Workers together with God

Preached in Angelus Temple, Bible Study #15 July 28, 1927

Interpretation of Tongues:
God has come to visit us and He has revealed Himself unto us, but He wants you to be so ready that nothing that He says will miss. He wants to build you on the foundation truth.

Are you ready this morning? What for? Because God has something better than yesterday. Higher ground, holier thoughts, more concentrated, clearer ministry God wants us every day to be in a rising tide. It is a changing of faith. It is an attitude of the spirit. It is where God rises higher and higher.

God wants us to come into the place where we will never look back. God has no room for the man that looks back, thinks back, or acts back.

The Holy Ghost wants to get you ready for stretching yourself out to God and believe that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. You need not use vain repetition. Ask and believe.

People come with their needs, they ask, they go away still with their needs because they do not faithfully wait to receive what God has promised them. If they ask they will get it.

Many people are missing the highest order. I went to a person who was full of the Spirit, but was all the time saying, “Glory! Glory! Glory!”

I said, “You are full of the Holy Ghost, but the Spirit cannot speak because you continually speak.” He kept still then and the Spirit began speaking through him. We are altogether in the way of God. Do more believing and less begging.

I want so to change your operation in God till you will know that God is operating through you for this time and forevermore more. May the Spirit awake us to deep things today.

Are you ready? What for? That you may move and be moved by the mighty power of God that cannot be moved and so chastened and built up till you are in the place, it doesn’t matter where the wind blows or difficulty comes, you are fixed in God.

Are you ready? What for? To come into the plan of the Most High God, believing what the Scripture says, and holding fast that which is good, believing so that no man shall take your crown.

The Word Changes the Believer
God can so change us by His Word that we are altogether different day by day David knew this. He said, “Thy word hath quickened me. He sent his word and healed me.” How beautiful that God can make His Word abound! “I have hid thy word in my heart that I might not sin against thee.”

It is absolutely infidelity and unbelief to pray about anything in the Word of God. The Word of God has not to be prayed about, the Word of God has to be received. If you will receive the Word of God, you will always be in a big place. If you pray about the Word of God the devil will be behind the whole thing. Never pray about anything which is “Thus saith the Lord.” It has to be yours to build you on a new foundation of truth.

I want to turn your attention this morning to the sixth chapter of 2 Corinthians. This is a summit position for us, although there are many ground lines to be examined to see if we are rising to the summit of these glorious experiences. This is also ground work for deep heart searching. This is divine revelation of the spiritual character to us. The writer must have been immersed in this holy place.

If you turn to the first verse of Romans 12 you will see that the speaker is operated by an operation. He has been mightily under the operation on more than a surgical table. He has been cut to the very depths, till he has reached a place absolutely on the altar of full surrender. And out of the depths of it when he has got it there, now he is giving his whole life, as it were, in a nutshell.

I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service —Romans 12:1.
Here in this sixth chapter of 2 Corinthians we have again a beautiful word which ought to bring us to a very great place of hearing by the hearing of faith.

“We then, as workers together with him. . .

It is a collective thought. It is preaching to the whole Church in Christ Jesus. Paul has the Corinthians in his mind because the Corinthian church was the first church amongst the Gentiles, and he was the apostle to the Gentiles.

Receive Not God’s Grace in Vain
“We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain” (2 Corinthians 6:1). This is one of the mightiest words there is in the Scripture. People are getting blessed all the time, having revelation, and they go from one point to another but do not establish themselves in that thing which God has brought to them.

If you do not let your heart be examined when the Lord comes with blessing or correction, if you do not make it a stepping stone, if you do not make it a rising place, then you are receiving the grace of God in vain. People could be built far greater in the Lord and be more wonderfully established if they would move out sometimes and think over the graces of the Lord.

Grace is to be multiplied on conditions. How? In the first chapter of 2 Timothy we have these words: “the unfeigned faith that is in thee.”

Everyone in this place, the whole Church of God, has the same like precious faith within him. And if you allow this like precious faith to be foremost, utmost on everything, you will find that grace and peace are multiplied.

Just the same the Lord comes to us with His mercy and if we do not see that the God of grace and mercy is opening to us the door of mercy and utterances, we are receiving it in vain.

I thank God for every meeting. I thank God for every blessing. I thank God every time a person says to me, “God bless you, Brother!” I say, “Thank you, Brother. The Lord bless you!” I see it is a very great place to have people desirous that we shall be blessed.
If we want strength in building in our spiritual character, we should never forget the blessings. When you are in prayer remember how near you are to the Lord. It is a time that God wants you to change strength there, and He wants you to remember He is with you.

When you open the sacred pages and the light comes right through and you say, “Oh, isn’t that wonderful!” thank God, for it is the grace of God that has opened your understanding.

When you come to a meeting like this, the revelation comes forth, you feel this is what you wanted, receive it as the grace of the Lord. God has brought you to a place where He might make you a greater blessing.

Constant Salvation
For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation —2 Corinthians 6:2.

Two processes of salvation. He succoured you when the Spirit was moving you and when the adversary was against you, when your neighbours and friends wished it not to be and when everybody rose up in accusation against you. When you know there were fightings without and fightings within, He succoured you. He covered you till you came into salvation. And then He keeps you in the plan of His salvation.

This is the day of salvation. Being saved does not mean to say that you were not saved, but that you are being continually changed, in the process of regeneration being made like unto God, being brought into the operation of the Spirit’s power, being made like unto Him.

This is the day of salvation. He has succoured thee in a time when Satan would destroy thee, and He is with thee now.

This is the day of salvation. If we remain stationary, God has nothing for us. Everybody must see that they must be in progress. Yesterday will not do for today. I must thank God for yesterday Tomorrow is what I am today

Today: inspiration, divine intuition, where God is ravishing the heart, breaking forth all shorelines, getting my heart only responsive to His cry, where I live and move honoring and glorifying God in the Spirit. This is the day of visitation of the Lord. This is the great day of salvation, being moved on, into, for God.

Interpretation of Tongues:
It is the Lord. Let Him do what seemeth Him well. It may be death, but He has life in the midst of death.

We will praise and magnify the Lord, for He is worthy to be praised!

He has succoured us, and now He is building us. Now He is changing us. Now we are in the operation of the Holy Ghost. You must every day make higher ground. You must deny yourself to get on with God. You must refuse everything that is not pure and holy and separate. God wants you pure in heart. He wants your intense desire after holiness.

“Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”

In Perfect Harmony
“Giving no offence in any thing, that the ministry be not blamed” (2 Corinthians 6:3).

That is lovely! Oh! The church can be built. God will break down opposing things.

If you people in Angelus Temple are in a place where you would rather see one person saved here than two people saved at Bethel Temple, then you are altogether wrong and you need to be saved. If there is anybody here from Bethel Temple, if you would rather see one person saved in your temple than two people saved in Angelus Temple, then you are still out of order of the Spirit of the line of God and you are strangers to real holy life with God.

If your ministry is not to be blamed, how will it not be blamed? You have to live in love. See to it there is never anything comes out of your lips or by your acts that will interfere with the work of the Lord, but rather live in the place where you are helping everybody, lifting everybody, and causing everybody to come into perfect harmony For remember, there is always a blessing where there is harmony. “One accord” is the keynote of the victory that is going to come to us all the time.

There are thousands and thousands of different churches, but they are all one in the Spirit just in the measure as they receive the life of Christ. If there is any division, it is always outside the Spirit. The spiritual life in the believer never has known dissension or break, because where the Spirit has perfect liberty, then they all agree and there is no schism in the body

“The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.” When there is division it is only because they take the letter instead of the Spirit. If we are in the Spirit, then we shall have life. If we are in the Spirit, we shall love everybody. If we are in the Spirit, there will be no division. There will be perfect harmony God wants to show us that we must so live in the Spirit that the ministry is not blamed.

It is a wonderful ministry God has given to us because it is a life ministry Pentecostal positions are spiritual positions. We recognize the Holy Ghost, but we recognize first the Spirit quickening us, saving us from every rudiment of evil power, transforming our human nature till it is in divine order. Then in that divine order we see that the Lord of Hosts can be very beautifully arranging the life till we live in the Spirit and are not fulfilling the lusts of flesh.

Interpretation of Tongues:
Let not thy goodness be evil spoken of, but so live in the spiritual life with Christ that He is being glorified over thy body, thy soul and thy spirit, till thy very life becomes emblematic and God reigns over thee in love and peace.

I like that because I see that when the Holy Ghost has perfect charge, He lifts and lightens and unveils the truth in a new way till we grip it.

Oh! What I would be if every one of us would go away this morning with this word in our heart, “Let not your goodness be evil spoken of.” I know we all want to be good. It is not a wrong thing to desire that our goodness shall be appreciated. But we must watch ourselves because it is an evil day (although it is the day of salvation), and we must understand these days that the Lord wants to chasten and bring a people right into a full-tide position.

I believe that it is possible for God to sweep a company right into the glory before the Rapture just as well as at the Rapture. It is possible for you to be taken if others are left. May God grant unto us a very keen inward discerning of our heart’s purity. We want to go. It is far better for us to go. But it is far better for the church that we stay.

If you comprehend the truth of this word which Paul realized was true, “It is far better for me to go,” you will never take a pill nor use a plaster. You would never do anything to’ save you from going if you believed it was better to go. There is a definite, inward motion of the power of God for the human life to so change it till we would not lift a finger, believing it was far better to go.

Then there is another side to it. Believing that God has us for the proclamation of the Gospel, for the building of the church, we would say, “Lord, for the purpose of being a blessing further for Thy sake, and for the sake of the Church, just keep us full of life to stay”

We would not be full of disease, but we would be full of life.

So the Lord grant unto us this morning a living faith to believe.

In Affliction for the Church
“But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses” (2 Corinthians 6:4).

Now, these afflictions are not the afflictions of the disease class. Paul is very definite on these lines. He suffered afflictions with the people. Jesus suffered afflictions with the people. There can be many afflictions within our human frame on the line of feeling the association of our spiritual acquaintance is not ripening in the life of others.

You have to so live in the Spirit that when you see the church not rising into its glory, you have affliction for the church. You are sorry and deeply distressed because the church is not capturing the vision, and there is affliction in your sorrow.

God would have us so spiritual that we could have perfect discernment of the spirit of the people. If I can in a moment discern the spirit, whether it is quickening, whether the whole church is receiving it, whether my heart is moved by this power, then I can see the declination of positions, I can see the waning of positions, and I can see faith waning, and that will cause affliction and trouble to my life.

May God give us to realize that we are so joined to the Church that we may labor to bring the Church up. Paul said he travailed in birth for people to be formed again.8 It was not to be saved again. But they had missed apprehension. They had missed fellowship of divine order, so he labored again that they might be brought into this deep fellowship in the Spirit.

God help us to see that we can travail for the church. Blessed is the person who can weep between the door and the altar. Blessed is the people of God that can take Angelus Temple on their hearts and weep behind, cry through till the church is formed again, till she rises in glory till the power of heaven is over her, till the spiritual acquaintance rises higher and higher, till the song lifts them to the heights.

This is the order of the church of God. The ministry be not blamed, but a higher height, a glorious truth, a blessed fidelity, higher and higher.

“Possess Your Soul in Peace
“In much patience.”

There is a word which needs to be in these days. I know I am speaking to people who have churches and who have a lot to do in churches. Remember this: You never lose so much as when you lose your peace. If the people see that you have lost your groundwork of peace, they know you have got outside of the position of victory. You have to possess your soul in peace.

Strange things will happen in the church, things will look as though they were all contrary, and you will feel that the enemy is busy At that time possess your soul in peace. Let the people know that you have acquaintance with One Who, when He was reviled, reviled not again.

Let your patience be so possessed that you can suffer anything for the church or for your friends or for your neighbors, or anyone. Remember this: We build character in others as our character is built. Just as we are pure in our thought, tender and gracious to other people, and possess our souls in patience, then the people have great desire for our fellowship in the Holy Ghost.

Now Jesus was emblematic of that line. They saw Him undisturbed. I love to think about Him. He helps me so much because He is the very essence of help.

Give Not Offense Nor Cause Distress
“In necessities and distresses.” This means spiritual distresses because of acquaintance with the Church. It is the Church we are dealing with here. Paul is in a place where he is breathing forth by divine appointment to the Church.

The purpose of these meetings is to gather the Church together in fidelity lines, because if five people could save Sodom and Gomorrah, five holy people in a church can hold the power of the Spirit till Light shall reign. We do not want to seek to save ourselves, but lose ourselves that we may save the Church. You cannot help distresses coming. They will come, and offenses will come, but woe unto those that cause offenses. See that you do not cause offense. See that you live in a higher tide. See that your tongue cannot move.

I wonder if you have ever seen the picture in the twenty-second chapter of Luke, “Lord, is it I?” Every one of them was so conscious of his human weaknesses that not a single one of them had a place where he could say that it would not be he.

“One of you will betray me,” Jesus said.

John was leaning on the breast of the Lord, and Peter beckoned to him and said, “Please get to know.”’2 He knew if anybody could get to know it would be John.

How long do you think Jesus had known? He had known at least for nearly three years. He had been with them in the room, He had been feeding them, He had been walking up and down with them, and He had never told any of them it was Judas.

The church that follows Jesus should be so sober, sober to a sensitiveness that they would not speak against another, whether it was true or not.

Jesus is the great personality I have in every way to listen and also to be provoked by His holy inward generosity and purity, and also His acquaintance with love.

What would it have done? If He had told them, everyone would have been bitter against Judas. So He saved all His disciples from being bitter against Judas for three years.

What love! Can’t you see that holy divine Saviour? Every one of us today would throw ourselves at His feet. If we had a crown worth millions of money, we would say “You are worthy” O God, give us such a holy, intense, divine acquaintance that we would rather die than grieve Thee! Oh, for an inward savor that shall make us say “A thousand deaths rather than sinning once.” O Jesus, we worship Thee! Thou art worthy!

Interpretation of Tongues:
Into the very depths have I gone to succour thee. And in the very depths I called thee My own, and I delivered thee when thou wast oppressed and in oppression, and I brought thee out when thou wert sure to sink below the waves, and I lifted thee and brought thee into the banqueting house.

It is the mercy of the Lord. It is the love of the Lord. It is the grace of the Lord. It is the Spirit of the Lord. It is the will of the Lord.

Be ready Be alert for God. Live in the Holy Ghost. Oh, I can understand, “I would that ye all spake in tongues, but rather that ye prophesy except we have interpretation.” I pray God that we may learn the lesson how to keep ourselves so that the Spirit shall blend, the harmony shall be beautiful. There is not a person in the place but is feeling the breath of the Almighty breathing over us. This is one of those moments when the Spirit is coming to us and saying, “Don’t forget. This is the receiving of the grace of God.” You are not to go away and forget. You are to go away and be what God intends you to be.

Apprehended in Sweden
“In stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings” (2 Corinthians 6:5). How those first apostles did suffer! And how we together with them do suffer.

Sweden is a most remarkable place in many ways. When I was in Sweden the power of God was upon me, and it was there that I was apprehended for preaching these wonderful truths, talking about the deep things of God, seeing people healed on every line.

The Lutheran churches, yes, and the doctors rose up like an army against me and had special meetings with the king to try to get me out of the country And at last they succeeded.’ It was in Sweden that I was escorted out with two detectives and two policemen, because of the mighty powers of God moving amongst the people in Stockholm. But beloved, it was very lovely!

One of the nurses in the king’s household came, and she was healed of a leg trouble — I forget whether a broken thigh or a dislocated joint. She went to the king and she said, “I have been so wonderfully healed by this man. You know I am walking all right now.”

“Yes,” he said, “I know everything about him. I know all about him. Tell him to go. I do not want him turned out. If he goes out, he can come back; but if he is turned out, he cannot come back.”

I thank God I was not turned out, I was escorted out.

They went to see the policemen to see if I could have a big meeting in the park on the Whitsun Tide Monday. The policemen joined together and they said, “There is only one reason that we could refuse him, and it is on this line: if that man puts his hands upon the sick in the great park, it would take thirty more policemen to guard the situation. But if he will promise us that he will not lay his hands upon the people, then we will allow you to have the park.”

They came and asked me, and I said, “Promise them. I know God is not subject to my laying hands upon the people. When the presence of the Lord is there to heal, it does not require hands. Faith is the great operation position. When we believe God all things are easy”

So they built places where I could speak to thousands of people.

I prayed, “Lord, You know. You have never been yet in any place fixed. You have ,the mind of all things. Show me how it can be done today without the people having hands laid upon them. Show me.”

To the people I said, “All of you that would like the power of God going through you today, healing everything, put your hands up.”

There was a great crowd of hands, thousands of hands went up.

“Lord, show me.”

And He told me as clearly as anything to pick a person out that stood upon a rock. It was a very rocky place. So I told them all to put their hands down but this person. To her I said, “Tell all the people what are your troubles.”

She began to relate her troubles. From her head to her feet she was so in pain that she felt if she did not sit down or lie down she would never be able to go on.

“Lift your hands high,” I said. Then, “In the name of Jesus I rebuke from your head to your feet the evil one, and I believe He has loosed you.”

Oh, how she danced and how she jumped and how she shouted!

That was the first time that God revealed to me it could be done. We had hundreds healed without touching them and hundreds saved without touching. Our God is a God of mighty power. Oh, how wonderful, how glorious and how fascinating it is that we can come into a royal place! This is a royal place. We have a great God. We have a wonderful Jesus. I believe in the Holy Ghost.

In Prison in Switzerland
“. . . in imprisonments.”

In Switzerland I have been put into prison twice for this wonderful work. But praise God, I was brought out all right!

The officers said to me, “We find no fault. We are so pleased. We have found no fault because you are such a great blessing to us in Switzerland.”

And in the middle of the night they said, “You can go.”

I said, “No. I will only go on one condition. That is that every officer there is in the place gets down on his knees and I pray with all of you.”
Glory to God!

A High Tide
Are you ready? What for? To believe the Scriptures. That is necessary. The Scripture is our foundation to build upon properly. Christ is the cornerstone. We are all in the building.

Oh! If I could let you see that wonderful city coming down out of heaven, millions, trillions beyond countless numbers, a city coming down out of heaven to be married, millions, trillions of people making the city.
Get ready for that. Claim your rights in God’s order this morning. Do not give way. If you hear any spiritual breathing from anyone, believe that is your order. If you see Christ, believe He was your firstfruit. If you see Paul by the Holy Ghost penetrating your divine position, believe it is yours.

Have faith in God. Believe the Scripture is for you. If you want a high tide rising in the power of God, say, “Give me, Lord, that which I shall be short in nothing.” Have a real faith. Believe that love covers you, His life flows through you, His quickening Spirit lifts you.

Prayer
O God, take these people into Thy great pavilion. Lead them, direct them, preserve them, strengthen them, uphold them by Thy mighty power. Let the peace that passeth understanding, the joy of the Lord, the comfort of the Holy Ghost be with them. Amen.

Questions and Answers

Q: In Ephesians 6:12 does “wrestling” mean wrestling in prayer? “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities,” etc.

A: According to 2 Corinthians 10:5, we are able to smite the enemy and bring every thought into perfect obedience to the law of Christ.

“Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”

Now is that through prayer, or how? It is quite clear to me that faith inspires you to pray but faith will command you to command. And if you are in the place of real faith when these things come up against you, you will say “Get thee behind me”4 no matter what it is.

Prayer is without accomplishment unless it is accompanied by faith. Jude says we can pray in the Holy Ghost. Be sure you are filled with the Spirit that you do not pray but Another prays. Be sure you are filled with the life of Christ till faith rises, claims, destroys, brings down imagination and everything that opposes Christ. Faith and prayer, an act, a command.

Q: Which is the right way to baptize, in the name of Jesus, or the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost?

A: Always do that which causes no contention and no split. Water baptism in the name of Jesus causes more trouble than anything else, and you should never have trouble in the church, you should be at peace. The Lord said it was to be in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and when we keep in the right order, as He said, then there is no schism in the body.

When you go on your own line and strike out a new cord, you cause dissension and trouble. This thing has caused more trouble than anything because it has not been satisfied to go there. It has gone further and said that Jesus is the Father, Jesus is the Son, and Jesus is the Holy Ghost. If you do not keep on the right line, keep in the words where Jesus was, you will be tippled over in awful distress and darkness. Keep on the high line.

Q: What should be our attitude toward the coming of the Lord? Should we be enjoying His personal presence now, disregarding the time of His coming, or should we wait and anticipate His coming?

A: Do what Peter did. He hastened to the coming, and he left everything behind him to catch the gleam of it. You have to keep your mind upon it, looking unto and hastening it. It is a joy to the Church. It is that “blessed hope.” It is that glorious appearing. And it will save you from any amount of things, for he that looks for that purifieth himself.

Q: Does a person have to go to school in order to save souls?

A: I think you will save more souls out of the school. What you have got to do is to understand that soul-saving work is never made in schools. Soul-saving work is the regenerative of the spirit, of the life, to make you eaten up with the zeal of the Lord. Soul saving is the best thing. It is the sure place, it is the right place, and I hope we are doing it when He comes.
Q: Is the Spirit of God within the individual that is born again? I have always thought so from the eighth chapter of Romans.

A: If you will rightly consider the truth and keep it before you, it will save you from any amount of error. The epistles are for people who are baptized in the Holy Ghost, baptized believers.

When you say, “Except you have the Spirit of Christ, you are none of His,”6 you will find that is a perfect word right in the epistles. The new birth has within it the Spirit of Jesus, and it has the word also, “My word is spirit and life.” It is not the Holy Spirit; it is the Spirit of Jesus.

The Holy Spirit is that which comes after, and is with you all the time. He was with you in revelation of conviction, but when you were filled He came inside. And after He comes inside, it is so much different from being outside.

Q: Did Jesus think it not robbery to be equal with God? What did He mean by saying that?

A: It meant He was equal in power, equal in authority, equal in the glory. He was perfectly one, and what His Father was, He was, perfectly joined. Yet in order for perfect obedience, that all the people should learn obedience, He left the glory left everything

behind to save us. He had as much right to stop and say, “Father, You go,” but He was willing to go and left the glory although He had the right to stop.

Q: If a contract were entered into by two people and broken by one party, should that be collected by law by the other party?

A: Yes, if you lived in the law. But if you lived in the Spirit, then you would not go to law with your brother. It depends upon whether you live in law or live in grace. If you live in grace, you will never go into law.

I thank God that I was in business for twenty-five years and might have picked up a lot of money, but it is still left there because I would not go to law. I do not believe in it.

But I am not a law to you people. I tell you what law is and I tell you what grace is.

Q: What is the seal put upon God’s people?

A: The seal is the Holy Spirit. It is different from anything else. It is upon you, and the devil knows it. All the evil powers of the earth know it. You are sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise till the day of redemption. You are also baptized in the same Spirit, and that is in the epistles. But don’t forget that you get a great deal in your salvation, in the new birth. Press on and get sealed with the Spirit.

All they which are in Christ will be caught up at His coming. The twenty-second chapter of Luke distinctly says that Jesus would not sit down again to break bread till the kingdom had come. Now the kingdom is in every believer, and He will not sit down till every believer is there. The kingdom is in the believer, and the kingdom will come and millions and millions of people, I am sure, will be there who never received the Holy Ghost. But they had the life of the Christ inside. When He comes Who is our life — it is not the Holy Ghost Who is the life; Christ is the life — when He comes Who is our life, then shall we go to the Life.
Q: Is it every Christian’s privilege to have his eyes so preserved that he need never wear glasses?

A: One thing will take place with every person here. There are any number of people who have been praying ever since they were ten years old, and if praying and the life within them could have altered the situation, it would have been altered. But I see they are here today with gray hair, and white hair, meaning that the natural man decays and you cannot do what you like with it. But the supernatural man may so abound in the natural man that it never decays. It can be replaced by divine life.

There comes a time in life when at fifty or so all eyes, without exception, begin to be dim. But why? What kind of dimness? If we were living in the time of Moses we should not require glasses and we should have as good eyesight as he had. How do you know? Because those tables of stone that he carried were written on so that he could see or anybody else could see without glasses.

It doesn’t mean to say that your eyes are any worse than were Moses’. It means to say that the natural man has had a change. I believe and affirm that the supernatural power can be so ministered to us that even our eyesight can be preserved right through. But I say this: Any person is a fool that professes to have faith and then gets a big printed Bible so that he will not need glasses. It presents a false position before the people. What he has got to see is if he will carry a Bible about in his hand which, as the whole of the Bible in very short space, his eyesight may require either some help or he may not be able to read correctly.

I have been preaching faith to our people for thirty years. When my daughter came back from Africa and saw her mother and myself with glasses, she was amazed. When our people saw us put glasses on the first time, they were very much troubled. They were no more troubled than we were. But I found it was far better to be honest with the people and acknowledge my place than get a Bible that was right big print and deceive the people and say that my eyesight was all right. I like to be true.
My eyesight gave way at about fifty-three, and somehow God is doing something. I am now sixty-eight, and I do not want any kind of glasses different, and I am satisfied God is restoring me.

When I was seeking this way of divine healing I was stumbled because all the people that had such testimony of divine healing were wearing glasses. I said, “I cannot go on with this thing. I am stumbled every time I see the people preaching divine healing wearing glasses.” And I got such a bitterness in my spirit that God had to settle me on that line — and I believe yet that I have not fully paid the price.

My eyes will be restored, but until then I will not deceive anybody. I will use glasses till I can perfectly see.

A woman came up to me one day and I noticed she had no teeth.

“Why,” I said, “your mouth is very uneven. Your gums have dropped in some places and the old gums are very uneven.”

“Yes,” she said, “I am trusting the Lord for a new set of teeth.”

“That is very good,” I said. “How long have you been trusting Him for them?”

“Three years.”

“Look here,” I said, “I would be like Gideon: I would put the fleece out and I would tell the Lord that I would trust Him to send me teeth in ten days or money to buy a set in ten days, and whichever came first I would believe it was He.”

In eight days, fifty dollars came to her from a person whom she had never been acquainted with in any way, and it bought her a beautiful set of teeth — and she looked well in them.

A person is prayed for for eyesight and as soon as he is prayed for, he believes, and God stimulates his faith, but his eyesight is about the same. “What shall I do?” he asks. “Shall I go away without my glasses?”

“Can you see perfectly?” I ask. “Do you require any help?”

“Yes. If I should go as I go now, I would stumble.”

“Put your glasses on,” I say. “For when your faith is perfected you will not require any glasses, and when God perfects your faith your glasses will drop off. But as long as you have need, use them.”

You can take that for what you like, but I believe in common sense.