                    [Times Square Church Pulpit Series]

                         The Witness of the Spirit

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By David Wilkerson
December 27, 1993
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          "And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the
          Spirit is truth" (1 John 5:6).

          Several years ago I was invited to attend a revival
          meeting in a suburban church just outside of New York
          City. People had been raving about a "successful
          crusade" being held there by two young male
          evangelists. Finally, I went to one of their services,
          and I was seated up front with the ministry team.
          Little did I know, I was about to endure a terrible
          experience!

          People had been calling this pair a "powerful
          evangelistic team." One preached, and the other sang
          and played the organ. But as the service began and I
          watched these two young men, something deep inside me
          began to twitch. I felt a strange uneasiness.

          Before the young preacher began his message, he hyped
          up the audience. He had a beautiful set of boxed gifts
          he gave out each night to the person who brought the
          most visitors. There were toasters, radios, mixers -
          even a bicycle for the closing night!

          His preaching was nothing but one exciting story after
          another. The crowd loved it - but I got nauseated! Now
          the uneasiness inside me spoke loud and clear: "This is
          not of God - it's all flesh! There is something evil
          going on, The Holy Spirit is not here. Those two
          evangelists are gay - and they're fooling every-one!"

          I was sick that night, grieved beyond words - but it
          was all because the witness of the Spirit was working
          in me! The pastor was so excited about the big crowds
          that he'd shaken off all discernment! And the people
          loved this flesh-show because they had blinded
          themselves spiritually - they were simply following the
          pastor!

          A few years later, I saw those two young evangelists in
          an airport. This time the Spirit's witness told me to
          confront them. We greeted one another, and then - with
          no malice in my voice - I said, "I know what you two
          boys are - you're homosexuals. Please, quit mocking the
          Lord! Go out and get another job. God won't let you get
          away with this charade. I don't want to have to expose
          you!"

          My warning didn't seem to bother either of them. A few
          years later I was in northern Canada for a crusade.
          Late after a service one night I was hungry, so my host
          drove me to a remote restaurant a half-hour away. As we
          walked in, who did we see sitting at a table nearby,
          entertaining two very effeminate men? It was the two
          young evangelists! How shocked they were when I passed
          their table. They knew they'd been caught!

          Not long after that they were exposed and left the
          ministry. The Holy Spirit confirmed what He had shown
          me years earlier! Yet what frightened me most about the
          ordeal was that all the pastors of large churches who
          invited these young men to speak never discerned what
          they were. No one had the witness of the Spirit to
          expose it all!

          On another occasion I was invited to hear a so-called
          "powerful evangelist" who was holding his sixth week of
          meetings at a large Pentecostal church in a Southern
          city. This time my wife, Gwen, and I slipped into the
          balcony unnoticed - and what a show we saw!

          The evangelist came out dressed like a nightclub
          performer, wearing a red-plaid, sequined jacket. The
          crowd applauded when he was introduced. I was startled
          by it all - and immediately I turned to Gwen and said,
          "Honey, that's the biggest phony who ever stepped into
          a pulpit!"

          For the first five minutes he merely pranced about the
          stage, joking and flattering the crowd. Then he stepped
          down into the audience and kissed a few women,
          imploring their husbands not to be jealous. I thought
          to myself, "He's a showman. He doesn't know God at
          all!"

          His preaching, too, consisted of one incredible story
          after another - and the crowd was awestruck! He said,
          "I was sitting in a barbershop when the Vice President
          came in and sat in the chair next to mine. He turned to
          me and, to my surprise, he knew my name. He said,
          'Brother Billy Bob, the President and I have heard all
          about your great meetings. Please stop in next time
          you're in the capital."'

          I turned to Gwen and said, "Honey, he's lying! He's
          telling great, big fibs!" But everyone was clapping and
          going crazy! The gray-haired pastor was eating it all
          up. And the big crowd was feasting on all the
          outrageous lies!

          Gwen and I left - and all the way to the car I had to
          hold my stomach. It was not a physical pain; rather, it
          was a deep, inner groaning, an unexplainable hurt. It
          was the witness of the Spirit again - showing me the
          difference between the holy and the profane!

          God had given that pastor what he coveted: a packed
          house and big crowds. But it had cost him the witness
          of the Spirit! He was blinded - he'd lost all
          discernment! Every Spirit-filled person who lived a
          holy life in that church recognized the sham inthe
          first five minutes - and walked out! These had the
          inner witness of the Spirit - and they could not stand
          to be in that man's presence!

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             Sometimes the Holy Ghost Won't Let You Sit Still!

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          There are times when the Holy Ghost's inner witness
          will not allow me to keep quiet. The Spirit rises
          within me and I have to speak up, loudly exposing the
          flesh and the devil!

          On one occasion, a "Christian" rock group begged me to
          attend their outdoor concert. I went, and most of what
          I heard was merely okay; it was all loud drums and
          unintelligible music. Then, toward the end of the
          concert, the smoke machines went on and lights began to
          flash - and the crowd went into a frenzy!

          As I looked up, I saw hordes of demons flying off the
          stage and hovering above the whole congregation. At
          that point, I fell backward to the ground, literally
          stricken by the Holy Spirit. The witness within me was
          saying, "This is Ichabod! The glory of the Lord has
          departed!"

          Suddenly, the Holy Ghost took over my voice. I got up
          and ran throughout the whole place, knocking over
          chairs and crying out, "Ichabod! Stop it - it's the
          devil!" But nobody cared!

          When I got home I fell on the living room floor,
          doubled up, groaning and weeping. I couldn't catch my
          breath. When Gwen saw me she was hysterical. "Dave,
          what's wrong? Where do you hurt? Speak to me!"

          I couldn't even talk. Never had I felt such grief.
          Finally, I blurted out, "Honey, it's the grief of God!
          There's a blindness in that ministry. They don't
          understand it was all satanic! Everyone was clapping,
          but they should have been weeping!"

          I will never forget that night. Into the wee hours I
          cried, "Oh God, all those preachers, staffers, parents,
          teenagers - and none of them could see it! No one knew
          it was flesh, that Satan was manifesting! Oh Lord, am I
          the crazy one? Why was I so stirred? Why did I run
          through that crowd like a fool?"

          It was the Holy Ghost within me - bearing witness to
          truth! "Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot
          receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him:
          but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall he
          in you"(John 14.17).

          The Holy Spirit abides in us to reveal to us what is
          true and what is false. He speaks with a still, small
          voice, deep within the heart. Many of our holy
          forefathers believed in this operation of the Spirit in
          believers. They preached much about "having the
          witness." But I don't hear this truth being preached
          anymore. In fact, the witness of the Spirit is
          virtually unheard of in most churches today!

          Yet the fact is, believers need the Spirit's witness as
          never before. And we're going to need it more and more
          as the day of the Lord draws near! Satan has come
          brazenly as an angel of light to deceive, if it were
          possible, the very elect of God. His evil seductions
          are going to flourish: false doctrines, false teachers,
          false gospels. Even now, multitudes are being swept
          away and captivated by wicked false prophets and
          corrupt teachers!

          But you can have the Holy Ghost's witness in you - to
          help you know whether what you're hearing is right or
          wrong, truth or lies! With His witness at work in your
          heart, you can listen to any teaching tape, go to any
          meeting, read any book, and know beyond a shadow of a
          doubt what's pure and what's unholy. You can walk in
          the assurance that you will not be deceived by any
          wickedness!

          You see, the Spirit's inner witness operates on the
          "principle of peace." The peace of God is the greatest
          thing you can have. And when your peace is disturbed,
          you can be sure the Holy Ghost is speaking to you! When
          there is a troubling in your spirit - a shaking and a
          turmoil deep inside - God is telling you that something
          is false. You will feel His embarrassment - His grief
          and anger!

          You may say, "I already have the Holy Spirit living in
          me. But I want His witness In my heart, How can I get
          it?"

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          1. The Holy Ghost Witness Can Operate Only in a Humble,
               Pure Vessel in Which the Peace of God Reigns!

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          "And let the peace of God rule in your hearts"
          (Colossians 3:15).ngs turmoil to the heart. And any
          hidden, unrepented sin will rob a believer of his
          precious peace! His heart will be torn by guilt,
          condemnation and fear - and the Spirit will speak only
          two words to him. "Repent! Flee!"

          Yes, the Spirit will speak to you to correct you; He
          will deal with you about sin, righteousness and
          judgment. But when it comes to giving you direction -
          that is, the still, small voice which tells you what to
          do and where to go - He will not operate in an unclean
          vessel!

          If you persist in sin - if you do not confess it or
          deal with it - your heart will feed you a steady stream
          of lies. You'll hear teachings that make you at ease in
          your sin, You'll think, "My problem couldn't be that
          bad. I don't feel convicted." But you will be totally
          led astray!

          Isaiah speaks of a people who went out claiming to
          desire the true counsel of God. They said: "Let Him
          make speed, and hasten His work, that we may see it,'
          and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh
          and come, that we may know it!" (Isaiah 5:19).

          But these people had deceit in their hearts - and they
          ended up perverted in all their counsel! Sin had
          perverted their judgment! As a result, they weren't
          able to discern evil. And the things that were holy and
          pure, they called unrighteous. Isaiah said of them,
          "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that
          put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that
          put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" (verse
          20).

          Some time ago a minister acquaintance of mine warned me
          not to listen to a certain Bible teacher, He told me,
          That man is preaching the worst false doctrine! Stay
          away from him, or it will destroy you. He's dangerous!"

          This acquaintance was full of anger toward that
          teacher. But when I heard the teacher on tape, my heart
          leaped within me. Peace flooded my soul! I kept waiting
          to hear the "dangerous" part - but the message was all
          about walking in holiness and having a pure heart. So I
          got another tape, then another - and each one was
          sweeter than the first! I thought, "How could anybody
          say this is dangerous or evil?"

          But that accusing preacher had really believed what
          he'd told me. I believe a voice had spoken to him - but
          it wasn't the voice of God! It was the voice of his own
          flesh crying out because he was being convicted of his
          sins!

          The messages on holiness and purity had touched
          something deep within him and made him angry. And an
          inner voice was telling him that this good teaching was
          evil. He totally misjudged! Why? Because sin had
          blinded him! He had compromised somehow, and the spirit
          of the world had crept into him. Jesus said those who
          are of this world cannot hear the voice of the Spirit,
          "whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him
          not, neither knoweth Him" (John 14:17).

          Beloved, be very careful not to be influenced by
          someone else's so-called witness! Whenever somebody
          tells me something evil or reproachful about another
          person, I want to meet the accused. Often it is that
          person's pure devotion to God that provokes the
          sinner's heart!

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                  2. There Can Be No Inner Voice of
                   the Spirit In a Proud Believer!

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          Let me distinguish clearly between pride and humility:

          A humble person is not one who thinks little of
          himself, hangs his head and says, "I'm nothing."
          Rather, he is one who depends wholly on the Lord for
          everything, in every circumstance. He knows the Lord
          has to direct him, empower him and quicken him - and
          that he's dead without that! He says, "I won't do
          anything until I get the mind of God. I will not act
          until He commands!"

          A proud person, on the other hand, is one who may love
          God in a fashion, but he acts and thinks on his own. At
          its root, pride is simply independence from God, And
          the proud person makes decisions based on his own
          reasoning, skill and abilities. He says, "God gave me a
          good mind, and He expects me to use it. It's silly to
          ask Him for direction in every detail of life."

          This person is unteachable because he already "knows it
          all." He might listen to someone who is higher in
          authority or better known than himself - but not to
          someone he thinks is inferior. I know this to be true;
          at one time it described me!

          I was a high-flying young evangelist, known all over
          the world. I would have listened to some well-known man
          of God. But I seldom listened to an unknown, uneducated
          person! Whenever some young preacher came into my
          office to try to tell me something, he got five minutes
          of my time before he was pleasantly escorted out, I
          reasoned, "I've got all this experience. I've been
          through such deep waters. Unless they have been equally
          experienced, they have nothing to say to me."

          In recent years I've thought God had dealt a death-blow
          to this attitude in me long ago. Then something
          happened several weeks ago that made me see I may still
          have some of it!

          Someone on our mailing list sent me a teaching tape by
          a man I'd never heard of. I took the tape home and
          listened for about fifteen minutes, and I realized this
          unknown man was speaking truth. The witness of the
          Spirit told me I was listening to a truly holy, humble
          man.

          Then the preacher spoke of having no education. He
          hadn't studied any books; only the Spirit had taught
          him. He explained in his Southern, monotone drawl that
          the only book he'd studied for the last fifteen years
          was his Bible.

          For a fleeting moment I thought, "This man can't teach
          me anything. I'm an avid reader - I've read entire
          volumes of the Puritans and all the great missionaries'
          lives. But he sounds like he's never read a book!" So I
          shut off the tape.

          Then the Spirit's witness spoke to me clearly: "Turn it
          back on. He has much to teach you!"

          Now I've ordered six more of his tapes and his book -
          and I've been greatly blessed! Yet my blinding pride
          would have robbed me of something God had meant for my
          growth!

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             You Can Easily Know a Proud Person by His Fruits!

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          Not one word a proud person receives is of God! It is
          impossible for him to judge righteous judgment -
          impossible to speak God's mind - because the Holy
          Spirit is not present in him to bear witness to truth.
          "There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the
          end thereof are the ways of death" (Proverbs 14:12).

          You may wonder, "How can a person who is filled with
          the Holy Ghost hear strange voices instead of the
          Spirit's?"

          Consider King Saul - a prime example of pride - a man
          who insisted on doing things his own way! He couldn't
          wait for God to act. So when the prophet Samuel was
          slow in arriving to make the sacrifice before battle,
          Saul played priest and offered up his own sacrifice. It
          was an act of pure self-will, independence, impatience
          with God's ways!

          God also had commanded Saul to slay all the Amalekites.
          But again Saul did things his way: When the battle was
          over, he spared King Agag. Samuel rebuked Saul for
          this, asking, "Why did you not obey God and kill him?"
          Saul answered, "Because I feared the people." Again
          human wisdom!

          The Bible says, "But the Spirit of the Lord departed
          from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord troubled
          him. And Saul's servants said unto him, Behold now, an
          evil spirit from God troubleth thee" (1 Samuel
          16:14-15).

          Saul was troubled - he had no peace! Everybody could
          see it in him: He had a troubled look, an angry spirit.
          Another spirit had begun speaking to his inner man -
          and it was a witness from hell!

          Saul constantly heard voices imitating God. They told
          him to kill David. They said his own son was a traitor.
          They convinced him he was being betrayed by his own
          body-guards. "No one loves you. Everybody is against
          you!" Saul became full of envy, hatred, anxiety, fear!

          Can a Holy Ghost-empowered person lose the Spirit, be
          given over to an evil spirit, and yet continue
          preaching and prophesying? Yes! Saul had been
          Spirit-empowered:

          "And the Spirit of God came upon Saul..." (1 Samuel
          11:6). Then we read that "the Spirit of the Lord
          departed from Saul..." ((16:14). And, finally, "...it
          came to pass...that the evil spirit from God came upon
          Saul, and he prophesied in the midst of the house: and
          David played..." (18:10).

          Saul was still prophesying - even though there was an
          evil spirit in him! You can be sure that what came out
          of this man was not of God. It may have sounded right -
          but everything he spoke was another gospel! Even though
          this man at one time had been chosen of God and
          anointed of the Holy Ghost, he was speaking straight
          from the flesh!

          Right now, thousands of Christians are exchanging tapes
          and books - but much of it is full of poison! You might
          not recognize the error at first; but if you have the
          witness of the Spirit, just keep listening awhile, and
          He will expose it. The proud teacher or preacher -
          under the direction of an evil spirit - eventually will
          say something that makes you uneasy. You may hear an
          entire hour of good-sounding gospel before you hear the
          five minutes of gross error. But only the witness of
          the Spirit can reveal it to you!

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                3. One Night During a Prayer Meeting,
                God Told Me Something About Our Church
                     I Was Not Expecting to Hear.

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          The Lord whispered to me, "This church needs shock
          treatment! Too many have grown satisfied and
          complacent. You feel safe and secure from all the winds
          and waves of false doctrines sweeping over the land -
          but you are not prepared for what is coming!"

          Beloved, this message of having the Spirit's witness
          functioning in you is not a request - it is a matter of
          life and death! If you don't have the witness of the
          Holy Ghost in these last days, you're not going to make
          it! You'll give in to the coming spirit of the
          Antichrist!

          Here's an example: in President Clinton's health plan,
          there is a provision for a national health
          identification card - and, eventually, a
          state-of-the-art, tamper-proof numbering system. This
          probably means an implantation device in the head, arm
          or somewhere on the body. No one will receive health
          coverage without a number.

          We also are headed for a cashless society - first by
          credit card, and later by a laser implantation beneath
          the skin. The European Community has already planned
          for this. We may be on the very brink of the mark of
          the beast! And if you don't have discernment, you
          become an accessory to a murderous government system
          that takes your tax dollars for abortion!

          Tragically, some Christians are not going to recognize
          these Antichrist setups! That is why you need the Holy
          Spirit witness every day - on your job, at work, at
          school. You'll need to rightly judge politicians and
          leaders so you'll not suddenly be sucked into the
          Antichrist system.

          Wake up beloved! This is what Jesus was trying to tell
          us about the foolish virgins who ran out of oil for
          their lamps. They had a supply of the Holy Ghost - but
          they didn't have His witness at the final moment. And
          if you haven't made provision to have a functioning,
          Holy Ghost witness in these last days, you'll run out
          of oil at the last hour!

          Don't end up a foolish virgin! If you are running out
          of oil - trusting your church or your pastor to keep
          your soul - then repent! Humble yourself and search
          your heart! Cry out to God to rid your soul of all
          anger and bitterness. Confess your sins and forsake
          them. And depend on God once again for everything!

          Get the peace of God in your heart, so you can have a
          Holy Ghost witness. And ask the Father for a greater
          enduement of the Spirit. Invite Him to be your witness
          and guide in everything! You don't have to be afraid in
          these days. He is anxious to become your witness!

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