It's my privilege. I appreciate so much what you're doing. I'm going to be honest with you, both last night and today, I've been amazed to see the hundreds and hundreds of people who've connected from all around the world. Of course, the real miracle of prayer is not that we're all doing it. The real miracle of prayer is that God hears it all at the same time and that we can all come to the same throne of grace together. That's really the amazing thing. You know, the first 24-hour prayer vigil I was ever part of, Dr. Sexton coordinated. And we used to do this annually at the church and college. I loved it. And in fact, I think as a, as a young man, about 17 or 18 years of age, it was the first time I had ever spent a full hour in prayer that I remember. And I remember how quickly the hour went. And what a precious thing it is. I'm honored to be on with you today. Let me give you just a brief thought from the Word of God to prime our pump, I hope, to pray in this hour. And it comes from the closing verses of Matthew chapter 9, if you have a Bible near you. I'll read just a handful of verses. I was thinking late last night about the time this hour of prayer we'd have and what scripture, and I believe the Holy Spirit led me to these verses. Matthew 9 is, of course, right in the middle of our Lord's ministry. Verse 35 says, And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom. and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. What a ministry. To me, it's striking. He did the same thing in the cities and in the villages. Every large urban area and every rural area needs the same thing. They all need the gospel. They all need the word of God and a Bible preacher. And then you come to verse 36 and it says, but when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them because they fainted. and were scattered abroad as sheep having no shepherd. Then say at the end of his disciples, the harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few. Pray ye therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth laborers into his harvest. This is a powerful passage of scripture. The setting, of course, is the field. In fact, he uses two illustrations. Both of them are field illustrations. One is sitting with a shepherd in the field, looking at the sheep, and the other is sitting in the field where the harvest is. And so he takes us to the field to teach us something great about prayer. And you might want to mark in your Bible these words in verse 38, pray ye. Now, I love the great invitations to prayer, but this is not an invitation. This is an imperative. This is not a, if you'd like to pray, come in and pray. This is, you have to do this. You have to pray. It's a command. It's something we must do. I'm an evangelist, as Stephen said a moment ago, and I'm a gospel man. I think you all are gospel people. The truth of the matter is, I don't think you'd be on here if you weren't a gospel person, because you wouldn't know Jesus if it wasn't for the gospel. And of course, to be a gospel Christian means not just that we believed it, but we're trying to get it to everybody else we possibly can. I love the different types of prayer I've heard even in this prayer meeting. There's worship, there's adoration, there's thanksgiving, there's praise, there's petition. I love all of that. But I'm convinced that the highest level of prayer is intercessory prayer, because that's the kind of praying Jesus is doing at this moment. So when we really enter in and we get the heart of God, or maybe I should say the heart of God gets us, we don't just pray for ourselves. Our prayers become passionate towards the lost and the advance for the gospel and the needs around the world. I've always thought it was ironic that in the one area of our Christian life where we think ourselves most spiritual, we actually reveal oftentimes how truly carnal we are. So we think, well, I'm praying. I'm praying. But when we listen to ourselves pray, very often, at least in our private prayers, most of our prayers is for us. And what I love in this passage is that Jesus takes a preaching meeting, turns it into a prayer meeting, and turns it inside out and says to the disciples, this is not just about you. This is not just about the people who are following with us. Look at all these multitudes who do not know Jesus. Now, I'm convinced of something. When you really get in a real prayer meeting, and I believe this is, but when you get in a real prayer meeting, you don't come out the same. And we are in the homestretch of your prayer meeting for this 24 hours. One of the things that I hope grows out of this is not just that we can all check a box and say we were part of it, but we will leave this prayer meeting more passionate than ever about souls and getting the gospel to people. The time is short. Jesus is coming. We have a little window here to get the word out. That's what we've got to do. So let me give you three prayer prompters, if I may. And I want to challenge the people who are joining us in this hour and who are going to pray. Why don't you take these three things and let's just concentrate our prayer in this hour. Now, as the Spirit leads you, obviously, and God may put other things on your heart, for which to praise God, pray about. But let's make a list here, all right? Number one, based on what we find here in verse number 36, we ought to pray, first of all, that the love of Christ would fill our hearts. That's where it all started, with the compassion of Jesus. He saw them. He saw them not through earth's eyes, but heaven's eyes. I'm thinking now the words of Jeremiah, mine eye affecteth my heart. We need to pray that God will help us start seeing people like he sees them. I think one of the great dangers in our world today, there's so much conservative news, and I'm conservative for the record, but if you're not careful, conservative news will work against the Christian heart because you can get so worked up and fleshly and angry even towards sinners that you don't love them like Jesus loves them. I certainly think we ought to hate sin and take a strong stand against it. But I'm convinced what we need is a fresh bathing of the love of God in our souls. And you know what's really interesting? If you back up to verse 34, the Pharisees had just accused him of being demon possessed. So here's a man who just had the most scathing criticism put on him. But the God-man, the Lord Jesus, is still full of love. Don't let the harshness of our world make you bitter. And I think our first prayer ought to start with ourselves. Lord, I want to be full of the love of God. That's the strongest word, that word compassion, the strongest word Greeks had for pity. This is God's love in us for lost people. Second thing on our list, we should only pray that we'll have the love of Christ, but number two, we should pray for lost people to be saved. Pray for the lost. Pray for sheep to come into the fold. Pray for a harvest. of souls that pray for an end gathering. And I was meditating on this this morning. What are these two field illustrations have in common? One thing, urgency. The lost sheep has to be found or the wolf's going to get it. The harvest has to be reaped or it's going to spoil. And dear God, give us some fresh urgency for souls. One of the greatest prayer meetings I was ever in at the Temple Baptist Church was a one-hour prayer meeting on a Monday night. I'll never forget it. We had a prayer meeting every Monday night for an hour. The pastor came in one week, he walked to the front. He always would give a little devotion, you know, and give some direction during the prayer meeting. And that week he said, tonight, I just want us to pray for souls. And he sat down on the front row and did not get up for an hour. I'll never forget that meeting. A woman stood far side of the room, weeping, young woman, calling a soul to God. Broken. She sat down, another man stood. Another, another, another. Went on for an hour without interruption, without any pause. It was powerful. It was like the Lord sat down on the place. And I'm convinced part of the reason for that is when you really get to talking to God about what's on God's heart, you get near the presence of the Lord. And when you get God's heart, you get a love for sinners, and you want lost people to come to Christ. I'm thinking about a neighbor right now, where I live here in the mountains of West Virginia, who's lost. He's up in years. And I'm praying for Mr. Hicks to be saved. I want to see him come to Jesus. I've been talking to him, praying for him. I'm gonna pray for him in this hour. But you might write a name down right now, somebody that the Holy Spirit brings to your mind. And if you don't have a name, ask God to give you one, because he'll answer that prayer. And the third thing, I think this is the real thrust. We not only pray for the love of Christ for us, for lost people to be saved, but then we should pray for laborers to be sent forth. Now, this is not just physical work or mental work. This is the greatest work of all, this is spiritual work. And I would challenge you to pray that the current laborers who are on the field, missionaries, pastors, evangelists, would be filled with the Holy Spirit and be fruitful. But we need to pray that God will send forth more laborers into the harvest. I cannot be convinced that with more lost people than ever on planet Earth, God is calling fewer people to labor in the harvest. I don't believe that. I think fewer people are listening and responding. We need to pray for a great awakening among our young people and families and churches and university campuses and colleges for people just to get eaten up with the gospel again, zealous about what Jesus is zealous about. One little footnote to this, and I'll pray. I just noticed today, looking at this passage again, did you know that the same word that he used here for sending forth labors, thrusting them out is the exact same word that was used previously in the chapter for the casting out of devils. That's really interesting. So the same force that expels the devils is the same heavenly power that sends forth the laborers in the harvest. That's the kind of power of the Holy Spirit we desperately need right now. And by the way, only God can do that. So let's believe God for what only God can do. Amen. Let me pray with you. And then I know many others have it on their heart to pray. Let's try to concentrate our prayer. Be specific, be definite, call individual names to God. Let's pray in faith.