K-028 True Ministry — Art Katz

True Ministry and the Holiness of Priesthood

A few nights ago, God started speaking about truth, truth in word and truth in deed, and last night he spoke about true life, and I think tonight that he wants to speak about true ministry. I can't think of a more desperately needed speaking, especially in such an age as ours, when there's such a prolific number of ministries everywhere.

I'm especially sensitive to youthful ministries, and I don't think that it's an old man looking down with a jaundiced eye upon kids who are having a wonderful time conducting services. I think it might be something of the solemnity of God, who, when he established his priesthood, gave as the year upon which a priest began his ministry the age thirty.

The first thirty years were wasted. Can you imagine being nineteen and twenty and not having a ministry? Twenty-one and twenty-two, my, you must be chomping at the bit. And twenty-three and twenty-four, you must be just about ready to come apart at the seam.

You're full of vim and vinegar and energy and dynamism, poisonality, as we say in Brooklyn. Tremendous advantages for the kingdom, and certainly there would be an impact if you could be released, but God said in times past, that's a no-no.

You waited until you were thirty to begin your ministry. His son had to wait that long, and first Peter, you don't have to turn to it, this is not my text, the second chapter and the fifth verse, we read, you also as lively stones are built up a spiritual house and holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.

There's something very sacred about priesthood, which I think God wants to remind us tonight. First that it's holy. And I don't know if any of us will ever really approach that word and understand from it what we ought.

I'll tell you, children, that I'll save you a trip to the bit of the day, it'll avail you nothing. You'll not, you'll not find the meaning of it in Webster's. And maybe you've noticed already that every great word is not to be obtained by recourse to dictionaries, they're to be obtained far more expensively, and if I were God and had something to do about it, I would say that the knowledge of the word holy should be high on our list of priorities.

However much pain would be involved in the understanding of it, whatever the cost, as God puts that word first before every other consideration, holy priesthood. Before I considered priesthood, I would first consider holy.

I think it's probably the absence of the knowledge of it that explains more than anything. The flood of callow, C-A-L-L-O-W, easy, glib, facile ministries that we see right now in Christendom. And just about anybody who can strum a guitar somehow has found a place, and if he's not too good, we can just turn up the amplifier.

What do they say, paraphrasing the scriptures, a good amplifier covers a multitude of sins? Well, I've got one friend in the audience. Oh, dear children, you know what a definition of truth was? Did I say it to you the first night?

Truth is everything as God sees it, everything as God sees it. I wonder how he sees us tonight. I wonder how he would view the service thus far. I wonder how much he appreciated the song service. I wonder how much he appreciates most of our charismatic trappings.

I would almost give anything if I could just see as God sees and perceives our present condition. I wonder if we would be stunned by the contrast of the way he sees as against as we see. And maybe that's one of the reasons why he's given us the book.

The Levitical Pattern of Costly Spiritual Ministry

And I'm going to be very tedious tonight and read laboriously and painstakingly from a section of scripture that not many of us ever have occasion to survey. It's monotonous, it's dreary, it's painstaking, it's full of explicit little details, and I'll tell you frankly that I've not had much appetite myself to dote upon it.

It's to be found in Leviticus, we'll turn to it in a moment. It's all got to do with priesthood and a whole array of painstaking details that God required in that old covenant priesthood of which we were reminded today was only a type and a shadow and that we have come to a more glorious covenant by which I would assume that if God were demanding then, he would be far more demanding now.

If that priesthood were only a shadow, that the substance of the fulfillment now would be even more painstaking, more profound in its requirements, not less. Even so, as we come to the end of the age, I think that ministry is a sacred thing in God.

It's not an antidote for boredom, it's not some wholesome alternative to finding entertainments in the world. It's a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices. And I would just say for a rough rule of thumb that if ministry of any kind costs us nothing, likely it does not have great significance or redeeming value.

True priesthood, as we'll see in a moment, always costs something. Sacrifice of such proportion that it will boggle our minds merely to survey it. And I would suspect if that was true then, it should be equally true now.

It's an act of service that is easy and glib and requires nothing. I wouldn't class it as a spiritual sacrifice. True prayer, true ministry, true witness always costs something, children. As we say in Yiddish, it comes out of the kiskis, out of the gut.

There's usually a reproach somewhere to be found lurking on the heels of it. You're usually going to suffer some criticism for the expressing of it. You'll usually have to accept at least a minimum of misunderstanding for your faithfulness to God invariably.

It's not going to enhance your popularity as a rule. You might be considered more loathsome when you're finished than when you began. And it may be that when the whole thing is over and the smoke clears, there's only one who's pleased with you.

It's the Lord himself. It's a sacrifice. It's a spiritual sacrifice. And for the life of me, I have yet to find any sacrifice that has not been painful, bloody, costly. It's acceptable to God. And I think we ought to be reminded of this, that every priestly ministry is unto God and not unto men.

How do you like them apples? And I'll tell you, there are inordinate temptations to pitch your direction down rather than up. I can't think of anything more seductive and more powerful and more tantalizing, heavier in its pressure than to be young and to be a minister.

Listen, I used to be young once. Oh, I know. And I remember faintly that I was very much concerned for peer approval. I wanted the backslap and the bear hug. I wanted to see the expression of esteem and acceptance in those whose judgment and evaluation I prized.

I think it would be a rare youth who has risen above that. It would be a rare youth whose ministry is unto God and not unto men or not unto his own generation. There's a holy priesthood required and called to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Christ Jesus, not by our intelligence, not by our wit, not by our winsome personalities, not by our groovy talents, none of those by's, only by one thing, by Christ Jesus.

And when you find that you've come to the place when you can do it yourself, it's no longer holy priesthood. It's some groovy alternative that has not redeeming and eternal value. Dig? So may we find our amplifiers more frequently breaking down, our electronic devices and all of the paraphernalia of our particular age.

Find ourselves trembling. Find ourselves more frequently beyond our abilities and skills and expertise and knowledge and personality. Find ourselves wholly lacking. Find our knees knocking. Find our bowels rumbling.

Find our faces flushing and wholly be cast upon God by Christ Jesus. I want you to turn with me to the book of Leviticus named from the tribe of the priests, the eighth chapter. If you have a weak stomach and you're the sensitive type that can't stand much blood, this is your opportunity to leave before we go on.

This is going to be sickly, folks. Gergelyne. When we'll be finished tonight, we'll be standing in pools of blood. Hallelujah. He must be Jewish. OK. Isn't it precious the way the eighth chapter begins, and I'm reading from the Amplified Edition and the Lord said to Moses, Hallelujah.

I love everything that begins with the Lord saying. And I'll tell you that before we even get an iota into this text, may God give us a holy fear for anything that does not come by his speaking. May every ministry, every priestly duty begin with the Lord said.

Will we avoid as if it were a plague, any self initiated activity, any ministry which has its origin in us. I don't give a rap what the needs in the world are. They can be stacked up to the doors with dying and sickly humanity.

I shall ever and always wait for the word of the Lord. Go, speak, do. May we never bypass God and relate ourselves directly to what we think are the human needs before us. The Lord said to Moses, and the Lord is saying now, if we have an ear to hear it and a desire to wait.

Can you wait, you young fellas, until the Lord says, I can't think of anything more definitely than you should wait in activity. My goodness, how scandalous you mean do nothing. That's it. Buddy. Silent.

Unspoken. Unseen. Unheard. It's death. Exactly. Until the Lord shall say, and when he does start speaking, you might be surprised at the things he'll say. He's not going to say, now take your guitar and your electronic equipment and get into Afghanistan.

There's a great public meeting that I have set for your rally, seventy-five thousand. He's liable to say, take Aaron and his sons with him and the garments of their office and the anointing oil. And the bull of the sin offering and the two rams in the basket of unleavened bread and assemble all the congregation at the door of the tent of meeting.

Moses did, as the Lord commanded him, and the congregation was assembled at the door of the tent of meeting. Moses told the congregation, this is what the Lord has commanded to be done. Moses bought Aaron, his sons and wash them with water.

He put on Aaron, the long undertunic, girded him with a long sash, clothed him with the robe, put the ephod upon him and girded him with a skillfully woven cords attached to the ephod, binding it to him.

And Moses put upon Aaron, the breastplate. He also put in the breastplate, the Urim and the Tumim, upon which the high priest put his hand when seeking the divine will concerning the nation. And he put the turban or mitre on his head on it.

In front, Moses put the shining gold plate, the holy diadem, as the Lord commanded him. And Moses took the anointing oil and anointed the tabernacle and all that was in it and consecrated them. And he sprinkled some of the oil on the altar seven times and anointed the altar and all the utensils and the labor and its base to consecrate them.

And he poured some of the anointing oil upon Aaron's head and anointed him to consecrate him. And Moses brought Aaron's sons and put undertunics on them and girded them with sashes and wound turbans on them, as the Lord commanded Moses.

Then he brought the bull of the sin offering and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the bull of the sin offering. Moses killed it and took the blood and put it on the horns of the altar round about with his finger and poured the blood at the base of the altar and purified and consecrated the altar to make atonement for it.

He took all the fat that was on the entrails and the lobe of the liver and the two kidneys with their fat and Moses burned them on the altar. But the bull of the sin offering and its hide, its flesh and its dung, he burned with fire outside the camp, as the Lord commanded Moses.

He brought the ram for the burnt offering and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the ram and Moses killed it and dashed the blood upon the altar round about. He cut the ram into pieces and Moses burned the head to pieces and the fat and he washed the entrails and the legs in water.

Then Moses burned the whole ram on the altar. It was a burnt sacrifice for a sweet and satisfying fragrance and offering made by fire to the Lord, as the Lord commanded Moses and he brought the other ram, the ram of consecration and ordination and Aaron and his sons laid their hands upon the head of the ram and Moses killed it and took some of its blood and put it on the tip of Aaron's right ear and on the thumb of his right hand and on the great toe of his right foot and he brought Aaron's sons and Moses put some of the blood on the tip of the right ears and the thumbs of the right hands and the great toes of the right feet and Moses dashed the blood upon the altar round about.

And he took the fat, the fat tail, all the fat that was on the entrails, the lobe of the liver, the two kidneys and their fat and the right fine out of the basket of unleavened bread that was before the Lord.

He took one unleavened cake, a cake of oil bread and one wafer and put them on the fat and on the right side and he put all these in Aaron's hands and his son's hands and waved them for a wave offering before the Lord.

Then Moses took these things from their hands and burned them on the altar with the burnt offering as an ordination offering for a sweet and satisfying fragrance and offering made by fire to the Lord and Moses took the breast and waved it for a wave offering before the Lord for the ram of consecration and ordination.

It was most of his portion as the Lord commanded him and Moses took some of the anointing oil and the blood which was on the altar and sprinkled it on Aaron and his garments and upon his sons and their garments also.

So Moses consecrated Aaron and his garments and his sons and his son's garments and Moses said to Aaron and his sons, boil the flesh at the door of the tent of meeting and there eat with the bread that is in the basket of consecration and ordination as I commanded saying Aaron and his sons shall eat it and what remains of the flesh and of the bread you shall burn with fire and you shall not go out of the door of the tent of meeting for seven days until the days of your consecration and ordination are ended for it will take seven days to consecrate and ordain you as has been done this day so the Lord has commanded to do for your atonement at the door of the tent of meeting you shall remain day and night for seven days doing what the Lord has charged you to do that you die not for so I am commanded so Aaron and his sons did all the things which the Lord commanded by Moses gracious God.

We ask the ministry of your Holy Spirit, you know, mighty God, how remote the description of these things is from the whole of our modern life. It seems to us so archaic, so absolutely distant, so biblical has no seeming relevance to our present life activity, and we ask Lord that you might show us by your spirit just what is the application to ourselves now.

Lord do something in our hearts, our spirits, our minds, our lives, our understandings that shall forever change us. May this night be a night of such a dealing of God that we shall forever gag and choke and splutter.

If we should ever dare to stand before your people and in your name bring forth something glib, shallow, insincere, coined out of our own skulls, our own little tinsel personalities, our own little cuteness, mighty God, may we tremble with the responsibilities of what it means to be a royal priesthood.

May we never dare mount a platform except that we come to bring living sacrifice ourselves. Teach us, deal with us, speak the word that's in your heart this night to save us from going the way of all flesh, get us off the gloomy bandstand, and remind us and restore us and establish us again in the true way, the way of true ministry, true priesthood, true service unto God.

And we'll thank you and praise you for it. In Jesus' holy name we pray, amen. What we're reading, children, is an ordination service. Before the priests could begin their duties, they had to be ordained.

Priests and People Under the Same Standard

Ordination today is something much less. Some places all it requires is a ten dollar check and an application and you'll get back a certificate. And others, if they know you and you're a pretty right guy and you're not in any apparent error or blatant apostasy and you seem to have something going for you, you're ordained.

God's requirements, as you can see, were very detailed and painstaking. This was an elaborate ceremony of ordination and consecration. And you would think that these were not priests being established, but butchers.

It almost seems that their priestly garments were wholly inappropriate. They should better have had a butcher's apron. Because I'll tell you that when the whole thing was finished, they were almost virtually standing up to their ankles in streams of blood.

But it says, as the Lord commanded Moses, as the Lord commanded Moses, as the Lord commanded Moses. Every painstaking detail had its origin in God. And though it boggles the mind, I think it behooves us to see this, because men would never have conceived of this kind of ceremony.

And there must therefore have been purpose in God in requiring the things that he did. There must have been a reason why he assembled the whole congregation at the tent of the tabernacle, that they might witness this entire process.

Because I'll tell you, children, there's a relationship between priests and people. And I think one of the sickliest characteristics of our present-day Christianity is the divorce which has taken place.

We have professionals and quote-unquote laypeople, vast audiences of people sitting on their rumps looking up, and an individual virtuoso looking down, doing his thing. I don't know if that's quite what God had in mind, but there's a kind of a casualness and ease with people slumped in their seats, either enjoying the kind of spiritual roulette which will come up for that night, if it happens to be a happy sermon which they can bid, or somehow having to bite their lips and change their positions in their seats and wait for the dreary thing to be over.

But there's hardly more involvement than that. But I'll tell you, God says that as the priests, so the people. And if you'll tolerate mediocrity in your priests, if you'll tolerate casual and indifferent service from men who are on the platform, you can be assured that you shall not be long, far behind in resembling and finally imitating and having a character like unto the priest.

As the priest, so the people. There's an identity between priest and people, sacred connection, and God showed them by assembling the people and saying, look what I'm doing to these priests. Look at the detailed things that I'm requiring of them.

Look at the heavy responsibility. Watch, keep your hearts with all diligence, for as the priests are, so also are the people. And when the day comes that priests shall no longer be able to discern the difference between the things which are sacred and the things that are profane, it'll be an oy vey day for you.

It'll be woe is me for you. Because if they can't discern it, how much better do you think you'll be? Because you're the ones that are applauding. You're the ones that are goading them on. You're the ones that are giggling and jostling and encouraging them in their practices.

You're the ones that are sitting there and taking it and enjoying it or tolerating it. As the priests are, so the people. And therefore he assembled them at the door of the tabernacle to watch what was going on.

The first thing he did was to wash Aaron and his sons with water, their hands and their feet. And that's just the beginning of humiliations. If you don't think so, how would you like tonight to be called up on the platform and be required to take off your shoes and socks?

And I would wash your feet publicly before all these people. It's a humiliation, but it's a necessary requirement. And of course it bespeaks the washing of the water of the word, which is the first approach to true ministry and which in fact we're performing tonight now.

Maybe at the end of this night, there might be one or two ordained, consecrated. And God is speaking a washing of the word on hands and feet, because there's been just a little too much traffic in the world, just a little bit too much of the groovy undertone of the current to be found in the entertainments of the world, which have found their way also into our services and into our practices.

That which has dallied and dabbled in the world needs first to be washed before there's another step taken in the consecration of the priests. And then the elaborate clothing was put upon them, long undertunic girded with a long sash with a robe and an ephod, kind of an upper vest, all made of linen.

Nexodus it says, linen breeches to cover their nakedness. From the loins unto the sides shall they reach. God was very particular about this, first no wool garments, because if a priest ever sweated, he's finished.

The day that a priest sweats, he's no longer a priest. The day that he wheels and deals and strives to perform, puts on a show and has to promote it and do it, that's the end of his priesthood. No sweat children, it's the father who doeth the works.

And the linen is the linen of his righteousness and it covers all flesh. God was so fastidious about this that he didn't even allow priests to walk up on steps into the Holy of Holies. They had to go up on a ramp, lest if they had gone up on steps they would have had to raise one leg higher than the other and in the cause of which some flesh of their thigh would be revealed.

No flesh shall stand in his presence. Have you got that? N .O. No flesh shall stand in his presence. Have you really got that? Are you covered from head to toe in the linen of his righteousness? Don't dare draw near to God or before men and assume holy priestly responsibility if your flesh is thickened up.

Skillfully woven cords attach the ephod to the priest, binding it to him. I looked it up, they were blue cords. And blue is the color of deity and it's the color of truth. The priest's garments weren't some kind of quick, icky thing like stepping into a phone booth and putting on your Superman costume and if so facto changed.

That's the way it's been up till now, but I tell you children, God is no longer winking. He doesn't care too much for this business of being one thing publicly and another thing privately put on and take off.

He's calling for a priesthood where the holy garments are attached to the very body of the priest, tied on. You're on view always. You're always God's man, always God's servant, always the high calling of God, always the integrity of God for things large, things small, things public, things private, things seen, things unseen.

You still willing to be a priest? No little groovy change of costume thing. It's bound to your very body. And on the turban upon the head, there was a shining gold plate and on it was written holiness unto the Lord.

Hallelujah. May we feel the weight of that plate slapping back and forth as we walk about in the performance of our duties. A continual reminder, just a heft in the weight of it, holiness unto the Lord, unto the Lord, unto the Lord.

There's a reason children for everything that's here. There was only one portion of the body of the priest that was at all exposed for the holy anointing oil, which is spoken of in the 11th verse, poured, sprinkled seven times and then upon the head of Aaron and down his beard and then to the hem of his garment had only one place where it can make contact with flesh.

And that was the head of the priest, the head of the body. And so is it also to this day, only one place exposed. Only one head that can stand before God, the Father, so one with him, so sharing his essential character and purity and holiness that the holy anointing oil can make direct contact.

But in everything else other than the head, from the neck to the tops of the toes, the body of Christ must be covered in the linen of God's righteousness. Upon man's flesh, it shall not be poured. And that's why children, the decibels are rising.

That's why the noise is becoming more strident. That's why there's increasing clamor and activity and programs and all the kinds of jazz. You can count on it as the anointing of God subsides, as more and more flesh is revealed, as God will not allow his holy anointing oil to be poured upon man's flesh.

Men who sense somehow intuitively the absence of the unction of God, for which no entertainments are required, shall be required to fill the silences with their own activities, their own noise, their own clamor.

May God give you priestly discernment to sense the difference and to be on guard and keep the sanctity of the temple. And so the anointing oil came upon Aaron's head and upon his sons. And then we read of a succession of sacrifices, bulls which Moses killed and poured the blood at the base of the altar and consecrated it.

And he took all the fat that was on the entrails and the lobe of the liver and the two kidneys with the fat, and Moses burned them on the altar. But the bull, its hide, its flesh, its tongue, he burned with fire outside the camp.

Doesn't that just controvert our own human wisdom and reckoning? Wouldn't we have thought the flesh, the most valuable part of the sacrifice, wouldn't that be the portion that should have been burned on the altar?

And the hide probably could have been sold. But God counts the hide as just the mere exterior. That's the place of superficiality. There's only one place for it. It's the dung heap outside the camp. No sacrifice to God shall ever be performed from that.

And as far as the flesh is concerned, you know what God thinks of that. He equates it with dung. Skin, flesh, and dung burned outside. But the things we would despise, the things that to us are despicable, the things for which we have no appetite, that God celebrates.

The lobe of the liver, the kidneys, the kiskis, the lowly organs, which are the seat of life, which have to do with the purification of blood, that God puts on the altar of sacrifice. His way is not our way, children, nor are His thoughts our thoughts.

And I'll tell you what. You love truth. You love true service. You had better start adjusting your life, your walk, and your ministry in keeping with the things that He sees them, rather than that which is popular and has become universally accepted in our own generation.

I'll tell you that true ministry will always require you to handle despicable things. We'll always want to reach for the things that look lovely and inviting, but I'll tell you that the real life is in the kiskis.

The real life is in the thing from which we would ordinarily draw back. It's not going to be in the places that are popular and approved and ringing with applause, but I think they're going to be in the hidden places, the secret places, the unesteemed places where God will be bringing forth the deepest and truest end-time priestly ministries to the end of the age.

That's just a suspicion that I have. And then in the 18th verse, another sacrifice, a ram for burnt offering. Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the head of the ram. You know why? It was an act of identification.

You know what they were saying by that act? Lord, it's my death that should be required. I'm unfit. I'm unworthy. I deserve your judgment. How do I presume, piece of dust that I am, to stand before you and to invoke and to perform holy things?

No way. But I thank you, precious God, that in your wisdom, you accept this substitute. And by the laying of my hands on that animal, high-spirited animal, independent, kind of rebellious, in which I see what is my own frame, I recognize the necessity for that death.

Because so long as that kind of independence continues, so long as that kind of egotism and self-will goes on, there's no way to be a priest. By the fact of identification now and this death now, I see myself as wholly dead and cut off, that the priestly ministry may be by Christ Jesus.

Moses killed it. Cut the ram into pieces and burned the head to pieces and the fat, washed the entrails, legs and water. Man, what gooey, icky stuff. The great Moses, having to do with entrails and things like that, standing already in a pool of slippery blood, with the things crudded under his fingernails.

Hey, you don't like that? They didn't tell you that? Did they give you a far more fetching picture of what ministry to God was going to be in the end times? And you saw yourself in glorious places and a great crowd swaying back and forth under the power of your great preaching and ministry?

Let me tell you, children, if there's no blood under your fingernails and icky crud and you're not slipping and sliding on the floor that's made wet by the blood of sacrifice, you've probably missed it.

And so he brought the other ram, the ram of consecration, in the 22nd verse and he laid their hands upon it again and Moses killed it and took some of its blood and put it on the tip of Aaron's right ear, on the thumb of his right hand, on the great toe of his right foot.

Isn't that foolishness? And they did the same thing to Aaron's son. Let me ask you a question tonight. Is the blood of Jesus on your right ear? What are you hearing? And to what do you give your attention and obedience?

Ministry in the Midst of Social Unrest

Oh, I can tell you stories, children, if I had time and you had the patience, of what it means to have the blood of the Lord on your right ear. How would you like, during the time of the Kent State murders, to have been scheduled for an open-air gospel encounter at a great university in Chicago to find that it, together with other universities across the land, were on strike.

Students under the hypnotic power of satanic spirits in the name of justice and righteousness had taken over the campus. And you got there on a hot, boiling day and found out that you couldn't perform your ministry.

The strike committee had taken it over and you pleaded with them that you had reserved that amphitheater and they're not even listening to you. Man, there's a gleam in their eyes and you know the origin of it.

They're intoxicated with the power of having shut down a great university. And so finally, by the wisdom of God, you say to them, listen, I love peace also. How about giving me at least ten minutes on the program?

So they did you a favor and they gave you ten minutes. But yet I spent two hours in the boiling sun waiting for your opportunity. And listen to the filthiest parade of incitement to violence, filth, haranguing, blasphemy that you've ever heard.

Your soul is just sick in the hearing of it all the more because it's a reminder that not too long ago before the Lord found you, you used to speak those vile things too. And finally you hear your name shouted, Cat, Cat, is he in the audience?

And cats come staggering out. Heat prostration, sunstroke, kishkas tied in knots hearing all these filthy things, mind all fogged up, unable to think, wondering what you're doing here, reeling, and a microphone is thrust into your hand.

And you stand in the middle of that amphitheater for the first time and you look at the bodies all around you. Whether it's the heat or your condition or just the peculiarity of being Jewish, it seems to you as if the bodies are in recline.

They're not sitting upright, they look like sinuous snakes intertwined. And what helps the scene is the litter, the lunch bags and the newspapers and the leaflets completely filling that arena with just a scene of bedlam and disorder and confusion, the architects of a brave new world.

Tell me, children, what would you say in that moment? What ministry would you perform then? What glib thing would you speak then? How cute and fetching would you be then? Trusting God because it's ministry by Christ Jesus?

I opened my mouth and I heard myself saying that I'm a Jew who's had a lifelong concern for social justice. But having sat for two hours listening to these speeches, I have to say that it has confirmed what I have all along believed, that our so-called solutions are just so much batting at the air, mere vain ceremony.

And you who profess to be concerned for the death of four students have your own mouths and throats filled with murder and with violence.

And the shouts began to go up, Give us Barabbas! How did he get that microphone? What has this got to do with the strike? And I said, Oh, you guys want a revolution? Right on.

But it's got to begin with you, in your own filthy hearts, in your own murderous hearts, in the name of justice ready to bring down entire civilizations in Africa. Well, you should have heard the shrieks and the howls.

It happens, children, every time you sacrifice animals. It happens every time you stick that knife into flesh. Whoo! You should have heard the shrieks.

You should have heard the screams. Hey! How did he get that microphone? Give us Barabbas!

And I'll tell you what, children, the day is not far off when we're going to hear Crucify Him! And I remember sitting that afternoon on the grass, talking with as many students who were interested to speak with me, peculiar Jewish freak that I was, speaking those strange things in that environment.

My Bible had burst at the seams and it had a piece of black magic tape on it and I was sitting on my Bible, and when I got up I had a big black stripe across the seat of my pants. Stunned at the treatment that I had received by men who claimed to love justice.

The Cross as the Only True Message

And that night I spoke in a great Pentecostal church in that city. Man, 15 churches were represented. They were spilling over. And you should have seen those pastors that night sitting together with me on the platform.

What a contrast. Man, what a sorry mess I looked. I had hardly a time to wash my face. There was that black stripe on the seat of my pants, which I hope no one was going to see. And I noticed for the first time that the pants I was wearing had one leg a little bit more faded than the other.

That's how I got it at Klein's basement. But the other guys, wow. They were sparkling. Pastel colored shirts and well manicured sideburns and they were just real groovy. And that night they had a popular pastor contest and I had to wait through that.

Took at least a half hour. And if someone did their Sunday school room, they got so many points that they washed their car, shined their shoes, and the pastor with the most points won. Well, it happened to be a tie.