Avoid works that jest with what is right or wrong, lest you unconsciously adopt a false test of truth and duty, namely, ridicule, and so become afraid to do right for right’s sake alone, dreading the world’s sneer and undervaluing a good conscience and the approving smile of God. Let your reading be always select; and whatever you read, begin with seeking God’s blessing on it. But see that your relish for the Bible be above every other enjoyment, and the moment you begin to feel greater relish for any other book, lay it down until you have sought deliverance from such a snare and obtained from the Holy Spirit an intenser relish, a keener appetite for the Word of God (Jer. 15:16; Psm. 19:7-10).
Horatius Bonar

Pea Soup

Pea Soup

PEA SOUP

by Pastor James Wilson

If you would please take your Bibles and turn to Romans chapter 4. We’ll begin reading in verse 16. Romans 4:16: “Therefore [it is] of faith, that [it might be] by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all, (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, [even] God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were. Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah’s womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.” I’d like to call your attention to verse 21: “And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.”

I’m going to preach to you a message this morning I call “Pea Soup.” Let’s go to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, I ask your blessing now upon the message. God, I pray that you be with every word spoken. May you put your special anointing upon it. God, I pray that you loose my wretched tongue this morning, Lord God, and I pray that you help me to preach with liberty, clarity, and thought, Lord God. And I pray that there would be a clear message put out from this pulpit this morning. And, Father, I pray that you be with our hearts this morning, God. Help us to forget all our trials, our troubles, our woes, Lord God, our differences, anything that might hinder our attention this morning. God, I pray that you take it out of the way. And I pray that you wash us clean in the blood of Christ. God, I pray that you fill me with the Holy Spirit of God. Father, I pray that we all go home edified. In Christ’s name I pray. Amen.

Now, I want you to notice that there are three “P’s” in verse 21: persuaded, promised, and performed.

Now, Abraham’s relationship with the Lord was a close one. Now, if you take a good look at the Lord while you read your Bible, you’ll find out that He’s a real intimate sort of a character. Now, if you look at some of these old Renaissance paintings and characterizations of God along around the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries, usually you’ll see a man bigger than life up in the heavens, maybe on a cloud perhaps, and maybe on some sort of a throne, with celestial bodies surrounding him, angels with long, flowing, golden hair, and you’ll notice that most of the looks on each of their faces are rather solemn–especially the look on God’s face. You’ll notice that He seems to be always old or elderly, with furrows in His brow and wrinkles in His face, long, flowing, gray hair, rather well-built man for His age, usually. But you notice that the expression on His face is usually that of an austere, sort of a stern, maybe even a cruel sort of a Judge.

But, you know, when you read in your Bible, you’ll find out He’s not really that sort of a God. He’s very deep. He’s very personal. He’s very emotional.

We read in the Bible how God got jealous over His chosen people Israel. And you say, “Well, jealousy’s a sin.” Jealousy is not a sin! Envy is a sin. Jealousy’s never a sin. You are to be jealous of your wife. You are to be jealous of your husband. You are to be jealous of your children. Those are yours. Those are yours to have, not for anybody else.

God was jealous over His children, His chosen people Israel. He did not want them to go a-whoring after other gods and worship other gods and other idols besides Him. God’s a jealous God. He’s very emotional.

We read about how God repents. That request of Moses when they came down from Sinai, and God wanted to destroy the children of Israel, and Moses spoke to Him. And God repented. That doesn’t necessarily mean He repented of His sins. That word “repentance” doesn’t always refer to a man’s sin. It just means that He turned; He changed His mind. Moses was able to do that.

We see how God is open to suggestions. When He was on His way to Sodom and Gomorrah and was going to destroy the city, we see how Abraham actually “jewed Him down,” where He was going to save the town for fifty souls, and Abraham got Him all the way down to ten. God’s open-minded. That’s why we pray to Him. He can change His mind. He’s open to suggestion. He’s a personal sort of a God. He’s not some distant Judge that we see in those paintings. He’s close. He’s personal.

Now, God has a chosen people in the nation of Israel, and a body of believers in the church–the few He really gets close to in the word of God.

Now, we read in the Bible in John chapter 15 where God refers to His disciples. He says, “I no more call your servants, but I call you friends.” He said, “Greater love hath no man than this, than that a man lay down his life for his friends.” He called his disciples friends collectively.

We read in Genesis 5 where Enoch walked with God, and at a tender young age of 365 years old, God took him. God took him.

Now, we often in the ministry run across these hard questions, you know, that people ask you. Like, “If God’s so omnipotent and so allpowerful, can He make a rock so big that He can’t pick it up?” Or they say, “Where did Cain get his wife?” Or, “Can God do this?” Or, “Can God do that?” And we get asked these tough, hard questions sometimes. “Why?” And we try to figure out and second-guess God.

People ask, “Well, why did God take him? He’s so young; he’s so little. He didn’t have a chance to grow and experience this world.” “What about all the starving people in Ethiopia and Uganda?” “What about the war-torn countries?” “What about the innocent children and the innocent citizens and laymen dying, going off into eternity?”

And, you know, we don’t always have all the answers. You know, I think sometimes, when God might take a young man, we have a saying down here, a cliche which we quote quite often, “God takes the cream of the crop–the best!” I think ofttimes a man may go home to an early grave because of some sin that he may have committed, where he may have defiled the temple of God, which is the Holy Ghost, and God took him home early. The Bible says, “The wages of sin is death.” But I think sometimes that God takes some sister or brother home early, because God may just need him worse up there than He does down here. And maybe God just appreciates his services and his fellowship so much that God says, “I want you just to come home and live with me right now. I can’t wait! I can’t wait until the Rapture. I can’t wait until your days are full. Come on up!” Like He did with Enoch. God is close; God is personal.

We heard about Lester Roloff, and Brother Marshall brought out a few things about Lester Roloff during the meetings these past few days. I remember sitting in class the night that Dr. Ruckman announced that he was killed in an airplane crash. And Lester Roloff had to sell his twinengine Beechcraft–I think it was a Beechcraft–that he used to fly from meetings to meetings so he could save on airline tickets–and how he sold that and bought a cheaper aircraft–a high-wing Cessna. And he was trying to fly over a storm one day with four girls who were in a singing group–a quartet that he had from his home for girls. And in his efforts to fly over the storm and get through it, because of the weaker craft he was flying, a wing tore off–and then another. Until finally they were helpless in that cockpit and the fusilage–and plummeted two- or threethousand feet to their death.

I wonder about the scene of havoc that went on inside that cabin, from the time that they were up in the air and those wings broke off, until the time that they hit the earth.

Lester Roloff was a healthy man. And Lester Roloff didn’t eat junk food like we did and go out for Mexican food now and then. He had a good diet; he was healthy; he was active; he was useful. And God needed him down here. He was winning souls for Christ; he was rebuilding broken lives, broken homes. And he was useful.

And I remember Doc saying, “I’ll never understand it. I’ll never understand it in all my years, why God would take Lester Roloff and leave somebody like Stewart Custer behind to be in the ministry.”

But, I think sometimes, God says, “I need you home. I need you home. I need you with me.”

God had so much faith in Job that He turned the devil himself loose on Job. One other time in the Bible where we read that, where he was loosed, was on Jesus Christ Himself for forty days and forty nights. And God had enough confidence in Job, where He said, “Have ye considered my servant Job, a just and upright man, perfect in all his ways, a man that feareth God and escheweth evil?”

And the devil said, “Yeah, because you blessed him!”

And God says, “Well, I got enough faith in him, that you can take everything he has, even his flesh. Just save his life.” God had a relationship with Job.

David was called “the apple of God’s eye.” Michael the archangel called Daniel, “O man, greatly beloved.” You can’t help but have children who mind you and obey you and have like faith and want to please you, it’s hard not to get closer to them than other children you might have that are full of resistance, and rebellious and stubborn. It’s hard.

John the disciple was called “the beloved of God,” “God’s beloved.” God is the one who took him with Him, in the Book of Revelation, up to the third Heaven, where he was to write those things which it was not lawful for a man to speak. And he went with the Lord Jesus Christ while He tarried. And he was finally exiled to the Island of Patmos. God entrusted Him with His word, the Scriptures. It says he was exiled to Patmos for his testimony and the word of God’s sake. John was beloved.

But Abraham was the only one in the Bible, where God finally singled him out by name, and he was referred to in this passage of Scripture as “the friend of God.” He wasn’t only God’s son, God’s child, but he was God’s friend as well.

Some of us have that type of relationship with our children, with our parents. Our parents not only become our mom and our dad, but they also become our best friends. We love to be with them; we love to fellowship with them; we love talk to them; we get advice; we give advice; we go places together. They’re our friends.

And God’s friends are persuaded, they believe in God’s promises, and they perform.

GOD’S FRIENDS ARE PERSUADED

Let’s look at the first “P” in this pea soup and see how God’s friends are persuaded. In Isaiah 55:9, the Bible says, “For [as] the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” God is a far-out kind of a Person. He is ‘way out there. He says, “My ways are above your ways. My thoughts are above your thoughts.” And a man is more down-to-earth, more substantial, more finite, more of a fleshy, earthbound creature than God is.

So, when God relates some of the things that He wants us to know, oftentimes He has to use parables in order to explain it to us so we can get a handle on it, so we can grasp it and understand what God is trying to tell us. Why? Because His ways and His thoughts are so much higher than our thoughts.

You know, ever since the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the sins of Adam and Eve, God just wants one thing foremost from us. And that is that we should believe Him. And the toughest time God has is when He is trying to persuade us to do something which He already knows is right.

God reaches down and condescends to men of low estate and brings His high thoughts and His high ways down and says, “Listen! Listen, you don’t see it right now. You’re earthbound creatures. You’re finite. But, listen! I’m in Heaven. I’ve got an overall view of what’s going on down here. And, listen, I’m telling you what. If you do this, that, and the other thing–then this, that, and the other thing will happen.”

What does God have to do to some of us who are unbelieving and unfaithful? He has to persuade us. He persuades us. Why? Because it just seems like some of the things He tells us are just so way out.

You know, Noah preached to his generation for about 100 years while he was building the ark that the flood was coming–and no one believed him. Why? Because it never rained before. The Bible says that until then that the dew came up from the ground and the mist came up from the ground and watered the earth. There was never a cloud in the sky before the flood came, and he preached to them about how it would rain forty days and forty nights, and no one would be left that breathed air.

And yet the people just mocked him. Noah, a preacher of righteousness, tried to persuade him. A hundred years! He didn’t get one convert. Not one! Just his immediate family. They wouldn’t listen to God’s persuasion.

God had to send ten plagues on the nation of Egypt before they would let Israel go, before Pharaoh would let them go. And finally, until He brought the death angel on Pharaoh, where Pharaoh lost his own firstborn son–and still Pharaoh was not persuaded, but followed the children of Israel all the way into the Red Sea, to his army’s destruction.

What does it take to persuade some people? I’ll never know.

Paul, the greatest evangelist in the New Testament, preached to Agrippa for 27 verses in Acts chapter 26. And when he was done, all Agrippa could say was, “Almost thou persuadest me.” Almost, but not quite. You know, “almost” doesn’t cut it. As we were talking about in Sunday school, there’s no halfway station, there’s no halfway house, there’s no purgatory. It’s either saved or lost. It’s either Heaven or hell. It’s either up or down, right or left, black or white. There are no gray areas with the Lord. “Almost” doesn’t count.

You know, we misuse the word “faithful” here in Christian circles. Oftentime, when we say somebody is “faithful,” we refer to them as being “consistent,” we can always count on them, we can always lean on them. However, the word of God has a different definition, and it simply means “full of faith.” “Faithful” means “full of faith.”

Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” First Corinthians 4 says, “A steward of the mysteries of God is required to be found faithful.” Paul told Timothy, “The things which you have learned, commit thou to faithful men.” He didn’t mean men who were consistent, men who could be counted on, that you could give these mysteries to and teach, so that they’ll be faithful in preaching it to others. No, these mysteries are hard to believe. That’s why they’re mysteries. And he says, “Commit it to men who have enough faith, that they will believe what I’m telling them will come to pass.” Men who are easily persuaded.

God’s friends are persuaded.

You know, God wasn’t looking for someone trustworthy to give the mystery. He was just looking for somebody crazy enough to believe Him! Why? Because God’s ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. Somebody who wouldn’t take so much to persuade.

What will it take to persuade some of us, brethren? You know, some of us who are Christian employees, we won’t believe what it says in Ephesians chapter 6 of “Servants, be obedient to them who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling and singleness of heart, as unto Christ”–until one day they call us in on the carpet and fire us! Because we won’t carry out our duties on the job.

It’s in there, brother. It’s in there. We won’t be convinced until it happens, though. What’ll it take?

Some of you won’t be persuaded not to defile your body which is the temple of the Lord, until you contract some sort of incurable disease. Which we’re experiencing nowadays. You’ve got AIDS running rampant–all kinds of social diseases, and people messing around with things they shouldn’t be messing around with, and they’re dying from scerosis of the liver from drinking too much alcohol, they’re dying of lung cancer from smoking cigarettes, they’re popping pills and taking drugs and dying by the thousands, by the millions. Why? Because they weren’t persuaded when somebody told them, “It isn’t good for you. It’s bad for you.”

“Well, I’m not persuaded! It seems OK to me! I’m going to do it anyway!”

Some of us parents won’t be persuaded to bring our children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, but rather will leave it up to the TV, the Sunday school teachers, their school teachers, and the radio, and the rock-and-roll bands, and their circles of influence of their peers–until our children wreck their lives with sin and immorality and worldliness.

And some of you wives won’t be persuaded that you should reverence your husband–“let your conversation be without covetousness, and be content with such things as ye have”–until you’ve brought pain down in your marriage through debt, or gone off looking for excitement somewhere.

And some of us husbands won’t be persuaded to love our wives and to cherish them and to treat them as the weaker vessel, until we come home to an empty house and a “Dear John” letter.

What’s it take, brother? What’s it take to wake you up where you’ll be finally be persuaded at what God says in His word to be so?

Lost folks here–maybe we have some here, maybe we don’t this morning–won’t be persuaded that there’s a devil’s hell, where a fire will burn for ever and ever, and you’ll go there and burn forever and ever–until you’ve been there and experienced for one, two, five, ten, fifteen, a hundred thousand years–it won’t matter; compared to eternity, it’s just a drop in the bucket.

What’s it going to take to persuade you?

You know, we get hard, don’t we? I was reading in the Star-Free Press the other day, when those floods came that one Thursday morning, where the Flood Control District called up that recreational vehicle park at the mouth of the Ventura River there, by the 101 Freeway. And it says that the man, when he built the park in the first place, was warned that it was a flood zone. He said, “Aww, it hasn’t rained there, it hasn’t flooded there in fifty years! It’ll be OK. We’ve got the dikes there to hold the water in. Everything is going to be fine!”

He couldn’t even get the place insured by the insurance company, because he built the park there. But he went ahead, and he did it anyway.

And on that morning, when that river was full and the floods were coming, 8:30 a.m. the Flood Control District called him and said, “You’d better evacuate. You’d better get out of there. The water’s coming over the top.”

And he looked out his window and he said, “It looks OK to me. It looks OK to me. I think we’ll be fine. But, I’ll tell you what. I’ll go check it.” It took him fifteen minutes to get to the dike, and see that the water was lapping over its banks and about to bust through. By the time he got back to the park and warned the people to evacuate, almost thirty minutes had passed–and by then it was too late. It was too late.

One lady said she was awakened by the sound of her Propane torch clanking against the frame of her travel trailor. She opened the door, and within five minutes’ time that water rose from the first step twelve inches up–and flooded her travel trailer. She barely got out of there alive.

People were driving off in their R.V. homes, dragging their hookups, their water and their electrical cords on behind them, to get out of there in time. Some didn’t make it. They had three R.V.’s just float out to sea. One broke and crumbled underneath the trestle of the freeway that went over the mouth of the river.

Why? Because the man on the phone was not fully persuaded at what he was told.

I guarantee you, if he was easily persuaded, he would have said, “Yes sir,” hung up the phone, ran out the door, and shouted, “EVACUATE! EVACUATE! THE FLOOD’S COMING! THE FLOOD’S COMING!”

But, no, like the people in Noah’s day, no big deal. “We’ve got it under control. Haven’t seen it before. We’re fine. We’re fine.”

GOD’S FRIENDS BELIEVE HIS PROMISES

I also want you to notice in this passage of Scripture that friends of God believe God’s promises. They believe God’s promises.

Have you ever heard the expression, “Promises were made to be broken”? You won’t find that in the Bible. In the Bible, a man’s as good as his word. Christ said, “Swear not by heaven or earth, but let your conversation be, Yea, yea, and Nay, nay. For whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.” The Bible says in Ecclesiastes 5:4, “When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it; for [he hath] no pleasure in fools.”

There used to be a time when a man was as good as his word. And it used to take just a handshake in an agreement to be a binding contract between two men, whenever it came down to buying or selling. Now, a man’s only as good as his word if he’s being recorded, and the tape can be played in the courthouse. We sure have degenerated.

You know, when a man takes an oath in court, he has to swear on the Bible. It’s not just enough for him to give his word. You know, you can’t shake hands on a deal; any more you have to sign a contract. And then sometimes the contract is no good and not binding. You can take that contract to court and get it overturned and overruled, and change the ruling because of it.

Marriage vows don’t mean a thing any more. You know, we treat each other like dirt and get divorced with no grounds. Our kids wind up in a broken home, and all we need for grounds for divorce any more is “irreconcilable differences.” Just go to a court in California, sign an affidavit, and, buddy–you’re gone! That’s it! You don’t have to go to divorce court any more.

You know, the trouble is, we don’t spend any time with God. We just don’t know Him. We spend all our time with the world, the flesh, and the devil, that we naturally treat God and His promises the same way we treat the world’s promises. We need to handle God’s promises and our own promises the same way God handles His promises.

The Bible says in Numbers 23:19, “God [is] not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do [it]? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?” We know God’s word stands.

I was reading this story here in this book of illustrations about an atheist’s daring challenge that came true. And the story goes like this: Gerald B. Winrod, who was editor of The Defender, which is a Christian publication, related a remarkable story about an atheist who had been very bold, blatant and outspoken against God and the Bible. He had defied God by saying, “If there is a God, my grave will be infested with snakes.”

At the funeral it was necessary to remove a snake from the grave before the coffin could be lowered. The sexton said that he had killed four big snakes at one time, yet never saw a snake at any other grave in the graveyard before they buried this atheist.

Now, Mr. Winrod’s informant said that he would ask a gentleman in Ohio to give him more details, and in due course he received further word, together with a picture of the bronze monument of the atheist, Chester Beddell, who had died in 1908 at the age of 82. The letter said, “Mr. Beddell said while living, ‘There is no God,’ and he never did believe in one. He did not hesitate to speak of these things. He built the monument years before his death. His statue is of bronze, and in his uplifted right hand, there is a scroll with this incription:

“‘Universal Mental Liberty.’

“Under his foot is a scroll representing the Bible, with the inscription:

“‘Superstition.’

“Before his death, he made this remark: ‘If there is a God, or any truth in the Bible, let my body be infested with snakes.’ Since his burial, the family lot has been full of snake holes around the curbing. Snakes can be seen any day you visit the graveyard. Last year twenty of us went out on the thirtieth of October and saw three snakes. The neighbors there say, the more they kill, the thicker they seem to be.”

Later the opportunity came to Mr. Winrod to make an observation of his own. While attending a conference in Youngstown, he was taken by a car to North Benton. He asked an old man if he could tell him where the Beddell grave was.

“Sure, everybody around here knows where Chet Beddell was buried,” said the old-timer. “You can’t miss it. Big monument in the graveyard. Looking for snakes?”

Later, another man said, “Well, if Beddell did ask for snakes, he sure got ’em!”

He and his companions came to the place in question where they saw the monument: the uplifted scroll, the other scroll under his foot, the stern bronze countenance. They approached the grave, camera in hand. Was it a hoax, or was it true? One of his companions was the first to see a snake.

“Look there!” he shouted!

Yes! There it was! They walked around the grave and counted six snakes. His companion killed one. He photographed one. And they also took other photographs. The sexton told him that he killed four that morning. He had killed as many as twenty snakes in a single day.

Finally, he said, “I don’t know. Maybe the Lord did have something to do with it after all.”

The Bible says, “By thy words thou shalt be justified. By thy words thou shalt be condemned.”

Brother, we have before us God’s word, God’s promises contained in this Book. They’re true. They’re real. They happen. They will come to pass. There are over 37 particular prophecies in the Old Testament, written by nine different writers, about one Man’s 331/2-year life span, which were fulfilled in the four Gospels alone. One hundred percent accurate!

Nostradamus never tried that! He’s eighty percent, at best.

But God’s promises come to pass.

He didn’t write this Book to keep us under His thumb, to keep us in line in order to control us. He wrote this Book for our wisdom, for our joy, for our peace, and our comfort, as a loving Father giveth instruction to a child. He says, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.” God wrote these promises so that we could be happy serving Him, with a clear conscience, free from the entanglements of sin.

The Bible says, “Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his ways? By taking heed thereto according to thy word.” God’s promises.

GOD’S FRIENDS PERFORM

The last “P” in this passage of Scripture is our performance. After he was fully persuaded at what God promised, then he was able also to perform.

You know, D.L. Moody–who has been credited with speaking publicly to over 100 million people, and personally shook the hands of one million who came down the sawdust trail to accept Jesus Christ as their Saviour–said this: “The world has yet to see what God can do with a man who is totally surrendered to Him.” He said, “I’ve done pretty good…but it’s not enough. It’s not enough.”

That was a man who could perform!

You know, Moses wasn’t fully persuaded He could deliver Israel out of Pharaoh’s bondage. The first time we read in Scripture that he went in to Pharaoh, the Bible says Moses and Aaron went in and told Pharaoh, “Thus saith the Lord.” Aaron spoke for him. He said, “I am a man slow of speech. I’m not eloquent.”

“I’ll give you your brother Aaron. He’ll speak for you.”

The second time we read in the Bible where they went before Pharaoh, it says, “They spake unto Pharaoh.”

The third time in the Bible, it says that Moses said unto Pharaoh. It took a little bit of persuasion, but he finally performed.

He said, “God, I can’t do it.”

And God, who is patient, said, “I’ll give you your brother Aaron.”

The first time he went in, Aaron spoke. Then Moses got a little more confidence, and was a little bit more persuaded. He helped Aaron along and threw his two cents’ in. The last time they went in to speak to Pharaoh, Moses took the floor, took the show, and he spoke the whole thing himself. Why was he able to perform? Because it was then that he was persuaded.

Look at Elijah’s performance on Mount Carmel. He called down fire from Heaven. It was quite a commitment that he made! He really stuck his neck out! He really went out on a limb when he told the 400 prophets of Baal, “My God is greater than your god. I’m going to call down fire from Heaven.”

I’d hate to try that nowadays! Especially when you douse the altar with water, so it ran down into a moat! But he was persuaded at what God promised, and he was able to perform. Fire came down from Heaven, consumed the offering, the altar, and lapped up all the water round about. And then he slew the 400 prophets of Baal.

What a performance! What a scene! Why? Because he was fully persuaded at what God promised.

How many of you have ever read Out of the Blue by Oral Hershizer? Out of the Blue was put out after the 1988 World Series. In 1987, Oral Herhizer was just a mediocre pitcher. And Oral said that when he first signed the contract with the Dodgers, he said his first few outings he had an ERA (earned run average) of almost 7.0. And he said that he just couldn’t get that ball across a plate. Whenever he did, they’d hit it out of the park. He couldn’t do anything.

He remembers one day, Tom LaSorda called to the bullpen when they were being miserably licked, and said, “Is there anybody out there who can pitch?”

And Oral Hershizer said, “Well, I’ll give it a shot. I’ll come out. I’ll do it.”

And he came out and he pitched–and he was horribly humiliated in front of the crowd.

After awhile, Ron Paranowsky, the pitching coach, came out during one practice and said, “Oral, Tommy wants to talk to you.” And he went and sat in Tommy’s office. He sat there and called Tommy LaSorda “The Great Motivater,” “The Great Persuader.”

LaSorda sat him down in a chair and said, “Now, listen, Oral. The problem with you is, you have no confidence. You got good stuff, sure enough. But when you get up to the plate, you hold back. You don’t give it 100 percent. You won’t commit yourself. And you look at these guys facing you, these big, heavy hitters like Will ‘The Thrill’ Clark and people like them, and they intimidate you, and you just can’t put that ball across the plate. You need to be aggressive! From now on, I want you to let ‘er loose! Let ‘er fly!”

He gave him a pep talk in that office for about thirty minutes. And Oral Hershizer said about the time he left that office, he felt like he was walking on six inches of air. And he said Tommy LaSorda pumped him up so much, he felt like he could do no wrong.

And during the 1988 National League season, he went out there and he broke Don Drysdale’s record of 51 consecutive scoreless innings. He had 52. And he also won the Cy Young Award, given to the best pitcher of that year in the League. And he also led his team to the 1988 World Series. Why? Because he was fully persuaded at what his coach promised. And he was able also to perform.

Performance, brother. Performance.

John Wesley said, “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you can.” A secular English historian said, “If it hadn’t been for the preaching of John Wesley, England would have suffered a revolutionary war.”

You know, it’s funny how we go along saying we have faith, we’re Bible believers, we believe in God’s word. And yet look at some of our performances! How do we perform? Does it really reflect the way we’re persuaded, and the things that God has promised? I’m afraid, brethren, that most of the time it does. Most of the time it does.

The Bible says in James 1:22, “Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” If God can hang the stars on high, Can paint the clouds that drift on by, Can send the sun across the sky, What can He do through you? If He can send a storm through space, And dot with trees the mountains’ face, If He the sparrows’ way can trace, What could He do through you? If God can do such little things, As count our hairs or birds that sing, Control the universe that swings, What could He do through you?