Questions & Answers 2019 - Part 2

I will be brief, knowing that you are anxious to return home. I receive three questions here. Number one is, our fellowship has a long tradition of the head of the household type of leadership. Basically, even though many things are discussed, one senior brother makes the final decision. This senior brother, leader, makes arrangements on the Sunday speakers too. The senior leader is well respected but has no real power, peer. The leadership style does not seem quite biblical because one person makes all decisions. The senior leader does not want to change. Is there any brother who can make the leadership more healthy? When you are in that kind of situation, I think the only thing you can do is to pray. And we believe that God will listen, hear our prayer. Pray that God will give that leader a sense of what the Bible teaches. No one can change another's mind, but God can. So, if you are in that kind of situation, I would say, pray and expect God to listen to your prayer. He may either touch the heart of the leader to enable him to see that what he was doing was not according to the Word. Because the Bible shows us that Christ is the head. But aside from him, those who are in leadership are always plural. In other words, no one is to stand as the head. You are only one of the neck, but you're never the head. So, when anyone tries to do that, and brothers and sisters are praying, either the Lord will give that brother an understanding that what he did was not scriptural, and he was willing to bring other brothers to be in leadership together with him, or the Lord will remove him. So, I think that will be the problem and the result. Number two. When brothers meet to decide issues, it is often the case that one man's leading may appear to others as only an opinion. Finding the Lord's mind on specific issues is a quite subjective personal experience. How do we encourage one another over this despised difficulties and patience their result? Now, as human beings, we are aped to have our own opinions. And when one opinion is formed, it is very difficult to change it. So, when brothers are serving together, they find when there is one brother who has formed his own opinion and will not change, no matter how they pray, no matter how they wait, he will always maintain his own opinion. And if this is the case, I think the only thing to do is ask the Lord to remove that brother. I always remember the story Lance Lambert told me. In their beginning, there was a brother who always insisted on his own opinion because they agreed. They would not move until all agreed. But he never agreed. He always wanted his own opinion. So finally, Lance told me, Lady Ogle, and Lance would pray, and if you know Lady Ogle, he was a very short person, small, but begging the Lord. And Lance told me when he was praying, he was like thunder. And this lady prayed that the Lord would remove that brother. And within a week, that brother passed away. So I think in serving the Lord, it is such a heavenly thing that we just cannot be earthly and maintain our own opinion. We have to be flexible before the Lord. And the Lord will honor such humility. If a brother is so proud of himself and set himself up as the head, sooner or later the Lord will remove him. So I think this is a serious thing. Our church has many Chinese-speaking brothers and sisters. When we are in an English-speaking country, do we need to conduct our meeting in English? Even remove signs in Chinese. Even stop teaching Chinese hymns in the Sunday school. Now I think this is a real problem to the Chinese in this country. When I first came to this country, I was meeting with few brothers and sisters, mostly Americans. But many that I knew in China, when they came, and they were among the Chinese. And I often argued with them. I said, we were in America, therefore our language should be English. But they did not believe in me. So finally, in this country, there are a number of Christians meeting together, and they spoke Chinese. But you know the result. When the young people grew up, they all speak English. And that caused a big problem among the Chinese groups. So they are looking everywhere for anyone who speaks English that can help with the young people. Now it is very true that for us Chinese to come to this country and try to speak in English is not natural. It's supernatural. But God expects us to do that. You cannot bring a Chinese church into another country. Wherever God puts you, and the language is what you need to do. Now it is difficult, I must confess, because I was a Chinese. When I first came to this country, I remember Sister Stearns was concerned about me. She said, Brother, now you have come to America, you have to speak in English, because she knew my background. I prayed about it, and the Lord told me, Who made your tongue? And on that basis, I started to speak in English. And the first time I spoke in English, it was short. But that's how it began. And thank God for Dr. Stearns, because after I spoke, he will always try to help, to correct where I was wrong in my English. And that was a great help. So brothers and sisters, if the Lord sends you to another country, you need to know that you cannot transport your Chinese into another country. You have to learn to speak the language of the land. Now I know it is difficult, because I have gone through it, but God is able to do it. And if we try to obey God, I believe that's the thing we must do. So even in Sunday school, I always say, we should teach these children English. As a matter of fact, if they grew up in this country, they spoke English. And if you try to teach them Chinese, it was unnatural to them. And sooner or later, after they grew up, they will leave, because they feel they are as foreigners among you. Did I use it already? That's all three? Yes, already done. You did all three? Huh? You finished? Has to be done. You did all three? It's all done. All done? Thank God. Well, I'm thankful my American brother had that last question. You know, before I... I won't spend a long time on this, because we want to pray for one another before we go. But I just want to thank the Lord for this precious occasion. I cannot think of anything more wonderful than to be together with 110 men who love the Lord and worship Him together. It was a prize to be here with you all. I don't know or imagine we'll ever do this again, but the fact that we did it this time had great value, I think, in my heart and encourages me greatly. Just to see what the Lord is doing, to hear people being refreshed in fellowship, and just, you know, I mean, there was so much impossible about this thing. Imagine, the only dates we could find was Sunday night, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. That made it almost impossible to come. And then, of course, the Lord just add to it, threw in a nice thunderstorm and canceled a bunch of flights, and we had no electricity on the first morning, and what a wonderful time. And through all of that, somehow, our dear brother Kit had to go up to New York, my hometown, just to get down here. I mean, what a journey we've all had. And I hope you feel as well that it was profitable and helpful to you. As you can see, we don't have all the answers. And really, every assembly here is in transition of some sort. We've been talking about the Chinese-English transition, but we're all in transition, and I hope the transition is from the natural to the spiritual, because we've been gathered by the Lord, and He's so gracious, and He gathers carnal people together, even, who have a heart for the Lord. I think that's the key. Sometimes we are so, you know, full of ourselves, we're too smart, and our will is too strong, but we have a heart for the Lord. If the Lord sees the heart, He can break the will, and He can change the mind. So that that be with brothers has such a heart for the Lord. To me, it's a precious thing. And I'm on board with you. I'm as Chinese as you are, and you'd be as American as I am. We're one. I don't sense any differentiation. I've been fellowshipping among you so long, I have to think about it. Oh, I forgot. Yeah, he is Chinese. But praise God we could be together. And here's some wisdom gleaned from 104 years. That's really speaking the truth in love. Now, I've been given some simpler questions, not those huge ones, but some questions that I think have value to it. And so we can, I think, share these in just a few minutes. One has to do with Matthew 10:37. And the person says, Matthew 10:37 says, He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. How do we apply this verse in service against serving with the same heart and pace as our wives? How do we avoid resentment from our spouse because they feel we are serving the Lord but may not see the same burden and feel we are neglecting them and spending time with their children? So let me, once again, cast things in a little bigger dimension. This verse here is Jesus speaking to his disciples. And this verse is declaring something that is a reality in the kingdom of God. Do you serve in the kingdom of God? Not just the church, but in the kingdom of God, under the king. Then he demands absolute loyalty. It's him alone. It's not him first. It's him alone. The wife, the children, whatever loved ones, it's the Lord first and only. And if we don't get that clear, the devil will use that and find circumstances where our lives will be compromised. So you've got to settle on that. The Lord's not looking for first place. He's the king. Full stop. If the king tells you to jump off the cliff, you jump off the cliff. If the Lord tells you to give up your son on an altar, you give him up. This is a king. And I think it's a healthy thing just to put in a little word for fearing the Lord. Because the other side is the gracious love of the Lord in the church. We have to balance this scripture out with the preciousness of our Lord saying how much he loves his church and has given himself for it. And how husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church. Now this means that the Lord, who is our king, is also fully aware of the dynamics of a marriage. And what is the sort of vision of marriage? I don't know which verse particularly speaks to you, but here's the one that always speaks to me. That little verse is in 1 Peter 3, 7 and 8, where it says, You husbands, in the same way, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with someone weaker, since she's a woman, and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered. To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted, and humble in spirit. Now we are to be kindhearted, humble, loving in spirit, and to be involved in the joint heirs of the grace of life. This is a precious possession of us by the grace of God in our marriage life. You think the Lord says ignore that? No. But here's the deal. We live in a constant tension between our life and our service. And there are seasons where the Lord calls for real cross-bearing self-sacrifice. There are seasons in your fellowship that involve nightly going to the house of God and praying with the brothers over some spiritual oppression or some conflict and you may have to pray every night, all night long, and leave your wife and children at home. But that would be for a season. The Lord does not intend... If you have a schedule that's left your wife and children out, you're doing something wrong. Because you're ignoring the fact that the Lord wants you to be joint heirs of the grace of life. Now, having said that, I don't think there's probably any brother here who's married who hasn't faced this tension. And sometimes the wife resenting that you're away or that you're not with the children and all of this. But this is a tension that, A, you have to bear the cross on because this is part of your cost in being responsible. But, B, the real key is bringing your wife into things. I don't mean into the problems of the fellowship. You know, here's the thing. People come up to you sometimes and say, Oh, how do you go through it? How do you do this thing? Listen. There's difficulties in serving God. But God gives grace to that servant to be able to handle the difficulties. But that doesn't mean that the Lord's given grace to your wife if you tell her all the difficulties. She may not be able to handle it. But joint heirs of the grace of life has this punchline to it. Your prayers are not hindered. And here's my thought. Even though there's a balance that is found. You know, a new marriage goes through this a lot. Marriage is supposed to be number one. It's the hobby and the wife. And suddenly you're responsible in church and not giving it time. So there's a tension there. But the key is to pray with your wife. Involve her at least in praying for your family. It makes such a difference. If you're actually praying with your wife. Your prayers won't be hindered. And by the grace of God, she'll get the picture. If you're serving the Lord in the fear of the Lord and you're also loving your wife and children, she'll get the picture and she'll see it. And besides, the Lord has put you together with a helpmeet who was born to help you and hold you up. So let's hold on to these two things. One, you've got to be absolutely loyal to the king. He may send you hither and yon. And when he does, be willing to go. The Lord will take care of your family. But on the other hand, remember that you're to enjoy the grace of, as joint heirs of the grace of life, back home. And when you're home, bring her into that grace of life. Which brings me to another topic. You know the verse in 1 Peter 5 that says, Cast all your cares upon him, for he cares for you. My father got saved at 50 years old. And he was a psychiatrist. Trained at Harvard as a psychiatrist for years. And after he got saved, I asked my dad, I said, Dad, how do you do it? How do you talk to people talking about committing suicide? People in deep depression, in mental anguish. How do you do it and then live a normal life? And basically he said, I have to cast the cares of that counseling session away. And just become a human again. You know what he used to do? He had a private practice as a psychiatrist. And his office was in our home. And every 10 minutes before the hour, to the hour, he would come back upstairs and go into his bedroom. And then the next 7 o'clock he'd go downstairs, meet the next patient. Here's what he did to survive. His survival secret? He studied Chinese. Now when he was 5 years old, his father moved to Peking Medical College. And my father lived there for 5 years. And not wanting to lose his Chinese, he studied words, he studied the words. He could speak fluent. He worked at a state hospital where many of the Chinese patients, he was the only one who could communicate with them. But that's what he did. He studied the characters. I said, what are you doing? But that was his relaxation. That's the way he practically cast the cares upon the Lord. Now, you know what, if you carry... Now, here's my question. What's the verse before casting your cares on the Lord? It's this. Humble yourselves. Now, the person who carries the burden of the Lord on themselves is mighty proud. You think you can handle that? It's a crushing weight. And some brothers intimated that they even got to feel... Our dear brother Emmanuel, the contour of his face was changing under the pressures of responsibility. Well, brothers, we need to bear those responsibilities, but we need to humble ourselves and say, Lord, I've got to cast these things on you. If you're going to live a normal life, you're going to have to do that. Otherwise, you're going to walk around the house jittery and impatient and yelling at your wife. It has nothing to do with her. You haven't cast those cares upon the Lord. Who cares for you? That's his prescription. Right? So, I think maybe it has something to do even in this marriage here. Don't take all that stuff home. Don't tell your wife who said bad things about you and all that. Listen. No, no, no. With your wife, it should be a beautiful thing. Joint heirs of the grace of life. That's such a beautiful, beautiful thing. Now, the Lord wants you to live that out. We see it in Ephesians 5. He wants you to be as tenderhearted to her as he is to us. So, keep those two in mind. You're in the kingdom and you're in a family. And they're not opposites. The second question. Our assembly is facing strong influences from both traditional Christianity and charismatic movements. What actions should we take in order to continue walking in the way revealed to us from the Lord? For this, I'd like just to simply turn to Revelation chapter 2. Just to look at a couple of verses here. Verses 14 through 16. As the Lord is talking to the church in Pergamon. Now, I have a few things against you because you have there some who hold the teaching of Balaam, who kept teaching Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols and to commit acts of immorality. So, you also have some who in the same way hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Therefore, repent. Or else I'm coming to you quickly and I will make war against them with the sword of my mouth. Now, in our assembly, as we talked about the Lord recovering his reality. Is there a foundation of truth that is seen in the assembly? The people know the truth. Is there a testimony of the Lord and a light on the lampstand of your assembly? If these things are there and functioning, and you understand the mystery of godliness as we talked last night from 1 Timothy chapter 3. Then when something comes in from the outside, you can immediately sense there's something wrong. There's something off. But as my brother John Blanchard reminded me yesterday, this thing that the Verne Frompke says, becomes quite an art. When you remember that the main thing is to keep the main thing, the main thing. And the reason I read these scriptures is, somehow Pergamum in the midst of their great anguish, you know, they were living where the seed of Satan was. In the midst of their anguish, they were holding, they started holding rather than hold on to the head. Isn't that our word? Let's hold fast the head, our Lord Jesus Christ. Instead of that, do you notice this? They're holding to a teaching. Now in this particular cases, the teaching of the Nicolaitans, which is basically a one man rule over the people. And they were also a whole beginning to some of you are holding to the teaching of Balaam. Which means, as it were, make a profit out of this Christian business. Now, forgetting what they were holding, I just think it's wrong to hold to a teaching. I think we have to hold on to Christ as our head. And what I mean by that is this. So, of course, recently now, it's come into vogue in the last 15 years, the whole matter of a renaissance of Reformed theology. With the tulip and the whole predestination and all of this. People are getting interested. Why are they getting interested in that? Because people are always, their flesh is always itching for something. And the flesh is itching for some kind of intellectual crumb that can make us more knowledgeable than others. To me, although basically predestination is clearly in the word of God. But Calvinism isn't in the word of God. And so when somebody holds on to a teaching like that, they're actually eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And it brings, among other things, division. I remember so clearly, we were out in WCCC, there in, what's the city that's south of Seattle? No, no. Yeah, in Tacoma, in that Pacific Lutheran. And I came around the corner, I'd been working with young people. And I came around the corner, I saw a girl who, you know, like eight years ago, she was in the young people's group. And I said, oh, hi, how you doing? And she said, fine. I said, okay. And I talked to her for just a minute. I said, let's go into the meeting. She says, oh, no, no, I don't go into the meeting. I said, well, why? She says, I can't go into the meeting and hear Brother Kahn. I said, why? She says, because he's not Calvinist. I was so surprised. But she had gone to a school in Philadelphia and picked up this whole Westminster brand of Calvinism, including you shouldn't fellowship with people who are Armenians, which of course is not what Brother Kahn is. But she basically said, there's a whole Chinese group. So she says, I'm waiting for my parents. We were going to go have lunch together. But she refused to go in. Now, what kind of unity of the spirit is expressed in that? You understand, that teaching has got some stuff in it that's fleshly. And she was proud of her newfound theology. A little theology is a dangerous thing. But people like to grab onto such things. It's the same way with the charismatic. Now, if your assembly has a foundation of truth and there's a light of his testimony in the midst, then there are gifts of the spirit that should be functioning as well if we're living in the fullness of the Holy Spirit. But we don't have to be charismaniacs. A charismatic, if we're going to define it the way it's usually expressed, is somebody who's taken his eyes off Christ-centeredness to a Holy Spirit pursuit. And once again, they're holding to a teaching, and as many here who know, especially our dear brothers from the West Coast, that thing can lead people who really love the Lord into all kinds of strange things. I just recently read about this thing of soaking, grave soaking. Do you have any idea what that is? There's a recent thing I read in California where some people travel to the sites of the burial of spiritual giants, and they lay on the graves and receive an anointing. It's called grave soaking. And they're very serious about this. I saw a picture of one sister, she was holding onto the gravestone of C.S. Lewis, praying for an anointing. And others fall on John Wesley's site to receive his spirit. You know where they get that from? Remember when Elisha's bones were in the ground, and somebody fell in there and came to life again? They've got a whole doctrine around this thing. Soaking. Grave soaking. Now, if you travel to England to grave soak, I think you're off a little bit. I mean, what I'm saying is you're off-center. Christ is the fullness of life. Get under Him, and under His throne, receive the Holy Spirit. You don't need to get soaked by some dead brother's bones. But such is the distraction of the church in Pergamon, that we're holding to this teaching, or holding to that teaching. And as Paul says, and not holding fast to the head, which is Christ. You know, Christ shines a light on all of these things, because, of course, the truth of the matter is there's an aspect of Calvinism which is true. There's an aspect of the Charismatic which is true. But we don't buy a package. We hold on to that which is good. And the rest, we say, as I stand before the Lord, this seems like it's an awful distraction. We heard from our dear brother, whose church got involved in the Toronto Refreshing, up there in Delmarva, and the division it caused. Because, can you imagine being in a meeting, and you're a God-centered person, and here's people laughing, and they have people who do a hyena thing, and some people bark like a dog, and other people get drunk and fall on the ground, and you're trying to preach, and they do it while you're preaching. But these people are getting refreshed. But what they're really getting is, they're getting an addiction of the soul, for some experience, that has to get bigger and bigger and bigger, because addiction grows. And you get into something on that wrong kind of track, I'm sorry, but, you know, there's something true, very true, about prey reading. But by the time that thing was distorted, and make it practice, it became so habit-forming, that people would, they'd need more and more yelling and shouting to get their soul satisfied. Supposedly, to break the soul and allow the spirit to be released is why they were shouting. But it became, it became soulish and emotional exhibitionism, instead of spiritual exercise. Now you see, there was something right about prey reading, reading together the Word of God, and thanking God for it. But when it's taken to extremes, and so what happens is, what happens when somebody leaves the local church, and now they want to join your fellowship? But they've got an emotional addiction. And if your fellowship just says, Lord, we love you, praise God, we have a few prayers, we break bread, that's not enough. It wasn't enough shouting. It wasn't enough stirring up. And it becomes something. You know, the early assembly in the Church of Jesus Christ in the Book of Acts, they weren't, it wasn't a circus, but people were filled with the Spirit, and people shouted Amen. It was full-hearted, to be sure. But it wasn't something that had to be done, and you felt forced, that I have to do this. That should never be the case. That's not true spirit fullness. So all I'm saying is, so forgive me if that example hurts you, from your own background. But I've seen a lot of people whose souls have been damaged by what they experienced in the past. And that's why sometimes... Can I say one more story? Now I'm drifting. I was in a fellowship on Long Island for 20 years. A wonderful bunch of brothers and sisters. And we had one brother there who was especially a dear saint. Truly dear saint. But his... So whenever we talked about, we had brothers and sisters meeting, we talked about the possibility of recognizing some responsible brothers. This guy just... No, no, no! We're just all brothers together. He kept holding on to this doctor. We're all brothers together. No, no, no, no responsible... Well, of course, at first I didn't understand what's going on. But in time I learned that he was one of those brothers whose whole family was divided and broken up by the local church. He left. His dear brother continues to serve there. Doesn't talk to him. Doesn't fellowship. Completely cut off. The parents were cut off. And he went through such a traumatic experience that anything that smacks of authority, his ears go up like a watchdog. But it's because his soul was damaged. Now, I just want to say something. Our brother talked about getting rid of those stubborn guys in our fellowship. And if the guy doesn't agree with me, Lord, get rid of him. I need to go grave-soak on Lady Ogle's grave. Then I can pray that prayer. That's one thing about the watchdog. Sometimes that watchdog, that stubborn guy in the assembly, his soul's been badly hurt by former religious experience. And it's the way they are. So we continue to reason, fellowship together, and pray that the Lord can heal that hurt. Because it makes them irrational on a certain point. Sometimes when it's a legitimate religious trauma that they experience, that needs to be healed. To trust the Lord. So what happens to a stubborn person if they believe that they are the watchdog who has to keep things faithful? It's a spiritual, not spiritual ambition, but it's a spiritual, I am going to be faithful, I don't care what anybody else does. Now, when you get in that position, you're all alone. It's much too great a responsibility. We have to go back on the Lord. Now, how did I get onto that? Okay. So, these things that are coming in, we need to keep... So, what I'm trying to say is we need to keep Christ as the center, but make sure that our assemblies are living assemblies. Because sometimes when the assembly is just dead with doctrine, that's when these enticing things come in. People say, oh, I need refreshing, oh, I need something, this isn't filling my need. Well, we should be on our knees asking that the Lord give us life so that our children could see the life. We could live in the life. And I don't know that there's that much hunger to go extraneous to our fellowship when there's real life. So, let that be a positive encouragement to us in that. Now, the last one I have. Do you have any advice on how we as responsible brothers can transition away from just discussing and deciding based on our understanding and towards really seeking and finding the Lord's mind on issues? As I thought about that, I was reminded of a brother's testimony yesterday where he said he's encouraged by the fact that David continually inquired of the Lord. Now, brothers, every admin decision that the brothers have to make is not something you have to go to the throne about. You know what I'm saying? Who's gonna unlock the door Sunday morning? You don't have to say, Lord, we come to you. I think you can make those decisions. But what we're talking about here is that when problems or burdens... Now, if you're a responsible brother, the Lord is sharing his burden with you. Now, what's that burden? Now, that burden needs to be brought into the Holy of Holies and not just discussed as if it's an intellectual matter. And this is what our brother's saying. So I'm gonna say in the natural life of the assembly, there's many things that are minor details. And for some reason, the responsible brothers feel they have to do everything. They do all that. I don't agree with that. But when there are burdens and when there are problems and when there are situations, this is the time to go into the throne room. I loved what our brother said yesterday. I've never heard this exactly said that way. The neck needs to express the feelings of the body to the head. So when the body is going... Now, the brothers need to take that to the Lord and say, Lord, what shall we do? It's just like Moses as he fell on his face before the Lord and said, Lord, these people, they're murmuring again. So you gave them food. Now they want more water. You gave them water. Now they want quail. Lord, these are your people. Moses was expressing the feelings of the congregation. And we can only do that before the throne. If we're the neck, we need to let the Lord know what the saints are saying and then say, Lord, we don't know what to do. So now we have moved from another level. We're not just talking, you know, intellectual things, trying to weight things out. But in the midst of it, there's often, along with our getting together and talking about things, which is always good to do, then there needs to be some things we're waiting before the Lord on. There's something going on. Lord, we're sensing something. And he's making us wait until we all really say, Lord, what is it you're saying right now? There's a... And even in this matter of distributing ministry, who's going to speak on Sunday and everything? Well, we heard the... perhaps the less way of somebody making that decision. But we should ask. And we should even consider asking somebody to come from somewhere else, something if we feel there's a... So who's going to share in our meeting on Sunday? It's actually a spiritual issue. And it shouldn't just be, you know, just, okay, we'll take a rotation. You go, then you go, and so on like that. It's just like Peter in Acts chapter 6, right? When the people came and said, the Greek-speaking widows aren't being fed. So Peter and the brothers, the apostles, they got together and said, Lord, what should we do? Lord, what should we do? They didn't say, right, okay, we'll serve the tables just after we say the blessing. And then after we clean up the tables, then we'll preach. No, but they went to the Lord and they found out. And Peter came back saying, now the Lord's told us, you people, find just seven men full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom to fulfill this need that we have in the assembly. But they got that from the throne. So whatever level the brothers are on in their meeting, let there be a level that moves just beyond the executive decisions. And because there should be spiritual issues in your assembly, do you think? There are some things, whether we're cognizant of it or not, there are things going on that we need to be before the Lord about. What time is it, Lord? What are you doing? I went one year to Halford House. Our brother mentioned where Lance Lambert was. And I went one year to what they call their Prayer and Bible Week. And what Halford House did, and they were a great praying assembly, by the way, what they did at the beginning of every year, I believe it was in January, is they got together for one week and prayed, Lord, can you give us a word to look forward in this year? Is there something, as it were, prophetic that we can claim? And they got together and they prayed during that week. And they also had some brothers share some message. Every evening there was a message, I think, perhaps every morning. But they got together morning, afternoon, and evening, and the whole assembly for a week prayed, Lord, what are you saying? What are we doing? Are we pleasing to you? Is Christ the center? Is there something we need to change? Is there something coming up? And they prayed in such a way that the Lord gave them a word every year. And they brought it before the Lord and said, Lord, then fulfill this according to your word. And it gave them a direction to go for that given year. And I thought, I don't know what to say about our assemblies. Could the saints meet every night for a week? Could be tricky. But at least to have that sense of there's times where we need to come before the Lord and say, now, Lord, what time is it in our assembly? We've heard all this stuff going on here at this leadership conference. Now, Lord, are you saying something to us? Is there some steps we can take to please you, Lord? And that all takes, not just executive decisions, but, right, into the throne room. Into the throne room. God bless the assembly whose brothers are in the throne. It just, it makes the head able to express his feelings back to the congregation. And it gives great value to those brothers who are so assembled. Well, now, that's the end of our questions. Now, here's our point. Before we leave, we just want to pray for one another. Now, let's just, we don't have time to go into this in a big way, but let's just raise our hand when I, because, you know what? There's 39 fellowships represented here. 39. How about the ones from the West Coast? Would you just raise your hand? So we've got Seattle and they're not Vancouver. We'll do Canada in a bit. Okay, now look at that. That's West Coast. Now, how about Canada? What do we got? All right, you see, we got Canada. And how about the Southeast? We'll go all the way down to Florida and up into Maryland. What are we doing there? There we go. And the Northeast. And we got a bunch there. And the Midwest. Let's include Minnesota and Indiana. Well, brothers, it's so wonderful we could get together. Have I forgotten somebody? Texas. Texas. That's it. You can never leave Texas now, can you? And they're not in any, you can't group them. They were raised it unto themselves. All right. The Lone Star Prayers. This is marvelous that the Lord's gathered us together for these days. Now, I don't think we can go through each region and say, what's our need? What's the problems? Because you all experience the same problems in every place. The enemy wants to come in like a flood. The Holy Spirit is raising up a standard. Now, we need to be awake as overseers and watchful over the fellowship because our enemy wants to do evil and the Lord wants us to overcome. So it's very important we be aware of that. So that's overseeing. Every assembly, we need those eyes that can see and be watchful. As the Lord said to the Sardegians and Sardis, be watchful. Don't let things die. Be watchful. Strengthen the things that remain. There we go. And then we're not only overseers, but we're shepherds. And my, my, how our children need shepherding and young people. But, you know, one of the great blessings for me reading shepherding, a dear brother's book, is those three things. You know, feeding the lambs, shepherding the sheep, and feeding the sheep. You had a discussion on that yesterday, right? Isn't that a challenge in our assemblies as well? And who can do that except our shepherd? And yet, as responsible brothers, not only do we need to shepherd, but encourage the rest of the saints to shepherd to the level of the grace, the gift, and the knowledge of God that they have. How we need shepherding. Growing up healthy sheep who can hear the Master's voice. This is a wonderful thing. And then, when all is said and done, not only overseers, not only shepherds, but elders. Brothers, I hope you have the character of Christ. That when people need to see a standard, somehow they can see Christ in you. It makes all the difference in the world. Of course, we look to the Lord. He is our satisfaction. He is the one we look to in the end. But brothers, sisters, people are greatly encouraged when they see a man with godly character sacrificing for their sake. Our dear brothers, they're in Flushing and in Manhattan where I meet. You know what? None of them's getting paid. All of them laying down their lives. And some of them are doing it in such a godly way that it's a testimony to the whole church. This is what it means to be a living sacrifice. I can smell the aroma of the sacrifice of their lives. And it's precious in the sight of God. So we need to pray for one another. That we could truly be those elders who manifest the character of Christ. That we could shepherd and ask the great shepherd to watch over us. And then that we might be the overseers he wants us to be. We have actually ample time. But why don't we pray as the spirit leads us. Praying for one another. Now we pray for our own assemblies. But maybe you were even touched by a testimony of a brother here from another assembly and you want to pray specifically. Feel free. Let's just intercede one for another. Because we're all on the same place. We need the Lord's help in these last days. Let's just come to the Lord. Lord, we're so aware that you're the great shepherd. And that you're our overseer. And you're our elder brother. And Lord we need your help. There are some assemblies here who are on the edge of extinction. There are other assemblies that are growing but not growing spiritually. There are others who have gotten stuck. And some that have a lot of old people but no young people. And just all kinds of things. As you place these in our mind, Lord, give us an intercessory heart as we bring them before your throne. We would come right into the throne room through the precious blood of Jesus Christ and make our petitions on behalf of one another. Not even for ourselves for the moment but on behalf of one another. Help us to pray in this hour of prayer. In Jesus' name.