The importance of collective prayer within the church, drawing from Acts 2:42 where early believers "continued steadfastly in... prayers." The examples highlight biblical examples of powerful prayer, including Abraham, Moses, Elijah, and Paul, and Jesus' own example of praying all night before choosing the apostles. The message argues that the early church's unity and persistent prayer were foundational to their spiritual growth and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, as seen in Acts 1:14, 2:4, 4:31, and 12:12. The sermon concludes by urging believers to engage in specific, practical, and unified prayer, believing that God answers collective prayer and continues to empower His church through it.
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That's wonderful singing. That's what I miss when I go away from here is singing. Now it's a joy to be back here. God has given us a few Sundays away and we've really enjoyed them. The last two Sundays I was speaking at Satellite Beach, Bethany Chapel by the Sea. Our brother Dan Snatton has been for two weeks up in New Hampshire, you know, in Vermont. A young man whom God saved and blessed and trained was working on the missile work down there in Satellite Beach and was in the meeting down there with Dan for about three years.
Then he was transferred to Huntsville and then with the cutback in the missile industry he sent right up into Vermont. He went into a town where there was no assembly but he's got one going. He's one of these men to whom God has given the gift of organizing and getting things done, and he got Dan Snatton to go up and spend two weeks. And the meetings were so successful the first week that last Sunday they had to bring out forty extra chairs to put in the chapel there for the meetings last Sunday. So I know Dan's had a good time. And I had a good time too down there because Brother Snatton has done a wonderful work at Satellite Beach. He's been there about twelve years, you know, and the work has grown.
And there's a wonderful spirit, a wonderful worship meeting on Sunday morning, and it was so easy to preach. I enjoyed being down there. But, of course, it's a joy to be back. So now shall we turn to the second chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. Verse thirty-seven. Let's read from verse thirty-two to get the context. This Jesus has God raised up. Acts two thirty-two. This Jesus has God raised up. Wherefore we all are witnesses. Therefore, being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he has shed forth this which ye now see and hear.
For David is not ascended into the heavens, but he saith himself, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand until I make thy foes thy footstool. Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus whom we have crucified both Lord and Christ. Now when they heard this they were pricked in their heart and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do? Then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sin. And ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation. Then they that gladly received his word were baptized, and the same day they were added unto them about three thousand souls. And they continued steadfastly. in the Apostle's doctrine, and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers. And fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done by the Apostles, and all that were believed were together, and had all things common, and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all, as every man had need.
And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people, and the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved. This is the first time you get the word church here in the Acts of the Apostles. The church had just come into being on the day of Pentecost, and the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved. Let's ask God's blessing again, shall we? Blessed God, our Father, we bow before thee now and cast ourselves entirely upon thee that thou wilt take these words of Scripture and apply them to our waiting hearts tonight.
O God, we have no power, we have no might. We are trusting thee, and we ask thee that the Holy Spirit might speak to every heart for thy glory. We ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen. This afternoon I went down to the office and played over part of a tape recording of the last message I gave from this platform. It was dated Sunday evening, November eight. And I played it for one purpose because I thought I had made a promise that night and I did.
And tonight I want to redeem the promise. We had been speaking in a series, a series of talks which came out of the baptism. Do you remember we had a baptism in October, about the middle of October. It was one Sunday morning when Debbie Meyer asked me if I would baptize her. We talked it over and I said, well, I can't do it. I'm going to England, but I'll be glad to do it when I come back. And the first Sunday I was back from England, she said, you're going to baptize me? And we made arrangements right away, and the next two Sundays after, we had a baptism. You remember so well, and eight people were baptized down in the lake. And we had a wonderful afternoon, I'll never forget it.
Our brother Meyer gave the talk down there, and we baptized eight people. And then I gave a series of talks, which I called after baptism. Do you remember? After baptism. It says in this verse, forty-one, they that gladly received his word were baptized. Verse forty-two, and they continued. Those that were baptized continued. And they continued in four things. Let's look at them. They continued in the Apostles' doctrine. We spoke one Sunday evening on the Apostles' doctrine. as applied to baptism, the outcome, the flowing out of baptism, from baptism, the fact that we're dead with Christ, how our lives are now.
We're risen with Christ and we're baptized. The symbol of baptism is death with Christ and then risen again with Christ. If he then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above where Christ did it at the right hand of God. And we spoke that evening from Colossians that wonderful chapter about this new life in Christ Jesus, the risen life. I call that the Apostles' doctrine as it applied to baptism. And then they continued in the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship. And we spoke one evening on fellowship. And the breaking of bread. And the last talk I gave in this series was the breaking of bread, November eight, Sunday night.
And many people, quite a number, have asked me for copies of that tape, and they've taken away the breaking of bed. Remember we talked about loves, let me see if I can recall, loves request, loves response, loves remembrances, loves repetitions, loves responsibilities, all connected with the breaking of bed. And that night I said, now the next time I speak here on a Sunday night, I'll finish the subject. They continued in the Apostle's doctrine, fellowship, breaking the bread, and prayers. And six months have passed by, and I've never been back here to speak on a Sunday night, and I just wondered whether I should do it.
Then when I listened this afternoon to the promise I made, I said, yes, you better speak on prayers tonight. So this is our subject, prayers. Now note, it's not prayer, it's prayers. I checked it up in the Greek New Testament, prayers, plural. I don't think that this subject here is individual prayer. I think it's the church prayer. They continued in prayers. I think it's the church praying, collective prayer, as far as I can understand it. Now, just very briefly, There are many, many examples in the scripture of men of God who prayed to God and God answered them.
Do you remember Abraham when God came to visit Abraham and he said, I'm going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. And Abraham's nephew was down there, Lot was down there in Sodom. And Abraham said, Oh, if there's If there's a hundred people down there that are righteous, will you save the city? And he came down and down and down and he said, Lord, if there's only ten down there, will you save the city? God said, I will. But there weren't ten down there. Righteous people. And God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. But Abraham prayed with God. He prayed with God. There are many other cases there. Abraham's prayer. Moses was a great praying man.
When God would have destroyed all those murmuring, grumbling people, Moses got in between God and the people. And he said, for your great name's sake, don't destroy them. The nations were saved because God couldn't bring them into the promised land. That's why he destroyed them. But I tell you what he did do. We talked about it the other night on a Thursday. He destroyed the murmurers, all of them. They all perished in the wilderness. Only the two men who believed God, Caleb the son of Japhani and Joshua the son of Nun, they were the only ones that got into the Promised Land over twenty-one years of age when they came out of Egypt. Elijah was such a great man of prayer that James writes about him, and James says about Elijah, Elias was a man subject to like passions as we, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain.
And it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. What a man of power with God. He could stop the heavens from raining. Three years and six months. And he prayed again. And the heaven gave rain. And the earth brought forth her fruit. What a power with God. God would have stopped the rain. Because his servant called upon him to do it. to teach that wicked King Ahab a lesson and to get rid of the prophets of Baal out of the land. And what a man of faith he was. When they put the sacrifice on the altar he poured buckets of water over all the wood and over the altar.
And then he called upon God to send down fire from heaven and the fire came and burned up the wood, licked up the water and burned the sacrifice. And Elijah proved that God was in the heavens and that God answers prayer. Paul was a great man of prayer. I love Paul's prayers. I think from time to time during my course I've spoken many times on Paul's prayers. Just look a moment, Ephesians chapter one. Verse fifteen is a wonderful prayer of the Apostle Paul. And note this, Paul never prayed for himself. Paul didn't pray for all the sick and suffering ones.
He prayed for their spiritual benefit. Now, it's right to pray for the sick and suffering ones. But he prays for these people whom he led to Christ for their spiritual benefit. Listen. Listen. Wherefore, verse fifteen, I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and love unto all the saints, cease not to give thanks for you. Make him mention you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, that the eyes of your hearts might be opened. This is what he prays for. The eyes of your hearts might be opened. that he may know what is the hope of his calling and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.
And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe according to his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and set him in his own right hand, far above all power and principality and dominion and might. And every name that is named. What a prayer. What a prayer of the Apostle Paul. Look at chapter three, verse fourteen. For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by the Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ which passes.
What a prayer. I love to hear the Apostle Paul praying. Praying for the saints. Look at Philippians chapter one, verse nine. And this I pray that your love may abound more and more in all knowledge and judgment. That he may approve things that are excellent, that he may be sincere and without offense to the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ. Look at Colossians one, verse nine. For this scroll we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will.
What a prayer, eh? That we might be filled with the knowledge of his will. I wish we could get prayer meetings like this, praying that we might grow spiritually, be filled with the knowledge of his will, in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. that he might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness. These are the prayers of the Apostle Paul. Individual prayers. But let me give you one more outstanding prayer.
Luke chapter six. Luke chapter six, verse twelve. And he is the Son of God on earth. And he said, All power is given unto me. Listen to the Son of God. It came to pass in those days that he, the Son of God, went out into a mountain to pray and continued all night in prayer to God. What for? Why should he who created this universe, why should he go out and spend a night on a mountainside all night in prayer?
Why? Read on and I'll tell you. When it was day, he called unto him his disciples, and of them he chose twelve whom he also called apostles. Of all those that were following him, disciples, He wanted to choose twelve men to be near to him and close to him. And so great was his decision, and so big a matter to the Lord Jesus Christ, that before he chose them, he went out on a mountainside and spent all night in prayer. Beloved, I don't think you and I know anything about prayer, do you? I don't think we've touched the fringe.
When have you or I spent all night in prayer? just to make some decision. And it wasn't for himself, it was for the glory of God. He was choosing these men whom he was going to train. Three years, wonderful, should I call it a Bible college more than that, three years with the Son of God. He's going to train them and make them the men they had to be. And he spent all night in prayer before he did it. Individual prayers. But I believe our verse, they continued in the Apostles' doctrine, fellowship, breaking the bread and prayers. I think this is the church's prayer. And there are not many examples, but there are a few of the church in the Acts of the Apostles praying.
Let's look at one or two for a moment. Acts one verse fourteen. Now this of course was before the church actually came into being. The Lord Jesus had told his disciples about prayer. We'll come back to that presently. But the Lord Jesus had told them about prayer. And had told them of this wonderful power that he was going to give them when the Holy Spirit came upon them. A power of praying. And after the Lord Jesus had gone back to heaven, it says in Acts I and verse... Nine, when he had spoken these things while they beheld, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight.
Verse twelve, Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the Mount Caught Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a Sabbath day's journey. And when they were coming, they went up into an upper room where abode both Peter and James and John and Andrew and Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, Simon Zalotus and Judas the brother of James, these all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus and with his brethren. What prayer meetings they had, eh? They all continued. I love the word all here.
This is the secret of the blessings in this second chapter of Acts. These all continued. in prayer and supplication. And there they were, the disciples. It says the number of them, and it says that there's somewhere, was a hundred and twenty, about a hundred and twenty of them. And they continued in prayer, night and day. Now I don't know whether they had any ink in when the Holy Spirit would be given. But Lord Jesus said, that they were to continue in Jerusalem, continue in Jerusalem, until he gave the Holy Spirit.
They hadn't to leave, they had to stay there. And day by day they continued praying and praying and waiting on God altogether. And then Acts chapter two, verse one, when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all, note the word all again, they were all with one accord in one place. and suddenly the Holy Spirit fell upon us. I believe, brethren, that if we could be like this, all with one accord in one place, we'd see more of the power of the Holy Spirit working in our midst. If we weren't divided, you know, if there weren't little schisms, little parties, little sections, bickering and murmuring, as we talked about some weeks ago, If we could be all together with one accord in one place, every heart bowed before the Lord, waiting for Him.
Then the Holy Spirit fell upon them, the day of Pentecost. Verse four, they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. See the little word all? They were all filled with the Holy Ghost. So they knew something about prayer. And yet how could they pray without the Holy Spirit? Romans eight tells us that the Spirit of God is the one that kind of interprets our prayers. You know, Romans eight, verse twenty-six. Likewise, the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself makes intercession for us with groanings, which cannot be uttered.
And when the Spirit of God fell upon them, then they knew something more about prayer. And they preached the gospel. Peter preached the gospel, and three thousand souls were saved. And they were all baptized, and then they continued in the Apostles' doctrine, fellowship, breaking the bread, and prayers. Now those of you that were baptized last October, And you and I were baptized many, many years ago. Have we done this? Continued? They continued steadfastly. Nothing turned them aside. They continued steadfastly in the Apostles' teaching.
That's the epistles. The epistles we have in the New Testament, the Apostles' teaching. They continued in that. To me, the Christian life is really very simple. We're saved by faith, simple faith in the Lord Jesus. And we live by what God tells us in this book. You read the New Testament, and then you put into practice what you read. That's the secret. Obey God. He says, do this, do it. And don't go contrary to it. You say, but the world doesn't do it that way. What does that matter what the world does? As I was saying down there at Satellite Beach last week there, They probably call you a square if you don't dress like they dress, especially if you're a young person.
If you don't do just what they do, they say it's a square. Well, we are squares. If I know the meaning of this modern term, a square, I suppose, is something doesn't fit into a round. It doesn't fit. And we don't fit. We don't belong to this world. We're not supposed to fit. We're not supposed to be like the world. We're supposed to be different. And the early church... took joyfully even the spoiling of their goods. They suffered for Christ's sake. They suffered for Christ's sake. But we go along with them, you know. Go along with them. We've got to be different. And especially those of us that have been baptized. You see, now we've recognized by baptism that we're dead with Christ.
And that old life, oh, how much we know about this all nature in us. It's dead with Christ. And we have to live in the power of the new resurrection life which God gave us. When He raised us from the dead with Christ. And gave us a new life and the Holy Spirit to live in us. The church at prayer. Chapter two, verse one we read. Chapter two, forty-two we just read. Chapter four, verse thirty-one. I love this. They arrested the apostles in this chapter. And then they got them out in the morning and then they forbade them. You can't preach any more in this name, the name of Jesus.
And they let them go. Verse twenty-three, being let go, they went. Where did they go? They went to their own company. That's where the Christians have to go. You see, the man of the world has his club. He has his club. He's in some society or the other, and that's his company. Now the Christian has his, I can use the term, I don't like it, but he has his club, and his club is the Lord's people. They went to their own company. One thing I used to love when I was in Greece, the Greek Christians were poor, and of course in those long, faraway days, there was no such thing as television.
I don't believe they got it out there now. And, of course, nobody had a car. I didn't have a car. Some of them had very poor homes. Some of them had been saved in godless homes. Maybe Orthodox church people, but I'll say again, godless people. Because you know where they found their comfort, those Christians, with the other Christians? Our meeting room, we haven't got a chapel, we rented some upstairs offices and knocked the walls down and made a meeting room upstairs.
Do you know what? It was open every night. Every night. That was the club. That's where the Christians met. We had our prayer meeting on Monday night, had our Bible study on Wednesday night, but they were there every night. That was their center. And these Christians... When they were released, they went to their own company. And then they had a decision. They made the decision. What shall we do now? Shall we stop preaching? And they looked up to the Lord. And they lifted up their voice to God. Verse twenty-four with one accord and said, Lord, thou art God. This is their prayer, the church's prayer, which has made heaven and earth and the sea and all that in the maze, who by the mouth of thy servant David has declared has said, Why did the heathen rage in the people imagine a vain thing?
The kings of the earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ. This really interprets Psalm II, doesn't it? No question what Psalm II is all about when you read this. For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together, for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done. And now, Lord, behold their threatenings, and grant unto thy servants that with all boldness they may speak thy word by stretching forth thy hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child Jesus.
And when they had prayed, here is the church at prayer. They continued steadfastly in prayer. And when they had prayed, the place was shaken. where they were assembled together. See how the power of God came down when the early church prayed. The place was shaken where they were assembled together and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak the Word of God with voice. Do you think God has changed? I don't. I think we might have changed, but I don't think God has changed. And I believe if you and I could get together with a spirit of faith like this, And we could pray, God will shake.
I don't think he's going to shake the building down at all. But I believe God will shake Keystone Heights and Stark and Palatka and all the districts all around and shake the people. And many women will be saved. If we, the Church of God here, this Church here that Parker the Palm, if we'll get together in believing prayer, God's going to shake things. And souls are going to be saved. And we'll all be filled with the Holy Ghost and speak the Word of God with boldness. as we go out day by day. Oh, I long to see this chapel filled with unsaved men and women. Brethren, let's get busy. Let's get the people in here. Let's be praying. We have prayer meetings, but let's lay hold on God for these things that with all boldness we might go forward.
Let's pray for our brother Speck down there preaching and working and seeking to do a work for God down in Groveland these weeks. Let's move on. Chapter six, verse four. There's a problem now with a question of the daily distribution. You see, they had all things common. And there were some people that had nothing of this world, and the others brought what they had, and they shared it out. And then the racial question came in, you know. And there was a murmuring. The Grecian women, the Grecian widows, and the Hebrew widows, one thought the other was getting more than the other had, and there was jealousy. And there was a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration.
And the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them and said, It's not reason that we should leave the word of God and serve tables. Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. But we, listen, we... the apostles. We will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word. And this is how the church grew. There were men who gave their full time to prayer and ministry. And let others, men whom God had appointed, the deacons, let them look after the business, it says, whom we may appoint over this business.
Men full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom. Now this is just how the church should really be run. The elders are the men that look after their spiritual affairs, giving their time to prayer and ministry. The deacon are the men that look after the business. That's the New Testament pattern. I believe the days will come when we at Parker the Palm will be all set up in the New Testament way. We started from nothing. When I don't say nothing, there were some of us here, but we were very few when we started. And it's taken a while. But God is leading us wonderfully. I'm not a bit impatient. I feel that God is leading in the days coming when we're going to see ourselves set up in the right New Testament way here at Park of the Pound.
But these men gave themselves continuity to prayer. This is the New Testament church in prayer. Chapter twelve, verse twelve. And here Peter's put in prison. You know the story well. Peter's put in prison. James was beheaded and it pleased the people, the Jews, when Herod put James to death. And so he arrested Peter and he was going to put him to death too. And you know what happened. The angel came. Peter was asleep. Gonna have his head chopped off next day. And he's asleep in the prison. And the angel came in and said, Get up, Peter. Come on. Put on your shoes. He smote him on the side, raised him up, arise quickly.
The chains fell off his hand. And the angel said to him, Gird thyself, and bind on thysandles. And so he did. And he said unto him, Cast thy garment about thee, and follow me. Then he went out, not knowing where he was going. Didn't know whether it was true or whether he just saw a vision. And whenever past the first and second ward, they came to the iron gate that leadeth to the city, which opened to them of its own accord, and they went out, and passed on through one street and forthwith the angel departed. And Peter, when he was come to himself, said, Now I know of assurity that the Lord has sent his angel, and has delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from all the expectation of the people of the Jews.
And when he considered these things, he came to the house of Mary, the mother of John, whose surname was Mark. I think probably that same upper room where they met in the first chapter, verse fourteen, where they all met together and continued with one accord in prayer. Maybe the very self-same house where the Lord... met with his disciples for the Last Supper. I don't know, but I have a notion it was, you know. The home of Mary. When he considered the thing, verse twelve, he came to the house of Mary, the mother of John, whose surname was Mark, where many were gathered together, prayed.
He is the church's prayer in the first century. Many were gathered together, prayed. And God answered their prayers, and when he answered their prayers, he didn't even believe he'd done it. Peter's knocking at the door and wrote it says, Can't be Peter. And she went and said, She's Peter. She said, No, can't be. And yet they were praying that God would bring him out of prison, and God had already answered their prayers. That's how God answered prayers in those early days. They continued in the Apostle's doctrine, fellowship, breaking of bread, and prayers. There's one more verse I'm going to read it later on. So, brethren, you and I have this wonderful, wonderful gift that God has given us.
Provision of prayer. Are we taking, making advantage of it? Do you know, I have found that God answers collective prayers. I tell you what else I found. That God answers the prayers of the ladies, the women's prayers. When I was a young fellow, I left home and went to live in the north of England. And I went to a city where there was a small meeting, and I went to the meeting. Whilst I was there, the meeting grew. We were there five years. I went there before I was married. I was married a year later. The first Sunday I spoke there, there were eight people there on the Sunday night.
But before we left the city, we built a chapel. About as big as this. And we left a thriving assembly behind. God picked us up and moved us out to Greece and left it, but the work's going on today. And that's over forty years ago. In nineteen twenty-six I went to the city of Hull in Yorkshire. But I learned something new. I had never heard a woman pray except my own mother in my own home. But some of the people that came to this meeting, they'd just been saved out of denominations, you know. Modernism was coming in, and some of them were getting out of it. And they came to hear Mr. Walter Scott, the man I spoke of this morning, and they got saved.
And then I was a single young man, about twenty-seven years of age, and they used to invite me to come and have They didn't have dinner over there in the evening. We used to have high tea. Oh, Yorkshire high tea is good too. This was in Yorkshire. And I used to go there. And when the tea was all over, they had a few friends came to the house. We had a little Bible study. And we used to have a prayer meeting. And I saw something I had never seen before. We all got down on our knees, men and women all together. And we started here and we went right around the circle. Everybody prayed, you know. I never heard anything like this. But I saw God answer those prayers.
I saw it work. We got married. Vera had never opened her mouth publicly to pray in a meeting before. They didn't do it. Women's prayer meetings, I don't know. They didn't do it. And some people were so shy, they wouldn't even come to the women's prayer meeting in case they'd be asked to pray. Well, nobody asked anybody to pray. But when we all sat around and knelt down in a circle, you know. It went right down and everybody prayed. Just a few words, but everybody prayed. And God answered those prayers. And I began as a young man to learn the lesson. Years later, we went to live at Wilmington, Delaware. And there was no assembly there. And God used us to get an assembly started.
And there were some young ladies. There were secretaries in the great DuPont concern there. And they used to invite us to their apartments sometimes. And we used to kneel down and pray in the home, all around the circle. I saw God answer prayer. I saw God answer the sisters' prayers. Today there's a thriving assembly in Wilmington, Delaware, a new chapel recently built and the work going on, but God answered their prayers. And I've made it my business whenever I have gone to introduce a men's prayer meeting, a separate men's prayer meeting, usually on a Saturday morning. I did it at Wilmington, Delaware.
It's going on today. I did it at Birmingham. God bless when we had a men's prayer meeting. Down at Hiawatha Hills Chapel, before we built the chapel, I got the brethren to gather together our brother Radimer's brother. He used to come out, I remember him so well before he passed away, underneath an orange tree out there in a field that we bought to build a chapel. Saturday mornings we used to meet the men got together and asked God to bless us and help us to build a chapel and to fill the chapel and to bring the right man and then Christensen came and the works gone on from strength to strength and they still have a prayer meeting. The brethren go down there Saturday morning I think it's seven o'clock, about six or seven, and have a prayer meeting.
And then somebody fries up a good breakfast while all the rest are cleaning the chapel. They clean the chapel, all the breading down there. And they have a great time every Sunday morning, Saturday morning, waiting upon God in prayer. When I came to Park at the Palms, I thought, well, let's have a Saturday morning prayer meeting. But I was very glad to find out that the Gideons have a prayer meeting here Saturday morning. So we said we'll work it out some other way. And we have our men's prayer meeting on Tuesday morning. And I'll say this, I have never been in a better prayer meeting than our Tuesday morning men's prayer meeting. We don't waste any time. We pray. Let's get there, brethren. We have our wonderful sister's prayer meeting here. Tuesday morning. Thank God for the sister's prayers.
God is answering the sister's prayers at Park of the Palm, as I've seen him do down through the years. The church came together in prayer. Prayer, I said, is a great gift, the provision God has given to us. Prayer opens the gates of heaven and pours out the blessings. It's the key that opens the gates. Prayer. Let's look a moment at some of the things the Lord Jesus said about prayer. John, we've read this many times, we'll read it again.
John chapter fourteen. John chapter fourteen. Verse thirteen. Let's go back to the context. Verse twelve. Verily, verily I say unto you, Look at these words, brethren. They're really true. They're the words of the Lord Jesus, but they're amazing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do, shall He do. Do you believe that? The works that I do shall he do also. And greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto my Father.
And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. Now I didn't write these words, you didn't write them. The Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, spoke these words. The night before he went out into the Garden of Gethsemane, the day before he was crucified, whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, I will do it. Wonderful word whatsoever. We like the word whosoever. God so loved the world that whosoever. We say that means you, me or anybody else. You can put them all in there whosoever.
But you can put everything into whatsoever. Whatever ye shall ask in my name. What do we need? We need a couple of hundred thousand dollars to put things right at the clock of the problems. All right, it's in the word whatsoever. Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, I will do it. Let's be doing it now. Let's be doing it. Let's be specific. Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do. that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If he shall ask anything in my name, verse fourteen. If he shall ask anything in my name, I will do it.
Do you believe it? Well, he said it. I believe it. I believe you do, too. If he shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. Let's go back to Matthew. Chapter eighteen. Chapter eighteen. Verse nineteen. Again I say unto you that if two of you, mark these words, if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything I like this, doesn't say everything now.
When you've got a problem, you've got to need anything specific. If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in him. Could anything be more simple? This is provision, provision for all our needs, if he shall ask anything in my name. I will do it. I tell you, beloved, we're millionaires and we don't know it. We're millionaires and we don't know it. All the wealth of heaven is ours and all we've got to do is ask God for it. You give it to us. Let's go down further. Chapter fifteen and verse seven.
If ye abide in me and my words abide in you, He shall ask what ye wills. I like it, don't you? Because we always say, yeah, we've got to be sure it's the Lord's will. Here it said, he shall ask what ye wills. I like that, you know. But I tell you something. If you abide in him, if he abide in me and my words abide in you, I'm not going to ask anything that won't be his will. I'm sure about that. If we're abiding him, if he abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will. And it should be done unto you.
Heaven is open. All we need to do is pray. In faith ask God for us. Chapter sixteen, verse twenty-four. This is one of the great verses of the navigators. This is one of the first verses you've learned when you learn the navigator verses. And their motto is review, review, review. And it's good to review this one. John, verse twenty-four. Hitherto, ye have asked nothing in my name. Ask and receive that your joy may be full. Isn't that wonderful? Ask and receive that your joy may be full.
We should be happy people. Because God will give us all we need if we ask him. We've got problems. We've got problems at Park at the Palm. You've got problems in your home. You've got problems in the family. We have new problems come up every now and again in at Park at the Palm. We can lay them all at his feet. If he shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. Ask and receive that your joy may be full. Hitherto you've asked nothing in my name. Oh, may God help us. To be men and women of prayer. Collective prayer. Now I'd like to say a few practical things. I have a brother in England, he used to say to me, I'd like to hear you talk because you usually finish up with something practical.
Because he's kind of teasing me a bit. You usually finish up with something practical. Just be practical for a minute, and I'm not criticizing. I'm just stating a few things. The Lord says, if he shall ask anything in my name, I believe that one man should ask for one thing. That's what I believe. If he shall ask anything. When we meet for collective prayer, and there are twenty others that can pray, if the first man prays for all the subjects, he might as well shut the meeting and go home. It's over, as far as I'm concerned. I used to go to a prayer meeting in Philadelphia, a monthly missionary prayer meeting.
in, what's got the name of the chapel, in Lansdowne Chapel, Philadelphia. And our brother Lucin Springer, a wonderful man of God up there, he led the prayer region with a great big map of the world. And he read fifteen missionary letters every, the first Sunday of every month, from India, and he had it all marked, Tom and Matt, as India, and this, China, and these were all the letters were coming in. And when he read all these letters, he said, now we're going to pray for these people. And the first brother would kid up, and he'd pray for fourteen of them. And the next brother would get up and pray for one, the meeting was finished. No, they'd go on, repetition, repetition, repetition. I don't think God wants a lot of repetition.
He hears our prayers. I used to say to Lucan Springer, dear brother Lucan, why don't you do that? Instead of reading fifteen letters, why don't you read one letter? And say, now let's have some prayer for this brother. We'll read a letter from Bill Deans in the Congo. Three brethren pray for Bill Deans. And let's read a letter from Bill Decker out there in Hong Kong. And three people pray for Bill Decker in Hong Kong. You'd have a far better prayer meeting. When they sent me when I was in Egypt to a British Air Force station down in the Suez Canal area, a large, very large maintenance depot, I looked around to see if there were any Christian boys there, and we had in the British services at that time what we called the Soldiers and Airmen's Christian Association.
And in the daily routine orders, you'd always see that the Soldiers and Airmen's Christian Association meeting would be on a certain night. And I found it was eight o'clock on Tuesday night in the quiet room of the YMCA. And I waited till they just made a start. And then I crept in quietly. And there were eight boys in there for prayer meeting. Wonderful boys they were. I learned to love them. I spent two and a half years with them. And one time I looked up, he said, Mr. Willie, he said, you're an answer to prayer. He said, we've been asking God to send a Christian officer here. We need a leader. Will you be our leader? Will you help us? We want to get some Bible reading started. We want to do some work for God in this camp.
Will you help us? And I went several weeks. And there was one fellow, a wonderful boy. He came from a wonderful Baptist church in London, Phil Bamber. Phil Bamber, a great Baptist minister, well known in England. He came from Phil Bamber's church. And he knew the Bible. And he prayed for twenty minutes, you know. Tell the Lord so much that he knew in the Bible, he'd tell the Lord all about it, and pray and pray for twenty minutes. And then there's another fellow, he came from one of the brethren assemblies up in the Lake District, near Keswick, up in England, and he could pray for another twenty minutes. And I said to them, I said, Now, you ask me if I would lead you. Do you mind if I do that? They said, No, we want you to.
I said, Well, I'd like to make some suggestions. This is no prayer meeting. There's about eight or ten of us here, and if two men do all the praying, that's not a prayer meeting. I'm trying to be practical now. I said, can I tell you what to do? He said, yeah, do what you like. We'll do it. You tell us, we'll do it. So I pointed to one, the one that prayed twenty minutes. I said, next Tuesday night, you'll be in charge when we get here. You open the meeting in prayer, very briefly now, very briefly ask God to bless us. And then you bring us a little scripture. and read two verses or three or a chapter and give us a wee word on it, but don't be more than five minutes now. Little word from the Word of God. Then I said, also you prepare a list of all the things we're going to pray for.
And I said, you'll be the chairman and you read out the things and we'll pray for it. And you've got to say, and of course we were in the British Army, the British Air Force, so first thing we pray for kings and rulers and all that are in authority. The first thing was the king. And he had it on the list, the king. And he said, I want three prayers for the king. And three men got up. And these boys had never prayed in their life before. Because they couldn't compete with a twenty-minute prayer. They'd never done it. But they got up. And in brief language they'd pray for the king. Then they'd pray for the country. And then they'd pray for this. And all the individuals and the needs and the boys we knew we wanted to be saved. We brought their names. And you know, in an hour we got forty prayers. Every Tuesday night we get about forty prayers.
They'd pray two and three and four times. But they'd just pray for one thing. Three men pray for one thing. I was never in a prayer meeting like it. It was just tremendous. And God bless us. I'm talking about practical things. I believe this is... I don't say we're going to organize it like this, but I think we should be practical, brothers. And let's pray for specific things. As our brother Waterbackman told us last Tuesday, we should have a list of those that are sick. And as our brother Graham says, don't three men pray for the same man. One man pray for this man and one man pray for that man. And one man for this sister, one for that sister. Let's be practical and ask the Lord. He doesn't want repetitions. God is in heaven, year upon earth.
Therefore let your words be few. That's what the scripture says. Practical. And they continued in prayers. Because I said enough, the clock's gone. Anyhow, you better stop. Do you know what I'm getting at? We need to be men and women of prayer. We need to be men and women of specific prayer. We need to be men and women of collective church, collective prayer. They continued in the Apostle's doctrine, fellowship, breaking of bread, prayers, and that's in the plural, prayers. Let me give you one more scene, and with this I close. Paul is going up to Jerusalem. And he's sailing down through the Asian Sea.
And he stops at Troas, the twentieth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. And you know, he had spent three years of his life at Ephesus. And he longed to see the Ephesian elders from the Ephesian church, but he hadn't time to go to Ephesus. And he sent to them. and asked them to come down. From Miletus he sent to Ephesus, Acts twenty, verse seventeen. From Miletus he sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church. And when they were come, he said, Do you know from the first day that I came into Asia what manner I have been with you at all seasons, serving the Lord and so on. And he went over his work three years in Ephesus.
And at the end of the chapter you get a very touching scene. They're treated. He said to them, I know you're not going to see my face anymore. I know that. I won't come this way anymore, says Paul. And he says in verse thirty-three, I have coveted no man's silver or gold or apparel. Ye yourselves know that these hands have ministered unto my necessities and to them that were with me. I've showed you all things, thou that so laboring ye ought to support the weak, And to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, who said, It's more blessed to give and to receive. And when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down and prayed with them.
What a prayer meeting, eh? With the elders of Ephesus on the seashore, he kneeled down and prayed with them all. And they all wept sore, and fell on Paul's neck and kissed him, sorrowing most of all for the words which he spake, that they should see his face no more. And they accompanied him unto the ship. I was once reminded of this in a very real and practical way. In the year nineteen thirty-three, we were sailing home from Athens to spend a month vacation in England. And we sailed through the Corinth Canal, past Corinth, and through the Gulf of Corinth, we left Athens, Porta Piraeus on a Saturday evening.
And on the Sunday afternoon, we got to the island of Corfu in the Ionian Sea, one of the most westerly islands. of Greece, Corfu, a beautiful island. And they led us down in little boats and rode us to shore. And some of the Christians knew we were coming there, and they met us. And they took us up to their little chapel. And we had a meeting, a wonderful fellowship with these Greek Christians. And I preached to them. I couldn't preach in Greek in those days. I'd only been there two years. And a brother who's now in heaven, he interpreted as I spoke to them. Then we heard the ship's hooter blowing, you know, for us to get back and I was still speaking. And we had to give me the tips, better shut up and get on that boat, you know.
And we went down to the shore. And what do you think? The whole assembly, all the Christians, many women, came down to the shore. And there we were on the blue waters of the Aegean Sea of the Aegean Sea, as a matter of fact. Just like Paul here at Miletus, and down on the dock, they all gathered around us. And wished us Godspeed. Forty, fifty of them probably. And we got in a little boat. And they were all the Christians on the island, all there. What a joy it was to be close to them and just to love them, you know. And we got in that little boat and they rode us out to the ship and off we went. But I thought of Paul meeting out there on that lovely seashore, meeting the Christians from Ephesus and kneeling down on the shore and praying with them and saying goodbye to them.
Brendan, let's learn some lessons tonight. They continued in the Apostle's doctrine, fellowship, breaking the bread, prayers. We have good prayer meetings here, but let's see they get gooder, shall we, for His name's sake. Amen. Blessed God, our Father, we thank you for these wonderful, wonderful examples from thy precious word of the early church, how they acted, how they came together on the first day of the week to break bread, how they continued in prayer. Help us, Lord, to put these things into practice and magnify and glorify thy name in our midst. We ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus.