She Listened From the Sidewalk

She Listened From the Sidewalk

by Tommy Tyson

Transcribed from the original recording; may contain errors.

In the twelfth chapter of Hebrews, the first two verses, “Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

I am constantly amazed at the urgency in the heart of God to reveal the person of His Son. Everything about heaven, everything that God is and does, is oriented to this purpose. That is the revelation of Jesus Christ. He wants to reveal Jesus to you. He wants to reveal Jesus in you. He wants to reveal Jesus through you. He wants to bring us to the place where we see the glory of Himself in His Son everywhere. As I approach heaven, I find a bias in favor of Jesus.

For everything that happens to me from the heavenward side gives me a greater capacity and ability to see Jesus. And I really believe the scriptures are right when it says, “Every promise of God is yea and amen in Jesus.” That everything that your heart hungers for, all that God has purposed for you from the foundation, is provided for you in the person of His Son. I know there are ways within our hearts that tempt us to believe that we can find fulfillment in some other way. I suppose this is a basic ego that we’re dealing with that makes us think we can be gods in our own right. I suppose this is one of the temptations the first Adam had when the enemy of his soul said to him, “God didn’t mean what He said. You’ll not die. In that day you’ll be a god in your own right. And you’ll know as much as God knows. And you can have your own life through head knowledge without heart union.”

And I think this is a temptation all of us have. Something within me yet wants to manipulate God. I even want God to make me good so I can manipulate Him. You know, “God, come on, do a great and mighty work in me. And fix me up and do a good job once and for all. And thank You, I’ll see You by and by.”

“God, come on and teach me some great principles about prayer. So I can learn all of this, these formula. And Lord, then I’ll show You how to really work it.” These basic temptations that want to make us God. So we can display even to God Himself how He should run the universe.

But in Jesus, God is not moving in principle. He’s revealing in terms of person. So for me, life gets this basic simplicity. And that is meeting and falling in love with Jesus. Now this is an utter simplicity in life from my point of view. Meeting and falling in love with Jesus Christ. And then in union with Jesus, letting this life unfold as we learn to walk in the harness with Him, and in the life of obedience. And so, if you haven’t yet found Jesus, everything around you is trying to teach you to find Him. Alan Walker again, in this wonderful book that I read recently, made this keen observation. He says, “Usually we seek Jesus in two different ways. Some of us are drawn. And some of us are driven.”

I’d say some of us are both. Maybe all of us are both. That at times we are drawn. At times we are driven. But everything around us is trying to teach us to find Him who is our Lord. And so this morning, I’d like to have as a theme this theme of the Hebrew letter: looking unto Jesus. For what you keep looking at, sooner or later you’ll get. Boys, if any of you need a wife that you don’t have, just keep looking at her. You’ll get her, if you look hard enough, loving enough. Looking unto Jesus. If we keep looking at Him, we get Him.

I recently had the wonderful privilege of going to different parts of the world with Brother Oral Roberts. Among other places we ministered was South India. We were down in Trivandrum in Kerala State. We had seminars there with ministers in the day. Incidentally, we had between twelve and fifteen hundred Christian ministers in seminars all day long. They sat on these floors and listened to everything we had to say. Just pull it out of you. And then in the evenings, we would have large mass evangelistic rallies. And these precious people so desperately in need and yet so willing to receive. One afternoon we had an invitation to go up to the palace of the Maharaja.

Most of you know much more about India than I. But I understand until a few years ago, India was made up of many different countries really. Just a big geographical area with different countries. And right much that way now. And these countries were ruled over by Maharajas. They were the religious and the political leaders, and were very, very wealthy. And after the Republic came in, they honored these Maharajas as religious leaders especially, and gave them a stipend from the government funds. And keep them living, we would say, high on the hog. I understand this man in Trivandrum is given $375,000 a year. Someone told me. And his palace almost takes it. You never saw such a tremendous palace. We were there in the afternoon, as the afternoon sun was at its most beautiful time. And in this large reception hall, about three-fourths as big as this room, as the sun was coming in through the windows, there was this gorgeous Persian rug. You’ve never seen such beauty in terms of human carpets. And here are all these golds and blues and beautiful variations as the sun caught it. And we prayed with this Maharaja’s mother who, incidentally, invited us to come. She had a condition of her arm that was swollen. It was black. It was in great pain.

And the doctors had not been able to diagnose nor to prescribe. And when people get needy enough, they don’t argue about doctrines of healing. They just want to be healed, don’t they? And this precious woman, though she was a Hindu and a very devout Hindu, was willing for Jesus to heal her if He would and could. And invited us to come in the name of Jesus. And we went, and had a marvelous time of prayer. The pain stopped immediately. The swelling did not go down while we were there. But the Maharaja came in. I told Brother Oral this so I can tell it with great freedom. I really felt the Lord had sent me along to be a buffer. I knew Oral was strong as a preacher for masses. But a lot of times when we get accustomed to preaching to masses, we forget the personal touch. And I knew that Oral was strong on Jesus and here we were dealing with a Hindu. And I felt that I should go along and sort of, you know, see that Brother Oral did not offend this man.

Old pride. But Oral Roberts did one of the finest jobs of personal witness I’ve ever seen. As the Maharaja began to talk with us, Oral asked him, “Maharaja, what is your personal dream in life?” Well, you know, nobody get offended at that, will they? Everybody has a dream. What’s yours? And this Maharaja said, “Thank you for asking me that. My dream in life is to fulfill my purpose for having been created, and fulfill my duty to God and to man.” And Oral said to him, “Are you satisfied with your life? Are you fulfilling your dream?” “Mr. Roberts,” he said, “I’m not. I long desperately to fulfill it, but I have failed miserably. Now,” he said, “I spend three hours at least every day in prayer. I seek to maintain a God consciousness. But,” he said, “I don’t maintain a God consciousness. And,” he said, “I do not love my fellow man, but I’m striving.” Then Oral said to him, “Have you considered Jesus as a means of fulfillment of your own personal dream?” And this man said, “No, I’ve considered Jesus as a historical figure. But I have not considered Jesus in my relationship to God.” And then Oral said, “If Jesus were to reveal Himself to you, would you consider Him?” And this Maharaja made this keen observation.

He said, “Mr. Roberts, your question is perhaps a good one, but it’s irrelevant. Because,” he said, “Jesus is not going to reveal Himself unto me, because I’m not looking in His direction.” I wonder why Jesus hadn’t revealed Himself to you.

I think it’s the same reason. A lot of people don’t know Jesus because they haven’t looked in His direction. And in order to look into His direction, we have to take our eyes off that which we are looking.

Quite often we expect Jesus to come into our lives, into ourselves, our circumstances, and break our line of vision. Seldom does He do that. He appears to those who love the day of His appearing. When you seek Him with your whole heart, you can find Him. I wish all of you had heard that marvelous meditation this morning. Francis, I had never heard it called the gift of hunger. What a wonderful expression. It’s as we really began to hunger after the Lord. And you know, again, let me throw this in. I hadn’t meant to say this. But I’m finding several different kinds of hunger in the world. There are some people who are hungering after the Lord. They know they’re hungering after the Lord, and they’re just waiting for someone to come along and feed them. There are others that are really hungering. And this hunger is expressed in all kinds of discontent. But they do not know it’s the Lord they want, and they have to be taught. There’s a third large segment that are hungering, but they are so hidden behind a facade of pride and fear that they are not even willing nor able to admit to a hunger. And this group has to be fed without even letting them know that you’re feeding them.

So there’s all kinds of hunger in our midst. But Jesus Christ usually does not reveal Himself until we’re willing to look away from that which has caught our vision, and began to look unto Him. And if you look unto Jesus, you’re going to have to take your eyes off of others. You’re going to have to take your eyes off of self. You’re going to have to take your eyes off what Jesus is not. A lot of people began to look to Jesus by specializing on their problem. Jesus is not your problem.

Really, He’s not. A lot of people in prayer, all they can pray about is just getting under the burden and begin to moan and groan and describe the problem. And we can go back through it and go over it and go in it and out of it, and we’re specialists in the problem. And every time you find us, “The Lord must not love me. I’ve been praying for eight years, and He hadn’t lifted this burden yet.” You haven’t been praying. You’ve just been participating in spiritual gossip.

I’m serious about this. That every time we go to a time of prayer, we drag out the problem, we analyze it, we hang it up to air, and there the problem is. And we’ve never gotten our mind off the problem.

Few people have met Jesus while they were specializing on the problem. If you have a problem, you usually meet Jesus when the problem gets big enough that you realize you can’t handle it and you throw it away. That’s what we call getting to the end of our rope. That means the rope gives out. We don’t have anything to hang on to.

So we start looking unto Jesus as we take our eyes off that which we’ve been specializing on. And Bob DeWeese is quite right when he says, “If the Lord would heal some of us, we would feel as if we’d lost the best friend we’ve ever had.”

We’ve so grown accustomed. Really, anybody who works for alcoholics knows this is a basic problem. For an alcoholic to become sober, his wife has to have a conversion. She’s been so accustomed to living with a drunk and getting sympathy from all of her friends, especially her preacher, that when the boy sobers up and she stops getting sympathy, she can’t stand it. I mean, this is a common problem. All of us who face this know it. Well, it carries over in every other realm. You have a preacher and you’re accustomed to him just in a certain line of thought, maybe on the level of just morality. And he’s a very fluent speaker. And all of a sudden, he’s baptized in the Holy Spirit and starts having a ministry of deliverance and you can’t stand him unless you’re converted.

It’s a tremendous adjustment to take your eyes off the problem. To take your eyes off the other person. Many of us have other people who become God to us. We have circumstances that becomes God to us and gives us our sense of security. And it’s very difficult for us at times to release that to which we’re holding in order to look unto Jesus. I’ll never forget a story told by Ed Winkley. It’s a marvelous story. About a little boy in London just at twilight time, the officers were walking down the street and saw this little lad over in a garbage can, robbing the garbage can. And they reached over and pulled him out and gave one look. And there he was. His face one cake of dirt. His clothing so dirty, they looked like leather. And his hair as if it had never been washed nor combed. And so they held him at arm’s length and took him down to a child’s home. And the nurse met them at the door and it was just at supper time. And as they brought the little boy in, there to the left was the dining room laden with the evening meal, ready to be eaten. But one look at the little boy let the nurse know, and rightly so, that he should have a bath before he ate.

So she ran a tub of hot water and got it sudsy. And then began to rip these clothes off this little boy and set him down in that tub of hot water and began to wash. Dirt and grime. And finally she came down to this hand and that little boy had that fist clenched. So she said, “Come on, son, let me wash your hand.” He wouldn’t budge. So finally she called in another nurse and said, “Would you help me here?” So the other nurse came and began to pry the little boy’s finger open and wash. Pry and wash. Pry and wash. And finally when they had the palm opened, there in the midst of the palm was a piece of molded breadcrumb.

And all the while, supper was waiting. What’s that in your hand? All the while, Jesus is standing. Jesus is standing. Our living man coming down from above, saying, “Look unto Me. He that eateth of My flesh, drinketh of My blood, shall never die. He that thirsts, come unto Me and drink. And I shall give him to drink of the water of life that will satisfy his thirst forever, so that out of his inmost parts will flow rivers of living water.” Now, how do we see Jesus? How do we look unto Jesus? Well, we seldom look with the obvious. Jesus said that we are to have a single eye. And as I have often said, the single eye is not squint-eyed. A single eye is having two eyes that see as one. That is, you see the outward and the obvious, but through the outward and the obvious, you’re able to penetrate and see the hidden or the invisible. And so this outward world is the obvious through which we have to look to see that who is, the one who is hidden. And His name is Jesus. And in order to see Him, we need to have eyes of the Holy Spirit. So often, I think, we make a mistake. For we seem to say to people, if you will believe certain doctrines about Jesus, He will give you His Holy Spirit.

Well, I found the opposite to be true. If you will respond to the Holy Spirit, He will reveal Jesus to you. I find this to be true. If you will respond to the Holy Spirit, He will reveal Jesus to you. And so I’m going to get real elementary about responding to the life of the Spirit. And consequently, seeing Jesus. One basic thing that I think is related to our seeing Jesus or responding to the Holy Spirit is this. To realize that Jesus Christ is the complement to our need. I know a few people who have met Jesus before they become aware of their need for Jesus.

Now, if you don’t have a need, the gospel doesn’t have much to say to you. Jesus said, “It’s not the well that need a physician, it’s the sick.” Jesus said, “I’ve not come to save the righteous. I’ve come to seek and to save that which is lost.” Jesus has come to forgive sins. You’ve got some of those, haven’t you? Jesus has come to fill that which will become empty. You can be that. So, in order to have the Holy Spirit operating in our life, is to see that Jesus Christ is the opposite or complement to our need. What is your need? Or you can just start with one. You don’t have to mess with us. Just any old need to do. What is that need? Become honest about it. Let that need be a handle that will open the door to your life.

And just use it as an open door. And how do I respond to the Holy Spirit once I see a need? I look around and I see where the Lord’s ministering. And I begin to go where I see the Lord ministering on the level of my need. If I need a hammer, I don’t go to the haberdasher. I go to the hardware store. If I need a suit of clothes, I don’t go to the hardware. I go to the haberdasher. And if I want to be healed, I don’t go where people don’t believe in healing.

I go where Jesus Christ is manifesting healing love. If I want to be baptized in the Holy Spirit, I don’t go running to people who’ve never been baptized. I go to somebody that’s got it. Where Jesus Christ is ministering. If I have a hunger, I don’t need sympathy. Somebody to put their arms around me and say, “I know how you feel. I’m just as hungry as you are.”

Misery may love company, but misery doesn’t satisfy a need. So if I’m hungry, I’m going where someone is breaking the bread of life. So I look around me. I look around me. Some book. Some person. Some prayer group. And bless your wonderful hearts. Those of you who are faithful in prayer groups, you can’t begin to imagine how God is using you. Beyond anything that you know, God is using those who week after week are faithful in their prayer life. Over this country, I’m just seeing all sorts of glorious things happen. And when you begin to trace their causes, you find back some prayer group behind it. I was up in Oxford, Michigan not long ago. I was there last year. Now, apparently nothing happened. We had a glorious time together, us saints.

But apparently nothing happened much. But I went back again this year. And thank God, He keeps letting me go back occasionally because I’m so childish, I need to see a few evidences. And when I got back this year, all sorts of things had happened. Just because people were praying. In this little Methodist church in Oxford where they have such a vital prayer group that meet every week. And businessmen take… Incidentally, men can pray too. You know, that’s a great revelation.

I used to think prayer was just for little children and old ladies. But it’s amazing what the Lord will do when men start praying. And this is a mixed group. And they just meet to pray in this church. Businessmen take off for an hour and come on down to the church. It’s right near the downtown. And one morning, last year sometime, there was a lady in this town who had been very sick mentally. They had released her from the institution because they said to the family, “She is harmless. You can keep her at home much better than we can keep her here. But she will never be well. And you’ll just have to learn to take her as she is and live with her.” And everyone in the community had just taken her just that way. And she’d go around and pick up trash in this person’s yard and carrot and put it on your porch. You know, that sort of thing. Just harmless but meaning well. One day she was walking down the street past this Methodist church while they were having a prayer meeting. And they made the mistake of leaving the doors open. They were meeting there in the room just off the sidewalk. And these people were sitting around in a circle praying.

And this time, for some reason or other, they were praying aloud. It wasn’t just a silent meeting. And they were entering into prayers of praise. Some of them praying what we would say in the Spirit. I mean by that, some of them were even praying in other languages. As they were just having a prayer time there, this lady stopped. Listened. And while she was standing listening, her sanity was restored.

Just while a prayer group was praying, she listened. Her sanity was restored. And she went on down the street telling people what had happened. And when I was there, she looked, really, I wouldn’t have recognized her at all if she hadn’t come and told me who she was. I’d seen her the year before. I wouldn’t have. I’d never known her. She was just a different, a new creation. Just because a prayer group prayed. Things happen. Things happen when you witness. Things happen when you just share automatically, in a prayer group, otherwise. There was a guy, since I’m on this little church, I got there and there was this lady named Mary Ron.

Well, I didn’t remember meeting Mary the year before. Here’s the story. A few weeks after the meeting last year, the superintendent of one of the mills called the pastor, said, “Brother Clark, what have you folks done to Mary Ron?”

And Mr. Clark said, “I don’t know that we’ve done anything to Mary. I said, I’ve noticed that she’s been coming to church ever since we had the revival, but,” said, “I don’t know that we’ve done anything to Mary. Why?” He said, “I have never seen such a change in a person. Up until a few weeks ago, Mary Ron was the roughest person I’ve ever seen. I kept her on as the foreman of her department because she’s such a capable person. But she said, everybody in the mill’s afraid of her. She’d just curse you before she’d look at you almost. And now, if anything, she’s too loving.

“I’ve never seen such a change.” And the pastor said, “Well, I’ll go see Mary.” So he went down to see Mary, and here was the story. Mary said, “Mr. Clark, during the revival, I went one night, and I think it was the last night. And I sat there and heard Tommy Tyson preach, and I didn’t know a thing he was talking about.

“And while he was preaching, all of a sudden, he said something about the blood of Jesus. And I didn’t hear another thing he said. Just that phrase, the blood of Jesus. And I thought to myself, ‘What does that man mean?’ And that phrase began to ring in my heart. And just as something burning within me, just began to burn deep into my heart. And by the time I’d gotten home, it looked as if my husband had changed. And the next morning, the children acted differently.

“And when I went to work, everybody there had changed. And I came back to church the next Sunday, and you’d changed. And the only thing I know, it looks like the whole world’s changed.”

What a marvelous testimony of conversion. Just because she happened to pick up a phrase that some Christian was using. Are you afraid to be yourself in your conversation with people? Looking unto Jesus. Go where Jesus is ministering. Get aware of your need. Go where Jesus Christ is ministering. And then submit yourself. Submit yourself to the ministry. Pride is a very strong thing. Pride somehow tells you that if you ever let a person know that you need something they have, they will take advantage of you.

Let me repeat that. Pride will suggest to you that if you ever let a person know that you need something they have, they will take advantage of you. So we have, in our business world, learned to be coy in this business of competition and trading. I used to be in the selling business, and I would never let a man know that I had a load of goods that I needed to get rid of quickly. Never. That’s the last thing a good salesman would do. He’s already lost everything he’s got. So you just become coy. And you convince the man that he needs what you’re offering. That you don’t need his buying power. He needs your selling power. That’s the way this world operates. But not so in the kingdom of my Father. Father, in the kingdom of my Father, he that’s greatest is least. And as you come to the kingdom, you come willing to humble yourself and to confess your need. And any old person will do. If you think you have to have certain people in order to minister to you, the Lord has glad surprises for you. Over and over again, I’ve seen this. Since I’ve mentioned his name already, you know how people get ideas, especially if they get magic related to a person.

And a lot of people think that Brother Oral has a magic touch. And he knows he doesn’t. And I know it too. But quite often in these mass meetings, I’ve seen person after person terribly disappointed because they can’t have a personal interview. And I know Agnes has the same thing. These people that are used so mightily, we somehow think they have magic. And we get disappointed. And so quite often, I know the one reason the Lord has let me minister with these great giants is that He might show the folks that He can use anybody.

So people get disappointed enough, they’ll come to me and they say, “Well, I can’t… I can’t get to Oral, I can’t get to Agnes, how about you?” Well, you’ll do. Anybody’ll do. And some of you here this week may be disappointed if you can’t have an hour of Agnes time, and you can’t.

But you don’t need it, really, if you listen to what she says. And if you listen to what I say. And if you listen to what other people are saying. If you listen, if you listen, and begin to submit yourself. This is a humbling process. Submit yourself. And I would say that at least half of you who have needs here this week will have those needs met through unexpected sources.

Quite often, when you are least expecting God to meet your need as you’re willing to submit yourself, He’ll bring up some person that you think is least likely to be used. And there they will come, become God’s instrument to you. So if you would look unto Jesus, come where He’s working. And He’s working here. You’ve come. If you would look unto Jesus, submit yourself to receive from anyone that God is willing to use. Now, another thing that I’d like to say is this. If you would look unto Jesus, start looking on the inside of yourself.

Regardless of where you or how you meet Jesus, your encounter with Him has not become relevant until it’s transpired on the inside of you. A few days ago, I had a pastor in another city call me. And he said, “Tommy, we’re having a great revival.” He said, it’s a Methodist preacher. He said, “We’re having a great revival, a great Pentecost. A lot of our young people are being baptized in the Holy Spirit, and they’re just going out to the church to pray all hours of day and night. And great manifestations are taking place and a lot of signs are happening. Now,” he said, “this is concerning me and this is the reason I call you. One little girl, every time she prays, she feels the hand of Jesus on her shoulder. Others say they feel something like warm rain falling on them. Others are saying they feel something like electricity going through them. And all kinds of signs and manifestations. And the parents are getting upset.” I said, “Why should they be getting upset?” He said, “Because they’re afraid that the Lord is really going to take their children away from them.”

You know, isn’t that true? Boy, we want the best for our children. We want the Lord to just fix them up just right, but never make a fool of them. Never let them have enough religion so the other playmates, our college mates, our friends, our neighbors, would think they’re a little bit fanatic. Not that Lord. Anything, as long as I can remain respectable. And so, but anyway, I said, I was just preaching on the side then.

Anyway, I said to him, “These signs, I pick up all over. Different people have these signs. But what I would do with these parents and young people, I would get them together and go into the scriptures. And I would take these post-resurrection appearances. Here, Jesus is appearing outwardly to ten of the disciples on the first night, all except Judas and Thomas, I take it. Jesus Christ came into the room through closed doors and stood. They had a manifestation of Jesus. There He was. And even later to Thomas, a personal manifestation with His pierced hands and riven side. And then later, here was Jesus standing by the seashore revealing Himself, breaking bread, eating fish and honeycomb.” All of these post-resurrection appearances. And I said to this preacher, “As I take it, these manifestations were for the purpose of giving the assurance of His presence. They were not the basis for witness. It was for the purpose of giving assurance of presence, but not the basis for witness. For Jesus said, ‘You’re not ready to be a witness to Me yet. Wait until it happens on the inside of you.’”

Never settle for manifestation. Manifestations are great. I wouldn’t take a thing for them. I’m willing for the Lord to manifest Himself any way or every way that He pleases. But manifestations aren’t enough. Starr Daily is quite right when he says it’s an inside job. Inside job. And so when Jesus taps you on the shoulder or pours buckets of water out on you or sends electricity through you or lets holy fire burn in you, yes, get shouting happy. And say, “Now, Jesus, let it be done on the inside.” As good as it is on the outside, it’s good enough to get on the inside. So get at it. And let Jesus Christ begin to reveal Himself in terms of the One who loves you with an everlasting love, who will never leave nor forsake you. Otherwise, several things will happen. In our witness, if we just witness on the level of manifestations, we will get people thinking that if Jesus doesn’t tap them on the shoulder, He’s not around. Or we will feel, if Jesus, if You don’t put Your hand on my shoulder, somehow, I don’t think You’re around. You see where our dependence will be? And that’s sorcery depending on gimmicks on the outside. So Jesus manifests, but let Him come in. And He actually is so much more willing to come in than we think He is.

Really, I found the only thing it takes is an honest invitation. If you really mean business with Him. Now, He knows when you mean business. Really, He’s not a fool. He understands us as persons. And He doesn’t always listen to our lips. He hears the murmuring of our heart. And you know how it is here in eastern North Carolina. Quite often when we go to church and we come out and shake the preacher’s hand, instead of saying it’s a pretty day, isn’t it, we just say, and especially this is true in the country, we say, “Preacher, won’t you come go have dinner with us?” Now, we don’t mean it. If the preacher said yes, we’d faint. Oh, you know, it’s just passing the time of day. “Won’t you come have dinner with us?” And he’s polite. He says, “No, thank you. My wife expect me to the parsonage. Thank you.” But let an old boy come along and put his arms around the preacher and say, “Preacher, yesterday, yesterday, my wife bought the most expensive roast they have down in the store and she put it on this morning before we came to Sunday school.” You heard that, didn’t you? Sunday school.

That’s just preaching on the side again. “And if you haven’t preached too long, that roast will be just right. Now, come on as soon as you can, you and your family, and let’s eat dinner together.” You wouldn’t turn a man down like that, would you?

Jesus knows your heart. If you’re really hungry for Him, get before Him. “Jesus Christ, I really want You to come in and take over. I really am offering my life to You. Do it any way You please.” And as you really began to open up through an invitation, things began to happen. Now I have found this to be helpful, if you will take Him at His word and realize that He wants to come into you. He says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man would open the door, I will come in and will sup with him and he with Me.” He wants us to take Him at His word just as He takes us at our word. And so if you would take Him at His word, this means you expect Him to do it. Agnes was so tremendous last night. Incidentally, let me say this too. When you come to hear Agnes from now on, bring your pencil and paper. This woman’s saying something. And you’re not going to get it all just by listening on the surface. I know because I’ve heard her many times and she’s one of the few people that I take notes on. And I get these great teachings, I go back over them. I go back over them.

And it’s tremendous. So bring your pencil and paper and if you don’t quite get some of the things she’s talking about, take notes on them anyway. And about a month or six months from now, when you run back through them, the Holy Spirit will hit you and you’ll say, “That’s what Agnes meant. That’s what she’s getting at.” So learn to do that. But expect the Lord to come in. Now, expectation is a great part of faith. A great part of faith is expectation. Living in divine expectancy means that you began to stand on tiptoe. You’re just waiting for it to happen any minute. “Lord, is this the person?” What about if every person you met today was the person Jesus was going to come to you through? My goodness. Do you mean every time I take over your hand today, that could be a laying on of hands for Jesus to baptize me? Do you mean every time we contact one another today, that could be the hand of the Lord to heal me? Do you mean every time you speak to me today, that could be the word of God forgiving me my sins? Cleansing me and making me whole?

Well, that puts me in high privilege, doesn’t it? Will you represent Jesus Christ to me today? I will to you, and we’ll live in divine expectancy as we began to minister one to another here. Now, in closing, let me say this, that the last thing about looking unto Jesus that I mentioned today is this. Start yielding to what you already know about Jesus. Repentance is not just a theological term. It’s a very practical term. Repentance is turning from everything that you know to be unlike Jesus and turning to everything you know to be like Jesus. It’s really that wonderfully simple. A little hard to do sometimes because we don’t want to turn. But if you would start yielding to the light you already have, you have already some love God has given you. You already have some faith God has given you. You already have some power of the Holy Spirit God has given you. You already have the means of ministering to someone here today God has given you. Now, will you accept yourself as an instrument of God today? To everybody around you today… and say, “Jesus… if You’ll pour it on… I’ll pour it out.” And walk in the light that you have. And if you do… you’ll find something happening… that will eventuate in a revelation… of Jesus.

Let us pray. Thank You. Lord, forgive us… that we… really don’t believe. At times… we are still looking for a Messiah. We are still looking for a deliverer. We are still looking for God. And Your word says… You are Emmanuel… God with us. Your word says… that You are the Messiah… who has come to deliver us. Your word says… that You are the only wise God. That You are our Lord and Savior. That You are.

And because You live… we shall live also. Help us to look unto You today. And in looking… live. Amen.