Daily Devotional for Tuesday March 4, 2008

Five Years of Liveprayer TV

(Matthew 24:4,5, 2 Timothy 3:13)

Five years of Liveprayer TV. Do you wonder why I do everything I can each day to reach the lost masses in the marketplace? Read this: "The teachings of Jesus and the word of God I believe in are nonjudgmental and unconditional. Therefore Jesus and God loves all and accepts all no matter their color, race, belief system or any other way to be shown as different from self. Lucky for me I don't believe in hell. Since you do, good luck into getting into Heaven." This is from one of Oprah's New Age devotees, who unless she turns from these false teachings she has embraced, is on the way to hell when she dies.

SHE CONSIDERS HERSELF A CHRISTIAN AND A FOLLOWER OF JESUS! This is the mindset so many now embrace who have either never been to church or who have been to the many watered-down versions of church that refuse to preach the Truth of the Bible, opting for the preaching of a non-offensive social Gospel focusing on good works, never talking about sin, and certainly never talking about the reality of hell. The watered down seeker and emerging church movements, along with churches who have abandoned the absolutes of the Bible, have contributed to helping people fall into these New Age philosophies that require no commitment, no accountability, and spread the lie from hell that everyone will eventually get to Heaven.

This is the battle I face daily in the marketplace in addition to those who have embraced the cults and false religions of our day as well as those who have simply rejected all together God, the Bible, and faith in Jesus Christ. Why do you think all the major ministries stay in the "Christian trough?" Instead of love and adulation from other Christians, there is hate and condemnation from nonbelievers. Instead of Christians sending you millions of dollars in donations, buying your books and other resources, coming to your conferences, nonbelievers send you death threats, endless attacks, and plots to silence you. Instead of preaching to the choir of saints, there is the battle with satan and his minions for the eternal souls of men.

The secular TV networks will never support and endorse any program that is preaching the pure Truth of the Bible, bringing a Biblical worldview to their viewers. They do, however, fill their programming with every kind of sin you can imagine and clearly support a view of the world and life in complete rebellion to the Bible and the Christian Faith. Of course, they are in the entertainment business, not the ministry. However, the entertainment they feed on their airwaves has a foundation of sin and rebellion to God, His Truth, and a faith in Jesus Christ. They are open to dealing with "spiritual issues," but from a New Age viewpoint, not from the Bible. The only way to access their airwaves is to buy time in those few hours a day they designate for PAID PROGRAMMING, which is usually sold to infomercial companies.

The few Christian programs that do pay to be on secular stations usually buy time on Sunday morning or between 2am-6am to troll for Christian viewers. These programs are the exact same programs these ministries air on Christian television, geared strictly for a Christian audience except for local churches who broadcast their Sunday morning worship service. When I started the Liveprayer TV program I knew to attract a non-Christian audience it had to be a different type of program from the standard preaching/teaching programs, geared to non-Christians, and have a similar feel to the secular programs it would compete against without compromising the Truth of the Bible.

Thus was birthed the Liveprayer TV program back on March 3, 2003 on the CBS owned UPN (now CW) affiliate in Tampa, Florida, the 12 TV market in the nation. "Live" every Monday thru Friday from 1-2 a.m. following the last network program. I would simply deal with the current issues in the world and people's lives from a Biblical worldview, take calls from the viewers to debate them, answer their questions, counsel or pray for them, and just love people who were hurting, struggling with life, and give them a word of encouragement and the greatest gift of all...TRUE hope!

As of last Friday, for 1,275 nights, except for 2 nights when the studio was closed due to the hurricanes we had in 2005, and 2 nights I was out of town and couldn't get back due to weather, I have been in my chair to share God's Truth with the viewers and minister to them. In addition to being on the CBS owned station for the first 1,175 programs, for 52 weeks (July 2005-June 2006) the program was up on satellite and also seen live on the ABC owned stations in Miami, West Palm Beach, and Jacksonville, and the WB affiliate in Ft. Myers. For 10 weeks in 2006 the program was also seen nationwide on the "i" Network. After being cancelled by CBS last August, the program was seen for 12 weeks on the Sinclair Broadcasting affiliate in Tampa in the morning, and on January 7th, we moved the program exclusively to the Internet where we have been airing the last 8 weeks.

All of this was made possible by many in the Liveprayer family who made great financial sacrifices, many more who spent countless hours in prayer, the many personal scarifies my wife has made so I could dedicate myself to the program, and a wonderful Godly team of television professionals who have made up my crew all these years.

During these past 5 years, millions of people across the nation and around the world via the Liveprayer.com website have seen the program. Over 10,000 people we know of have made the decision to accept Jesus Christ as their personal Savior by faith. We have taken over 12,000 phone calls from viewers, responded to over 3 1/2 million emails for prayer, and have over 30,000 praise reports archived from people who took the time to emails us back and tell us how God moved in their life. What we did was use the secular media to bring the unadulterated Truth of God's Word into people's lives who for the most part don't go to church, don't read the Bible, aren't Christians, and see their lives transformed by the power of God. The hunger is out there, but so are those who hate God, reject the Bible as Truth, don't believe in Jesus, and want to silence the Truth from being told!

You can only imagine the outrage by people who are in bondage to a sin like homosexuality when I had the audacity to share that the Bible calls their choice a sin. You can only imagine the outrage by people who have chosen to put their faith in the false gods of the world, follow the cults and false religions that are out there, when I had the audacity to look them in the eye and tell them they are following a lie to the fires of hell. You can only imagine the outrage by people who don't want to be held accountable by God or anyone, when I would sit there night after night and tell them that Absolute Truth does exist and that they are free to believe and do whatever they want, but there will be consequences for their choices. Forty years ago, there would not have been the outrage from someone preaching a Biblically based message. There is today!

Each night we get many hateful emails, every month several death threats are received by email, letter and phone. The drive to take this program off the air started virtually after the first program and never stopped. For CBS, we were a paying client. We paid them nearly $400,000 a year in air time and product costs. The station managers over the years took the position that we had what some considered "controversial content," but so did many programs and that is why they put up the disclaimers before and after our telecast. Liveprayer was a good customer and the people who didn't like the program didn't have to watch. They also knew that I was a broadcast professional and that I would never do anything to violate FCC regulations and that we did tremendous good in the community and in many lives through the program.

More vocal than even the numerous homosexual groups, Scientologists, Mormons, and atheists who have been trying to take us off was CAIR, the Council on American Islamic Relations. CAIR, is viewed by much of the mainstream media as a Muslim version of the American Civil Liberties Union instead of the face of the radical Islamic movement that it has been proven to be since its inception here in the United States. CAIR believes that free speech ends when someone tells the truth about Islam. Sadly, CBS caved into the intimidation tactics by CAIR and told us they would be taking our program off the air on September 11th. 9/11, an interesting date. You can read more about this radical Islamic group at: http://www.anti-cair-net.org/

My message for you today is simply this. Don't ever let anyone or anything silence you from telling people the Truth. The Truth of God's Word is all we have. It is our only message. I realize that we will not have much longer before there won't be any secular venues left to bring forth the Gospel. The better percentage of two full generations don't go to church, don't read the Bible, and unless they come to know Jesus as their Savior will die and go to hell. WE MUST REACH THESE PEOPLE, AND TO DO THAT, WE HAVE TO INVADE THEIR LIVES WHERE THEY LIVE!!!

I love you and care about you so much. Thank you for all of your love and prayers, for your concern, and for your support. It has been a wild five years, but God is good. Tomorrow is promised to none of us. Every second someone is dying and going to hell, someone that could have been saved if they had been told about Jesus and His love for them. That is what drives me each second of each day, to keep telling all that I can about our wonderful Savior who loves them, died for their sins, so that they could be forgiven and have the assurance of heaven. That is the Gospel message and we can't let ourselves be intimidated into silence!

Many people ask me why I keep fighting so hard each day, go through all I do each day. Some get upset that I ask people to support God's work here. I don't play mind games with you, I don't take passages of the Bible out of context to try and manipulate you. I don't bribe you with gifts to send Liveprayer money. I simply tell you what our needs are and ask you to pray about helping me to do the work God has called us to do. Not everyone is called to be physically on the front lines like I am. Some go to the front lines through their prayers and through their giving. A war can't be fought without money and some are called to help finance the war! The reason I put myself out there, the reason I beg you to help me, is because of thousands of people who send me emails like this:

"Dear Pastor Bill, Without your inspiration and constant presence in my life over the past two years, I have no doubt that I would NEVER have developed the frame of mind or sense of hope and optimism to even try to get out of bed and function again. In addition to the thyroid cancer you know about, I was struck by lightning in 1988 and it severely damaged my nervous system and broke my spine completely. It is a miracle I can walk at all! Last year I had three small heart attacks followed by strokes, and now I have been diagnosed with COPD and emphysema. Given all that plus a 60 mile an hour motorcycle accident and 4 serious car accidents over the past 20 years, I truly believe you when you say that God still has work for me to do. Otherwise I would simply have died. I had given up any thought of ever being a "productive" member of society again, considering that magnitude of physical and mental adversities I was faced with. But you inspired me to keep going, to get out of bed and try to walk tall in the light of the day again. I can never thank you enough!"

As you know, we are raising $1,250,000 to advertise and promote the new TV program and network on the Internet. Last fall I contracted with a wonderful venture capital firm headed up by some sold-out Believers who helped us put together a highly professional business plan and other key documents for those who would like to not only help us bring God's Truth to this dark world, but minister to hurting people and win the lost to faith in Jesus Christ while getting a nice return on their investment. We are raising the $1.25m in 50 units of $25,000. Each unit will be accompanied by a 1-year note that will be paid in full after 12 months along with 10% interest.

It is critical to raise these funds as quickly as possible so they can be deployed in the various ad and branding campaigns we have formulated to drive millions of viewers to the program and quickly build that nightly base of viewers that then allows us to tap into advertising dollars. On the Internet, advertisers are not interested in your content as much as they are your traffic. So this $1.25m is being used to build up those traffic numbers to attract the ad dollars. To date, we have commitments of 20 1/2 units. I need to tie down the final 29 1/2 units by the end of April, though, the end of March would be better.

I just need a couple dozen of people who aren't afraid of taking on satan and will help me battle in the marketplace for souls. I know there are 30 people who are reading this right now, who have $25,000 they can invest in the Lord's work for 12 months and can help me to finish this off so I can focus all my full attention on saving souls. This is an incredible way you can help me to bring God's Truth into the marketplace, save souls, and get a nice return on your money over the next 12 months. If God has blessed you to be able to help me, please take some time today and pray. To get a copy of our Business Plan, Investors Brief, Equity Report, Vital Statistics, and our Power Point Presentation, please email me at: bkeller@liveprayer.com

I am thankful for these past 5 years and the difference we were able to make in millions of lives. However, I see our work in reaching people thru broadcasting just beginning. Oprah will now have her own cable channel that is being programmed to channel all of her New Age teachings to millions daily. Nonbelievers will NOT watch Christian TV, but they WILL watch Oprah. Satan is relentless in trying to take souls to hell and that is why I will be relentless and keep fighting daily for ways to reach the lost and hurting masses to bring them the only true hope there is, the Truth of God's Word and faith in Jesus Christ!