Theology and Practice of Evangelism - Lesson 4

Dr. Robert Tuttle, Jr.
Theology and Practice of Evangelism
th610-04
God is Faithful
Lesson Transcript

[00:00:00] Give it. Tell your story. I told you. I came home one day when I was teaching at Fuller Seminary. The first Wesleyan Armenian ever hired at Fuller Seminary. They only had 17 on the faculty. All 17 interviewed me, interviewed me. Bromley Lad. Do it. Martin Monger panel. All these names that you have read, books you've heard of most of those people. Bromley translated all of Bart and Kettle. I used to hike in the Sand Gables with Geoffrey Bromley, played racquetball with George Ladd. George Allen Ladd taught him how to play squash. Three days a week, it was high cotton, I tell you. Heady atmosphere. I only had 500 students, and now it has like 2500 students. All had 500 students. When I went on the faculty, 17 faculty, I was number 618, the only Wesleyan. How many? All that? All 70. I interviewed me. It was a great time. Great. Greater. Love teaching there. Could still be there. After I left, the Dean guy named Bob my call me once a month and said, We realize your reason for leaving didn't work out. Leaving didn't work out. We want you to come back. And I said, You can't go back. You know, John, get why. John, your daddy went back. And I admired him for that. I've never been able to do that. But they said after a year, if you won't come back, we want to hire somebody just like you name him. I got to name my successor. It follows him there. I couldn't believe it. The reason I left is. After I've been there for years. My wife, we were we were obviously living separately with my son.

[00:01:54] I was single parent virtually while still married. She said, We'll be reconciled if you move to Tulsa. Which is her home. Her mom and dad lived in Tulsa. And so I called up Ora and Jim Buskirk and they said, Sure, well, are you a guy that gave me a professor of historical theology? I wanted to be a rock and star. So I call up David Alan Hubbard. It was the president for the seminary and told him, he said, Tuttle, that's the only reason I would let you go. Is to be reconciled. I salute you, sir. I drove my car around over to Tulsa, bought a house, decorated it. Welcome. You know, I'm going to be reconcile with my wife and son. You know, my wife and son. I'm going to have momma back, went to the airport to greet my wife and son and he was on the plane and she wasn't. She used that as a ruse to get me out of Pasadena, California. I was invading her space. You see, I was teaching at the seminary where she was a student and a Ph.D. student in psychology. I'm so mad at God. Driving home from the airport, I was so mad at God. I wanted to slap all Roberts, hope in God to get the message. We had 100 consecutive days of over 100 degree temperature in Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1979. My office was so air conditioned that all of my books mildewed and I caught pneumonia. You do not have to die to go to hell. My students come up and say, pray for me. The more they prayed, the worse I felt because I knew they were praying. Right. So I must be receiving wrong. My heart is broken. I'm hot. I got the creep and crud.

[00:03:41] All my books are mildewed and I'm trying to raise my boy. You'll understand. One night I remember saying, God. With all due respect, it really wouldn't take a whole lot of time out of your busy schedule to do a healing number on me. If there's anything standing between me and healing, you show it to me. It is yours. I am sick and tired of being sick and tired. First it got all night. And guess what happened? Nothing happened. There's so much high pressure. Two nights later. I had a dream. And in this dream. There's a white light sitting on the foot of my bed shaped like I think Jesus ought to be shaped. And I'm here to tell you, friends and neighbors, I'm going after that white light. I mean, I want a white light on the outside. On the inside. And I'm all over that white light trying to get. Can't get that white light on the inside. And, of course, it won't work. I can't get the white light on the inside. And the more more I try to get the white light on the inside, the more frustrated I became. And I woke up screaming. And after I got my son back to bed. God spoke to me. I didn't hear a voice, but I got an inside. You know what God said to me? You won't believe this. God, that tunnel. Shut up, man. You're sweet as I am. Just shut your mouth. It's just so much high pressure. And then God said this to me. Total. In the silence. That is you. Who should allow my spirit. To plumb some new depth of your experience to reveal some area of life not yet yielded to me. Some area of resistance.

[00:05:41] And with your willingness for me to take it from you. Renew your faith and trust in my son Jesus and go to sleep. Well, I got to tell you, it took me 30 minutes to get the volume on the old history tapes low enough so I could even hear the voice of God, the spirit of God. So the spirit of God could do a thing in May. That's why I'm in therapy. You suspected that, didn't you? Therapy gets the volume on the history tapes low enough so you can hear the voice of God. That's why you go to AA. After 30 minutes, I finally got the volume Only history tapes. Mourning over the loss of my family. And there's creeping crud just kind of weakening the springs to my whole machine. The Spirit of God began to reveal areas of life not yet yielded to God. Actually, the Spirit of God began to reveal areas of life. Once you let the Guard and I take Him back. And areas of resistance. Little things in my life that might not even be seen with somebody else, but they were separate me from God. Do you understand what I mean by that? Wesley talked about things that don't seem like sin, and the sin is absolute. Murder is always a sin. But their relative says some things can be said for some people and for others. Little areas of my life that were separating me from God, myself. And so there were sin for me. And as the Spirit of God began to reveal those things one by one, I said, God, as far as I know my own heart, I'm going to be to take that from God. As far as I know my own heart.

[00:07:24] I'm willing to take that from me. God, as far as I know my own heart. I can't give it to you. If I can give it to you, I wouldn't need you. I'm willing to take that from me. And after I. Finished. God, I thought God finished revealing those things. Area of resistance. Areas of have not yet yielded to God or taken back from God. I renewed my faith and trust in Jesus. I got on the airplane, went to sleep and woke up. No more pneumonia. What do you think of that? Yes. Changed my life forever. It reminded me, you know, this stuff really does work. And if it doesn't work the first time, try it again. Do not despair. Healing most of the time is gradual. That means do not despair if you've got some disease. Most of the time, healing is gradual. I fully expect you to submit your disease to the healing prayers of the saints for ever. Just keep on doing it. Do not despair. Sin most times kneejerk. Don't you realize that just happens to be the right time of the week or the month? I don't want to any anymore. I hope I'm on my way to perfection. I told you, my wife has to limit me to two words a month. But it used to be a week. I'm getting sanctified. I never want to use that word again as long as I live. But I'm capable. You wouldn't believe. You would probably suspect the stuff I'm capable of doing. I got a bit of an IQ as well. Do not despair. That's the moral of the story. God is faithful. If. She's gone. I want to ask her why she did this. She said one word, sin.

[00:09:38] Anyway. Thanks for asking. I don't understand. Dip about women. Never have. Never will. My wife and I. Love and adore each other. I married my sister's best friend. Who's a saint, by the way. And I just got lucky, I guess. You can think that's irreligious to say something like that. Most of the time we say a knee jerk just happened to be the right time of the week. And if you mess up, what do you do? You don't go back to the cross and get saved all over again. You renew your repentance and faith. It's kind of like this is another silly illustration. I'm almost embarrassed to tell you. But and I may be the only person here who does this. But when you get hiccups. Somebody told me if I hold my breath long enough, they'll go away or drink some water or something, you know. And so I always hold my breath and still want to get the heck off the whole my breath and count. And then hiccup again, and then a home of breath again and count again. I usually get more and more distance, you know, like if I hold my breath to a five count the first time, it's usually at sometimes an eight or a ten count before I hiccup again the second time, the second count, and then eventually it goes away. I get more and more distance on the hiccups. That's kind of the way thing is. I stand and repent and believe and get. And then that the counts of eight or ten and 15 minutes, it's 1620 and then it goes away. I'm not I'm not plagued by that anymore. Do you understand what I'm saying? You can overcome sand. You really can't. And what's that ever done for you? It's the great deceiver and always promises that which it never produces.

[00:11:31] God's not some kind of cosmic killjoy. If Sam was where it was that it'd be on every page of the Bible. God be saying, Do it, do it, do it. Why does God say, Don't do it? Because it don't work. He just promises that what you never produces. It's the great deceiver that's through the devil is He's a liar. That wants to know what to tell you. If you just believe the right stuff, you don't have to get on an airplane. Leave all the rest to you. A little love like a Buddhist doesn't matter. All religions are going to the top. We got a break. We're going to chapel. Right. We need to go.