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[ Music ] Still away to Jesus. Still away to my Lord. Still away to Jesus.

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Still away to my Lord. Still away to Jesus. Still away to my Lord. ♪ Oh, what a communion ♪

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♪ Just me and my Jesus ♪ ♪ Oh, what a fellowship ♪ ♪ Just me and my Lord ♪ ♪ It ain't no harm to steal away to Jesus ♪

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♪ It ain't no harm to steal away with my Lord ♪ ♪ Steal away to Jesus ♪ ♪ Steal away to my Lord ♪ ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh ♪

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♪ Oh, what a communion ♪ Just me and my Jesus. Oh, what a fellowship, just me and my Lord. I'm never alone.

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He's always with me. Oh, yes, he is. Walking with me, holding my hand, being all I need him to be.

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And the times I thought he loved me, those were the times that he carried me. ♪ What a fellowship ♪ ♪ Just me and my Lord ♪

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♪ I gotta say it again ♪ ♪ Ain't no harm to steal away to Jesus ♪ ♪ It ain't no harm to steal away with my Lord ♪ ♪ Steal away to Jesus ♪

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♪ Steal away with my Lord ♪ ♪ Oh ♪ ♪ Oh what a communion ♪ ♪ Just me and my Jesus ♪

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♪ Oh what a fellowship ♪ Just me and my Lord I'm never alone He's always with me

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Walking with me Holding my hand Being all I need Him to be And the times I thought he left me,

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those were the times that he carried me. What a fellowship, just me and my Lord. I'm never-- I'm never alone. He's always with me.

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Walking with me, holding my hand, being all I needed to be. And the times I thought He loved me, those were the times that He carried me.

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♪ Not a fellowship ♪ ♪ Just me and my Lord ♪ ♪ Me and my Jesus ♪ ♪ Me and my Lord ♪

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♪ Me and my Jesus ♪ me and my Lord me and my Jesus me and my Lord

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me and my Jesus oh it ain't no harm me and my Lord ♪ Mmm, me and my Jesus ♪

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♪ Me and my Lord ♪ (audience applauding) In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up,

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and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims. Each one had six wings. With twain he covered his face, and with twain

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he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory.

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And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips,

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and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For mine eyes have seen the king, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar.

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And he laid it upon my mouth and said, "Lo, this has touched thy lips, and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged." So I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send and who will go for us?" Then said I, "Here am I, send me."

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And he said, "Go and tell this people, hear ye indeed but understand not, and see ye indeed but perceive not. "Take the heart of this people fat and make their ears heavy and shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and convert

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and be healed." Then said I, "Lord, how long?" And he answered, "Until the cities be wasted without inhabitants, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate."

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And the Lord hath removed men far away, and there is a great breaking in the midst of the midst of the land, but yet in it shall be a tenth. And if it shall return and shall be eaten as a teal tree and as an oak, whose substance is in them when they cast

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their leaves, so the holy seed shall be the substance thereof." I've read the book of the prophet Isaiah, the sixth chapter. May the Lord bless to us the reading and hearing of his holy word. Let us stand as we sing together the first stanza, just the first stanza of hymn number 94,

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"Near the Cross." Hymn 94, the first stanza. (dramatic music) [MUSIC PLAYING - "JESUS, KEEP YOUR HEART ON MY SHOULDER"]

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♪ Jesus keeps me in the cross ♪ ♪ There's a well just past the end ♪ ♪ Free to all the healing strain ♪ ♪ Falls from down this mountain ♪

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♪ Be the news ♪ ♪ Be the voice ♪ ♪ Be thy glory ever ♪ ♪ Till thy hand, dear soul, shall find ♪

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♪ Rest beyond the river ♪ Speak to our hearts, O God, in the strong and perfect name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. In the book of Deuteronomy, the fifth chapter and the twenty-third verse are these words,

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And it came to pass when ye heard the voice out of the midst of the darkness, that ye came near to me, even all the heads of your tribes and your elders, and ye said, Behold the Lord our God hath showed us his glory and his greatness, and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire. We have

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seen this day that God doth talk with man, and he liveth." The subject, "Voices in the Night." During the wilderness wanderings of the children of Israel, God communicated with His people through His prophet Moses. But the people wanted to hear the

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of God for themselves. So the Lord commanded Moses to have the people to sanctify themselves and stand at the foot of Mount Sinai. This was done, and there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud upon the mountain. And they heard a voice which spoke out of the darkness.

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They trembled at the sound of it. They said to Moses, "Go thou near and hear all the things that the Lord our God shall say, and speak thou unto us all that the Lord shall speak unto thee, and we will hear and do it.

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For we have seen this day that God doth talk with man and he liveth. Voices in the night. The human voice deserves to be studied and admired as the most effective and delicate an exquisitely beautiful provision for the expression of thought and feeling.

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The ability to think and articulate speech distinguishes humankind from the beast of the field. The voice is one of our ways of communicating with one another as human beings. The voice distinguishes mankind from the beast of the field.

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So the voice is a way that we communicate, not only with ourselves, people like us, humankind, as I said, but it is also a way we communicate with creatures. The article appeared in a periodical here some time ago that said that people do not fall in love with faces,

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they fall in love with voices. We may not all together agree with this point of view. However, in a very real sense, it's true. Your voice is you.

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Your voice reflects your nationality, your training, your disposition, and your character. Your voice tells others the mood that you're in. When you're happy,

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your voice is radiant with joy. And when you're sad, tears creep into it. Your voice is you.

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In life, people who live on the sunny side of the street have cheery voices. Those who linger in the dismal shadows have dreary voices. Happy people have happy voices. Mean people have mean voices. Gruff people have gruff voices. Your voice

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stills a great deal more about you than you may care to reveal. You never know how much one knows or one doesn't know until that person starts talking.

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When Jephthah ruled Israel, And the Gileadites fought against the Ephraimites. Some of the Ephraimites escaped and sought to be admitted into the camp of the Gileadites.

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By appearance, the Ephraimites could not be distinguished from the Gileadites. The voice was used as a test. The men of Gilead would say, "Are you an Ephraimite?"

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If he said no, they would ask him to say, "Sibyleth." If he were an Ephraimite, he could not say, "Sibyleth," he would say, "Sibyleth," because the Ephraimites could not pronounce the word properly.

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Whenever one said Sibyleth, he was slain because he was revealed as an enemy. His voice revealed his true identity. When Peter denied Jesus, it was his voice that betrayed him. said to him, "Yes, you're one of his disciples. You're a Galilean. Your speech betrays you.

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So our voices tell others who we are. Our manner of speech reveals whether we are saints are sinners. Since our voices are so important, we should be careful in the use of them. There are those about whom we say His Word is His bond. We like to repeat the utterances of some people because we believe in them. Then there are those

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who have no voice, no influence in the lives of others because their word cannot be depended upon. While the children of Israel were gathered around the mountain, a voice spoke out of darkness. During the day we can see and hear people who talk to us, but at night

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we must rely upon our ability to recognize the voices we hear. When Isaac grew old, it was nighttime in his life, his eyes were dim, and he was blundering in the darkness. He could not see people with whom he talked. He recognized them by their voice. Jacob took advantage of his father's blindness and stole his brother Esau's birthright.

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He attempted to disguise himself by placing goat skin upon his smooth hands and neck in order to appear hairy like his brother Esau. When Isaac touched him he said the hands are the hands of Esau but the voice is the voice of Jacob. And although he gave Jacob the blessing intended for Esau this statement shows that he

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recognize Jacob's voice in the night. In the night it is important that we hear and obey the right voice. Nighttime is the most dangerous period in the lives of individuals and nations. Even now, we're hearing reports

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concerning Saddam Hussein's presence, whether he's dead or alive. And the tape recording that he has recently released has a great deal of concern generated

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because we can't see him talking, we can only hear him, and it seems, what some say, that it is authentic,

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and others say it may not be authentic. But we're making that judgment largely by his voice. So the children of Israel gathered around the mountain. It was a time of darkness.

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It's a time of darkness in our world. It's a time of darkness in our lives. And we need to be sure that we hear the right voice. Now there is a voice that we call the voice of the multitude,

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the clamor of the crowd that is usually a loud voice. And it's a very popular voice because we often make judgments determined by how many people on this side or that side.

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We take a poll. So the voice of the multitude, however, is often a voice of prejudice. The multitude failed to accept Jesus because of prejudice.

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Is not this Joseph, the carpenter's son? Did he not grow up here in Nazareth? We know his brothers and sisters. No prophet cometh from Nazareth.

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It's a voice of prejudice, of prejudging. They passed judgment on the master before they examined his message and his ministry. Prejudice means to prejudge, to render that final decision before you have considered the facts seriously.

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cries made today that Christianity has failed. But Christianity has not failed. We have failed to give it the proper place in our lives. Christianity has been tried, found difficult, and abandoned. The voice of the multitude is often the voice of worldliness. When the children of Israel found themselves in the

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wilderness without bread, they murmured against God, they murmured against Moses saying, "Would to God we had died in Egypt when we sat by the flesh pots and when we did eat bread to the full." God rained down manna from heaven but they continued to complain because they had no meat. Oh, that we were back in Egypt. We

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remember the fish which we did eat freely, the cucumbers and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlic. They were thinking about what they had in Egypt and the voice of the multitude is like that of a boy in early adolescence it changes, his voice changes frequently. So we must not hearken to the

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voice of the multitude. The scripture says, "Be not conformed to this world but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." We must live above the world. The voice of eternity calls us to higher heights. I want to live above the world, though Satan's darts at me are hurled,

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for faith has caught the joyful sound, the song of saints on higher ground. While we listen to the voices of this earth, we shall endure distress and discouragement. Redemption comes when we fail to listen to the voice of the multitude and hearken to the voice of God. Well, once there was a man who spoke not his own small ideas, but the truth that was given

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him from on high. The voice of one crying in the wilderness is how he is remembered. John's mind and soul were not mere moods and opinions of his time. from the clamor of men, he kept the vigil of his own meditation and prayer. He did not

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listen to the chatter of the multitude, he listened to the voice of God. He arrested the attention of people from all walks of life. John the Baptist was a channel representing someone mightier than himself. It's like the telephone.

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The telephone is not the voice. It's just merely the channel through which the voice flows. So when the telephone is out of order, the message does not come through.

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So we cannot be channels of the divine blessing when our hearts are out of order. So often we want to be the one blessed rather than the channel through whom the blessing comes.

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So often we put ourselves first and God last. We live and move and have our being in God. God is the substance. We are but spooky shadows.

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"Have thine own way, Lord, have thine own way. Thou art the potter, I am the clay." So it matters not how dark the night, how charged with punishment the scroll, how bloody the battle,

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how steep the hills of disappointment, the voice of God still speaks. There was a great deal of concern today about our predicament.

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Commentators are saying over and over again that we cannot police the world. That we do not have the army sufficient to do so, neither do we have the finance sufficient to do so.

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So in all of the things that we have been able accumulate we must recognize more and more that these are not the things that will bring peace in the world. So as we celebrate our birthday as a nation we also must recognize that we are subject to the will of God whether we like it

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You know, I came up during the period before 1954, Pledge of Allegiance was, I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands,

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one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. That's the way it was when I was in school. But in 54, we changed it. One nation under God. We added under God. Now, the court has recently ruled that we must take

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it out. So we put it in, we take it out. But that's not the way God works. He's not subject to our whims, whether we put it in and today and take it out tomorrow, God is still God. And sometimes we want to change it just to suit our whims.

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And they began to question Moses about this. Look, Moses, you're always going up there in the mountain and coming back telling us what God says. We want to hear God for ourselves.

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And Moses told God what they had to say about it. The Lord said, "All right, have them together down at the mountain. I'll come down and I'll talk with them." And God came down, shook the mountain and all around it, and they were trembling with

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fear and they said, "No, no." "That's all right, Lord. We'll hear what you have to say. Let Moses tell us.

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We'll hear it." Well, God is the voice in the night. No matter how dark the night is, his voice must still be heard.

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Out of the night that covers me, black as a pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul. God is God, and he still speaks.

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Sometimes he speaks in the mighty sound of thunder and in lightning and other times, he speaks just in a small whisper, but he's still God and he's still speaking

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and he's free to choose whatever manner that he wishes to use. And every one of us can remember times when, In the quietness, in the still quietness of the night,

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God was speaking to us. And this is a consolation in time of darkness. When you can't see your way, it's a consolation to hear a voice that is certain.

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I can remember as a lad growing up, and we had a lamp, and many times my mother would burn the lamp all night. She just liked to have some light in the house.

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But then there were other times when the light was put out and everybody went to sleep, and she would call, and I always knew that voice. No matter where it was heard, whenever she said it,

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I recognized that voice. and we somehow must be able to recognize the voice of God. Voice of God. John is on the Isle of Patmos.

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He's out there, he's been boiled in oil in an attempt to get rid of it, but somehow he miraculously escapes according to tradition. And he's removed from his choir, church in Ephesus.

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He's not there pastoring with a choir, deacons to carry out things. He's out there on the Isle of Patmos. And they thought, no doubt, when he survived the boiling

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in oil and other things, that his loneliness would kill him. But John says, "On the Lord's day, I heard a voice saying, "I am Alpha and Omega. "God is first and last.

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"We all have to come before him." And John recognized that voice. Oh yes, I heard that voice before. It was by the rippling streams of Galilee that he said,

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come follow me. I responded to that voice. And John, he said, come up high and I'm going to show you things that will come to pass.

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John heard that voice again. It's a voice that had appeared in his life from time to time. In his beginnings in the Christian ministry and in the ending here we find John listening to that voice.

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And the wonderful thing is our nation, our world, and our souls must respond to that voice if we would live in a redemptive manner. Respond to the voice of God.

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I'm so glad that I heard the voice of God. - Yes Lord. - You look all through scripture and you'll find those who heard the voice of God.

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Abraham, where are you going? I don't know, I just heard the voice of God. And not only Abraham, but Isaac and Jacob, all of the patriarchs heard the voice of God.

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And someday, someday, somewhere, even those who do not confess him must hear the voice of God. Isaiah, he'd been to church many times.

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He'd listened to the words of scripture. But on this particular occasion, as I had died, he said, "I saw the Lord." high and lifted up and he says, I heard a voice when I had that vision saying,

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"Whom shall I send and who will go for me?" And Isaiah answered saying, "Here am I, send me." That voice, that quiet voice, sometimes loud, sometimes quiet, is is speaking to you and to me today, that the voice of God.

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I heard, I heard, I heard the voice of Jesus say, "Come unto me and rest. "Lay down, thy weary one, lay down thy head upon my breast." And I came.

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I came to Jesus as I was weary and worn and sad and said, "I found in him a resting place, and he has made me glad." Thanks be to God who speaks to us in the darkness, out of the darkness, the darkness that may surround us.

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He's present, and he makes himself known by his voice. He communicates with us through his Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. - Amen. - Amen.

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- As we come to the hymn of invitation, we extend the privilege, someone here, who's outside the arc of safety, you're living in Austin without a church home,

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you may come and identify with the family of God here at Ebenezer. We invite you to come by letter, on Christian experience, on professional faith.

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Come. It's an open door. It's an invitation to Christian discipleship. Where he leads me, I will follow.

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♪ Where he leads me, I will follow ♪ Where he leads me, I will follow. Where he leads me, I will follow. I'll go with him, with him, all the way.

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[MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] [MUSIC]

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♪ Halloween ♪ ♪ Halloween in through the morning ♪ ♪ Halloween in through the morning ♪ ♪ How low with Him ♪

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♪ How low with Him ♪ ♪ How low with Him ♪ ♪ With Him, all the way ♪ ♪ He will give me grace ♪

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♪ And glory ♪ ♪ He will give me grace ♪ ♪ And glory ♪ ♪ He will give me grace ♪

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♪ And glory ♪ ♪ I'll go with Him ♪ ♪ With thee ♪ ♪ All the way ♪

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- We come now to... [BLANK_AUDIO]