Well, this morning it is a joy to be here. I was not expecting to be here on this Lord's Day, but I was sort of fired into the breach to speak over at the University, and so I have some idea this morning what it must be like for one of those shells They've been fired out of those guns in Iraq. And I do hope that the visit will have been a means of attacking the devil's kingdom and bringing some glory to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's good to be here. I want to take this opportunity of thanking you people for your kind prayers and concern about us over recent months when we're ill. I'm happy to report that I think I'm about 90% 90% back to normal again, whatever normal is and I really do appreciate the prayers. We received some lovely cards from some of you folks and prayer requests and emails and we want to thank you most sincerely. It was a tremendous encouragement to us in our time of need. I want to turn this morning to the book of Exodus. When I was coming down at sudden notice to the university, I had a message in mind. When I got here, it was not the one that the Lord would settle in my mind, and so I had to make a change. And then I thought, I'm only supposed to preach here once today, Your minister is a very persuasive character, and so I have to preach two times, and I had the message already for this morning's service, but again the Lord has laid upon my heart something different because of the situation that we all find ourselves in, and so what I want to do is to really go over the message I gave on Thursday morning in the university. Now, I know that some of you were not there, some of you were. Those who were, if you want to leave, you can leave right now. But I want to go for this because I think it's important that we bring you a message relevant to the situation we find ourselves in. Exodus chapter 17. The children of Israel have just come out of the land of Egypt, and they've moved into the wilderness, and they find themselves in a situation where they have no water. And then the Lord wonderfully supplies water for them. In the chapter when Moses stood before the rock in Horeb, the Lord gave them a tremendous supply of water. And then, in that day, they began to fight. with the enemy over wells of water. And today we cannot dismiss from our thinking that some of the battle that is going on is over wells, not of water, but wells of oil. But there are some tremendous encouragements for us in the scripture. For sake of time, we'll just commence at verse number 8 and read down to the end of the chapter. Exodus 17 and reading at verse 8. Then came Amalek, Now Amalek is a nation whose name means warlike. Then came Amalek and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out to fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in mine hand. So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek. And Moses, Aaron and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed. And when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. But Moses' hands were heavy, and they took a stone and put it under him. And he sat thereon, and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side and the other on the other side. And his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua, for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. And Moses built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovah-Nissi, or the Lord My Banner. For he said, Because the Lord hath sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. May the Lord bless to our hearts this reading of His own infallible and inspired word. Let's just bow for a word of prayer. Our loving Heavenly Father, We come to Thee today and we thank Thee that Thou art the God of this universe. And, Lord, while we are so small and insignificant, yet, our Father, we thank Thee that Thou dost rule in the kingdoms of men. And, Father, we know that we live in a most difficult time. Our cry comes unto Thee, and we pray that Thou would hear and answer prayer and that Thou would bless Thy people in this day. And, Father, we ask of Thee that Thou would work out Thine own sovereign will on sovereign purposes And Father, help us, we pray, not to fight against God, but rather to acquiesce to Thee and to Thy will and to Thy way. And so, our Father, we pray this morning that Thou would encourage us in the Word of God. We thank Thee, our Fathers, always a word in season for the weary heart in the matter what situation we find ourselves in. We thank Thy Father, Thou dost always have a word. And so today we pray that Thou would encourage Thy people. And Lord, we ask of Thee that should there be any today who know not the Lord Jesus, that they would begin to realise how short time really is, and how they need to prepare for the great eternity. And Father, we pray that they would come to know the Lord Jesus, who alone is the way of salvation. Be with us now, we pray, and speak to us by Thy power, and refresh our souls, and do us good, for we ask good in Jesus' name. Amen. This morning we meet in a critical time in the history of this world. Your country and my native country are embroiled in the battle in Iraq at this present time. I have to apologize the weakness of our Canadian Prime Minister, of whom many of us are disgusted and ashamed, because in the time when our troops should be standing with your troops, ours are not there, because of the will and the whim of our Prime Minister and of our Liberal government. And I want you to understand that despite what the government has taken as a stand, that there are many, many Canadian people who are right behind you in your time of trouble and your time of conflict. I saw just a couple of days ago that there was a poll taken in your country that said that some 76% of the people support the action in Iraq. And how sad that is to see those many thousands in San Francisco and other places fighting against your government and against your country. And it is a grieving thing indeed. 76, that's 3 out of every 4 citizens in this country support the action of your president and your government. Well, they had a poll in Canada just a couple of days ago, and I'm happy to say that 67% of the Canadian people, even though their government has let them down, 67%, that's 2 out of every 3 Canadians stand with you, and the Premier of our province, Ernie Eaves, and that would be equivalent to the governor of one of your states, he came out against the federal government and he said there are times when you have to stand with your friends and your allies. And he says this is one of those times. So I'm glad that our province at least has publicly given its support to the conflict that your country is involved in. So I want to be assured that we are with you. I have just finished reading a book by a Canadian, David Frum. David Frum is a Canadian Jew, and he was one of George Bush's speechwriters for a while, and he was the man who coined the phrase, the axis of evil. And David Frum is a Conservative, and he wrote in his book that he first of all when he met George Bush he didn't really particularly think very much about him or anything really positive about him but when he came to write his book he called George Bush the right man So, understand that there are Canadian people who do see things and I have to smile because when Frum opens his book, he says that he is a Jew, went into the White House for the first time and somebody came up and said, why weren't you at the Bible class this morning? as a Jew, he made that comment, but it tells you that in the White House you have a lot of people who are born again, a lot of people who are of evangelical persuasion, even though perhaps they don't go to churches that will take the stand that our church would take. But I want to turn to this chapter of the Scriptures because there is a tremendous encouragement here and guidance from the Lord what to do in a time like we find ourselves in. I just want to give you two points. First of all, to outline the very serious situation that we all find ourselves in because this is a much more complex issue than you may think it is. So I want to outline that first of all, just very briefly paralleling it to Israel's situation. And then I want to go on to look at the very strange strategy that the Lord guided Moses in and understand that that is a strategy that will best succeed in this situation. Now, first of all, the very serious situation. This was a new experience for the people of Israel because they who were the brickmakers in Egypt under the time of Pharaoh's awful treatment of them, the brickmakers now become the battle warriors. Now earlier on the Lord guided His people away from a battle area, but now they come to a situation where for the first time they're going to face a serious, serious battle against a war-like enemy. Now your country and my country, the North, we have lived in relative peace. I lived through the early days of the Second World War. I remember what it was like for our city to be bombed. and I have some idea what war is like and some of you have served in your armies and so on, you have some idea what it's like, but by and large North America has been a peaceful place and has not been attacked. But all that changed on the 11th of September in the year 2001 because something happened then that changed forever what our Western society is going to be like and then begins a serious war against terror. And if you think that that war can be won in a few days, it will not be won. It's going to be a long, lengthy battle indeed. And when you go now to the airports and you see the security, you have to take your shoes off and even examine your shoes and make sure there's no bombs in them. You understand we're living in a very serious situation. Now, what we're dealing with today is not a simple matter by any means, it's a very complex matter. And this morning what I want to do, just first of all, in dealing with the situation that we find ourselves in, which is a new situation for North America, is to give you a handful of pieces of the jigsaw puzzle. Now, I am not a prophet, neither am I the son of a prophet, and I'm not going to try and explain how these various jigsaw pieces fit together, but I want to leave them with you, and I want you to think about them, because that leads us to why we have to use the strategy that was given here in the Word of God in this battle with Amalek. First of all, there are several factors that we have to take into consideration. First of all, there is the Bible lands factor, because this is not an ordinary war. In fact, this one is very much different to the one that was held in 1990. This is not an ordinary war, because we're not talking about battle on the fields of Europe. We're not talking about Vietnam. We're not talking about Korea. We're talking about a battle that is focused in the lands of the Bible. You're talking about Israel. You're talking about Mesopotamia. You're talking about Babylon that is in present day Iraq. You're talking about Persia and Syria and Edom and all these Bible lands. And so, friends, that gives a factor to this whole thing. This is not just an ordinary battle. This is a very, very different battle. Then you've got to take into consideration what I call the Nimrod factor. Because way back in the book of Genesis, you find this man Nimrod, and Nimrod becomes, we're told, a mighty hunter before the Lord or against the Lord. And Nimrod is the first major picture of the Antichrist of the latter days. And Nimrod was a wicked, wicked man. And he was the man who founded Babel. And this is all tied together. So he was the first man that founded Babel. And of course, the word Babel means confusion. And it is the foundation of Babylon. And Babylon, of course, the existing city, the original city, is some 50 miles south of Baghdad. And so the American troops right now are very close to that famous biblical city of Babylon. That brings into play now the Babel factor itself, because in the book of Genesis, you find the people in that day, they build a city and a tower, and they want to unify the people, and they want to bring them together. But never forget it was God who disturbed them. It was God who scattered them. And it was God who gave them diverse languages. So we're dealing here with the area of the ancient Babel that the Bible speaks about. And I'm just looking today, and looking at the United Nations. The United Nations is somewhat emaciated from what it was earlier. and the common market, the power of the common market of Europe is somewhat in disarray today because you have France and Germany on one side and you have Britain supporting and is a bit of a mess over there as well. And so you talk about confusion. The Babylon is coming up and I'll say a word about that in a moment or two. The next thing we need to consider and the next piece of the jigsaw puzzle is the Nebuchadnezzar factor. Because this man Hussain, Hussain sees himself as a sort of reincarnation of Nebuchadnezzar. And I just read an article in the Toronto paper there just a few days ago called Hussain, King of Babylon. This man they're dealing with is no Sunday school teacher. Because in this article it told us of at the time of the war of Iraq with Iran, that Iraq was suffering. And Hussein did something unusual. He actually asked for advice. And one of his trusted advisors told him, Mr. Hussein, what you need to do now is you need to resign from office. And then that will allow us to go and negotiate a security agreement with Iran and with the Ayatollah Khomeini. He said, then, after we get the paperwork all in position, then you can come back in again and resume your position as the leader of the country. That trusted advisor was delivered to his wife and to his children in a canvas bag, cut in pieces. So you're dealing here with a butcher, the butcher of Baghdad who sees himself as Nebuchadnezzar and who in fact upon the ruins of the ancient palace of the original Nebuchadnezzar has erected bricks, now the bricks of Nebuchadnezzar's palace were made with all kinds of hieroglyphics on them and a dear friend of mine has one of those bricks in Ireland, I've had it in my hand and Hussein has built on top of that And his bricks all have Saddam's name on them. So he sees himself as the Nebuchadnezzar of today and the reincarnation. Of course, he would need to read the book of Daniel, because the book of Daniel told the original Nebuchadnezzar that the Lord would bring him down until he learned that the Most High God reigned in the kingdoms of men. And God did bring him down. And this one's coming down too, if he's not already down. so you've got the Nebuchadnezzar factor, then you've got the Israel factor and this one is always there because Israel is surrounded by these nations and it's the only democratic nation in that area and while we do not support any of the wrongdoing of Israel as a nation Yet, if we look back as believers, and we thank God for Israel, because it was through Israel that we got our Bible, and it was through Israel we got our apostles, and it was through Israel that we got our Saviour. So that's another factor. And the Bible tells us how the Lord set Israel aside, and the book of Romans, no matter what your eschatology may be, the book of Romans does say that there will be a movement among the Jews in the latter days. In fact, I bought a series of tape recordings for Pat Mills, who I understand is coming down here. And Pat, she works for the Jewish Mason in Toronto. And I bought this set of tapes, 20 audio tapes, done by a rabbi in New York. And these tapes were done to teach Jews how to resist Christian attempts to evangelize them. In the very first tape he says, that there has been more Jewish people converted to Jesus Christ in the 20th century than in the 19th century before that. So, you have the factor of Israel. Then you have the end time factor. Because the Bible tells us that the Lord Jesus Christ is coming again. And we believe as we look at the signs of the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. We don't know exactly when the Lord is coming, but there are certain indicators in the Bible that would suggest that that coming of the Lord is drawing nigh. And the spirit of lawlessness that is abroad today is very evident as it was in the days of Noah, a time of great iniquity. We're living in a world where the inequity in my lifetime that I have seen a tremendous decline in public morals in this last number of years and we have to keep that in mind as well. Then this Babylon factor. Revelation tells us that there will be the revelation of mystery Babylon. Now I'm not going to argue with you whatever your eschatological bent may be, whether that's the original Babylon or not. The very fact that it's prefaced by the word mystery suggests to me it is something like Babylon and will have the same marks as Babylon. On the Babylon, the Marks, you go back to the book of Genesis. You have the city and the tower of Babel. The city is the political, the mercantile. And the tower is the word for a religious temple, a religious place of worship. And so I believe that just as they were having a people unifying movement at Babel with a political and religious dimension, so when you go to the last book of the Bible, there's a revelation of the mystical Babylon that will have the same two marks. The mark of the political movement and that is they're working towards a one world government. Interesting. In the Iraq war, the desert storm war of 10 years ago, there was a lot of talk about the new world order. But there isn't too much talk about a new world order this time. Something is different this time. So, you got this babbling factor of trying to make a one world government. And then you have the desire to make a one world religion. And I don't need to discourse to you this morning about the attempts that are being made to get together not just all the so-called religions of Christendom but join together with the religions that have no movement towards Christendom at all, they have no thought of the Christian God and so today if you believe in some sort of a divine being you all join together in the great attempt to make a one world religion but just as in Babel the Lord will destroy both these Babylon factors and Lord he will reign mightily another factor that has come into our society recently another piece of the jigsaw puzzle that is getting more important and that is the Islamic factor Because, I want you to understand, and this is proven, that Islam is working on a carefully planned program to turn the western world Islamic. And Britain was one of the countries, and England particularly, that was focused at the beginning of this, When you go to England today, you take the city of Bradford, a major city in the middle of England, almost totally Muslim today, and several other ones like that. Near our church is a mosque there, just a mile away, that has a congregation of 17,800 people, 17,000. And I spoke to a little man who's a doctor from Egypt, a little man who's about 80 years of age, and he told me about seeing a woman in Toronto with the black burka on, that's the hold from head to toe, covering with just a slit for the eyes. And he said to her, why, why do you wear that in Canada? And her answer, I cannot afford not to wear it. because she is paid, she told him, 500 US dollars a month to wear that in Toronto to raise the visibility of Islam and the attacks there on New York and on Washington and that awful terrorist attack on September 11th is just a further indication of the aims and objectives of Islam and while they tell us that we should think of all these peace loving people you look at the Quran and the Quran is full of the very opposite of that and you find that the silence is deafening when you listen for major Islamic leaders to come out and condemn what happened on the September 11th so that's another factor that is coming in so I hope you understand folks that what we're facing right now is not a simple matter it's a complex matter I've given to you just a handful of the jigsaw puzzle pieces and how they fit together I'm not quite sure but I do know this when you're doing a jigsaw puzzle you can look at the piece and look at the coloring and the shape and so on and it's hard to fit then all of a sudden you get it in and then all the other pieces they fit around it and so we're waiting for the Lord to make clear to us just His purpose but the good thing is that He's working it all out according to His will and so we're facing a very serious situation now we come to this very strange strategy that Israel used in the battle first of all Israel prepares for battle against Amalek And in verse number 9, Moses said unto Joshua, that was Joshua, and you will know that Joshua is the Old Testament name for Jesus. Joshua means Saviour, Jesus means Saviour. And so the lesson we learned at the very beginning is that when we go into battle, whether right now in Iraq, or in the battle, the spiritual battle, we have to make sure that we are following in the train of our great Commander, who is the Lord Jesus Christ. But a strange thing happened in this battle, because here is Joshua down on the desert floor, and in the wilderness, he's down on the desert floor, and three men, that turn their back on the battle. Moses, Aaron and her. And you say, well, what's wrong? These are leaders in Israel. Are they cowards? Are they afraid to fight the battle? But they turn their back on the battle that's raging down the floor of the desert, and they head for high ground. And they stand up there. And if you remember nothing else of this message today, remember that the battle on the desert floor is won on the mountaintop. Get into your mind. The battle of the desert floor is won on the mountaintop. And the situation we find ourselves in today is the same situation exactly. Because you may have the best army and the best equipment and the best rockets and the best missiles and so on that man can devise. But if you do not win the battle on the top of the hill, the soldiers will never win the battle down on the desert floor. The battle of the desert floor is won on the mountain top. Now friends, you have thousands of soldiers and marines and air force people in Iraq at this present time. I know some of you here have, some of your relatives, we've seen the list, that go somewhere different churches. And some of our churches in Ireland, the young men going to the battlefield. But you're not going, you're staying here. You've got to get to the mountaintop Because they'll never win there, unless you're on the mountaintop. And so Moses and Aaron and Hur, they went to the mountaintop. Now, the Bible to me is a wonderful picture book. Not a picture book in the sense that you flick over and you see pictures of this in our modern understanding of the word picture. But the Bible is full of word pictures. And don't miss them. And I ask the Lord to open your eyes to see them, because what you have here is a tremendous picture given to us by Almighty God. And you look at Moses, and Moses pictures something for us as he climbs that mountain. Now sometimes in the Bible, Moses is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. And sometimes we're told that God is going to bring a prophet like Moses. Of course, that was a prophecy of the coming of the Lord. But Moses is not a picture of Christ in this chapter. Moses is a picture of you and me, the individual believer. You say, how do you know that? Because we're told of the weariness of Moses. And the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords, never is weary, and never is weak. So Moses is a picture of you and me. And we can learn from that picture this morning. Now when he's up at the top of the hill, what he does, he has the robe that the Lord has given to him, and he holds his hands up towards heaven. And while his hands are up towards heaven, down the desert floor, Israel is prevailing in the battle. But his hands get weary and they drop down. And then Amalek begins to prevail. So Moses sums up more strength and lifts his arms once more. It's a hard thing to hold your hands up too long because of circulation problems. So he lifts his hands again and again Israel begins to prevail and again his hands get tired and Amalek begins to prevail. And friend, what a picture you have of you and me. We have here in the Bible the indication of the wonderful ministry of prayer. The only problem is that we are so weak in prayer. You think of the tremendous potential we have and God tells us, call unto me in the day of trouble and He says, I will deliver you and you shall glorify me. The trouble is that we have so great difficulty appropriating the promises of God on being successful in the ministry of prayer. And so like that we are weak. And the psalm tells us about in supplication holding up your hands before God. So Moses up there There's a picture of the believer at prayer, but his hands go up and they come down and they go up a little bit more and down, not so long again, they're down again, and finally Moses has difficulty and Amalek is prevailing. But thank God there's a message of help here, because there was help for Moses in his time of weakness. Because there were two men there, Aaron and Hur, And they came, and they stood, and the first thing they did was they set Moses down on a rock. And how suggestive that is. Because the Lord Jesus Christ is the rock of our salvation, and He is the Word of the Living God. You know, when I got the Word on the 25th of October, and I had prostate cancer, now one of those things that you want to hear, I drove home from the surgeon's office, and the only thing I could think of was, all things work together for good. Sometimes we have the old things that are nice, and sometimes the old things that are not so nice, but the one feature is that the Lord never changes. Our circumstances change, and so I was encouraged. I met my wife at the end of the house, and she looked at me and said, well, well, it's not too good. And she was quite upset and told the family. And my daughter Joanne was very grieved. And she sat down the next day, the Saturday, to pray with her children and to read with them in their sequential reading, which happened to be Psalm 41. And she prayed, Lord, Lord, if you get something for my own soul. Now she was talking about herself because she was concerned about her father's illness. And she started to read her next reading which was Psalm 41. And she got the second verse and it says there, The Lord shall preserve him and keep him alive. So she was greatly encouraged by that. And then the next verse, verse 3 of Psalm number 41 is, The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing. So that was encouraging. And then it says, Thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness. So she could hardly wait to finish the reading until the phone rang in my house. Dad, what did you hear I read? And that was a tremendous blessing to me. because I knew I was going to have an operation, a surgery, and I had seen that particular operation on television about three or four years ago, and it was not pretty sight, I can tell you, and I was quite concerned. But here is a verse that tells us the Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing. Lord, I am going to a bed of languishing. I know that. But you said, I will strengthen you. And then again, Thou wilt make all his beds." Now, you know, it's nice to have the doctors coming in, the nurses, and they were so kind and so good, and they can say what they like about the Canadian medical system. Our system, as far as I'm concerned, is very, very good. I had no problem with it at all. But here is a promise, and I was able to rest on that promise. And so, from the month that I knew I was going to have the operation until I actually had it, I can testify I never had a moment's worry or concern. Not even a butterfly in my stomach. In fact, the only thing I had was an enlightened feeling that I'm going to prove the Lord again in some wonderful way that's not possible any other way. You see, I explain it like this here. If you want to learn to swim, when my wife and I got married, we went on our honeymoon and I could swim and she couldn't. She wanted me to teach her to swim in the pool at the hotel. And so I discovered that when you start to teach your wife to swim, there's two things. Don't try to teach her to swim. Don't try to teach her to drive the car. Otherwise, you get into all kinds of problems. But I told her, I said, dear, don't worry that the water will bear you up. Now you tell that to somebody who's never been able to swim. And they can get 50 books that read and tell you how to do all the actions of swimming. But you never know until you're in it. And you discover the water does boil you up. And the Bible tells us, in the Psalm it says, it is good for me that I have been afflicted. Now you say, well Lord, that's a kind of strange, good to be afflicted? It is good for me to be afflicted because I have learned thy laws and thy statutes. You see, it's one thing to learn them in the head by root, but it's another thing to learn them and you go through the thing and you discover that the Lord is there. I had my operation. four and a half hours. Normally you go in early on Monday morning and they hopefully let you out on Friday night. I was out first thing on Wednesday morning. The doctor said to me that you've set a sort of a record for him and he does these things all the time. Out in less than 48 hours. He's a Jew and I had the joy of telling him about Psalm 41. and testified to him about the blessing of Psalm 41. So what a thrill it is to be able to rest on the promise of God. And you know, I knew I wasn't going to die in the operating table because the Lord said He will keep me alive. And then young Esther, you know, she sent me a card with a verse from Isaiah and she was reading, the Lord will heal him. And so I was blessed indeed. So what a blessing it is to be able to rest on the rock of Jesus Christ, our Savior, and upon the rock of His precious Word. God does not lie. God cannot lie. And so Moses sat. And we need to sit upon the promises of God that are in Christ Jesus, yea, and in Him. Amen. So it doesn't matter. What happens in Washington, or New York, or London, or Paris, or Bonn, or Baghdad, God is in control. And we can rest upon His Word and His promise. Then, here's the tremendous blessing. Moses was sustained. He was weak in himself, his arms were heavy, they began to fall down. But he was sustained by Aaron and Hur. and they held up his arms until Israel got the victory. We are weak in prayer. Our prayers, I don't know how you feel, but my own prayers grieve me at times. They grieve me because of their poverty and their ineffectiveness. Nothing wrong with God. Here's the problem. The hands are weary. And they hang down. Remember how the Lord even said to His disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, what, could you not watch with Me one hour? One hour, in a critical moment, they're fast asleep. And how many times at night do you get down to pray before you go to bed and you find yourself sleeping? Remember, as a young boy, the elder of our church used to come around, George Archer. Now, George was not the most lively of men. very staid old farmer and we were farmers that's not a derogatory comment on farmers but he was a staid old farmer and he came and he would catechize us he would read the Bible and he would pray and we all go down and go down on the stone floor of our farmhouse and I'm down there and when I wakened up George was long gone a boy about 10 years of age right out and that sadly is our situation But Moses was held up on either side. But I want you to see how he was held up. Because on one side was Hur. Now Hur is a name that means light. And immediately my mind goes back to the tabernacle. In the tabernacle there was a light. It was a candle stand. Seven branch candle stand. Not with candles. But the lights were fed by olive oil. And so in the tabernacle, the holy place, you had the light in the tabernacle reflecting off the golden wall here and the golden wall over there. And what a sight it must have been there. Those seven lights multiplied in that. And then over here and going back and forward, it must have been quite a sight. And that candlestick is a picture of the glorious light of the gospel of the Lord Jesus, fed by olive oil. And olive oil, in the Scriptures, is the great type of the Holy Spirit. So, her is holding Him up on the one hand, a type of the Holy Spirit. And that brings you, in a way, to the book of Romans and great chapter 8 of Romans. It says, likewise, the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities. For we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself, or Himself, maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered." What does that tell us? It tells us that true prayer comes through the Holy Ghost, and here on the earthward side we have the help of the Holy Ghost who maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Moses' other side, Aaron. Who was Aaron? The first high priest of Israel. And Aaron, of course, is a picture of the one in the book of Hebrews, who is the great high priest. And it tells him in Hebrews that Jesus Christ, He now lives before the throne of God, and He lives there ever to make intercession for His people. And so our prayers, no matter how feeble they are, they are poured out by the Lord Jesus before the heavenly throne of grace. And so on the earthward side, we are helped by the Holy Ghost who teaches us how to pray and what to pray for. On the heavenward side, our great high priest is pouring out our prayers before the heavenly throne. How can a believer fail in prayer with such divine help as God has given to us? Moses was steady. The verse there says in verse number 12, that as he held his hands up, his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And so we have to be steadfast. We have to be unmovable at the throne of God because the best thing you can do for those troops out in Iraq right now is to get up the hill of prayer and to lay hold upon God and not to let go until God gives the victory. You see, I think that This time we might have had raised expectations because you had the war back there in 1990, the Gulf War. And at that time it was a very short, sharp conflict. But here we are today, going to war. And you have now armies that are far better equipped with far more technical and accurate bombs and so on. And the Iraqi Air Force, an army, is seriously depleted. And so you say, well, in your mind, if 1990 went like that so quickly, then this one is going to go. My friend, don't count on it. Don't count on it. Because it may not be like that. Sad news this morning. Another 10 US soldiers missing. And already a number of British soldiers and American soldiers have laid down their lives on the battlefield. If ever we need to be steady at the throne of grace, it is now. And then Moses was successful. Because while his hands were held to heaven, ultimately Israel got the victory and Amalek was defeated and destroyed from the face of the earth. My friends, you as Americans, you have a tremendous blessing. I was talking to Dr. Paisley some time ago and he told me about going to the White House and meeting George Bush. They met there, it was just about this time, a couple of years ago I think it was. And George Bush saw Mr. Paisley's Jesus Save badge. And he spoke to Mr. Paisley and he commented on the badge. And Dr. Paisley said to me, it is my firm conviction that George Bush is a born again believer. He was asked, who is the greatest philosopher who'd ever lived? His answer was Jesus Christ, because He transformed my life. So, while your president is not a perfect man, and there are areas that you may feel about his life and so on, and associations and sometimes things he does that you may not agree with, I think we can agree that he is a man who knows the Lord. If that's the case, then he has the indwelling Spirit of God And so, like David of old, he needs to ask of the Lord, Lord, do we go into battle or do we hold back? Do we do this? Do we do that? Because the Lord will guide. And I thank the Lord that you have a man like that in the White House right now, because some of the things that could have happened could have been far worse. But today, he, in a sense, is your Joshua down the desert four-floor fighting a battle. And I called upon my own church there just a couple of weeks ago to pray for George Bush and for his advisers that the Lord would guide them and they would do that which is right in the sight of the Lord. Dear friends, there's another factor I want to leave before you. I want you to think about this very seriously. And that is that just over ten years ago there were two superpowers. And then, unbelievably, Russia was reduced to just a regional power. And I think it was hard to any of us in the middle of the 80s if we said, look forward, Russia will be destroyed. Not one of us would have said, well that's a possibility. But look what has happened. There's only one superpower left. And my friend, you need to pray that the Lord will protect your country. because I was down in Florida just a few weeks ago for some recuperation with my wife. When I was there, I went to a local church. It was a good church, a fundamentalist church. And the pastor had written a very good article on the anniversary of Roe versus Wade. In the last 30 years, 42 million Babies were aborted in this country. In our country, the North is no better. Our numbers aren't as big as that, but percentage-wise, they're just the same. And remember how the blood of one person, at the very beginning, Abel's blood, called to God for vengeance. And while America stays with God, the Lord will bless it. But you read that book by David Frum, who I say is a Jew. He does say it's in the White House. You have a man right now who's trying to undo Roe versus Wade. That's a helpful sign. And I trust that you'll pray that the Lord will be able to stop this awful bloodshed in this land and our lands and North. Because the people right now who are out there protesting in San Francisco and in Chicago and there are thousands. Look at them. And they are the very same people who call for freedom in abortion. And so we need to pray. The Lord will turn the whole thing round and give a breath of answer and a breath of revival in this awful day. But Moses got the victory. He got it on the top of the mountain. And the victory is there for the taking for us on the top of the mountain with prayer. Remember again, the battle of the desert floor is won on the mountain top with God and prayer. And if we ever come to a place where we think that the victory comes because of superiority of weapons or of numbers, bad mistake to make. Because in the Bible, God routed many as a superior army by a small number to teach them a lesson. May God help us then to realize that our answer does not lie, even as Mike read there, in chariots. Our answer lies before God in prayer. And that puts the responsibility fairly and squarely upon the shoulders of those who know and love the Lord. May God help us then to pray through. And may we yet, in a very short time, be able to praise God and say, Jehovah-nessai, the Lord, my banner. Let's bow together in prayer. Our loving Heavenly Father, we come before Thee at a very critical time in the history of the world. But Lord, we thank Thee that in the floods of great waters they shall not come nigh unto Him. O God, we pray that we may not put our trust in horses or in chariots or the modern equivalent of them. But Lord, we pray that our trust may be upon the Lord who is our Masada, our Matsuda, our refuge and our strength, our fortress. O God, we pray that Thou would help us all to lay hold upon God in prayer and to pray through. And Lord, we ask of Thee that Thou would give a victory in this current situation in such a manner that we'll be able to say beyond any shadow of a doubt, this was the Lord's doing and this was the finger of Almighty God. Remember, Lord, those young men and young women who have gone for various churches to serve over there. Lord, put a circle of the blood round about them. Protect them by Thy mighty hand. And Father, we pray in due time that Thou would restore them back, their families and their friends once more. O God, be with us now, we pray. And Lord, keep us like John of old in the Spirit on the Lord's day. And Father, we pray. If Thou would answer prayer, then may our hands be held high by the power of our great High Priest and by the blessed Spirit of God. Part us, Lord, now in Thy fear and with Thy blessing, for we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.