The Holy Spirit - Part 8 — Keith Daniel

Jonathan Edwards and the Revival Power of Prayer

Gave him sinners in the hands of an angry God. Oh, I dare you preachers in America to just say the title, let alone preach the content. You'll have revival just saying that title. They don't know there's an angry God awaiting them.

But because of the way he groaned in prayer, soaking his prayer, soaking his people, soaking his nation, soaking himself, soaking this book, with groans through three days and three nights, not sleeping, not eating, weeping for God to come.

God came with such a thunderbolt, the devil couldn't stop it for a hundred and thirty years. And that's why America is the nation she is today, beloved. You think you're here because of your great politicians.

America’s Founding Legacy and the Need for Another Edwards

You're not. You're here because your forefathers sought God. You became the greatest nation on earth for that reason alone. And what God tolerates is because of what's left of the repercussions of those God-fearing people.

But don't doubt it unless you get another Jonathan Edwards among your millions of preachers, unless you just find one more. You lose everything, America. I guarantee your greatness is about to go soon.

Because the scales of the tipping is in God's hands. I don't know when it's going to go down on the one end, where there's more evil being produced to the world and influence in the world than there is good.

But when that scale goes down, then you're close to it. God give you another Jonathan Edwards, or you're finished. You won't know what's left of your country and how devastatingly fast it will come. Trust me about that.

I'm no prophet. My common sense tells me about your history and looking at you now. All preachers anoint the word with prayer. Don't go out there to impress with hours of preparing great homiletical messages and not soaking it in prayer groaning before God for souls.

Prayer Before Sermon Preparation

Do what Jonathan Edwards didn't see what God does for 130 years after your sermon. But God give you one more man that won't go out there homiletically prepared through hours of preparing to impress. But they'll never see revival until they get down in their face and start groaning for hours and come out with a little bit.

God gave them as the tears fell on verses that they had to give, though no other preacher in the whole land gave it to say the word hell until Jonathan Edwards did from the pulpit. What's what God gives you when you start praying preach more than you start preparing.

God showed me how much he anoints this word when, as a young preacher, he put it upon my heart to memorize these books, chapters upon chapters, and he gave me the ability that I didn't know how it came and I didn't know what God was saying.

But I obeyed him as I took hold and found that it was all there. God just burned into my soul and I stood there weeping through the night as I saw what God was giving me. But when I stood in the pulpit, I saw how God anoints his word above all things, how he honors his word as it stands above all things, when I didn't say one word apart from just quote the words Christ said.

Before I'd finished just what Christ said, I looked across and I couldn't believe what this effect is, sir. Men were falling down all over, falling off their chairs, unable to sit as they writhe in pain of the conviction the word of God brings.

Oh, God showed me how whole congregations fall on their face halfway through a book that I'm quoting. I don't know how God does that, but I know something. He honors his word. He uses the word more than anything else, the anointed word, to the degree that you soak it in prayer.

Revival Through Prayer-Soaked Preaching

But, oh, I've soaked it in prayer. Sometimes I haven't had more than 10 minutes preparing for a sermon, but I spent the whole afternoon and hours weeping and suddenly the whole town converges on a building until there's no room.

And there they are outside of the windows, on the walls, sitting on the cars and the loudspeakers and the whole town just came and come. And most, 20 minutes after you're preaching, are on their faces before God.

When you pray, sir, God comes. When you preach, very little happens. But when you anoint the word through consuming your life in prayer and the people you preach into in this holy book, oh, what's what God does for another Jonathan Edwards in this land.

Beginning the Day With God

Please find one, though, among your ranks of preachers. And he anoints a life, he anoints a life to the degree that that life is soaked in prayer. When I was a young Christian, I used to stand on the beachfront talking to God after my readings.

I would go down for two hours and walk in the dark until the sun rose. And then after praying and walking in prayer, calling on God and praising him, I would end as the sun rose, singing praises to God.

And then I got in my car and then I drive to my work and my heart would begin to sink and sink as I realized, oh, I've got to face a day with defiling people. I feel defiled in their presence. Oh, they didn't seem to matter that I was saved.

I used to groan before God and say, God, it's like I'm being defiled. You know, I'm saved, but they just keep this defilement. I didn't know. And I thought I was being defiled. And that's all that's happening here.

But one day God showed me because of the way I started the day, sir. If you begin the day with God, that is the greatest priority in your life. God himself, not religion. Men aren't sleeping. I found out soon as a boy started weeping in my company.

A Prayerful Life Brings Conviction to Others

And I said, what's wrong with you? He said, it's your life. And I thought that boy had no conviction of sin and no respect of my Christianity. And he began to groan like he was in pain. And I said, what's wrong with you, man?

He said, it's your life. Your life so condemns me that I can't sleep in the nights anymore. I can't enjoy my sin. And he ran from me, couldn't bear being in the car with me. And I began to realize God is doing something.

The devil tells you you're not being used. Suddenly, the worst sinner in the whole firm, the company that I was working for, grabbed me, pulled me into his office, threw me down to the floor. And I thought I was about to be hurt.

I said, what's wrong with you, sir? And he fell down on his knees and he said, oh, I'm a sinner, boy. Help me to find your Jesus. The worst sinner was under conviction, weeping, groaning. A woman touched my arm and just said, Keith, I'm losing my husband.

I'm losing my children. My life is full of sin. The whole firm knows it's a scandal the way I'm with men. But now my husband's found out and she's weeping. She said, you're a Christian. Everyone knows that, Keith.

Can your Jesus help me? I can't stop my sin. I can't help myself. Can Jesus set me free, Keith? So that I don't lose my husband, he's found out. And I said, of course, Jesus can set you free. And we prayed.

We stood there crying out for God to save her soul. Do you know God so saved her that the men who committed wickedness with her stood in fear as he walked into a room within days of her salvation? They stood in fear of the transformation of her life.

A Skeptic Confronted With God’s Love

The owner of the firm called me in, swearing and cursing him in the end because I didn't react and defend myself as he was screaming at me. He sat down and he said, you're a Christian, aren't you, boy?

I said, yes, sir, I'm a Christian. He said, you must be mad. There's no God. There can't be a God. And if there is a God, how can you love him? Because anyone who created this world must be a monster with all the suffering and the hurt.

Don't you tell me to trust a God that is such a monster if there is a God. So I said, oh, there is a God, sir. And he is love. He's not a monster. He said, you prove to me there's a God. You prove to me God is love and I'll give my life to him now.

He was the owner of one of the biggest companies in our country. And I said, sir, I'm so scared of you, the way you swear and the way you scream. I can't prove anything to you unless you keep quiet. But if you don't say a word until I'm finished, you know there's a God and that he is love.

And I spoke, I don't think for 10, maybe 15 minutes, telling him of my life, bringing in scriptures, my family, what God did. And suddenly this man, it was like someone who'd never, ever grasped the concept of God.

And suddenly he knew what he's wasted. He threw himself across the table that I got frightened. His head hit the table so hard. I thought he was hurt. He's just like somebody who suddenly grasped something he couldn't grasp before.

And he threw himself and pow! And he grabbed me and I stood. And he groaned in pain and said, help me, help me to find your God, King. I need him so. He came to Christ. The next day my manager called me.