The Purpose, Priority, & Power of Prayer

So let me talk about this topic real quick, but first give you the title, the purpose, the priority, and the power of prayer. Lots of P's in there. The purpose, the priority, and the power of prayer.

Now some of you know, but some of you might not know that we've been doing this, I think, for about four years. I can't really, I need to go back and look when this started, I think right during COVID, when we stayed open and said we're going to meet. That first one we went for two weeks straight, every single night, and then we've done subsequent Reading the Heavens, but it's based on Isaiah 64.

You can read that tonight. It's actually a prayer. Many times we don't realize a lot of the Scriptures we enjoy are prayers.

They cried out to God, and God answered their prayers. It's not just written doctrine. It's not, oh God, rend the heavens is a good doctrine to follow.

He's praying, oh God, rend the heavens. Come down that the mountains may shake in Your presence, and the nations may know that You are the Lord. So rend the heavens.

And we're asking, God, would You come down again, rip open the heavens, and shake the very foundation of our nation, and the world of course. Now, to clarify, sometimes I want to clarify because I know people are at different spots in their spiritual walk. God is everywhere.

He's not hiding up in heaven and deciding to come down. He's everywhere. The Holy Spirit residing.

But there are certain seasons where they would refer, and I'll use this term, I'm not scared to use it, the manifest presence of God. The Old Testament talked about the Shekinah glory of God, that God came upon His people in the upper room. We've been going through in the book of Acts.

There are times where the Spirit of God just comes upon you. And there's a book out there on the history of revivals. And one of the ones I recommended that you can still, I don't know if we have any left, but you can order it.

Amazon will deliver it tomorrow, which I still don't understand how I order things and they get here tomorrow. But the book is in the day of thy power. In the day of thy power.

And he's giving principles to encourage God, I should say, to bring those seasons of revival. Because when it comes to revival, you can't work it up. You can't make it happen.

It's a sovereign act of God. But, we prepare the soil. We're asking for the rain, but the farmer has to prepare the soil.

The Spirit never comes upon a dry, dead, legalistic, critical church. And actually, I hope it's okay to acknowledge, I talked to Yvette, many of you know of course, on texting. She had a great point that a lot of us, we've got to repent of fear and anxiety and what's going on and the election and civil unrest and one world government.

I've noticed that when I'm living in fear, I'm not very thankful. And I'm not filled with the Spirit, I'm filled with fear. You can't be filled with both.

It's impossible, because perfect love casts out fear. So filled with the Spirit of God, there is no fear. Now it might try to sneak in sometimes, correct? It tries to sneak in, but you can push that fear out.

So what we're doing with Ren the Heavens, we're actually going to look at some of the principles from that book in the Day of the Power. Those principles that can help you, maybe not corporately, but individually. I'm convinced that people can experience an incredible renewal by the Spirit of God.

And I think we texted it out, you can ask the office for it later if you didn't or email them or call. But we put these slides and sermon notes in a link. So you can look at these at your convenience later on, go back.

That way you don't have to take so many pictures too, unless you want to, of course. But you'll have the slides if you want to get those and you can kind of go over them again. I don't know about you, but sometimes I need to hear something a few times and I have to reprocess that.

But let me begin with Al Whittingill, a quote from Al Whittingill, a friend of mine, lives in Georgia. He writes on Revival often. He said, God repeatedly warns a nation and pleads with that nation in many ways before He removes it.

The great hope in a wayward nation is that God will be merciful and send a mighty move of His Spirit in that nation and bring the people into a right relationship with Himself. In America, true revival will not come by simply making people aware of our great need for revival. True.

And revival will not come even if we are successful in pointing out all of our present grievous sins and errors. In other words, we can talk about revival. We can want revival.

We can point out the need to repent. Look how corrupt the church is and America is. But none of that does anything, that's just head knowledge.

We see our need for it, but revival only comes by God's sovereign grace. When the people of God recover God's revelation of who He is and we respond in faith to Him. We realize who He is and we respond to that call.

We respond to that call to seek Him and to never give up and to hold on. And it's a good reminder, what you put in is what you'll get out. Prayer thrives when God is prioritized.

When you prioritize seeking God, prayer will thrive in your life. But why is this so important? Because most of the challenges we go through, most of the difficult situations, most of the intense circumstances, most of the conflict can be resolved by prayer. And I don't mean God instantly fixes something, I mean often He gives you the strength to go through it, through prayer.

So either way, you've got to pray. And it's not just a quick five-minute devotional. We spend more time eating than praying.

Look at the course of a day, how much time do we spend preparing it, waiting in the Carl's Jr. drive-thru, and then eating it. I mean, I haven't done that in a few years, but I know it takes time to prepare food. But how much time are we preparing our hearts with prayer? How is prayer a principle of revival? Prayer is one of the number one principles.

The book spends four chapters on it. Of course, we're going to have a lot of Bible verses as well. But prayer is a principle of revival in this way.

It's the first step toward revival. Like I said, oh God, run the heavens. And it's the last step to maintaining it.

So once you begin to pursue God, and you latch on to God, and you're pursuing Him, and there's rivers of living water, and times of refreshing, you guys can tell it tonight, there's something a little bit different than a normal Wednesday, correct? I mean, it's just with the worship and things like that, and you maintain it with prayer as well. Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it. The way to bring that wander back is through prayer.

Prayer initiates and prayer maintains. Prevailing prayer is the road to every true revival. And by revival, I don't mean, in case you're not aware of what the word means, it doesn't mean a series of camp meetings or meetings at a church.

It doesn't mean people are acting weird and charismatic chaos and things like that. It doesn't mean that. The word actually, I'm sure you can kind of figure it out, revival from the word revive.

Have you ever seen somebody revived? You know, mouth-to-mouth. Right, wake up, wake up, and then what happens? The heart starts to beat again, the lungs, and they're revived. And so that's why the prophets would pray, Oh God, would You not revive us again? And I know, man, I have walked the walk of deadness, and it will still creep into my life from time to time.

The enemy will try to take the spiritual life out of you. Not by an overdose of a drug, but an overdose of the world. And we need spiritual resuscitation.

From the book, In the Day of Thy Power, they said this, it's a really powerful introduction. It was a springtime in 1938. A boy in his middle teens stood in the little school room adjoining Moriah Chapel in a small Welsh mining town.

A strange feeling of awe and wonder filled his heart, for this was the very room that witnessed the beginning of the great outpouring of the spirit, the Welsh revival of 1904. And I'm not putting this up on the screen because I want you to just listen. He listened to the host and the guide, himself a convert of that revival.

He spoke of those incredible days when the hardest hearts were melted by the presence of the Lord. And when the hills and the valleys rang again with the songs of Zion. It was almost too wonderful to be true, but it created questions deep down in his heart for which he could find no answers.

If God can achieve such mighty things in times of revival, and if the spiritual labors of 50 years can be surpassed in many days when the Spirit of God is moving, why, he wondered, are we not more concerned that there should be another great awakening? Why do we not pray for it day and night? And that is the burden of the heart of many people. But this might be for someone this evening, in order for you to really dig in deep, some have to pay the price for the benefit of all. Some of you parents, you're going to need to pay the price for the benefit of your family.

That means humbling yourself. That means developing a life of prayer, prioritizing God. It costs.

It costs you something. I was thinking about it, but it's going to be a whole new sermon in itself. But if we really talked about what does it mean to pick up your cross and carry it? Dying to self? It would really revamp the way many of us live our lives.

Me included. Absolutely. Because it breaks us out of the comfort zone.

It's not comfortable to carry a cross. Have you ever tried? Remember that guy who used to carry it across the United States? Remember what his name was? In the 80's or something, what was it? Okay, well, tell me later. But some have to pay the price for the benefit of all.

And you'll see, any time a family experienced renewal, a neighborhood, a church, it wasn't the whole church, thank God, because it would be hard to get everybody on the same page, but God would answer the prayers of a remnant church. Those few who are paying the price, God would honor their labor and bless everyone. I truly believe the reason that California is so blessed is because of the seeds that were planted decades and decades and decades ago.

Without a shadow of a doubt. The fifth largest economy in the world. As California goes, so goes the nation.

Where do we get our name? San Francisco. San Fernando. San Diego.

San Jose. Santa Barbara. All the missions that were built.

I know Roman Catholicism, but some of them, there were some good leaders in the movement that made a difference. Where did Billy Graham start? 1950's in a spot called Los Angeles. I think it was Hearst, the big newspaper tycoon that owned all the newspapers, he said a couple words, Puff Graham, and he told all his reporters to get his story out there from Los Angeles.

Unknown Billy Graham. God exploded. Anybody heard of Calvary Chapel Movement? Where did that start? Chuck Smith.

Calvary Chapel Movement. Anybody heard of Azusa Street? I know it's mocked some by those who don't believe that God still does that, but there's some profound truth to it. The largest ministries that were born here and birthed here.

California is the place of mighty moves of God. There's no other state even close. If you look it up, if you research it.

I have questions, of course, about Trinity Broadcasting Network, but there are good people on there. Pat Robertson or John MacArthur, Kirk Cameron, Ray Comfort. There are some good things that came out of that.

Orange County. Lots of movements of God. San Diego.

Even in this area, I think it was in the field. I think actually where our parking lot is. I'd have to double-check.

There was a little building next door. Keith Green was in the parking lot when it was filled with a tent revival going on in Leading Worship. Right here where you're parked.

And so, see guys, I just get so passionate about this because we can recapture that. We can reclaim that lost ground if certain conditions are met. And that's why I encourage those who can be here as often as possible.

You've got to feed that spiritual life. You've got to desire that. And the more you seek Him, the more you find Him, and the more you find Him, the more you love Him.

The purpose and priority and power of prayer. Prevailing prayer always perseveres. Always perseveres.

I just had a situation today I've been praying about and it got worse. I told my wife, oh, the irony. Oh, the irony.

All hell broke loose this week too on all kinds of offenses. And it's like, Lord, persevere. Persevere.

Get up and walk straight and strong in the faith that you have. Though I fall, I will not be cast down because the Lord holds me with His right hand. Isn't that freeing when you know you don't hold yourself up? You don't keep the enemy at bay.

God does. But we have to participate. One of the greatest myths I think in Christianity is if it's up to God, He'll do it.

If it's His will, it's His... And we just sit at home watching Netflix. Isn't it interesting? Revival often came in prayer meetings first. They rarely happen when a pastor's just up there preaching.

Ronnie Floyd experienced that. Others have experienced that. I've talked to Dr. Brown about the Brownsville revival many times.

I know people have questions about that. I do myself on some things. But those are some exceptions.

But more often than not, in this Welsh town, I believe it started in a little barn. And it grew from there. And then Duncan Campbell in the 1950s, another barn revival started.

And what it does, it flows out into the community and into the churches. And so we pray, Lord, send revival, but let it begin in me. One of the heaviest weights that I carry is because we pray this prayer and I know that I would be one of the greatest hindrances to it if my own heart and life wasn't right with the Lord.

Because often He'll work through the leadership, of course, of the church. He wants that pure bride, because as the leadership goes, so goes the nation. Many woke churches that aren't preaching the Word, you wonder why are those people staying there? Because they like it.

The leadership affects them and they're comfortable in that type of environment. And we often think of the Bible just as a book of doctrine and commandments. If you ask most people, they'll say it's a book of do's and don'ts.

And I don't like the Bible. It tells me I can't do this, I can't do that. Well, it's also a book containing many prayers.

Many prayers. And once you understand that, you can learn how to pray even more effectively. Another incredible book, Fire Upon the Altar by Gene Easley.

He said, The spiritual battle in which the Christian is engaged is fierce. It is no game. Satan is intent upon destroying the presence of Christ from our lives.

There are no vacations from spiritual warfare. That is why the fire must be kept burning on the altar of your heart. How do we keep that going? With prayer.

Prayer will keep the fire burning and the passion blazing. Prayer will keep faith from faltering and strengthen you from failing. Prayer will rebuild the broken and it will heal the hurting.

Just think about how powerful our thoughts are looking at the Word of God. Because if we took a survey, I would bet that a large percentage of you are very hungry for more prayer right now than you were when you first came in. Why is that? Because we're taking our thoughts captive.

We're looking to what the Word of God says. We're having our minds conformed, transformed actually, by the renewing of our mind by God's Word. And now there's a hunger for prayer.

And we have to keep that hunger going. So, let's look at the first point. I'm also going to get into some important Scriptures.

The priority of prayer. The priority of prayer. What we base Rent in the Heavens on.

Oh God, rent in the heavens and come down. I find it ironic that it records the word, oh. Really? But it shows, doesn't it, the heart.

Oh God! Have you ever been there? Have you ever prayed when you don't know how to pray? Like, I don't even know how to pray for this. It's that bad, I don't even know what to pray for. I need wisdom because if I pray for the wrong thing, this could all fall apart.

Oh God, would You rip open the heavens, come down and visit Your people. Ezra prayed, give us a measure of revival in our bondage. God, even in the sexual perversion, even in the school districts and what's going on, even in the Hollywood and the satanic thing and the trafficking, oh God, even in that bondage, Lord, give us a measure of revival.

Come down and renew spiritual life in Your people. And then that way you can fight the darkness. That way you'll be strategic and you'll know how to come against these things and pray against these things.

That's how we truly make a difference is being filled with the spirit of prayer. And of course, the Psalms, many of you know, wilt Thou not revive us again that Your people may rejoice in You? One of the best things about being revived is joy and peace follow. You want some joy in your life? Be revived spiritually.

Get rid of that critical spirit. Get rid of that judgmentalism. You might have sound doctrine.

You might act like you pray. You might act like you worship. But so did the Pharisees.

Be very careful. Make sure you're truly broken and contrite before God. And of course, the priority, the power of prayer.

It shatters darkness. Did you hear that? It shatters the darkness. That's why the enemy doesn't like you to pray.

And he doesn't want you to pray for people in which he's taken them captive. It shatters darkness. It extinguishes sin.

You cannot continue in sin if you have a powerful prayer life. One or the other will prevail. It quenches fear.

It eliminates doubt. It slays the enemy. It calms anger.

And it strengthens what remains. It's powerful. And I love that verse about this.

Be watchful. Revelation, be watchful and strengthen the things that remain. Listen, there's things in your life that are ready to die.

Jesus said, I found your works and they're not complete before God. So strengthen these things. Be watchful.

Well, what does that mean? Well, I'm glad we have Matthew 26. Then He came to His disciples and found them sleeping and said, what? Could you not watch with Me one hour? How are we supposed to watch, Jesus? Watch and pray. Watch and pray.

A watchman is a prayer warrior. There's no sleeping watchman in the Bible that are speaked highly of. They're sleeping watchmen who God rebukes.

He calls them barking dogs that have no bite, basically. They fall asleep on duty. And so the best way to watch your home, watch your family, is incorporate prayer.

Watch and pray lest you enter into temptation. The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. So how do you overcome the flesh? As you get into that prayer closet and you strengthen yourself.

Also, what I love about prayer is the power to intercede. I think we have those verses up there as well. Elijah prayed for his servant, Lord, open the eyes of My servant that he may see.

He's interceding. The servant was fearful. There's this whole army coming at us.

And Elijah said, hold on. Lord, open his eyes that he can see. What's he going to see? He's going to see that the Lord's army is greater than this man's army.

That the Lord's army, one angel could wipe out the entire Assyrian army. Open his eyes on behalf of the Holy Spirit coming and revealing this to him. He interceded on behalf of his servant.

Moses stood in the gap for the people. Job interceded on behalf of his children. Hezekiah pleaded to save Israel from their enemies.

Nehemiah, upon hearing the bad news, he began to pray for God's help and intercede for his people. Show me one verse. There's a few where God even told Jeremiah, okay, stop praying.

Judgment's coming. That's a scary spot to be. But the prayers I found on intercession, God answered.

God answered the prayers when His people interceded. Actually, He wanted to do something, but He couldn't because He told Ezekiel, I look for a man from among the church who would stand in the gap, build a wall, a prayer wall, intercede between me and them, but I found no one. He's looking for the intercessor.

The intercessor is what stops the darkness in this nation. The intercessor is what... because we have a perfect intercessor, don't we? As our example, Jesus interceded and there's something about God that loves those who intercede. What they do is they identify.

Lord, I can identify with that person caught in sin and addiction, because that could have been me. I identify with them and their brokenness and their broken home. God, would You please do something on behalf of my prayers.

Pray for that young daughter that you have that's gone wayward, or your son. Pray for them. Intercede on behalf of them, because if you don't ask, you might not receive.

And then we have some examples of prayer. Psalm 25. Make me know Your way, O Lord.

Teach me Your paths. It's okay to pray that. Lord, teach me Your paths.

Lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation. For You I will wait all day long. It says all the day long, but I think we know what he means.

We will wait on God. Luke. Oh, this lady's incredible.

Anna. Look at what this says. Anna, a widow, did not depart from the temple, but served God with fastings and prayers night and day.

Wait a minute. You can serve God by praying? I want to serve God. I want to know God's will.

I want to follow Him. Pray. And throw in some fasting in there.

Tell King's Stomach to be quiet for a while. Anna. Now, I'm sure she left it, maybe to go eat or go home and have things to do.

But what that means is it was a priority. She was in there. That was her priority.

And as a result, she served God night and day. You don't need to raise your hand, but how many of you know what her reward was? She saw Jesus being in the temple at the right place at the right time. Can you imagine seeing baby Jesus? She actually gave a prophetic word.

One of the other people was in the temple. They also spoke prophetically about Jesus and then she was able to see the Messiah by being in the temple. Listen, you don't know what God will show you when you're in the right place at the right time by praying and seeking Him.

We talked about Sunday. The prophet said that God will pour out His Spirit on all flesh. Your sons and your daughters.

Your old men will dream dreams and your young men will see visions. That often does not happen unless God is warning somebody unless a person is spending time in the prayer closet. Because out of that relationship of prayer, out of that seeking Him, that is one way that God reveals Himself.

He shows you. I know people, Shane, I've been praying and fasting. I did it all week from 7 a.m. to 8 or whatever it was or 9 and I gave up breakfast and I was praying, God, I could see my daughter coming home.

I could see her getting out of the car and coming back home. The prodigal coming home. Literally, just picture what God is going to do because of her prayers.

That's biblical. If that bothers you, well, maybe you don't spend enough time in the Bible. Because your experience will line up with the Word of God.

It doesn't make you weird, it makes you solid and secure and building a life of faith. Oh, Psalm 19, keep back your servant from willful sins. Let them not have dominion over me.

Let them not control me. That's a great prayer for you every morning. Lord, my rock and my Redeemer.

Psalm 51, have mercy on me. Oh God, have mercy on me according to Your steadfast love and according to Your abundant mercy. Blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sins. See, we read these in the Bible for our devotional, but we don't realize these are prayers. You're actually reading the prayers of the saints of God and God allowed them to be recorded in the Bible.

It might be a good idea to follow their model. Call me naive, but I think it's a good idea to follow the model of prayers given in the Bible. Lord, have mercy on me.

Blot out my transgressions. 1 Kings, give Your servant an understanding mind to govern Your people. Solomon prayed this.

Lord, give me wisdom. I need to discern between what is good and what is evil. For who is able to govern this great people? Oh, I wish Trump would pray that.

Or Kamala. Or Biden or Newsom or anybody. Pray that prayer and mean it.

Can you imagine? I just get it. There's hope, guys. There's got to be hope when God's on the throne.

Matthew 6, 9, of course. I won't go into this one. We're going to do it.

I did it I think a few Wednesdays ago. Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Respected be Your name.

Reverenced be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. And we look at these and we learn a few quick things.

Prayer rebuilds our lives on the right foundation and it heals the hurt. So if you're off course, or you don't want to get off course, prayer will rebuild your life on the right foundation. Get back on the rock of prayer and let God introduce you to the rock of salvation.

That rock, that foundation. Prayer puts everything into perspective and it focuses on the awesomeness of God. There's a hunger that begins to build in your heart.

Prayer strengthens the weak and it empowers the coward. I love Acts 4. We'll be getting to that soon. And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant Your servants to continue to speak Your Word with all boldness.

Boldness. Boldness. And you know what stood out? I would have prayed, Lord, look at these threats.

Remove these people from my life. Get me out of here. Hide me.

It's amazing. He says, give me boldness to stand strong and confront the evil. That's why martyrs can give their lives.

Because they're full of the boldness of the Spirit. And sometimes people get concerned, I don't know how I would do that. I don't either.

But it's not you. It's you emptying yourself and being filled with the Spirit. And as a by-product of being filled, the boldness comes out.

And you stand the line. You hold the line. And you say, Lord, help me make a difference.

And I wonder even in our great state of California if that's what's happening. We all want to flee the problem instead of God give me the boldness to confront the problem. I mean, I've been spending a lot of time thinking about this homeless issue.

L.A. County is the highest county in the whole state. Lord, we need wisdom. We need discernment.

Obviously, we know there's mental issues. We know there's drugs and alcohol. We know that people just need help income-wise.

Those are the three things you're dealing with. We're also enabling it by saying, come here, we'll give you... The worst idea I've ever heard of is you give an alcoholic more alcohol. Or we'll provide shringes.

Or we'll provide hotels. You're supposed to remind them of what the Bible says. Work or you don't eat.

We'll help you. And we'll help you get there. You empower people.

You give them self-esteem and dignity. What that looks like, I have no clue. But we should pray for boldness instead of fleeing the situation.

Lord, give us boldness to make a difference. Folks, we have to know where to hide. We have to know where to hide.

God. God is our hiding place. God is our hiding place.

He is our strong tower. He is the rock that covers. He is the lion that protects.

He is the king who conquers. He is the commander and the chief. Under His wings I find safety.

He is the great physician. He is my Sabbath rest. Come to Me all who are weak and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Don't you love that Scripture? Come to Me all who are weak and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Come and flee under My wings. Come and stand on the rock.

Come and run to the strong tower. Let me tell you something. You might not know this, but I didn't meet God at church.

I met God on my face praying and asking for redemption. Oh God, it doesn't matter where you are. You can cry out to God.

I met God on my face on my floor in a prayer closet I was going to make. I was going to say, Oh God, come and do something in my heart and in my life. I've drifted.

I need Your help. I need Your security. There is no hope without You.

And life is hard, isn't it? You've got to keep fighting with prayer. Keep fighting with prayer. Keep fighting with prayer.

It's a hard fight. Hallelujah! From time to time. My wife sent me the clip on Instagram and I had it on Rewind for a while.

I love these lyrics. There's a time when my hands go up freely. And there's times when it costs.

There's days when a praise comes out easy. And days when it takes all the strength of God. So I'll bring my hard-fought, heartfelt, been through hell, hallelujah.

I'll bring my storm-tossed, torn-self story to tell you hallelujah. It's that perseverance and that perseverance that's so important. Two quotes I'll leave you with.

David McIntyre, another incredible author on Revival. I like to read books 100 years old. These guys really had something to say.

I mean, they do today too. Don't get me wrong. You can go deep when you don't have to look at your phone and internet and you have time to just spend time with God.

As the electric fluid which is diffused in the atmosphere is concentrated in the lightning flash, so the presence of God becomes vivid and powerful in the prayer chamber. Think about that. He is making the connection between lightning in the sky that comes during a storm that pierces the darkness.

And that's the same as the presence of God is vivid and powerful in the prayer chamber. And this is a good one to leave you thinking about. A. W. Tozer, why does God manifest His presence to some and let multitudes of others struggle? Of course, the will of God is the same for all.

He has no favorites within His household. The difference lies not with God, but with you. You have as much of God as you want.

You have as much of God as you pursue. If you seek Me, you will find Me. And I love that story.

I know half of you have heard it. I think I mentioned it the last run in the heavens. But it was about that old man who experienced revival in his younger years.

Maybe even the person I read at the beginning. And they were interviewing him decades later. And they said, what happened to that powerful move of God? What happened to it? And he looked at the reporter and his eyes were like fire.

And he said, young man, when you lay hold of God, never, never, never let go. When you lay hold of God, never let go. When you lay hold of that cross, never let go.

When you find that prayer chamber, although hell may try to distract you, the enemy may try to stop your plans, all hell might break loose, your family. But you hold on to God and you never let go. It doesn't mean you won't fall.

It doesn't mean you won't stumble. But you get back up and you hold on to God and you let Him drag. Remember how when your kids would hold on to your leg and they wanted to come on.

No, I'm not letting go. I'm not letting go. Oh God, don't let us go.

Don't let our families go. Don't let my marriage go. God, we are not giving up on our state and on our nation.

Even though all hell is breaking loose, we are not giving up because I know a God who still rules on the throne. I know a God who commands angel armies. I know a God who speaks the Word and it creates the universe.

That's the God we pray to. I don't care to watch the Dodgers and the Yankees. I can see the highlights.

I want to get in my prayer closet and I want to pursue God like never before. Watch what happens. Watch what happens.

If you come here and you go watch the game later, you watch what God does. It's amazing. It's a form of fasting, I believe.

My flesh wants this, but Lord, I know what You want. Don't wait. Did you know we're not even guaranteed tomorrow? When you hear His voice, harden not your heart.

The only place I can find, maybe with one exception, in the Bible, where something is mentioned three times in the book of Hebrews. We heard it a couple chapters ago. When you hear His voice, harden not your heart.

When you hear His voice, harden not your heart. A third time, when you hear His voice, harden not your heart. If you need to make that decision tonight, pray with me or Pastor Abram and say, I need to make that decision.

I need to repent of my sin. I need to experience the new birth. I need to believe in Jesus that died for me on that cross.

I've been a rebellion against God. And that's truly how you experience revival.