Nothing Shall be Impossible To You

Amen. If you have your Bibles, I want you to turn to Matthew chapter 17 and verse 20. Matthew chapter 17 and verse 20.

We're right in the midst of School of Christ here. We've had a week of teaching every single day, nine messages a day. We're going to be continuing for another two weeks, but on our Wednesdays and our Sundays here in the local church, we just put our messages, our series on pause.

We'll be starting again in two weeks time, but here in the midst of this school here in the Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights, we're preaching messages from this Bible school that we're running here in the midst, and we're in our prayer series at the minute. This morning, as I heard our brother Paul Walsh just praying in the prayer meeting this morning, here we are in a prayer series, in a prayer meeting, calling upon the Lord. I couldn't help but think it as that man lifted his voice to pray in this prayer meeting.

I'm thinking back a number of years to a School of Christ prayer meeting in an evening where his dad was attending that school, going through it. In that prayer meeting, I'll never forget it. Right in that prayer meeting, as everyone is praying, seeking the Lord, calling on the Lord for personal issues, his father began to pray for his son who is far from God in the world.

In fact, at that very point, Paul is caught up with a desire for drugs, taking his drugs, giving over to drugs, with his only dream being that he would do nothing else than give himself in the years ahead to drug taking. But do you know what you have? You've got a prayer meeting that has taken place. You've got a father in a prayer meeting, praying for his son that he might get born again.

As we prayed in that prayer meeting, Paul being the mechanic he was, had his head under the bonnet of his car, working on that car. And as he did, he began what come to his mind. This is a sinner.

What come to his mind was an old song he used to sing as a child in Sunday school. Seek ye first the kingdom of God. And out of the blue begins to sing that.

Saints of God, I'm talking about prayer in the house of God, a prayer meeting where people are beseeching God. As his father prayed, suddenly, as that head is under the bonnet, the spirit of God moves on him and he begins to cry out to God, which led to his conversion. Saints of God, it's a miracle that you have access in prayer in this place.

We have got miraculous testimony sitting in this gathering of the reality that God does answer prayer. Here this morning, my message, nothing should be impossible unto you. Prayer is the most powerful tool that God has given to his church.

And yet I am fully persuaded by experience, by close observation, that this has to be one of the most neglected things in today's church. Reading from Matthew chapter 17, verse 20, and Jesus said unto them, because of your unbelief, for verily I say unto you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, remove hence to yonder place, and it shall remove. And nothing shall be impossible unto you because of your unbelief.

Jesus said this because of their ability or their failure to cast a demon out of a little boy. They prayed, but they had no power to eject a demon. Then listen to the next verse, verse 21, how be it this kind goeth out not but by prayer and fasting.

Then again it says in Luke chapter 18 and verse 1, and he, that is Christ, speak a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray and not to faint. Father, help us this morning in Jesus' mighty name. Men ought always to pray and not to faint.

The word faint that Jesus uses here, we could say stop. The word faint literally means to be weak, to be feeble, to become spiritless, to reach a point of utter exhaustion. And so Jesus said men ought always to pray and not to faint.

There's a lot of fainting in today's churches. There's a lot of exhaustion with Christians. They're tired of fighting the battle.

They are weary of praying. They have become exhausted in trying to go to God in prayer. The scriptures that we have read here this morning, they say in Mark chapter 16 and verse 56, as many as touched him were made whole.

All of this statement implies, and all the scriptures we're looking at here implies a struggle in the place of prayer and the place of faith. The Bible says nothing shall be impossible unto you. And so it's saying unto you and me, we are going to face a struggle.

If you can touch God, you will get an answer to prayer. I and you are going to face utterly impossible situations, but through faith in God, things become possible. I actually believe in what the word of God says.

You can touch God this morning. You can press through and touch them in prayer. Today's theology that has saturated the church of our generation is an easy believism.

Name it and claim it theology. It is an easy going Christianity that demands everything and does nothing for it. It is a Christianity that quotes the promises of God and says, God is obliged to do it, but neglects the place of prayer, of wrestling at the throne of God, of pressing through unbelief and the hindrances of the flesh.

We have actually accommodated and raised up in this generation a sort of Christianity that was unknown in the first generation. It wasn't taught or imbued in the early disciples. They had a Christianity that wrestled with God until they got an answer.

This playing down of the struggle in prayer, in faith, in the presence of God today and today's church has allowed the enemy access right into the house of God, in the families, in the marriages, in the churches to cause chaos. As the church lays back, as husbands don't wrestle in prayer anymore, as mothers go about their activity, but they're not women of God praying and fasting anymore. The enemy walks into homes, splitting them, causing chaos and stealing your children from right under your nose.

Today it's become normal in churches that the teenagers, the youth all leave the church, come 16 years old. There go all the youth out of the church. That's become a normal thing.

That's a tragedy church, I want to tell you. If we were at the altar of God praying as we ought to, that could never happen. In this scripture that talks about as many as touched him were made whole.

In around Jesus Christ was great crowds clamoring around him, making much noise, wanting to see him, wanting to hear him, wanting to touch him, but only those that touched him were healed in their physical bodies. We're talking about those within the crowd, many here, many see, many are there, but only some, only certain ones actually touch him and get an answer from heaven. Only those that can touch the hem of his garment will walk away with an answer to their prayers.

Believing requires an effort. Prayer involves a fight of faith. Standing in this hour and generation is going to cost a man and woman is something.

If you're looking for an easy believism, God ought to do. Getting bitter, dissatisfied, discouraged, disappointed, accusing God because he has not done everything, and yet you're not wrestling at the throne of God since you've got it back to front this morning. You can sit there in your sorrow, disappointment, anger, bitterness, and jealousy, accusing everyone, but there is going to be some who rise up and go to the house of prayer and touch God again.

The Bible in Matthew chapter 9 verse 20, it speaks about a woman who had an issue of blood for 12 long years. The Bible says that she'd gone to all the physicians. She spent all that she had, and yet she wasn't improved.

She was no better. She had done everything, labored through those years, but she was not at all improved. But this little lady comes to Jesus.

Listen to what her testimony is in Matthew 9 verse 21. If I can but touch the hem of his garment. That little lady did touch him, and she went away healed.

12 years sick in her body. No doctor could help her, but this little lady says, if I can but touch the master, I am going to go away healed. Some of you are so locked into nothing changing, nothing happening, nothing improving, that you've lost all hope.

And some of you sit in church, you don't even believe God can touch you here this morning. I want to tell you, I want to stir your heart here this morning. Rise up, go and touch the master this morning, and you'll be made every whit hole again.

This little lady, I assure you, after 12 years of bleeding from her body, she is losing blood every day, every week, every month for 12 years, in a state and a condition of being anemic, losing that blood. I can assure you, she is in a state of fainting and a weakness. But that little lady pushed through the crowd.

There's a mass of crowd, strong men, children, vast crowds. But you know what? She says, I'm going to touch the master, I may be weak, but I'm going to touch the master. I'm here with a determination.

She didn't have strength of body, but I want to tell you, this little lady had a strength of spirit, a confidence in the living God. You see, for you and I, there is an enemy, and he will not go away unless you make him go away. It was some 30 years ago, I was part of a team living in Scotland, in the borders of Scotland.

We had embarked, we're young people, I was about 22 years old, and we were embarking in evangelism, about to pioneer a new church work, to reach souls, begin gathering them, and then embark on that process of having a functioning New Testament church within that town. As we embarked upon that work, this sickness hit my body, 22 years old. I felt this particular day, it was like a mantle came down over my body.

I was out evangelizing on the streets of the town, with tracks going door to door, one door after another door, telling people about their need for Christ, reaching souls for Christ, holding open airs. But that particular day, this mantle fell upon me, that's how I can only describe it. And all of a sudden, my body rejected all of the fluids in it.

I had to run to a toilet, and literally my entire body, through vomiting and diarrhea, rejected all the fluids within it. This continued for three months, every three days, this would happen. It was like something would come down over me, and my entire body would reject everything in it, instantly.

I was once at a door, knocking on the door, about to hand them a gospel track, here it came again. I had three minutes to get to the public toilet, before my whole system rejected everything in it. You know what, I knew I'm in a fight, but I didn't know if it was physical or spiritual.

That Christmas, I took a journey back to Northern Ireland, to my mother's. I was back at hers two weeks, it didn't happen once in that two weeks. I went, well, my mommy's cooking, it's made me better, all this rest, recuperation, mommy's always good for the body of a young son.

I got in the car, driving back with her over to Scotland. We were 100 metres from where we gathered as a church, and here it came upon me again. See, at that very point, I know, I'm not wrestling against flesh and blood.

This is not a natural battle, but now I come to understand, this is a spiritual battle, this is a spiritual power, and it's all about establishing that local church, and that local community. If you don't make the devil go away, then he won't go away. If you're ever going to touch Jesus, you'll have to go through the devil to touch him.

If he can resist you, and stop you on the way to Jesus, I promise you that he will. The Bible says that violent take the kingdom by force. There's a holy violence that we've lost in the church of today.

It's got none to do with personality, nothing to do with your temperament, or your knowledge, or your experience. It's got everything to do with a heart for the living God. As you read in the Bible, Daniel became desperate for an answer to the problems of his nation.

For 21 days, he sets himself to pray, and to fast, and to seek the face of God. No answer from heaven, no feeling, no word, no prophecy, no answer. Things continued the same, nothing to lighten his burden.

Here is a man setting himself to pray. Then on that 21st day, an angel came to him, and listen to what the angel says. Beloved of the Lord, you were heard the very first day, 21 days ago, your prayer was heard.

But what happened? 21 days of delay, 21 days of silence, 21 days of no change in the situation. This is a man fervent in prayer, setting himself. This is a man that says, I am going to touch God in prayer, and I'm not going away until I touch him.

What happened in the middle of that? Well, we read about it. The demons had withstood the angel, and kept him from getting through 21 days. It was a demonic power, a satanic power.

There was a spiritual power surrounding, an opposition and warfare surrounding the place of prayer. You may think your little prayer here, it's just you trying to get to God. I want to tell you there's a warfare to touch God.

That time when I got back to that church, and I realized this is a spiritual warfare, I changed the whole direction of my prayer. I had all the mommies in that church trying to book me into the doctor, trying to get me to go to the hospital. Some of them, they'd bring me all these paper cuttings from the newspaper, saying you've got the ghost syndrome, that's what's wrong with you.

All these faithful Christians that pray for healing in the prayer meeting, they're telling me, you've got the ghost syndrome, you need to go to the doctor. I went, this isn't anything physical. I want to tell you, I'm in a spiritual warfare for a church to be birthed in a community, in a town, and for souls to be won by the power of the gospel.

Since do you realize the warfare that we are in? That battle continued from that Christmas all the way through that year, till about September time again. Every three days, my entire body rejects all the fluid in it. At times, I fainted, I'd be standing tall to someone in church, I would collapse.

Other times, I had to run for the bathroom. I continued evangelizing. I kept going on the streets and preaching.

I kept exhorting the saints. We kept praying every single day. You know why? We're in a spiritual warfare.

22 years old, but I knew what this battle was all about. It's a spiritual warfare against powers and principalities. At this point, most people go home.

They fold up the Bible. They say, I'm not in this for the battle. I want to merely pray and have my prayer answered.

In that September, October, a visiting preacher came, testified, prayed for the sick there. And last of all, before we left, I said, you need to pray for me. He says, you as well.

I said, me as well. He went to pray for me. Then he stopped, stood back, smiled, just smiled at me.

I wondered what was coming next. He says, you do realize you'll have to go back to Ireland. Reluctantly, I said, I do.

I do. I was running. I was like the prophet of God running from Nineveh.

I said, I do. He says, then we can pray. Instantly, I was healed.

Saints of God, there is a warfare for this real. There's a raging warfare. The demons that delayed the answer to Daniel's prayers are still real as ever right now today.

If you in this church don't think there's demonic powers in this city or surrounding your prayers for your family or your prayers concerned in the call of God, if you don't realize there's a battle raging for your children this morning, then you're gravely mistaken. If the devil can discourage you, he will discourage you. Do you see how the church has been victimized by easy believism? This new gospel that entered the church of name it and claim it, blab it and grab it, simply quote the promise and God is obliged to do what you say.

If God said it and I believe it, then God has to do it. You've got people all through the church demanding of God, commanding God, and I want to warn you, if you ever meet anyone who commands the Holy Spirit, you better get out of there very quickly. What a dangerous thing when men in the church think they can command God or tell God what to do.

See, a radical change has come in the theology of this hour, but we need to get back to this wrestle, this fight of faith. Nothing should be impossible unto you if thou can't believe. If you can believe, saints of God, if you can touch God in prayer, then God will answer.

Some have said, we say it's done so it's got to be done. We leave the praying to God. We just claim it.

We don't need to pray. We don't need to fast. We don't need to deny ourself.

We don't need to pray 21 days like Daniel. What Bible are you reading this morning? I'd ask you. You see, we have lost the inner commitment to keep us on our knees, to stay there until God answers from heaven, until he saves that loved one, until he reveals his will to you.

We have lost the ability to obey what Jesus said in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 and verse 7. He said, pray without ceasing. It doesn't mean every second of every day you're praying. That's impossible.

You can't pray all through the night. You can't do that straight in a week. But what it means is you never move away from that position of praying what you're praying for.

You will not stop. Every day you're found in prayer. Or what it says in Luke chapter 18 verse 1, men ought always to pray and not to faint.

We've had a new generation of prophets and preachers come into the church. They say, if you pray for anything twice in a row, it's unbelief. They say, just ask God and then just praise God.

Just thank him for the answer. You don't find this within the scripture, but it's become the popular theology of this day and this generation. Hell never sold a greater lie than you can simply pray once, leave it all to God, and go on your merry way.

And he's obliged to do it. That's not what the Bible shows. Look at what it says in Mark chapter 8, verse 22 to 26.

We look at Jesus and the blind man in that story. The blind man came to Jesus and Jesus laid his hands upon him and prayed for him. When he lifted his hands off the blind man, he said, I see men as trees walking.

Now some of you sitting here, if I said I prayed like that, you'd tell me I missed God. I haven't prayed for him. And then he sees men walk.

He sees men walking as trees. What does the Bible say? Jesus prayed for him a second time, not once, a second time. He's not lacking in faith.

He's right in the will of God. He's in the right place at the right time. But praying once was not sufficient for Jesus Christ.

You're going to pray again before that man is healed. Or what about in Gethsemane in Matthew chapter 26? We read about Jesus being in Gethsemane. The cross is before him.

The father presents the cup of suffering onto him. He takes his disciples to prayer and three different seasons of time, he goes and prays on his face to the father. Then he comes back.

Then he goes again, comes back and goes again three times. It doesn't mean he just prayed three times, but three seasons of time. He's there in travail of prayer.

Would you dare accuse Jesus of unbelief that night? Remember one of those times he comes back, he woke the disciples and said, can you not even tarry one hour? Can't you even pray? Don't you know my soul is in agony? You see, since those disciples had fainted in the darkest hour, you know why? It's the hour of darkness. It's the hour of Satan coming. It's the hour of betrayal.

It's the hour where friends desert you. It's the hour of betrayal within the church of Jesus Christ. And I want to tell you, you want to be in Gethsemane praying like Christ was.

But do you know what Christ did not have unbelief? Three times he goes and prays the exact same thing. When we go to the Old Testament, in 1 Kings chapter 18, we see Elijah, the prophet of God, the man who can bring fire from heaven. There he is fighting the prophets of Baal.

But in this chapter 18, now he goes to the mountain of prayer to pray for rain in the nation. He goes there and he prays once, sends his servant and says, go and see if there's any sign of rain. The servant comes again, says there's nothing.

The sky is clear, not a cloud in that sky. Go and look again. Praise again.

Praise the very same prayer for the very same thing without an answer having come as yet. The servant comes again, says there's no sign of rain. The prophet goes to prayer again and he sends a third time and a fourth time and a fifth time and a sixth time.

Saints of God, this is where so many become persuaded. It's not God's will to send the rain. I'm discouraged.

I'm confused. I don't know what's happening. If you tarried there and prayed until the rain come, that sixth time, thank God the prophet said to his servant, go and look again.

And he went to prayer, praying the same prayer with the same determination. I'm staying here until God answers prayer. The servant come again and says, I have seen a cloud the size of a man's hand.

You know what the prophet done? He tucked up his skirt and his belt and he went running. He said, that's it. That's all I need to know.

There is coming a torrential rain. Saints of God, there is coming a rain. If I don't get running now, I'm going to get caught in this flood.

Are you mad? You know, everyone's talking about no more revival. The day of revival is over. It's all apostasy.

We need people who can prevail with God again. Don't just tell me revival's coming. Oh, we believe as a church.

There's coming a revival. I'm waiting for it. Wish you'd hurry up.

You don't believe anything if you're not praying. I'm preaching this pulpit. A revival's coming to Jerusalem.

And I pour in the Holy Spirit. God is going to revive a nation. I've shown you in scriptures.

You don't believe in anything if you're not praying that. You don't believe that you're just waiting around here, hoping to catch a glimpse of it when it happens. I'm saying, oh, we knew that.

You need to be a lot more than that I want to tell you. I spent five years in the army. I went to a new army camp in Germany after having been backslidden.

Two of my friends getting killed in front of me in a helicopter crash. I was backslidden, drinking their drink, running after their women, laughing at their jokes. And when those two friends died in that helicopter in front of me, and I looked at my hands, and when their blood is upon my hands, I never warned them.

I never told them. I was playing the hypocrite. I was ashamed of Jesus.

I was embarrassed of him and didn't open my mouth. I'm drinking their beer with them. But when they died, I said, God, forgive me.

I'm going to serve you. I'm going to walk with you. I went to a new army camp.

On that army camp, 1,500 guys, no Christian among them, not one. I'm the only born again Christian on there. I love Jesus.

Now I'm utterly committed, radically committed to Jesus. I'm praying. I'm fasting.

I'm seeking him with all my heart. I'm separate from sin. They all went drinking on a Saturday night.

I'm either in that room or I'm going meeting with Christians to pray and seek the Lord. Two years I'm praying. Nothing.

No open doors to evangelize. No one's getting saved. No one healed.

Nothing's happening. The door is closed. Two years on an army camp and absolutely nothing.

But you know what you've got? You've got an 18-year-old, 19-year-old, 20-year-old who's persistent, steadfast in glorifying Jesus. I reached a particular point where one day a breakthrough came. I mean a breakthrough came.

Saints of God, I'm the same Christian with the same faith, but I've never let go of God. Sometimes I question when is there something wrong with me? If I'm not affecting them, they must be affecting me. See, no middle ground.

But as I'm there, a mighty breakthrough came. All of a sudden people started to get mightily born again. The power of Satan was broken in that place.

I could give you testimonies of healing, of salvation that came out of that. But there was a battle. There was a wrestling.

The Naaman and Clement gospel has left the church helpless in a face-to-face battle with the devil. When she doesn't get an answer, she doesn't know what to do. You pray, nothing happens.

What do I do next? Do you know what we've lost? We've lost what our old Pentecostal pioneers used to call praying through. In other words, you lay hold of God. You do not move.

You do not change direction until God answers. We've lost that. We don't believe in praying through anymore.

You don't hear anyone talking about praying through to touch God anymore. If you know the will of God, if you know what Scripture says, if you know that your heart is right before God, then stay in the place of prayer until God answers. Everything that our fathers in the revival movements of previous generations taught us was that if you can believe God, you're a believer.

A real born-again Christian is a believer. A real Christian prays. A real Christian will seek the face of God.

That's a Christian. And so believing that the war is over in this generation, we don't believe in fighting anymore. We don't believe a Christian should have to wrestle in prayer or go through nights of agony and turmoil wrestling through the issue that the heavens are brass or that heaven is silent.

But here today in this school, in this church, we need to press through and touch God again. We need to pray until the thoughts of God become our very thoughts. The mere confession theology, thank you, has sentenced millions to a life of defeat because they have not actively resisted the devil.

The Bible says in Ephesians chapter 4, 27, God commands us, give no place to the devil. This tells you something about the devil. The devil is looking for a place in the church and in a believer's life.

The word means a foothold, just a small area, just a hand grip or a foot grip. The devil is looking for that, not to possess a demon. A Christian cannot be demon possessed or indwelt by demons or demonized, but you can have a foothold in your life.

You can give the devil a foothold, a grasp in your life where he sabotages your prayer life, your walk with God, your faith in God, what you're actually called to. He will sabotage it from not one spot. He'll sabotage your entire walk.

He'll preoccupy you and take your eyes off the will of God. But we must know the Bible teaches that Satan was defeated at Calvary. But more than that, we've got to enforce the victory.

We know the devil is defeated, yet the Bible says he goeth about roaring like a lion, seeking whom he may devour. He is defeated, triumphed over in Calvary. So what makes the difference? Why can he still roam about? Why is he able to try and gain a foothold in a Christian's life? Because the Christian must wrestle, fight, resist the devil in order that there's a breaking of his power.

If you want health, you've got to be against sickness. No one ever got healed that didn't set themselves against sickness. If you want to be holy as a Christian, you need to set yourself against besetting sins.

If you don't do that, you'll never be a holy man or woman of God. Jesus said in Luke 18 verse 1, men ought always to pray and not to faint. Paul admonished in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, 17, pray without ceasing.

You see, prayer is the battleground. That's where the fight takes place. Do you think that you're going to go to prayer for mere feelings, to be made happy, merely to be encouraged? Do you realize when you embark in the place of prayer, you're engaging in warfare and some of you haven't been prepared for that.

You go to prayer and you draw back from it. You never realize it's a battlefield. It's a war.

You're going to meet the devil there. If you mean business and say, I'm looking for the blessing of God from heaven, I'm going to pray until the blessing of God comes down in this church. You're very dangerous here.

If you're there standing on behalf of your family or your church or your city or your nation, if you're there standing in the place of prayer, the devil knows if you ever touch God, things are going to happen in life. He will resist you. He'd be a very bad devil if he didn't.

You go to prayer to gain encouragement and strength and blessing, to experience the fullness of the spirit of God. If I'm the devil, I'm going to meet you there. I'm going to stop you on the way.

I'm going to meet you as you go to get encouraged from the Lord. Prayer is where we engage the enemy. Faith demands that I be as fervently against evil as I am for good.

We need to realize there's a devil like I did with that sickness that came on me. Nothing's going to stop me going to doors to evangelize, handing out gospel tracts, being in the prayer meeting. I ain't going to no doctor.

You know why? If you're sick physically, please go to your doctor. But I'm telling you, when I know it's a spiritual warfare, none of the mummies in that church are going to get me to go to hospital. No way.

I'm engaged in a spiritual warfare. Nothing is going to stop me until a church is established in these border towns and evangelism is going out every single week. I'm going to be here.

See, faith in its truest sense is prevailing prayer. You want to know if you have faith this morning. You want to know if you're a man or woman of faith or that if you really believe God, then you believe in prevailing prayer.

Prevailing prayer is a manifestation of real faith in the heart. Show me a man with faith. Show me a woman with faith.

And they go to the house of prayer to say, I will lay hold of God until he answers. It says in Luke chapter 18, verse seven and eight, Jesus speaking again and shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, crying day and night, though he bear long with them. This is Christ theology.

You know what he's saying? A real elect saint of God, a chosen one who prays, who cries day and night can be in a condition where God is delaying though the Lord bear long with him. This is Christ theology. You could be praying in the will of God and there's no answer, no change, nothing happening.

And yet you're in the will of God. The problem with us is we begin to doubt. We begin to say, what's wrong? What's happened? Where's God? Why isn't it working? Do you know what God may well bear long with you to see what's in your heart? Do you get angry? Do you disbelieve the promise? Do you begin to accuse? Do you fall apart? Do you give into discouragement? God does bear long with you, but it says in verse eight, I tell you that he will avenge them speedily.

So he's delaying, but he's answering speedily. What God calls speedily may not be speedy in your book. Many years ago, God taught me a great lesson that I never forgot.

21 years old, I had a prayer book, names of family members, nations on another day, churches on another day, friends on another day, salvation on another day. I used to pray and do all these things. And on my list of family members and relatives, I'd pray through them.

On that day every week, I bombarded heaven for those relatives. But I'd been praying every week, every month, every year. I thought it was long, and it took 21.

I'd been praying at least two years for this. Thought I'd been really doing some praying. Maybe it was two months.

I don't know. But here I go, I get discouraged. And I took a pen.

God help me. I took a pen. And this day I got so discouraged because of one of them.

I struck a line through their name, struck them off. The only family member, I struck a line through them. I lost confidence.

I lost hope. I said, they're not going to get saved. Nothing's happening.

In fact, they're getting worse. I got a phone call the very next day. This is a true story.

The very next day, I get a phone call from my mom. Said, you're not going to believe this. They got born again.

The very next day, I went, that wasn't accidental. This is a rebuke from God. That's why many of you, I've said over the years, you get to a point and you say, I'm discouraged about them.

I said, it's not your job to save your family member. You pray. You don't have the right to decide.

I think they're past it. You don't have the right to say that. You must not say that.

You don't have the sovereign knowledge of God to decide about a man's soul. It's none of your business. Your job is to pray for your loved ones.

Oh, but if you knew what they're like, pray for your loved ones. Pray for your family. Where are those old grannies who used to pray for decades? I had a great old grandmother.

She prayed for the entire family. Now she's up on the night she's going to die and go to be with the Lord. Not one family member born again.

Outside Dromora in the north. And there she is, an old lady, walk with God. She wrote letters to many of the family members saying you need to be born again.

No one listened to her. But here she is on the eve of going to meet the Lord. Earlier that evening, my mom walks into a gospel mission as a teenager gets born again that night.

Mightily saved. You know, my mom went to bed that night, transformed, saying I can't wait to go and tell my granny in the morning. Granny went to the Lord that very night.

She stood by the graveside three days later, looking down into the graveside. It was like the Lord said, now it's your task to pray for the family. The only born again Christian in that family.

Do you know what's happened since? The next generation came in and then the grandchildren have come in. Since God has worked in every generation saving, bringing the gospel to them ever since that. But that old lady never seen the fruit of her labors.

Jesus says, nevertheless, when the son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? I believe this is one of the most misinterpreted scriptures in the Bible. I've heard person after person say, look, Jesus said there would be no faith in the last day. Just before he come back, no one would believe in him.

It's going to get very dark. It doesn't say that. That's a wrong interpretation.

That's a bad interpretation. The Bible doesn't say that Jesus said there'd be no faith in the earth when he returns. You're utterly wrong.

Do you know what it does say? This kind of faith. What kind of faith? He said, those, the elect of God, which cry day and night unto him. That sort of faith.

You see what he's talking about? The sort of faith that cries unto God day and night. Avenge me. Avenge me of my enemies.

Deliver me. Break the power of my enemies. That's going to be rare.

That sort of prayer, that sort of faith, it's going to be hard to find in the church of God. And I want to tell you, we're there right now. Where are those that are saying every day, every morning, every night, avenge me, avenge me, avenge me, avenge me.

You pray for a week and then you think, God's letting me down. This isn't working. It seems to God you're to set yourself.

You're in a war. You're in a battlefield. We're fighting for the souls of men.

We're looking for revival to come again to the church. I've spent since five years old, believing, praying, looking for revival. I'm not the least bit tired or weary or fainting.

I am not going to faint in this hour. It seems to God a revival needs to come again to the church of Jesus Christ. Real faith then, according to Jesus, is the ability to hold on.

God seems to delay, but he will be speedy. This faith is rare in this hour, but it's a faith that God honors. To hold on means that the devil is not going to have your boy or girl, your children on their way to hell.

Well, maybe it's God's will. You kidding me? Maybe it's God's will to go to hell. Are you kidding me? If you don't fight for them, who is? You may be the only Christian in your house and street, in your area, in your family.

If you don't pray, who is going to pray? To hold on in prayer for the loved ones, for those we care about. We are in a vicious war, and we must be prepared to stand. Give no place to the devil.

Don't be intimidated by the devil. We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities. There are spiritual unseen powers of darkness that will discourage you, that will hinder you, that will lie to you.

You are in a warfare out of the devil's. One of the devil's greatest tricks is to make us believe that people are our enemy. So you're not wrestling powers of darkness anymore.

You see family members. You're a Christian, and you're getting angry. You see Jimmy Jones, your children, your parents, your brother, your sister, your cousin, your neighbors, your workmates.

The Bible says we don't wrestle. We do not fight as Christians against flesh and blood, against persons. We're on a whole different realm.

I'm a man, a woman of prayer. I'm a person of faith. We're not wrestling, engaged in a spiritual fight.

Some of you are engaged in such a fight with flesh and blood. You can't even engage the enemy. You're exhausted.

You're worn out. You're trodden underfoot fighting against flesh and blood. But that isn't where the battle is.

When we believe our enemy is another human being, we are resorting to carnal weapons. Prayer is a spiritual weapon. Faith is a spiritual weapon.

Resisting the devil, these are spiritual weapons. But when you engage men and women and use the natural means, you're using carnal weapons. Our enemy is spiritual.

Therefore, our weapons have to be spiritual. It says in Ephesians 6, 12, we wrestle not. The Bible never says we don't wrestle.

It says we wrestle not against flesh and blood. We ought not to. Wrestling implies hand-to-hand combat.

And our wrestling is in the area of prayer. Prayer is a place of wrestling. This word wrestling used here in the Greek, it's a Greek term used for Oriental wrestling.

How they used to do it in the Middle East, where you'd get all oiled up and you engage your opponent hand-to-hand, face-to-face wrestling. And it's the last man standing. We are going to wrestle until one of us isn't standing.

It's either going to be you or it's going to be me. But one of us is not going to be standing at the end of this wrestling match. Do you realize all of you sitting here are involved in a wrestling match? Right now, all of you, over your family, over your own faith, over some issue in your family going on, over your wife, you're in a hand-to-hand.

It's not flesh and blood. You are literally wrestling. And I want to tell you, either you're going to be on the ground or the devil's going to be on the ground, but it can't be both of you.

There is an outcome to every single wrestling match. It is you and the opponent that you're involved in and wrestle. But today, this easy believism has led to a defeat in this war.

Paul said in 2 Timothy chapter 4, 7, said, I have fought the fight and I've kept the faith. See, Paul was involved in a real spiritual warfare, engaged in it constantly, not just a day-to-day battle, but an entire campaign of war. Today is my fight.

This is the localized battle, but there's an entire campaign that's going to go on my entire Christian life. It will never, ever come to an end. It is our fight of faith and faith is the ability to stand.

Are you standing? Are you resisting? Are you opposing the enemy? Can you discern the enemy at work, undermining your own walk with God? And so he says in Luke 18, nevertheless, will the son of God find faith on the earth when he comes? Where are the intercessors today? Where are those who will stand in the gap and make up the hedge for our families and for our church? I said to the folk this morning, I said, those old ladies that I grew up with were women of prayer. Oh, there was men of prayer, but I'm telling you, it was those old women of God that impressed me so much. Numbers of them.

I've always been highly attracted to those old godly women of prayer who knew how to walk with God, walked in humility, knew how to engage God in prayer, and had lived a lifetime praying for their family members. I've always noted them and watched them carefully and listened to them. I didn't sit with them and begin to engage in conversation.

I sat and listened at the feet of women who knew what it was to walk with God. They are the intercessors. When I was in the army, we were taught how to engage the enemy, how to protect ourselves as a troop, as a group of fighting men.

What our corporal would do is set us in a circle with our legs crossed. So you go in an entire circle pointing out the way. You get your legs crossed.

Then the corporal went to each one of us and he said, I'm going to give you your arc of fire. Malcolmson, that tree there is your tree. See on your left, see over there, see that bush? That's your marker.

Malcolmson, that's yours. That's your area. Your job is to defend against the enemy.

That's your fight against the adversary. He went to the next guy, gave him his arc of fire, and it all overlapped. Do you know what's happened today's church? Those old saints of God have died.

I've worried about this for 40 years now. I've watched them die one by one by one. Women who knew revival, those women who prayed down revival, who walked with God, who gave faithfully to God.

I've watched this all through the years and I've watched them go one after another. One of those old ladies, she came to us at a very dark hour. She was up in her 80s, stayed with us straight through until one day after 100 years old.

Said a prayer to the Lord that had reached 100. She got to 100 in one day. Her husband worked with George Jeffries, that great Pentecostal revivalist out across Britain and Ireland, started his ministry in Ireland.

Remarkable ministry. She worked with him. She was baptized in the Holy Ghost at 13 years old in one of his campaigns.

13 years old, she had TB. She was sick in her bed. She told her mom, I need to go back, get baptized in water.

Mom says, you can't go. She says, I've got to be baptized in water if it kills me. They took her, got baptized in water.

When she came out of those waters, she was completely healed. Healed by the power of God. That old lady, she phoned us once.

She'd heard a message of Brother Clendenin online. She managed to get in contact with us and says, he reminds me of George Jeffries, that man of God. Do you know, all through those years, as she walked with us, a woman of prayer.

Do you know that woman? We weren't in contact. No emails. She'd phone up, say, Candace, what's going on? I know there's something happening.

Every single time she was in tune with the Spirit of God. Every time we're in a battle or had an issue, she knew it. She'd come on saying, now what's going on? I need to know.

She prayed. She was up in her late 90s. She was in her house.

We went to visit her. She'd fallen, cut her head on the radiator, the edge of that metal radiator. They'd put four stitches in.

She went to the hospital. And of course, when you're in your 90s and you suffer something like that, they're not going to let you home alone. So she's in there and said, Nadir, is there anyone at home with you? She says, yeah.

Yes, there's three others that live with me. And then she told us, she laughed and said, I didn't like to tell them, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. She says, I'm not staying in there.

Do you know, before that, I'm talking about a period of days, when she got that done, she didn't go to the doctor. It was one of her grandsons forced her to go in there. She wasn't going.

We turned up. It's several days. I'm staring at this four stitches.

There's not even bruising. She comes through with a big pot of tea. I could hardly lift it.

She wouldn't let me serve it. Saints of God, we have lost women of prayer in the church. Oh yeah, there's men of prayer, but I'm talking about women of prayer here.

I'm talking about those I got raised with and I watched all through the years. Ladies, it's time to arise. We have lost this from the church and we wonder why families are falling apart and churches are, and we're not seeing answers to prayer.

We have lost this weapon of prayer in the church, militant, fervent, determined, constant prayer in the church. And now we're watching apostasy march into church movements again. See, this is the way of the intercessor.

When we lose intercessors, when Christians leave the place of prayer in the local church, they're caught up in their own personal battles, discouraged, employed with other activity, and the devil begins to attack the church. If we will return to the altar of prayer one more time, there is no situation that cannot be won again in this hour. If you believe God, nothing shall be impossible unto you.

You can prevail in prayer since we can have a revival again in this hour and I pour in of the Holy Spirit. But who believes this anymore? Who actually believes that revival, rain from heaven is the will of God? Our weapons are mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. It's talking about the mind.

Your mind is dangerous. It can talk you out of prayer, remove you from persistent prayer. Paul fought with the beast of Ephesus.

What was the beast of Ephesus? It was a demon set in that place, determined that the church doesn't get planted there. Ephesus was a city given over to idolatry and the devil was determined that that idolatry would stay there as a stronghold opposing the gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul actually fought that devil for the city.

Before a breakthrough comes in the city, before souls get saved, before a church gets raised up, Paul's going to have to fight a demon in that city of Ephesus. He's going to have to wrestle. He's going to have to resist.

He's going to have to pray. He's going to have to fast. But when preachers no longer do that, the enemy remains and we play religious games.

We wrestled in prayer. We've got to wrestle again. If the Bible teaches anything, it teaches that the lost are held captive by the devil.

Your family members are not just victims of their own thoughts. There's a real devil. The devil, Satan, has darkened and blinded the minds of those that do not believe.

You're simply wrestling with them, arguing with them, frustrated with them. Don't you see the devil? Aren't you angry at the devil? There's no point arguing with them. You need to get on your knees and go to prayer, since this is a spiritual warfare for the souls of men.

It says in John 6, 44, no man can come to God except the Father. Draw him. It's not just within their power.

It takes a miracle of God. A sinner's prayer is not going to save a sinner and regenerate them supernaturally. It takes a work of the Holy Spirit.

It's a miracle. Salvation is supernatural. Unless the chains are broken by prevailing prayer from the church of this hour, the lost will not come in.

Harvests are going to perish unless people are praying. But when Zion prevails, sons and daughters are born again. You can do your evangelism.

Have you prayed? You can go and say your little bit to a workmate or a family member. Have you prayed? And when prayer didn't work, have you added fasting? You know the new versions that take out fasting from prayer and fasting. They put a little note there saying, not in the oldest manuscripts.

It's a work of the devil. Take fasting out of the spiritual warfare. Before revival came to Ephesus, Paul had to engage the strong man in a place of prayer.

The same is true of every city on earth. The lack of knowledge or this lack of knowledge has defeated the church, not knowing what was going on behind the scenes, getting frustrated with natural things, being conscious of mere flesh and blood men. Great plans are laid for revivals, for meetings.

Money is spent. Never has so much money been spent as this generation to reach souls for Christ. Never has so much activity been employed as this generation now to reach people.

And yet never has there been less genuine revival, less genuine conversion, less changing in society than this hour. I believe this is the reason. It's because we've lost our ability to pray.

Jesus' prophecy is right. When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith in the earth? Yes, saving faith, but not this kind of faith, not prevailing prayer. It's been lost.

I'm calling you back as a church, as a school, all of you that are here in the providence of God, I'm calling you back to prevailing prayer again. The problem is Satan opposing the church. Until the church makes him go away, he'll remain controlling, destroying lives.

The failures of God's people to recognize Satan's control over the lost has left them in a place of defeat in evangelism. Are you in those streets of no one getting saved? Are you satisfied saying, well, I've done my part? Go to prevailing prayer. As a preacher, I must see souls born again.

I've got to see the drug addicts saved. Why do you think it happens, saints of God? Because someone's prevailing in prayer on a Saturday night, prevailing that God will do the work, saving souls, delivering them, setting them at liberty. It's not just circumstantial.

It's a warfare that we're engaged in. Nothing should be impossible. The Bible says in James 4, 7 as we close, resist the devil and he will flee from you.

Resist him. The word resist is a term of opposition, militancy, of standing your ground. Turn your faith against Satan this morning.

Maybe you need to resist sickness in your body, or maybe fear is binding you. Why don't you go evangelize? I'm scared. Are you against fear? Oh Lord, give me faith.

Give me faith. Are you against the fear? Are you against the enemy? Some of you won't go do the will of God. Why? You're terrified.

Why not get angry at the fear? I'm paralyzed by fear. Then get angry against it. Resist the fear.

Your adversary, the devil, stands against you. Not flesh and blood. It's not your temperament.

Well, I'm just quiet. God help you, I'm quiet as well. Never hindered me all through these years.

Timid, quiet, shy, backward, lacking knowledge and experience and ability. But I'm telling you, engage the enemy in a real warfare. Become violent in your prayers here today.

There's nothing impossible to the saint that will pray. And the Bible says 1 Peter 5 and 9, resist steadfast in the faith. Stand with me here this morning.

We're in a warfare. We're in a real warfare. We're not playing knowledge gathering games in this school or this church.

We're in warfare. You're in a raging warfare. And we say time after time, I'm discouraged.

And we just capitulate. We go back. We change direction.

We give up. We grow tired. We get weary.

We say nothing is happening. Saints of God, that's unbelief. You need to repent of that.

Lord, forgive me. Break it in my life. I need to get back into the battle.

Get back to praying for your family members. Don't you dare put a line like I did through that family member. Don't you dare give up on them.

It's not your job to. Oh, we prayed for revival 10 years, hasn't come. So what? Went to a church once.

This mature lady come to me, led the worship. Her husband, a preacher come to me and says, I've been praying three years for revival. Where is it? Up north in Belfast.

Where's the revival? We've been praying three years. I said, I've been praying since five years old. Do you think a revival that suddenly comes and changes a nation, you're not going to have to fight and prevail.

Evan Roberts, go and read the testimony, praying for years for revival. And it happens in one moment of time. 17 people in a youth meeting and the leaders in the community wouldn't let him preach anywhere else.

So he's left with the youth meeting and revival breaks out. First time I ever preached, but he prayed for years, praying, prevailing, never letting go of God. God send us a revival one more time.

Since this church is here to see revival come again. If ever I die, you better write that in my gravestone. Malcolmson prayed for a revival and it's going to come.

My bones will be a testimony. That gravestone will be a testimony. It is coming.

God's going to revive this church again. If you've given ground, it's time right now, here this morning, repent, ask him to forgive you, ask for a fresh oil and let's engage the enemy again. We could write the enemy this very day, this week, this coming week in this school, we could touch the throne of God.

We could see something happen in the body of Christ. Something could happen in this city of Limerick because the people prayed. It won't be in those streets.

It happens. It'll happen in this room in a prayer meeting. You just go out and find out about it when you go out there.

Let's call upon him. Let's pray here. Let's begin to pray.

Begin to pray for your family and your life. What's been resisting you? Is it fear binding you this morning? Is it unbelief? Is it apathy? Is it lethargy? Is it some issue of sin? Is it some begetting sin? What is it hindering you this morning? Is it your lack of ability? What is it that's stopping you in your tracks, saints of God? Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Resist him steadfastly in the faith.

Begin to pray and believe God. Lay hold of God. Ask him this morning.

Ask him to forgive you for being hindered. Ask him to restore you again. Let this faith be evident here this morning.

Ask for vengeance against your adversary. Ask that the Lord would avenge you today. Let's look for a breakthrough in this place.

My God, we look to you. Lord Jesus. Lord Jesus.