Genesis 26:18 tells us "Isaac dug again the
wells of Abraham." [Narrator] In every generation,
there have been revivals, massive moves of the Spirit that changed the course
of history. In every revival, there were believers like you who chose to answer the call to become the one in
their generation. Discover your call to be the
one in your generation. We are about to take you face to face with history. So tell me about your
meeting with Kathryn? She sent for you and
you went to see her. [ Ms. Kuhlman ]
"You know what you
are supposed to do." I said, "But I don't know
if I want to do that. [Laughs] I said, "I
don't know Ms.Kuhlman
if I want to do... I really don't and I
don't appreciate you are pressuring
me to do that." - Sure. - and she said,
"Billy" and she told me she had to go somewhere
so I was waiting there. Well Maggie came over to
me and Maggie said, "I can't believe the way you
were talking to Ms. Kuhlman"! - "I didn't say
nothing wrong." So, she grabbed me. I had a tie, a
skinny tie on. She grabbed my tie
like this, seriously. She grabbed my tie and
she pulled me until the other side of the room
and she pushed me into a corner and she said, "Young man,
you are rebellion". And she said, "That woman
that helped you is trying to help
you yet again." - Right. And she said, "If I was
you, I would listen to every word that she is saying
to you. You hear me?" - "Yes, yes. Yes, Ma'am." I mean nobody ever
grabbed me by the tie! - Now you're sitting
there in front of
Kathryn Kuhlman and you've got all of
this to weigh out. - I was very grateful I've
never lost my gratitude for her I told her that. "I owe you everything." But I said, "But I just can't
jump into what I think you're trying to
get me jump into. - Which is the
healing ministry." - She said, "I'm not
trying to get you to
jump into anything. but I tell
you someone that is." [Chuckles]
Oh my God!... - Great thanks. - Here we go again,
you know. Because you
feel helpless. You feel like you know,
here's this power that just and you felt
that power. There was never a time around
her where you didn't feel it. She didn't turn this on. She walked in this. If she was in a department
store, it was there. If she was in a
restaurant, it was there so she never
didn't have it. So that wasn't put on. Maybe a little bit of it
coming onto a big stage obviously but I mean what
exuded there, that inner man... As people today, it's
the same thing today it's just again. I don't know. I can't separate that
time from this time. You know the Glory is
greater today and back then maybe
fewer carried it. I don't know I hate to
lift one up over another I don't like to do that
but for me at that time, it was the best thing
that I've ever experienced at that time and her words
to me were, I said, "Well what do you want me
to do, you say you want me
to travel with you?" She says, "Billy I want you to
be in the meetings" and she said, "I want you to
go to school. You must
go to school." I said, "Well why can't
I just travel with you?" She said, "Have you
believed for any milk in the refrigerator yet? Have you believed
for one carton?" [Laughs] I said, "No." She said, "Where does
the milk come from"? I said, "My
grandfather buys it". - Exactly, exactly. She says, "You must
believe for everything then you can come and
follow me and be with me." I said, "Well I don't know
long it's going to take". She said, "Exactly". She said, "I want you
to go to school". So that was my journey. Then she pointed me to
California to be with Pastor Wilkerson
at the Melodyland. That's where that
whole thing went. - Now tell our audience, you
and I both know obviously Pastor Ralph Wilkerson,
his involvement but give us a snapshot of
Pastor Ralph at that time what Melodyland, what it carried
at that particular time. - Oh my... Oh my, there is not
enough time or words. To this day, I
mean, again timing is everything
for all of us. When I arrived at
Melodyland in 1970, seventy-five,
seventy-six, I've never seen a
place like it. I don't know what
to describe to you. That same atmosphere
was there. You walked
right into it. It was waiting
for you, I mean... The first service I
walked in, I was late. I got there I think at
10:30 and I got a seat down there at the front and
there was already probably four or five hundred people
at the altar. - Wow. - I said to the person. I said, "What are
they doing here? - Well, he had
an altar call. I said, "When
did he preach?" She said, "No, he
hasn't preached yet." I said, "How did he get
this people up here if he
didn't preach?" - He doesn't
operate like that. She said, "He heard, this
person they said he heard the Holy Spirit
and these people here, "He'll be preaching. Don't worry, you'll get
to hear his sermon" and I began to realize, wow. And the up is down here,
back is front and front is back and I began to watch this
man move as a pastor. See I understood her
being separate in this church setting who
didn't have any church that she was
able to do that. I'd never seen a pastor have
this huge congregation. I don't know what they
were running, several
thousand there, and to just have
the abstract approach to hearing God
with altar ministry. I sat there for
three, four years and just watching and now
he's become so dear to me. - Yes he is. He truly--what a
giant in the faith. - Oh my, oh my. He's the one who brought
her to the West Coast. - Right. - He opened up that
door to the Shrine Auditorium. - Let's go back. I kind of skipped
over something. I want to go back to when you're
meeting with Kathryn there. Obviously you made
a decision that you were going
to do as she said. You were going to
embrace this call. - Painfully. Because the high
price that came to get my attention was the
loss of my brother. So He didn't cause
that but He used that. Clearly, I want to
make that clear. He used that. God uses stuff, you
know, I mean... I wish we could all be led
by our obedience and our knowledge and
all of that. It says, Psalm 32 "I want
to guide you with my eye but if you refuse, I'll use the
bit and the bridle." So I never learned about
the bridle within the horse's mouth, the bit. How that little
piece that big turns the big beast around. It's a little
uncomfortable things. A bit doesn't kill you. It's just enough
irritation to turn you so God says in Psalm
30, I believe it's 32: "I want to guide you
with my eye" meaning
"I want you to look that way and
you go that way. I want you to look that
way and you go that way. - So you made a
decision. - I made a
decision. - So here you find
yourself at Melodyland with Pastor
Ralph Wilkerson. You said three years
you sat under... - Almost four. - Sat under his
ministry, just watching. You were learning
how he flowed. You are learning
everything? - I didn't know that. I wasn't
doing that for that reason. I was just captured. I was
just captured by... the anointing, the Presence. I mean I am learning all
that. I know it now. - Right. Looking back you
can see that. - Looking back I was
just so sponge. I was a sponge. I was just
after something. I didn't know what. People would always say,
"Are you a pastor, are you an evangelist? Which one of the
five-fold are you?" And I'd say, "I
don't know what I am." I didn't care
at that moment. I just like I got to
be in the next meeting. Every time those doors
opened I was there. He had a Thursday
morning miracle service-- every Thursday morning
and probably about two thousand people
would attend that. - Wow. - And that was just a
continuation, it was, "This guy is just
like Kathryn." - So now during this time were
you still seeing Kathryn? Or in communication
with her? - Oh she died. She
had died, age 75... So when that happened I
felt like, "Oh Lord, I
never got to really"... You never think you thank somebody enough...You
know how that is. I did but didn't think
"Oh, I didn't do enough! Oh my gosh," and so I
made attempts through the Foundation
to get all that. I still have regrets and
I still think I could have been better,
behaved towards her. She just caught me
in a transition. I was back here. I didn't really
want to do this. God was chasing
me through her. That's a good term. He was chasing me. He healed me through
her, now He's chasing me through her and I didn't
want to be caught. But I ran to somebody
who had this whatever that was, the anointing
and the Presence, whatever. I mean, she was able
to say, "Do you remember? Do you remember the day? Do you remember
that day?" And so I could not
get away from that. If it was somebody who
didn't know, it was not that convicting but the
very person that was used had the data on
me and she said, "You're supposed to be doing
this very thing." I just, "Argh"...I just
didn't want to hear it. But through the years I
wouldn't even say her name. I would say this
lady prayed for me. I would be in a lot of
churches because a lot of the churches did not
like her because she was so effective with
church people. So people had to go
outside the church ...to get help. In the same thing if you
study AA Allen's history as you are doing here,
so many of these people, they didn't mean to
create para-ministries but they weren't welcome
in the four walls of the church. - Why do you
think that is? - Well I think it
boils down to basic
David and Saul. You know, I think the
biggest giant that David fought was jealousy and
not Goliath. I think a lot of
insecurities is in the pulpits. I think it's hard to
defer to somebody else's gifting because the person that has a
different gifting has to walk in that
in such a way that the gifting is laid down
and there is humility. I think there is all
kind of maturation factors involved
in that. I don't fully
understand that. I just know that I see
the same thing today that a lot of...a lot of
field ministries aren't welcome in the church
and a lot of it is some of it is maybe they don't
fit with the church's vision. Some of it is there's
insecurity and insecurities. Some of it is the
field ministry is misappropriating
some form of
behavior... - Right. - Ethics or
whatever. So there, it's
a package. It's not really
easy to call it. But I do know when
miracles begin to happen, you have to be a
very secure leader to allow someone
in your church, when people begin to
see supernatural stuff because supernatural
stuff really captures the mind of people
and that a pastor who doesn't move in the
supernatural says, "How can I compete with that?" We shouldn't be thinking
of that but you do. Now if you are
secure, you don't. So there it all comes
back to being secure in your grace, your gifting
and understanding the person that you are
allowing into your midst which we have it today.
I mean it works. Brother Copeland: Look
at the network he is in with Jesse,
Creflo, Jerry. I mean they all
complement one other. There is no striving. They all remain and they
all talk about, "Hey Jerry said this and Brother
Kenneth said that." See to me, that to me
that's the first I've seen that kind
of team work. I would hear Kenneth say,
"Yea, Jerry was saying" and I'm thinking, "Hey, he's
giving Jerry credit!" - Yes, that's
unheard of... -Yes, he's giving Jerry credit!
Wow! That's pretty amazing. And then I hear Jesse say
yeah like Creflo said and I begin to
think what is this? Well, that's the way
it's suppose to work. And so that was one of the
most refreshing things to me of movement
of Revival is really honoring, you know
honoring the deposit or the Grace that is
in the other person. Because when someone
honors you like that, it just makes you
want to honor back. - That's right.
That's true. - It's just amazing
how this really works. - Let me ask
you something. Kathryn Kuhlman made a
statement and I've heard a few other ministers
say that and then they never would expound. "You'll never know the
cost I had to pay, what this ministry costs." - I know...[Chuckles] I know. Well number one, we have
done a documentary on her now, ...our ministry. One is her
spiritual side. One was is her
practical side. But her spiritual side,
she was very unwelcome in every place
that she went. They burned her church
down in Franklin. The foundation
is still there. Second church... - Did you get that? They burned her
church down. That's enough to deter
you a little bit. - They came out and burned it
down. Said, "Get out of here!" She stayed and they had
another church built. She ended up barricaded
in that church with thirteen of her leaders
whether a break in the door down on that church
so finally then she was invited to get
out of that town. That's Franklin, PA. And comes to Pittsburgh to
Carnegie Hall to the Music Hall and so she began, she realized
my time here. Again, how do you handle?
Was she chased out of town? or was God leading them into
another place? All that. She ended up in
Carnegie Music Hall. That's when the miracles
really began to happen in Carnegie and she was
packing out Carnegie Music Hall but the
problem was people are complaining about the
atmosphere there, the smell of tobacco,
a public hall... - Yuh-uh, sure! - The pastor of First
Presbyterian at that time, Bruce, he
came to her and said, "Look, use my church. Bring your meetings
downtown, use my church" and that's when that
whole transition began to go downtown
to 6th Avenue. That's where I really
was introduced to her there at that Sixth
Avenue Church. It's amazing how these
things that God has for all of us, are
time released. These people that He
sends into your life and getting to know Brother
Kenneth now I can't even say the value to that to me and
you say, I say, "Why now?" That is my big question. I know seasons
and cycles. I know revival,
the season and cycles. All of our lives is
filled with seasons and cycles. But it's still is
intriguing to me like this happens
but why now? You realize that
He just has
everything. We are part of
a great plan. We are part of Jeremiah
29:11 and we are, we are! And it's just the sooner
you surrender to that which was Kathryn's main
message not healing. Her main message was
never ever healing, ever! It was not even
Holy Spirit. It was a
surrendered life. It was woven in
everything that she said. - A surrendered
life. - I die, He lives. That was
her message everywhere. So, part of that was her
desire to be married and to have a family, to
meet the right person and she
did, in her mind. After the marriage
thought that this can't work. So she had to lay
that marriage down. Today, we would
call that a divorce. And that took place and
he was from the Lake Charles, Louisiana area and that
whole thing to her was very, very emotionally
hard for her. All along the way and I can't
account for everything, I don't know
everything. The bits and pieces that
I knew from being around her or in her company,
I will be happy to share that. But a lot of it, how
do we understand that? The path that
we are all on. How do we understand the
path of Moses, the path of Joshua, Ezra's path? All of these paths...the
Apostle Paul's path? The one thing we learn
is if we stay true and faithful,
grounded, trust. It's sometimes it's
hard to know what you've allowed, or what
He's allowed. Very fine lines between what He
allowed to happen to me, and when
His Father filtered. It's very interesting. - You know Pastor
Billy, we have so many ministers watching,
church leaders especially on the Believers
Voice of Victory Network. I really feel in my
spirit, that you need to speak right in that
camera and you're encouraging some people
today that have been in ministry and maybe
fallen out or feel like they don't want to do that,
maybe they are like running from their
call that they know. - I was good at
that, yea... - So just look at that
camera and talk to people. - You know, I believe it was
Elisha that lost his axe head. You know, he had been
given a great gift, a great tool to--the
servant, excuse me the servant that had lost
the axe head and he was chopping down the trees to build
a structure facility and the axe
head came off which is the cutting edge, the
cutting edge of your life, the cutting edge
of your ministry. He came to Elisha and he
said: "Alas, you know, my borrowed axe head",
it was a borrowed instrument and he valued
that what was
lost and he valued enough
to say,"I lost it
over here." He valued it enough to say, "I
need the help to recover it" and the prophet
said, "Show me the vicinity of just
exactly where you lost that." I just say to you,
today, whatever you may have lost along the
way--We lose vision. We lose passion. We lose purpose and
we lose the why of why we're doing everything. It's so easy to be
pulled into the Hoover bag where you are no
longer cleaning up but now you're in
the bag yourself. You are pulled into the
machinery of ministry and it just gets to the
place where you lose touch and you're
preaching, you're reading the Word only to preach,
you know, you're praying only to pray for
people and you've lost communion, you lost
contact, and when the vertical is gone then
everything else begins to get dulled out and
you reach for other people's stuff and
there is no fresh water flowing through you. I want to say this to you:
You can recover the axe head. If Elisha made that
axe head float for that particular man, then He
can make your axe head float to the top too. It's never too
late for that. You know the gifts and
the calling, they go on. They work, you know,
whether you're working for God or not but that
doesn't mean your heart. See for God to recapture
what you want to get back into, hopefully you
want to get back into that at some level
irregardless of age, irregardless of personal
failure, you know, irregardless of
any of that thing. We are living in such a
time now where all hands on deck are needed and
you may be just the person who God is
looking for to put fresh fire, to put a
deposit, you know. I love the story of
Elijah and on Mount Carmel where the
wood was wet and he burned wet wood. Sometimes we get soaked
along the way, sometimes our wood gets so water
soaked with mistakes and our own agendas and
ideologies and the anointing is nowhere
around us and we are just going through
the motions. His fire can fall on
wet wood and bring back fire. That's my prayer for you. It's
not to make it complicated. Just to begin today to,
you know, call out to Him. Call out to Him, I mean,
there is the Bible you can read, that maybe
before you read the Bible, there is some
form of mental and emotional connection
you need to make. If you have somebody to
call and go talk to and vent. Every living thing has
waste and you know, you just go sit down and say,
"Hey, I'm confessing my faults. There are so many
options for you but the main option is: Do you
desire? Do you have the desire? Maybe not the
strength right now, maybe not the wisdom,
maybe not the plan but does that
still burn in you? "Yeah, I'd like to
get back in the saddle again. I'd like to be
preaching again. I'd like to be praying
and touching people. I'd like to be making
contact with people. I used to help people." I hear that a lot. "Pastor Billy, I used
to really be involved." "Pastor Billy, I used to
do what you're doing. I used to see miracles. I used it to, oh Pastor
Billy, I don't know what's happened. I'm selling
insurance now." Nothing wrong with
selling insurance if that's what you're
called to do. But once, you've touched
the human hearts and you led people into
eternity and you know, you get away from it for
the wrong reasons... There's an effect on you. You realize you
have stepped down. You haven't stepped
up and you're aware of that. "Yea, but I failed God. I had a divorce." Well, you know divorce is not
the unpardonable sin, thank God. Yea, it's a sin but you
can recover from that. Yea, but my denomination
well, then maybe then you have to go outside the
boundaries of that denomination, you know to get that other
opportunity that you need. Yea, but we're not
supposed to get sick and I've had surgery and I
fought cancer then you've been through
something. Then you can
help more people. The more you go through,
the more you can help them, the more you identify with
most of their needs. It's so important. If you haven't gone
through anything, how can you help me? How can you help
the average person? If you have no
identification of pain or confusion or
suffering of something? So count as a badge of honor,
you've come through something, you're out on the
other side of it. Maybe some have
judged you for that. You know, but I wouldn't
let that get you down. I would just say,
"You know what? I'm going to rise back
up again, I'm going to stand back up
on my feet. I'm going to
be like Paul. I bear on my body
the marks of Jesus. You know, I bear the
sufferings of Christ. You know, I know the power
of His Resurrection. I am not going to be
ashamed of the gospel or me his prisoner." See, Paul was so strong. He wouldn't let anything
that happened to him come back as judgment
because he would always say, "I don't understand
everything and neither do you. One thing I know I've
pressed for that mark, that mark of the prize
of the high calling." Pastor, do you still
want to go back and do this? I'm talking to ladies,
I'm talking to ladies whose husbands have been
unfaithful, that have left you outside
of the ministry. That doesn't mean you're
outside of the ministry forever. Don't let people
determine your destiny. Destiny is
not by chance. It's by choice and you
need to say today "I am just going to rise up
again and reach for that hem of His garment." That hem isn't
just for healing. That hem is for
strength, for energy for focus, to get
back the fire. That's my prayer for you today
is to get back that fire. Get back
that fire by watching broadcasts like this, by
getting into the right places where God's word
is being preached, where you see demonstration
of His power and wherever you can do
that, just to get around that. Don't back
away from that. That reminds me of that,
that hurts me because it reminds me of
where I used to be. Now, don't do that. You subject yourself to
that and that may be the very thing that God's
going to draw you back into it. He may be trying to resurrect
desire, passion, vision,
purpose. These could be
your best years. These could be your best
years what's right ahead of you. Yea! Because why? Because you have more
experience of God's Grace of Him healing you
because not you're good but because He's good. That sets you on a whole
other level. When you ever realize, it's all
about His goodness, not my goodness. Whenever you can begin
to convey that to people because most people
out there, listen to me most people out there want to
get healed on merit. They want to get healed
by what they've done, what they're doing, how
much they pray, how much they do this, and that's
where they base their worthiness and that's what's wrong with
the whole system. We both know, we all
know, that's coming into this great understanding of
the Grace of God is because of
His Goodness, not because of
our goodness. It's because of
His Faithfulness not because of
our faithfulness. Today reach out right now, I am
going to pray for you pastors, I'm going to pray
right now, Father bless every leader
watching this broadcast. Those that are weary,
those that feel like they lost their
axe head, they are going through
the motions. They searched
frantically for sermons to preach on
Sunday morning. They don't know how to handle
so many of the problems and there's money and
there's building issues and there's so much that
by the time they get to the pulpit, they're
absolutely exhausted. God, I pray for a fresh
revelation on how to micromanage and how to
multitask, how to send in the right people to surround
them with their vision. Send in every resource
that they need. Give them back
that desire. Give them "the fire shut
up in their bones" as you gave Jeremiah. I pray for a bursting forth of
the Gifts of the Spirit, a bursting forth of
signs and wonders and miracles. I pray, Master, you even now
begin to create such a desire. Oh my, such a desire
that they would cry out to You, day and night,
that they would begin to believe for the
impossible, the demonstration through
them, the demonstration through their people and
all the finances they need to make it happen. I thank you for each
one, in Jesus Name. Amen. ♪ [Music]
