Christ Missionary conf.1956 — J.M. Davies

I must apologize tonight, I wrote and mentioned that my wife would be with me, well I don't know if it's known or not, but we've had to leave Jamaica and our love was there for health conditions. She's had a tropical germ in the intestines which seems to affect the head and she very often go almost prostrate and heavy.

On Saturday, going in for the Fort Dodge conference, we stayed in a home where someone was quite ill with influenza and she seems to have picked up the germ and it's affected the head and she's about ten miles out in an old town.

I must apologize for all of that. Before passing on God's message tonight, there's one little request I would like to make and that is concerning humour. If you don't know exactly where it is, you ask Mr. Rogers afterwards.

A year ago, a lady made a professional escape by the name of Mrs. Hotley. It was my privilege to meet the lady early in the meeting and on the last Sunday evening, her husband came to the meeting. I wish you could meet Mr. Hotley.

He's about six feet four, a typical farmer, western farmer. And coming into the meeting that night, he walked about halfway up the hall when he discovered the other men had their hats off and his was still on.

So instead of bothering to go to the rear of the hall to remove it, he just pulled it off and shot it over the people's heads onto a table. Well then the battle of wits began. We did our utmost to penetrate the pedestal and he seemed to do his utmost to hinder.

I can see our friend Hotley now, putting down about three feet from the front, chewing gum and sitting quite in his lair. Throughout the meeting progress, we could see that the Lord was gaining the victory by his faith.

He had started and by the time we were lifting up our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in the finished work of Calvary, we found that he was intently listening. Well justified in asking the people to leave the building quietly prayerfully, and if anyone would like to stay behind, we would be only too glad to part with them.

Everyone left and it wasn't exactly to my amazement because I feel he would be praying during the meeting. But our friend Hotley stayed behind and after about forty-five minutes dealing with him, I'll never forget the way that round, tough westerner broke down, shed a few tears and accepted the Lord as his Saviour.

Said he, you know my wife, he said, had been vicious through life, he said, many times I've had to strike her to quieten her down. Said he, somehow when she was saved she offered and for the last eight weeks she's done everything, she's actually brought my slippers to me at night and before I couldn't get a kind word for years.

And he said, I feel if Jesus Christ can do a thing like that for my wife, I felt he could do it for me and he said, I'm saved now. Well on Tuesday I got a message in Newman when I got out of their farm on Thursday morning and I was leaving on Friday.

And I'll never forget what transpired in the farmhouse. Getting there about ten o 'clock in the morning, I found the boys had been kept in school and he sat me down to the head of the table and sat everybody around and he said now, he said on Monday the priest came.

I'd been brought up, he said, Catholic and we're still registered as Catholic. And the priest came on Monday and said that I should go back to the church. And the first invitation was that the Lord had worked a work of grace in his heart but he had not seen exactly how to use it.

He said the priest began to put his statements to me and he said I couldn't answer. So I calmly told him if he was not off my term within five minutes, he would be put in the pond. It had not yet taken effect.

But he said I began to think Monday night if I couldn't answer that fellow, how am I going to answer the people in Denver, Massachusetts? Answer them, be it Newman. So he said, Brother Davis, I want you to tell me everything you know about salvation.

To my amazement, he brought one of our few writing tablets, twenty-five pence, about baptism and he began to write as I spoke. Then he wanted to know, if you please, everything I could tell him about baptism.

We broke off for a midday meal and afterwards we sat around the table again, only about a twenty-minute break. And then he wanted to know everything, if you please, about the Lord's table. After that he wanted to know everything about the Lord, she said.

And if that was not enough, what would happen to the people left behind when Jesus came? We sat at that meal table with just a twenty-minute break from ten o 'clock in the morning until ten to four at night.

I cannot help but think that man wanted to know more in one afternoon than many Christians I know have wanted to know in ten or fifteen years. On the pilgrimage home. After the tragedy, I wrote to Mr. Wynn earlier this year and I said, now, how is our brother Copley getting along?

Well, Brother Davis, he said he's proved a disappointment. The new testament you gave him is being used consistently in Denver Magnet and also in the Huma Grammys. We see him at Sunday school occasionally and sometimes for the gospel and occasionally on a weeknight.

But we have never yet seen him at the Lord's table. I wrote to Brother Copley and he said, well, perhaps you can come out and help me further. Then today we've turned over the two thousand four hundred miles on our way out.

So we really value your prayer. We're going for meetings at Huma, but the main and primary reason for the journey is to spend tomorrow afternoon around the Copley meal table. So we do value your prayers as we go forward, leaving it to the Lord that he may work through us.

Christ’s Certain Return

So friends, will you please turn with me to John's Gospel, chapter fourteen. John's Gospel, chapter fourteen and verse one. Let not your heart be troubled. He believed in God, believed also in me. In my father's house there are many mansions.

Though I would have told you, I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself where I am. There he may be. Oh, will you please look at this.

And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am, there he may be. It's my privilege to work quite a deal among teenagers. Back in the East, especially in New York and New Jersey, there is a tremendous movement taking place among the assemblies concerning high schools.

You may even have heard the name. It is called the High D .A. The letters H .I. abbreviated for high school, and D .A. born again. I go to New Jersey about once or twice, sometimes three times a year, and every time it's my privilege to move among some of these Christian teen-agers.

And at Bloomfield High School, New Jersey, we have no less than 47 high school kids that meet after school twice a week for prayer and a word of ministry. And I remember conducting one of these meetings on a particular afternoon, and one boy that had just moved up from grade school into junior high, and was struggling with the King's English, corrected me when I spoke on, read that verse, verse 3, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again.

This young boy, just beginning to struggle in the King's English, said, but sir, I see a doubt in that verse. A doubt, I asked. He said, oh, yes, sir. Our English teacher tells us that if always gives an element of doubt.

Well, the little fellow had taken one word and made it stand out boldly, that if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again. Now, supposing the boy was right. Supposing there was an if in the statement.

Supposing our Lord said, now, if, or supposing I go, supposing I go, I promise you this, there will be no supposition concerning my coming back. If I go, there is certainly no doubt about his coming back.

All through the Old Testament Scripture, we find that he is the promised Messiah. And now, coming down to John's Gospel, chapter 14, I find the promised one himself becomes the promiser. And the promise is this, I will with a certainty come again.

He went, and therefore he must return. He promised. They were giving out some pamphlets one day. I certainly thought someone had handed me a Gospel tract until I found it was advertising matter for a New York insurance company.

They put it out. They must have copied Tom Alston or other people's tracts, for it was put out in a perfect tract form. And the story on it could well have been a tract concerning the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.

They went on to say that John, a twelve-year-old school champion swimmer, was swimming off the coast of the Atlantic one day with her father. Drifting and playing around in the water with her dad, they were unconsciously taken further away from the coast, from safety.

The father looked up and, to his utter amazement, the coast was away in the distance. Knowing John's capabilities as a swimmer, he knew very well that even she could not make shore. So, he left a definite and an absolute instruction with John, and the instruction was this, John, I want you to float, and when you get tired of floating, swim alone for a little while not to get cramps, and then float again, because I am going to swim to the shore for help.

Now, John, don't get lonely, don't get nervous, and do as I tell you, because if you float and swim, you'll be all right for several hours. Of course, your father is going, but he's coming back for you, so, John, don't worry.

And so the brave father began to swim to shore. Three hours later, he was picked up in the water, unconscious. In the oxygen tent, regaining consciousness in the hospital, he very frantically pointed, and they heard him say, John, that's me.

Every small craft and every motorboat in the vicinity began to search for water, and they estimated that seven hours after the father had let the girl, they certainly saw something floating on the water.

They took it to be the body of John, but now getting closer, to their utter amazement, the supposed body sat up and began to wave, and they got within shouting distance. And somebody shouted, John, were you not afraid while you were in the water all those hours?

And a little astonishment passed over the girl's face. She said, afraid? Why should I be afraid? My father promised to come back, and he's never yet brought his word. If I gave our brother, Hartburn, that little pamphlet from the insurance company, I am confident there would be a good little gospel appeal put at the end of that.

And it is a definite promise for every count of God, our great Lord and our Saviour, that died on Countess Cross for our redemption. He said, I am going away, but now he said, if my God, I will come back and receive you unto myself, but where I am dead, he will be.

Our Lord, just like the little girl's father, has never yet broken his word, and he never will. And he has promised to come, and he will come. But Christian tonight, I want to ask you, especially you young people in the meeting, are you waiting, and are you looking for a disappearance?

The Commission to Be Christ’s Witnesses

I am not giving you scriptures tonight for the sake of time. But when I turn over the pages of my Bible to Acts chapter 1, I come to the last words that our Lord and Saviour, upon the earth before his going, said, He, I want you to be my witness.

Do you think it is possible for me to give you the earthly life story of our Lord Jesus? Well, the Gospel of Luke was written, and we find that the Acts was a continuation, and they seem to tell us, and I perfectly agree with them, that you could not close the life story of Jesus Christ because he lived today.

But I would like to try in about two minutes to give you the earthly life story of our Lord. He was born in a manger. At a young age he was taken into the land of Egypt, as they say. Later, as a young child, he was brought back into the land, and then there is a complete and an absolute silence concerning him until approximately thirty years of age.

We find him ministering from Dan to Beersheba. After somewhere around three and a half years of ministering, we find he is taken and killed on a Roman cross, buried in a borrowed tomb. On the third day he rose triumphantly, and then, if we have our Easter and Woodson to go by, about six weeks later he was caught up into the heavens, and there, in two minutes, I have given you a complete picture of the life story of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ upon the earth, with one instruction that I deliberately avoided.

From the age of a young child, at that glorious time of stepping out into the ministry of It seems as if a curtain of silence had been put over his life. We have today the mythical iron curtain of Russia.

We have today the mythical bamboo curtain of China. And we seem to have a curtain of silence concerning the life of our Lord from childhood, young child, thirty years of age. But it seems as if God blew apart the curtain, and as the curtain blew apart, we got one tiny, tiny glimpse of our Lord at the age of twelve.

Jesus’ Mission and the Father’s Business

And now, at the age of twelve, he's disappointed, he says to his parents, for they've been struggling on the journey, and they've missed him. And, coming back, we find they had occasion to rebuke him.

Why do you treat us so at the effect of their message? And for the line that the Lord Jesus Christ would say, "'Whisp not! Don't you know that I must now be about my father's business?". Please remember, especially young people in the meeting tonight, that at around the age of twelve to fourteen, there's a kind of an adolescence in the East, and they're beginning to mature earlier than in the Western Hemisphere.

He is stepping out of childhood into youth. And I am certain that our Lord would not have spoken such to an earthly parent concerning an earthly parent. He was certainly not referring to Joseph, but he says, in effect, "'I must now be about my heavenly father's business.'".

Have you ever paused and realized that when I hear that statement from the Lord, there is a recorded word in Scripture of him upon the earth, a word recorded of a statement of his, before that tremendous statement that, "'I must now be about my father's business.'".

Then, when I come to the book of Acts, chapter one and verse eight, I come to the last recorded word. Never after these words do we hear of a word from him spoken upon the earth. We certainly hear of him speaking from the heavenlies to Saul of Tarsus.

But now, the last recorded word that ever left his lips upon the earth to this present time was this, "'You shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and even unto the uttermost after the earth.'". The first recorded word to the Lord Jesus is that, "'I must be about my father's business.'".

What exactly are those things? What is this father's business? This is the true and faithful, worthy of all acceptation, that came into the world through father's business. His last recorded word now is, "'It is no longer I that can walk from Dan to Beersheba.

It is no more I that can go along the coasts of Galilee, and now I have completed my purpose at hand. I, as a boy of twelve, could say it is my job, but now he says, "'You shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and even unto the uttermost after the earth.'".

Gospel Witness Beyond the Pulpit

I find that people often say to me, "'Brother, I am not gifted to teach the gospel.'". We have sisters sometimes say that Paul said that, "'Sisters should not use self-authority when dressed in the present.

Sisters should be silent when dressed in the present.'. Therefore, my lips are sealed in teaching the gospel to the unsaved.". If it's a teenage boy in the meeting tonight, and because you cannot stand behind a few square feet of wood to proclaim the name of Jesus, don't let it hinder you in your testimony to your Lord.

My beloved sister, if you think you can only stand behind this little bit of lumber and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, I'll tell you something. I feel that my ministry in the gospel is more important away from the gospel platform than even it is when I'm apart.

You say, "'Well, how can I, brother?'. I had a close friend. We were in our early twenties. We were Sunday school teachers together in the city of Gloucester, Britain. I found my way down to Jamaica serving the Lord, and dear Wilfred Durham found his way down into Bombay, India.

I went on to be with the Lord at the age of thirty-eight, leaving a wife and four children. But he had an army service centre in Bombay, and he was also looking after some work in a community assembly.

And he told us the story that the old man, eighty years of age, the dear old man was almost blind, and the only way he could go to the worship meeting, Lord's Day by Lord's Day, was with the age of one-sixth.

And also, he would have a glimpsed, almost supportive Bible under his arm. And walking down the narrow street of a little gospel chapel in Bombay, making his way to the church, two British army service boys were walking up the other side of the street.

Wilfred Durham, in his letter, the two English coacher boys began to laugh. The old man was going to remember his Lord. The two English coacher boys in a khaki uniform were out for a Sunday sport. And one stopped and nudged the other and shouted across the road, Good morning, Grandpa!

The old man stopped. He said, Good morning, boys. Grandpa, is that a Bible you've got? Yes, boys. Grandpa, how is Jesus Christ this morning? Then the old man pulled himself up straight. Boys, said he, do my eyes deceive me this morning?

Are you not wearing the uniform of the British army? Are you English born? Yes, Grandpa. Perhaps I've made a mistake. But for sixty years, I've been sitting on my knees and thanking God for your little island across the sea, because it brought John William Carey and others to bring us the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And is it possible a man which has sent out missionaries to convert us, and now sending out boys to ask how Jesus Christ is, is it possible? Listen, boys, for a moment. You see my Bible? For over fifty-five years, I've got on my knees every morning and every night.

And you know, boys, I thank God for your little island through the British and foreign Bible societies sending out the word of God. Have I made a mistake? Is it possible you don't know how Jesus Christ is?

Boys, he said, if you don't know, I'll tell you. Jesus Christ proclaimed yesterday, today, and forever. Good morning, boys. And the old man made his way to the little gospel hall. Some of you will say that wasn't much of a testimony.

It was a testimony for the last few years. All the story goes on to tell us that two o 'clock next morning in the English town up above the city of Bond Bay in the hills, a little cot creaked, and a boy named Fred got down on his knees as he said that.

Within a couple of minutes, another cot in the fence creaked, and a boy's flesh came. I said, Tom, what are you doing? He called in Britain. I gave my hat to Jesus Christ. I lent it. This morning showed me that he saved me, but I got away from him.

Fred, he's never left me. He's the same yesterday and today. I left him, and I'm coming back. This has been on my list all day. And two o 'clock on that Monday morning, Fred was restored to his Lord, and Tom accepted Christ as Savior.

Today, in the mountains overlooking Bond Bay, there's a mission station. And the missionaries in charge of that station are named Fred and Tom. All prove a testimony of an old man 80 years of age. You, says Jesus Christ, shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria, and even unto the uttermost ends of the earth.

The Church’s Mission and the Tragedy of Fear

Chapter 7 closes with a tragedy. For then I find that Stephen is beaten. His face is terribly misshapen from the stone throne, and he's slumped to the foot of the looking-glass. And he says, Lord, will not they pay for their cash?

Did I say that was a tragedy? I feel in my own mind that there's a greater tragedy in the commencement of chapter 8. And the tragedy I'm referring to is this. That we find chapter 8 starts that they were teaching the gospel.

They move down into Judea for S-E-A-N, for fear of the devil. And later in the chapter, we find that Philip is teaching the gospel in Samaria. And in that generation, the Apostle Paul had blazed the trail across the known world to this day.

The fulfillment of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, was fulfilled in one generation as to what is now. Recorded words were given, first of all into Jerusalem, then into Judea, and then into Samaria, and then to the uttermost paths of the earth.

But that statement, his most potent statement, was fulfilled completely in one generation. But did I say it here? Yes. I don't wish to bring theatricals or be melodramatic on your platform, but I do ask you this.

When the Lord stood before his disciples and said, Now I want you to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost paths of the earth, he was tossed up, and a third received him out of their sight.

That was not just a little favorite band of disciples. That was a representation of the church at lunch, even the church today. How do you think he spoke those words? Do you think it was with a tongue like a whip-lash?

Do you think it was with a keen eagle eye? He said, You men, get out and preach my gospel! Come along! Get out! If I could possibly be an artist and paint a picture of that scene, I would put tears in the eyes.

I would put the most loving look upon the Savior's face that ever pain could paint. I'm sure it was with a heart of love and not with a voice of a whip-lash. But he entreated, he pleaded with them. Take my gospel to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost paths of the earth.

I can no longer do it through my lips, but I can still continue the work through yours. Will you lovingly watch? And that tragedy of chapter 8 is, it's instead of going for love, they stayed on the streetcarn tracks of Jerusalem until fear brought them out at the stone of Eden.

Evangelism Amid Religious and Political Opposition

You know, the last 12 months it's been a little bit easier to get into the United States of America. I live about 100 miles, 110 miles out of Toronto. And I had to drive in at 6 .30, three mornings running, and spend three whole days in the consulate, the U .S. consulate in Toronto.

And then drive back each night before I could get a visa, which is called a visitor's visa, to come into the states any time I wish. It's quite about 30 hours and about 6, yes, 6 to 700 mile journey. For the first four years of our living in Canada, in spite of it stamped on my passport giving me a free entry into the states, over time after time I was questioned and questioned, until I sometimes wonder if I could step into the states that day.

Going back to Toronto, I saw your consul himself, and I said, Sir, can you tell me why it is that you let me stay 30 hours in your consulate, and yet I'm given the third degree every time I want to cross the border.

Yes, he said, I'll tell you why it is, but he said, I'll put a stamp on it and seal that. The reason is, Mr. Davis, is this. We are getting 40 to 60 communists a day crossing the border, and we can't stop it.

You see, your country is in fear, and is still in fear of human rights. When I landed from Jamaica in Peterborough, Ontario in 1953, I went down into the city of Ottawa, the capital of the nation, and I only saw one priest in roughly all the four weeks I spent for a gospel campaign, walking the streets.

You go there today, and the city is just riddled with nuns and priests. You find that Quebec is certainly not the only place that is 100 Rome, but it is spreading like a prairie fire across Canada and Canada and beyond.

And I thank God, night after night, on Wednesdays, that God has put a bitter enmity between Rome and Russia. And if they ever find the peace back, child of God, you and I would only preach the gospel in fear of our lives.

They'd crush it even better for us if they did, for there would be more people standing up. So please, I mean, this is not a mother's request, it's the command of our Lord. I want you to be my witnesses.

The Lord’s Expectation of Spiritual Fruit

Now, what exactly is His expectancy? If I go, I will come again. His final command is that you shall be my witnesses. Now we find His expectancy is found in James chapter 5, verses 7 and 9. For there we find the husbandmen stand before the God, I'm sorry, the husbandmen awaited for precious proof of the earth, and thus line the church subjects before the God.

And my hands, willing hands, working hands, waiting to do the master's work. If you remember in Matt's gospel, chapter 12, the husbandman sent his servant, and then he sent his son. We find that his son shut the winepress alone, and there the husbandman is awaiting the precious proof of the earth, and has long patience on it.

I go an empty-handed, not one soul to meet my love, and child of God, how I adore you such that you are waiting, and have long patience on it. Please bear in mind that the church stands before the God.

I worked in Jamaica with Mr. Hannah Wildish, and not only in Jamaica, but also in Britain, we are past crossed and were moved together often. And on one occasion, we were on the east coast of Britain, in a little tiny country assembly that was having a one-day party.

I can see him now. They came into this little gospel chapel, a boy that was mentally retarded, his name was Fred. And Fred came in, a youth of about 18 in Britain, but religious would call him the village kidney.

But he was by no means a midget, he knew Jesus Christ, the Savior. He used to do the menial tasks around the farm, called the man that employed him. But I can see Fred now with that dreadlocked scarf around his neck, his hair all shaped, he's pulled the floss off.

And during the afternoon conference, he was perhaps cutting a straw, and sitting on the platform while Brother Wildish was speaking, I noticed Brother Wildish said something like this. He said, friends, the judge standeth at the door.

And you know, friends, he said, I'm a workman, and Wildish pointed out his hands and said, you see my hands? They're the honest hands, he said, of a workman. I go to Jamaica, he said, and I labor for my Lord in the gospel.

And then, I had to stand with exhaustion, and take a 14-day rest, and by the time I land in Britain, he said, you people in Britain have booked me up for meetings all over the country, and I'm only too grand to get on the ship again to go back to Jamaica for a rest.

I think, said Wildish, I do a hundred days' work. These are the hands of a workman. Well, I noticed Fred begin to chuckle, and I could see quite a gleam coming from the dear boy's face as he began to put the straw together to see something was working in that poor old mind of Fred.

And after meeting Frosch, we made our way to the back, and standing in the doorway was Fred. Brother Wildish, show me their hands. Show me their hands. Called Brother Wildish to his hands, and Fred took them and began to feel them.

He turned them over and examined the fingernails, and then he gave quite a slap. He said, they're not the hands of a workman, Mr. Wildish. Look at mine. Callouses and cuts. The fingernails very grimy from the tractor grease.

What's the dead that we should criticize these workmen? And we're certainly not Fred, Fred, but he put cream for them from those hands of his that were cut and hurt and calloused and grimy. Call your hands the hands of a workman.

They're not, he said, they're not the hands of a workman. He ordered God to judge them just before the dawn. And it may be in the coming days that our Lord should say to you, show me your hands, thy bone-empty hands.

Not one soul to meet my Lord. Let us beware, young people, we might say that's not the hands of a workman. Look at mine. Those points of the hands. It bears the scarcest call. Friends, I've not received the Lord's promptings, but I'm just going to quickly bring to you now his coming.

The Resurrection, Judgment, and Eternal Destiny

If I go, he said, I will come again, he promised. You shall be my witnesses, he commanded. The judge standeth at the door. The husbandman awaiteth the precious fruit of the earth. His expectant aunt now will see his coming.

It seems to me, in the first book, a text of earliest chapter four, that somehow the apostle Paul had a very disappointing letter sent to him. I've often wondered what that letter could have been like, and I've tried to surmise in my own mind it could have gone something like this.

Dear brother Paul, you came into our town and you teach the gospel. And during your gospel campaign, you know, that's the trouble with you young people today. Well, you don't understand Scripture, I'll tell you right now.

You try to put the things of Scripture as something on a pedestal that is really out of his needs for today. If you young teenagers want to learn the things of God, do it the way we taught the Tomatoes.

Read that precious book. And read it not once or twice or three times, but five, six, ten times that particular portion of Scripture. Mr. Wildish used to do it, I used to do it, and we got dozens of Tomatoes through it, and I'll tell you it's a treat.

Did you hear those Tomatoes? You must have a word of God. They sit down on a dark night in their little hut and they close their eyes and they try to visualize that they were in the Scripture that they read so much during the day.

And you know, surprisingly, Daniel becomes very real if you try to take it on that way. The disciples become very intimate If you try to put yourself as an onlooker into those lovely Bible stories, and do not try to think the things that were so good for him that day, the proper evangelization today is exactly the same as the evangelization of Paul's day.

That's why I bring this political letter to you. You were preaching the Gospel, Paul, and as you were preaching the Gospel, my husband and I were saying, we began to come to your college meetings. We began to come into your ministry meetings.

We came into your prayer meetings. And during those meetings, while it's going in September 9th, we oftentimes used to hear you say, the Lord is coming again. He's coming for this night, and we should be caught up to be with him.

But Paul, something's happened in our home, and it's shaken my faith. You know, Paul, that my husband and I used to go out each night and say, well, perhaps before that moon goes down tonight, Jesus will come.

Possibly before the dawn of another day, he'll be here. We'll be with him, as Paul told us. And we lived in our inexpectancy, because he told us so much about Jesus coming again. But Paul, something's happened, and I see tears streaming from the table now.

My husband's day, and he looks to the left. And I think it's something like that, that we get that lovely reply of Paul. He says, Now, concerning them which are asleep, sorrow not as to those which have no hope.

Now, listen, if there's an unsaved friend in the meeting tonight, listen very carefully. Concerning those, he said, which have sorrow not, which is those which have no hope, there should be a great shout, and the trumpet of God shall sound, and the dead, listen, my friend, the dead in Christ shall rise first.

And we which are alive shall be caught up together with them, and we shall leap in in the air, and so shall we leap forever with the Lord. The coming of the Lord is in a moment, the scripture tells us, in the crinkling of an eye.

That is the downward movement of a blade. And in that moment, the very slow motion is there. The Christian, not the unsaved, but born again, child of God upon the earth, walking, moving. Our beings, Brother Rogers, Brother Hartman, Brother Jones, Brother Patterson, others, living creatures upon the earth, and their parents and forefathers which have died in Christ, the moment of the crinkling of an eye, the dead in Christ shall be raised first.

And we shall be caught up together with them to meet Christ in the air. So shall we leap forever with the Lord, comfort one another with these words. Wonderful comfort for the believer, but my, oh my, wonderful desolation for those not trusting in Christ.

Not a woman, a boy, or a girl in this meeting tonight. I want to give you on the authority of the word of God. It's not my word, it's God's. But for you to die out of Christ, then it's going to seem as tragic thing, which calls me first to invent letters to the Thessalonians, those which are without hope.

Why? Because they're not washed by the precious blood of Jesus Christ. What's going to happen to those that have died in their sins? What is going to happen for any to have somebody in this meeting tonight?

But on the earth, when Jesus comes, and may not settle for great transgressions, I believe, there's no need for me to bring you a long oration concerning the cross, where the Christ you know it must be spotted in heaven first.

You know that Jesus Christ bled for your sins on Calvary's cross. You know that that precious blood that flowed from his head, his hands, his feet, his thighs, is the only atonement for sin. I am not detaining you tonight to go into that euphoric confines of death.