I don’t know why it is but we always want to see somebody else change. We want to see our boss change, our husband or wife change, we may even want our neighbors to change. But I have discovered that when I find myself desiring change in others the first step in witnessing that change depends on me.

Change begins with the one who wants to see change. If I wait for others to change I might be waiting until hell freezes over. But when I begin to change, when I begin to love, forgive, when I begin to soften, whatever adjustments need to be made, then I will see the things around me begin to be affected. The secret is to allow the Holy Spirit to reveal to you what part you have in the process of change and many times it involves love and forgiveness on our part. Proverbs 28:13 says, “He that covereth his sins shall not prosper; but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.” And I will tell you, there is no one who knows how to give you mercy like God.

I have counseled with couples who say they have never said I’m sorry or acknowledged being wrong throughout their entire marriage. Repentance is so important. This is especially true in the healing of relationships. It is an opportunity to see the power of God move on your behalf when you make the decision to walk in love, when you choose to do things His way. The best advertisement for Jesus is when people see a changed life. You can hit them in the head with a 15 pound Bible and get no response, but when people see a change in your conversation, a softening in your attitude, when people see Jesus in you then it will draw them.

Supernatural change is the result of allowing God to move in you first which will release His power in your situation. So the next time you desire to see change take place in another ask the Holy Spirit to search your heart and to let change begin in you.

I will never forget a man I met down in West Columbia Texas named Dan Smith. They called him the meanest man in town. His face looked like a road map from being cut by so many beer bottles. But, God gave a pastor named B. B. Hankins a burden for that man and he just kept loving that man. He would go into the bar, sit down beside him and talk to him about Jesus until he would leave.

Then one day, the meanest man in West Columbia Texas got saved and do you know what he did? He got after his boys and began to bring them to church. He told them he would whip them if they didn’t go to church with him so they did because they knew the old man could whip them. He was mean.

See they didn’t know about all the transformation that had taken place, all they knew as that he was still capable so one by one they came to church. I remember the week he brought all of his family in and he wasn’t nice about it. And he brought them in and told them to sit down and then he took the aisle seat so they couldn’t get out. When the altar call was given he would say, “Do you want to accept Jesus?” One by one they would come down and get saved, bawling and squalling and hugging each other. Mean old Dan Smith, that’s the only life he had ever lived. He didn’t know any different.

Dan Smith was a soul winner for Jesus. He thought it was a sin if he came to church without bringing somebody who needed Jesus. You may say, “I wouldn’t want that old man in my church.” Hey, I wish I had a thousand of them. You can build churches with folks like that. Dan Smith was not a nice man but thankfully churches aren’t made for nice people because none of us were nice before Jesus found us. Church is for sinners who have found the saving grace of Jesus Christ. People like you. Well I think you get the essence of the message, it’s time to win some people to Jesus.

One of the great men of days gone by could not go to sleep at night unless he had won somebody to Jesus. One night over in London, he had laid his head on a pillow after a long day of preaching and it dawned on him “I haven’t won anybody to Jesus today”. He got out of bed, changed out of his night clothes went out to the street corner and found one lonely soul under an umbrella and won him to Jesus then went back to bed. You say that is fanaticism. No that is new testament Christianity. Do you have to win the city? No, but by all means win some and whatever it takes, bring them in.

Back around in 1970, we had worked real hard in our church and had built it up to about 125 people whom we loved dearly. After spending five years of hard physical labor, there wasn’t a part of the old building that didn’t have some piece of my hide nailed to it. I said, God I don’t mind doing this, but it’s time for a harvest, I’m hungry for a harvest. It was during that time that I got the vision of the great feast which I want to share with you today.

As Christians we have such a wonderful thing that is available, but there has to be people to enjoy it. Restaurants close because people don’t come. I mean there have been some very fine restaurants that have opened with great promise; they were going to be famous! Everything about them was good. They looked good, the sign looked good, the food was superb… they just had one problem, the people didn’t come. You see that will close down any steakhouse. Or close down any house.

So here I was preparing the house for a great feast, and I began to cry out, “God I will do anything that is right and I will do anything that works”. I never have examined the theology of that, it was just my heart crying out to God. It has got to be right and it has got to work. Some things are right, but they just don’t seem to work. Some things work but, unfortunately, they are not right and we must be people of integrity and people of honesty. I wanted Calvary Cathedral to always be subject to change, God’s way.

So what did God do in response to my prayer? He sent in a group of hippie young people! They didn’t look like I was accustomed to folks looking and they brought drums and guitars with them to worship. We had never had those in our church before because as you know, Jesus didn’t have drums in his church. But we have come a long way baby! So we started doing a lot of things differently but you know what, young people began to come, lives were being changed and we decided we would continue do some things differently.

Throughout that time we did not compromise the Word of God, but how many know that there are different baits that you put on the hook to catch different fish. We learned through that experience that the harvest is ready, the people are hungry and we stand ready to serve a great feast. The meal has not been altered. But in the presentation, if we want to see a harvest, we must be willing to change – God’s way.

John 3:16, “God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

I was thinking about how beautiful it is that every sin can be forgiven. That we are not only are forgiven, not recycled sinners, we are new creations in Christ Jesus. I mean, God didn’t just clean us up a little bit and then push us on out the door. You are not an accident looking for a place to happen. You are a new creation in Christ Jesus. You may have had many issues in the past but the old things have passed away and behold all things are becoming new.

So where do I stand as a believer? I’m not all that I want to be but I’m not what I used to be and I am on my way to being everything Jesus died for me to be. That’s what it is all about. Every sin forgiven and the chance for a new beginning. I’m a new creation in Christ Jesus. I’m justified – just as though I had never sinned.

Jesus made a way so that none should perish. It is a beautiful transformation we experience as we walk in daily relationship Him. From lost and broken sinner to beautiful new creation. All because God so loved the world.

A young man, 16 years of age, came into the revival in June of 1993. They said he had learning disabilities and could never function in a normal classroom setting. And he was, by his own admission, a social misfit, whose life was a disaster. His mother talked him into coming to church one night, and he was touched by the power of the Holy Ghost. He went to the floor and God did a work in that young man’s life.

You may say, “I don’t believe that”, well that’s okay, pass on by. You may think that most folks fake it, well some of them probably do, but not all of them. I will tell you there are people that get off of the floor and God’s done a work of surgery.

I will never forget the grief that was in my wife’s heart when her youngest brother Rex was killed by a drunken driver. It was such a senseless tragedy. All that people think about is who does or doesn’t go to jail. But people don’t realize the pain and heartache of the tragedy. He was twenty eight years old with a beautiful wife and brand new baby. My wife was hurting; I saw her hurting and Dr. Kenneth Hagin prayed for her one night. The power of God put Joy on the floor and when Joy goes on the floor I can go get several hamburgers before it is going to be all over. She and God negotiate so it’s going to be a little while before they get through. But she said afterward, you know when I got up the hurt was healed, God had touched me. During that special time God had taken away the sting of her loss and given the grace to go on.

You know, we need to be very careful about judging the things we see in the church. Occasionally somebody may be doing something ugly or ungodly, we know that is wrong. But what I am talking about is judging someone else when you don’t know what God is doing in their life. There may be a reason why they cry or laugh so much. A little laughter would probably help you too. There may be a reason why they come to the altar so much. Listen to me, I’m talking to you out of a pastor’s heart, leave them alone and let them come to Jesus. Let God do a work of grace in their lives.

God said don’t make a big deal out of why they come, just receive them as they come. Minister to them and help them because this could be, just as it was for that misfit young man and my precious wife, their day of turnaround.

3 John 1:2 “Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health…”

I believe God’s desire to prosper his children is part of the full gospel. “Oh, you must be one of those prosperity preachers and I just don’t believe in that.” My guess is that you do. You want every dime you can get your hand on. Did you give your paycheck back this week because you didn’t feel you deserved it? I doubt it, because everybody is after prosperity. Everybody wants to pay their bills, make their mortgage payment on time, live in dignity, put shoes and clothing on their children and send them back to school. The ability to do those things is called prosperity.

“Beloved I would that you prosper and be in health…” This verse goes on to say, “…even as your soul prospers.” Bob Nichols has never, preached material prosperity over spiritual prosperity, we have preached this thing in balance. But I hate poverty, I hate sickness and the works of the devil. We are here declaring that if you are poor, hang around, you are going to pull out of that. If you are sick, hang around, you are going to get well. If your home is in trouble, stay around a little while and God is going to restore harmony in your home. That’s what the gospel of Jesus Christ is all about, the assurance that God is going to turn it around.

A man came to me one day and said, “I served time in jail and when I got out I came to this church and asked Jesus into my heart.” He was coming to tell me that for the first time in his life he paid a $300.00 tithe. He said he had never been able to do anything like that before he came to Jesus. And he said the blessings just continued to flow. He had a church family that loved him, a place that welcomed him and make him feel like he had worth. Not only that, God had given him a beautiful home for half the price. This may not have happened to you yet but it will. Just hold steady and keep on believing, keep on giving, keep on praying, keep the switch of faith turned on and God will turn it around for you.