Prayer and Revival - Part 3 — Bill McLeod

Well, good morning. Did you pray for me before you came? If you did, would you raise your hand? Okay, some people prayed. Thank you. Just a word of advice, perhaps, here. Don't ever go to any church meeting, any Christian meeting, without first praying.

Because, you know, you often get out of it what you put into it. And so, it's not like a circus where you go to notice what's happening and then walk home. It's different. And we need, as it says in 2 Corinthians chapter 1, you also helping by prayer.

By prayer. That's a tremendous ministry, just a ministry of prayer. Remember, Anna, she served God with fastings and prayers, night and day. And she never even left the temple. I don't know how she survived.

I guess she could get food and so on in the temple, but she never left the temple, apparently, for years. And, of course, people would criticize her for that. Now, yesterday, I must say, I apologize a little bit, I had some problem when I was preaching.

You see, I have a small upper plate, and it kept coming down on me, and I had a terrible time. This has never happened to me before in preaching, so I think I'm going to have to add a new chapter to my book, you know.

Christ's Promise of Joy and Answered Prayer

I'll read John chapter 16, and then we're going to turn to Ephesians chapter 3. John 16, 22. He's talking to the disciples just before his crucifixion. And you now, therefore, have sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no man can take from you.

And in that day, now he's talking about the day of his resurrection, you shall ask me nothing. In truth, in truth, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give it you. Up until now have you asked nothing in my name.

Ask, and you shall receive that your joy may be full. These things I have spoken to you in parables. But the time is coming when I will no more speak to you in parables, but I will show you plainly of the Father.

At that day, you shall ask in my name. Now I do not say to you that I will pray the Father for you, for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came out from God.

Christ's Work Creates One Family of Jews and Gentiles

And in that day, remember, in that day you shall ask me nothing. Whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Then in Ephesians chapter 3. Just go back to Ephesians 2 for a moment. Verse 12, he's talking about us as Gentiles.

You see, there was a time, as he says here, we were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world.

That's how it was for Gentile people before Christ came. But now, in Christ Jesus, you who sometimes were far off, are made near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who has made both, that is, both Jew and Gentile believing in Christ, has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinance, for to make in himself of two one new man, so making peace.

And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby. And came and preached peace to you who are far off, Gentiles. For through him we both, Jew and Gentile, have access to one spirit, by one spirit unto the Father.

Now, therefore, you are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens of the saints, and of the household of God, and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom all the building, fitly framed together, Jew and Gentile, that is, believing in Christ, grows unto a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are builded together for a habitation, a dwelling place, that is, through the Spirit.

And Paul says in verse 1 of chapter 3,. For this cause I, Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ, for you Gentiles, and then he digresses for 13 verses and comes back to it again, yet for this cause, in verse 14, for what cause?

For what God is doing by saving Jews and Gentiles, making them into one body, a place, a dwelling place, eternally for himself. For this cause I bow my knees, and let's just stop there for a moment. Is there some physical posture we should assume when we preach, when we pray?

Biblical Postures and Persons in Prayer

Not really. Sometimes, some people might take it when it says, Oh, come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker, that we should always kneel when we're praying. Well, sometimes when you get a lot of arthritis, you can't kneel when you pray.

Anyway, I noted something. Christ said, When you stand praying, oh, it's okay to stand praying. David went into the temple and sat before the Lord and prayed. It's okay to pray sitting, right? Okay. Jehoshaphat was in a chariot on a battlefield, and he was surrounded by the enemy that were going to kill him, and he cried out to God.

So, okay to pray when you're driving your car, right? And Jonah, I'm sure, was horizontal when he prayed in the fish's belly. So, it's okay to pray in bed, okay? For this cause, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

To whom should we pray? Well, we know there's no jealousy in the Godhead, and we can pray to God the Father, Christ the Son, the Holy Spirit. If we can't, we'll have to get rid of a lot of the hymns we sing.

However, I think, basically, we should be praying to God the Father, as we saw in John 17, praying to God. He said, in that day you'll ask me nothing. Whatever you ask the Father in my name. And basically, I think, that's the way we should pray.

Now, in some Christian circles, they pray always to Jesus, to Christ Jesus. And I don't think that's really right, in spite of what I said a moment ago, that there's no jealousy in the Godhead. Paul here said, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, I may be wrong here, but I can't think of any place after Pentecost where people prayed directly to Jesus Christ. Except Stephen when he was dying, and he cried, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And I think you'll agree, that's something different again.

I bow my knees, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. He's been talking about that, remember, in chapter 2. The whole family of God. Jews and Gentiles together now. The differences are gone in Christ.

We're no longer Jew nor Gentile, we're part of the church of God. We're believers in Christ. And all those differences are gone. And I don't agree too much with the idea of having Messianic fellowships for Jews alone, where Jews meet by themselves as Christian believers.

I don't think that's really right. That's not how it was back in the early days. We know that because of Antioch, when Paul had to straighten Peter, the first pope, up. The first pope was not infallible, you know.

And we know from what is said there about the church at Antioch, that there were Jews and Gentiles that were meeting and fellowshipping together. And I think that's the right thing. The whole family. God only has, God only has one family.

He doesn't have an Old Testament family and a New Testament family. He has one family. This is not understood in some Christian circles. It should be. So Paul said, there is no difference between the Jew and the Gentile.

Human Sinfulness and God's Initiative in Conversion

No difference in the mind and eyes of God. You know, we're all the same. There's none that seeks after God. What? Not even one? No, not even one. It started in the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve were not looking for God.

They were hiding from God. We've all been hiding. I hid from God for years. And one day He found me. I wasn't seeking God. He was seeking me. And He found me. And I can't, when I think of the way I felt shortly before I was converted, I was in a meeting and a guy preached the gospel.

I got so angry at him I could have spit at him. I'm no kidding. I was that, I hated what I heard, you know. I couldn't get out of there fast enough. Now, a few days later, I'm on my knees in the basement of our home in Winnipeg, crying to God to come into my heart.

How did that happen? You know, people talk about free will. They're talking about a will of the wist, but it isn't really there. Did you choose your parents? No, you didn't choose your parents. Did you choose the country you should be born in?

No, you had nothing to do with that. Did you choose the time in history when you would be born? No, you had nothing to do with that. When you get talking about free will, people, in operation in a very narrow sphere, I think you can say amen if you want.

The whole family in heaven and earth. And someday, you know, we're going to see the results of His death on the cross. Did you know this, that God's going to sing to us? And if God sings to us, it'll be a trio.

Won't it? It tells us that, you know. The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty. And it goes on to say He will sing. He'll sing. And we'll be there. There won't be any other soloists or singers in that sense.

We'll all be singing together at times, I'm sure. But He's going to sing to us, and I don't know what kind of a song it'll be, but I imagine it'll be a love song. Because God so loved the world, and He'll have all His family there with Him.

And it'll be a most glorious time, I believe. Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. But He would grant you, and somebody put it this way, if God doesn't do it, it'll never get done. And there's another verse that says, Whatsoever God does, it shall be forever.

Nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it. And God does it that men should fear before Him. So we want to make sure that what we're doing is what God is doing. Workers, fellow workers with Him.

Letting Him be the Chief, the King. And let me be the channel through which He works. That He would grant you according to the riches of His glory. I love to tell people, God never has a problem. God never finds something He can't handle.

God's Infinite Resources and Equality Before Him

The riches of His glory. And if everybody prayed once in the entire world, this would not bother God. He'd have no problem with that. His riches, it says here, the riches of His glory, they are like Himself, infinite.

Infinite. I heard of a place, a large city, and there's a section in the city where you could build a house, providing you were a millionaire. There was another area in the same city where you could build a house, providing you were a multimillionaire.

And then there was an area in the same city where you could build, providing you were a billionaire. And I thought to myself, what nonsense is this? You know, you couldn't buy an ice cream cone in heaven with a billion dollar bill because it's not current over there.

Our money is not current in heaven, you know. If a man with nothing at all prays, God hears him. The rich and the poor, the Bible says, they meet together on the same level. Don't ever forget that. James had something to say about people who, when strangers came in, if he's a nice looking guy, well off, you give him a good seat.

If he's poor, you tell him, well, stand here under my stool, you know. They were doing that. They didn't know, apparently, that the rich and the poor with God, they meet on exactly the same level. Your money doesn't make you more acceptable to God, and it never can.

And one of Moody's meetings, they were in a big hall, and people were gathering chairs, the crowd was getting to be big, and Moody was down there helping them put more chairs up, and somebody came running and said, Mr. Moody, Senator, I don't know what the name was, Senator, let's say Smith.

Senator Smith is here tonight. Where is he? And so he went over to him and said, Mr. Smith, would you help me grab some of these chairs and help us put them up? Yeah, people, we have to keep that in mind.

We're so impressed, you know, by people that have lots of money. How eternal is money? What is it? What did God say to Abraham? Fear not, Abraham, I am your shield, and your exceeding great reward. You don't have a nickel in the bank, that's fine, you've got God.

He's our reward. He's everything and all we'll ever need. When my wife and I were married, there were two things we promised God. There were more than two, but there were two. We promised God, although we were on a tiny salary of $30 a month.

That was 64 years ago. We promised God we'd give him a tithing offering, off the top, always, no matter what. And we've always done that, I can say, by the grace of God. The other thing was this. We decided together, we promised, we would never, ever let anybody know what our financial needs were.

We would just let God know. I didn't know this, and I don't know where this phrase came from later on. And it was this. If God knows what the need is, then whosoever needs to know. So we've operated by that principle.

I'm not saying everybody should. But we've operated from that principle ever since. And it's been incredible at times, the kind of answers to prayer you get, when you're looking to God alone. I'll not go further into that.

Inner Strength and Christ's Indwelling Presence

That He would grant you to be strengthened with might, with power, by His Spirit in the inner man. And I'm sure we'd all love to have this happen, to have Him strengthening us by His Spirit in the inner man.

We all need that, to be stronger as believers than we are. And God listens to us as we pray along these particular biblical lines. He goes on further then with the same thought in His heart, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.

I remember years ago, as a young Christian reading this and staring at it, I thought to myself, what in the world is he talking about? He's praying for Christians that they may come to know what it means to have Christ dwelling in their hearts by faith.

This doesn't make any sense, you know. I didn't know how to interpret it. I didn't know what to do with it. But I read something Moody said. He said, I read the Bible the same way that I eat fish. If I come to a bone, I don't stop eating fish.

I just lay the bones on the side of my plate. He said, that's how I read the Bible. If I come to something I don't understand, I put it to one side, ask God to show me what it means, and somewhere down the road, He's going to show me.

And here's what happened to me. Kenneth Weiss, a well-known Greek scholar, did a New Testament from the Greek. And here's how he interpreted that part of the Word of God. That Christ may settle down and feel at home in your hearts by faith.

I've traveled a lot. I've sometimes been in a room in a hotel or motel or something that was right over the beer parlor. And you know, Saturday night, when you'd like it to be quiet for Sunday, there's a big roar going on down below.

Guys arguing, pounding the table and all this kind of stuff, you know. Do you think I felt at home up above? I never felt at home. I was in one place. People, it was so evil. All the walls were just clapboards.

You could hear what was going on in this room and this room and this room, you know. And it was just a veritable Sodom. And I prayed and I said, Lord God, this is a Sodom and Gomorrah. I think you ought to burn it down, but make sure nobody gets hurt.

And a week later, it burned. Now, nobody told the insurance company how I prayed. Or I might have been in trouble. But that's how I felt. It was just horrid, you know. Christ cannot feel at home in a heart this full of lust.

And sometimes, even as Christian believers, we watch some program perhaps on TV, and something lustful comes. You know how easy it is to get it in? You know how hard it is to get rid of it? It stays sometimes for days on end.

And maybe six months later, it comes back to you again. Or two years later. Christ cannot feel at home in a heart. It's got lust in it. In Ecclesiastes 7, there's a verse that says, The Lord has made man upright, but they have sought out many inventions.

I looked up this word, invention. And it means mental fabrications. A fabrication is a lie. A mental fabrication is something you do in your mind. You think that maybe you're having sex with some person you're not married to.

That's a mental fabrication. Or you're living in a $3 million house. That's a mental fabrication. God made man upright, but they have sought out many of these mental fabrications. It says about the world before the flood, that every imagination of their heart was only evil continually.

And then it says the earth was corrupt. He meant morally corrupt. The earth was corrupt. And the earth was filled with violence. And corruption, moral corruption and violent people, they go hand in hand.

And we see it today in your country, in my country. Moral corruption everywhere. Violence everywhere. Convening conferences, as they're doing in Canada now, to find out why there's so much violence against women.

But it's not just violence against women. It's just plain, simple violence in society. So, I might be thinking ill in my mind against some other person. Christ will not feel at home. It isn't that he leaves, but he doesn't feel at home in a situation like that.

And we may think of some person, have bad thoughts about them. Maybe they did something bad to us sometime before. And we can't shake this. You can, but we don't. Been thinking bad about this person. It's a mental fabrication, you know.

It brings you into trouble with Christ. He doesn't feel at home. He doesn't feel at home. You're hoping maybe something will happen to some person. You can't do that. Love one another fervently, being born again.

In 1 Peter chapter 1. Seeing you have purified your souls, and obeying the truth through the Spirit, unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that you love one another with a pure heart, fervently. Then 1 Peter 4 .8.

Have fervent love among yourselves, for love shall cover the multitude of sins. No matter what they've said, no matter what they've done, no matter what they've failed to do, you still have to love with a pure heart, fervently, so that Christ may settle down and feel at home in your heart.

Living by the Bible's Promises

You know, we waste hours sometimes just sitting, thinking. About what? Well, sometimes just about nothing. We should be thinking about our Savior and His Word, His promises. There are, listen carefully, 7 ,487 promises in the Bible.

Did you know that? Herbert Lockyer wrote a book on it. He's got them all indexed in catalog. I haven't counted them myself. I didn't have to. He did all that hard work. 7 ,487 promises. Why do we live, dear people, at such a low level?

When we have, oh, people say, oh yeah, but wait a minute, Bill. All those promises are not for us. Many are for Israel. Yes, okay. Let's take a hold of that. Let's cut it down to 2 ,000 promises. So now you've got 2 ,000 promises.

Isn't that going to get you through? How many more do you need? Here's one. Casting all your care on Him, for He cares for you. Isn't that enough almost by itself? And that's only one? And you've got 2 ,000?

People, listen. You'll never run into a problem in life that isn't covered somewhere in the Word of God. You just have to get to know it well. When I was first converted, I had an advantage because it was the end of what we call in Canada the dirty thirties, just before the war.

And you couldn't buy a job. And I couldn't get a job anywhere. And so I just had just been converted. I got into the Bible. And I used to read six and eight and ten and sometimes twelve hours a day. I never ever got any training in an institution for the Bible, you know.

Just I read the Bible a lot. And so I went on and on and I was so happy when I finally finished the Bible. I started all over again. And I came across this phrase in Mark's gospel, Have faith in God. I don't know why it spoke to me so strongly.

I wrote it at the top of every page I read. I just wrote it, Have faith in God. I had that Bible at home somewhere. I had a great time. Just I didn't have any books. Then somebody gave me a book on the story of George Muir, the famous man of faith and prayer.

And that got me going right. I thought it was a faith thing. It was a tremendous help to me. Then George or Harry Ironside's book on holiness, the false and the truth. Beyond those two, I didn't have books.

I had the Bible. And people, to this hour, I try to read. I try to study about 12, 14 chapters of the Bible every day. And some days it goes on, I just can't quit. I might go on to 24, 30 chapters of the Bible.

I love it. I thank God for it. It speaks to my heart. We need to know it better. You know, Muslim children, many of them, by the time they're 10 years old, they know the whole Quran off by heart. The Quran's about the size of the New Testament.

You know, as Christian believers, I often hear people say things like this. You know, I read the Bible an hour every day. I can't remember a word of what I read. Is that how it should be? What did Christ say?

He said, the Holy Spirit will bring to your mind the things which I have spoken to you. Ask the Holy Spirit to keep the things of God in your mind. He'll do that for you. We need to remember so we can talk to other people.

Because people often tell me this also. The reason they don't witness is because they don't know the Bible. They don't know where to find these verses in the Bible. Well, brother, sister, you better find out.

You can't serve God well if you don't know the Bible well. But I started when I knew nothing about it. I had a bad start, a poor start. But I got off and God began to touch people's lives. So, anyway, that Christ may settle down and feel at home in your hearts by faith.

And maybe right now God is speaking to some of your hearts. There's things that should not be there. And you need to ask His forgiveness and pray for the Spirit of God to strengthen you so that you'll not continue this kind of a way of living.

All our thoughts, we're told in Psalm 139, are known to God. Keep that in mind, too. Christ may dwell, may settle down, feel at home. And then He goes on to say that you being rooted and grounded in love.

Being Rooted and Grounded in Christian Love

When we get a sinner converted, we usually think in terms of getting him well grounded in doctrine. Well, it's important to get to know doctrine well, yes. But also they need to be rooted and grounded in the love of God.

See, Moody had great crusades. They assumed perhaps a million people found Christ as their Savior through His labors over the years. But then he began to hear stories from pastors in areas where he'd been, where there'd been hundreds or maybe thousands of people converted.

They were complaining about the problems they had in their churches. People squabbling and all this kind of thing. It became so important to Moody, before he died, speaking to a group of 400 pastors. Among other things, he said this.

He said, brethren, hold the churches to love. This is where we've gone wrong. Above all things, the Bible says. It says that twice. Above all things, have love. In Colossians 3 and in 1 Peter 4. Above all things, love.

In one of our churches, we had a fellow who was a mink rancher and a Christian. He knew his Bible pretty well, but he loved to argue. And he loved to get on to certain doctrines and argue. And he had a reputation, don't get involved with John, he'll snow you under.

Had a lot of Bible verses and stuff, you know. He never witnessed for Christ, as far as I know. He was dead in that area. But he came into the meetings we had in Winnipeg, right after the meetings in Saskatoon.

And God was working powerfully. God began to work on John. And one night he phoned me and he said, Brother Bill, he said, you know, the Lord has torn me apart. And I'm lying in pieces on the floor. Do you think God could put me together again?

Well, I knew what he meant. He was under deep conviction. And God was showing him these areas of his life. And he was fighting against God. You fight against God, you can never win. Well, he came forward in five different meetings.

The meetings went on for five weeks, it turned out. God did a great thing there. Years later, we heard of about 30 people that went into full-time service as a result of those five weeks of meetings in Winnipeg, Canada.

Anyway, one night, about the fourth week, he came running up in the sharing time onto the platform. I can see him in my mind so clearly right now as he ran up the stairs with a shining face. And he got there, and here's what he said.

Five trips to the altar later, and four weeks later, I can now say, I am wholly his. And then he started witnessing. God gave him a tremendous ministry in witnessing. So much so that the church he attended, they asked him to become director of evangelism, and he did a tremendous job at that.

I was in that church a while ago, and if I asked somebody, how did you find Christ, they'd point to John. How did you find John Sparks? I heard this over and over again. He never even tried before he met with God.

But God took care of all this wicked pride he had, you know, and got him shriveled down to the size of a New Testament Christian. Things were so different, you know. I should say this too, you know. He loved to argue about predestination.

I believe in predestination as much as you do. But he didn't, it wasn't that. He just loved to hit people with it, you know, as hard as he could, and knock them under the chair and everything, you know.

He knew every verse dealing with this in the Bible, but he just had it wrong, that's all, you know. We're to walk in love, we're told. Walk in love. The servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient, in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves, if God perhaps will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.

So we have to be gentle when we're talking with people, not try to beat them on an argument. Just present Christ and His loveliness and His love. That's what's needed. That you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height.

He's talking here, I think, about the love of God. There's a verse in Job 11, I think it is. It says something about who can understand God. He says it's higher than heaven, deeper than hell, broader than the sea.

I think he was talking about the same thing. Possibly this is connected here. He goes on to say, and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge that you might be filled with all the fullness of God.

Moody, J.B. Earle, and the Power of God's Love

Some of you have read about Moody walking down the street in Chicago one day, and the Spirit of God came on him in a new and powerful way. He ran to a friend's house, asked for a room where he could be alone for some hours.

And during those hours, he was immense in the love of God. He said he thought at one point he was going to die. The experience was so overwhelming and powerful, and he cried to God. But you know, he said this afterwards, after this had happened.

I preached the same sermons I had preached before. And whereas before ones and twos came to Christ, now they came to Christ by the thousands. It was obvious a great work of the Spirit of God in infilling something he'd never seen or known before.

He was called to do a specific work, so he had a specific calling and mantle of power given him. J .B. Earle, that was something different. He'd had many crusades in eastern Canada and in the States, and then he gave up on God.

Nothing was happening. Preached sermon after sermon, nobody responded. Nobody found Christ. And finally, here's what he did. He decided he was going to preach in a harsh way to get these people to stir, you know.

So one of the barbers said, here's what he did. He filled his sermons with salt, saltpeter, cactus, barbed wire, everything you could think of he put in his sermons. And then he hurled it at the people, you know, and nothing happened.

He preached for nine nights in the church, and nobody stirred. So he took the last sermon he had and reworked it, putting in more, you know, broken concrete and stuff. Everything you could think of to hit these people over the head, you know.

And you know what happened? Nobody stirred. So that night, J .B. Earle got alone in his room, and he cried to God, and he said, God, what's wrong with these people? And God said, nothing, but there's much wrong with you.

Me? Well, God, you know I cry when I preach sometimes. Yes, God said, it's water off an iceberg. And J .B. Earle tells how he just collapsed on the floor, and he spent hours crying to God for mercy. Would have been nice if we had the prayer and we could listen to what he said, but we don't know that.

But we know this. After that night, before he died, 150 ,000 people found Christ as their Savior through his labors. He said, though, this one thing. That night, he said, I was filled with the love of Jesus Christ.

That's what he's talking about here. To know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge. If we don't know the love of Christ, we can't very well show love to other people in the measure that we should.

I think I was telling some people here one time. I don't know if I told it from the pulpit, I don't think so, but I was in the home. A bunch of people there, and I'd gone out to get a drink of water, and a lady followed me out, and she filled a dipper with water and threw it in my face.

Have you ever had that happen? Anybody? Now, if that had been my old days, I'd have grabbed her and struck her head under the tap and turned her down, you know. But I didn't, and I smiled and said, well, thanks for the water.

Do you think you'd find a towel? She looked at me, went and got a towel and threw it at me, and then she said, I suppose you're wondering why I didn't. Yeah, I said, it's never happened before. Well, she said, I wanted to hear what you would say if I caught you off your guard.

You see, she knew I'd worked in logging camps, and she knew the kind, her husband was a logger too, and she knew the kind of people who had to curse all the time. She really expected I wasn't going to give her a cursing, but thank God, I just gave her a smile, you know, because Christ was in control.

It was just a pail of water in the face. What does that mean? That's not forever. It's just for a few minutes. Anyway, to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge that you might be filled with all the fullness of God.

The Love of the Spirit and True Filling

And I'd like to say this too. There is no such thing, dear people, as being filled with the Spirit of God if you're not filled with the love of God. Why do I say that? I say that for this reason. The Bible has a phrase, Romans 1530, the love of the Spirit.