When Paul was brought before Felix the Governor, the man with the power to release him and set him free, what did Paul talk about? Acts 24:25 says, “And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgement to come, Felix trembled.”

Righteousness - Are you in right standing with God?

Temperance - Do you live by principle or impulse?                                 

Judgement to come – ‘Governor, there is a bigger throne than the one I am standing in front of today and we’re both going to appear before it. Are you ready?’ And it says, ”Felix trembled!”

It’s enough to cause any church growth expert to run for the nearest exit! Not a word about the terrific nursery, the church sports program, or adequate parking. BOOM! He lets him have it. “Righteousness, Temperance, and Judgement to come.” Preaching that wakes you up and shakes you up!

When Jonathan Edwards, the New England Congregationalist, preached his famous sermon “Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God” over 250 years ago, a Boston newspaper reported, “A congregation that included politicians, doctors, lawyers, bankers, and educators, groaned and doubled over in anguish, some of them falling to the floor, weeping and repenting of sin.” It started the great New England revival that changed history and birthed thousands of churches.

Sin is not a merely rash or a blotch on the skin, it’s a terminal condition. The Word preached should so convict us that we either tremble and run like Felix or fall at the feet of Jesus and cry, “What must I do to be saved?”

During the establishing of Victory Churches of Canada in the early 1970s and 80s my wife and I saw many incredible moves of God, very similar to the one in Acts 24. During those revival days we would be preaching, and a person would jump up and run out of the service holding their head and crying, so moved with conviction by the power of the Word being preached. I was preaching in Korea at the largest Baptist Church in the world. Suddenly thousands of people, all at once, fell to the floor crying out to God. Many repenting, many being filled with the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues.

Let us never underestimate the power of the spoken Word of God preached under the anointing. It’s not our charisma as preachers that moves people to repent or change - it is the power of God’s Word, preached from the heart, without apology!

This is my charge to you today:

(1 Tim 4:1-5) “I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all long suffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.” 

“For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us!” (2 Cor 1:20)

Yours for the last great end-time revival that will usher in the return of our Lord Jesus Christ and His Kingdom,

Dr. George HIll
President and Founder, Victory Churches International