Make Your Day Count

You say, “But I’ve done something that I’m ashamed of.” Well, that may be true. You say, “But I’ve made so many mistakes.” That may be true. We’ve all made mistakes. The Bible says we’ve all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Sure, we make mistakes but the important thing is that when we do we can get back up on our feet, we can say, “God, I’m sorry.

Forgive me. Help me not to do that again.” And we can take a stand and we can make a change. God can turn the situation around. It’s like a letter Richard Roberts received from a woman the other day who said, “God turned it around in my life when I turned my life around toward him.” Right now you can have your life turned around. You may have never accepted Jesus as your personal Savior. You may have never repented of your sins. Well, if you will let me, I believe my prayers can help you right now. I’m going to ask everyone here to join hands and let us join hands together and I want to lead you in this prayer.

Richard Roberts mean, you want to be saved today. You’re tired of the life you’ve been living and you want to come to Jesus. Or perhaps you may have slipped away from God. Maybe you’re a backslider but today is your day to get right with your Heavenly Father. I’ll tell you, it can happen. God can turn it around in your life. He really can. If you will let me pray, I believe my prayers can help you. I’m going to ask everyone here to pray this prayer and I’m going to ask you
to pray this prayer out loud after me.

O Lord, I’ve made many mistakes. I confess them. I’m sorry. I apologize. I want to change. And so I give my life to Jesus. I confess his name with my lips. I believe in my heart that God raised Jesus from the dead and I receive him as my Savior. Save my soul, fill me with your Spirit. I will start my life again. I receive your forgiveness in Jesus’ name. Friend, if you were sincere, and I believe you were, Jesus has entered your life. You will never, ever be the same again.

I have a book I want to send you. “Now you have accepted Christ. What next?” All you have to do to receive this book is write me: Richard Roberts, Tulsa, Oklahoma. Or you can call the Abundant Life Prayer Group, area code 918-495-7777 and say, “Please ask Richard to send me the book on what to do next.” This book will help you know what to do now that you have accepted Jesus.

The first thing I’ll tell you about is going back to church. I believe in the church. The Bible says the gates of hell will not prevail against the church. Well, you say, the church has a lot of problems. Well, let me tell you, that may be true but it’s better than anything the devil has to offer. I believe in the church. The Bible calls us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together. I talk to you about praying, how to really open up and talk to your Father, how to talk to him like he is your Father for, my friend, he is.

How to open up and release your prayer language and pray in the Spirit. and I’ll talk to you about reading your Bible for God’s Word is alive and full of power and it makes it active and effective in your life. God’s Word can begin to turn your life around. As you study the Bible and as you read God’s Word not just as a book, but it’s life. Life to you. In fact, if you don’t have a Bible, if you don’t have a Bible, let me send you a Bible. The Oral Roberts Ministry has printed a Bible in paperback and if you don’t have a Bible, I’d like to send you one.

Father, I just ask you in Jesus’ name to break the power of fear over people’s lives that’s trying to stop them from going to the phone and asking for that agreement in prayer. In the name of Jesus the Word says that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that ye shall ask, go to that phone and ask that prayer partner to pray with you. They are ready to agree with you. Father, we thank you for the agreement and we thank you for the
word that comes forth when they agree.

Yes, and Lord, we just pray for people to have the confidence to go back to church, not to be afraid of God. Don’t be afraid of God. God is waiting there for you and he has his arms opened. He’s not folding them in judgment. He hasn’t got his lips tight and saying, “I’m going to punish you for this.” He’s saying, “Come home, come unto me, and come to the Father’s house.” Go to God’s house and let a preacher like Dr. Allen minister God’s healing power to you. Don’t be afraid of your church and don’t be afraid of your Heavenly Father. They love you and they’re going to minister to you if you open up to them.

We have just a few moments, Dr. Allen, before our program comes to a close and since last night and this morning prayer requests have been coming in and I want to take time and I want us to lay our hands on these requests and pray. And I’m going to ask, Dr. Allen, if you will begin the prayer and then we all want to pray.

O God, our Father, we thank you for faith. And Heavenly Father, we thank you for the faith that has caused people to phone in and express their needs. We believe the first step in coming to God is to feel a need and to believe that God can hear and will meet this need. Bless these people, O Lord.

Father, I, Richard Roberts, add my prayer to Dr. Allen and I pray for every person that these pieces of paper represent. In fact, I’m thinking only of the person and Richard Roberts pray for you in the name of Jesus that you be healed from the crown of your head to the soles of your feet, spiritually, physically, financially, family, in your whole life. And I’m expecting a miracle for your life.

Well, Richard Roberts has been given a healing ministry by the Lord Jesus. Richard Roberts had some misfortune in his life and he could have laid down and allowed them to throw him on the garbage heap but he rose up and said, “God, I want to love you and serve you. I ask you for a healing ministry.” God gave it to him and people are being healed and brought to Christ. God gave him a wife that supports him and loves him.

And a new baby. And they’re anointed. I want to tell you, I’m proud of all my children but I’m proud of this young man who is preaching the gospel with the Word of God and with singing, but above all the Word of God, and reaching out to pray for people to be healed. I tell you, people need to be healed by the Lord. Even if they’re healed through doctors, that’s being healed by the Lord too and we give God the glory for it.

Dad, let me ask you the question that I asked Dr. Allen a few minutes ago because here you have an opportunity. What would you say to pastors across this nation who are watching this program now and they see you, they see what through faith in Jesus you’ve been able to accomplish here with the Oral Roberts University, the City of Faith, with the healing ministry. We’re in our 38th anniversary month and now here over the past few years as the Lord has called me into the healing ministry to stand by your side as a father-and-son healing team, what would you say to pastors across
the nation?

Well, the first thing I would say is that if you can clear your date in June, June 24, 25, and 26, we’re having a minister’s conference here on this campus where I and many other ministers are going to minister to pastors, evangelists, and teachers. If you can clear your schedule to come here to Mabee Center and be our guests, June 24, 25, and 26, we’re going to share with you the mighty move of God in these last days. Secondly, wherever you are right now, Jesus is more real to you than your breath. You have the ability to believe God. You have the faith and your faith is being fueled now by this program, and by others, and you can preach, you can teach, you can heal in the name of Jesus.

People are sick like they’ve never been sick. They’re lost like they’ve never been lost. It’s the greatest opportunity of your life. Believe in God, believe in yourself, believe in your ministry, and believe that God will set people free through you and he will do it.

These are new, yes. And I’ll certainly read them and appreciate the and they will be on the shelf right in my living room. When I came back to my childhood church, the United Methodist, in 1968 and you called me to come down and preach for you in Houston, I remember those great crowds and they were filling every seat and standing along the wall. And I remember what you said to me.

“Oral, be yourself. Preach the gospel just like you would anywhere, like you did it in the tent. Invite people up to be saved.” And Richard Roberts remember when we had the invitation to accept Christ there was no place for them to come because everybody was sitting everywhere. We had them to stand all over the building and hundreds of people accepted Christ. And Richard Roberts see that coming back in the Methodist Church as never before. There’s a charismatic renewal of the Spirit of God coming back in the church that so many of us love and you run across that, don’t you?

Yeah. But Oral, I really feel God is using television in a great way. I think of you and how you began and you’d go to a city and then another city. But now you’re going all over the world and Richard is singing all over the world.

You know, Oral, I’ve retired from the church. Are you ever going to retire? Why, I’m just getting refired. I feel the best in my body I’ve felt in years. By the way, God has really done great health in my body through the City of Faith, through the prayer partners and the doctors and nurses. I’m in the best health I’ve been in years, Charles, and I’m anointed. I could never retire. In fact, I’m going to heaven if I don’t run past it.

Dr. Allen, I believe on his way to heaven he’s going to say, “Let me build one more building.” Well, he’s done great. It’s just beautiful. Charles, I want to give you three of my books. I have read “God’s Psychiatry” that you wrote and the one, “Led By The Master’s Hand,” and I guess 20 of your books.

You are one of the writers that God has anointed to write. Millions of the books are out all over America. They are still selling and because they have Christ in them and because you have a winning way to write…. I just finished “The New Testament Comes Alive,” a personal New Testament commentary in 3 volumes. I want to give these to you, my friend and my brother, not because you need them but because I love you and I want to give them to you.

Richard Roberts think I have every book of yours. I love them. Well, you don’t have these because these are just off the press.

Oh, it’s good to see you. Give him a big welcome. It’s a joy to see the man that I love. Bring me a microphone. I tell you, I love this man, Richard Roberts, cause he loves Jesus.

I want to tell a story about you. Is this a clean story? It’s a good story. I think of many things about Oral Roberts. You know, early when you first came into the Methodist Church you came to Houston and you preached in my church and Richard Roberts sang and we couldn’t get the people in the church for 3 services.

Not because they didn’t want to come in. But, you know, one thing I’ve told about all over America…. my wife was sick in the hospital and Oral Roberts came to Houston and went to the hospital and laid his hands on my wife and prayed for her and I’ll always remember that. And I think about the multitudes of people you’ve prayed for and how God has blessed them.

Dr. Allen, laying my hands upon sick people and praying for them in Jesus’ name is the most wonderful thing in my life because not only does God heal, but through healings he causes hearts to be softened. And I’ve seen more souls saved when people’s hearts are softened by a healing and then they get to hear the Word of God and the Word of God sows the seed in the heart. I remember praying for your lovely wife. She was a dear friend and became a very close friend of my wife and me. And I loved her and we saw some changes in that hospital that day, praise God.

I want to ask you a question. I promised Richard I’d ask. They’ve got a new little baby and I want to ask an honest man. Is it a nice little baby? I’m a very modest sort of a person and I would say of all the babies that I have seen in the world, except Richard Roberts, this probably is the sweetest baby that has ever been born. Now, Dr. Allen, what would you expect him to say right here under the shadow of the City of Faith and with us sitting right here?

Let me tell you a word about Dr. Allen. In this nation when we used to have Sunday night services in our churches across the land and people would come just like they came on Sunday morning…. as a matter of fact, more used to come on Sunday night to hear the gospel than on Sunday morning. And when the churches were closing down on Sunday night and saying, “Nobody will come,” this man in Grace Methodist Church in Atlanta and later in the First Methodist Church in Houston opened the door Sunday night and
packed out the building.

Souls were saved and came to God. He has kept the Sunday night services going. He has proven to the nation that when you really have Jesus and you’re on fire to preach the Word, people will come. And this man knows the Lord and has kept the Sunday night services open. Charles, I appreciate you for many reasons but not the least of which is keeping the Sunday night services going for God.