Thank you so much. You didn't have to get through so quickly. I don't get that very often. That's kind of you. Let me say, and I'll only take a minute to do it. Many of you are driving home after the service, and I want to get you on the road as quickly as possible. I leave early in the morning, and so we'll not stay any longer than necessary. But I do want to personally thank the Lord for my two pastors, Dr. Lee Robertson and Dr. J.R. Faulkner. I came to this school just a few months after God saved me. I saw these men and I watched them. I didn't know how to do anything, and I watched these men, and they were the best examples I've ever seen. Sometimes when the waters are troubled, I just kind of lean around and look and see what they're doing. And when I see everything's all right with them, it makes it all right with me. And I thank God for these stabilizers, these men who, for both you and me, have been men. I've quoted them more than I guess all the other men I've ever quoted all together. Dr. Robertson continually And I always give them the credit, use the reference. I always begin when I go in meetings, and I've had the privilege that I've, I got a thing back in July for Eastern Airlines. I've traveled 31,000 miles on Eastern Airlines alone. I've crossed the Pacific twice on other planes, but I'm saying all that to say this, I always introduce myself, and I say I'm a graduate of Tennessee Temple University. I'm proud of it. And I'm proud of my pastors and I thank God for the influence they've been on my life. Now there's another reason I'm saying all this. September the 9th, I completed 30 years as pastor of the Northside Baptist Church. I had the privilege of beginning it. the second Sunday in September 1954, having graduated from Tennessee Temple Schools in May of that same year. And with 27 other people, my wife and myself, making a total of 29, we organized. They said then they didn't want much of a pastor, and I was about the nearest thing they said they ever found to it, so it's worked through these 30 years. Reporters were there in my 30 years of ministry, sometimes being controversial. I got the kindest write-ups I think I've ever gotten. One of the reporters said to me, do you have any plans to retire? I said, well, I hadn't thought about it, but I thought I would at my 50th anniversary of the church. You see, I've got a special occasion all lined up. I mean, I got a letter verifying what I'm saying to you. Dr. Lee Roberson is going to preach at our 50th anniversary. And Dr. Faulkner is going to lead the singing, Behold He Comes. Now that's 2004, and their book, I got a letter, it's framed right on the wall of our auditorium. Then we're going to sing in a trio, a male trio, and sing in a land where we'll never grow old. So I'm waiting on that 50th anniversary. Just, I guess, probably in June, I was with Dr. Truman Dollar out in Detroit and got up that morning, had a reasonably early flight, departure, and I was praying early in the morning, as I always do, and the Lord said, why don't you do something unusual? And I said, well, Lord, what would you like me to do? And I got this from the Lord. He said, it's your 30th anniversary. Why don't you visit 30,000 homes in your city? And I said, Lord, I'm up here in Detroit, and you're talking to me. I'm from Charlotte. And sure, you mean Brother Truman Dollar, some of these fellows up here. You don't mean me. And all the way on that flight, people saw my mouth move and thought I'd, you know, run away to the funny farm. I said, Lord, you don't, yep. He said, why don't you do it? 30,000 homes, I said, Lord. Well, to make a long story short, then the Lord seemed to give me, break it down with 30 good men, give them 10 couples, let each group visit 1,000 homes. We got our packets ready. The packet was printed on the outside. It told about our homecoming, gave an invitation. On the inside, there was a New Testament. 26 pages in the back that I'd done with a little place to tear out if you got saved and send it in. Had Ford Porters tracked. We got 50,000 of them. And then we had, what else, there was something, oh I know, an eight, 16-page tabloid that the Charlotte Observer had done. Now here's what constituted a visit. In other words, you knock on a door, and we call it you eyeball somebody. You don't leave it on the door or hand it out in a shopping center. You knock on a door. And when they finished, they visited over 33,000 homes in our city. And I was talking to my secretary this morning. She said, this day, I got a place torn out where an 82-year-old lady has signed it. She had accepted Christ. They're coming in all the time. 30,000 homes. Then on Sunday night of the homecoming, they had something I never had happen to me before. The first thing they did, they came up to the house when after the big morning, we had the feeding of the 5,000, Senator Jesse Helms. It's hard to say that in here, isn't it? And he was there with us. And as a result, great big day. I lay down to rest a little bit, and they came up there and changed the clocks, so I wouldn't get to church early. Fact is, they took both cars and said, we'll come up and pick you up. And they did. And when we got there, we sat on the front. They said, please come in and sit down on the front seat. And the curtain went up. And when it did, they stepped to the microphone and said, this is your life. Now that's not new, but the way they did it was new. They had people, they brought people in for over a thousand miles. Listen to me. They had the first man that I led, the Jesus Christ. I was saved on Wednesday night, February the 22nd, 1950, and on Friday led my first soul to Jesus. Hadn't got used to it yet. Still the greatest thrill I've ever experienced. Had him there. And on, it just went on and on and on. Then when the thing was nearly over, the chairman of our finance committee came forward, and he's a very dignified man, and he said, we want to do something for you. And he said, in business we don't know how to do anything for anybody but give them a bonus. I was liking that already. And he said, um, we thought we'd give you a thousand dollars. I said, told myself, praise the Lord that financed one of my wife's shopping tours at least one time, you know. Then he said, let's see who's got the check. And he started looking in his pockets, you know, and so unusual for him to be humorous, he looked in his pockets and couldn't. He said, any of you fellas got the check? And about the time two men came out with a four by eight piece of material. And it had a legal check. Had an artist to draw a legal check. Now, frankly, we had little problems. Four by eight feet. We had a little problem getting in that little slot where you deposit your stuff. Oh, he said, I forgot to tell you, it's $1,000 for each year. $30,000. I said, Lord, 30,000 homes, $30,000? Why didn't I visit 50,000, you know? I've been having a little trouble, you know, and the doctor had to put a shot in my hip. And I told him, I said, the doctor put a shot in my hip and it helped it, but that shot you put on my hip did more than anything I've had in a long time. And I said, you know, I've been having a little bit of pain on this right side. They said, no, no, no, no, forget that. I thank God for being so faithful through the years. It's just so good, so good. I'm going to waste all my time if I don't hurry, but I hope it's not wasted in this sense. I see Brother Wiley Cameron and his precious wife over here just last week. I called and I said, Brother Cameron, I had a 16-year-old girl we don't know what to do anything with. Her parents are good and faithful. They've done everything they know to do. Actually, her parents were killed when she was young. She just, and I said, can you take her in? Yes, sir, he said, brother, we can take her. You get her on down here. By the way, let me, they're flying down there. They were leaving at three o'clock this afternoon, and they'll get the girl down there. And I'm so glad, and I don't know, you know how long I've loved Lester Roloff and the home and promoted it and backed it, but when I hung up the phone, I had a little feeling that I don't think I've ever had before. What would we do without the Roloff homes? And homes of that kind. And I thank God for it. It's been such a blessing. By the way, wasn't that a great message Brother Clayton brought a while ago? That dancing wasn't bad either, was it? That's where breakdancing originated, I think. Down in Texas. All right, now I'll tell you what, I'll preach fast if you'll listen fast, and we'll get on the road here in a few minutes. Philippians, if you will please, chapter number two. I'm bringing not, in essence, a message tonight, I'm bringing my heart throb. I'm bringing to you some experience that I've had, that God has given to me. I'm not sure it's what you need, but it's, oh, it's what I needed. If I could help one person here tonight to understand what God is saying in these verses, then I feel like my ministry would have been accomplished. When I was asked to speak, and that was the last speak, I realized what I was really bringing was the doxology. Dr. Bob Kelly, who brought that tremendous message, the first one, that was the invocation, that was the beginning of it. This is the end of it, the doxology. Everything ought to begin and end with Jesus Christ and everything in between. Now in Philippians chapter 2, let's begin reading, if you will please, in verse number, well we could begin anywhere, but let's begin in verse number 4. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. If you want to get balanced, there's your verse. There are things that I must do. But there are things that when I get through with them and maybe have a few minutes to rest, I ought to look over to your vineyard and say, hey brother, could I help you a little bit? And if you get through with yours, you ought to look over to me and say, hey brother, could I help you a little bit? I'm afraid too many times we look over and criticize us because we're not doing the best we can, but we ought to help one another. That'll keep you balanced. Read on. Let this mind be in you which also was in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men, and being found in the fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. Our Father, I pray the night through the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, which gives me entrance into the holies of holies, And I plead now, our Father, for the power of the Holy Spirit to interpret this word, make the Lord Jesus very real to every heart tonight. In Jesus' name, Amen and Amen. Now, Paul is pleading with this church. He'd been gone for about ten years and there were some problems. I'll not go into them. But he says, now, here's the only way that you'll ever settle those problems in your church. And when Paul said it to the church at Philippi, he could say it as well to you and to me. It doesn't matter what your situation is or mine may be. There's only really one way to settle it. Let this same mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. Now the word mind there is a very interesting word. In the Greek, in which I'm not fluent, I jotted it down. I'll spell it for you. We have so many Greek students here and maybe they have a little different accent and maybe they'd sit there the whole time I was preaching, but let me just spell it to you. The word for mind is P-H-R-O-N-E-T-E. It's such a great word that it takes three of our words to translate it. Three of them. The three words that it takes in the English language To translate, let this same mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. It's the word think, feel, and do. Now stop and think a minute. Think, that's the intellect. Feel, that's the emotion. Do, that's the will. Let this same mind, let this same motivating factor be in you, Totally consuming you that was also in Christ Jesus Now many times we think of doing things well some of you right now Maybe think brother when I get home. I think I'm gonna change my ministry I'm gonna change the way I teach my Sunday school class or operate my bus. I'm thinking seriously about And that's about as far as we ever get Someone said brother. I'll tell you right now. I really got something. I really feel that ought to be doing thus and so And that's only two-thirds of us if we both think and feel. What if you, wives, would have your husband come home on your anniversary and you'd put on your best dress and put on that good smelly perfume and you met him at the door and said, hey honey. He said, hey why aren't you dressed up? Did you forget? Now he knows he's in trouble. He'll lie, he'll do anything to get out of it. So he says to her, he says, oh, of course, I was just kidding. I was trying to tease you. Oh, sure, it's our anniversary. Then she starts looking. Nothing in your hand. Nothing in my hand I bring. You start thinking. And you say, honey, I thought about bringing you a gift. That won't fly, brother. You may even add another dimension and say, listen, I thought about it and I was in the flower, floral place and I felt like I ought to buy you a dozen roses. The world may not end for you, but your part's going to be pretty rough for a while. She doesn't care about your thinking. She doesn't care about your feeling. What she wants you to do is to do something. And lost people on the road to hell don't care how much you think about going on visitation, how much you feel like it, the only people who are going to get them saved and get them to heaven are the people who do it by the grace of God. And he said, let this same thinking and think it affects your feeling and it affects your doing. Let this same mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. You don't want a thing you don't hear much about. Think about the messages you hear everywhere. You don't hear much about thinking. One of the hardest things to do today is to get people to think. You can get them to do anything. You can get them to give and get them to go, get them to do anything. You can even get them to charge hell with a water pistol, but you can't get them to think. Remember what the Lord said through the Apostle Paul, Romans chapter 12, not quote at all. He said, be not conformed to this world. But be you transformed. How? How? I want to be like the world. I want to be conformed to the image of God's Son. How do I do it? By the renewing of your mind. And it's the thinking process. And when our thinking is right, it works through our feeling. And they get together and gang up on the wheel and they say, now you get to doing it. And he says, let it do it, but now let me show you. First, if you want to really do this, notice what it said about the person of the Lord Jesus. He made of himself no reputation. He made himself of no reputation. Boy, you talk about something that goes contrary to the flesh, there it is. Boy, we like reputations, don't we? We like the accolades. We like the applause of the world. This old flesh is made to do that. It responds to it. It has an affinity to it. And it works better when somebody brags on us. Preacher, if I can say this to you from my soul, don't you go out and try to build a reputation. You better stay there and build a church. Choir leader, don't you go out and try to build a reputation. You build a choir that sings for the glory of the Lord. Youth director, don't you go out trying to build a reputation. You build a youth program for the Lord. He made himself of no reputation. Now, what you have to understand, let me turn for a minute back to the book of Isaiah, and we're not going to stay long, don't get worried. By the way, I forgot to say that was my big point, my first one there. I like that, Brother Clayton, that was good. Listen what he said in the book of Isaiah. He's telling us something there that we need to see. He's saying, and his name shall be called. Well, it's still here. I know that it's still here. I'm still, have you ever broken in the new Bible? One of the reasons I got me some old school fields. I got three new ones and they're really hard to break in. Listen to what it says. I'm going to turn here. and read it to you because I want you to see now before the Lord God you talk about an introduction we've all had flowery introduction but we've never had an introduction like this we have never listen what it says for unto you a child is born now may I stop there and make a quick reference that's telling us about born as a child it's speaking of his humanity Unto us a child is born. Unto us a Son is given. That's His deity. And there's His humanity and His deity. Now think who He is. He's going to be the perfect Son of the living God in the flesh. There's going to be deity about Him. They'll never mingle. But by the same token, he'll live within perfect harmony as Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God. God manifested in flesh, absolute total flesh, but absolute totally God, and yet without sin. Boy, you're talking about an introduction. What if we could get here and say, folk, we've got a man coming to preach who's never sinned in word, deed, or thought. He is absolutely God, but he's also absolutely man. He's God in flesh. Boy, what a reputation. Read on. And the government shall be upon his shoulders, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor of the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Can him where but again to take them all, but take one of them, his name shall be called Wonderful. His name shall, future tense, be called Wonderful. When we introduce him in meetings, we'll say tonight, wonderful is here to speak to us. We can say he's wonderful. Is he not in his attraction? You know, I found out reading the Bible, don't make noise. God doesn't get too excited about noise. People do, but God doesn't. That's why the Holy Spirit is depicted to us in the form of a dove. Listen, when you read the Bible, stay quiet and let's ease over. to the streets of Jerusalem the Lord Jesus is nearly 30 years of age and he's standing there looking over the city and a man walks up to him well he said good evening and the Lord Jesus turns his head and the man said why are you looking over this city crying Jesus said you wouldn't understand how old are you sir? I'm nearly 30 Well, he said, I attended the university up here, and so and so, where did you go to school? I didn't go to university. But one day, I'll take five loaves and two little fish and feed 5,000 people and give them 12 baskets full. Well, he said, I've noticed you over there at that carpenter's shop. Is that your father? He's my foster father. You a carpenter?" Yes. Yes, he said, I'm a carpenter. And then I think the Lord Jesus thought he would listen, maybe we'd even hear him thinking. He said, two or three weeks ago I made a chair. One day I'll be able to say, oh, Jack Hudson, come on to me and rest. And I made a table where we can have communion together, sit down and talk. And I made a window so that people would understand when I say I'm the light of the world. And I made a door. As I was making it, I thought one day, I'm going to tell old Jack Hudson I'm the door. By me, you can enter. He thought all these things standing there. No wonder that man was attracted to him. He had not really begun his earthly ministry. That was to come a little later. And then, think about in his teaching, he taught so simple, I wish we could understand that. He taught about seed, birds, talked about a net. He said to a woman whose primary job was carrying water, he said, John Ford, to the woman at the well, he said, in essence, how'd you like to have some water where you didn't have to come to the well? You know what he was saying, ladies? How'd you like to have life a little easier? He's still saying it. I would, God, I could preach to every person living on the face of this earth and say to you, ladies, God made your life a lot easier than you think He did. You better stay away from that ERA. You better go to G-O-D. That's where you need to go. He's the one that emaciated you. And emancipation comes from Him, doesn't come from some government doings. And then, think about it, when He was dying on the cross, and they put Him up there, and they put the tent pegs through His... I never have known, don't know, and I'm gonna ask Him where they put Him, through His hands, through His wrist. Doctors say it wouldn't have helped that they put Him through there. Now, God can do anything. They said He'd pull through. They said they put Him right here. I don't know where they put Him. Let's just say hands. That seems to be tradition. But when they put him through, he was hanging on the cross. Now listen. Be quiet. Let's walk up and listen. And look. Oh, I never have been able to tell it. Can you see him? His hands are nailed. And I see his fingers moving. I don't know what does to your heart. Those fingers. One day, God stepped out on space, and as far as the eye of God could see, darkness covered everything. Blacker than a hundred midnights down in a cypress swamp. And God said, I'm lonely. I'll make me a world. I'm not going through the poem. And God took that hand, that hand, and he reached over into the river of life. And he got some water on the ends of his fingers and he said, and that fixed all the fresh water on the face of this earth. That'll be needed until he makes it new again. Don't be worried about us running out of fresh water. My, the omnipotent hands of the Lord did it. It says in the book of Isaiah, He measured all the dust of the earth in the hollow of that hand and he poured out the various mountains and the formation of the earth. That's the hands I'm talking about. Then he looked to the ocean and he said, it's got to have salt water in it to purify it. And there was no salt water in heaven. And God thought about old Jack Hudson and his sin and having no way to be saved. And he reached up and pulled a great big salty tear off of his eye. And he did like that. And it filled all the salty oceans. And you'll have all the oceans with all the salt that you'll ever need until God makes it over again. That was the hands that were hanging there. Don't you see what I'm talking about? My hammers don't you see it? And yet with all that he made himself of no reputation. His name should be called Wonderful. And as a result of it, I think about, don't you think, God, that God could do some things that people can't do? I don't know why, I love to tell about it. I love to tell about when he was on that little boat and sleeping, Peter went back and said, Master, carest thou not that we've perished and the Lord got up? He stood in the bow of that boat of always, I don't know where it was like this or not. You see it like you want to and don't mess up with mine. And I think he folded his arms and stood there and the water was dripping off of his beard and he said, peace! And the winds stopped. But the water was still boisterous. He spoke twice, he gave two commands. Then he turned to the water, Be still! And the water... Now he didn't do this for you and me, he did it for the liberals. Later with the disciples one day, he said, He could hear him thinking. He could see, you know, he knew what was in the heart of it. He knew they were thinking and questioning. One of them said, I don't really know about that stop in that storm. And the Lord said, well, I might as well prove it to you. And he threw a leg over that boat and got the other out and started walking on that water. Now this doesn't say it in the English, doesn't say it in the Greek. I just made this up. But I like it. I believe what he said was, boys, you don't have to worry about it. Look at it. And when he walked across it, it didn't leave any print. He walked across it. And that means I can walk across old Chili Jordan, for he's already made the way. His name should be called Wonderful. He made himself of no reputation. God in heaven knows you and I had to book 400 meetings on one incident alone. Did you know it? Oh, you said, I didn't know I'd do like that to be like Jesus. Well, you haven't heard it all yet. Not going to take long, but look at the second thing he said very quickly. And he said, and I want you to be, he made himself of no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant. Now, if you want the flesh to get in a battle, you deal with that little fire. We don't want to be slaves. We're not subservient to anyone. We're masters. We're the bosses. And I'll have to tell you, I'm going to be the boss of whatever it is. If there's two of us, I want you to know just before we start, I'm going to be the boss. But he whose spoken words came into existence, Took upon him the form of a servant. I'm going to give you three quick little things about servants because we've got to hurry. A man said one time on the way home, every preacher's wife, God bless them, has said this, Honey, I enjoyed your message tonight, but it was a little long, you know. Preacher's wife said that to him one night. It was a little long. He said, I didn't preach too long. They just listened too long. Now, don't you listen too long, you'll get me in bad trouble. Three quick little things about servants. Number one, when you're a servant, the master is totally responsible for our needs. You say, oh, wait a minute, Brother Hudson. I know, I know. I talked to some young couple last night. Little children, I won't go any further than identifying them. He said, I was here in Temple, we had to drop out. I said, have you gotten down to popcorn yet? He said, what do you mean? I said, have you gotten down to eating popcorn? Having to pray every day that God will give you the money to pay? Well, no sir. You're not ready to quit yet then? You sold your color television? Traded off that good dependable GM for a Ford? You're not ready to quit yet. Then did you sell the Ford and start walking? You're not ready to quit yet. Your heavenly father wants to teach you that he can and that he will supply your need, but he's going to do it at his discretion. But he will do it. But he will do it. He will do it. And until you learn that, you can't learn much of anything else. He'll supply your needs. Secondly, a slave reports for duty and just Ask the master for directions for today Are you talking about something that will give you peace in your soul? That's the sweetest peace you'll ever know in your life For a long time now, and I'm gonna tell it so quickly that it'll probably lose some of its beauty But I've got to I got to I don't know what six years ago seven years ago the doctor sent me to Arizona provided I wouldn't go home just go straight to Arizona and I did and They called the doctor out there, was a counterpart of the doctor, and so he examined me, and he said, you'll have to have surgery out here. We can't even send you home. You'll have to have surgery out here. I've had so many operations. Last time I went in, they put a zipper, so you can just zip it open, just fix everything in there. Found out what was wrong, really. They'd been putting in Ford parts, and you know they don't ever work good. We had rented a little place and we went back, Joyce and I, and when I have a deep decision to make, and I guess the week before that, please forgive me for making it so brief, but we must. Some men had gone out on the desert and prayed for a long time and they came and offered me a position, preaching of course, live in Arizona, and they said, we'll give you $50,000 a year. I don't even know how much money that is. I never have, never have. And I went in, George was busy, and I said, let me make us a little salad, and I was cutting it, and I said, Lord, I don't want an operation. Why do I have to keep on having operations? Now, when I say the Lord spoke, I didn't hear an audible voice. but in my soul." The Lord said something to me that I've never heard Him say before or ask me before. I've never heard anybody else say it. That doesn't make me unique because God doesn't have to duplicate Himself. God's not a mimeograph machine. He's an originator. And He said, you've trusted me as your Savior a long time ago. Why don't you let me be your shepherd? And I was standing there cutting up those little ingredients and I got to thinking about it just before the siren started. A shepherd is one who finds the green grass. He's the one who maketh you to lie down in green pastures. He's the one who protects you from the enemy. And every morning he'll take you out to a good grazing place. The little sheep worry about nothing. They leave it all to the shepherd. He said, why don't you let me be your shepherd? And while I was cutting those things, I said, Heavenly Father, would you take up that much time with me? Oh dear God, I've never heard anything so good in my life. And he said, well, I'll do it. And right there, now I didn't shout, my hair didn't stand up on ends, I didn't talk in tongues, didn't do anything. I just said, oh, thank you, dear Lord. And I got in the sheepfold. And God did something for me that I've never done before. I've never quit doing it, pray that I never will. My first conscious thought in the morning. See, you don't know how blessed it is to have arthritis. You don't have to go outside and see if it's raining. You don't have to have an alarm clock. Man, you'll wake way before anything else, you know. And I wake up in the morning, Good morning, Lord Jesus. I love you. What would you have for me to do for you today? Just report for duty. Lord, what would you have me to preach Sunday? I used to, Saturday night, be in a frenzy, trying to get something together. Sometimes rearranging, warming over leftovers. Well, now I don't mean I never have yet had one of those absolutely positives that have to be there overnight and gotten outlines from the Lord. I don't mean that. But oh, that, the beloved book is so precious, it's just so real, it's so sweet and so fresh. And sometimes I say, Lord, could I sing you a song this morning? And sometimes I sing, the fairest of ten thousand, the bright in the morning star, you're the lily of the valley, and Lord, you're my best friend. I've had a peace that this world doesn't know anything about, and to be honest with you, that I never knew anything about. And lastly, and one of the most precious things in the sense of being a Master, He's the only Master you have to have. Now, supposing, you know, think of a farmer. Master takes his slave out and says, look, you hold this for a while. I'll be back this afternoon and get you for supper. It's okay. Somebody comes along, hey brother, would you come over here? I'm sorry, you'll have to see my master. You know, I get so concerned about men in groups here, there, yonder, and there's always a Dr. Sparrow. Now Dr. Sparrow is, have you ever noticed sparrows? They sit on the ground, and the least little noise, one of them jumps, that's always Dr. Sparrow. And the rest of them have no earthly idea why he jumped, but they jump with him. You ever seen them sitting on a telephone line, just a little row of them, and one of them jumps, and the rest of them jump? They don't know why they jump, But anytime you go to Dr. Sparrow before you go to the Lord Jesus, you've got the wrong master. Do you know why I love these men so? I know many times they said, oh dear God, Jack Hudson is embarrassed. Pray that you'd help him. Never have they called me and rebuked me and said I've done wrong, and I have. I love them for that. But you see, they're not my master. They're my friends. They're not my master. He's my master. And He supplies my needs, He tells me what to do, and I don't have but one. Now I've got one more, but this is short. Brother Williams, I've got a new one. You know when you say lastly? Say lastly, one, two, and three. Now this is lastly. You still looking alright? Now, listen what he says at the last one. The latter part of verse 8. And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. In a vernacular that both you and I can understand a little better, it simply means dying out to self. Turn to Revelations chapter 4. We won't turn anymore after that. We'll turn you loose maybe, but that's about the only thing. Revelations chapter 4, verse number 10. And that's page 1335 in your Schofield Bible. The old one. That old lady said it was good enough for Paul, it ought to be good enough for us. If you missed everything else I've said, will you please listen to this as I sum it up? The four and the twenty elders fall down before Him that sat on the throne. That's before the Lord Jesus. and worship him that liveth forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Thou worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for Thou hast created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created." Notice what they did, two things. Number one, they fell before him. Secondly, they cast their crowns before him. It alludes to something that in those days every person who read this Bible then knew. In the days of the great Roman empires, the Caesars and so on, if they captured a country, a lot of little countries, they'd capture the king. And they wouldn't bring everybody, but they'd bring the king, and maybe his entourage, but they'd bring the king. And the king would come before the Caesar. Now, they wouldn't beat him up or make him bloody. They'd fix him up. I mean, he'd put on the best that he had, and he'd put on his crown, and he'd stand before the Caesar. He was captured now, and he'd take off his crown, and he'd lie prostrate in front of Caesar, which meant absolute, unconditional surrender. I'm giving myself over to you. I'm not a king anymore. There's nothing I rule over. I have no subjects. I have no treasure. I have no kingdom. I have no country. I'm giving it all to you." Then, but then only, would he take his crown, and he'd put it before him. And in putting it before him, it was the title deed, so to speak, to everything that king had owned. And when these elders fell before him, an act of total submission, and their crowns was a symbol of yielding everything they had to him. And then the king would take over their country and supply all their needs. And they had the benefits of it. Sometimes it was a better situation than it was before. That's the condition that we come to him on. May I tell you an old illustration very quick. There was an old lady dying, a mother, had a lot of children. They went to her bed, I've seen it happen many times, a dying person or rally. And she did, just got, and she looked around trying to see but couldn't focus her eyes. And they heard her say, bring. And they said, he must want the older son. And they got him and brought him in and whispered down in here and said, here's the son. She barely nodded her head. In a few minutes she said again, bring. And they went and got her a glass of water and tried to give her water. She barely could shake her head. The third time they did something and finally, it seemed like just before she left this life into the next, she got a little strength. And she said it loud enough for them to hear. Then she went home. Bring. Bring. forth the royal diadem and crown Him Lord of all. Now I'm through. That's the conditions of being a person of God. You say, Brother Hudson, that strips us of everything that we've been taught. But you didn't read the next verse. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, there's the secret, and given him a name which is above every name, isn't that wonderful? And that at the name of Jesus, not Emmanuel, not the Creator, not Counselor, but Jesus. Little babies can say it. Old dying people can say Jesus. It's the easiest word in the English language to say, Jesus. And then it says that at the name of Jesus, every knee, watch the myriads of people, watch the millions of people as they've gathered, watch the pornographers, watch all the sex merchants, watch all the everything that you can think of and listen to them as they say in one unison, as the angel, mighty angel holds his hand and says, say it! And they'll say, Jesus is Lord! How did he get that way? How did he get this mind? Well, the first thing you do, don't try to make a reputation, let him do it for you. Take upon you the form of a servant, just get busy with what God's telling you to do. I think we need to maybe get on our face and say, Lord, here it is, I'm surrendering it. I want you to take my title deed to everything that I am. and everything I hope to be, I'm going to lay it at your feet. Let's stand together, heads bowed, Heavenly Father. Oh God, what a challenge. What a challenge to make ourselves of no reputation. To take upon us the form of a servant, and to be obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, which is dying to self, But in doing so, you do the exalting. While heads are bowed and eyes are closed, when I was first saved, a man said to me something I've never forgotten. I thought about having it put on my tombstone, but I don't think, don't think that I'd be worthy. You make much of Jesus, and He'll make much of you. I wonder, I mean, tonight, would like to slip out of your place and come down here and say, oh God, I'm falling on my face before you. Now you don't have to lie down on the floor and don't mean that, but I'm surrendering. Here's my crown, here's my title deed, everything that I have. It's yours. I'm surrendering it now. I'm yielding it. I'm turning it over to you. Oh God, it's yours. It's yours. While the instruments play and the choir sings whatever they have ready, softly, prayerfully, tenderly, and pleadingly, come on down here and say, here Lord Jesus is my crown. He wants to do something for you. He wants to do something for you. Come on right now as I begin to sing. Be the first one. That's it. That's it. God bless you. Come on. Yeah. Lord, I don't have too much, but what I have is Yours. You gave Your home in glory. You gave it. Everything that I am, You gave that I might have life everlasting. And when those precious hands that once were little hands clung at the apron of Mary, and later were nailed to that cross, for me, oh God, how can I help? but give my all." Myself and my crown. Myself and my crown. Some of you say, Brother Hudson, I've given him my life But have you given your substance? I'm not asking you to give anything away or write a check. That's not what I'm talking about at all. I'm talking about giving everything to Him. That doesn't get the flesh excited, I'll tell you that. But God will give it back to you, don't you, can't you trust Him? Come on now, choir sing another verse. Come on. Come on. Don't be afraid. He won't take anything. Unless you're willing to give it to him. I can't find in the Bible where he ever took anything and kept it. All he ever did was took it and blessed it.