Lets Make It Happen Om Staff Conf 1994 — George Verwer

This week, I hope that you've taken greater ownership of world missions. This week, as you've heard experts and gifted communicators, that a vision has just exploded in your heart. And I must confess that as I have gone through Operation World again almost entirely, it has been exploding in my heart.

It's one of the reasons I got into AD2000. And as you read this book, you'll realize how much has to be done. How much has to be done. You will also realize how much God has done. He's given us this book.

We in OM are the publishers of this book. In a sense, we relaunched it after it died 20... I don't know how many years ago. And then the prayer cards, which will be distributed soon. I sent a memo to leaders around the world.

Let's get the prayer cards out. I hardly got any response to that memo. I guess it got lost. Though I did tell them to respond direct to Don Velbum, so maybe I didn't get a copy. Brothers and sisters, this is serious business we've been dealing with this week.

Men are lost. They're going to a Christless eternity that the Bible calls hell. The academics may debate it, but Jesus preached it. And we must respond to that word where it says, I, Jesus speaking, in the way, the truth, and the life, no man comes to the Father but by me.

Turn with me in your Bibles to Acts chapter 1, verse 8, just for a kick-off. Every one of you can preach on one, Acts 1 .8. We have so many gifted communicators in OM, it's an embarrassment for me even to come and speak.

So many other people that could be speaking. And I just love to see the younger men and women speaking. And I just want to be a supporter of the new generation, but I don't want to pretend to be something I'm not.

So I also have something to say, and God in his mercy gives me 400 times a year to say it. And it's just getting more and more exciting, though not always easy. And I often preach on Acts 1 .8. I have a brand new translation just sent to me by the Bible Society.

Bible for today's family. Probably someone will attack it, but it looks good to me. Isn't it amazing how much we have in English while hundreds and millions have never had a gospel tract? Just amazes me.

But anyway, someone gave me this and I haven't had a chance to sell it yet, so I'll use it. But the Holy Spirit will come upon you and give you power. Then you will tell everyone about me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and everywhere in the world.

Since I haven't listened to all the ministry of the week, I don't know how much this has been emphasized, but let's realize this is so absolutely vital to everything we're saying and doing. It was the heart of the prayer meeting.

I missed the first 20 minutes of the prayer meeting. Maybe this was the scripture used because that's what we were into in prayer when I arrived. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost part of the earth.

I'm not going to expound this, but I am going to say that what has been put on our plate this week, what we have been challenged with, what we want to do can only be done by the power and the reality of the Holy Spirit.

And we need to make sure as we go from here, some tonight, some tomorrow, that we go in the power and the reality of the Holy Spirit. Turn to Acts chapter 13. Another passage. I have the privilege of speaking on and tonight as it says in Timothy, I give these things to you that you may contextualize them into your own ministry and give them to others.

If the 60s was a decade when a few people, and it was only a few, attempted to copy George Verwer, the 80s was the decade in which people definitely overreacted to make sure whatever they did, they did not appear to be like George Verwer.

It was weird. We could have made a movie of it. People that absolutely would not sell books because they knew I sold books. People absolutely refused to read any Tozer book because I was into Tozer books.

People would never be seen with a map because I was into a map. There was a fear someone might accuse you of copying George Verwer. Satan is a great intimidator. I remember speaking at Moody after I graduated and somebody coming up to me and saying, Oh, you're just trying to be like Billy Graham.

You know, that's a pleasant thing to say to somebody, isn't it? When he's just a young Christian, hasn't preached that much. You know, I think I'm about as similar to Billy Graham as I am to, you know, ballet dancing dinosaurs.

But no doubt, you know, no doubt there are some similarities. We both have a mouth. He's a gentleman. He's a southerner. He's an evangelist. I can name a whole bunch of other things that he is, none of which I am or should try to pretend to be.

Though I must confess the first southern woman I ever met, I was just a teenager, blew every circuit in my romantic head. And on the first date, I didn't understand southern, you know, how they work. They're a lot slower than us New York people.

And I brought this girl, her name was Marsha, and I brought her back after the date and there was her father and mother. They talked to me for 10 minutes, finished, case closed, never dated her again.

So much for southern romance. I'm glad he gave me a Milwaukee yank as a wife. Thirteen, five men got a vision. Have you got a hold of the vision this week? I mean, to go out of a conference like this without a vision is just, to me, beyond comprehension.

Unless you, of course, are at a major time of spiritual depression and defeated in your walk and somehow bitter or hurt. And we know there are people like that at our conferences and we try to reach out to them and praise God.

Over the years, many, many people who have been in that situation have been set free and ministered and healed and helped. But one of the purposes of this week, this was one of the more focused conferences.

This was not a traditional OM conference. This is a focused conference. People wanted a focused conference. We got a focused conference, but, of course, some people are wondering why we didn't get some of the other more general OM ingredients.

You can't do everything in a week. Though I may attempt to do everything in this last hour and end up a real fool. But certainly, one of the great goals of this week is to increase our vision. These five men got a vision.

We find in verse 2, while they were worshiping the Lord and going without eating, I know that's not exactly the favorite thing in the church these days, but you still find it in the New Testament. The Holy Spirit told them, appoint Barnabas and Saul to do the work for which I have chosen them.

Our brother Paul shared about Paul and Barnabas in his ministry, and it was beautiful what he had to say. Everyone prayed and went without eating for a longer while or a while longer. Next, they placed their hands on Barnabas and Saul to show that they had been appointed to do this work.

Then everyone sent them on the way. Notice that in that verse, it's speaking about the Lord's people, the church in Antioch, sending them on the way. Whereas the next verse, it says, after Barnabas and Saul had been sent by the Holy Spirit, they went to Seleucia.

There, it says, the Holy Spirit sent Paul and Barnabas. What a beautiful balance, the human factor, the divine factor. Man's part, God's part. And I just find that in everything that I do, if I want to stay in the straight and narrow, I got to find that balance.

Man's part, God's part. My part, God's part. And I think that's been coming through the ministry of Louise and Paul and others during this week. And this is one of the greatest chapters that we can share on in churches.

If you think churches have looked at Acts 13 in an in-depth way, you obviously haven't ministered much. And there it is. And I feel that today in our ministry, we need to tie it more and more to the Word of God.

The Word of God has the authority, not us. Yes, we can speak with authority. We need men and women who will speak with authority. But the Word of God is the final authority. And I find when I stick to the Word of God more and attempt to find biblical balance, that there are less old Verwarian distractions that keep the Holy Spirit from what He is wanting to do in people's lives.

And it's exciting. And I'm grateful for what I've been learning through more study in the recent years about communication. The Holy Spirit. Billy Graham said in one of his great messages, be filled with the Holy Spirit, right from Ephesians chapter 5.

And I hope that on this final night of this particular conference, that every one of us could go from here with the assurance that he or she is filled with the Holy Spirit. And I'll warn you in advance, I'm going to give an invitation for you to be refilled or filled with the Holy Spirit at the end of this meeting.

I realize that any crisis not followed by a process will soon be an abscess. But a lot of people with no crisis, you'll not have any abscess because you don't have anything. The New Testament emphasizes the person and the work of the Holy Spirit.

We are a movement that wants to emphasize the person and the work of the Holy Spirit. Half of you are probably card-carrying charismatics. You hide the card a little bit when you're on OM. I don't know why.

Some people don't. They're pushing it all over the place and causing confusion in some of our countries, but nothing new. And people said all along, what we're attempting to marry the evangelical and charismatic movement together is impossible.

It would have come apart years ago, according to them. But it hasn't. And now we've got a whole international network called AD2000 that is attempting the same thing. And it's one of the reasons I like AD2000.

It represents really where the Church is today, because 60 to 70 percent, that's a rough super-calculated guess, of the active Christians in the world. Probably, when we count places like Brazil, I think Luis Busch, didn't he say on one of his tapes, there's more believers in Brazil than all of Western Europe?

You know, whether that's... it probably is true. I've heard it many times. Somebody else from Brazil said, look, take it easy, brother. Half the Brazilian Christians are backslidden. Statistics aren't everything.

But what are we going to say of half the European Christians? Will it be necessary for truly godly spiritual people in OM to lower their standard to stay in the movement? Ask yourself that question, my friend.

Because the tendency of history, if you look at 2 ,000 years or more, is for spiritual movements and churches and people to degenerate. It's not automatically better and better. If your church is going uphill, better and better and better every year, I know there are churches like that.

I've been in churches like that. But since this week I've heard about a lot of churches in the disaster zone, maybe you could write me a letter about your growing, balanced spiritual church where people are being saved without a multitude of people being hurt and ground to powder in the process.

I'd love to hear about your church. Because my commitment to the local church is as great as my commitment to OM. And most of my ministry, a lot of it, is in local churches in fellowship. And I have a bonding with pastors and churches that is hard to explain.

And I stick with them even when the whole place is just about coming unglued because sometimes that's when God breaks in and does a new thing. I love Acts chapter 13. I love to see the Holy Spirit working in the lives of people through this great book that I've studied pretty regularly for about 39 years.

Look at Acts 4 .31. That's a good one for tonight. Acts 4 .31, you've heard it again and again. They were gathered in prayer. After they had prayed, the meeting place shook. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and bravely spoke God's message.

Bravely spoke God's message. A number of years ago, I realized it was getting harder and harder to speak at OM conferences. So easily because we were the family, because I knew a lot that was going on and they knew that I knew a lot.

So easily you'd say something that was a general principle and someone would take it personally. I wrote something in my Bible around that time that I really believe the Lord put on my heart. It doesn't mean it's perfect, but I wrote it in the front of my Bible.

Messages or strong spiritual statements which once convicted us and brought us to repentance now upset us and lead us into self-defense, bitterness, hurt, or even resentment. If you don't think that's true, believe me, you haven't been in the thick of the battle.

We are in some ways in the middle days of the beginning of our movement. We have seen disappointment. We have disappointed one another. There has been hurt. I don't believe we should pretend about our warts and about our problems or our sins.

At the same time, I believe that OM is well and healthy. There's a message I gave to the field leaders in January. Ten signs of health in OM. People are coming to Christ. Two, young people are still signing up and many are being recruited.

Three, good balance of ages, nationality, and denominations. Four, people are handling change in a mature way. Five, we are keeping the focus of people and their needs, fellowship, and family. Six, most of our graduates love us and stay in touch with us.

Seven, we are paying our bills, almost no debt. Eight, moderate and simple lifestyle is holding. Moderate probably would be more accurate, but it is simple in some countries, I can assure you. So don't judge OM on just where you're living, my friend.

People are repenting and being honest, good relationships with other missions and networks. I believe in many ways 1994 and 95 as we move toward the year 2000 is the brightest day in OM. Our God is not wanting us to look back.

We have no bitterness about the past. God's Spirit was moving in every one of these conferences that I've been to, which I think is all of them, almost for 31 years. But we believe that God has laid a foundation.

Many countries like Albania that we once only prayed for, now we have churches and people. Lands that were once only targets in prayer meetings, now are fields with people, with conversions, with churches being born.

This is OM's brightest hour. Don't miss it. Don't get caught down some corner arguing over some theological tidbit. Don't get down some road of extremism because you think this would be a shortcut to doing what you feel wants to be done.

Beware of your own personal agenda. And as you see in the book of Acts, submit and let the Holy Spirit do the speaking. We're living in exciting days. I remember when I first went into Yugoslavia, one of the nations that was more on my heart than almost any other place in the world.

I even thought of living there. My first trip in Yugoslavia was similar to my first trip into Russia. I got arrested. I think it was on the second day. And then we, after the interrogation, somehow the window of the car got broken.

So we drove back with a sheet. It was a long drive with a sheet peeking out through the sheet. Roger Malsted and this one other fellow and myself. And we met on the border at that time, I think both before and after the trip, two women with Christian Literature Crusade.

And they taught me a song that I've never forgotten. I never hardly ever hear it sung. And I wrote it in my Bible. And I believe it's the need of the hour. I believe it's the need of tonight. Let me read it.

It was written by General William Booth. Thou Christ of burning, cleansing flames, send the fire. Thy blood-bought gift today we claim, send the fire. Look down and see this waiting host. Give us the promise, or we could perhaps insert the power of the Holy Ghost.

We want another Pentecost, send the fire. God of Elijah, hear our cry, send the fire. Make us fit to live or die, send the fire. To burn up every trace of sin, to bring the light and glory and the revolution, now begin.

Send the fire. The fire, tis fire we want, for fire we plead. Send the fire. The fire will meet our every need, send the fire. For daily strength to do the right, for grace. To conquer in the fight, for power to walk the world in white, send the fire.

To make our weak hearts strong and brave, send the fire. To live a dying world to save, send the fire. Send the fire, send the fire. O see us on thy altar lay. Our lives are all this very day. To crown the offering, now we pray, send the fire.

I want to ask you, our time's short tonight. Are you on fire for Jesus? You know, some of the greatest Christians I've ever met, and I've had the privilege of meeting a lot of mighty men and women of God, many of them have not been well educated.

I've traveled and ministered in almost every state in India, so you can imagine Brother Hebert's ministry got pretty close to my heart, as he talked of Rajahmundry, talked of Guntur, places where I saw the power of God come upon meetings, and sometimes 50, 60 people profess Christ in a night, and more.

I remember one time when I was so incredibly sick, I think it was actually in Guntur, and I was vomiting and sick, and they said, oh brother, you don't want to preach. I said, what do you mean I don't want to preach?

And they carried me to the meeting. And I leaned on a table and preached as people prayed. And I'm not over-emphasizing this spectacular, I can assure you, but some spectacular things happened that night.

And when people come up and want to be saved, and got good luck charms and evil spirit wires around their head, you know, that's a little obvious. Some of the things people talk about, evil spirits today, doesn't seem very clear to me.

But this was pretty clear. And to pray and to see this woman seemingly set free, and other people converted, and other people helped and healed, is something that a young missionary in India will never forget.

Brothers and sisters, the normal Christian life is to be on fire for Jesus every day. Stop complicating it with overly thick books on sanctification. Do you think these people that don't know how to read in India cannot be filled with the Spirit?

Do you think these brothers and sisters that traveled on my teams up and down that country, who were very simple people, didn't have higher education, but were out in the streets winning men and women to Jesus Christ?

Do you think this was unreality? Do you think these poor souls, they weren't quite where we are, with all of our education and all of our knowledge? And I believe in education. I believe in knowledge.

I'm in God's study program that involves thousands and thousands of pages of reading every couple of months. I go through an average of 200 lectures probably every year or two. Listening, growing, learning, repenting, because I believe that that's part of God's program for my life.

But I would never despise the weakest brother or sister in Jesus, even if he or she could not read or write. And if you study the great mass movements, especially in Latin America and other parts of the world, you will discover they were like some of the apostles.

Ordinary men. Ordinary men. And people could not understand them. We need that balance, especially in the Western world. We really do. Be filled with the Holy Spirit. Send the fire, send the fire, send the fire.

Are some of you afraid of that? I don't think in an OM conference, but I tell you some of the churches I go into. It's amazing. As soon as I get on the subject of the Holy Spirit, I see things sort of change in the audience.

People are so afraid of extremism. Maybe that's my fault. I wrote a book on the subject. I pulled it out of print years ago, but I think the illegal copies are going around. I wrote the book, Revolution of Balance.

Love and its Place has a whole new message. The message I gave at Peshawar so many years ago on being big-hearted. I still, of course, preach against extremism. But as Brother Andrew reminded me, in this very country, when Corrie Ten Boom spoke in the morning, I had to speak in the afternoon.

Brother Andrew arrived. We had a cup of tea together, and he said, Brother George, did you give an invitation? I've always had struggles giving invitations. I don't know whether it's my Calvinistic streak or my cowardice streak.

When I get to heaven, I'll check it out. But I said, well, Brother Andrew, I didn't give an invitation. Boom! He shot back at me as quick as a Dutchman knows how to do. And he said, well, I'm sure going to give one tonight.

I've learned it's easier to cool down a fanatic than warm up a corpse. You've all heard that before, right? Which are you? Will there be a day in O .M. when any even borderline fanaticism will not be tolerated by the hierarchy?

I don't think so, praise God. Half the time, the hierarchy doesn't even know what's going on. I'm not sure that's good, but it's partly the truth. Spirit is the chief executive officer of all missionary work, if you like that terminology.

And it's God's will that we know something of that fire. In the book of Revelation, it says, Be ye hot or be ye cold. If you're lukewarm, I'll spew you out of my mouth. In the book of Hebrews, it says, Our God is a consuming fire.

Right at the end of the book of Hebrews, some of you who know me know I fill in all the blank spaces in my Bible. Not with things that are inspired as the Word of God, but quotations and statements from men of God that have impacted me.

And right at the end of the book of Hebrews, and I see Peter Maiden sitting here, and I think the patience of this guy to listen to me over the years, and he's probably heard me read this at least 30 times.

But anyway, you'll have to listen again. Samuel Logan Bringle's definition of fire. How many remember it? Maybe even in one of my books. I have trouble re-reading those books. How many of you? Samuel Logan Bringle.

Hmm. Just shows the ability of the human memory. Makes you want to leave preaching and go into full-time fundraising. What is fire? Samuel Logan Bringle was that man that united with William Booth and became one of the greatest winners of men and women to Christ the world has ever known.

He wrote a book called Resurrection, Life, and Power. Here's his definition of fire. We're talking about spiritual fire. What is fire? It is love. It is faith. It's hope. It's passion and purpose and determination.

It's utter devotion. It's divine discontent with formality, ceremonialism, lukewarmness, indifference, sham, parade, spiritual death. It's singleness of mind, consecration unto death. It's God, the Holy Ghost, burning in and through a humble, holy, faithful man.

Will you be that man? Will you be that woman? The story I'll never forget of Brother Hebert's ministry is the guy with a coffin. I'm definitely going to try that. If you missed that message, you better get the tape.

The guy going around India. Into the interior where there's a much higher chance he was going to die. And so the guy takes a big wooden box. I've been in those places. I didn't have that much creativity.

I had a van that was more or less like a coffin. And that's where we slept in the van. I had Ray Lynch on my team. And Ray Lynch and I didn't have the exact same philosophy on counting the numbers saved in the meeting.

And we had an argument par excellence. I love Brother Hebert's emphasis on arguing. Thank you, brother. I'm not sure if what I'm into is exactly what you were referring to. This missionary, do you remember?

He slept in the coffin some nights. I guess it was mosquito proof. And then when he got back to the main city, somehow he had a celebration. He buried the coffin and praised God and said, Death, where is thy sting?

I'll never forget that story from this week. I hope you've written some of the stories down. I hope you do get some of the tapes. I hope you realize that you're not here just so that you can get a good feed, just so that you can get a good bless up and a good notebook fill.

You are responsible now to take what you've received here in your own situation, contextualized, and build upon it for the kingdom of God and spread it across the world in operation multiplication, in operation mobilization.

What is fire? It's much more than perhaps we think when we first say the word. I want to ask you, are you filled with the Holy Spirit? If a character like me with all my failure and all my sin and all the things that have been wrong in my life can know something of that fullness almost every day since my conversion, then I'd like to know who has an excuse.

And I don't have a very high IQ. When they first tried to get me into Urbana in the late 60s, believe me, I heard the history later, it was a major debate because they don't have people at Urbana that are that young who don't have a degree.

I didn't even have a B .D., much less an M .D. and D .D. and all these other things. Though I've always loved and admired people with degrees, it's wonderful if people are led in that direction. We're not all led the same way.

If you go out and fellowship with a pig farmer, and I've had great fellowship with pig farmers, do you ask him whether he has a Ph .D. or does he know anything about pigs? God is working in different people in different ways.

And as we get more involved and more global, we are going to have to understand the unique ways that God works in the world. And it often is not our Western way. It often is not loaded with all the academic sort of things that we carry with us so often and that we often need.

And let's face it, some of the academic things that people gather are not necessarily for their career. They are because of their own insecurity, and they cannot function unless they have these papers and these documents.

And you and I know that our seminaries are graduating thousands of people who do not know the reality of prayer, the Spirit-filled life, brokenness, Biblical relationships. And I could tell you stories, and we have stories out of OM, so we are not putting anybody down whatsoever.

We are just giving a plea for reality. God is using different people in different ways. And as we go out to these other countries, with sometimes greater training, with sometimes arms full of books, and all kinds of maps and charts and experiences, I pray that it will never come to the place where we don't know how to humble ourselves, especially in front of that national pastor, and learn from him, and esteem him, and be willing to listen to what he has to say.

Because to me, the way ahead, without that kind of Biblical humility, is fraught with difficulty. Fullness of the Holy Spirit. In my notes, which I'm sure you realize are always so extensive, I've written the word, Grace Awakening.

It's not either or. It's both. The verse I wanted to read the most about the Holy Spirit is actually found in the book of Galatians. A verse that most of you have memorized, where it speaks about the fruit of the Holy Spirit.

Verse 22, chapter 5. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering. That's what it's all about. We want the gifts. We have the gifts. We still have the policy that we are not ashamed of, that super-controversial gifts that the Church has not been able to agree on for hundreds of years must be handled very discerningly and very carefully within OM.

That's a rewording of it. You can discuss that at the next Area Leaders meeting. You realize some of the churches that emphasize in Latin America the power of the Holy Spirit, some of the ones I've been in, absolutely legalistic.

Absolutely legalistic, and they are sending people out the back door hurt by the hundreds. If they're a big church, buy the hundreds. And the cults are often there to grab them. Some of you are going to be quite shocked as you launch into worldwide missions and discover some of the dirty tricks of the enemy.

For Satan has a roaring lion, seeketh whom he may devour. Yes, we want the gifts of the Spirit. We want the power. We want the anointing. I would yearn for a wee bit of it tonight. But without the fruit, then I don't believe we're building on a solid foundation.

Jim Ingle asked a good church of us in the 82 ,000 movement, planting churches, wonderful. What kind of church? Surely as a movement we are committed to quality more than quantity. Surely our program of disciplined slow growth, which has been our policy for 30 or 25 years, I believe has helped us maintain quality, though we know we have a long way to go.

If you think this is a new message in OM, I would tell you that in Mexico, in one of the first ever equivalent of a summer conference, the summer of 1960, every single night, back in those days I used to speak every night.

I don't know why, but I guess I just did it. I don't know. Every single night I spoke on a different fruit of the Holy Spirit. The first major conference outside of the student conferences we had back at Moody and Wheaton, every night we just spoke about the fruit of the Holy Spirit.

If you don't understand that the heartbeat of OM was 1 Corinthians 13, the fruit of the Holy Spirit, relationships, godliness, brokenness, walking in the light, being right with God, being right with one another, then you do not understand the history of OM.

Whatever other little story you may have, whatever little thing you can pull out of the discipleship manual, which surely may seem legalistic and probably was, you never gathered the heartbeat of the movement as it was, even from the late 50s, with all of the needs, and yes, the legalisms that did at times creep in.

The fruit of the Holy Spirit is the key. It's the key to the grace of weakening. Let me share something here in which I know I might miscommunicate. I have a lot of struggles with God's people. And I have struggles, of course, with myself.

But it does really bother me why so many of God's people are so critical, so quick to criticize. Nothing has disillusioned me with Christian leaders. And I admire Christian leaders. I esteem them. But I've got to be honest.

I find it difficult that when so often I'm with a Christian leader, within a few minutes another Christian leader is indicted. And when I check it out, there doesn't seem to have been really that much research.

And sometimes whole books come out with this kind of criticism. And when you get a chance to talk face-to-face with the author, you find out really he didn't have enough time to do his homework. It bothers me.

And I don't want to criticize the critics. I want to love the critics. And I know that I myself had a critical spirit. As we're growing in Christ, it takes time to discern between strong convictions in which you're trying to speak out what you believe is from God, and criticism.

If you've got that all sorted out neatly in your life, you can write to me about it. I may use your letter in a message if you don't copyright it. Brothers and sisters, as you get injected with missiology, beware of becoming a critical, old, fossilized missiologist.

Because there are plenty of them. And one of the things I found so pleasant in fellowshipping with Louis Bush as we walked for an hour or more, in all my time with him, I never heard him criticize anybody.

You say, well, he's extreme. Well, maybe we need a little more of that extremism to bring some of us, characters like me, a little more into balance. It doesn't mean we compromise our convictions. It doesn't mean we don't speak out.

But it means we're incredibly careful what we say, especially when it's negative and when it's critical. Have we done our homework? Do we really know what we're talking about? And then when we bring people's names into it and other organizations into it, I tell you, we better really be careful because probably the mud is going to end up on our face.

The fruit of the Holy Spirit is going to set us free from a lot of the critical spirit. The Grace Awakening that Swindoll talks about in his book and many other books are similar. It's not a new theme.

It's going to help to set us free from a critical spirit and we'll learn to be more positive. With that, we'll learn to be Grace Awakened in the many areas that are referred to in this amazing book. Let me just read some of the titles of the chapters.

Isn't Grace Risky? That's the title of the Dutch edition, by the way. Undeserving Yet Unconditionally Loved. Squaring Off Against Legalism. Guiding Others to Freedom. Grace to Let Others Be. Graciously Disagreeing and Pressing On.

It's almost the present motto of OM as we work our way through all kinds of differences of opinion on a range of subjects that's almost bizarre. Grace Up Close and Personal. Are You Really a Minister of Grace?

A Marriage Oiled by Grace. Charming Joy of Grace Giving. Grace, it's really accepting. I thought of writing a sequel to this called The Confessions of a Grace Killer because I can tell you, especially in my home in the 60s, I was a grace killer.

And by 1976, my wife was in depression, deep, and I was partly to blame. And it took a bold woman in the same September conference where we agreed to go ahead with Duloss, a bold little woman, Judy Hammond, took me in a corner and I tell you, she took out her gentle six gun and started to aim at this grace killer with all six bullets and hallelujah, down he went.

And within a few months, that depression left my wife and has never been back. And it doesn't always happen that way. There are many different kinds of depression. And one dear lady I'm praying for in Scotland has had it for eight years.

But I do believe that God wants to continue to set O .M. free from being grace killers in any form or any manner. It doesn't mean things will be perfect. It doesn't mean that now George Burwer is Mr. Grace.

Come to my house and you'll discover that it's just not quite that simple. But I turned a corner, and maybe tonight, if you're a grace killer, maybe tonight if you don't know the fullness of the Holy Spirit and the fruit we've been talking about, maybe tonight if you are entangled in bitterness and failing to forgive someone, and Louise Bush even brought that into his missiological challenge on the first or second night, then tonight could be your moment of decision.