of town. I called Betty. I said, did they take the little growth off today and she said, no, they didn't. I could tell Betty was disappointed and I said, well, why didn't they do it? Why didn't they do it right now?

Why didn't you insist that they just do it? And Robin got on the phone and she's 11 and she's just a little girl but when she got on the phone it was like I was talking to a grown woman. Childish things have been put away and she became very mature.

She said, daddy, I want to tell you why I think he didn't do it. Said, I really believe that God told me that he wanted to do this that God wants to take this thing away. And I said, well, that's wonderful.

And that's real tough to say, well, you're a little ding-a-ling, you're a little kid. You don't know anything about stuff like this. You know, there's something in the Bible about somehow offending a little believer and I didn't really want to spend the rest of my life going around with a millstone tied around my neck trying to preach.

You'd be surprised how many churches, members and pastors go around with the yoke of oppression on them that was placed there like a millstone because they in fact hindered the faith and the potential faith of little childlike believers.

See, we don't really encourage faith. We destroy any possibility of faith. We tear it down. We build up confidence in the flesh but we tear down confidence in the Lord. We make a mockery of everything.

We make a mockery of somebody if they prayed for sick people and they didn't get well, then we make a mockery of them and say, see, it didn't work. They should have been at the doctor. But have you ever stopped to think how many people died on the operating table and how many people die in the hospitals and how many people die because of improper medication?

A whole lot more than dying prayer meetings. Now, are we going to spend the rest of our lives are we going to spend the rest of our lives scoffing at the medical profession, making a mockery of doctors and accusing all of them of malpractice?

Do you know that there is a little preacher right now in West Texas that is being tried for practicing medicine without a license because he prayed for a man that was sick? The man died. And so they are bringing a charge against him.

It's already on. It's already in court. They're bringing in some of the big Baptist professors to testify against the man. He never told this man not to go to a doctor. To the contrary, after he prayed for the man, he said, and the man said, I believe I'm healed.

He said, I really believe you ought to go on and see your doctor and let him confirm it. And the man died. I believe that night. And so they're trying this man for practicing medicine without a license.

Do you know that in over 20 cities in America right now that home Bible studies are going to have to get a license from the city council to continue? That came up in Dallas when they were going to have to have a license to have a Bible study.

This is America I'm talking about. In 20 cities, it's already on the docket for vote. What we're doing is we're assaulting any possibility of believing faith coming up. Well, my little daughter said, I believe God told me.

Well, I just said, amen. And when I got home, I told her, I said, Robin, you know, we've been praying about this thing for a long time and I know you've been praying about it. I said, God tells us that there's some reasons our prayers don't get answered and God has prompted me that you and I need to read the book of James and find out when we ask and don't receive why perhaps.

And remember, Robin, it says in the first chapter of James that a double-minded person does not receive anything from the Lord. I said, Robin, get into the book of James, let God talk to you. And I said, I'm going to do the same thing.

That little girl got in the book of James, her whole countenance changed. She matured tremendously going through the word of God. She began to see areas of need in her life that were more important to God than that bump on her lip.

She began to see a need to walk according to the word and will of God. Do you know what stuck out the most to her? She noticed that the control of the tongue was important. She noticed that she was a little bit self-centered sometimes and somewhat double-minded, but do you know what really stuck out in her mind?

This astounded me. This would not have been something I thought she would see. What stuck out in her mind, she said, Daddy, I think it's that part where God said, humble yourself before him and resist the devil.

And with mourning and with sorrow, brokenness because of your sin, you'll find yourself in the presence of God. She said, Daddy, I believe that's what God wants me to do. He wants me to get in his presence.

I thought, my goodness, 11 years old. Well, this beautiful little girl continues on. Last Sunday night, one week from this Sunday night that we just passed, my wife in the middle of the night had a dream.

It was so clear, it was like a vision. She dreamed that this huge little tumor, you know, I mean, it's big on your lip, maybe the size of a marble, fell in Robin's hand during the night, and there it was.

My wife got up excited. She had cried and wept and prayed over Robin. I was preaching in Ohio and in Arkansas and St. Louis, and she went in there to see if it was gone, and it wasn't. As a matter of fact, it looked worse.

Well, when I came home, Robin had asked Mama, said, do you think that might've been a vision? Betty said, I hope so. Well, when I got home on Tuesday morning, it looked worse than it'd ever looked. By Thursday morning, it was about three times the size it had ever been.

It was horrible. I would look at it and cringe. And finally I said, Betty, we're gonna go ahead and call that plastic surgeon and tell him that she can't brush her teeth. She missed two days of school because she couldn't even eat, and it was just terrible.

And I said, well, he's got to see her now. And little Robin said, I still just believe that God's gonna take this thing away. Well, we went to Randy's Little League ball game on Thursday night, and Dudley Hall brought one of our directors over there from Tennessee, and you saw it.

And did it look like it was getting well, Dudley? It was so horrible that he and his son could hardly stand to look at Robin. Dudley told me that he went home and got his entire family, and they gathered together to pray for Robin.