The Book Found During a Phone Call

The Book Found During a Phone Call

by Bert Kerley

Transcribed from the original recording; may contain errors.

May the words of my lips and the thoughts of all our hearts be now and always acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our Redeemer. A young Baptist minister was very keen on looking after his first church, and he made a little pact with himself that he would go and visit all of the congregation within the first month.

He chose a certain day to visit a certain lady and went round there. He thought that she was always in there. He’d heard that she was always in on a Tuesday afternoon. And he went to the house and knocked on the door and got no answer at all. He thought it was unusual because the window was open, so he knocked again and nothing happened.

And so he took out his visiting card and wrote on it, Revelations 3.24, which is 3.20, isn’t it? 3.20. It was 3.20, which you all know, don’t you? No! “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to them and sup with them.” So he left his card there. On the next Sunday morning he was at the back of the church and he was shaking hands with all the people as they came up. And this dear lady who lived in that house came up to him and he shook her hands. And she, instead of saying anything, gave him her card. And her card had on it, Good Wishes, Genesis 3, Chapter 10, which I’m sure you all know.

And Genesis 3, Chapter 10 says, “I heard the sound of Thee in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself.” You can do anything with scripture, can’t you? I’d like to introduce you to that lovely passage in Chapter Acts, friends. Acts Chapter 8. It goes, “But an angel of the Lord said to Philip, Rise and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is a desert road.” And he rose and went. “And behold, an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a minister of Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians.” By the way, don’t worry about pronunciation in Bibles. I used to have a lot of trouble over that, wondering whether I said it right. But I’ve learned a secret. I’ll pass it on to you. That however difficult the pronunciation, you say it boldly and confidently, and everybody else thinks I’ve got it wrong. That’s right.

Anyhow… “A minister of Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians, in charge of all her treasure, had come to Jerusalem to worship, and was returning, seated in his chariot. He was reading the prophet Isaiah.” In English, Isaiah. I know you should say it in a different way. “And the Spirit said to Philip, Go up and join this chariot. So Philip ran to him, and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet, and asked, Do you understand what you’re reading? And he said, How can I, unless someone guides me? And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. Now the passage of the scripture which he was reading was this: As a sheep led to the slaughter, or a lamb before its shearer is dumb, so he opens not his mouth. In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken up from the earth. And the eunuch said to Philip, About whom, pray, does the prophet say this? About himself or someone else? Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news of Jesus. And as they went along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, See, here is water! What is to prevent my being baptized? And he commanded the chariot to stop.

“They both went down into the water, Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him. And when they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord caught up Philip, and the eunuch saw him no more, and went on his way rejoicing.”

The wonderful… An interesting thing about that story to me, when I learned some of the inner secrets of life, was how just at the time a person opened the book, and couldn’t understand what he was reading, there happened to come up, just at the right time, someone who knew exactly what it meant. What a bit of luck! What a bit of luck! Isn’t that amazing? Isn’t that amazing? Until you understand that this is going on all the time. Got it? The Eastern people can teach us many things, and one of their little sayings is this, “When the pupil is ready, the master comes.” There is another anonymous saying which says this, “If therefore you are intent upon wisdom, a lamp will not be found wanting, a shepherd will not fail, a fountain will not dry up.”

Now you remember that I said that I saw this book, Prescription for Anxiety, written by Leslie Weatherhead, and Leslie Weatherhead was one of our great ministers, the people used to pack his church. Some people thought he was a little bit unorthodox, and you had to be careful of him, which is usually a good sign that you want to listen to a person like that.

And then I said, “Teach me, Lord.” And so I officially resigned my church leadership. I handed over the church and all the affairs to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and released myself from any responsibilities in that way. And I severely restricted church activities just to going to church once on a Sunday. And I gave myself to my family, and time for the next three years just to my family, my work, and learning some of the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven.

For a while I kept on tablets. You notice I said, I knew I was healed, but I was going to be healed. I knew immediately. But God gave me a wonderful understanding that it wasn’t necessary to throw all my tablets away. Because don’t forget, I was still in a state, in a sense of hypertension. And letting go of those tablets, I could be in trouble in a day or two again. And so it wasn’t necessary to stop. For some it is. Some it’s possible, and I’ve seen it done. But for me, it wasn’t necessary. So God is so good, isn’t it? He understands us. He understands our needs. He understands our strength. But don’t forget, I’ve been suffering for so many months, I was in a terrible state with my nervous system. So I kept on taking those tablets. And then slowly and slowly, they were decreased. I remember particularly one morning, not too long afterwards, when that sort of little thought came. And that’s the sort of thought that Jesus had in the desert now. “Well, if you really believe God has healed you, why don’t you throw your tablets down the toilet?” And from out, the fear came up. You know? And then as I got still again, there’s that lovely reassurance of, it’s not equal.

“Don’t do it. Don’t do it.” Isn’t that lovely? It’s not a challenge of faith God is looking for like that. It’s an embracing love. And He understands how much I could take. And so instead of having panic, I had a quiet peace. And I just again, gently went down onto a reduction.

I actually came off of sleeping tablets in a very good way too. I’d been taking tablets, they’d have been much good, but they say would give me some time. But by the time I’d had this understanding, I was healed, the sleeping tablets would give me a good night’s sleep. And so I took them one night. Having learned to relax, I had the tablet by the side of my bed, and then I would relax. And if I didn’t go off to sleep in 10 or 15 minutes, I’d pop the old tablet in my mouth and I went on. And then one day I found out I woke in the morning, the tablet was still there. Now that’s lovely, isn’t it? Really? Others can do it another way. But I’m just telling you how it happened my way. You see friends, there’s no need for this battle between faith and medicine. And it gets so many questions in this state, you know. Yeah.

Some tranquilizers are given you to calm you down. And then Christians sometimes get into a state because they think they should be taken though. And they get themselves worked up, which is working against the knowledge that God has given man to give drugs to help His children until they recover. I mean, we don’t do that with a broken leg. If we get a broken leg, we put a plaster on it. And that plaster’s there. It creates the conditions for the healing to come from within. And you don’t take the plaster off and then immediately go out and kick a ball, do you? You then have some strapping round. And it’s done gently. And so it is with… In the same way with drugs. So too with doctors and nurses. I often have people ring up and say, “My son’s got to see an educational psychologist,” or “I’ve been told to see a psychiatrist. I’m a Christian and I don’t believe that’s right.” Do you know, that is so silly. Every person who’s in the real healing profession, actually whether they know it or not, are instruments of the divine love. They have gone into their profession because they care for people. They don’t like seeing people suffer. And that’s the very heart of God. Isn’t it?

And then He gets other people, scientists, to discover these wonderful secrets which are in the world already and bring them from the herbs and from the chemicals to show there’s a way of release and there’s a way of healing in these things. And so we Christians shouldn’t be getting ourselves into a twist over that thought. There’s no need to get upset.

But anyhow, I had said that, “Lord, teach me.” And it wasn’t long afterwards that I went into a library and I walked along the bookshelves and I happened to see a book titled on the shelf, a book I had never heard before. And I’ve never heard of the author before. But I took this book down and it was The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale. And that book, with Weatherhead’s Prescription for Anxiety, absolutely revolutionized my life. I have by now, I must have sold or given over a thousand copies, real copies, of the book The Power of Positive Thinking in the 30-odd years since this experience I had, and another few hundred of another book that we have in England called Inspiring Messages for Daily Living. And I can’t find it over here. But we have it and I order them by the dozen. We were sent also two lots of about 400 copies of The Power of Positive Thinking condensed edition by you American friends, some of my American CFO friends, sent them over to our ministry and we put these books out in our waiting room and what they are doing is quite incredible. It’s quite wonderful. So that’s gone on and on. But Norman Vincent Peale taught me two great things, two great secrets.

He taught me how to relax. See, I said to you, lots of people say, “Relax.” Not many people tell you how to relax. Got it? How to relax your body. And here again, Young says, a great secret. I hope one day you’ll learn how to relax and quieten your thoughts too so that you can quieten those thoughts that disturb. To get into the stillness. Got it? He taught me how to relax. Got it? And he also taught me how to think positively instead of negatively. And those two secrets have stayed with me and will stay with me until I die and go on.

Of course, that’s so necessary too, you see, for the Christian life, isn’t it? Because if you’re going to learn the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven, sometime or another, you’ve got to learn to be still. You’ve got to learn to sit down and reflect and then let the words and the teaching come from within.

And this is what Norman Vincent Peale did for me. I was able then to start beginning to look at myself and see where I had gone wrong, the mistakes I had made. And I like Glenn Clark here. He says, “When we focus our attention on doing, God is focusing His attention on our being.” Which is a great secret.

He also taught me not to hurry. There’s a lovely phrase that I give to you, friends, and I often give it to many of my clients. There is nothing divine in hurry and no hurry in anything divine. Do you notice whenever you make a mistake or you fall over or you get into a state, it’s usually because you’re rushing around. It doesn’t make sense if God is a God of law and order and He’s dwelling in us. It doesn’t make sense for us to be rushing there and rushing there and try and be in two places at one time, does it? Christians, hear this? Christians who are busy on committees, He doesn’t want you in two places at one time. One place is where He doesn’t want you to be. Got it? All understand that? Look at that with Jesus and Jairus’ daughter, you know. He heard that Jairus’ daughter was dying. And Jairus came up and said, “Come and see my daughter.” “Sure,” He said. And so He starts to go and just as He’s going along, a woman comes along and touches the hem of His garment. Doesn’t say, “Stop it. I’ve got to go over there.” He stops and He deals with her. Then He goes on. Now, Jairus could have said, you know, “Well, she’ll be dead.”

Jesus goes there and He does that one thing at a time. There’s a time for everything. Got it? Yeah. Someone said, we run today where Jesus walked. And we do, done. Yeah. The other secret he taught me and this, again, friends, and I know I’m talking to people that have learned this secret, but some haven’t. He, get your ears open, here it comes. This alone is worth $100. This little money. He taught me to say no kindly. Got it? He taught me to say no kindly because I often used to say yes when I was meaning no and thinking no and wanting no. Got it? But Jesus said, “Let your yes be yes and your no no.” Got it? And that was a tremendous secret for me to learn. But then again comes this teacher that the pupil is ready for. The teacher for me came mostly through books and I must say this, mostly through American authors. So I have a great love for Americans in America. One significant book was A Man Called Peter and someone had it in this camp here this week and I saw the actual cover. I didn’t see the title but I could tell by the colour that it was Mr. Jones, Meet the Master. A Man Called Peter first and then she had this other one, Mr. Jones, Meet the Master.

And in Mr. Jones, Meet the Master, and I showed it to her, this page, you see, we turn to the chapter Research Unlimited and it tells of a man there who he sort of listed in relation to George Muller who Norman was talking about. Now George Muller I did know about many years ago as a kid, I read that and I was thrilled with these miracles this man was producing. But they mentioned another man and the other man’s name was Roland Brown, and I thought, and it listed what he’d done, the way he’d got his prayers answered, he listed it all down, and I said, “Lord, if I can just meet this man, even just for an hour,” that’s how keen I was to learn, “if You can get me to America to meet this man just for an hour, I’ll be thrilled.” I wanted to ask him some secrets. Of course it’s wonderful, as I told you with the story, I had a week with him the first time I met him and I’ve had more weeks with him and he became a very, very dear friend before he died. What an answer to prayer. All in that chapter Research Unlimited in Mr. Jones, Meet the Master. And there again in Peter Marshall’s book he starts me along the line of thinking about a man called Starr Daily.

He mentions him and it captures my interest. It’s wonderful, isn’t it? How you can read a thing and something within says, “Listen, that’s the teacher within.” Is that it? And you should respond to those impulses. And so I heard about Starr Daily and his book Love Can Open Prison Doors mentioned. I thought, “Lord, I’d love that book.”

However, just before that I went into a library again and I saw another book which was most illuminating to me, it was called The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science. It was a book on metaphysics. Friends, I didn’t know what metaphysics meant. But I opened this book and it illuminated me. It showed me secrets of life and the universe which I hadn’t even thought about. And I was sitting there and I would say to Rosie, she said, “Rosie, this is marvelous.” And then after I’d finished it came into my hands, I can’t remember how, Love Can Open Prison Doors. And I saw that in the first chapter at all Starr Daily had put all that I’d seen in the metaphysical book in the first chapter and he called it love. I was thrilled. But it was wonderful that I should have understood more about metaphysics because when the Lord teaches He allows us to open up our mind wider and then brings us back to Himself. But the going out has been more helpful. We understand more how things work. And our faith is not just on an unknown faith but it’s an understanding that there is laws in the unseen. You see? But anyhow, I read Starr Daily’s Love Can Open Prison Doors. And then right at the back of the book, and I remember this distinctly, and I was sitting in my office and I read the last passage just during one of my lunch hours, and then I was thrilled.

And I saw that he’d written three other books. It was listed at the back of the book. It had Good News, Release, which is the next book really, isn’t it? Where you hear about the lifer and him talking in prison. Release, Good News, and This Is the Life. Now I said to the Lord as I shut the book, I said, “Please, I would like to read those other books.” Now then happens something which even today I find most amazing to believe. I shut the book. Went out of my office and I went down the road to a Christian bookshop. Now this Christian bookshop had new books on the ground floor but down in the basement they had loads of old books. No order at all. People who perhaps had been deceased, they wanted to pass their books on, they sent them there and they stuck them all over the shelves. And it was a little bit dull down there but I walked down the stairs and stood in the centre of the basement and I looked up at the top shelf. Listen, youngsters, listen to this. I looked up to the top shelf and I saw these three books. Release, Good News, This Is the Life. What a bit of luck. What a bit of luck.

And all for a few cents each. I still have those books on my shelf. I do lend them out but I always keep a careful note who’s got them. And I bring them back. I treasure them. Isn’t that wonderful? What are the odds on that being loved, friends? What are the odds on that being loved? I then in some way came across Glenn Clark’s book, I Will Lift Up Mine Eyes. And I did that course on prayer. I did it daily. Well, I took it a little bit slower than the plan. He said, “Do something one a week or one a day,” and I did it a bit longer because I really wanted to learn the lessons as I went along. And I still have my book. I was studying now. I still have that book where I did that course page by page. And I’m going to tell you because of a prayer and because of what he taught me in that book, I’ve gone all around the world.

One of these days I’ll tell you that story too. But that was a tremendous book. And I noticed this. The other day before I was coming in, I took out that book and I looked at the date that I did the course. And it was two years before I came into CFO. I’d forgotten that. So Glenn had taught me prayer. And the wonderful thing he taught me was that God can do it without me. Because in my days, you see, when I was getting all steamed up, I was praying, but then I was going and running out answering my own prayers. You do that, don’t you, sometimes? You pray for somebody and then you do all you can, you know, to try and solve all their problems. And you take all the burden on yourself. But then he told me that things do happen if I can let go of it. And that was a tremendous release.

I then came across the Agnes Sanford books, The Healing Light, and another one that taught me so much. When I was wanting to learn the secrets of healing, I came across Rebecca Beard’s Everyman’s Search, Everyman’s Goal, and Everyman’s Mission. You had two of them in your old books up there, didn’t you, Richard? I don’t know where they’ve gone, but Everyman’s Search is certainly a wonderful book to read, to get sort of started on healing. And I had a wonderful experience there from that. I think I can share it. It was because I’d heard of a young boy that had haemophilia, and he was very, in a bad way. He’d been laying on a settee for four days because the bleeding in his knee had sort of congealed, you know, haemophilia, you can’t stop the blood, and it was locking him up. This young boy, and of course if it keeps on, then he can’t walk. And so I heard of this just at the time Rosie came home from church, and I found up three friends, and I said, “Would you be praying at a certain time tonight because I’m going to visit this young lad, and I’m going to pray and lay hands on him at nine o’clock. Now, five minutes before, and let’s all be in prayer.”

So I went to this young boy, and I talked to the mother, and I talked to him, and I talked to him a little bit about the healings of Jesus. He wasn’t a Christian then. And then my first experience then, of laying on hands, I said, “I’m going to go, I’m going to launch out here,” and I laid on hands at nine o’clock, and then left him and walked over and sat with his mother. And I was talking to her, and she was looking away from me and smiling, and she said, “It can’t happen that soon, Bert, can it?” So I said, “What do you mean?” She said, “Well, look at him.” A leg that has been unbendable for three days, he’d taken it off of the settee and bent it double under him, and without him knowing. Isn’t that wonderful? And he told me afterwards that just at the time the hands were laid on him, he felt an electrical warm feeling. Now, this is a boy of ten who didn’t understand anything about these things. Got it?

So Rebecca Beard encouraged me. I’m not telling you it happens every time, friends. Don’t believe that, you know. But I have a lot more to learn, and one of the things to learn was don’t tell anybody about it for a while. Another great secret in healing. Don’t go out and tell everybody the one. Wait for the right time to share it. And I had to learn that one painfully. But I was learning. And I was encouraged. So Rebecca Beard helped me there. Now, some books read and give you a warning about reading books, don’t they? They say you should only read the Bible and that sort of thing. But I didn’t find that with my teacher. He allowed me to read many wonderful books.

Reading can be an escape, that’s true. We can reach saturation level and you have to have a rest. But the teacher, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, He likes us to have an open mind. And He likes to stretch our minds too. As I said, He would take us to books that perhaps would never be on a church bookstore. And for me, He took me even into other faiths too. I remember being thrilled by the Bhagavad Gita and the way of life. But I could see the truth in there that Jesus Himself was trying to teach. And I had no problem at all. And I always come back to keeping my hands in the hands of Christ and allow the Holy Spirit to bring the right books to me at the right time. And I must say that’s been a tremendous blessing to me.

I found, you see, that one of the ways I know a book is for me is when I start reading it and it captures my attention. If I find I’m fighting my way through it, I put it down. It may not be the right one yet, but I leave it.

It’s the same with speakers. You don’t have to believe everything the speaker says, do you? But you take that which you know is for you, which rings deep down in the heart. This is for me. I was interested in reading in Two Kings, a story of Josiah. It’s wonderful, you know. Josiah was a young king and he sent his secretary up to the builders of a church. A church and he was trying to restore a church. And the secretary, when he got up there, he was given a book that they found in the old building. And he brought this book back, read it to the king, and that book transformed Israel there. Just the finding of that book at that time. Quite interesting that this goes all the way along.

Now, being a slow learner, it took me some time to realize that something remarkable was happening here. A teacher was working very carefully in answer to my desire to learn the secrets of the kingdom. He was actually moving me to people and to books at a certain time to help me understand certain things. And He’s still doing it. Books began to appear to me in strange ways. I remember being at the newspaper office and at one time I really looked at our newspaper office and it’s one of the great big offices in London. And I remember one morning walking up towards it and I thought, “That’s going to be my university of living. I’m going to learn to live the Kingdom of Heaven, the secrets of the kingdom there in that place.” And so it was wonderful experiment, an experience of being in union work and then later on in management because although I went back as an office boy, what began to happen as I learned these secrets, I began to get promoted again. And I began to get given more and more responsibility. And every time the promotion came up, someone would say, “But what about his nervous breakdown?” Got it? But it’s interesting, you see, because if God’s got us in His hands, He’s going to promote us, isn’t it?

He’s going to get us into the sort of places that we need to be fulfilled. And so eventually, I finished up at the Daily Mirror newspapers in charge of the whole of their buying of the newsprint, which was a tremendous responsibility. We’re talking about millions of money in buying newsprint for the group. And that’s where I finished up in the Mirror before I decided that that’s not for me all my life, and I would come out and do God’s work specifically with people, which was my heart’s desire. Got it? But that shows you the measure of these great secrets that even though you’re really right down in the depths, God can lift you up and raise you up to the higher places again. But in this building, once I was sitting there with… I went to see a manager, a friend of mine. I haven’t seen him for a long time.

And I was sitting whilst he was… I was waiting for him to be free and I was talking to some of the people in the office. And then he came along, he said, “I’ll be with you a minute, Bert.” And he did, and we went into his office. And I remember sitting there and he was just going to start talking when the phone rang. And it… Notice again the timing. The phone rang. So as he was on the phone, I turned my head to make out I wasn’t listening. But of course he didn’t make any difference with it. And as I turned my head, there was a bookshelf there. And then standing up this bookshelf, which was all trade directories, was an amazing book. Now it’s a book that previously I had seen mentioned, I had seen quotes, and I thought, “I must have that book, I must have that book.” But I’m not a quick learner, you see, and I didn’t respond quickly. But standing outside those books was a great big book. It was about that big. It had a beautiful blue cover on it with gold letters on. And the book that I was supposed to read was this book, God Calling. In great big… I couldn’t miss it. And I said to him, “How did you get that book there?”

He said, “Well, I don’t know.” He said, “Someone sent it, nothing to do with us, as you can see, so I stuck it in there, Bert.” Wasn’t that wonderful? He said, “Would you like it?” I said, “Yes.” I said, “God’s been telling me to get that book for a long time.” And I thought, “I’m so lazy.” And do you know, for that next three months, that book was just as if God was speaking to me directly. Wasn’t that wonderful? Wasn’t that amazing?

And so, book after book came my way. And I could go on for a long time telling you stories. And I know that you would share stories like this with me, wouldn’t you? I’m sure you have. Got it? But I want one except to say here, and this has really come since I’ve been here. It’s happening now. I’m going to tell you about another little book that come my way. As you know, I’m in the counselling ministry, but some time ago, Phyllis Davis here, and Bill, as you know, Phyllis and Bill lost their son, as we say, but it’s not lost really, in an air crash, a tragic air crash, a wonderful 13 year old boy. When we was in Shasta, Phyllis was reading out some of her writings as we sat by the table in the old hut. And I was thrilled by these, and she told me that she was writing a book. And then later on, when I’d forgotten all about it, she sent me this magnificent book, Brief Climb Towards Understanding. It’s a most beautiful book in every way. It’s beautifully formed. The illustrations, the writing is in a strange way. It’s everything beautifully thought tell. But it tells the story of her going through her feelings along while afters in various stages.

And I thought it was wonderful. It helped me share with my friends in their pain and suffering. And I was moved by the book, and then I put it aside. Well, do you remember the other day, I told you about the lady that came to the counseling session, who had just had her son killed. Got it? And really, although I said, “Come and see me,” I just wondered what I could do for this dear lady, you know? And so I went home, and I saw this book again on my shelf, and I took it, and I began to read it again, and it was as if the heavens opened. And I read slowly that book before every session, and it was a tremendous help to me. Then, eventually, I gave that book to the friend, and they read it themselves, and they were thrilled and moved by it. You see? It so happens that Phyllis does have some of these. I’ve found out this, and Richard has been kind enough to allow her to put a view on the book table. This is very unusual in CFO, but this is a special occasion. So if anybody does want to look at this book, but if you want one, take one, but give the money directly to Phyllis, that has saved them, getting them a pickle up there.

But if you know anybody that’s had a tragic death like that, or if you want to understand anything about the grieving process, then that really is an amazing book. And I’m so pleased, you know, to be able to say something, and no one’s asked me to say this, but I’m just showing you again that that book came at that time for a certain reason, and that will always be a treasure to me. Whenever I deal with anybody that has a tragic loss, or a grieving. So it goes on and on. One last story about it. I wrote to Starr Daily, and I’ll tell you this perhaps tomorrow, and asked him about meditation, and he mentioned a book called The Magnificent Love. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of this, have you? You’ve heard it, Alex, yeah. No one seems to know about it, and I didn’t know about it. But you know, I went to Rosie Maitman, and I was staying with her, and she took me to her church.

And we went round to her church, and she said, “Come into our library.” Now you know what’s coming, don’t you? But the interesting thing, that library was practically empty. But the one book I wanted was there, on the shelf.

Isn’t that good? Isn’t that wonderful? But of course, friends, we know that reading is not enough. The lessons have to be applied. I wish I could say I’ve learned all the lessons. I haven’t. I wish I could say all the teaching has been faithfully practiced. I mean, if you looked at my bookshelf now, I really ought to be a mixture of St. Francis, Norman Vincent Peale, and Brother Lawrence. I really should. That’s because I’ve read them. And I’ve read so many saints and so many mystics and so many wonderful teachers. I should really be a mixture of all those. But it’s not as easy as that, is it? I think you are. Well, I never joke. Well, I shared with someone at the table this morning, I’ll share with you a lovely passage which has been a tremendous help to me, and it helps so many of my friends who come for counseling. And I usually give it for them to take away and stick on their mirror. It’s something very beautiful. It goes something like this. I am neither good nor bad. I am both. Do you remember that? I am neither selfish nor generous. I am both. I am neither honest nor dishonest. I am both. I am neither saint nor a sinner.

I am both. But God accepts me, forgives me, and loves me just as I am. Therefore, I can accept myself, forgive myself, and love myself just as I am, and others as they are. Isn’t that wonderful? Now, I know this has been put now into the lovely pamphlet and sent out by CFO. They share all the good things, CFO, that they don’t want to sit on any of them. But you know, that’s been a help to me as I’ve gone along the walk and I’m still learning and learning. But now, I’m not hard on myself. I allow myself to fail, I allow myself to have a little bit of leeway, and I know God respects that, and helps me. Now, if one of those stories was told, it would be coincidence. If two, someone might say, well, that’s a bit of chance. But when you put them all together, and you put all your stories together, what have we got? We’ve got an amazing situation where there is a person who knows everything about us and who wants to teach us and can teach us if we let Him. If we are aware of this thing going on, it’s an awareness of the closeness of God that we want to give. An awareness that is around about us.

We’re never away from Him. He’s omnipotent, as Glenn said. He’s omniscient, or knowing Him, as He is omnipresent, He’s everywhere present. Isn’t that wonderful? Aren’t we privileged to know these great truths? Let’s take hold upon them and walk out with them. Just let’s be still to reflect on the truth for moment.

We thank You, Father, for the way already in our lives You have blessed us and touched us, that You have drawn to us teachers, books, friends, and situations which have brought us to this point in our spiritual walk. We would just ask now that You will help us to be more aware of the leading of the Spirit, to be responsive, to be understanding Your way and will, and to continue to increase in our desire to know the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven and Your righteousness. We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.