Our scripture this morning is from the book of Revelation, chapter 8. Last book in the Bible, Revelation chapter 8, and we'll read this morning together verses 1 through 5. You hold in your hands the very words of God. When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. And I saw the seven angels who stand before God. And to them were given seven trumpets. Another angel who had a golden sensor came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer with the prayers of the saints on the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense together with the prayers of the saints went up before God from the angel's hand. Then the angel took the sensor, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth. And there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake. The grass withers in the flowers fade, but the word of our Lord stands forever. Let's return to Revelation chapter 8. The passage we read was John just a few moments ago. Our messages for the last few weeks have been the theme of prayer and a call to prayer and a call of reaching out. We've seen the grace of God that is reaching and seeking and searching and saving. We will return in the coming weeks to the book of Luke to continue our study there. But this morning, we'll look at another passage about prayer. This is not one that we know that well. So if you would get a Bible, if you don't have one, scrunch up the support next to you or take a few from the Bible, it's the easy to find the last book of the Bible. Revelation, let's look at chapter 8. Let's pray together. Our father, the most amazing thing is that the awesome Christ that we read in this passage is here this morning, right here in our midst. Father, we have prayed that we might see something in His glory. We pray now that we might hear His voice. Not only see His glory, but see that hear His voice in our hearts. That's what happens with all true preaching. It's not about the eloquence of a man or about the theological knowledge of an individual. Father Paul said that all true preaching was simply a demonstration of the great power of the Holy Spirit. Our father, you know that I understand that in my heart. And father, you know that every week I pray that we would hear Him, that we would be changed from the inside out because I can't do that. And I can't teach like that. But father, this morning there's even a greater helplessness because as I look at this passage father, I feel that I'm on holy ground, that there are things here that even when I've been an eternity for 10,000 years I'll not be able to grasp. Father, we're looking at something that is beyond us this morning. We pray that the Holy Spirit would lift us up and that we would see what we've not seen and hear what we've not heard. And we pray that Father, our hearts and our souls would be profoundly affected in Jesus' name. Amen. Do your prayers shake the earth? In his book, your God is too small. Mark the Canon writes of having dinner with some folks who were uncomfortable when they discovered that he was a minister. An awkward silence followed and was finally broken by a well-meaning hostess who said, Well, that's nice. I've always felt that churches serve an important role in society. They are safe havens. People should be able to go into a church and escape reality for a little while. The Canon could not resist the temptation. He looked at his hostess and replied, You know, somehow I missed all that when I read the book of Acts. He said another lady walked up to him after he spoke to a friend's funeral and said, Thank you for that message. What you said was so nice. I'm religious too. The family always asked me to pray for the weather when we go golfing. The Canon went on to say in his book and I quote, I reckon this, the idol of the nice God, the safe God, has done more damage to biblical faith, more damage to people coming to the faith than the character tour of a tyrant God ever did. This milk-toast pampering deity is nothing but a cosmic lackey. An errand boy we call on to make our golf games pleasant or to help us escape reality for a little while and then we summarily dismiss him. Folks, the Christ we see in Revelation chapter 8 is not that milk-toast lackey. Revelation 5 through 8 is an escape into reality. And the picture is not of a small God or of saints who pray for good weather for their picnics. The God here is neither small nor is he safe. He shakes the earth. That's what the passage says. As you watch him in the context of Revelation chapter 8, I want us to ask the question of ourselves. I want you to ask the question of you. I will ask them myself. Do my prayers shake the earth. That's the question before the house. First, I want you to see that prayer is a holy endeavor which places us in a holy position. A holy endeavor which places us in a holy position. Let's just read over this again. When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. And I saw the seven angels who stand before God and to them were given seven trumpets. Another angel who had a golden sensor came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense together with the prayers and the saints went up before God from the angel's hand. Now, all I want us to think about for a few minutes and lock in here. All I want us to think about is the context in which these prayers were offered. The prayers and the saints, your prayers and my prayers, go up before God. What's the context? Let's look at it. God pulled back the veil and allowed John to see into the world beyond. What was happening in heaven? Chapters five through seven had described the praise of heaven as Jesus stepped forth to take the scroll and break the seven seals which held the scroll. Someone has said that the scroll was the deed to ownership of all the earth and all of history. It was the deed to all of the universe. Only the real owner could break the seals of the scroll. The deed belonged to the owner and his Christ stepped forward and he took the scroll. What happened? How did heaven respond? Look at Revelation chapter five, verse nine. He had taken the scroll. That's the act. In heaven he had taken the scroll. And what do we read? And they sang a new song. You are worthy to take the scroll into the open and sealed because you were slain and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people in nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God and they will reign on the earth. And that was just that small group around the throne. But it's like concentric circles. The circles that were included in this praise kept getting wider and wider and wider because look what happened next in verse 11. Then I looked and I heard the voice of many angels numbering thousands of home thousands and 10,000 times 10,000. That's his way of saying they were literally millions of angels. They encircled the throne and the living creatures and the elders. And a loud voice. They sang and they sang to you. Worthy is the lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honoring glory and praise. Then what happened? Someone else joined the course. Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea. Excuse me. And all that is in them singing. To him he sits on the throne and to the Lamb he prays and honoring glory and power forever and ever. The four and living creatures, the four living creatures said on the end and the elders fell down and worshiped. What a scene. The praise started here and it grew wider and louder and louder and louder and louder. What a scene. John had been an observer. Even more than an observer, this was an interactive revelation. John talked to some of the participants and they talked to him. He had been watching this great scene of praise. You know praise is a noisy thing. Can you imagine? Can you imagine? You could have heard this from galaxy to galaxy. In this small room, it's hard to talk. When Jennifer is playing this wonderful organ. Now we're only a thousand folks here in this room. And besides that, we're Presbyterians and Presbyterians don't worship loudly. But look at the numbers that participated in the worship. John was watching tens of thousands of angels singing. And then the whole earth joins. That worship was thunderous. A cacophony of praise. And then what? Then what? You go back to Revelation 8.1. Then there was silence. Suddenly, the great noise, silence. Significant silence. What a contrast. The silence. The seven angels who held seven trumpets were about to blow those trumpets. What did trumpets do? They announced something. They announced the coming of the king. They announced the coming of an army. They announced something. Well, each one of those trumpets that would blow would announce the beginning of events which had been sealed up in that scroll. And these trumpets were about to sound. And then the praise gave way to a different kind of all. A silent all. As heaven was about to break forth the foam of the earth. Have you ever seen people being in the crab and there's been noise in suddenly in anticipation? Everybody goes quiet. That's what happened here. And what happened during that silence? What happened during the silence? The prayers of the saints came up before God. Right in the moment of silence. Right in the moment of trembling all. The prayers of God's people came before Him. Now listen, what I want you to see is that is the context of the prayers of God's people. See, this is where I think we get it wrong. We tend to think in prayer as we pray. We tend to think of God drawing not at us when we pray. But here in this place we are pictured as drawing not at God as going into the very throne room of God. That's why our prayers, guys, are daring to speak when others are silent. Prayer takes us to the Holy of Holies. When Jesus was crucified, God ripped the veil of the Holy of Holies. Why? Because Christ had opened the door of the real temple. Now, you know, what do you say? What do you mean? You should cannot not pray anywhere at any time. Sure. We talk about the prayer without ceasing and we can prayer at cause. And we can pray walking down the street. But here's what I want us to see. God does not stand at the corner of popular and main hearing our petitions. If we are standing at the corner of popular and main, our prayers go to the very throne of God. That is the Holy place. And speaking to Him as a holy endeavor, the incarnation did what it brought God to earth. That the earth might be raised to Him. The incarnation begins on earth in Bethlehem in a stable of all places. But where does it end? It ends in glory. Jesus came to us that he might die opening wide, opening the very throne room of God. It is one thing when we think this way. We pray in our bedrooms and we think, well, God enters our bedroom and he sits in our chair. And he listens to us. It is one thing when we think that way. It is the wrong way to think. It is quite another for us to be ushered into the throne room of God where six wings, Saratham cover their faces and all in reverence. They don't even speak to Him and we dare to come to Him and speak in that context. Let me tell you, we were saved in these last few weeks that we must take prayer seriously. Well, to take prayer seriously, you must take, we must take God seriously. And if we were to take God seriously, we cannot take Him seriously. And can we understand in some way, we can't grasp it all, but understand in some ways, the hugeness of His being as the angels understand in this passage, the hugeness of His being. Why do this Saratham cover their faces? It is not because they took, which is schools and they read in a book about the protocol of God's court and angels say, well, we've got to keep wings. It is because they know the greatness of God. And they can't do anything else but their wings before their faces. There was a man who lived in the 19th century. He was born in 1865, died in 1912. And he got a great name in life. He got a great name because of the way he lived. His name was praying hide. That was his name. That is what people called him, praying hide. He was born John Hyde in Illinois in 1865. He became a Presbyterian minister. He went to seminary. He was an avid student. He earned great marks as a student. In fact, when he graduated right out of seminary, the seminary asked him to stay and become a professor there. But a group that he knew was headed to India and he wanted to go to India as a missionary. He went to India. And God blessed his preaching there. And people came to here and people thronged to hear his preaching. It was a revival type of preaching. But somewhere in India, some point in his ministry, he said there's more. And he became possessed with what we're reading here in Revelation chapter 8. He became possessed with prayer. And he began to pray as he never had before. And even a greater revival broke out. And he prayed so much sometimes he would go upon his knees and pray for 40 hours. And he not only affected India with his prayers, but he changed the Christian world in the United States in England. All of when he began to pray for something, he really prayed. And he understood that he was in the presence of God in the throne room of God. And he understood the greatness of God. And he prayed, and he prayed, and he prayed. There was another Presbyterian minister named J. Wilbur Chapman, who wrote to a friend of his about needing praying hide. Praying hide was in London. J. Wilbur Chapman, a Presbyterian minister, was in London. J. Wilbur Chapman was a well-known minister. And he was preaching a series of services and it was just flat. It was just like nothing was happening at all. It was like God was absent. And praying hide came one evening when he left. He told J. Wilbur Chapman, he said, I'm going to pray for you. I'm going to pray for these services. And over the next month, a great revival broke out in that place. Praying hide, knew how to pray. J. Wilbur Chapman went to, in fact, I'll just read, let him tell his own story. They were in a meeting together one night. And this is what J. Wilbur Chapman wrote. As we were leaving, I said, Mr. Hyde, I want you to pray for me. I'm just for the services, but for me. Later, he came to my room and he turned the key in the door and he dropped to his knees. He waited five minutes without a single syllable coming from his lips. I could hear my own heart thumping, beating. I felt hot tears running down my face. I knew I was with God. Then with upturned face, down which the tears were streaming, he said, oh God. Then for five minutes, at least, he was still again. He said nothing. And then when he knew that he was talking with God, there came from the depths of his heart, such as petitions for me, as I have never heard before. I rose from my knees to know what real prayer was. Now, did God enter the room with Hyde, sit in the easy chair and say, okay, God, Hyde, what do you want? No, Hyde was transported to the very throne room of God. He knew where he was. He understood prayer is a holy endeavor which places us in a holy position. Secondly, I want you to look at this passing and see that our prayers are pleasant to God. Now, good back to Revelation 8 verse 3. Another angel who had a golden sensor came down instead of the altar. He was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense together with the prayers of the saints went up before God from the angel's hand. What is the incense? You ever wondered about that? All this incense in the Old Testament? In the book of Revelation, what is incense? What was it? There was a special altar in the temple for incense. There was a special mixture of incense that was to be used on that altar. God said, don't use any strength. Use this. And this incense gave out a delightful aroma. Now, what does that mean? What's that about? You must know that every piece of furniture, every instrument in the Old Temple, in the Old Tabernacle, was symbolic of something, symbolic of a reality. The altar of incense represented the prayers of God's people as the aroma rose, as the smoke arose. It was like the prayers going before God. Now, in Luke chapter 1, if you're taking notes, we don't have time to turn there. But remember, when the angel came to Zachariah to announce the birth of John the Baptist? Where was Zachariah? He was in the temple, and we read this. And when the time Luke 1.10, and when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside. It was time for the burning of incense, so what was it time to do? It was time to pray. And so here's the incense being offered. Offered? What was the incense? The incense was symbolic of prayers, and here's the people praying. Now, turn to Revelation chapter 5 again. And let's see this in our minds. Revelation chapter 5. And let's look at verse 8, the last part of verse 8. Revelation 5.8. Each one had a harp, and they were holding golden bulls, bulls, full of incense. Incense, which are the prayers of the saints. You see it came right out and said it. It's all through Scripture, but here he just says it. The incense represents the prayers of the saints. So the angel in Revelation chapter 8. He offers up the sacrifice, and all of us are up the incense. He has the censor, and he's offering up the incense. He's offering up the prayers. FF Ru says that we translated that Revelation 8.3 should be translated. This angel was given much incense to offer consisting of the prayers of all the saints. Now, what's the picture? What's that mean? The picture is this, that the prayers of God's people are pleasant to Him. They are like perfume. Somebody comes back and they have perfume on, and you like the perfume. The perfume is pleasing to you. Well, God used that imagery to say that our prayers rising up to Him are pleasant to God. What's that saying? It's saying that God loves to hear you pray. God loves to hear you talk to Him. As solemn as awesome as holy as daddy is, God loves. He revels in your prayers. John Sartail prayers, your prayers. God wants you to talk to Him. Isn't that something that God has pleased? Like we're pleased with the smell of perfume. He's pleased with our prayers. I love my children talking to me. I love for them to call them married or out. I love them to talk. Now, there's a time we've got to all be honest here. There was a time when we didn't like to hear our children talking to us. You know what I'm talking about. They're two, three or four years old, and they talk, and they talk, and they talk. And they ask, what? And they ask, where? And they ask, why? And they're never, ever, quiet. There was one of my children. You know, I have three and two girls and a guy. I won't tell you which one it was. But when he would ride in the car, sometimes I would stop in the car. And I would sit in the back seat, and I would say, don't say anything. Be quiet. I don't want to hear you say a thing. For ten minutes, you must remain absolutely silent. But you know, I enjoy even listening to him now. And it's like, it really is. It's like a perfume when your children call. Or when your children come back, and you just sit, and you talk. I'm convinced. That is the reason God used the imagery of incense and Old Testament. He was saying, I delight in your prayers. There was a football player several years ago at Tennessee, who came from abject poverty. He came from the projects of a major northern city. He loved the food in the athletic dorm. He had never seen that much food. That she could just eat all he wanted all the time. He loved his dorm room. It was much better than his home. He didn't want to go home. The team would tease him from time to time just because he was such an easy target. He seemed naive. One day, he came in and sat down at lunch. The guys at his table said, hey, your mother called today. And she wants you to call her. And his eyes got real big. And he dropped his plate. And he said, my mother called me. And she wants me to call her. The guys at that table knew that they had made an awful, awful mistake. For the first time, they realized that his mother never called. And she didn't care if he never called her. He craved to have a mother who wanted to hear from him. It's a sad, but true story. But do you know what's sadder? To have a God who does care. Whose care is beyond imagination. To have a God who wants to hear his children speak to him. Who delights in the prayers of his children yet they refuse to speak to him. They speak to him so little. And their conversations, for the most part, are very shallow. Look at this passage and see that prayers are holy endeavor which places us in the holy position. See that our prayers are pleasant to God. Isn't that good news? Thirdly, I want you to see that prayer involves the holy disciplines of waiting and conforming. Look at verse 4 in chapter 8. The smoke of the incense together with the prayers of the saints went up before God from the angels. And now, what does that tell us about waiting and conforming? Let me ask you this. What prayers do you think that these were? Do you think that the saints right that moment were prayed and these were the prayers? Maybe, but not for the most part. You know where these prayers have been prayed years before. Judgment is about to break forth upon the earth of some trumpets, about the sound, and the black horse and the white horse and the pale horse, the red horse are about to break forth upon the earth. These prayers have been prayed long before that. Turn with me to Revelation 6, just back in chapter 2, Revelation 6. You must take Revelation 5 through 8 as a unit. Revelation 6, and look at verse 9. When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the Word of God and the testimony they had maintained. These were the martyrs. They called out in the loud voice, how long sovereign Lord holy and true will you judge the inhabitants of the earth until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood. Then each one of them was given a white robe and they were told what? To wait a little longer. It's not time for justice to roll down the mountains and over the earth yet, not the perfect justice. And he said, you wait, you must wait. Wait till it's time. And when the time came, God said those prayers that were prayed some of them years ago, bring those prayers before me now. But all of heaven know that I'm faithful to answer the pleas of my children. People, I tell you this, if you're going to pray, if we're going to pray as a church family and be serious in our prayers for our own spiritual health and for those individuals that we know that don't know Christ. If you're going to pray, I can tell you that you must develop the Holy Disciplines, that we must develop the Holy Disciplines of waiting and conforming. And they are hard, hard disciplines. Alexander Solzeness and wrote a book entitled The Day in the Life of Ivan Dishonovich. He describes the life of Ivan living in a Soviet prison camp. Of course, Solzeness is talking about himself. One day Ivan is praying with his eyes closed, when a fellow prisoner notices that he's praying and he begins to ridicule. And he says to Ivan, prayers won't help you get out of here any faster. And opening his eyes, Ivan answers, I do not pray to get out of prison. I pray to do the will of God. You see, if you're going to pray, you must develop the Holy Disciplines of waiting and conforming. Prayer is surrender. We think that we are to pray and we're to take God's arm and we're to twist it and we're twisted and twisted until God calls uncle. And then his will becomes our will. Then our will becomes his will. I should say it like that. That we get God to do our will. That's not what prayer is. Prayer is surrender, all right. But it's not God's surrender to us. It's our surrender to God. If I take, you know how hard it is to park a boat. You know how hard it is. You're coming into a pier and I don't care whether it's a 20-foot speed boat or whether it's a 60-foot yacht. Parking a boat is not easy, especially as windy. And the smart captain, he always has a rope there to throw out. You know, to someone on the pier or to hook onto the pier. And when you begin to pull on that rope, what happens? Do you pull the shore to give or do you pull the boat and yourself to the shore? He's standing, Jen said, that's what prayer is. We throw out the road and we pull ourselves to the will of God. We don't pull God to our will. Young mother and this congregation in our church family was suffering. She was watching her small child suffer. Why did this happen to her? Why did that happen to her, baby? She sat in Alps and cried and cried. A few weeks later, she returned. She spoke of understanding for the first time in her life just something of God's sovereignty. She was no longer asking why. She was no longer screaming at God. She had been humbled. He was God and she was not. He had always been good to her all of her days. And even with this child. And she finally said, you know, I can let go of my child now. God can do as he wills. Two weeks later, she was back in my office again. And she said, I've learned my lesson. Dang it. Why is God going to take, when is God going to take our child on? When will this suffering end? I listened and gently suggested that God is not only sovereign of the what's in the wise. He's the sovereign of the winds. And that's the hardest. The greatest supernatural events I have seen have not been in the area of seas parting or diseases being healed. The greatest supernatural events that I've seen and answered a prayer have been mothers with a courage to give birth to a down syndrome child. Fathers and mothers who care for that child with incredible patience and love, who sacrifice without complaint, who even though they must cry tears and wear very thin, they just seem always to encourage others. People, when we pray, waiting is hard and conforming is hard. Do you think it was hard for these martyrs as they died? And they were separated from their families and their families were to do not think as they cried for justice to come upon the earth. It was hard to wait. It was hard to conform. Here I must say that you cannot pray. I mean really pray without having to wait. Unless you want your faith to turn to cynicism, you must learn, we must learn also to keep praying. Finally we wait. It's not just we wait. We've got to keep praying while we wait. The prayer is a holy endeavor which places us in a holy position. Our prayers are pleasant to God. Prayer involves the holy disciplines of waiting and conforming. Forstantly and finally, prayer in the hand of God shakes the earth and shapes history. Now if bread is meant to sleep, ethyl you wake him up and do this a whole message. This is the one thing that we need to get right here. This is worth the price of admission. Look at Revelation chapter 8 verse 4. The smoke of the incense together with the prayer of the saints went up before God from the angel's hand and what happened to those prayers. Look what happens next. Then the angel took the censor, filled it with fire from the altar, hurled it on the earth, and there came peals of thunder rumbling splashes of lightning and earthquake. What an extraordinary scene. God takes the prayers of these people there in the censor. They go up to it before him and to heaven. And he gives them to the angel and the angel puts these same prayers. It's directly related to the prayers. Without the prayers there's no thunder. There's no earthquake. And he hurls the censor holding the prayers back down upon the earth and the earth is shaken. It's as if he takes the incense. It's as if he takes the perfume and he turns it into micro blisterin. When I read passages like this, I do think we play at praying. Queen Mary, powerful interposition, powerful as queen. She said, in reality, in really minute, fear the prayers of John Knox, more than after an army of 10,000 men. Is anyone fear my prayers? I think not because I don't think I fear God like that. Andy Dillard wrote a book entitled, Teaching the Stone to Talk. And she talks about this greatness of Christ and throwing down the prayers on the earth. And she writes this, Does anyone have the foggiest idea of what sort of power we so glithily invoke? Or as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? Our churches are like children playing on the floor with their chemistry steps. They're really playing with dynamite. It's magnus to where ladies velvet hats to church. We should be wearing Christ helmets. Ushered should issue light preserves and signal flares. They should lash us to our pews for the sleeping God may wake some day and take offense. Or the waking God may draw us out to where we can never return. Jesus is saying to his people in Revelation 8, Don't forget, through your prayers, I will shake the earth. There's a passage in Acts that always used to puzzle me. It's in Acts chapter 4. John and Peter have returned from the Sanhedrin. They've been in prison. And the people have been praying for them. And they return. And the people just arrived. Here's John, here's Peter. They're back. They're safe. And then the people begin to pray. And they begin their prayer. Sovereign Lord. It's in Acts 4.24. If you're taking notes, go home and read it. It's a wonderful passage. Acts 4.24. And they pray. And they talk about how hostile the world is. And how great God is. And then they come down in verse 29. And they say, Lord, consider the threats of this world. And enable your servants to speak boldly. Give us courage, Lord. The world is threatening. And it intimidates us. And then we read this in verse 31. After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. Now, I read that. Now, I've always looked at it. And I've always said, what's that about? I mean, you know, why did they put that in it? Because the place really was shaken. God shook the earth. Why didn't He answer their prayer in that way? He wanted them to know that He could shake the earth with their prayers. He wanted them to know that this God knew they were praying. He could take their prayers. And literally shake the universe. And so he shut it. We've got to ask the question. We read this passage. Do our prayers shake the earth? William Willemann is a Methodist minister. He serves Duke University. He tells the story of a friend of his. He was a member of the World Council of Churches. And this friend in 1970, went to Russia on behalf of the World Council of Churches to visit and see how the Church of Russia was getting along under that hostile atheistic regime, that dictatorship, that was so oppressive. And when this man, when this friend returned from Russia, he told Willemann this, when Willemann inquired about the churches there, he said to Willemann, he said, they're not much. He said, it's just a bunch of little old ladies praying. And the minister said this in derision. He was really saying, you know, their prayers are nothing more than perfume. And what's perfume going to do when it's all heard up against a harsh, dogmatic, monolithic, unbending, gigantic military machine? When Willemann told that story, it was no longer the 70s, it was in the 90s, early 90s. And the statues of Stalin and Lenin had been pulled down. One of the two world powers of the 20th centuries had been completely dismantled. Mark Buchanan wrote about it in his book, Your God is Too Small, and he said this, beware of little old ladies praying secretly their revolutionaries who make Bolsheviks look like kindergarteners. They comprise a veritable bomb-making factory. That's what our prayer closets are. Bomb-making factories. God says they ought to be. When we talk about prayer being a sweet perfume to God, don't be deceived. He takes that perfume. He takes those prayers. And he turns it to the nitroblist and he shakes the earth. You know, something hit me this week. And I don't think I'll ever recover from it. We often speak it independent. Of the great things that God has done in this place. Don't we? We say, look what happened. And I must tell you that when I came here in 1977, I could not have imagined that God would do this. I would like to tell you that I had a five-point plan, a ten-year plan, and I would have a vision. I didn't. I didn't have a vision that God would do this. I know our leaders, the leaders of this church, and not one of us dreamed this. Not one of us did. But we sit here today and we talk about the great things God has done in this place. And it hit me this week. Maybe this is really just a very small thing. It hit me this week. What would God have done if we had really, really prayed? Maybe what we see here is very little compared to what could have happened. But better still, maybe what has happened here, thus far, but a very small thing compared to the thunder he is going to bring down when we pray.