SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Well, what you’re saying to me, Johnny, is a message to this nation and the world. It’s a message to you, my friend, that you are special to God. There is nobody, no one, that is like you. You are unique, you are irreplaceable. Without you the world wouldn’t be the same. God has a need for you. You have a need for God. You and God, you need each other. You say, “Well, I’ve heard you talk about him but how can I know him?” I’m so glad you asked. It’s so easy for you to get to know Jesus. Everybody here in our studio audience, join hands together and let me pray for you for you are just a prayer away from receiving Christ as your personal Lord and Savior. You are just a prayer away from the Man, Jesus Christ, that Johnny Johnson has been talking about from entering into your heart and into your life and for you to be transformed from your hair to your toenails. Father, I thank you that as I pray this prayer I believe you hear my prayer. Now, my friend, I pray for you right now.
I’m going to ask everybody here in our studio and I’m going to ask you at home to pray this prayer out loud after me if you really want to meet this Man, Jesus Christ, that Johnny has been talking about. You pray this prayer out loud after me as everybody does. O Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner, a backslider. I’ve turned my back on you, God. I recognize I’m wrong. I renounce the devil and all of his works. I take Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. I speak his name with my lips for he went to the cross for me. He rose from the dead for me. He ascended to heaven for me. He sent the Holy Spirit for me. God, I ask you to forgive me now. I repent. I change my mind. I take Christ into my heart and I receive your forgiveness. And now that I have your forgiveness, I’m going to forgive others. I forgive them now. I forgive those who persecuted me. I forgive those who have been my enemies. I do not lay it to their charge. I freely forgive them. God, I ask you to forgive them. Lord, right now I’m going to start over again.
Jesus Christ is in my heart. His spirit has just entered me. I am a new person. I’ll never be the same again. O friend, if you meant that prayer from your heart, and I believe you did, you will never, ever, ever be the same again. Jesus Christ has cleansed you. All that old stuff inside is gone. You are forgiven. And the Bible SR03 says if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. ( RR_1_John_01:09 ) Oh, I thank God. I thank God for the miracle of forgiveness. The greatest miracle of all is the salvation of a soul. As we were praying, Johnny, someone who has deafness in their right ear began to receive a healing. There is a right ear that’s being healed right now. You say, “Well, Richard, how do you know that?” I know for God gave me a word of knowledge as I was leading that prayer. Someone’s right ear is being healed right now. Someone’s tumor on the left side of your stomach, the growth way down on the left side of your stomach, is being healed right now. That cancer there in the cells on the left side, that thing is disappearing right now. In the mighty name of Jesus I pray for you to be healed today in your body. I speak to the sickness and the disease and I command it to come out of your life and I enter into a holy agreement with you for God to heal you and I will not turn loose of the agreement.
There is a person who has had a rib problem right here on the last, lowest rib on the right side, right here. You are receiving a healing, you are receiving a healing. There is a person has not been able to raise your shoulder for weeks. I believe it’s your left shoulder. It may be your right but I believe it’s your left. You can lift that shoulder now without pain. I want you to step to your telephone now and call the prayer group and give me your testimony. Let me share it on the air. Let me know what God is doing in your life. Johnny, God bless you. Thank you so much for being our guest today. May the Lord continue to anoint you and bless you as you minister. Bless you while you’re in Washington in those congressional prayer breakfasts. Remember the Charismatic Bible Ministries Fellowship conference, the Oral Roberts Ministries conference July January June 23, 24, 25. Mark those dates down. Cheryl, Lindsay, till we see you tomorrow, remember, no matter what it looks like, God can turn it around for you.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS It’s filled with the Holy Spirit.
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS It really is. It’s not just exercise. It is an uplifting, self-lifting video tape and I’m proud of it. I’m done. (APPLAUSE)
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Are you going to sing?
SPKM CHERYL PREWITT SALEM Yes, sir.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS What are you going to sing?
SPKM CHERYL PREWITT SALEM “I Will Never Be Afraid.” SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS I will never be afraid. Would you take that microphone off and step over there and get ready to sing, “I Will Never Be Afraid.” Lindsay, do you have another testimony you want to share while Cheryl is getting ready to sing.
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS Yes, I have two more. Yes, I do.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Then we’re going to have a word about her video and we’ll tell you how you can get your own copy.
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS This lady called from Columbus, Ohio, and she said, “I don’t know exactly what was wrong with my arm but I could not raise my arm up and it progressively got worse to the point where I couldn’t even bend it at my elbow. Richard gave a word of knowledge and now all the stiffness and the pain is absolutely gone.” That’s from Columbus, Ohio. And this lady called… this is so cute. She said, “I have listened to Brother Oral Roberts for years and now I am listening to Richard too.” She said, “Years ago I had lockjaw and I nearly died, but God healed me through Brother Roberts.” Now she said, “I thank God for your prayers.” She said, “My doctor’s name was Dr. Roberts but the real doctor is Dr. Jesus,” and she said, “Praise God for all you good doctors on earth.” (APPLAUSE) I praise God for the doctors on earth trying to get them well, and let Dr. Jesus finish the job.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Cheryl’s song is titled, “I Will Not Be Afraid,” and you remind me, Cheryl, as you’re getting ready to sing that we read a lot in the Bible of the commandments that Jesus gave, but perhaps the commandment that he gave the most often is, “Don’t be afraid.” Are you aware of that? He would say to his disciples all the time, “Don’t be afraid. Be not afraid.”
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS Be not afraid. Believe only.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Then he had another commandment, or I should say another promise, and that is, “Lo, I am with you always.” And when you think of fear in those terms, you hear Jesus saying, “Don’t be afraid for I am with you always.” Right now here is Cheryl Prewitt Salem to minister, “I Will Not Be Afraid.” Cheryl. (APPLAUSE)
SPKM CHERYL PREWITT SALEM SONG I_will_not_be_afraid (APPLAUSE) AD03 ROLL-IN of CHERYL PREWITT SALEM’S video, “Take Charge of your Life with Cheryl and Friends.” (APPLAUSE)
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS Cheryl and I are talking about baby pictures.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS You women. I’m showing the people Cheryl doing the video and they’re talking about baby pictures.
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS We were. Olivia’s baby picture is the cutest thing you’ve ever seen in your whole life.
SPKM CHERYL PREWITT SALEM It is.
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS That’s what we were discussing.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS If you’d like to have…..
SPLR LINDSAY ROBERTS It is. It’s a picture of Olivia.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS If I could get a word in edgewise. If you’d like to have a Holy-Spirit filled video of Cheryl’s aerobic tape, then all you have to do is sow a seed of $25 into this healing ministry and let me know you want it. Write me: Richard Roberts, Tulsa, Oklahoma. In Canada: Richard Roberts, Toronto, Ontario. Or you can call the Abundant Life Prayer Group and sow a seed on your credit card and it will be released immediately in the mail to you. And I believe this will be a blessing to you. This is what we were talking about earlier. (APPLAUSE) Now SU01 I want to say a word about the Oral Roberts Ministers’ Conference in association with the Charismatic Bible Ministries Fellowship. The dates are June 23, 24, and 25. If you are a minister, if you’re a pastor, if you’re an evangelist, if you are a prophet of God, an apostle, if you serve in a Sunday school ministry or as an associate pastor, or if you have your own ministry, then you are warmly invited to attend this outstanding fourth annual Oral Roberts Ministers’ Conference in association with the fastest growing fellowship in America, the Charismatic Bible Ministries Fellowship, which is built on love and unity through signs and wonders. There are nearly 2,500 men and women who have already joined this fellowship. This past summer we had an outstanding conference and I want to share some of those highlight with you right now. So go back with me this past year to the third annual Oral Roberts Ministers’ Conference with the Charismatic Bible Ministries Fellowship and let me give you an idea of what happened so you will have an idea of what to expect next month. (APPLAUSE) (ROLL-IN of highlights from the 3rd annual Ministers Conference in 1986.) (APPLAUSE)
They needed a daddy who could hear their troubles and their problems and their burdens. They needed a daddy who could hold them in their arms when they came home from school and say, “I understand, but let’s find the answer and it’s in the words of God and in the words of Jesus.” And I was too busy trying to make a living out in the world, and I almost lost my family. And I lost everything that I had. And had a beautiful wife who continued to pray. And in 1979 I faced 150 years on 30 counts of conspiracy to violate the control drug acts. Went to the federal courtroom for two weeks, and it had been plastered all over the newspapers in Spartanburg and Greenville, South Carolina — I remembered calling up all my friends of the world, the doctors, and the lawyers and the politicians. I tell this to young people on high school campuses and in churches — all over America — I found out we won’t have any friends out there in that world, not one of those friends would show up. When your money runs out your friends run out.
When your drugs run out your friends run out. When your sexual popularity runs out and you are used and misused and abused by the world your friends will run out and kick you aside and they want to marry a virgin. I hope you keep your body cleansed for the temple of the Holy Ghost and marry that young man that is a Christian that loves Jesus Christ. I found out the only friends I had, Richard, were Christian friends who would lift me to the throne of grace and pray for me. (APPLAUSE) High school quarterback, Dave Walton, he came into that courtroom one day and he sat down beside me — you know, there is a scripture in John 15 and 12, and I tried to memorize the Bible when I was in prison. I found that Gideon Bible in a trash can and I read that David had hid the word in his heart that he might not sin against God. And I want to be a man after God’s heart, I want to be broken bread and poured out wine for a lost and dying nation, that we might see revival in our high schools and junior highs, and in our nation, and we can do it through prayer and through the study of the Word. And I had a high school friend that came in and one of his favorite scriptures was, SM05 “Greater hath no man than this that he would lay down his life for a friend.” ( MS_John_15:13 ) That is what I see you and Brother Oral Roberts doing here, Oral Roberts University and throughout the world, as your mission outreach goes out with medical missionaries and doctors going into the foreign fields, (Yes) sharing love, medicine and prayer, and the touch of Jesus Christ, we still (Hallelujah) serve a Master (APPLAUSE) who can reach down from heaven and touch the cripple, and touch and heal that (Yes) drug addict or that alcoholic. Dave Walton came in and sat down beside me. He was a friend who had prayed for me for 12 years. And he put his arm around me that day in the courtroom and he said, “Don, I’ve come one share with you.” And I said, “What is that, Dave?” He said, “I’ve come to share that I love you just like a brother. No matter what you’ve done I still love you, but Jesus loves you, Don, and you need Jesus where you are going.” I said, “Dave, man, I can’t receive Jesus today, I’m a cocaine addict, I’m an alcoholic.” I didn’t realize that Jesus would take us right where we are.
SPKM DUSTY KEMP I’m not one to admit it. But I do remember it.
SPKM RHONDA KEMP But he just kept coming on and kept coming. You know, he sensed something in our church that he had never sensed before and that was the power of the Holy Spirit because it was there in our church. And you just started coming, how did you start coming?
SPKM DUSTY KEMP They let me play my guitar in the band.
SPKM RHONDA KEMP We had a band and he got to play in the band, so he came to where he could play and minister, you know, in music.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Then after you got married, you were called to become a pastor. How did you know that the call was real?
SPKM DUSTY KEMP Well, at that time I began working–after I graduated from the University of Houston, the Lord reminded me that I was called to preach, just forget about being a lawyer. It was at that time that I married Rhonda and I worked at construction jobs with a college degree, but just worked a regular construction job and learned more about life in that one year working construction than I probably had in all my life at the other things. And after that He reminded me that I was called to preach. I started working for Ronda’s daddy and did everything there was to do, proving my faithfulness to the Lord, that special time when you just have to be faithful. And He raised me up at that time after I was with him approximately for a year, and opened the door for us to go to Houston.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Where are your parents pastoring now?
SPKM RHONDA KEMP In Montvale View, Texas, about 60 miles outside of Houston.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Now that’s a large church.
SPKM RHONDA KEMP Yes, the church is bigger than the population of the town.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS That sounds like Larry Lea in Rockwall, almost 7,500, I think, in Rockwall and his church has 11,000.
SPKM DUSTY KEMP Right, so if we do that in Houston we’ll be doing something.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS You certainly will. I understand, Dusty, that about half of your church is single.
SPKM DUSTY KEMP That’s surprising, but we took a survey and just about half of our church is single. Now some of those are single who have never been married. Some are divorced parents, some are widows.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS Single parents.
SPKM DUSTY KEMP Probably 35 to 40 years old is the median age of our church.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS How do you minister to singles?
SPKM DUSTY KEMP Well, I minister to them just the Word of God. I believe that the power of God and the Word of God and the Holy Spirit will take care of itself, if I’ll just minister to them the uncompromising Word of God. We do have two special singles groups, one for over 35 and then one is for under 35, which is more of a time of fellowship and then giving them an alternative to a worldly life-style.
SPRR RICHARD ROBERTS What do you do–and, Rhonda, I want you to be included in this, in this answer–what do you do when a person comes to you whose life has been broken. Perhaps they’ve gone through a divorce or through a separation and they’re hurting and perhaps they’ve been criticized or they’ve been judged or maybe somebody’s cast them out? How do you receive them? What do you do to minister to them and to help them get over, get healed of that hurt? What do you do? I want a pastor and a pastor’s wife to explain.
SPKM DUSTY KEMP You said, pastor and a pastor’s wife, and I need to preface what I’m going to say with this, that people really don’t understand what I know that you and Lindsay go through as a minister and really what your dad and mom have gone through. That’s been probably the single most powerful inspiration in my life is what they have suffered, not that the Lord sent, but that the devil sent, and the constant persecution and the constant afflictions of the devil to try to shut them up. And people sometimes don’t realize that a pastor and his wife feel that, not only from people coming against them but also begin to feel that for every person in the church. Because Jesus said in John, chapter 10 that a true pastor is concerned for the sheep. So automatically just by–it’s almost like when a broken person comes to us, we’ve already been broken in our own selves.
We all make mistakes every day. I was reading a book recently about Thomas Edison, and I learned that along his way to inventing the light bulb he made 6,000 mistakes! But when someone would remind him that he’d been a failure 6,000 times, he never agreed with that statement. He always said, “No. I just learned 6,000 ways not to make a light bulb!”
Failing doesn’t make you a failure! When you go to bed at night, you can get on your face before God and say, “Lord, I’m sorry for the mistakes I’ve made today. Please give me a new start tomorrow and help me do it right.” And according to the Word of God, He not only forgives your sins, or mistakes, He also forgets them (Micah 7:19).
Once you’ve given your mistakes to God, it’s important to remember that He has forgiven you and given you a new start. When the devil tries to make you feel guilty for your past, hold fast to God’s promise in Romans 8:1, which says there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.
I believe that when we keep a positive, Word-centered, determined attitude and allow God to work in us, He can complete the good work He has begun in all of our lives.
And if God is for us, who can ever be against us? (Romans 8:31 NLT).