All right, thank you, folks. Praise the Lord. That was good. Now, I noticed Preacher hadn't asked me to sing all week. Now, let me tell you, I was destined to be a great singer. Yes, sir. I didn't say I was. I said I was destined to be one. I went to my grandmama's one summer and spent the summer with her, and they had these old screen doors. You know, back then, I sang through a screen door and strained my voice. Never been able to sing since then. But anyway, one old boy said, my singing's like jailhouse singing. I'm always a few bars behind and looking for the right key. But anyway, well, thank you, preacher. My wife wouldn't let me put up that poster, either of me, in our bedroom. But anyway, thank the Lord for, hey, thank the Lord for his blessings, amen? Getting ready to say something about the preacher, and I can't think of what it was, but it was a good one, too. But anyway, let me just say a word about faith promise before we get into the message tonight. I hope this will be your biggest faith promise commitment. And you know, you just think about what God has done for us, how good He's been to us. Never be tight-fisted with God. Everything we have, He gave it to us. You say, well, I went to work, I did this. Listen, it wouldn't take but one little blood clot and you wouldn't be going to work no more the rest of your life. So God's been good to us, and I hope that you'll let God stretch your faith, and you'll just give like you've never given before for the cause of Christ. And I appreciate providing me, even though I don't live, but I only drive, we would only be driving a couple hours a day. Preacher was so kind, church was so kind to give us a place to stay, and it's a nice place, and I appreciate that. You missionaries have stayed in some nice places, and you missionaries have stayed in some places. I'll never forget preaching one time. I was up in Richmond, Virginia. It's been years ago preaching. And they put me in an old econolodge. And I was by myself. And I mean, when I say an old one, it was an old one. And it was right at the end of the Richmond Airport runway. And it didn't have hardly any insulation in it, so you could hear everything going on. I was on the very top floor. And planes came in that airport all night long. I mean, I thought the next one was going to skim the top of it. And I thought, Lord, I believe the next one's going to hit it. I believe it's going to hit the entire building that would be in it. I mean, you say, Preacher, how close did they come down on that thing? Well, all I know is I got to go to the bathroom at about 2 o'clock in the morning. A stewardess told me to sit down. So they were getting pretty close, I tell you that. But anyway. Praise the Lord. Exodus 17 tonight. Thank you, preacher, for letting me and my wife come. We've appreciated being here. I love you. I thank God for your church. And I praise the Lord for your people here. They're so kind and gracious. You know, I was reading something this afternoon about many years ago when the Moravians were a little more conservative than they are now. And of course, I know some are. But when they went to the mission field, Many times they would build a coffin for themselves and they would put all of their clothes and supplies and stuff in that coffin and ship it and take it with them overseas because they didn't expect to ever come back again. And I thought, boy, that's what you call dedication and sacrifice. So let's just have a word of prayer, and I want us to look at Exodus chapter 17. I want us to look at an Old Testament story that's going to tell us what I believe is the greatest need in missions today. You say, Preacher, what is the greatest need? Well, I'm going to give you my opinion on that. What I'm going to say is going to come from the Bible, but this is what I believe is the greatest need in missions today. Father in heaven, we certainly thank you for the privilege and the joy to come back at church tonight. Thank you for the attendance. Good crowd tonight. Pray you'll bless us, meet with us. I sure would like to be a blessing to these people, but unless you help me, I can't help them. And so Lord, I'm dependent upon you tonight. Give me clarity of thought. And we'll praise you and thank you for what you do. Give us, Lord, warm bread from the oven of thy word, and may we feast. May you give us a spirit of revival and an urgency about reaching this whole world. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Exodus chapter number 17. Preacher, the question is asked a lot of times. What do we need in missions? What do we need more than anything else? Well, when a missionary comes to a church like this week in these missions, you folks already support us and we so appreciate that. If you're going to take a missionary on, you usually promise him two things. There are two things you usually promise missionaries when you take them on. We're going to support you financially. because we know it's not cheap to go overseas, get on airplanes, get over there and have to live in an economy that most of them won't let you work or earn money off their economy. They want you pumping into their economy. So you need finances. They're vital. We can't go without them. And we find that taught in the Bible as well. But I believe the second thing that most churches say, we're not only going to give to you, we're going to do what? Y'all tell me. Pray, okay, very good. We're gonna pray for you. And I think we probably do better with the giving of our money than we do the praying. And listen, I'm guilty as dirt as well as some of you, and maybe some of you are not guilty of that. You know, your verse of scripture talked about in Matthew chapter 9, Jesus said that the harvest is plenteous but the labor is a few. What's the answer to that? Pray. Pray, pray that God, the Lord of the harvest, will send forth laborers into His harvest. So prayer is so vital, and I think it maybe is the missing ingredient in most Christians' lives personally, in our churches corporately, and in missions in particular. And I believe if we could correct that, and I could correct that, and listen, I'm preaching to myself tonight, okay? I'm going to let the preacher off tonight, I'll just preach to me tonight. But anyway, I want to challenge you tonight to enroll in a school. And I'm going to recommend a book for you to read. Of course, the main book is the Bible, always is the main book. But I want to encourage you to enroll in the school of prayer. You know, and you've heard this said that when the disciples were with the Lord Jesus, and by the way, I believe Jesus was the greatest preacher ever to have been on planet Earth, and teacher, preacher, but anyway, they heard Him preach, but they never, we don't have recorded, they may have asked Him, we don't know it, but we don't have recorded where they ever asked Him to teach them how to preach. Now preaching is important, amen? Man, preaching's important, but when they heard Him pray, And he got through praying, Lord, teach us to pray. Teach us to pray. And so it must have been something that so overwhelmed him. Well, in the school of prayer, there's only one subject. You don't have to take but one subject, and that's prayer. And then there's only one textbook, and that's the Bible. There's only one teacher, and that's the Holy Spirit. And there's only one perfect example of prayer, and that's the Lord Jesus Christ. And by the way, if you enroll in this school and learn about prayer, and I'm going to, let me just go ahead and give it to you now before I forget it. Harold Vaughan is an evangelist. He wrote a book on the prayer life of Jesus. If you Google it, you can probably find it online. I had some of them, and I don't know what I've done with them. I think I left them in my office. I meant to bring them. But anyway, it's one of the best books I've ever read in my entire Christian life on the prayer life of Jesus, and He is the example that we ought to seek to follow. But in this school, there's nobody that makes an A+. Nobody. Everybody has problems with the prayer life. Now, the reason I know that is because Romans chapter 8 tells us that. Romans 8, 26 says, the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities. Why, why preacher? For we know not what we should pray for as we ought. We don't even know what to pray for. So there's nobody gonna make an A plus in this school, but boy, I'll tell you, you will get the greatest education you've ever had and I've ever had. So prayer really does change things and things change when we pray. Missions was born in a prayer meeting. Acts 13, you read that sometimes, born in a prayer meeting. I heard this little, well I read it, I guess it was, boxing. Now this guy I'm going to tell you about real quick is not very well known, the Muhammad Ali's and George Foreman's and all are, but this guy back in the 1930's, his name was C.D. Blaylock. and he was famous for having a strong uppercut. I mean, he was powerful, man. He'd come up like that and hit an old boy under the chin, but he'd be on the canvas. They'd count him out and knock him out. Well, he's the only man in history that this is what I'm getting ready to say happened to. He went to give a guy that powerful, and I mean he was gonna lay one on him, and he'd come up, and he missed him, and he'd come up and hit himself in the nose, and he knocked himself out. And he's the only person in recorded history in boxing that lost the fight because he knocked himself out. Now, we're kinda doing that in our lives when we don't pray. You see, we have a fight on our hands as well. It's with the world, it's with the flesh, and it's with the devil. And it's with society, which is the world, it's with ourself, which is the flesh, and it's with Satan, who's the devil. And let me tell you something, if we don't pray, we're knocking ourselves out. It's not that we're just losing the battle, brother, we're knocking ourselves out. We're to blame for that. You know, I think about Scripture sometimes, and I read them, and I say, Lord, do I really believe that? Do I really believe Jeremiah 33? Call unto me, God said, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not. You mean, Lord, you're waiting for me to call on you because you want to show me some great and mighty things? Sure does. How about James 5, 16? The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. Now, you say, well, how in the world do you get missions out of Exodus 17? Well, you're there. We're going to start in a moment at verse number 8. Paul gives us the warrant or the permission to take Old Testament accounts and learn from them, and preach New Testament truth from them. And they're good examples of things, and that's what I want to do tonight. I want us to look at the nation of Israel. They had just come out of the land of Egypt. They had been delivered by the blood of the Lamb, and by the power of God, and they were now out across the Red Sea, and they were in the wilderness. And there was an unprovoked attack upon them by the Amalekites. Now we believe the Amalekites were a desert people and probably descended from the grandson of Esau. And it's a picture, many people believe it's a picture of the flesh, but anyway. Let's begin reading this and it is such a pretty picture of how, of intercessory prayer and of preaching the Word. Look at it if you would in verse 8. Then came Amalek and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men. Here's what I want us to do. Choose out men to fight with Amalek tomorrow. He said, now if you'll do that tomorrow, here's what I'm going to do. 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 they went down the valley with Amalek, and they fought with him. 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. The word prevail means to gain strength for the battle. And Moses' hands were heavy, and when he let his hands down, Amalek prevailed. Then verse 12, But Moses' hands were heavy, and they took a stone and put it under him. And he sat thereon, and Aaron and Hurst stayed up his hands, both of them, the one on one side, the one on the other side, and his hands were steady under the going down of the sun. And the result of that was that Joshua discomforted Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword. And the Lord said to Moses, by the way, the first time God's ever said in the Bible to write something down, He said, Write this for a memorial and a book, so the folks at Carytown would have it, so Preacher Baker can preach on it. I added a little bit to that verse. And rehearse it in the ears of Joshua, for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from heaven. Moses built an altar and called the name of it Jehovah Nissi. The word Nissi means banner or flag, war flag. For he said, Because the Lord has sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. So I want us to look at it tonight with the Lord's help and see, you know, anytime you're fighting a battle, and it is a battle for the souls of men, women, boys and girls, missionaries are sent to the front lines to do the fighting, and we as a church, now hey, we've got to do our battle too. We've got to win the folks in our community as we were talking about last night. But as they go and fight, boy, I'll tell you one thing, they need desperately. In fact, they need it more than our money, though they do need our monies, they need our prayers. I read one guy, he said there's nothing, there's no way a person can be more involved in missions back home apart from intercessory prayer. Do you realize tonight I can go anywhere in this world before I go to bed tonight? I can go to Italy tonight. I talked to one of our missionaries in Italy this afternoon, Brother Brandon Cook, and I can go to Italy tonight on my knees in behalf of that dear brother and his wife Kristen and those five little children. I can do that. I can intercede for them. I can pray. I can get a call from a missionary and he's having a battle. Man, I don't have to fly over there on an airplane, I can drop right to my knees. And I can have intercessory prayer in his behalf. So when we're dealing with the enemy, first of all, we gotta know who the enemy is, and then second of all, we need to know the most important weapon to use against him. Now I wanna give you a little outline here, and then I'm gonna do something I rarely ever do. I don't like to tell much about my past and statistics and details and all this. I just never felt comfortable doing it, but I'm gonna do a little bit of it tonight to show you the power of intercessory prayer. And have we prayed? I did pray, didn't I? Okay, the battle that was fought. That's our first point, the battle that was fought. And Joshua went down to fight in the valley. And he took the men of Israel, and they went down to fight. To me, that's a good picture. And I know I'm preaching some symbolic stuff here a little bit, but that's a good picture of the missionary who's gone down to take the sword of the Spirit, and he's on the front lines. He's invaded the devil's territory, and he's now fighting. He's fighting. He's using the sword of the Spirit. He's preaching the Word. He's trying to get the gospel out all around the world. Well, let me tell you, he goes down that valley, he needs somebody to go up on a mountain. He needs somebody to go up on that mountain and Moses said, you go to the valley and fight, I'll go to the hill and pray. You say, well, which is more important, prayer or fighting? Both of them are. You've got to do both of them. But I fear we're sending people in the valley to fight the battles over the souls of lost sinners all over the world, that nobody's much up on the mountainside, interceding and praying and begging God to be a help and to be a blessing. I believe the victory will not be won on the mission field alone. I believe the victory is going to be won when there's fighting in the valley and praying on the mountain. I believe that with all my heart. Our preacher has already said that we're a team. Missionaries need the church, and the church needs the missionaries. Amen? Well, that's more than just monies. It is monies, but it's more than monies, it's prayer. Now let's talk a little bit about this rod of God in your hand. He said, I'm going to go up there and I'm going to have the rod of God. That rod was pretty important in the life of Moses and the nation of Israel. You remember that rod? He took that rod into Egypt with him, and the Lord said, throw that rod down. It turned into a serpent. I mean, hey, that rod was a symbol of the power and the presence of God Himself. And so when God got ready to judge Israel, God said, Moses, you got the rod? Yes, sir, I got it right here. He said, I want you to strike the land, and when you do, I'm going to turn... I mean, the dust is going to turn to lice. I want you to take that rod. You still have the rod, don't you, Moses? Yes, sir, I got the rod. Assemble of the presence and power of God. He said just reach it over there and strike it on the water and it'll turn to blood. And so that rod was used many times when he got down to the Red Sea and they had to go across the Red Sea. He said take that rod and stretch it out over that water and God parted the waters. And so the people could go across. And by the way, sometimes we get the idea, I do, because I watched, what was his name that played in the Ten Commandments? Heston. And I saw that little movie and it looked like the water opened up probably as wide as this building right here and banked up about as high as the walls of the building. But boy, was I wrong. To get two and a half million people across the water in one night, it's estimated that river had to be opened up three miles wide. What a God we have. Amen. That's no problem for Him. And so the rod represented that. Then when they got in the wilderness just before the battle, they didn't have any water. God said, You got the rod, son? Yes, sir. Let me tell you, Moses is not getting rid of that rod. And so he said, well, you'll hit that rock and I'll give you water. You know, I thought, I used to picture it in my mind, I picture everything in the Bible in my mind, which I don't know why I try to see it. I'm wrong a lot of times. But I could just picture a 10-inch pipe coming out of that rock about that far, stick it out. And when he hit that rock, man, it was like you turn, you put that big old wrench on that fire hydrant, man, it was shooting water out there about 20 or 30 feet, big old stream of water like that. You know how much water it would take to water two and a half million people and all their cattle, all their sheep? It's estimated that it would have took 150 big tanker trucks every day to do that. And what a God we have, amen? And so here is the rod, and so He goes up there, and He's up there with first of all the rods in His hand, but He lifts both hands up, which is a picture of intercessory prayer. And so here the people are in the valley, they're fighting the battle, and man, let me tell you something, if I was one of the soldiers in the valley, And I knew they were praying for me, of course I'm praying too, amen? Man, I'm slinging the sword and I'm praying, begging God to help me. But while I'm doing that, I'm acknowledging that there's somebody, Moses, her and Aaron, are up on the mountain and they're interceding for me. And they hold the rod up as a symbol of the power of God and the presence of my God. And brother, I'm gonna tell you, you think about these in the valley, they were dependent upon those on the mountain. But could I tell you that those on the mountain were dependent on those to fight in the valley, because they were the ones that will kill the enemy and keep our families safe. So it was really a team effort here. And what a picture of that, what a picture. You know, we can work as hard as we want to, we can plan as much as we want to, but unless somebody's praying, it'll never have the effect that it should have before the Lord. Little victory will be known and great defeat. I believe there's a direct correlation between victory on the mission field and prayer in our churches. You ever had a missionary to come back home? I mean, boy, he planned to stay maybe for the rest of his life. And after a term, term and a half, he just come home with his head down, kind of embarrassed, hurt. And you know what? Sometimes we preachers have a tendency to do. I didn't think he'd make it. I thought he lacked something. I kind of could see it in him. I didn't think he... I ought to be ashamed of myself. Before I criticize that man, I ought to examine, how much did I pray for him? How much did I pray for his dear wife? The assistant director of our mission board, and he wouldn't mind saying it because he said it publicly. He said when he first went to the mission field, he went to Africa, he said his wife, Miss Karen, cried every night for six months. Every night of her life, she went to bed weeping. I can't do this. I can't have my little children in this kind of thing and she'll tell the same story. And let me tell you something, my friend. Somebody better be on the mountaintop praying while they're there in the valley fighting the battle to reach those people. And it's so vital that we do it so there was a battle that was fought and we have one too. Weariness in prayer will equal weakness in the battle. And we're talking about a battle between life and death, heaven and hell. So the battle that was fought, second of all, quickly, the burden that was felt. Look at verse 11. And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed, and when he laid it down, Amalek prevailed. But see, it was hard, it was heavy. It was a burden to hold up. You ever tried to hold your hands up? Just hold your hand out and maybe take a... You don't even have to take any weight. After a while, your hand gets so heavy, you can't hardly stand it. And so, he had the burden and he needed somebody to help him. He needed somebody to help him. Let me tell you what the church desperately needs, and I'm part of the problem, as well as, I hope, some of the solution, but I'm part of the problem. We've got to have people that really get a hold of this thing of prayer, intercessory prayer. We've got to do that. And I've always said that when we started Calvary Baptist Church, there were several things that we emphasized. preaching of the word, preaching and teaching, visitation, Sunday school, and prevailing prayer. Now, I wish I could say it was all my prevailing prayer that built a miracle church, but I can't say that. But I had some people that knew what it was to walk with God, fellowship with God. Now, they were human beings like we were. They were in the school of prayer. And they weren't A students, but boy, they were up there pretty good. And we had some people that could really, really, really pray. I want to tell you about a couple. And you can do this, but don't do it if it's not God's will for you. I had a man in our church named John Vernon. John Vernon was a little bit peculiar. He had a good mom and daddy. And his daddy and mama were godly people, and of course they were dead when I first got to the church. They had already died. His mama, when the kids would come, when John was a boy and come home, if they entered the house and mama was sitting in the rocker with the apron up over her head, they got quiet because they knew mama was praying. His daddy, he said his daddy, they hauled produce from Miami up to North Carolina and back. He said every time my daddy riding down the interstate pulling this tractor-trailer and all, he said every time he passed the church, he took his hat off and tipped it to God, put it back on. Wasn't a show now. Those kind of people are gone. They're a thing of the past. But I'll never forget when John was on his deathbed. He was my greatest prayer warrior I've ever had. And missionaries, when you go into churches, you try to find you one or two if you can. Sometimes you won't find one because you don't know the people maybe well enough to do it. But anyway, you find you some prayer warriors having them on the mountain while you're down fighting the devil there in that other country where you're going to be going to. But old John told me on his deathbed, he said, Preacher, I'll never forget the first service you were our pastor. It was on a Wednesday night. I said, John, I remember it too. I said, I can tell you what I preached out of. I preached 1 Thessalonians 1. He said, you did. He said, when that service was over, I went outside and went around behind that old storefront building that we were meeting in. And he said, I looked up into heaven and I said, God, I believe this young man. I was 26 then. He said, I believe this young man will probably make us a good preacher, but he don't have what it takes. And he said, Lord, nobody has what it takes unless you give it to them. And he said, God, if you want me to, I'll be my preacher's prayer warrior until I die or he leaves. And he said that night, behind that building, God confirmed that he wanted him to be my prayer warrior. And John Vernon was the prayinest man that I've ever known. And he never did things so that people could see it. For 29 years, John Vernon came to our church at 5.30 on Sunday morning. He did it. He would have done it longer, but he got where he couldn't see at night when it was dark in the morning, and so he couldn't drive. For 29 years, he came to our church. And I know what he did because I'd go down there real early sometimes just to watch him. I never let him know I was in the building. And he would come up and he'd cut on one light in the auditorium, he'd take his Bible, and he'd walk and read for about 15 minutes. He'd close his Bible, he'd come up here, he'd drop down on his knees, and within 5 minutes he was weeping. And he was begging God to help Preacher Baker. God, you're going to have to help the preacher, he needs your power. And he would pray for me for 30 to 45 minutes. He would stop praying for me and then he would go down and kneel beside of every pew and beg God to touch the lives of whoever be sitting on that pew. And he'd work himself all the way through the auditorium including the last auditorium we had that was a pretty large building. He would then leave and he would slip out and go to every Sunday school class. And he would pray and beg the Lord to help that teacher and those students and then he'd even go to the nursery. And it'd be about 8.30 then, three hours is past the praying. Then he'd go get on his church bus and he'd run a bus route to bring boys and girls to Jesus. What a man of God he was, what a man of prayer. By the way, at his funeral, there was two or three hundred people at his funeral. I told what I just told you. I said, how many of you people knew that John did that for 29 years? And the only people that I know that raised their hand was his immediate family. He never told anybody. He never told it. You ever seen people that'll pray all night so they can come in the next morning? Well, guess what I did? Last night I stayed up and prayed. Man, that ain't worth five cents. Do it under the Lord, amen? Do it under the Lord. I challenge you. Missionaries, find you some prayer warriors. I wish I could tell you, and I will, maybe in a minute, tell you a few things. Belle Sandifer, Miss Sandifer is one of my prayer warriors, her mind is gone now, and she's waiting to go to heaven. But Miss Sandifer, I would give her my itinerary, missionaries, the itinerary of what church you're going to be in, what's the date and all that stuff, and I'd give her a copy of that, and I'd give John a copy of it. and a few others, and Miss Sandifer, if I would say I'd been out on meetings, when I'd come into church and she saw me, she'd have her walker, and our eyes would meet, I'd start toward her, she'd start toward me. And I don't care where I'd been, she would come up to me, preacher, and she'd say, hey, Brother Baker, how was your meeting at Currytown this past week? You know why she knew where I'd been? Because she'd been begging God and praying for me. I've lost those two prayer warriors. I think about Loretta and Pam, two ladies in Myrtle, Mississippi in a church. They tell me they are my prayer warriors and pray for me every day. I remember I was in Hickory preaching at Tabernacle in Hickory, North Carolina. And I got a notice in this lady, elderly lady, and I don't know, there was something about her, just seemed like she loved God. And I said, Miss Barbara, I said, do you enjoy praying? Oh, she said, I talked to my Jesus all the time. I said, you ever read your Bible much? She said, preacher, I couldn't live without my Bible. She said, I have to read a chapter or two every day in my Bible. And she started, we just started, she wasn't boasting, she was a very humble woman. And I said, Miss Barbara, would you consider being a prayer warrior for me and my wife? What's a prayer warrior, preacher? And I explained to her what I wanted her to do. And she said, Oh, I'd be delighted. Her face lit up. I'm going to tell you, there's some older folk in your church that love God, but they can't do what they used to could do, but they can be a prayer warrior. And some of the best you will ever see. Then I think about Miss Connie down in Central South Carolina. I remember one day I was in a mission meeting and I went out on a visitation. Saw this lady standing in the yard, went over and talked to her. She was a very unattractive lady. She had some real issues about her appearance. I got a witness into her and she had just moved there and she couldn't drive and she didn't have a way to church. But she said she was saved. And I said, if I can get a couple from the church to come by and get you, would you go? That's been eight years ago. And she goes to that church every service now and they come pick her up. And so the next time I was there, I said, Miss Connie, would you be a prayer warrior for me? And I got her. And then I think about Hope and Carol Robinson in Statesville that are my prayer warriors. And not only I send them stuff, they send me stuff. I'm just saying we've got to get some people praying again. We've got to do that. We've just got to do that. So the battle was fought. But it wasn't one just down in the valley with the sword. It was a combination of the sword and intercessory prayer on the mountain. You see what I'm saying? And then the burden, it's a burden. Praying is a burden. Praying is not easy. And then the banner. The banner that was flown was like a war flag. And you know what happened in verse 13? They won the battle. They won the battle. There was a book to record it. There was an altar. They gave God the credit. Can I just say a word about Calvary Baptist Church, and I say this to the glory of God, and I say this to show you what can happen in prayer. I told you the four things we always emphasized. We had cottage prayer meetings. And I'm not saying you ought to do all this. That's not what I'm saying. Don't copy somebody. Let's just do what God wants you to do. And so I remember we had cottage prayer meetings before revival meetings. You say, don't that tire people out? Yeah, but what meetings we had. Amen. And then we'd have prayer rooms before services, and we'd have Saturday... Let me tell you, the driving spiritual force behind Calvary Baptist Church was a group of men that met every Saturday night. at eight o'clock, eight o'clock every Saturday night. We started that when I first got there, and when I left after 32 years, that thing was still going on, amen? And I never pushed for people to come, preacher. I never said, where y'all been? You deacons not in the prayer meeting. I never ever did that, because the only people I wanted there were the people who really wanted to be there. And we'd have in those early days four people, five people sometimes, and as our church grew, of course, that number grew, and I tell you, we prayed about everything. I remember we needed a Spanish building. We were running out. We had about 75 Spanish folk. We didn't have anywhere to put them. And I said, Lord, we've got to have a building or something. We're going to have to go somewhere and get a building or build one here. And we didn't have the money to build one. So we started praying about that, begging God to give us a Spanish building. One day, a realtor come to the church and knocked on my door. And I said, come on in. I knew him. And he said, I got a church for sale. I said, you do? Where at? And he said, they only want $350,000 for it. I said, is that all? He said, yeah, $350,000. I went back to that Saturday night prayer meeting and I said, they got a church, they got our building, but we can't give them that kind of money, so we're going to have to pray that we're going to get that building somehow without all that money. And without going into details, when we ended up buying it, we got it for $1,000. And it wouldn't have been a thousand, but they owed some money, and they wanted to pay off a thousand dollars, so we got it for a thousand dollars. We pray for dirt. You ever prayed for a pile of dirt? Preacher, that's strange, isn't it? We just got to the place, we prayed, we just believed that God was going to answer prayer. And I'm going to tell you, I wasn't the strong one in the prayer meetings. It's kind of like what I was talking about last night about the rank and file church member has a great influence. But it was John, and oh, I can't name all the people. There wouldn't be any need to do that. But I remember we were needing some dirt. We were doing some construction around the building. We had to have some dirt. Well, we didn't have any money. I mean, zero. We didn't have nothing. I mean, we had enough money to keep things going, but that was it. And so John, my prayer warrior, he said, well, preacher, you know, they're building that bank over there. And King said, man, they've dug that place out. He said, there's a pile of dirt over there about half as big as this building. And he said, why don't you go over there, let's pray about that dirt. So we got on our face that night and begged God to give us that pile of dirt. I went over there on Monday, and I said, sir, I said, talk to the construction man building that bank. I said, what you gonna do with that dirt? He said, I got it sold. I didn't know you sold dirt. I thought dirt was dirt. You know, I didn't know you sold it. And I said, you sell dirt? He said, sure you sell dirt, son. Of course, I was ignorant about all that stuff. And so I said, well, I said, somebody's already bought it? He said, yep, they've already spoken for it. He said, they're gonna come get it, and they're gonna pay me X number of dollars. I went back to the prayer meeting. I said, well, John can't get that. He said, that's strange. I said, what do you mean it's strange we can't get it? He said, the Father has given me assurance that we're getting that dirt. He said, preacher, we can't give up on the dirt. The Lord wants us to have it. So we started going over there every Saturday night. pitch dark, on the van, six or seven of us, we'd gather around and just get on our knees around that pile of dirt and beg God for it. Now, we didn't tell anybody what we were doing, we didn't make a show of it, we just believed that God would give us the dirt. We prayed about two or three weeks like that, and John said, Preacher, I believe if you go back to that man, we'll get that dirt. And I'm thinking, he's already sold the dirt. So my faith wasn't big, you know. So I went back, walked on the job and saw the foreman. I said, sir, I don't mean to bother you. I was here a few weeks ago. See, I remember you. I said, you know this pile of dirt you got here? I said, is that guy, I guess it's still sold to that guy, isn't it? He said, that sorry rascal, he said he called me Friday, last Friday, and backed out on the deal. I said, how much did you say you wanted for this dirt? He said, can you move this pile of dirt by this Saturday? That was on Monday. I said, yes, sir. I had no idea how we'd do it. I said, yes, sir. He said, I'll give it to you. And we had a man in the church work for a construction company, and they give us a dump truck and a front end loader. And buddy, we worked Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday morning, we had the last pile of that dirt off. I'm just saying, pray about everything. Pray about everything. It don't make no difference what it is. I remember in 1990, and I hate doing, I don't like doing this, but I'm trying to show you the power of God. And it wasn't my prayers, I'm telling you. I wish I could tell you it was my prayers. But I had some praying people. They got a hold of this thing of prayer. And it was 1995 and you know you have to motivate people. You know, one of the big jobs of your pastor and every pastor is to try to get people, motivate people to do what they already know they're supposed to do. But anyway, so it was 1995, and I always tried to use everything I could to motivate people. I said, folks, by that time we were running about 400. I said, let's pray. We had a revival meeting coming up in a few weeks. And he was a good evangelist. And we were gonna go Sunday morning to Friday night. And I said, let's pray, it's 1995. Let's pray that God will give us 95 visitors. We'll bring 95 visitors to the church that week. Well, I could see people kinda looking at each other like, we ain't never had 95 visitors in any week. I went around to all the Sunday school classes, I said, let's trust God for it. But now you're gonna have to work. So you not only go up on the mountain, but you gotta go to the valley and go get them. You gotta do both. It's not fight or pray, it's fight and pray. And so I challenged our people and got them really stirred up about it. And when that week ended, we had 97. Not visitors. 95 people got saved that week in that meeting. I had the joy and privilege, me and my assistant, to baptize 76 people the next two weeks. And I give God the glory for that, brother. And I guarantee you, old John Vernon, when he said he prayed for me, his son said sometimes he'll go in the prayer closet, and he said he'll stay there three hours, and I listened in on him, and he's still praying for you after three hours. I mean, he was a great man of prayer. Probably most of what Calvary did was due to him. I'm gonna give you one more illustration and I'm through. We had a man, and we prayed for souls. I mean, we didn't just pray for dirt. Amen, we prayed for souls. And I'll never forget, there was an old boy coming to church. In fact, he came to hear me preach at a church here in the area not too long ago, and he still goes to Calvary. But anyway, old Junior, Junior, we'd won his children to the Lord through the bus ministry. His wife started coming, she was already saved, and he would come every Sunday morning. He was lost as he could be. He'd sit right over there, about halfway back, right on the aisle, his two girls would sit, and then his wife. Every Sunday morning I preached, I would be looking, and one of his little girls sitting beside him would pull on his coat tail like, don't you want to be saved? He did that for just over a year. Every Sunday. He was more faithful than a lot of our church members. Every Sunday he would do that. We were in one of them Saturday night prayer meetings, and I don't recommend this kind of prayer preacher. I ain't got it figured out theologically yet. And we're praying, and old John let out that night, my prayer warrior. He let out, and we just prayed one at a time. And he started praying, and we started crying. And he said, old Junior Martin's gonna die and go to hell, Lord. said the gospel, he's been hearing it every week for over a year, and said, I'm afraid it's going to harden his heart, Lord, and we want to see him saved, we don't want the devil to have him. And old John said, Lord, I'm going to believe you right now, right now in this prayer, you're going to save him in the morning. He's going to get saved in the morning, Lord, I just know you're going to save him. And I'm the theologian of the crowd, and I'm sitting there thinking, can you do that? Can you pray like that? I mean, I know we're gonna pray for him to be saved, but you gonna tell God you believe he's gonna get saved in the morning? Next guy prayed and he started weeping, praying for Junior. He said, I believe Junior's gonna get saved tomorrow too. Well, man, there's about five of us and he come around to me. And I thought, Lord, can I pray that kind of prayer? I said, Lord, I said, I'm sorry for my unbelief. And then God broke my heart and I said, I'm gonna join these men and we're gonna trust you to save Junior in the morning. Now he'd probably been there 50 times. Same routine every Sunday. But the next Sunday, that's five men I could look at, man, there was anticipation on their face. And of course my weakness of my faith sometimes, I'd say, Lord, if you don't save him, what's that gonna do to those men? I said, excuse me, Lord, you're gonna save him. I preached the gospel that morning and here's one of his little daughters did the same thing. Would you be saved? No, no, no, no. I saw it. I kept looking. In a minute he caught my eye and I caught his eye and down the aisle he came and Junior Martin got saved that morning. Now I'm not telling you to pray that way. I'm not even sure if that's the scripture way to pray. I ain't got it all figured out yet. But I know that people had faith that people would be saved. I wish I could tell you the preacher boys that are around the world today, and around this country, pastoring, preaching, missionaries, that God saved out of there. There's so many things. I'm going to bring it to a halt. You know, it doesn't take many to pray, just one. The Bible said when Moses came down from the mountain and the children of Israel had gone back into idolatry with golden calves and all that stuff. You know what he told Moses? He said, Stand aside, I'll wipe them out and start over with you. And you know what? Old Moses interceded for them and begged God not to do it. One man, one man, and I'm gonna read to you Psalms. Psalm 106 refers to this. Therefore God said, he would have destroyed them had not Moses stood before him in the breach to turn away his wrath, lest he should have destroyed. He saved the entire nation of Israel through one man's prayer. One man, one man. Hezekiah, I love Hezekiah. I love Hezekiah. Oh, Hezekiah got a letter, I call it a letter from the devil, came from Sennacherib. And he wrote him a letter and he said, Hezekiah, I'm coming to Jerusalem. It won't be long before I'll be in camp round about your city, and you can talk about your God all you want to, and I'm paraphrasing. You can talk about your God all you want to, but we've defeated all these other countries and every one of them had gods too. So your Jehovah ain't gonna be nothing to us. We're gonna come in, we're gonna slaughter y'all, we're gonna come in and take you. And you know what, of course, the letter was a scroll. You know what the Bible says that Hezekiah did? First of all, he sent a messenger to go tell Isaiah. And then he went straight to the house of God. And he rolled that scroll, rolled it out. And I believe he must have done something like this. Lord, I got a letter, I need you to read it. Well, God already knew what was in it. And he began to rehearse how great God was and what Sennacherib was saying, and he begged God to save the city of Jerusalem and all of its people. The next morning a runner came and said, King, and I'm paraphrasing again, there's a hundred and eighty-five thousand soldiers outside the town, and every one of them is dead as a doornail. One man's prayer saved the whole city. I remember when Dale Moody went over to Europe, and he came, I remember reading about it, I don't remember reading about it, I'm not that old. I'm almost that old, but I ain't quite that old. You know, there were two elderly ladies that wrote him, sent him a telegraph and said, you left too soon, you gotta come back. God has told us you're going to have revival here. Europe is going to have, Great Britain is going to have revival if you'll come back. And he got so seasick on the boats he said he'd never go back, so he wrote them back or telegraphed them back and said, I can't come. These are two elderly ladies, never been married, love God, women of prayer, and said, Mr. Moody, you'll be out of the will of God the rest of your life if you don't come back. And it kept bearing on his heart, he went back, and it was that trip that God gave a great revival to Great Britain under that man's ministry. I'm just saying God's waiting, God's waiting, God's waiting. You know, we just need to fall on our face and touch heaven for somebody, some soul, some community, some missionary, and just believe God can do some great things, amen? Some of us men, and I know you can pray anywhere, I know you can pray anywhere, and you don't tell people, you don't make it a show, but sometimes it do some of us men good to humble ourself a little bit and go out in the woods somewhere and find us a stunt, take our Bible, get down on our knees in a pair of blue jeans and just beg God to do something in our soul. Ask God to please help us, and I'm gonna be like Jacob of old, Lord, I can't let you go until you bless me. And some of you ladies standing there washing your dishes at the sink and the kids are outside, you could beg the Lord to make a difference in your life and be a prayer warrior for somebody. Amen? Just keep on praying until the light breaks through. The Lord will answer. He'll answer you. God keeps His promises. His Word is true. Just keep on praying until the light breaks through. God's a good God. Amen? And He wants to show Himself mighty through simple people, ordinary people that believe Him. Let's bow in prayer. Heavenly Father, thank You for the attention. I've preached a little longer all week. I pray You'll bless tonight. Thank You for their kindness to be patient. But I pray tonight that You'll raise up some prayer warriors. Maybe this preacher already has them, but he needs them. This pastor needs some people that'll take it upon themselves to daily, and I'm sure there are many that already pray, but some that will go beyond the first mile and go the second mile and be the preacher's prayer warrior. Never has to tell a soul about it. Father, I pray that you'll raise up people that'll take a missionary or two missionaries and spend time in prayer with them on a regular basis. I pray, Lord, there'll be lost people all over this community that'll start getting saved because some of your children have talked to you about them and then talked to them about you, and you answered prayer and you saved souls. We love you today. God, would you bless. We ask you tonight, that night, to bless the faith promise of this church. May people's faith be stretched. But we believe that as vital as money is, and it is, Lord, there's nothing more vital than intercessory prayer. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Let's stand to our feet tonight. If you need to come gather around the altar, whatever you need to do, you mind the Lord. Do nothing to please this preacher, but everything to please God. Now you may say, I want to be a prayer warrior, but I'm afraid I'll fail. You will. But you don't stay down when you fail. You realize in the school of prayer, you'll never be an A student. You don't know everything about it, and neither do I. But the Holy Ghost of God will help you. And God can use your life to make a difference in so many people's lives, in the future of this church, in the power of God on your pastor. Oh, how I've wished to many a time I could talk to John. Now I've got his picture on my wall in my office. First time I visited his home, he had an 8 by 10 picture on his wall of the preacher. I told his son, I said, your daddy's got an 8 by 10 picture of me on his living room wall. He said, did you go in the rest of the house preacher? He said he's got a picture of you in every room of the house. So no matter which room he goes in, God reminds him that you are dependent on his prayers. There's just not much of that anymore, is there? Preacher. Okay.