A recording of a 1980 community celebration menâs night. Three parts of the evening were recorded: prophecies given at the menâs night; a spontaneous response to those words by Paul DeCelles exhorting the men and boys to resist carnal temptation; and a prepared teaching on love of neighbor (the Good Samaritan) and love of God (Martha and Mary).
Transcript
This document is a direct transcript of an audio recording, and may contain transcription errors and other minor edits for the sake of clarity.
[Tape begins after Paul has begun speaking]
PAUL: . . . introduce them. But there isnât time to do all that. So, instead of doing that, what Iâd like you to do is to make sure that your sons meet as many of the men as possible, this evening. Later on, during the time downstairs, weâll have time for fellowship. This is a time for the young men to get to know something about the older men. Watch out for âem. [All laugh.] But take the opportunity, all you fathers especially, to get everybody to kinda âcross-pollinateâ and get to know each other. They should know who your children are in particular, you know.
Okay, letâs turn now to the Lord and continue to worship him. And speak up as the Lord leads you. [Paul and all worship.]
MANâS VOICE 1: I call upon you, my men, to pray for a manly boldness, to proclaim my victory over death and this world. I tell you, my men, to pray for a manly boldness, to be examples in this world thatâs fallen far from my grace. I tell you, my men, to pray that you could in fact be men [inaudible] this world, as examples to other men in this world as to how to live. I tell you, older men, to pray for the young sons that I am raising up, that they would be bold, in a generation thatâs fallen farther from my grace than the one that youâve seen. I tell you, younger men, pray for your fathers, for your older brothers, that they could be bold in a world thatâs falling farther and farther from my grace. I call you, men, pray for the boldness to be the witnesses in this world, so that you might be my mouthpiece, that you might be strong, in the midst of evil. I call you all, my men, to pray to be freed from sin, that you could be lights, that are shone in a dark world. I call you, my men, to be bold in this world, for my sake. I tell you, follow my example, and be men for my sake, and for the sake of this world, and for the sake of the souls that should come to me.
[All worship.]
MANâS VOICE 2: [a couple of inaudible sentences; both seem to begin with âI stand among you. . . .â ?] I stand among you as a friend among friends. And know that I can see right through each of you, your inmost heart. I know the most intimate of your sins. I want you to look to me for salvation. I want you to understand that my power and my grace can overcome the deepest of your sins. For I have created you to be my own, to go forth in this world, to be a light to the nations. And through my power and grace, the most intimate and deep of your sins is as nothing. And I [inaudible], that you would be renewed in spirit and in truth, able to worship me, able to love your family, and your friends, and your brothers. Through me all things are possible, my sons, if you would but give your hearts totally to me. Dedicate your heart to me, dedicate yourself with acts of self-denial, and assist me in ridding yourself of sin.
MANâS VOICE 3: My brothers, focus your hearts on me. Focus your praises on me. Know that I am the Lord. I am the Lord, your God. I am the one who can purify you. I am the one who can set you free from bondage, the bondage that Satan would entwine you in, the bondage that he would turn you away from your brothers, the bondage that he would say that you are not worthy to be part of this assembly. My brothers, come with your praises before me. Come with your praises, that they may act as a song of praise to me, that my grace may flow into your hearts and may root out the darkness that is there. Come, my brothers! Come, my brothers, with your glad songs! Come, my brothers, and enter into the joy of your Father! Come, my brothers, and accept the inheritance that Iâve laid out before you. Come, my brothers, and sing my praise! Rejoice in me! Let my praise be always on your lips. Let my praise be always in your heart, and in your mouth, and in your mind. Know, my brothers, that my praise can blot out the darkness, that singing my praises will cleanse you, will set you free.
[All worship.]
MANâS VOICE 4: . . . [inaudible] and the wrath of God burns out against his enemies. My sons, my wrath is enkindled against my enemies. And I wish to fill you with this wrath and this anger. You yourselves might be angry, you might be [inaudible]. . . . My son, let my righteous indignation fill you, that you might still be [inaudibleââpeopleâ?] that you might lay down your lives in fighting the enemy. My sons, my wrath is enkindled. I am very angry with those whoâve blasphemed against me, with those who work against you. My sons, be filled with my wrath, that I might give you strength, that you might fight against the evil one.
[All worship.]
MANâS VOICE 5: Know what I am calling you to. I place before you my crucifixion. I am calling you to die. Do not turn back from the crosses that are going to face you. The evil one may attack you; do not turn away from my cross. You must bear my cross if you are to live. Look to me, look to my crucifixion, look to the way that I have pointed out to you. Look to my life as an example. Do not turn away from the cross. You must accept what I present you. You must accept my crucifixion. Only in this way can you enter into the life to which I am leading you. This is the only way in which there is any hope for you.
[All worship.]
MANâS VOICE 6: This is from 2nd Corinthians 6.
Do not try to work together as equals with unbelievers, for it cannot be done. How can right and wrong be partners? How can light and darkness live together? How can Christ and the devil agree? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? How can Godâs temple come to terms with pagan idols? For we are the temple of the living God, as God himself has said, âI will make my home with them. I will live among them. I will be their God and they shall be my people.â And so the Lord says, âYou must leave them and separate yourselves from them. Have nothing to do with them. Have nothing to do with what is unclean, and I will accept you. I will be your father and you shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord, the Almighty.â
[All worship.]
PAUL: [Inaudible] . . . asked to say a few words tonight. And it wonât be very long. When Iâm finished weâll pray a little bit longer, and then weâre gonna go downstairs and have some fellowship time, or some time to do whateverâs downstairs. [Laughter.]
There are a couple things that I think the Lord might want me to share with you tonight. One of them is that I was surprised by the direction the prophecies took, initially, with regard, you know, to the direction that we were getting here, getting purified, and being in a position to be in front of the Lord. To eliminate the sin in our lives, in order that we could come before the Lord. I was struck by that, because I donât think weâve heard that kind of word from the Lord for quite a long time. And I was thinking aboutâthat it might have something to do with the fact that weâre a bunch of men gathered together, and thatâalso that there are some young men in our midst, who probably are having a very difficult time getting sin out of their lives. And I thought I would share a few stories with you about that, briefly. And then Iâm going to talk about something else later. In fact, several things. Not too long, all together. [Laughter.]
One story that I was thinking of was about Saint Benedict, who was one of the first people to begin the whole business of being in the desert, being a Desert Father and a monk, and living single for the Lord. Not that he was actually the only one who had done that, but he was the first one who did it in such a way that a lot of other people followed him.
Early on in his call to be holy, when he was in the desert, he, you knowâhave you ever seen a desert? The desert isâthe kind of desert that he was involved with was something like the Mojave Desert in the western United States. In fact, it may have been a lot worse than that. Very desolate place, although in the deserts there are some bushes that are very thorny, for example, among other kinds of brambles that lie around in the desert, and blow around a lot.
And one time, when he was praying by himself in the desert, which is where he lived, he had an apparition of a totally nude woman. And this apparition was very appealing to him, and was also very frightening, because it was a real temptatio, to him, to leave the calling which God had put on his life. And the urge was not just to be involved with that woman that he was seeing, but, in fact, to leave the way of life that he had set out. And, of course, he recognizedâit didnât take a lot of wisdom, I think [all laugh], for him to realize that this was probably not from God. [Paul and all laugh.]
But his reaction, I thought, was really worth knowing about. And that isâguess what he did? He jumped into one of the thorn bushes. [All laugh/groan.] And he rolled around in it until he was just, absolutely, really cut up. And when he came out of it, that whole thing was gone. He didnât have any more problems with it. [Paul and all laugh.]
The thing that strikes me about that story is thatâI think that all of us, especially at different stages of our life, are tempted to all kinds of different sorts of carnality. And I think for the young men who are in our midst, carnality is certainlyâand lustâand what I mean by âcarnality,â especially, is âlustâ nowâis something which is really a tremendous temptation. And the world that weâre living in takes lust, fornication, adulteryâif that were something possible for youâas something which is just perfectly ordinary.
You can countâthat is to say, probably every young man here, if you were to take a poll of all of your friendsâI would say, just in your mindâs eye, do a little calculation. Count up ten people who you count as your young men friends. Okay? Got âem in mind? I will tell you that the data saysâand I think itâs absolutely trueâthat at least nine out of those ten men will fornicate within the next couple of years.
Now, the question is, what are you gonna do about that? Well, you canât do much about what theyâre gonna do. But you gotta realize that youâre in the same kind of situation that theyâre in. Well, the question is, what are you gonna do about your situation? How in the world are you going to avoid being in that predicament? And I would say, thereâs not much chance that youâre going to avoid being in that predicament. You will, in fact, experience a real live temptation, perhaps a nude woman, who will be tempting you to fall away from the way of the Lord.
Thatâs horrible, you know, for some of you to think of right now. And I really thank God that thatâs the case. You should be horrified at that. Some others will say, well itâs not so horrible, I mean, you know, eight of the nine guys are already gone. Something like that. And then the temptation is to get kind of cynical about it.
But really and truly, itâs a very serious problem. And you oughta know that you donât stand alone in this problem, that everybody here has been tempted in the same kinds of ways. Maybe not with as graphic of detail as Iâve indicated, but there are definitelyâyou can count on it, the men who are here, who have gone before you in the Lord by at least ten to fifteen, twenty years have all experienced the same kinds of temptations. You donât need to be amazed that these kinds of things can be temptations to you. When they come, you should, in fact, have confidence that people who have gone before youâyour fathers, your older brothers, your friends who are older in the Lordâhave also survived this.
And you can count on that. But, I would say, one thing to keep in mind, is that you do need to struggle against it, and not simply give in to it because itâs an overwhelming temptation, and everybody else seems to be giving in to it.
Iâd say that itâs not just a question of fornication, though. Itâs also a question of lying and right speech. Thereâs a tremendous temptation to lie, toâyou know, to cheat on tests, to just sort of find some other way around the truth. Itâs a very huge problem. And everybody hereâIâm sure everybody hereâhas been tempted to cheat on a test.
I was in a class one timeâI was a kid, and I was justâit was the first time it had ever happened to me. I was in this room, and everybody in the room cheated. It was absolutely amazing. Every single person. As soon as the professor walked out of the room, everybody started cheating. And I didnât even know how! [Paul and all laugh.] It was a very great temptation. Fortunately, we all failed, and we had to take it over anyway. [Paul and all laugh.]
I wanted to do something else, with regard to one passage in Scripture Iâd like to read to you. This is from Lukeâs gospel, in chapter 10. And if you have your Bible with you, Iâd like you to read along with me. This is a rather unique translation. This is the New English Bible, and occasionally itâs very good, and occasionally itâs very peculiar. Anyway, this time, itâs okay, I think.
On one occasion, a lawyer came forward to put this test question to Jesus.
This is verse 25 in chapter 10.
âMaster, what must I do to inherit eternal life?â Jesus said, âWhat is written in the law? What is your reading of it?â And the lawyer replied, âLove the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.â âThat is the right answer,â Jesus said. âDo that and you will live.â But the lawyer wanted to vindicate himself, so he said to Jesus, âAnd who is my neighbor?â And Jesus replied. . . .â
Now what I want to do is, I want to talk about these two stories that come. The first story has to do with the love of neighbor. And let me just tell you now: everybody pay attention. What the Lord said is that the guy was absolutely on the mark. He understood what the gospel was all about. He understood what was on the mind of the Father. Our job really isâthe whole revelation of God boils down to this: love God with everything youâve got, and love your neighbor even as you love yourself.
So then he starts to talk about the love of neighbor. And then a little later on, he talks about the love of God. Let me just go through the first part.
But he wanted to vindicate himself, so he said to Jesus, âAnd who is my neighbor?â And Jesus replied,ââA man was on his way from Jerusalem down to Jericho, when he fell among robbers,who stripped him and beat him and went off, leaving him half dead. . . .â
And it goes through that story. The point of the story is that the man did for that man a great deal of good. He took care of him in his need. Now there are lots of other points you can make about that story. But youâve gotta understand, the plain sense of the story is: the guy who did the good thing to the man that he ran into who needed help, was the guy who was neighbor to him. He was the man who loved his neighbor.
Then a little later on it goes on, in verse 38:
While they were on their way, Jesus came to a village where a woman named Martha made him welcome herâwelcome in her home.
And Martha is the woman, now, who made room for Jesus to come and stay in her home.
She had a sister, Mary, who seated herself at the Lordâs feet and stayed there listening to his words.
Now, get the picture of what Mary was doing, okay? As far as anyone could tell, Mary was doing nothing whatsoever that was worthwhile, in any way whatsoever. I mean, she was a real drag on the market. [All laugh.] She sat at his feet and didnât do a thing! She was just sittinâ there, not doing one single thing for Jesus. What a dumb thing to do! Okay?
Now, Martha was distracted by her many tasks. You can imagine how she was running around, trying to get the house straightened up and get the food prepared. You know how your wives and mothers are carrying on when thereâs somebody whoâs really important in the house. They spend a tremendous amount of time just taking care of them, loving them. In fact, acting a lot like the Good Samaritan: taking care of the one who is there, who needs some help.
So she came to Jesus and said, âLord, do you not care?â
âDonât you notice? I mean, didnât you pay attention to the fact that my sister has left me to get on with the work by myself? Tell her to come and lend a hand!â But the Lord answers,
Martha, Martha, you are fretting and fussing about so many things, but one thing is necessary. The part that Mary has chosen is best. And it shall not be taken away from her.
Let me just say, while Iâm at this point, that chapter 11 in Lukeâs gospel begins to talk about prayer, and in particular the Lordâs Prayer. And I suggest that you read, you know, from verse 25 in chapter 10 all the way through the first part of chapter 11, so that you see the continuity there thatâs involved.
But let me just say this: that whatâs going on here is that Mary does nothing for Jesus. She also doesnât do anything for Martha. And as far as anybody can tell, she wasnât doing anythingâI suppose she wasnât really doing anything for herself, except maybe resting. Now, you say, how can it possibly be the case that she has chosen the better part, that sheâs doing the better thing? But the words are really plain. And itâs also plain that this part of the story applies to what is more important, in fact: the first commandment, which is to love the Lord, your God, with your whole heart, your mind and soul, and all of your strength.
Now, think about it. The most important thing that we have to do . . . doesnât involve us very much. It doesnât consist of us doing very much, according to this (which is the word of God, by the way). [All laugh.]
Then whatâs going on is that in that situation, with Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus, sort of waiting for every word that he says, listening so that she can be taught by him, and being in that relationship of just simply being subservient to him in that way, not serving him but being below him, at his feet: that that situation made it possible for Jesus to do something to her. All of Marthaâs doing for Jesus didnât amount to anywhere near as much as what Jesus was doing for Mary.
Now thatâs something which weâre not accustomed to thinking about. If we donât earn it by ourselves, it ainât worth much. You know? If we donât work and sweat and slave at it, what good is it? If it doesnât cost us a lot of money, if it doesnât hurt us enough in doing it, whatâs the advantage to us? We really do equate the value of whatever we have, with what we put into it.
But see, all the gospel has to do with something else. It has to do with what Godâs put into it. The most important thing about all of Scripture, is not what we put into it, but what God is putting into it, which is himself. The most important thing that we have to learn in all of Scripture, is that God wants to communicate himself to us! And that what we need to do, in order to do the first commandment, is put ourselves âby way ofâ receiving what God wants to give us.
Now thatâs a lot different than going out, and doing a lot of good works, and knocking ourselves outâwhich of course is really important, because itâs the second commandment. But whatâs more important is that we eradicate sin from our lives, so that we can hear what Godâs saying to us. If we get the lust out of our lives, and the cheating, and the stealing, and all the other things that we do, the bad talking against each other and everybody elseâget those things out of our way, so that, in fact, we can hear what God is saying as we sit at his feet.
Now, thereâs no way to do that, except passively. It really is the case. In order to be in the position that Mary was in, we have to sit down and shut up! It really is true. It does not consist of us saying a lot of words, and getting into all kinds of hyped-up activity, and singing a lot of loud songs. What it consists of is sitting down at the feet of the Lord, in humble submission to him, and listening to him.
We can listen to the Lord as we read the Scriptures. He speaks to us plainly about 90% of the time. I mean, any plain fool could read the Scripture and understand what itâs saying. You know, most of the time. Of course there are those hard passages we donât understand, or weâre not ready for, or something like that. But mainly, it makes sense. And when we read the Scripture, I think weâre sitting at the foot of the Lord, listening to what he has to say to us.
Read the Scripture. You wanna love God with your whole heart, mind, soul, and strength? Well, read the Scripture. Sit down with it. Sit at his feet and read the Scripture. Itâs no kidding. Thatâs what he wants you to do. Thatâs all. Itâs not your idea of what counts. Itâs his idea, and he said, âDo that.â
Another thing is, youâve gotta sit there and engage him, or be engaged with him, in what he wants to say to you. Now, I wasâat one time in my life, I had an opportunity to do a lot of praying. It was a great blessing to me, which may never come again in my life unless I get fired. [All laugh.] Or until I die. But the advantage was that I had a lot of time just to sit. Now, I used to do a lot of praying. I used to pray by the hour, see. I mean, I had a kind of a job where it was possible for me to do that. I mean, I wasâI did what I was supposed to do, but I also had the opportunity to pray a lot. And I used to pray many hours a day, you know, a lot of hours a day. And some of the time when I was praying, I was just praying all kinds of prayers that Iâd learned. And then, of course, after quite a few hours of that, you run out ofâyou get tired, you get a little hoarse. [Man laughs.] You donât have much more to say, and you wind up just sorta sitting there. And so I used to just sit there in the presence of the Lord.
I remember a story that somebody told me one time. It was about a bishop who wasâused to work real hard all day. He was an older man. And at night, he would go to his prayers, and as he was sitting in a chair praying, sometimes he would fall asleep. And his dog would fall asleep at his feet. His housekeeper came in one time and said, âBishop.ââwoke him up, you know. âThis is terrible. Youâre supposed to be praying. Here you are sleeping.â And he saidââWell,â he said, âlook at my dog.â He says, âHeâs sleeping in my presence, and I think itâs just great.â [All laugh.]
So, there comes a time where you donât have to do a lot of talking; you just sit in the presence of the Lord. And if you give him an opportunity toâwhere you take the time, long enough, it may be that he will begin to talk to you. He may talk to you in a variety of different ways. Like, he may speak a word that you hear with your ears. Or he may appear in a vision that youâll see with your eyes. Or he may appear as a light, very attractive and delightful to you. He may appear to you in some kind of sound that you hadnât heard before, and as you hear it, your heart becomes enflamed with the love of God, and youâre left in peace til it disappears. There may be all kinds of signs and symbols that the Lord may use as heâs dealing with you at moments like this. Sometimes it may be that your chest will begin to expand, and you feel like youâre about to burst. Like, you know, some kind of a vegetable thatâs growing too big. The effect of all of these things is to make you feel extremely pleasant in the presence of the Lord, and with experiences that you havenât had before.
The point I want to say to you is: put yourself in the presence of the Lord, and let him communicate to you. Those things are not important, in the sense that if you donât have experiences of that sort youâre not, in fact, encountering the Lord. But they are very good. And I highly recommend them to you. If you put yourself in the presence of the Lord, you will enjoy it very much. Heâs very faithful, and he will give you blessings and consolations, and heâll set your heart on fire. But he wonât do that if you donât spend time with him.
So while weâre very busy about taking care of our brothers and sisters in the Lord, and other people whom we have responsibility for, or others who simply need our help as we see them, we also have to take account of the fact that the most important thing that happens to us is what God does to us, not what we do to him. And in order for that to happen, youâve gotta put yourself âin the wayâ of spiritual experiences. You have to put yourself in the presence of the Lord.
So, I want to conclude by saying two things. Itâs very goodâthis is not one of âemâitâs very good for you to do good things, to be honorable, upright, carrying out the law of God, taking care of your responsibilities as youâre supposed to. Very important. But God does not want Good Samaritans only. He wants holy men of God who really know him, who know his mind and his heart, and who operate with his strength and power. People who are really dedicated and locked into the mindset of Jesus Christ. People who âsmellâ like Jesus Christ, because they spend time with him. He wants people who act like Jesus, because they know the way he is. Heâs a man, and a man of God, a son of God. He wants people who know Jesus Christ, who really put the time in to know him, who put him first.
He doesnât want only people who do good things. He certainly wants us to do good things. But his highest commandment is that we should love the Lord, our God. Thatâs a love which, you know, you can talk aboutâwe can even talk about love in a lot of different ways. We talk about love being commitment, honoring our commitments, doing what weâre supposed to do, and so on. But that by no means exhausts the meaning of the word âloveâ in this context. Love of God enflames your heart until itâs about to burst! It sets your heart on fire, so that nothing else in the world matters! You would rather do anything than offend God. You would rather do anything whatso- âyou would rather have somebody tear your heart out of you, rather than to do something that would put you out of the presence of God. The Lord wants us to love him with a full heart, on fire, enflamed by the Holy Spirit. All the language of the Holy Spirit, you know, that describes the action of the Holy Spirit in our lives, talks about this kind of enflaming, this zeal, this tremendous love of God, which is poured out into our heart by God, which is the Holy Spirit: the love ofâperhaps the love of Jesus for the Father, the relationship between the two, which catches us up in the whole Trinity of God.
So all I want to say, really, is one simple thing. But I donât mind saying it many, many different times, over and over again. Because I think that thatâs pretty much the way you have to approach the issue. Just . . . love God! Really . . . love . . . God. Just go all out for God. Nothing else matters. Everything else is gonna end.
If youâre lucky, you may live to be 80 years old. In some cases, if youâre unlucky, you may live to be 80 years old. [Paul and all laugh.] At any rate, itâs a very short period of time. It doesnât look like that when youâre young, but when youâre older it looks very short, and it rapidly approaches as time goes on.
The point is, it is a very brief moment. What does last forever is the immortal fire that God puts in your heart, the action which heâs offering to you all the time, which is his bending down to us, his taking on human form in the Incarnation. Itâs his action, itâs his movement toward us.
And we can stop that movement from taking place! We can put up barriers. We can, in fact, dishonor our mother and father; we can be disobedient children. We can be disobedient to God. We can be adulterous people; we can be thieves. We can be all kinds of things that will make it impossible for us to be in a right relationship to God.
We can stop it; we canât cause it. What causes it is the love of God himself poured out in our hearts. God wantsâitâs like a great dam, waiting there. The only thing that keeps the dam from bursting forth is our lack of interest in it. Itâs our sin that keeps Godâs love from flooding us. Itâs our activity of running away from the Lord that keeps him far from us. Heâs always there. Actually, he never moves! Weâre the ones who depart from his company. What the Lord wants of us, more than anything else, is for us to let him invade us! To completely take over us, to take over our hearts and our minds, and captivate us entirely.
My two points, then, are these. Shun evil with everything youâve got, and if you have to, jump into a thorn bush. I really recommend it. I really do! Iâd recommend it. Iâve done the equivalent of jumping into thorn bushes. I highly recommend it. It works really well. The second part is to love God with all your heart, and put no barriers or limits to what God can accomplish in your life, in his love for you. You donât have to measure according to your achievements. Nobody here, as one of the prophecies said, is worthy to be here.
When I was in graduate school, there was a guyâwho was a very crazy guy, as a matter of fact âwho was part of our group. But the rest of us were perfectly normal. [All laugh.] Well, he was the son of a psychiatrist, which explains a lot of his problems. [All laugh.] Anyway, one day we were having a terrific time at dinner time andâI mean, it was really a lot of fun. Everybody was joining in. It was a real good bunch of people. And Harold stood up and he said, âThis is a hell of a good group,â he said. âI just canât figure out how I got in it!â [All laugh.]
So, thatâs pretty much, I think, what we experience here, you know. Like, when we gather at times like this, we feel likeâI mean, I do. I know a lot of others do, and I heard the prophecy that said, you know, a lot of people feel like they donât belong here, theyâre not worthy to be in this company. And itâs really true, you know? None of us is worthy to be in this companyânot because weâre together, but because the Lord Jesus is here. God himself is here. Heâs been hereâ heâs been waiting for us to pay attention to him.
And what we need to do is to recognize him in our midst now. So letâs just shun evil with all your heartâwell, not all that much, just shun evil completely, okay? And love God with all of your strength.
Letâs turn to the Lord, and justâletâs just take a moment and think about . . . not what we can do to shun evil, but what we can do, right now, to recognize the face of Jesus Christ in our midst, in our presence, however that might be.
[Recording ends here.]
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