God Will Come to You Where You Are — Carter Conlon

And greetings to all of those that are with us tonight online from all around the world and those that will be joining us in your time zone in just a little while from now. And I trust and believe that you will be greatly blessed as we continue to pray for you and to believe God for miracles in your life.

God Comes to Us in Our Struggles

And I believe tonight you're going to experience that kind of a miracle. You know, a lot of people are sitting in darkened places tonight and listening to this prayer meeting and you ask yourself the question, how can I get to God?

Well, the good news for you is that you don't have to get to God. God's coming to you right where you are, right in your darkened place, in your struggle, your trial, your difficulty. I'm gonna show you that in the Bible.

Then we're gonna have a prayer together with you, a prayer of freedom, a prayer of deliverance. We're going to believe for your miracle, your healing, your situation, your deliverance, whatever it is, your despair, your suicidal thoughts.

We're gonna pray that the triumph of Christ would override all of these things. And the promise of God, not only to forgive you, but to give you a new and abundant life here on this side of eternity will become yours.

That's why we've gathered in this sanctuary. There's students here and visitors here and people from the Summit Campus Church, from all over the community and all over the world. And we're gathered here for one reason, it's for you, it's to pray for you and to believe God for your salvation and for your deliverance.

And you can believe with us if you want tonight, and even if you don't, God's still coming to where you are this evening. Just as we heard the testimony of the atheist who just happened to be in church.

He didn't happen to be there, God brought him there because the Lord was gonna visit him and transform his thinking and transform his life ultimately. I was on a Zoom call today with the chaplain from Yale University.

And some of you would remember last year we went to Yale University and we had a worldwide prayer meeting from there, one of our meetings. And he was telling us today that you guys lit a fire that's still burning at Yale right now.

Now, typically at Yale University, there are about 40, and a good year would give them 50 students in the Christian Union. They had an open house last week and 250 students from Yale University showed up.

The returning students who remember last year have begun spontaneous open prayer meetings out in the public, worship times, and there's a lot of students beginning to attend that. And even faculty, they tell me, are passing by and they're saying, keep it going, keep it going.

We want to be part of this as well. Thank God, thank God. We were also on Zoom call at the same time with the chaplain from UPenn who heard about it and he's seen the video of the service at Yale and he wants in.

And so good news for all the Summit students and anybody else who's visiting tonight. The buses are coming here sometime in the next few months. We're heading off to UPenn on a Wednesday night. And Pastor Teresa and I met with the chaplain who's pastoring the church that was instrumental in the founding of Harvard University.

The church sits somewhere between those two campuses, MIT and Harvard, and he said, we want in. We want to pray as well. So we're gonna be organizing a prayer meeting at the church that's right in the center of Harvard and MIT, built in 1642.

The church in which the first ordained minister in America was ordained. The church that was responsible for the establishing of Harvard University. We're going to be there and we're gonna be praying on a Wednesday night from there too as well in the not too distant future.

Probably sometime early or a little later into the new year. So we've got some great, great days ahead of us. And we talked today about Yale now bringing a busload of young people, not only to visit us here, but to come with us to UPenn.

And after we're done with the prayer meeting in UPenn, we talked to the chaplain there about the students from Yale and UPenn boarding buses and coming to Harvard. This is going to be a student initiated prayer awakening in our Ivy League schools in this part of the country.

And we thank God for that with all of our heart. The chaplain from UPenn is asking for a prayer meeting to come there, the very latest by the spring. And he asked if we could pray for the Christian students on campus to step out, to join Bible classes and join the Christian groups, to have courage.

The same thing that's happening in Yale right now. A lot of Christian young people probably or staff were there, but they were too afraid to be identified. And suddenly they're just stepping out and going public and saying, I'm a follower of Jesus Christ.

I'm not ashamed to worship him in public. I'm not ashamed to pray. And suddenly they're finding that there's other people who want to join. This thing is going to be bigger than we can understand. We had that feeling when we went there.

And by God's grace, by God's grace, Summit Campus of all places has just called us. All we are, I told them today is we're just a match coming to light your candle. That's all we are. We're only there for one night.

We light your candle and away we go. And it's up to you to stay public with your faith in Jesus Christ. And by God's grace, what we saw in Asbury College, by God's grace, may it come to our Ivy League schools across the nation.

Courageous Public Faith on Campus

Father, we do pray, Lord, for UPenn tonight. God, thank you for your God. You're putting chaplains in there that love you. You're putting chaplains in these major universities and you're doing it sovereignly.

We're watching it happen because you intend, Lord, to visit these institutions that were founded for the training of the ministry. Father, we thank you, Lord, that you're bringing some of these universities back to their roots again, where you're going to be glorified.

Thank you, Lord Jesus Christ, for the young people that are having the courage to step out and identify as your followers. God, give them courage tonight. Give them courage, Lord. Give their chaplains courage.

Give the Christian teachers courage, Lord. Let cowardice not be a part of Christian life any longer in these campuses. God Almighty. Lord, your word says, let the redeemed of the Lord say so. So this is our prayer tonight, God, that those who have found freedom and grace in Jesus Christ would not be ashamed of their testimony, would not cower back because of the sneering and mocking of those who oppose their own salvation.

God, I pray that you would baptize them with an anointing of power and of love and of a soundness of mind, that it would cast away all the fear of any opposition they're going to face. Lord, there's a high calling on the lives of those who are called by your name in this generation.

Would you help each of us to fulfill that calling and to not draw back, Lord God, from what we are called to be? You said we are a city set on a hill that should not be hidden. We are lights in the darkness showing the way to eternity to those who live in a place and don't know how to get out of it.

And Father, we thank you, God, with all our heart for what you're going to do this year. This is a great year. This is a year of miracles. And we thank you for it in Jesus' name, amen. Psalm 40 tonight, and after the short sharing of God's word, we're gonna come to communion together this evening.

If you have any juice in your home, any crackers, any bread, anything like that, you're more than welcome to celebrate the victory of Christ with us tonight and the depth of his love for you. Psalm 40, a psalm of David.

David’s New Song in the Horrible Pit

A young man who had known struggles in his life, known difficulties. He'd had some hard, hard places on his journey, but he'd learned one thing, above them all, when you cry out to God, God answers. No matter how tough it gets, no matter how deep or dark the place is that you are in tonight, when you just say the name Jesus, he'll come.

There's no door that can hold him back. There's no wall too thick, he can't walk through it. There's no sorrow so deep that he can't penetrate that area where your heart has been broken and bring healing into your life.

I want you to hear my words tonight because God is coming to you where you are. Right to you, right now, tonight. Not 24 hours from now, not next week, not next year, but now, he's going to come to you.

All you have to do is open your heart and just say, Jesus, come to me. Don't make it complicated. He hears the cry of your heart. Psalm 40, verse one, David said, I waited patiently for the Lord and he inclined to me and heard my cry.

He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock and established my steps. He has put a new song in my mouth, praise to our God. Many will see it and fear and will trust in the Lord.

David says, I was in a terrible place. I don't know if we can even begin to understand how terrible that place was. He made some tragic mistakes in his life. Some when he was younger and one in particular when he was older.

But he had learned that when I cry out to God, God will give me back that song again. That song that people could see, that confidence in you, God, my whole countenance just exuding a confidence in your ability to lift me one more time and to deliver me from my enemies.

In verse 11, he says, do not withhold your tender mercies from me, oh Lord. Let your loving kindness and your truth continually preserve me. For innumerable evils have surrounded me. David says, I can't even count them.

I seem to be opposed on every side. My mind is being bombarded by thoughts from my past. Things that were spoken over my life. Things I began to believe about myself. And the enemy has taken these and I'm surrounded.

I don't even know what to do. My iniquities that have overtaken me so that I'm not able to look up. I'm not only being accused, but I'm aware of my own weaknesses. I'm aware of my failings and failures.

They're more than the hairs in my head. Therefore, my heart fails me. Be pleased, oh Lord, to deliver me. Oh Lord, make haste to help me. Let them be ashamed and brought to mutual confusion who seek to destroy my life.

Let them be driven backwards and brought to dishonor who wish me evil. Let them be confounded because of their shame who say to me, aha, aha. Every voice that says we've got you. Every thought that says you're going to amount to nothing.

Every demonic power that tries to bring the mistakes of my past or somebody else's mistakes that were done to me in my past. That try to come back upon me and try to declare we've triumphed over you. We have you now.

We know you were anointed to rule and reign, but we have conquered you. David said, they seek to destroy me, but I'm asking you, God, to drive them backwards. I'm asking you to bring them to dishonor and let them be confounded who think that they have the right to triumph over those that you have touched and called your own.

Make that your own prayer. Make it your prayer tonight. Make it your prayer, young and old, that are here in the sanctuary this evening. God, push back my enemies and don't let any voice that is trying to tell me I'm not gonna make it ever triumph over me.

David says, let all those who seek you rejoice and be glad in you. Let such as love your salvation say continually, the Lord be magnified. But I'm poor and needy, and yet the Lord thinks upon me. You are my help and my deliverer.

Paul and Silas Sing in the Inner Prison

Do not delay, oh my God. The book of Acts chapter 16 tells us of a dark and despairing prison that held fast its prisoners. As a matter of fact, it was called the inner prison. Bad enough being in the outer prison, but the inner prison was a place where there's an absence of light.

There are no windows in the inner prison. There is no light in the inner prison. Matter of fact, later on, the keeper of the prison had to call for a light to go in because you can't see in that place.

It's so dark, there's no visible comfort around you anywhere in that place. Nothing visible. No window, nothing pretty to look at. No birds to watch and trees or flowers to look out on the grass. Everything is dark.

All that anybody in that place would be aware of is the depth of their failures. The struggles, the trials, the hopelessness of their predicament. The cruelty of their captors. The bleakness of their future.

It was a place where only the faint hope of divine help was left. There was nothing else left. I wonder if some in that place may have even given a thought about God. You don't know for sure. But somebody there must have said, God, can you help me?

Somebody online is saying that tonight. I'm speaking about you and you know it because you're in that place. You're in the inner prison. You're in a dark and despairing place that has held you fast for a long time.

It's so dark there that it's hard to see light. You can't see a future. You can't see a way out. You see the glass is continuously half empty. You can't see the half full side of the glass at all. And in the midst of it all, suddenly, in this dark place, they heard a song.

Isn't it amazing? Song by people who shared some of their pain. But the curious thing about this song is that the pain that the people singing it seemed to have lost its power of despair over them. Amazing.

Two guys, Paul and Silas, are thrust into that prison. They've been beaten with rods. Feet are in stocks and they're laying on cold slabs of stone. And at midnight, they begin to sing. And praise God.

Can you imagine? I don't know what they were singing. But again, I'd love to hear that song. I think we're gonna sing one like it after I'm done speaking. There's a song I just love. It goes, all my hope is in Jesus.

And maybe Silas was like Brother Ross, going, come on, Paul. Come on, Paul, sing it again. Come on, Paul. And when they heard the song, you see the point being, I wanna speak to the people online tonight.

I know the stories of a lot of people in this sanctuary tonight. I know the stories of some people on this platform. And I know that people are going through struggles. There are people here with physical afflictions.

There are people here who are trying to get through struggles and trials of their own and difficulties. There are people here who, without the intervention of God, would already have been swallowed by the sorrow of some things, perhaps, that came their way when they were younger.

But tonight, you heard a bunch of people singing a song, and the despair they could be feeling has lost its power over them. And the people in the inner prison began to hear the song, just as you have heard us here in this sanctuary singing tonight.

There are people here that have, in this sanctuary, they're still struggling with family issues and marriage issues, people struggling with physical illnesses. There are people struggling to get victory over something that they have to fight through.

Everybody has to fight through certain things time and again in our lives. But yet, all the struggles of this world and the trials of this world have lost their power to take away that song. You remember David said, God heard me, he took me out of a horrible place, set my feet upon a rock, put a new song in my mouth, and many will see it and fear and trust in the Lord.

Yes, so tonight, you saw the song. You didn't necessarily see the struggle. But the struggles are still there. We're not here to pretend like we don't have struggles. I know there are some people who try to do that, but that's not the truth.

We all have to go through storms. We all have to go through trials. You know, Paul and Silas weren't shouting in from outside the prison through the window. They were in the prison, beaten up with their backs on cold stone, with their feet in stocks and their hands in chains.

They weren't spared the hardship. But the hardship had lost its power over them to defeat them. As a matter of fact, God put such power in their song that when they began to sing their song and pray their prayers, the whole place began to shake.

When you and I make the choice to live for God and sing for God, let me tell you, hell begins to shake. Every devil of hell begins to shake because every demon of hell knows that one saint of God, rising up on his or her feet with the song of God in his or her mouth one more time can tear their kingdom to pieces, can destroy their imprisonments.

How many years did it take to build that prison? You think of the iron forgers forging their iron that made up these iron gates in the fire. You think of those who installed the bars in the inner parts of the prison.

You think of those who had to lay the stone. You think of those who had to develop a system to hold the captives captive. And what did it take to bring it all to nothing? One song, hallelujah. One song sung in the midnight hour.

One saint or two saints in this case that chose to worship God above their struggle and their own personal trial because they knew they already had the victory in Jesus Christ. They knew heaven was already their home.

They knew there's no power of hell that could hold them down. They knew they were given a divine commission to take the strength of Almighty God to their generation. Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah.

And when they began to sing and when they began to pray in the midnight hour, it just doesn't get any darker. The place was shaken. Can you imagine? Tonight as we sang in this sanctuary, I think somebody's place began to shake out there.

Your dark apartment. You know, I'm speaking to somebody tonight, even your one lamp you have has like about a 20 watt bulb in it. You're afraid of light for some reason. It's dark, but as we began to sing tonight, you don't even know why you're watching this prayer meeting.

I know why. And as we began to sing tonight and we chose to sing through our own fatigue, I think it was Vanessa got up and said, God had to drag some of us in here tonight just to sing because we're tired.

We got our own struggles. It's been a hard day. It's 90 degrees outside. 100 degrees, thank you for that correction very much. But God brought us here and as we began to sing our song, your place began to shake.

Everything the devil has built around you began to shake, began to lose its hold. It began to lose its sense of permanence. It began to lose its lies of hopelessness. You'll never get out. You'll never amount to anything.

You'll never be anything. God doesn't love you. God doesn't want you. All of a sudden, all these things began to break. Then suddenly the scripture says the doors opened. You mean those doors have big keys and they got big deadbolt locks and they go into big iron openings and the big steel frames around them and they just, when they shut, they stay shut.

Took all that to lock them in and it took one song to open it up. When Jesus Christ stood in the temple and opened the book of the prophet Isaiah, and he said the spirit of the Lord is upon me, he began to state the reasons and one of them was to set free the captives.

Christ’s Presence Brings Freedom

By the power of his presence, by the power of his word, not to have the captives find a way out and then come to church, get themselves all cleaned up and all dressed up and get their speech all good and look respectable and come to church.

No, no, he goes to you right where you are. And then another thing happened. The chains fell off, hallelujah. The chains on their hands just let go. The things that say you'll never be more than what you are.

You'll never have more than what you have. You'll never be anything other than what you've been. Those chains that say that you're bound to your past, you're bound to your behaviors, you're bound to the lies that are governing your life, then suddenly the place is shaking, the doors open and the chains fall off.

And the glory of God comes into every cell. Do you wanna know the interesting thing about this story that I love? Is none of them left. Because the presence of God was sweeter than the whole thought of freedom in this world that lay before them.

They didn't want to leave the presence of God. It's really that simple. The presence of God had come in. When you have the presence of God, where do you go to get more? What does this world have to offer that could even rival that or even match that or even come close to that?

The jailer sprang to his feet and ran to the jailer. Ran in and called for a light. And he was gonna kill himself because it would cost him his life to lose his prisoners. Those were the rules back in those days.

And he was about to kill himself where Paul said, do yourself no harm, we're all here. Could you imagine? I think that's part of the reason why he gave his life to Christ that night. Because these were hardened criminals in this place and the thought that they would not flee an open cell was perplexing to his mind.

The only explanation I can come up with is the presence of God had come to them. And where do you go from that? And every man chose, or woman, whoever it was, they chose to sit in their cell, even with the door open and the chains off.

They stayed there because the presence of God was there. God comes to you where you are. He's not afraid to come to you where you are. He's not ashamed to come to you where you are because he loves you with an everlasting love.

As a matter of fact, he said through the prophet Isaiah, I can never forget you, I engraved you on the palms of my hands. When those nails went through the hands of Jesus, your name was on the tip of those nails.

And he loves you with an everlasting love. He has a future for you tonight. He has a plan for your life. Not just eternal forgiveness, as wonderful as that is, but a plan for your life, for the future.

I don't know what happened to those prisoners, but I strongly suspect when I get to heaven, we're gonna find out some of them became evangelists. We're gonna find out that, I don't know, I think maybe one day they stood before magistrates and the magistrate would say the door was open, why didn't you leave?

And all they could say is God came to where I was and changed my life. Amen. I think some of them may have found themselves with this sudden supernatural, not just that prison, but the whole system letting them go so they can serve God and glorify God.

I don't know that for sure, it's a conjecture. But I think I'm gonna live to, when I get to heaven, to see some of that. God came to them. And that's the word that God's given me for you tonight. People who are online tonight.

God has come to you right where you are, right in your room. You with your burlap lampshade with about a 20 watt bulb in it. He's come to you tonight. And he's come to you to set you free because he loves you.

He's come to you because that's why he came to the earth in the first place. That's why he went to a cross. He went to a cross, the Bible says, to take your captivity captive and give gifts to you. To give you the gift of eternal salvation by taking your place on the cross and paying the price for everything that you have done that separated you from God.

He came to you to give you hope and a future. To give you a new song. And before you know it, you're gonna be singing the song. Like the students at Yale, you're gonna be out in public singing your song, Unashamed.

You're gonna be telling all your friends, I've got to tell you what God has done for me. And you're gonna find yourself praying for them and you're gonna find God doing the same thing for them that he did for you.

That's what's gonna happen to you and that's what's happening in this last generation. A mighty army is coming to its feet and you are part of it. So Father, tonight, in Jesus' name, in Jesus' name, in Jesus' name, Father, I ask you by the power of your Holy Spirit to visit people right where they are.

I ask you to shake their captivity, shake their strongholds. I ask you to open their prison doors. I ask you in Jesus' name to take the chains off of their hands. I ask you, Lord God, to give the people a new mind, a new heart and a new spirit for this is the promise you made through the prophets of old.

I ask you, God Almighty, to have them sing this new song that David spoke about. I was seeking, I was dying, I was in a horrible place. I called up to God. He lifted me out of a horrible pit. He set my feet upon a rock and established my goings and he has put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God and many will see it and fear and trust in the Lord.

God, thank you for planting that new song in somebody's heart tonight. Thank you for new words coming into their minds, new thoughts about the future, a new pathway before their feet, a new solidness they never had before, a new freedom they've never known.

Thank you, God. Thank you, Lord Jesus Christ, for doing what only you can do. We give you praise and glory for it tonight. We thank you, Lord, that our songs have borne fruit, eternal fruit tonight. We thank you, Jesus Christ, for all that you are doing.

A Prayer to Receive Freedom in Christ

Now, I'm gonna ask you to pray a simple prayer with me tonight, a simple prayer and here's what it sounds like and I'm gonna say it and you say it right after me. Jesus Christ, Son of God, come to me right where I am.

Set me free and I will serve you and I will walk with you all the days of my life. If you just prayed that and you meant that with all your heart, text the word decided to 51 ,000 on your cell phone. Just go ahead and do that right now as a simple act of faith or you can do it after we have communion, whenever you choose.

But just do it, go ahead. Just text the word decided to 51 ,000. We're gonna have communion tonight in just a moment. We're gonna celebrate this great victory that's come to your life tonight in your house, in your dark place.

Can you actually feel the light that's coming in now? Can you feel the light? It first begins in your own heart. Suddenly, there's a warmth, there's a hope and it radiates through you, up into your mind.

Suddenly, God says, just let me and I'll give you new thoughts and I'll give you a new way to live and a promise that when death comes your way one day, that heaven will be your eternal home. Heaven is the place where God is and you'll be with God forever, hallelujah.

Father, thank you for what you have done. God, I don't know the people, but I see the faces and I wanna say thank you tonight. I wanna thank you for the tears coming down somebody's face right now. I wanna thank you, God, for the hope coming into somebody's heart right now.

I wanna thank you for the chains falling off somebody's hands right now. I wanna thank you, Lord, that somebody's gonna go outside after this meeting and just sing for the first time in a long time. They're just gonna sing to you.

God, thank you. Even if it's a song in their own words, they're gonna sing to you and give you thanks and give you praise. In Jesus' name, get some juice, get some bread. I'll be back in just a moment after the song and we're going to celebrate the victory that is yours tonight in Christ.

I've been held by the Savior I've felt fire from above. One of my favorite songs. Thank God.

Communion and the New Covenant

For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you. The Lord Jesus, on the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, take, eat. This is my body, which is broken for you.

Do this in remembrance of me. In the same manner, he also took the cup after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. The covenant is God saying, I will cleanse you. I will keep you. And we heard it earlier tonight.

No one can take you out of the Father's hand. You belong to me. Yes, you'll be fought against, but you'll not be triumphed over. You will finish life in victory. I make a covenant in my blood, he said.

I make a covenant with you that I will keep you. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. In other words, don't forget, don't forget that I'll be faithful to you. As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

Mm. Thank you, Lord. Thank you for this great victory. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, God. Lord, again, thank you for what you've done for us. Thank you for giving us a new song that nothing in this life can triumph over.

No sickness, no suffering, no sorrow, no opposition. Nothing can take this song away. This song of victory that you've given to us. The song of power that can transform other people's lives. Thank you, God, for bringing us here tonight to sing.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. In Jesus' name, amen. We need a couple of things. Christina, where are you? Where'd you go? You still here? Okay, we need some old timers. You got an old timer kicking around there?

You do, okay, all right. You knew it. You were anticipating me coming. And where's that flag? We need that flag, okay? Can you go get it? We need it. We need the flag. And the rest of you, just do what God tells you to do.

You want to jump straight up and down? Go ahead. You want to clap your hands? You want to walk the aisles? Give him a shout of glory in this house for who he is.