By Gipsy Smith
II Chron. 7:14 -- "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from Heaven and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."
"My people shall be called by my name."
The promise is to "my people." Don't you forget that word. The promise is not to any people -- only to the people who can legitimately be called "my people."
So this morning I ask you to look into your hearts and find out if you really, and truly, and wholly, have surrendered and obeyed, and by faith in Jesus Christ can honestly say you belong to God.
I am not talking in the general sense because in the general sense everything belongs to Him, but I am talking of whom the Bible spoke -- "my people." Now do you belong to Him?
Many came to Jesus and said to Him, "In Thy name we have cast out devils and in Thy name have done many wonderful works." But Jesus said to them, "I never knew you -- you don't belong to me."
Which crowd do you belong to? To the separated few working for God, those that have yielded themselves as servants to God -- who have come out from the world, and have learned the wonderful joy of complete fellowship with Him?
"My people" -- these words were spoken to my people. If my people ask, if my people believe, if my people meet the conditions -- then it is that they may expect an answer when God says "My."
Do you remember one day when Jesus was teaching and healing, and His mother and brothers came to see Him? The crowd was so great that they couldn't get into the house where He was. They were impatient with Him -- they had not learned to follow Him. Messengers brought Him word that His mother and His brothers were waiting for Him on the outside. Jesus answered them, "Who is my mother? Who are my sisters? Who are my brothers? All that do the will of my Father which is in heaven. The same is my mother, my sister and my brother."
"My people" -- if you are doing the will of God intelligently, if you are obeying God's commandments, then you can ask things of God, and you will get them.
The Lord will not hear any who have not done His will -- they do not know how to ask -they ask amiss. The man who is out of harmony with God can't ask the right things in the right way. If you want to get the right things, first of all, get right yourself. Begin with yourself. Begin with the person who wears your clothes. Begin with the person who is sitting where you are sitting.
"If my people seek, if my people ask, if my people knock they shall find. They shall see -to them will the door be opened."
The promise is made to the specific one -- to the obedient, and God knows better than to answer some prayers that some people offer. I know of cases where they seem to be praying for revivals. They ask for things, and if the Lord answered their prayers they wouldn't know what to do with the things when they get them. It would be moral and spiritual suicide for the Lord to answer some prayers.
At a revival meeting, if you were to pick out some brother or some sister -- church members -- and say, "I want you to speak to this woman or this man -- I want you to bring them to Christ" -- the one you had chosen would say, I will get Brother So-and-so or I will call Sister So-and-so to do it. Yet they are church members.
I tell you what I have discovered. It is easier to preach to a thousand than to talk to one person about Jesus. But what is the good of a sermon if we cannot direct it to the salvation of an individual?
Some of the mightiest things in the New Testament were said by Jesus Christ to one person. You and I must appeal to the individual.
The promise is made to "my people." Do you really belong to God? Where do you stand now? I know there was a time when you gave yourself to Him -- when you were His. But where do you stand now?
There are many people labeled God's who don't belong to Him at all. The promise is made to "my people." It is my people and God knows who are His. "The Lord knoweth them that are His."
If you will listen to me, and there is any doubt in your soul as to your spiritual condition, I will ask you to act promptly -- to act today. Get right -- get right so that you can help others, so that everybody will know that when you say, "I'm the Lord's and He is mine," they will feel that it is true, and they will know it.
If you are right with God, you can't help knowing it. If you do not feel it, something is wrong -- something is wrong with you. When you get near a rose you know; when you get near a violet bed, you know; when the world is flooded with the glory and magnificence of God, you know.
You can't come in contact with a changed life, a life that is Christ-like, without knowing it. You can't hide these things any more than you can stop the tide of the sea with an umbrella.
When God saves you, there is happiness, and people know it. If you really and truly know that you belong to God, somebody else will get the blessings.
When I was a boy I heard a man talk about vessels of honor. I didn't know what a vessel was. I had never seen one, but I got the idea that a vessel was to hold something. And I decided that I wasn't a very big vessel. I couldn't read -- I couldn't write, I was only a poor Gipsy boy -- I hadn't been to school. "What am I?" I asked myself; and I thought, I may not be a very big vessel and cannot hold very much, but if my vessel is small, and I keep under the supply, I can overflow a lot, and we can overflow with the glory of God -- overflow until from us will stream channels of blessing. It is "my people." It is not the disobedient. It is not the crowds that are ever seeking pleasure. It is not the people who are not working with God. It is the people who are living with God -- the people who are standing up for Jesus.
"My people" -- "If a man love me, my Father will love him and I will love him and we will come and make our abode with him." It is "my people" -- the people who have God's love in them will show it.
I will tell you something -- the people in the churches today who love God with all their hearts, and want God, and are anxious for this city to be saved by God, will stand out more conspicuously a month hence than they do today as followers of God.
There are moments when my Gipsy heart cries out for the woods -- there is still something of the wildness of my youth left in me -- and I am glad of it. If I were to be born again, I would want to be born a Gipsy.
I have stood in the woods in Spring -- in the month of April. I have seen the primroses, the hawthorn, the fern, the green lush grass -- standing in it up to my knees. I have smelled the perfume of the flowers -- perfume that would make you think it had been wafted by the wings of angels, from the hills of Paradise.
Once as I stood thus I saw an old trunk. Not a branch remained on it. The limbs had all rotted off. It was not even covered with ivy. There it was in the midst of this beautiful Spring's bridal bouquet -- barren and ugly. And I thought I heard that old trunk say, "I don't believe in Spring." And I answered, "No, poor thing, you are too dead to believe in anything."
There are people in our churches who are like this old trunk. Their lives are barren -- their souls are stripped of brotherly love, and of kindness. But they are not "my people."
"My people" are standing out for Jesus. "My people" will pray and work. "My people" will come forth as an army with banners streaming for righteousness. The dead crowds will stand conspicuous without any leaves. Which crowd do you belong to?
"My people." If "my people" seek Me they shall find Me and if they pray according to the conditions laid down in the Word of God, and honestly meet those conditions, then the windows of Heaven shall be opened and I will pour out such blessings that there shall not be room to contain them.
