Revival Is Family — Malachi O'Brien

Malachi O 'Brien, if you would please come. He is an Associate Pastor of Prayer and Church Revitalization at Connection Point Church in Missouri. He has been called by the Lord for revival. And I would like to ask Pastor Dr. Al Whittingill to please come and pray for our dear brother.

Thank you for doing that. Thank you.

Wonderful time of worship and we come just as we are by the blood of the Lamb in agreement of heart that you yourself have forged on the anvil of your cross. Thank you for the moment we're in. We ask you now to allow us to see the bigness and the fullness of what you're doing here in these moments together.

Entering God's Presence Through the Word and Prayer

May we seize these moments and embrace them and receive what the Spirit of God is saying to the churches. And we thank you that we can come by this new and freshly slain way within the veil. We can come boldly to your throne and we can come having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience by the blood of the Lamb and our bodies washed with pure water and in full assurance of faith we have such a high priest over the house of God that we can come and consider your word and consider one another and consider how great you are and what you're doing in our day and provoke one another to faith and good works.

May we not forsake these moments, these kind of assemblings. But may the name of Jesus be exalted in our hearts. Bless my brother Malachi as he preaches your word, as he opens his mouth wide. Will you fill it?

Will you anoint his heart? Will you speak to him that which we need today? We need you, Lord, to speak to our hearts. Living words, lasting words, loving words. Lord, do it for the glory of your name.

We're here for you, Lord. And we're not concerned so much about outside this building. Even today, outside those that are listening, we are concerned for everyone that gathers here to hear your word. And bless brother Malachi as he opens the scriptures and you take your sword and pierce the hearts, plant the seed, crush the hardness, and send forth light and truth in Jesus' name.

Amen. Hallelujah.

Amen. Thank you. Thank you, Brother Al. I love you. And this is a joy to be with you again. We were not too terribly long ago. And so it is a joy to be a part of this conference. So I thank you, Greg, for the invitation.

I am honored to be here. And just knowing that there are people who are joining in online. I was doing so yesterday as I was getting here via Twitter. And so just checking out what was going on and just the testimony that was given.

And so, and thank you for the kind introduction. I'm grateful. And, you know, I feel like I'm in a room of friends, if that's safe to say right now. And many of you, I don't know. Many of you, I do. I'm so grateful to have Glenn Shepard right over here.

And Glenn puts up with me a lot. And so we live only 20 minutes from each other in Kansas City, but I am so grateful for Glenn and his influence in my life. And then Dan and just several friends. And then I know tonight, you know, here in just a few moments, Al's gonna come up and speak.

And so I just wanna set the stage well for you to come with what the Lord has put on your heart. And then tonight, I know John Avant's gonna be speaking. And so, you know, I guess let me just say this.

Revival Begins With Personal Hunger

I'm sharing from the word of God, but I'm sharing out of the overflow of some things that God is doing. And I just wanna declare to you some things that I believe will edify and build up the church. And so let me just first off and say that a revival conference like this is rare, but it's needed.

They always haven't been this rare. I mean, I know Glenn can go back and tell stories of a day that there were conferences like these going on in the 70s during the time of the Jesus movement, but a conference solely dedicated for the purpose of speaking forth revival truth, that's not common, but it's needed.

And you know who it's needed the most for? Those of us in this room. Those that might be tuning in online right now. Because those of us, I said this before, that people that need revival the most think they need it the least.

And people that probably need revival the least think they need it the most. And so at the end of my time with you and just exhorting you and sharing the works of what the Lord has done, I will do what has been done before.

I will encourage all of us to have a time of prayer here at the altar, just again, to cry out, to say, Lord, use me for revival. The greatest hindrance to revival today, in my opinion, is not, it's not a different group that's out there doing their own thing.

It's not somebody in your own home. The greatest hindrance to revival is not even, it's not even the false teachers out there in the world. The greatest hindrance to revival are those of us that know the truth and have become bored with it.

The only person stopping you from a greater encounter with the living God is you yourself. And so today God wants to meet us. God wants to reignite faith once again in your heart and my heart. And here's what I do know.

Encounter usually meets expectation. If you think God will meet with you and you've come believing God will meet with you and if you're right now in your heart saying, God, speak to me, I believe he will because he's faithful to do so.

Seek me, if you seek me, you'll find me if you seek with me with all your heart. But if you've come here today, especially those of us that preachers, we do this a lot. We can easily check out of another person's message because we can easily say, I've heard that.

I could share that better, but it's us. It's us brothers and sisters. It's us that need God the most. And so I just wanna encourage you that God is doing a new thing in this day and age. And I believe we are on the precipice of the greatest spiritual awakening in the history of mankind.

I do, that's worth clapping about, we can do that. I believe it's coming. I believe it's coming, but I believe it's gonna, somebody and a lot of people are gonna have to pray the price because in order to receive what God has, it is going to cost everything.

If you really pursue God who revives, it will cost you everything. It might cost you, it might cost some pastors and leaders their church. It might cost some of you a variety of things because revival is costly.

But revival is not the Christian lottery. It's a Christian inheritance. The more of God, which is already within us, the living Holy Spirit is available now. There's a well that we can drink of any moment.

Why would we do what Jeremiah says and go to broken cisterns that can hold no water when the living water is available to us any moment? I mean, honestly, the worship was phenomenal. And we're like, oh, if I could have that every day, you can, you can.

You don't have to go to a church building to experience the living water and the beauty of what that time of worship was. You can have it any moment. We have the bread of life, but we've become very satisfied with the crumbs of the world.

Oh, brothers and sisters, there's so much more if we would go after it. But you have to believe with me today that the person that needs revival the most is you. It's me. I wanna say today, and I guess if I was to title what I wanna share with you, it's this, revival is family.

Revival Is Family and God Is Moving

Revival is family. Revival is family. And the God of heaven and earth is on the move, bringing people together in unprecedented unity for the greatest moving of his spirit visibly that we have seen. If you believe the Bible, that's what my Bible tells me.

That's what my Bible tells me, that God is on the move. So I came here today with a little bit different kind of message. If you wanna take your Bible, take it to the book of Malachi, not because that's my name.

I do like the book. There's phenomenal truth there, but take your Bibles there. I wanna unpack some of this truth to you, but let me begin by sharing with you just some things that God is doing as I really, I'm living in the overflow right now of two of the greatest miracles of God I've ever seen or witnessed in my entire life in the last 30 days.

And I could just spend the entire time telling you about them and most of it will be that way. But let me tell you something that might encourage you. A few months ago, people say, well, is God really working?

Is God on the move? Yes, he's answering prayer. A few months ago, I was in San Francisco area for a meeting at Facebook and Instagram headquarters. And did you know that every single week there are 800 believers that gather at Facebook for prayer and worship and Bible study?

800, 800 on this sprawling campus there at Facebook. God is on the move. There are believers there that are gathering and they pray for the presidents and the vice presidents of Facebook to come to faith in Christ.

And there are believers there that are actively sharing their faith while they are part of the team at Facebook. We had a worship service at Facebook just literally last summer. And they said, this might be the largest worship service they've ever had on their property.

God's on the move. It started because there was a pastor that went to that area and had a burden to reach college students. But he found himself very unfruitful reaching college students and found himself with a church of 25 people.

But he began to disciple people that were working in the Silicon Valley. The church today still runs about 25, 30, 40 people. But there are believers at Google, believers at Facebook, believers at Slack, believers in all these companies that are seeking the Lord.

Why? Because there was one pastor that believed that God wanted to move and he did not care. Even though his church was not large, the God of heaven was large. God wants to free a generation from believing that the greatest thing in the world is having the largest church in town.

Heaven help us. Heaven help us. God is on the move. So let's take a look at the book of Malachi here. If you love Jesus, we say amen. Amen. Again, I'm looking forward to hearing Al here in just a few moments.

Leadership, Honor, and the Call to Repentance

Verse number six of Malachi says this, a son honors his father. Remember, we're talking about revival as family and God is on the move and God is doing a new thing and the spirit of God is doing exceedingly abundantly above all that we could ask or imagine.

Son honors his father, a servant, his master. Feel the weight of this. But if I am a father, where's my honor? And he says, if I am a master, where is your fear? Where's your reverence of me? Says the Lord of armies to the priest, to the leaders, to those that have been in the very near presence of God, those that have been there.

He says, but what's happened? He's not talking to the entire congregation at large here. He's just talking to the leaders because what God wants to do in this room today is speak to those of you that are leaders.

He wants to move on your hearts first. Let me just time out here for a second. Again, I've just got a lot I'm flowing with right now. The repentance we want to see in the church at large, we will never see unless leaders are willing to lead the way.

The testimonies we long to have of people confessing of breaking through the chains of sin and bondage and we say, oh, I would give anything to see that in the church. If brother so-and-so or sister so-and-so, if they would just get right, but I promise you this, we don't get right because it's awkward.

It's uncomfortable to be the man or woman who stands up vulnerable, naked before a group of people and say, it's me. It's me. It's me. Oh, if our people would just worship with enthusiasm, if they would just understand, but do we understand?

If people would just move and just begin to, listen, the reason why the church isn't seeing more people saved and baptized, flat out reason is because pastors don't share their faith and pastors don't share the gospel and leaders don't do what God's called leaders to do.

So we will be held the most guilty of all because we are the one that know the great stories of revival. We are the ones that have seen God move and work and judgment. We will be responsible for so much more.

Everything that you're given here at this conference, you will be responsible for. You will give an account. And if we can leave a conference like this and not be prone to fasting and prayer and brokenness and sackcloth and ashes, we better not expect it in our churches.

It begins with leaders. It always has. Because revival is family. The author here is just speaking of just the relational aspect of this. He says, they ask him here, but how have we despised your name?

Looks good to us. Have we done this? Those of you that have kids know this very well. What did I do wrong? You broke this. I didn't do it. You're the only one in the house. Have we despised your name?

He says, by presenting defiled food on my altar. How have we defiled you? You ask. When you say the Lord's table is contemptible, it's not worth a worthwhile sacrifice. He says, when you present a blind animal for sacrifice, is it not wrong?

Yes, it's wrong. When you present a lame or a sick animal, is it not wrong? The answer is yes, it's wrong. Bring to, would you bring it to your governor? Would he be pleased with you or show you favor?

Ask the Lord of armies. And now, plead for God's favor. Pray for God's favor. Beg for God's favor. Will he be gracious to us? I will tell you this. God will be gracious to us because we do serve a loving father.

He says this. He says, since this has come from your hands, will he show any of you favor? Ask the Lord of armies. Now here is maybe one of the most astounding, hard verses in all of scripture. I wish one of you, would shut the temple doors so that you would no longer kindle a useless fire on my altar.

I wish one of you, I wish one of you would get sick and tired of being sick and tired and say, God is worth so much more than he's getting. I've got to bring him the very best that I have. According to Romans chapter 12, we know that the sacrifice that God wants is us.

It's us, it's me every day. It's me coming to that altar, broken, barren, needy to the father. Would one of you, would one of you, would one of you believe that there's God is worth so much more than we're giving him now?

Would one of you believe that God's worth absolutely everything? That if he said today, sell everything, give everything, you're doing a heartbeat. If he said, go across town and talk to that person, you're doing a heartbeat.

Is he worth everything? The answer is yes, he is worth everything. If you're asking us, am I getting somewhere? I'm getting somewhere, brothers and sisters. Do you know why in heaven right now, right now, right now, do you know why the angels can't stop singing?

You know, they're singing a song right now, right? Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God almighty who was and is and is to come. You know why they cannot stop singing? They see him, they see him. And they see him and they only see part of it because they cover their face, but they see him and they cannot stop singing.

When you see him for who he is and his glory and majesty and might, you're like, God, I'll give you everything, whatever you want. And when you see him, you're no longer concerned about the church across the street or the person across town or the person on the radio or the preacher on the TV.

It does not matter to you because you've been consumed with someone much greater. And it's the Lord Jesus Christ himself. They can't stop singing. But you go to some churches on Sunday morning and like, well, they've been singing a little too long today and singing a little too long.

Oh, but when you see him, we just couldn't, honestly, we could have spent the next hour singing the songs you guys were singing. That would have been fine with me because it was good. You felt that, it was so good, it was so good.

Do you know why the elders bow in heaven? They see him, they see him, they see him. Do you know that like in heaven, after service is over, they don't go around to each other going, how was church today?

How was it today? You know, the lion-headed angel doesn't ask the other angel, well, it was okay today. I mean, never, never. Do you ever think Timothy went to the apostle Paul and said, hey, Paul, how was it today?

Ah, so-so. You know, a lot of people didn't show up to the synagogue today, it was okay. You know, they're all on vacation, it's okay. Never, because the object of our worship is not anybody sitting in a chair or a pew.

The object of our worship is the one in heaven and revival is family. And I wanna say, brothers and sisters, we must get our eyes off of this and our eyes on him and him forever and him eternal. But there's two fires in this passage.

There's two fires mentioned in this passage. There's the useless fire. It's for show, it's not what it's intended for. It looks like the real thing, but it's not. He says here in verse 11, here is maybe one of the greatest revival promises in all of scripture, my name.

It'd be fun if we had time to go through all the names of God, but we don't. But my name will be great among the nations. From the rising of the sun to its setting, incense and pure offerings will be presented in every place because my name will be great among the nations.

Useless fire from those that are not enthralled by the one on the throne. And now we see a picture of a future promise of a God where there's gonna be fire going up everywhere all the time and he loves it because his name is great.

His name is great. His name is greater than the name on the sign. His name is greater than the denominational tag that we give ourselves to. His name is greater than the style of songs we like to sing.

His name is greater. The only thing that'll change our cities and communities is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. The only thing I have to give when I talk to somebody is let me tell you about the lamb.

Let me tell you about Jesus. Let me tell you how good he is. Let me tell you how awesome he is. We must be enthralled with him once again. And the church of Jesus Christ needs to seek forgiveness for peddling a hollow gospel.

A hollow gospel. The Jesus we've peddled is the one to make us great. And that's never how it was meant to be. When his name is great, I can just be the guy holding the door open every week because his name is great, not me.

I can be the person just doing whatever, because it's all about his name, his name, his name. Did you know a little over a week ago, across America, there was tents in almost every state capital and many, many, many college campuses.

And for three days, three solid days, day and night, it was called Tent America. Hundreds and thousands of young people were gathered underneath a tent in almost every major state capital in America to declare the matchless name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

What church were they from? It doesn't matter. Because they were making much about the one who's great. Some people see dry bones. You know, when some people see dry bones, you know what God sees? You see dry bones, I see an army.

You see the dead, he sees the living. God is up to something powerful, amazing. So let me tell you something, because what I'm about to share with you is so sacred to me that it's almost hard to talk about.

A Miraculous Healing and the Power of United Prayer

But I hope by testimony, because it's not mine, it's his, that God burst something in your heart. A month ago, I was at a prayer meeting on a Friday night. We had a six hour prayer meeting. And there was a gentleman in that prayer meeting.

He is a pastor in the area who comes and he just stood up and said, I've got a word from the Lord tonight I wanna share. So I asked Pastor Lawrence to share. And he said, believe the Lord is saying, believe me for a miracle.

Believe me for a miracle. We went to six hours prayer meeting. It was a powerful time of worship and prayer and just waiting on the Lord. That Saturday comes and a month ago, at about three in the afternoon, I get a text from a gentleman.

He said, he immediately says, please pray right now. My son has been critically injured. About five minutes later, I get a text from the grandma. She says, Xavier, Xavier has fallen from a tree. He's fallen face down onto a metal stake.

It's gone through his skull. That grandpa, that gentleman at the prayer meeting that for was Xavier's grandpa. Come to find out what had happened was three boys went into a tree house and they began to play and they didn't know there was a bunch of hornets in the tree house.

And so Xavier tries to get out of the tree house. And as he's swapping one of the hornets, hornets are different than bees. Hornets will keep on stinging, stinging, stinging. Bees will sting you and they'll die.

He gets stung and he lets go and he falls face down onto a metal meat skewer that was sticking up in the ground. That metal meat skewer went through his entire skull. He gets up. A miracle of God, he gets up.

He goes into the house. His mom freaks out like any mother would. Throws him into the car and there's still tons of hornets all around him. Rush him to Cass Medical Center and immediately they rush him to Children's Mercy in Kansas City.

And then when he gets there at Children's Mercy, they say, we don't have what it takes to help him. Like the best children's hospital of Kansas City and they don't have what it takes. So they say, we're gonna have to rush him to a neuro unit at KU Medical Center in downtown Kansas City.

They did not know the extent of the damage on Xavier. We come to find out later after they finally, and again, the metal meat skewer sticking six inches out of his face. What happened is the metal meat skewer completely severed one of his jugular veins.

Completely. I didn't know you had more than one until four weeks ago. They completely severed it. But instead of bleeding, it clotted. Instead of bleeding, it clotted. Just by the sheer angle to which he fell and the weight of the meat skewer, it clotted.

That metal meat skewer was exactly one millimeter from the main artery, the main jugular artery, that if you nick it, you cut it, you bleed out in moments. One millimeter. I have the x-rays to prove it.

One millimeter. Did you know there's a God in heaven who designs our bodies so uniquely, so creatively, that the veins in your face and my face run differently? That the way that my jugular vein runs in my head is different than the way it runs in your head?

That only the God of heaven before time began knew what he was gonna do with Xavier Cunningham and knew how he was gonna put that main jugular vein in his face and he knew there would come a day that this boy would fall from a tree and he knew there'd be a day that this steak was gonna go through his skull.

So God says, I'm just gonna move this just here enough so that it doesn't kill him because I serve a God of miracles. We're there at the hospital. The parents are weeping. They rush him to children's mercy.

The dad texts me that night. They don't know if he's gonna live or die, but they just say pray. So we get everybody to pray. And I mean, when there's an emergency, you text everybody. You text every church in town.

You text every pastor you know. You go after everybody because when it's critical, we unite when it's critical. By the way, Church of Jesus Christ, it's mission critical in America right now. It's mission critical, we unite.

They didn't know where they was gonna take him from. They thought they might've had to take him to Denver or St. Louis, but let me read you something the dad wrote, put on Facebook in the middle of the night.

I don't even know if I could write this, but this is what the dad said in the middle of the night. A heart-wrenching, gut-wrenching, soul-wrenching prayer at about two in the morning, literally just several weeks ago.

Shannon says, middle of the night, he said, my beloved Lord, my God, I do not know the plans you have for us. If it's your will to heal my son, I ask you to do it quickly, but if you take him, I'll be forever honored that you let me call him my son, my boy, my own bear.

I will still worship you, my King. I will draw strength from you as I grieve. I will rest in knowing that you love me. I will not forsake you, my God, my King. I will forever praise you. Please have mercy on us, your will on earth as it is in heaven.

So I'm there with the family at the hospital four weeks ago on a Sunday morning. We immediately just called at the entire church service, which I barely showed up for any of it, was just gonna be a prayer service, period.

We're just gonna pray. That's all we're gonna do, we're gonna pray. And I'm there when it's just me, the mom, and the dad in a massive, empty waiting room. At KU Medical Center, Kansas City. All throughout the night, doctors had convened all around Kansas City from different hospitals, specialists from different hospitals, all in a room wearing their individual coat and colors from their hospital, but united with one purpose to save this boy's life.

All throughout the night, they did not sleep. They did not sleep. I think there's coming a day that we wanna see God move in America. Some of us are gonna give up sleep and food to seek God like we've never sought him before.

We're gonna fast and pray like never before. And they say, we've got a plan. We've got A, B, C, and D. We've got 30 doctors and surgeons in the room ready to go. If something happens here and this goes bad, this team goes in.

And if something else goes different, this team goes in. And if that goes bad, then the C team goes in. And if the worst of the worst happens, the D team goes in. But we are ready for the worst possible scenario.

But they told the mom, we cannot promise you that we will be able to save your son, but we will try. He was coming in and out of consciousness as they were driving to the hospital and in and out of consciousness while he was at the hospital.

And you know what he was singing when he was coming in and out of consciousness? There's a song called Reckless Love. He was singing the song, Reckless Love. There ain't no mountain, there ain't no wall that my God wouldn't do.

They begin that surgery. Hour and a half later, they come in and they just say that we've, okay, it's a miracle. We've got the breathing tube in. I mean, they had to be, because his mouth was, because they couldn't even touch the stake.

It's still in his face after all these hours, because if we touch it, it may hit the jugular and he bleeds out and he dies. So I was there for that. They said it's gonna be about an eight-hour surgery.

I was there about seven and a half hours in when the doctors come out. Dr. Ebersole from KU Medical Center, Kansas City, Missouri. I was there when Dr. Ebersole came out of there in tears. He comes to the mom and the dad.

He says, it's a one-in-a-million miracle that he was alive when you brought him here to us. And we needed that same one-in-a-million miracle to get that out of his face without doing any further damage.

He said, I've never in all of my medical history seen such a miracle, never. He goes, I can't explain it. When we pulled it out, every doctor on the floor was celebrating. Because when God does a miracle and God sends a revival, I don't care if it's this church or that church or wherever there, we celebrate.

Because only God can do the impossible. He's in tears, the families are in tears, we're in tears. It's amazing. He said, there's no human explanation. That stake went through his skull. It missed every major nerve.

It missed the blood vessels in the back of your head that go to provide blood to the brain. It missed those. He goes, there's no way to explain this. There's a miracle. The next day, I go to the hospital and Xavier's out of surgery.

He's in a hospital room playing Xbox. Seriously, seriously, two days later, metal stake through the skull. A millimeter from death, he's there. News crews are starting to come in. By the time this thing, it's still circulating.

Good Morning America, Washington Post, CNN, BBC, CBN News, I have friends there that help run CBN News. Inside Edition ran an exclusive story on the miracle boy from Missouri. The miracle boy from Missouri.

The city we live in just declared tomorrow to be Xavier Cunningham Day for the miracle that God did for him. The whole city celebrating that God did a miracle. Because when God, God doesn't need our strategies.

God doesn't need our business plans. God doesn't need our fancy vision statements because revival's family. Revival's family. But it gets better. I was there that Monday with him. And Xavier said, pastor?

I said, hey buddy, yeah, what's going on? He goes, I knew I'd be okay. I go, well, Xavier, how did you know you'd be okay? He goes, because before they took me in for surgery, at the foot of my bed, I saw Jesus.

And his hand on me, he was praying for me. And his eyes lit the room. He said, I knew I'd be okay. What a God. What a savior. What a miracle working God. That would do such a powerful demonstration that only God can get credit for.

No human being, no doctor, no nothing. If he would have fell one inch higher, he would have been dead. If he would have fell one inch to the left or the right, he would have been dead. If he would have pulled that metal stake out of his hand, out of his face, he would have been dead.

Only God. My friend from CBN News asked him, how come you didn't pull that out of your face when you came out of the ground? He said, no, you guys will laugh at this. He goes, well, I saw the movie Black Panther.

And in the movie Black Panther, when that guy pulls that thing out of his chest, he dies. So I knew I better not take this out of my face. That was his logical reasoning, not to take this thing out of his face.

But the human reaction is just to pull it out. I'm here to tell you that I serve a God who can part the Red Sea. I'm here to tell you that I serve a God that can make the sun stand still. I'm here to tell you that I serve a God that can take a nameless, faceless group of people in the Middle East and declare them his sons and daughters for all eternity.

A hated people that he still has a plan for. I serve a God that can raise the dead. I serve a God that can heal the sick. I serve a God that can make the blind see and can make the deaf hear. I serve a God that can take dry bones and make them into an army.

And I serve such a God that when I know what he has done, I say, God, I don't want useless fire. I want your name to be great from now to the setting of the sun. That's what I want. And I serve a God.

I don't serve a day of miracles. I serve a God of miracles. And what God has done before, God can do again. And we're about ready to walk in to the greatest era of human history. Well, there'll be more miracles, signs and wonders than we could ever explain.

How do you know that? Because my Bible tells me that. My Bible tells me that. My Bible tells me that. My Bible tells me that. So I'm here to tell you revival is family. Revival is family. And I don't know what your miracle is today, but I'm telling you, there needs to be something in your life that if God did it, you yourself would know God has done a miracle.

And I've been around this long enough that for some of you, it's a prodigal son or daughter to come back. I've been around this long enough and not as long as Glenn, but a little while. But I know a God that can do the miraculous.

But I fear the church of Jesus Christ has put God in a box. And we've told God what he can do and can't do, who he can do it with and why he needs to do it this way. And just when you begin to say that God can only do it this way, he'll say, I'll show you wrong, I'll do it this way.

I serve a God that two years ago did a miracle working revival in Burlington, North Carolina. Unbelievable story of a church that prayed for 10 years for God to move and work in power. For 10 years, they prayed.

And they had a season of revival and a preacher came in who was a dear friend of mine and God didn't do anything that week. But the preacher said week two. The end of week two, the church begins to fill up and a few people got saved.