(South West Baptist Church 2008) Task Oriented Prayer — Gerhard Du Toit

Robert Moore is a doctor in this congregation. You know, I heard a friend of mine said, I've got a Bachelor of Arts degree. He said, I've been born again. And then he said, I've got a Master of Arts. He said, I'm mastery altered.

And then he said, I've got a Doctor's degree. I'm devil disturbing. And Robert Moore is a deacon here in the church. And he just said, show to me and say, take your watch off and throw it away. Isn't he in trouble?

We will not do that. But I trusted the Lord tonight for 90 people. And there are about, I think, 85 of us all together. So there are five sinners running out here in the mountains of the Adelaide Valley who's saying, no worries.

Amazing Australian term. No worries. Talked to my wife this afternoon. She said, I said, she said, how are you doing? No worries. But it's tremendous. It's been tremendous to have you with us in these times together.

Memorizing Scripture and Entering the Gospel of Luke

You know, we know so much about the Scriptures. But oh, the Scriptures know so little about us. I want to encourage you. Memorize God's Word. Let it become part of your relationship with God. I tell you, one of the men that greatly influenced me in North America is a man by the name of John MacArthur.

He is the personification of the modern Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones. And just the depth of Scripture to get into God's Word. Look at chapter 11. And if you don't have your Bible with you, say, may God have mercy on my poor, wretched soul.

But why don't we stand just for a few minutes for the reading of the Word of God. And then we are able to change our positions. And what we are going to do is just to try to take a few minutes of your time.

That would be great. Look at chapter 11, verse number 1. It came to pass that as Jesus was praying in a certain place that when He ceased, one of His disciples said unto Him, Lord, teach us to pray. Teach us to pray as John also taught his disciples.

Verse number 5. And Jesus said unto them, which of you shall have a friend? And he shall go unto him at midnight and say unto him, friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine in his journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.

And he from within will answer and say, trouble me not now. The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed. I am not able to rise and give it to thee. I say unto you, though we will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, and because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.

And I say unto you, ask, and it shall be given unto you. Seek, and you shall find. Knocked, and it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asks, receive. And to him that seeketh, findeth. And to him that knocked, it shall be opened.

If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give unto him a stone? Or if he shall ask for a fish, will he for a fish give unto him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer to him a scorpion?

If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those that ask him? You may be seated. There are some of you that somehow have not been able to be with us.

Prayer in the New Testament and the Unity of Scripture

And we don't want to dwell much time on that which we have considered over the weekend. But yesterday morning and last night, and we said on Friday night that we want to spend some time in the New Testament as it relates to prayer.

Simply because the New Testament is revealed for us, is hidden for us in the Old Testament. And the Old Testament is manifested for us in the New Testament. It's kind of, you know, if you cannot come to grips with the Christ of the Old Testament, you will never be able to understand the depth of the Christ of the New Testament.

So in our interpretation of prayer in the New Testament, you need to realize that everything that the Old Testament is saying to us about prayer was manifested in the life of Christ, and of course in the foundation of the practicality of what Jesus said about prayer in the Acts of the Apostles.

And then of course the Apostle Paul would come in the New Testament and he gives unto us this combination of what Scripture is about. That's why we were able to say that if you study the New Testament and you explore those 7 ,957 verses, you will discover that there were three men in the New Testament that dominated, as they were inspired by the Spirit of God, to give unto us the reality of Scripture.

Dominated those chapters in the New Testament. So, who were they? The Apostle Paul, the Apostle John, and of course Luke the physician. The Gospel of Luke that gives us 1 ,151 wonderful verses. The longest book in New Testament Scripture.

The Acts of the Apostles which gives us 1 ,007 verses. Let me suggest to you, and I don't want you to think that I do not have respect for the translation that we are using because that's what I use. But, you know, the verses and chapters only came into being about 1 ,200 years after Christ.

And because I love the New Testament, in fact, if you are interested, I would love to put the Greek New Testament in your hands which you can listen to it on audio. And it's a tremendous blessing. I sit in a plane for 21, 22 hours and listen through the whole of the Greek New Testament.

And, you know, just to let it really become part of your life. But, K .W. Wuest who wrote some marvelous works on the Greek New Testament. There are three men that I regard as just excellent. Robertson in his interpretation of the Greek New Testament.

W .E. Vine in his practical looking at the Greek New Testament. And then K .W. Wuest who gave us an expanded translation of the Greek New Testament and what he has done. He translated it in English. But he's taken the Greek New Testament and he's given you 1 ,461 passages together.

And those passages when you study the language, they really fit together in wonderful ways. But when you study the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts, you study the Apostle Paul, 233 verses in his epistles.

Incidentally, the longest epistle in the New Testament is not the epistle to the Romans. You say, which one is it? The epistle to the Romans has got 433 marvelous verses. But the epistle to 1 Corinthians has got 437 verses.

My wife said to me, why do you think there are so many verses? Well, they've got so many problems, you know. People say to me, I want to be part of the New Testament church. I say to them, which one? A man came to me one day and said, I want to be part of the perfect church.

And I said, don't join it, you're going to spoil it. You know? And so Paul, and then you say, who else? The Apostle John, 879 verses in the Gospel, 404 in the Book of Revelation, 105 in the first epistle of John, and then 13, 14.

And you bring those three men together. And brother and sister, plus possibly the epistle to the Hebrews, if I may say that. But you bring this all together. And when you do that, they give you almost 80 of the New Testament.

So how does that relate to prayer? I mean, all that you have left is the 1 ,071 verses of the Gospel of Matthew, the 678 verses of the Gospel of Mark. And all that you have left is a little epistle of James, and Jude in the New Testament, and 1 and 2 Peter.

That's all that you really have left, you know. And so you say, how does that relate to prayer? John gives you the deity of Christ in prayer. Look the physician, because of his emphasis upon humanity.

You see, I don't know if you know this, that Luke, in his Gospel, almost gives us 60 more prayer information than Matthew and Mark together. You say, why is he doing it? Simply because of this. In Matthew's Gospel, we see Christ as the King of the Jews.

In Mark's Gospel, we see Christ as a servant of God. In the Gospel of John, we see Christ as the Son of God. And how do we see Christ in the Gospel of Luke? We see Jesus as the Son of Man. Listen, brethren and sister, a deity do not have a necessity to pray, but humanity has.

And so he became a man of prayer. And so Luke gives us the humanity of Christ in prayer. John gives us the deity. And Paul gives us the Old Testament theological understanding of prayer as it relates to the life of Christ and the New Testament.

Pauline Prayer and the Twelve Aspects of New Testament Prayer

In fact, when you come to Philippians 4, and the Apostle Paul said, Be anxious or be careful of nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known.

And you study those four statements as it relates by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests... You discover those things become the four pillars in Paul's understanding of what New Testament prayer is all about as it is moved by the Spirit of God.

And so what is it? I mean, this is immense, you know. And this is so rich when you and I will begin to study it. And so we talked about the New Testament tabernacle of prayer as it relates to the Greek language.

Then we spoke about the possibility of looking at 248 possible prayer passages in the New Testament. Now, you need to differentiate, because if you look at Christ and His humanity as it relates to prayer, because one of the key words for prayer is the word asking.

And if you look at the ministry of Christ, and you need to distinguish that as it relates to prayer, with people that came to Him in the four Gospels, and they were asking Him in the strictest sense of the word, when the request came to Christ, even within the realm of His humanity, is it possible for us to say it can be looked upon as an aspect of asking for a need as it relates to prayer.

So what have we done? Out of all of this, brethren and sisters, is coming 12 aspects of New Testament prayer. And those are tremendous concepts. Fellowship praying as it relates to worship. As it comes, it gives unto us the secret of worship in the New Testament that is coming out of the acts of the apostles.

When the early apostles said that we will give ourselves to fellowship, to breaking of bread, and to prayer, and to the apostles' doctrine. And that becomes the pillars for us to understand New Testament worship.

What else do we discover? Routine praying in the New Testament. And if we would have had time, I would have been able to give you the passage that we can look upon and do exposition on that passage. And then let us go to the rest of the New Testament and see how that relates to routine praying.

How do I cultivate that discipline in my life where I day by day pray for those same things, where I don't claim the promises of God because I will get so tired in doing that, because I will subjectively focus upon the needs of those people that I pray and then go to the promises.

But where George Muller of Bristol said, No, no, no. The promises of God that God has given to you, you let them claim you. And they become part of your life. And as they become part of your life, when you pray through the Scriptures, the things that you are praying about, and the people that you are praying about, they become the consequences of the infiltration and the saturation of Scripture in your life, and you never get tired to pray for them.

Why did George Muller say that? As long as he prayed for someone who was 63 years, you know. You say, when did that person become a Christian? Three weeks after Muller of Bristol died. Routine praying.

You say, what else do we discover? Praying in the name of Jesus. There are seven great themes in the Acts of the Apostles, and one of those themes is the name of Jesus. Brother and sister, it just doesn't stop in the name of Jesus, because listen to what Christ said when He prayed in John chapter 17.

Praying in Jesus' Name and the Will of God

And He said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, so that Your Son may also glorify You. And then He made the statement, and He said, Father, glorify Me with the glory which I had while I was with You.

And as He addressed His Father, and remember, He was standing in the holiest of all. Because the Gospel of John, Christ became the New Testament tabernacle. And when the Apostle John said, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, in the Greek New Testament, it's the word for tabernacle.

It's the same word you find in the book of Revelation. And that Christ became our New Testament tabernacle, and the New Testament, and brother and sister, and John chapter 17, He prayed. And you remember what He prayed?

He said, Father, I have manifested Your name. And you go to those Hebrew names of God in the Old Testament, and you know what you discover, brother and sister? Here Christ came, and He became the manifestation of God in the Old Testament, and the beauty of what His life was all about.

And so when we come and we pray, you can't pray in the name of Jesus if you don't live in the life of Christ. You see, God can't answer prayer outside of the will of God. You say, what else is praying in the will of God?

Do you know one of the greatest pleasures of prayer in the life of the Christian? And oh, brother and sister, you know, we're not just dealing with the sins of omission, but we're dealing with the sins of co-omission.

You know, the things that we do wrong. We confess those things before, but there are things that God wants us to do that we never do, you know. Those are the things that breaks my heart. Because God has got so much in store for us as His people, and when we speak about learning the language of prayer, brother and sister, fellowship with God is one of the greatest gifts that God has entrusted.

Can I be honest with you tonight? Some of my great, one of some of my greatest difficulties in the presence of God as I try to cultivate and learn the language of prayer, where you never come to the place where you really know how to pray, but are those times in my relationship with God, when everything becomes quiet and the presence of God becomes a reality, and you just sit in the love of the Father.

Listen, He's our Father, you know. He's not a slave driver. He's not a dictator. He's not that legalistic one that is standing there with a whip. And whenever you and I have done something wrong, you know, this whip would come and there's this level of condemnation.

That's not the kind of God that you and I are serving. And when we have fellowship with God the Father, brother and sister, it's so precious, it's so sweet, and then we pray in the will of God. And there's a wonderful passage in the New Testament.

You need to understand the life of Christ as it relates to the will of the Father, because He said, Lo, I've come to do thy will, O God. He said, It's my food, it's my meat to do the will of my Father.

And then the Apostle John would come to us when he speaks about praying in the will of God. And he said, This is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, that He hear of us.

And if we know that He hear of us, we know that we are the petitions of those things that we are asking of Him. The high priestly ministry of Christ in prayer. Brother and sister, have you discovered prayer in the epistle to the Hebrews?

Christ's High Priestly Intercession

Those wonderful 303 verses that you and I find ourselves in. What is Jesus doing this Sunday evening? Listen to the epistle to the Hebrews. He is ever interceding for us. Listen to His high priestly ministry in prayer.

Listen, you are not on your own. Not on your own, you know, as it relates to prayer. You say, Why do you say that? Let me give you two marvelous passages in the New Testament. The Apostle John made a statement, and he said, My little children, these things I have written unto you, that you do not sin.

But he said, When any man sins, we have what? An advocate. It's a wonderful word. Parakletos is this great explanation of the Spirit of God. We have an advocate with the Father. Who is He? Jesus Christ the Righteousness.

What does He do? He is the propitiation for our sins. And not only our sins, but the sins of the whole world. Listen to the epistle to the Hebrews again, about the life of Christ. Hebrews chapter 4. You know what He said?

We do not have a high priest that cannot be tempted to the feeling of our infirmities. No, we don't have that kind of a high priest. But what kind of a high priest do we have? One who is tempted in all points, just like us we are, brother and sister, and yet without sin.

As a result of that, what does the writer to the Hebrews say to us? He said, Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace and the throne of mercy. Why? So that we might be able to receive mercy in time of need.

He said, What does it mean in time of need? It means in the nick of time. You are not on your own, you know. Why? Come unto me, all ye that are labor and heavy laden. He said, Take my yoke upon you. Learn of me.

Jesus said, Why? And you shall find rest for your souls. There remaineth therefore a rest for the people of God. Those that have entered into His rest, they rest from their own works as God has from His.

You see, there is His place. You know, Hudson Taylor speaks about His place in the crucified life as it relates to prayer. Brethren and sisters, where we rest in God. That's why the Lord Jesus, when He gave us those 8 principles that relates to prayer and the teachings of Christ as they come out of the New Testament, you discover that those 8 principles are based upon 8 Hebrew words in the Old Testament.

I want to encourage you, if you can get a hold of that book by Dr. J .G .S. Thompson, it's called The Praying Christ, where Dr. Thompson takes those 7 principles, those 8 principles out of the teachings of Christ in prayer, and he takes you to those Hebrew words in the Old Testament, and he explains to you this thing of lingering in the presence of God.

You say, What does it mean? Does it mean that I just sit there? No, brethren and sisters, you know, I mean, we are so dumb. They are saturated with activity. Saturated with activity. They are great words, you know.

So, what is it? So, there are 12 aspects. I just want to mention 2 of them to you, and I'm going to do it as quick as I possibly can. We've got a program in Canada, it says this hour has got 20 minutes.

The one is the ministry of the Holy Spirit as it relates to prayer. Brethren and sisters, if you have not come to grips with the ministry of the Holy Spirit as it relates to prayer, you will always have difficulty in prayer.

Now, the Holy Spirit is a person. When He came into our lives, we received Him as a person. We received that which there was of the Holy Spirit, or is of the Holy Spirit, because you cannot divide a personality, but now He can be in my life, and He is resident, and yet He is not present.

But if He is in my life, and the Spirit of God is present... Brethren and sisters, do you know what happens to me? God gives me a spirit of prayer. That's why prayer is initiated by God. You see, if I'm indwelled by God, the Holy Spirit, there is a sense of responsibility that we are dealing with.

And you say, Gerard, what is responsibility? Responsibility is my response to the ability of God. I'm indwelled by the Spirit of God, and because of the fact that the Spirit of God is in me, brethren and sisters, He wants me to have fellowship with God.

Now, let me take you to some passages in the Old Testament. Do you remember the prophecy of Zachariah? The prophet Zachariah made this incredible statement, and this is what he said. He said, in those days, and he was speaking about the last days, he said, in those days, he said, God will pour out upon them the Spirit of grace and the Spirit of supplication.

Now, if you go to the Greek translation of the Old Testament, and you study these words, you know, they are fascinating as they relate to the Hebrew text of Old Testament Scripture. But when you come into the New Testament, what do you and I discover in the life of Christ?

The Spirit of God. Have you studied the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the life of Christ? It is absolutely tremendous. Do you remember at His baptism, what happened? The Holy Spirit came upon Christ in the form of a dove.

Brethren and sisters, why did the Holy Spirit come upon Christ in the form of a dove? Because there was no sin. You see, John the Baptist said, when Christ will come, and he made this statement, he said, what will He do?

He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Why did he make that distinction? Because of the depravity of sin. Fire speaks of cleansing in the Scripture. You say, can you take this one step further?

Absolutely. You remember in Acts 2, the Bible is saying to us that when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all of one accord in one place, and suddenly there came a sound from heaven like as of a rushing mighty wind.

And it filled all the house where they were sitting. And then the Bible is saying, and where they filled the house, and tongues of fire came. And you know, the Greek New Testament is emphatic, because what it is saying to us, they came and they distribute themselves upon each and every one of those 120 disciples.

And brethren and sisters, when those tongues of fire came upon them, something amazing happened, because there were manifestations of the coming of the Holy Spirit. And let me be absolutely frank with you tonight as it relates to that.

You say, Gerard, what happened? You see, there were three feasts in the Acts of the Apostles. There was the Passover feast in the month of April. There was the feast of the first fruit, the feast of the tabernacles in the month of October.

And then there was the feast of Pentecost in the month of May. And so you see, when the Holy Spirit of God came on the day of Pentecost, and brethren and sisters, the Spirit of God descended upon them, and distributed itself upon each and every one of them, there was a manifestation.

You say, what was the manifestation? They spoke in 16 known different languages. They never did that again. The word is dialectos. You say, why did they do that? Let me explain to you why they did that.

They reckoned to us, the theologians are saying to us, they said, you know, there could have been a million people in and around Jerusalem. And when the Spirit of God came, brethren and sisters, those early disciples spoke in those 16 known different languages.

Why did they do that? They didn't preach the Gospel. They spoke about the wonderful works of God. And as people came together because of the place, the sign of the rushing mighty wind, this manifestation of the coming of the Spirit, the tongues of fire that came upon them, and then they came out and they spoke in these languages.

And these men came out and said, these men are full of new wine. These men are drunk. It was 9 o 'clock in the morning. And Peter stood up and he turned to them and he said to them, these men are not drunken, I should suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day.

But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. In the last days God said, I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your old men shall dream dreams.

Brethren and sisters, don't you run away from the exposition of Scripture. What happened? They spoke in those languages. It's the word dialectos. Now, they never did that ever again, those early disciples.

But you say, what is the evidence of the coming of the Holy Spirit? Was it because they spoke in those languages, 16 of them? I mean, you know, one of the explanations of the epistle to the Romans as the way that the church was found in Rome, is that they were Jews, possibly from Rome, because that was one of the 16 languages.

And they went back. And as they went back, we don't know if that's how the church started in the city of Rome. But brethren and sisters, what was the greatest evidence of the coming of the Holy Spirit?

It was not the sound of the rushing mighty wind. I mean, that came and that went. It was not the languages that they spoke. You say, what was the greatest evidence? It was the purification and the cleansing of the Spirit of God.

You see, there is no power without purity.

Purification, Faith, and the Spirit's Work in the Church

And you remember in Acts 15, when the apostle Peter, he went to the household of Cornelius. Why did he do that? Because he was sent of God and he went to the household of Cornelius. And as he spoke to them, the Bible said, the Spirit of God fell upon the household of Cornelius.

And so the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the Gentiles. And brethren and sisters, the same happened in Acts 19. But you know, in Acts 15, there was the first synod meeting, the first council meeting of the early church that came together.

And as they were coming together, the apostle Peter had to give an explanation. To what? To those that were there. Because you see, here the most unbelievable thing has happened. The Holy Spirit of God was poured out upon the Gentiles.

And Peter was the instrument that it was done. And Peter stood up and he had to give an explanation. How could God pour out His Spirit upon the Gentiles? I mean, it was impossible for the Jew to be able to understand it.

And you know, these Jews, there were 12 of them and they had 15 different opinions. You know how these Jews are? And ah, brother and sister, the apostle Peter stood up and he made one of the greatest statements that he ever made.

And this is what he said. He said, God who knew the hearts gave unto them, who is that? Cornelius and his household, the Gentiles, gave unto them the Holy Spirit, the same as He did unto us. When did He give us the Holy Spirit?

On the day of Pentecost. He said, He made no difference between us and them. And here comes the essence of the life and the Spirit. He said, He purified their hearts by faith. Fire speaks of cleansing, you know.

And ah, brother and sister, would you allow me to suggest to you tonight that when you study sin in the New Testament, when you study the efficacy of the blood, when we speak about the fullness of the Spirit of God, hey, you know what?

God is able to cleanse us from all conscious sin. We are not speaking about sin as perfection. No, no, no. We are not speaking about the sin that we know. We are not speaking about the depravity of sin.

I mean, that's the brutality of the consequences of sin. And if God will come into this gathering this evening and show us in one split second what happened when Adam and Eve sinned, and what happened when the apostle Paul sinned for us by one man sinning to him to avail, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men for all our sin.

Brother and sister, if you and I would have a glimpse of the depravity of sin, none of us would be able to get out of this place tonight. But God is able to cleanse us from the sin that we are conscious of.

So when the Spirit of God is in my life as a person, and God convicted me of the sin that I am conscious of, and I confess it before God, you say, what happens? The Spirit of God becomes present in those areas of my life.

Hey, you know what, brother and sister? The fullness of the Spirit of God is not a goal, it's a gateway. And a crisis without a process, folks, is an abscess. You say, what happens? How does this spiritual life work?

Let me explain to you how it works. It's a crisis that leads to a process, that leads to a crisis, that leads to a process. And in the process of sanctification, God consistently is cleansing us, but the Spirit of God wants to be in control of my life.

People often say to me, can you give us a very simple explanation about the life and the Spirit? Not necessarily as it relates to prayer. And I say to them, oh, I would love to do that. And they say, come on, how are you going to explain this?

The Law of the Spirit and Freedom from Sin and Death

And I said, let me use a practical illustration. And they say, what is it? I said, you know, it's like that 747 jumbo jet that is sitting in the tarmac. What are they telling us? They said, three and a half thousand tons of steel and metal and aluminum.

And yes, this thing sitting on the plane. And I mean, I can't stand this thing of flying. And you know, when this thing takes off and my wife is with me, I take her hand and all I sing is all the blood of Jesus.

And she say to me, and I just sing about the blood. And sometimes I sing out loud. People must think, you know, he's really a crackpot, isn't he? But I sing. You say, why? I mean, you know, for that thing to take off, brother and sister, it's a miracle every time it happens.

35 ,000 flights every day just in North America. And so when that thing takes off and I would hold Janice's hand and she would tell me, she said, are you afraid of dying? I said, no, but I would like to know how it's going to happen.

And you know, when that thing stands in the tarmac, brother and sister, and all that steel and everything and aluminum, it stands there packed with people and they're going to go to another country. You say, where?

Oh, they're coming from Canada to this boat in the ocean called Australia. It's a super liner. I mean, the place is massive. And it stands there and you and I sit in this plane and we are like the old man and his wife that when they saw the first train and she said to him, what do you think?

And he said, this thing is never going to move. And so they waited and they got this train going. She said, what do you think? And he said, this thing is never going to stop. And so, and you and I sit there and thought, what is going to happen?

They're going to try and get us off in the air? And there are these four massive Rolls Royce engines, brother and sister. And you and I sit there and there's a moment when the tower said, you can take off.

And so as this plane is taking off, because this is what Paul is saying, you see, there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are on Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

Here comes the life of the Spirit. And he said, for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has done what? Has set us free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was dead free sin, God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condensed him in the sin of the flesh, so that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

He said, what is the life in the Spirit? We sit in this 747 and there's a moment when the captain, when the tower gives a sign, and you and I sit in this plane, and there's a massive 4 rolls, why is it on the ground, brother and sister?

There's a law that prevents it from flying. He said, Gerard, what is the law? It's the law of gravity. It cannot take off. And then there's a moment when those engines began to roar, and as they would go down, what is it, 5 kilometers possibly down this runway, and they started, how did they start?

1 mile an hour, 2 miles an hour, 20 miles an hour, 50, I mean this is a massive thing, and we sit in this thing, and then it goes 120 miles an hour, instead of 140 that it is, and you and I would sit there and we thought, oh brother, good night, what's going to happen?