This was transcribed from Paul's message. There are places on the tape where the words could not be understood it was replaced by "?????")

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1999 New Years Eve Message 12/31/98

"Dying to Live in Kansas City" by Paul Cain

(Pt 2 of 2)

 

PAUL CAIN SPEAKING:

Now we are in a similar situation here in Kansas City. The only solution to our woes and to our problems with so many coming down with cancer and even in the leadership of the church. Those great people have been smitten with these afflictions. Now here is our dilemma. Either we pray without ceasing and don't give up just because you get a good report. Now, with all due respect and with all kindness, I am not trying to destroy any faith, we should not stop praying for Don Steadman. We should not stop praying for anyone who has a remission or seems to be getting all good reports because the same faith that we employ praying for them to get these good reports, we may need to maintain that for them to keep getting good reports from here on out. Let's keep the demon of cancer, that has an intelligence all it's own, let's keep cancer away from this body by red-hot intercession, prayer, fasting and a lifestyle that pleases God.

I want to show you that five great things came out of this Acts 12 prayer meeting at John Mark's mother's house.

1) The angel of the lord delivers Peter from prison and that was no little miracle. 2) The angel of the lord smote Herod because he gave not the glory to God. 3) The Word of God grew. 4) The Word of God multiplied. 5) The greatest missionary journey in all of history. Paul and Barnabus launched on the first missionary journey.

So it pays to pray. Look what comes out of it.

(Matthew 17:21) Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.

Some things don't move easily. Some things are not easily cast out, done in or done away with. So, we are going to be approaching some big demons and some big problems. Forget about Y2K and think about the problems of 1999 that God is giving you and giving me the opportunity to stand in the gap, to pray again, to war again. There is going to be a war of the saints, especially here in Kansas City. I challenge every one of you listening around the world tonight, I challenge you to make this a year of warring. A lot will depend upon how far Y2K goes, by how far we go in our prayer, our red-hot prayers as we keep praising God, worshipping God and praying day and night without ceasing.

So the church is being called upon to fast in this desperate hour. We need to fast in many and varied ways of life. I know some people who just are tired of reading something about the news. They fast the news and they fast the newspapers. They fast CNN, they fast television news. They fast periodical reading and book reading.

You can fast television, that's a tough one right there. When I first started apostolic ministry as a teenager, I want you to know that television was just coming in. It hit New York big time. It was black and white then and had a lot of snow in it them. We had snow just about every night even in the summer, just by watching television. But anyway, I hated that thing. It was like a demon that started rising up against the church and it started eventually emptying the churches. It also emptied the theaters. A lot of the great theaters out west are closed now because of television, when television hit. We used to rent out some of the largest and most beautiful theaters in the country because television closed them down. Television was a one-eyed monster that just robbed the church of attendance. Let me tell you something, it wouldn't hurt the church to fast television. You say, "What about Christian Television?" There will be no Christian Television when we get to heaven so you might as well get used to it now. ????? I wouldn't want to go to heaven with Christian Television. Wouldn't you be bored watching television throughout eternity for millions and billions and quartrillions of years?

Oh my, no way. Just let everything that hath breath praise the lord will be praising the lord without television doing anything. Thank God for television right now, but I'm going on a fast. Now, you have heard me, didn't you? I am going on a fast, but lord, don't take my videos away from me. I just rented some videos and I'm anxious to go home and watch them.

But this is a wake-up call for the church and for Kansas City. We really are sleeping. Not all of you, but some of you are sleeping. The bad thing about sleeping, as I have said before, is that you don't know you are sleeping until you wake up. Before a great awakening there is going to be a rude awakening. We do things in our sleep that we would never think of doing while we are awake and the church is doing some embarrassing things these days. When I was a young Southern Baptist, I had been ordained by a Southern Baptist church. I had been a fiery Pentecostal preacher before that, but there was so much legalism in the Pentecostal church that I ????. I thought that I would find less gossip and less sin in a more revived church. Well, it was just ??? some of the shameful things of the other group, they made up for in other ways so I was just out of the frying pan and into the fire. So the only way out of this is for us to truly wake up and for us to truly, truly see what the major vision is. It's not leaving Metro and going into something else or leaving that something and going into something else, you will never find peace. But there is a rude awakening right where you are and we need to come out of our sleep. Amen. ??????? (changed tape here)

Kansas City, June 1996, the IHOP vision, Intercession, Holiness, Offering and the Prophetic and that was enough to bring me here, but the thing that happened in August of 1997 in which God revealed to me that Kansas City was a place of day and night prayer. I couldn't think of any other place because I thought, if Kansas City is red-hot on this day and night prayer, then that is where I have to be because I had a dream in Anaheim, California and I was told that I would not survive and I would not come through what I was suffering if I did not find a place of day and night prayer. So I hopped a plane from Anaheim to Kansas City for that reason. Well, I am here for that reason and if you let down and you stop praying without ceasing, if you discontented the vision for your ????/ than I am stuck and a lot of other people will sink with me. But let's go all the way with this. God is beginning to use similar events like in Acts 12 to wake up the sleepy church.

(Proverbs 6:10-11) Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: {11} So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man.

My mother has quoted this scripture to me in her lifetime probably hundreds of times.

Father, I pray that you will anoint the rest of this message and not let anything take away from it. Lord, we refuse to listen to that fallen worshipper ever again. We refuse to give in to the spirit of witchcraft and Jezebel ever again, in Jesus name, amen.

This is not a time to sleep. This is not a time to be numb or to numb our senses with the wine of Babylon or any other kind of wine if you want to know the truth about it. You say, "Well, what about wine drinking? There's nothing in the bible about drinking wine as a sin, it's only drunkenness that is a sin." Well, be that as it may, this is the time for soberness. We are right on the heels of doom or we are right on the threshold of the greatest move of God in all of the history of the world combined. So don't you think it's good if we give up the wine of Babylon and all else that comes from Babylon and come out from among her because the good that are in her will perish with the bad. All the bad that are in her. So you don't want to be the good mixing with the bad. That is an unholy mixture. God has come to give something to his people in an unprecedented way. He will visit his people without mixture, with his Spirit without measure.

(Ephesians 5:14-16) Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. {15} See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, {16} Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

I want you brothers and sisters to know that we here tonight, (it's just before midnight, I can say it) We are the only people on God's earth, on this planet, who have a unique ability to buy time. Redeem and buy it. We, the children of God, can buy time. We can say, "just a little longer please, Jesus." That's not just an icky song. That is a special message to the church; just a little please, Jesus, just a little longer to get our loved ones in. There is time for you and I to buy time because the days are so evil. It seems like one more day of evil will overwhelm us. No, we can buy time.

Luke 21:26 describes a vision I had about AIDS, a communicable form of cancer as it were coming upon the human race. Twenty years ago I preached ardently and even some of the of the medical community and doctors were attending our meetings who were great friends of ours who said, "Paul, you're going to ruin your ministry and lose all of your credibility because there is no proof and never will be that cancer is communicable. There will never be anything like this, surely. If you want to keep your ministry intact, don't say that anymore." But I kept saying there was a ???? that in the last days men's hearts would fail them for a form of disease that would come upon them through sexual acts and would transmit a thing like cancer. It would be communicable and they would die from it and men's hearts would fail them for fear of this coming upon them. Well, there are other reasons too, men's hearts failing them from fear and from looking after those things that are coming upon the earth. There will be people who will die over Y2K, over the fear of it. Not over the calamities, but over the fear of it before a calamity ever comes. So let's get that out of us right now, amen? Let's work on that. We have a whole year to do it. So don't fear those things which are coming upon the earth for the powers of the heavens shall be shaken.

(Luke 21:34) And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares.

This is an awesome warning tonight. This is why we should not partake of the wine of Babylon. That is the reason we should not get investing into the money system, the world system of Babylon because Babylon will fall. We must have our feet in the unseen which is the only real thing left to have faith in. The seen is absolutely futile, that is not real. It's the unseen that is our way out and our invisible means of support.

(Luke 21:35-36) For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. {36} Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.

"Oh, but the grace of God will cover us." Oh we say that the lord will take care of it, "Jesus paid it all." Of course he did, but why should we watch then? Why should we pray? Why pray if it has already been determined what God is going to do? No, we can pray and God will hear our prayers and God will heal our land. God will save our household, he will save our nation; maybe in a day.

{36} Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.

Brother Bud and I were talking tonight about the need to pray the kind of prayers that I prayed in the early part of my message and the kind that I want to end with. John 12:38

(John 12:28) Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. where that saying of Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled which he spake.

(Isaiah 53:1-2) Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?

all right, I am closing this message, but I'm closing it on a positive note. Earlier I talked about the finger of God. Do you know he spans the heavens with His little finger? If he can do all of that with his little finger and he brought the stars in space and hung all of the constellations in the sky and he did all of that with his finger and his hand, what on earth could He do with His arm? I want to end this on that.

We have something wonderful to look foreword to and my heart will not fail me for fear because I see the finger of God and I see Him casting out devils. I see the hand of God, I see Him making all things well and I see the arm of God strengthening us to preach the prophetic gospel to the ends of the earth and then shall the end come. God has raised us up for such a time as this for the time is for the arm of the lord to be revealed.

In the 1960's we published a periodical called, "Our Report." It was a clever little thing that we came up with because we had a scripture at the top that said, "Who has believed our report?" Then underneath it we had the rest of the scripture, "And to whom has the arm of the lord been revealed?" Then we would have some pages in there of testimonies of people who had been saved in the meetings and people who had been healed in the meetings, people who had marvelous deliverance's. They were the

ones to whom the arm of the lord was revealed. So I say there will be a greater manifestation of this. We are going to hear from people who have believed the everlasting gospel, who have believed the prophetic gospel, who have believed the report which is the prophetic gospel and to whom the arm of the lord has been revealed. God has raised us up for such a time as this and the lord wants to reveal his arm.

One last thought: God is looking for true worshippers who are always in the pursuit of worshipping Him in Spirit and in truth. He is seeking for those who worship Him, to worship Him in Spirit and in truth. That is how we come into alignment with the plan and the purpose of God for us.

(Psalms 8:3) When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained;

The work of His hands in other words. The lord made the heavens and the earth by the work of His hands, but just wait until you see, in the last days, what He will do when He reveals His arm. His arm is about to be revealed. His arm is about to be revealed in the prophetic gospel. His arm is about to be revealed in the most invasive move of God the world has ever seen. It will be the preaching to the ends of the earth of the prophetic gospel in a way that none will be able to gainsay or resist it.

The redemptive work of God. I just want to add that a whole city will hear it, like Ninevah, and turn to the lord in a day. The whole nation will hear it, I don't know by what means, but they will hear the preaching of the prophetic gospel and one day maybe in your lifetime and mine, we will see a nation! I hope it's Iraq. I hope it's Jordan. I hope it's Israel because he promised that he would purge the iniquity of Israel in a day! In one day! So I hope he turns nations to him in one day and the preaching of the prophetic gospel can do that. The redemptive work of God: the cross, the death, the burial and the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ according to the prophets.

I tell you, I used to come home from a meeting and my mother would say, "Was it a good meeting? Was there any Azusa there?" I said, "What do you mean by that?" She said, "Was there any presence of the lord there? Did anybody shout? Did anybody get saved? Did anybody get healed?" Well, I just want all of that to happen here tonight. I know my mother is looking in on this. I don't think she is looking in by internet, they don't have it up there. Microsoft is too hard for heaven. They have something better and she has a way of looking over, into this service tonight and my Grandmother is looking in too, saying, "There's my Buzzy, God bless him."

That's what she always said when I preached.

All right, I don't apologize for preaching so long. I wish I could preach longer. ??????????/ I'm glad to be here and to be anointed. If you don't think I'm anointed then that just shows you how much the devil has fooled you. ????

(Revelation 18:1-4) And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. {2} And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. {3} For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.

Won't you prepare for it tonight? In closing, can we see the need of coming back to those four values that I came here because I wanted to share those values with you? I wanted to live them out with you and I intend to live out my value of a celibate life with you in hopes that somewhere along the way there will be others who will be able to make it.

There is a great reward in that. There is a reward in being a eunuch for Christ. There is a reward for making a choice of this kind. There is a reward for making the IHOP choice. There is a reward for making all of this extravagant giving to the poor, the choice to do that. All of these:

IHOP, in this international house of prayer is also meaning by acronym, this great intercession and pursuit of holiness, and offering to the poor and this prophetic preaching; let me tell you, some great things are in store.

But the things that I have read to you of a negative nature: Babylon falling, which means get out of her or you will fall with her. 2 Peter 3:11-14, and I'm closing. What manner of people ought we to be? I'm asking you, will you prepare yourself with me, for 1999?

(2 Peter 3:11-14) Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, {12} Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? {13} Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. {14} Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot, and blameless.

Heavenly Father, tonight I have preached none other invitation than that of the sinless, spotless Son of the Living God; His invitation to discipleship.

(Luke 9:23) And he said to them all, (It's a matter of choice) If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.

Lord, we want to follow your steps throughout 1999. We don't want to just be secular Christians and believers and be a part of a humanistic form of church that both saint and sinner would do no differently and if we come into a situation saying, "What would Jesus do?" Then try to do it. Lord, we want to be so filled with your power and with the lord Jesus Christ. We want to be so much in Christ, for in Adam all died, but in Christ are made alive. We want to be so much alive in you that we would automatically do, what it is to do when we see a situation of the poor, or with the saints suffering and especially with the lost and dying. Lord, we will just do it because we are following in your steps.

I want every one of you that will accept the challenge, you have plenty of time before this meeting is over, to accept the challenge of making 1999 the most important year, ever, in your life. We don't know how many else we will have, if we will have many more years. ???? go all through 1999, but lord willing, if we have 1999 before us, will you accept this challenge tonight to make every day count? My ??????? used to say that happiness is the elusive thing in the world and I gave up on it. But I'm still thinking that happiness, to me, means something to look foreword to. I heard that and it just kind of set with me. Have you ever heard a little thing like that? Just something said accidentally? Not even a believer said that. I thought, that's what it is, that's what happiness is, something to look foreword to. I'm looking foreword to red-hot, glorious intercession and prayer meetings. I'm looking foreword to IHOP becoming a reality. I'm looking foreword to Shiloh amounting to something more than we ever dreamed of. I'm looking foreword to 1999 producing marvelous results as the lord comes along side us and the Holy Spirit automatically accompanies us and we do things that we do not ordinarily do and we say things that we cannot ordinarily say; and preach the prophetic gospel just this way and then a city or a nation will come to the lord in a day.

???? messed up all day and the last two days I've been under an attack, but I cried out to the lord over and over. I said, "Lord, keep me out of palpitations, keep me out of atrofibulation." Right now I'm wearing a heart monitor and I think it has blown up and I'm going to have to pay thousands of dollars for it because I think the power showed up tonight in the prophetic words that were said and the prophetic preaching, or gospel. I know that sounds funny to you, but it's a very expensive little gadget. I was warned not to wear it because there has been a time more than once where power has come into a meeting and things happen. Somebody said, "Don't wear that tonight. That's the first thing that the power will hit." No, I just think it hit my heart. I really do. It hit my heart and I said, "Lord just stand off this uh..." Well, I actually talked to the devil, I said, "I refuse to listen to a fallen worshipper. I refuse to listen to a scorner of the truth and the father of lies. I want to listen to the Father of truth, the Father of praise, the Father or worshippers and I'm going to trust him." The lord gave me grace for this meeting tonight. He gave me power and strength and he has made my way plain to preach the gospel. So, I'm believing with you to have a long time to do something with it before 1999 rolls in. Well, maybe not so long, but I would get on it if I were you. I'm going to get with it. We're going to see God do things that will astonish us just like it did the believers at John Mark's mother's house in Acts 12.

God be with you. God, bring us into everything that Kansas City IHOP vision, Shiloh vision was ever, ever meant to be and don't let us miss a thing, in Jesus name.

Mike Bickle:

I just want us to settle our hearts and give ourselves to the lord in a personal way for a few moments before we invite people to come up for ministry. Paul, thank you for delivering the word. I really appreciate that. I want Michael Sullivant to come up here and give us a summary of everything that Paul just said. He is really good at this. We have these staff meetings and when we are all done I say, "Michael, tell me what I just said for an hour," and he says it better than I just said it. He really has a gift to do this. So, tell us what you think the word of the lord this servant of the lord had for this body in 1999. I want folks to hear this and then I want to call for a response to it.

Michael Sullivant:

Tonight is a very special night, I think, in the spirit. You know that God uses human vessels, don't you? And God uses the human vessel of Paul Cain in our church often, at critical times. Really, what Paul said to us tonight is nothing new to us it's just another anointed human vessel, saying some things that others have been saying. One of the persons that has been saying it is this person here, Mike Bickle. Paul was just reiterating a number of things that Mike has been preaching to us. Mike does it with his Pastor's hat on and Paul does it with Prophet's hat on. A number of things that he said have also been said by the lord, through the Holy Spirit, to various prophetic people in our fellowship through dreams and visions. It's really such a clear thing and here is how I would capsulize it.

This was a prophetic understanding into the season of God, the season in God, that we are living in right now. The Holy Spirit is giving us divine perspective regarding the season in which we are living and that we are coming into. Through this season, and how many of you know that we don't get to choose the seasons? They come upon us. There is a season in God that is coming upon us. There is a season in the world that is coming upon us that we didn't get to vote on; it just happens. God gives us the option to see it ahead of time. To embrace it and to embrace him in the midst of that changing season. The seasons are changing and it's important for us to have ears to hear this. It means that there is a paradigm shift going on. It means many changes for our lives. It means many practical changes in our lives. One of the things that is happening is that our options are being shut down by the lord. In a very gracious way, God is shutting down our options and he is shutting us up into a way of life that speaks of a deeper kind of obedience. It's about dying to self, but it's a good thing. The judgments of the lord are true and righteous altogether, the Psalm says:

(Psalms 19:9-11) The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether. {10} More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. {11} Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward.

The judgments are more to be desired than gold because it is the judgments of the lord that give us a divine way of life. That is what God has called us to as forerunners. Judgment is in the house. Judgment begins at the house of God.

(1 Peter 4:17) For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?

This is not a negative thing, this is a good thing and God's fire is burning in our congregation and judgments are coming upon us. First of all, this is a self-evaluation; a self-judgment.

(1 Corinthians 11:31) For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.

If we will judge ourselves, then we will escape other kinds of judgment. That's what the lord is saying to us. One of the things the lord is saying is that he is enforcing the Genesis 22 principle in our midst. That's where Abraham sacrificed Isaac. This is the whole thing that Paul talked about; if you came to Kansas City to live, then you are going to die. But if you came to die, then you're going to live. God is requiring every one of us as we come here, even with prophetic promises like Abraham had with Isaac, he is calling us to lay them on the altar and allow them to die because the seed that God gives us, prophetically, never looks like the plant when it grows up. The seed has to die. It changes form and many of us have agendas and expectations that we come with and God is calling us to lay them, once again, on the altar. He is enforcing Genesis 22. He is enforcing this principle. It is not human beings that are enforcing it. It is not the Pastoral staff that is enforcing it.

(tape change) ????/ Paul said that we are going to lose our life and I wrote this down as I heard him say that, "You are going to lose your life one way or another. Will you lose you life well?" That is the question; will we lose our life well? Will we do it nobly? Will it have to be forced on us or will we just voluntarily lay our lives down? We need

courage in order to do that. We need spiritual courage and that's one of the ministries that we can give to one another in the body. We can encourage one another. We can put courage into one another to lay down our life. We can model it and speak about it and challenge one another in the Holy Spirit. There is going to be very, very practical outworkings of this dying to self. Paul read a whole series of things, remember, about what it means to die to yourself in very practical terms and we need to capsulize that. We need to get that transcribed and published for our next newsletter.

He talked about the threefold providence taking place. Y2K, which is just a precursor. It is just a little pop quiz. But then there is going to be global economic pressures like a domino effect that comes forth from that. Then there is going to be terrorism upon the world by forces that satan stirs up and this is going to bring much fear. But the lord said to us, "Don't be afraid when these things begin to happen because it will be the finest hour for the church. When these things begin to happen, people get ready to get saved and that is when we can stand there, stable and firm, and saying, "We know the way of life. We know the words of life and here they are." So don't be afraid because it is going to be our finest hour.

He talked about a wartime mentality. When a wartime mentality settles upon a nation, suddenly, things that seemed like great sacrifices before, don't seem so great anymore. They just seem reasonable. God is going to give us that reasonable sense of sacrifice in our lives for the gospel. We are going to be drawn into it by the love of God.

He talked about Acts chapter 12 and the pressing needs from the attack of satan that caused the church to come to a place of fervent prayer and the lord was speaking through him tonight about our need to gear up the prayer ministry. Not just gear it up in terms of a schedule, but gear it up in terms of having our hearts engaged in it. Of praying with all of our hearts; whole hearted prayer. Then this is another thing that the lord is saying to us, "red-hot prayer" as he called it.

He talked about a wake up call. About a rude awakening coming before a great awakening and many of us are beginning to experience that rude awakening as the lord is shutting down our options.

He talked about a line of demarcation and how the lord would give to the church without mixture, the Spirit without measure.

He talked about redeeming the time. The Ephesians 5 passage that David Saunders referred to before Paul even got up here. Then he talked about Luke chapter 21. About how our hearts can get weighed down by a physically dominated life. That is how I define a fleshly life. A fleshly life, according to Romans 6-8 is a physically dominated life and God doesn't want us to have a physically dominated life. He wants us to have a Spirit dominated life in which our physical life becomes subordinate. It's not eradicated???, physical things are important. They are necessary, but they are to be subordinate to the guidance and leadership of the Holy Spirit and to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Then we will live a Spirit dominated life. That's what God is calling us into.

The challenge that is set before us, I think with the challenge, from the lord comes the promise of grace. He will provide for us the graces we need to enter into this and we need to encourage one another to do it and do it in practical terms. Not just in ethereal or theoretical terms, but in 1999 Metro Christian Fellowship, practical dying to self so that we can really live in the Spirit.

Mike Bickle:

I want to stress something that Paul didn't say. He didn't say that Y2K is not important. I have talked to him for hours about it. He said it needs to be secondary. It needs to be secondary to encountering the lord in 1999. The problem with Y2K is if it becomes primary in the next 12 months, then the lord becomes secondary. I have talked to him for hours about this. He is not saying that there is nothing important about this. He is saying that it cannot be number one. I think that is a good word, but don't over react to that and say it has nothing to do with nothing and then when troubles and pressures are created you say, "Paul Cain said there wouldn't be trouble." That isn't what he said. He said it has to be secondary to encountering the lord in 1999. Ok, let's stand.

One practical way I am going to ask you to respond. There are multitudes of ways the lord may want us to respond, but the issue is intercession. The issue is intercession. I want you to close your eyes and focus on the lord. I want you to ask this question as a body. What about me, (put your name in there) what about me and the issue of intercession in 1999? A number of people have dropped the ball on their divine invitation to intercession. Just forget it. Don't worry about why you did it. It is time to pick it up again. It's time to say yes again to the grace of intercession that is in the genetics of this body of believers. We have prayer meetings 10 or 12 times a week, I guess, I don't know the exact number, but it is something like that. There are prayer meetings in homes. There are prayer meetings in the office and different places. The lord is tugging on hearts and saying, "It's time to make time to pray more again. Not just devotional prayer, but intercessory prayer." Open your heart right now and say, "Lord, it's time to make time again for prayer." Don't worry about why you didn't in the last year or two or three, or how you lost it. Just pick it up and start right now again.

There is a clarion prophetic call that it is time for MCF to say yes to intercession in a new way and as the Pastor of this church I am asking you before the lord to say yes, in a practical way, to intercession. I'm asking you to say yes to a baby step. One time a week, a baby step. One time a week in the grace of God you will endeavor to attend an intercessory prayer meeting. It doesn't have to be at the church. It could be with a few friends and you can set the time yourself. Just think about that right now and if you want to I'm going to call you to come stand as a commitment before the lord, so I just want you to think about it. I'm not talking about a vow or a promise, I'm talking about the intention of your heart. In 1999 I'm going to find a way, a may take me a few weeks to figure out where, but I'm going to go to one prayer meeting a week. It's just a very practical baby step. For some of you it's one more prayer meeting, it's one more gathering. Maybe you already go to one. Maybe it's the second one. It's a practical baby step.

That is the genetics of this church and God will give us such power in that place that our hands have grown weak and our legs our weary in the call of intercession. Now if that is a statement you can say to the lord,

"Lord, in 1999 I want to endeavor to do this." I'm not asking for a vow or a promise but an endeavor of the heart. "I'm going to add one more prayer meeting. Maybe you will go from zero to one, for others maybe it will be from one to two and for others maybe even more. But you want to say yes to the issue of intercession at least a little bit in 1999. In a different way you are willing to say yes to that, in a different way, more than you did in 1998, then I want you to come and stand right here. Because this is an issue that the lord is calling our church to repentance on. Paul was very nice about it, but it's an issue of repentance. The repentance is, we just got too busy. We have all sorts of prayer meetings: in homes, church building, every Friday night, it's a wonderful time. We make it late on purpose so that people can go do whatever they have to do and then come and spend a couple of hours before the lord. I'm not trying to cause bring guilt, I'm just saying it is the wisdom of God to do this. It's time for us to make time for it. I assure you that what we do in 1999, the lord will pick up the pace in the years to come. We've got to start with the baby steps. Baby's take step one, then they take step two. etc ministry time.