[0:00] If you would take your Bibles and go with me to the book of Ezra chapter 1. Ezra chapter 1. I am so glad someone gave so that I would hear the gospel. Great song. Thank you very much. Ezra chapter 1.
[0:11] We are in a new book of the Bible and always making our journey through the Word of God. And it just happens to be one of my favorite chapters when we are talking about world evangelism.
[0:23] And that's what our whole week will be wrapped up in next Thursday night and Friday night. And then Saturday night we'll have a banquet. And it will be all kinds of food from all over the world.
[0:33] And the Spanish church will be participating with us. It's going to be a lot of fun. And then Sunday morning we will have two hours straight. Sunday school you'll be in here. And we'll have two hours straight with missionaries sharing stories about what God has done.
[0:48] Now if you are used to coming only for the last hour, you still come when you come. That'll be fine. We just want you to come. I don't want you to miss it. Any part you can be here for, you're going to enjoy. I am so grateful to God that I heard the gospel.
[1:02] It was like May the 6th, 1962. The majority of you weren't born yet. And I was a little boy. I was seven years old. I would soon be turning eight years old. And I had heard the gospel over and over.
[1:13] And my dad, I didn't know this until I was a grown man. My dad said every week I would go back to him and I would say, you want me to go up here and get saved or not? And he'd say, just go sit down and be quiet. And I don't even remember any of that.
[1:26] And he said, on the day I got saved, I didn't ask him. I just went forward. That's the only day I remember. I don't remember all the other asking parts. But on that day, I knew that Jesus had died for me.
[1:37] The pastor preached on the crucifixion. The Lord really dealt with my heart. And that day, I got saved. I have been brought up in church all my life. I've had the privilege of hearing the Bible preached and taught.
[1:49] I don't remember when I memorized John 3, 16, for God so loved the world. He gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believed in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. I'm glad I got through that because if I hadn't, it would have sounded really bad when I said I didn't remember when I memorized it.
[2:02] But anyway, I grew up knowing all these things. And then I went to the mission field. I lived in Mexico in 1987. In 1988, we moved to Peru, South America, to a people that had never heard.
[2:16] The people I dealt with, they knew who Jesus was. Fact is, they named their kid Jesus. But they didn't know what Jesus did on the cross. They knew Jesus had been crucified.
[2:28] They didn't understand why Jesus had been crucified. It never really made sense to them. And I had the privilege of sharing it with hundreds of people as they accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior.
[2:40] So this week, we'll talk to you about Arise and Go. We'll talk to you about the idea of going to the mission field. And it just so happens that in the book of Ezra, chapter 1, it's like the follow-up chapter for the last chapter of 2 Chronicles.
[2:54] In 2 Chronicles, they end the chapter with the nation of Israel going into 70 years of captivity. And so what happened is God's people had sinned against God.
[3:05] You are saved by grace, but if you don't honor God and live for God, He will take you to the woodshed. Can I get an amen about that? If you don't honor God, I mean, a born-again believer, a born-again believer wants to love and honor and serve God, and they didn't.
[3:20] And they had now been 70 years in captivity. And at the end of that 70 years, a pagan king stands up and says, God told me to tell some of you to go back to Jerusalem and build his house again.
[3:35] God told me to tell you that some of you are going to have it in your heart, that you would like to do that, and so I'm going to give you freedom to go back. Not only that, I'm going to give you all the instruments of worship that we stole from you, that we got in storage over here, and you can take it back and set your temple back up.
[3:53] And not only that, I'm going to raise some money for you so that you can go and build the temple for your God. He's your God. He's the God of Israel. He's your God, and I want you all to go back and do that.
[4:03] And people got happy, man. They're like, boy, we've been over here 70 years as captives. We've been taken out of our homes, and we've been held prisoners here for 70 years.
[4:14] Some of our kids don't even know about Jerusalem, and now all of a sudden, we're going to get to go back to Jerusalem. We're going to get to build the temple again. And then he said, and some of you all might not want to go back, and some of you might not want to participate in building a temple.
[4:28] That's okay. But if you stay here, I fully expect you to help those that go back build that temple. I want you to give them offerings from your heart.
[4:38] I want you to give them offerings to help them. I want you to give to them so they can get the job done. And so Ezra tells us the story of Cyrus, this pagan king, knowing that God owned everything, knowing that God gave him everything, telling a group of people to take the money and the effort and to go back and to build the temple of God back in Jerusalem.
[5:03] A beautiful corollary, beautiful way that compares to what happens to us in the New Testament. That's an Old Testament story. That's a story about what God did with the Jewish people to rebuild their temple.
[5:14] Now, their temple, it was nothing like this church building here. Their temple was overlaid. Everything just about was overlaid in gold. It was a billion-dollar affair, and it was a big deal, and it was the center of all their worship, not like churches that are everywhere.
[5:31] It was the big place. It's where everybody went. It's the center of worshiping God. Now, we get the New Testament, and Jesus comes, and he tells us that he has died on a cross.
[5:43] He has paid the sin debt so that everybody everywhere can be saved. He has done all that needs to be done. He has reconciled the world to himself. They can all be saved if they will simply accept the free gift.
[5:56] And then Jesus says, I want you to go, and I want you to tell everybody everywhere about what I did. I want you to go, and I want you to tell everybody everywhere about what I did.
[6:06] And so the early church, the one that saw Jesus alive, the one that saw Jesus die, the one that saw Jesus buried and rise again, the one that saw Jesus ascend into heaven on a cloud, everybody got excited about taking the gospel.
[6:21] And except for the church in Jerusalem, basically the whole New Testament is a story about a bunch of people going everywhere, telling everybody about Jesus so that everybody could come to know him and be saved.
[6:32] But the key would be, how do you find that? And so the story of Ezra is a great picture of exactly how that happened. So take your Bibles with me, if you would, and go to Ezra chapter 1.
[6:44] We'll read verse 7, but let me have a word of prayer with you to begin with. Father, there may be people in this room today that do not know you. They're not saved. They could be religious.
[6:56] They could be people that love you but don't know you. I want to ask you to save them today. There could be people in here that are burdened down with sin, that feel like they've done wrong, and feel like they're a long ways off from you, and feel like they desperately need you.
[7:09] And I'm asking you today to speak to their heart and draw them to you. Dear God, there are people in this room that aren't going to heaven, and you know that, and you know who they are. Please deal with their hearts. And then, God, there are Christians in this room, and the majority of us are not going to go overseas.
[7:25] The majority of us are going to stay here and enjoy our lives. And I pray, dear God, that you would deal with our hearts that we might, as a church, do even more. And I'll give you praise and honor and glory for all you do.
[7:36] In Jesus' name, amen. Well, if you do this sort of thing, you can write in the margin of your Bible outside of Ezra chapter 1 the word remainers. Remainers. That's what I call this message. That's not even a word.
[7:47] I made that one up. But it's people that remain. Maybe there is a word remainers. But I want to talk to you about remaining, those that stay here. Now, you need to know, if you're visiting this morning, that we're not in any kind of financial trouble.
[8:01] For a church the size of our church, it gave a quarter of a million dollars this past year to world evangelism. I'm just in Ezra chapter 1. And I just am blessed by God that it happens to be here right before we start the missions conference.
[8:12] And I'm just blessed by God that it happens to be a chapter I used to preach all the time when I was on deputation and when I was on furlough and I preached to people. So we're not hurting, but the world is.
[8:25] The world needs the gospel. The world needs preachers to go and tell them. And others in this room ought to volunteer to go, but God wants to do a work. I want you to go with me to Ezra 1.7.
[8:36] This pagan king decides that he will return all the things stolen. The Bible said in Cyrus, the king. That guy's a pagan. He's not Jewish. He's not circumcised.
[8:47] Brought the vessels of the house of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had brought forth out of Jerusalem. And he put them in the house of his gods, the false gods. Even those did Cyrus, king of Persia, bring forth by the hand of Mishreva, the treasurer.
[9:02] And he numbered them unto Shezbazer. Boy, I hate those guys' names. The prince of Judah. The prince of Judah. So he went in there and he got all this stuff that Nebuchadnezzar had taken away 70 years earlier.
[9:15] He brought it out and turned it over to the treasurer and they counted it so he could return that. And they could take it back to him. You finished up Mark chapter 16 last week.
[9:26] That's where we were last Sunday here at our church. We finished the gospel of Mark. And in Mark chapter 16 and verse 15, the Bible said, Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
[9:38] Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. And then it said in Mark 16, 20, They went forth and preached everywhere, and the Lord working with them and confirming the word with signs.
[9:49] So this was God said, Jesus died for you. Jesus was buried. Jesus rose again. Now go tell everybody. And they got excited about telling everybody.
[10:01] And they went everywhere. And the Lord worked with them. The Lord blessed them as they taught and as they preached, as they started churches. Today, I got a video message from China.
[10:13] This is just one of those examples. A guy got saved in the church there in Dali in China. And he got saved last week. Or the last few weeks. I'm not sure what day it was he got saved.
[10:23] And he's really excited about serving Jesus. And he ran into the church today. He had had to take a test before church this morning. In the college and university where he was going. And he ran and he told Cannon today.
[10:34] He said, you know, I just wondered if God would do it. So I asked God to help me on my test. And he said, and I got there and I was taking my test. And I had asked God to help me.
[10:45] And I turned my test in. And the professor said, answer is wrong here, here, and here. Change those answers so you'll get a better grade. And he said, so God help me. And so Cannon said, I didn't know what I was supposed to tell him.
[10:57] I was glad he was excited that God answered his prayer. I didn't know if I would tell him. But we don't cheat to get God to answer our prayers. But God works with us. And he works with people like Cannon and the guys that are working there in Dali.
[11:09] Trying to get the gospel to those people. I don't know what the lesson I told him. I said, just laugh at it now. In a few years from now, you can mention that and say, you're just kind of on the wrong track back then. But we don't need to body slam the poor guy like his first two or three weeks of getting right with God.
[11:24] Now go with me, if you would, to Ezra chapter 1. The whole book of Ezra starts off with this guy who's in charge, the commander, the king of the country of Persia.
[11:36] It says in Ezra 1.1, now Cyrus, the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, it says that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled.
[11:49] So the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and put it in writing, saying, I just want you to get this.
[12:00] Everything that's about to happen is because God said he wanted it to happen. So you need to underline in verse 1 the word of the Lord. And by the way, what word?
[12:10] Well, we got a book of Jeremiah. It's old Jeremiah doing the talking. And he's telling them that Jeremiah explained the captivity. Jeremiah explained they would be coming back home again. And so Cyrus has heard from the word of God.
[12:24] And it says here, the Lord stirred up his spirit. Underline that. You ought to be sensitive. You ought to be saying, God, deal with my heart. Show me what I ought to do and help me with that.
[12:35] And then I want you to underline in verse 1, the last part says, in writing, in writing. Now I want you to look here just a second. But God speaks through his writing. God speaks through what he wrote down.
[12:47] And so in this story, Ezra's going to step out there and he's going to say, guys, we need to rebuild that temple. I mean, after all, that's what Jeremiah said. It's been written down. I'm telling you what God wants to do. Here's a proclamation.
[12:58] So the story of Ezra started not in the heart of Cyrus, but in the heart of God. It was God who told Jeremiah to write it. It was God who stirred up the heart of Cyrus.
[13:10] Look at, if you would, at chapter 1 and verse 2. It is God who told him what to do. In Ezra chapter 1 and verse 2, the Bible said, then says Cyrus, king of Persia, the Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth.
[13:24] And underline, the Lord God of heaven has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem. So Cyrus feels a charge.
[13:35] His heart's stirred up. And he feels in his heart, I believe God's got something God wants me to do. I believe God has something that God wants me to do. And it was stirred up.
[13:47] And see, Cyrus is already getting lined up with what God says because he's hearing from the word of God, Jeremiah. And I, God is stirring up his heart. He says God's the one that told him what to do.
[13:59] And I want you to notice in the verse, he realized, well, really, who I am and everything I have is all God anyway. Look, if you went to Ezra chapter 1 and verse 2 and underline it. He said, the Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth.
[14:13] So he realized, Cyrus realized, amen, I'm a powerful king. But in all honesty, it's God who gave me everything I have. Every Christian ought to realize that.
[14:23] Could you say amen right there? Every person, every human being ought to realize that. The air you breathe, the place you live, all of it is a gift from our God. It is the attitude that you find in David, king of Israel, who built the first temple.
[14:38] In 1 Chronicles 29, 14, he has said, Who am I and what is my people that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort? For all things come of thee, and of thine own have we given thee.
[14:52] And the last of verse 16, he said, Everything comes of your hand, and it's all yours, all thine own. Now, here's what Cyrus realizes. Cyrus wakes up one day and says, boy, God's in my heart.
[15:03] God is speaking to my heart. God's telling me I need to do something with everything God's given me. I need to make a difference. I need to do something with it. I don't own it anyway. And he says in Ezra chapter 1 and verse 2, if you look there, it's to build him a house at Jerusalem.
[15:20] So it was going to be built for God. It wasn't about building Cyrus. It wasn't about what he could do for himself. It was about God. He realized even the people belonged to God.
[15:32] Look at Ezra chapter 1 and verse 3. Who is there among you of all his people? Underline that. His people. That's possessive. That's my car. I'm his people.
[15:43] I belong to him. His people. Then it said, his God being with him. And here's what the commander realized. Here's what the man in charge realized.
[15:54] God owns everything. God has spoke to me through his word through the mouth of Jeremiah. God has stirred up my heart. Everything I have belongs to him. He wants me to do something, and I'm going to get about doing it.
[16:05] Now, I could stop right there. We could go home. Don't worry. I'm not going to do that. But I'm just saying to you this morning, you need to realize he owns everything. You need to realize you belong to him. You need to realize he has a purpose for your life.
[16:17] You're not just an evolved animal that's sitting here, got clothes on because you're a more evolved animal. You were a special creation of God. God has a special plan to use you and everything about you.
[16:29] He even realized that God would pick who would go out. Look at Israel 1.5. The commander realized that. And he told him, some of y'all ought to go. And in chapter 1 and verse 5, Then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin, the priests and the Levites, all of them whose spirit God had raised to go up to build the house of the Lord, which is in Jerusalem.
[16:48] Now, everybody's not going to be a missionary. I wish they would. I always hear people say, well, if everybody went to the missionary, you wouldn't have anybody to preach to. Well, I'm 64 years old. I ain't never seen that problem happen. I mean, that's a theory.
[16:59] That has never been a problem. The fact is, it's rare when somebody wants to be a missionary. But here, God stirred up some people's hearts to go to Jerusalem to build the temple. And God will stir up your heart to go and see people get saved and see lives be changed.
[17:15] Now, go with me, if you would, to Ezra chapter 1 and verse 2 again. It's Cyrus the king we're talking about. Chapter 1, verse 1, The word came from the mouth of Jeremiah.
[17:27] God told Cyrus what to do. Cyrus now steps out to go do what he told him to do. Just like as the pastor of Vision Baptist Church, I would say to you, God wants us to do some things.
[17:40] That's not coming from me. When we talk about carrying the gospel to the world, when we talk about us giving substantially and sacrificially and making a difference, can I just tell you, it is in my heart.
[17:51] I would be lying to you if I didn't tell you it's in my heart. I wish we were doing 10 times more than we're doing. I wish we were sending out 10 times of people and giving 10 times of money. It's in my heart. But here's what Ezra says about Cyrus.
[18:04] It wasn't in Cyrus' heart until he got it from God. So the real motivator of world evangelism, the real motivator of building a house in Jerusalem is the God of heaven speaking to his man and telling him what to do.
[18:19] It was God speaking that told him. The command and the whole part of this is very personal. If you look at Ezra 1, 2, he said, God has given me all the kingdoms.
[18:31] Underline the word me. Could I ask you to take that personal? I think you hear me talk about God gave us life and everything. And you're like, yeah, I hope everybody gets that. I hope everybody understands that money's God's.
[18:43] I hope everybody understands that ought to be serving. We say that and it's like generic. But it ought to be personal. It ought to be personal. It ought to be, you ought to feel like, yeah, you're right.
[18:55] When it says that God has a plan, he's talking about me. Because some of you might be sitting here saying, well, I wonder what he's going to do in my grandson's life. I wonder what he's going to do in my son's life. What about that guy over there? God really needs to speak to him.
[19:06] That's not the picture here at all. It was personal. It was personal. Some preachers might say, don't take this personally. Let me say this. Please take it personally. I hope you take it personally.
[19:18] God wants to use you. God wants you to go or God wants you to give so others can go. Remainers or senders, God wants you to give or God wants you to go. In chapter 1, verse 2, he said, he's given me.
[19:31] He's charged me. He's given me. He's charged me. God spoke to me. When's the last time God spoke to you? When's the last time you asked God to speak to you?
[19:46] You know, honestly, we get so busy building our nest and enjoying our stuff, and we're so focused on everything down here that little do we think of what God's doing.
[19:57] We're so focused on what I want and what my wife wants and what my kids want that we rarely think of what God wants. There would be some who were going to go.
[20:09] Look if you would at verse 3. And this is the question. Cyrus steps after, and he says, all right, guys, I'm given freedom. Y'all can go build a temple. And he's saying to them, some of y'all are going to want to go, and some of y'all aren't going to want to go.
[20:23] Look if you would at verse 3. Who is there among you of all of his people? Underline. Now, I'm not talking to people that don't know God. I'm not talking to people that aren't Hebrews, who that temple belongs to him.
[20:36] He said, I'm talking to those that belong to this God, who of his people, his God, be with him. His God. So he's my God. Is he your God?
[20:46] Do you know if you died today, you'd go to heaven? Do you know he's bought you with his blood on the cross of Calvary? Do you realize you belong to him, that life's not about you, but it's about him? Is he your God? Is it personal?
[20:57] His God. Let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of God in Israel. He said, who in here wants to go?
[21:08] So Cyrus steps out and said, now, guys, I've been reading the Bible back over here. And I'm in the book of Jeremiah. Why? And the Lord's touched my heart. And he told me that y'all's house in Jerusalem ought to be restored.
[21:21] And it looks like the 70 years are up that Jeremiah told him about. Time for y'all to go back. And I'll tell you what, he just told me for y'all to go. And so I need y'all to go. All right?
[21:32] I need somebody in this room to stand up and say, I'm going to go build the temple. I'll go do it. Now, who is it? In this room, you're one of his people. You know he's your God. You know Jerusalem's your city.
[21:43] Which of you'd say, for my God, I'll go do that? And he asked them, which one of you do it? Here's what God's doing to us today. I'm his people. How many of y'all are his people? Say amen. I belong to him.
[21:54] Amen. My money belongs to him. He says, which one of y'all do it? He said, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. That was in Mark 16 last week. He said, go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, and teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I command you.
[22:09] Lord, I'm with you to the end of the world. In Acts chapter 1 and verse 8, he said, after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you, you shall be witnesses unto me. And he said, all right, guys, go. Go. See, you need to take that personal.
[22:22] Everybody in this room ought to really have to deal with whether or not you should be going. It ought to be a struggle for you to say, well, if he wants the house built in Jerusalem, maybe I ought to go.
[22:34] It ought to be that you would be going, I think maybe I ought to go. And at the end of it, you might end up saying, I don't think I ought to, but I really thought about it. Instead of, here's what you just did. Go.
[22:44] No. Go has nothing to do with me. When you say go, I hear no. But you never even thought about it. You never even considered that you might see people being saved, that you might see churches being started, that you might see God doing something great with you.
[23:03] You never even considered it. Chapter 1 and verse 3 said, who will go? And then he said this. You'll know. You'll know. Look at chapter 1 and verse 5. Chapter 1 and verse 5. He said, then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and the Levites with all of them.
[23:18] Now look, whose spirit God had raised to go. So something happened. When Cyrus walked out there and said, hey, guys, guys, God wants me to get that temple built back in Jerusalem for him.
[23:32] God wants me to take care of that. And here's what God wants to do. God wants some of y'all to go. And the second that happened, some of the people in the room went, I think I'd like to do that.
[23:45] I'll go. If I knew how to do it, I knew what to do. You could show me what. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'd like to go. I remember as a little boy in a little Southern Baptist church I went to as a boy, the vacation Bible school teachers, you know, they're real old ladies, like 35 and 40.
[24:02] I mean, when you're three, 35 is really old. Amen. It's older than my mama. And at my age now, that's my daughters. But anyway, but anyway, I remember them old ladies talking about their little books, their little quarterly things they read from.
[24:16] And they talked about this place in Africa where the chief had come out of the back jungles and he'd come to the city and he walked up to a missionary and he said to the missionary, we need a missionary.
[24:26] We need somebody to come preach the gospel to us. We need somebody to come tell us about Jesus. And the missionary said, well, we don't have enough preachers and we don't have enough missionaries. Sorry, we can't get to you. And I remember thinking, man, I'm like seven years old, six years old.
[24:39] And I remember thinking, I'd go. I'd go. And little did I know that I would go, that I did go. And I enjoyed going. But as a little boy, I thought that.
[24:50] I was preaching and I heard that. I mean, that story rang true in my life all those years. And I was preaching in Atiquipa. We had dozens of churches going around the city and around the country.
[25:01] And people out in the country, we'd started churches out there. We were starting churches everywhere we could. And one day, somebody came up to my office and they said, there's a little lady who wants to talk to you. And I said, okay. So they brought her in the office and she was a Ketwista, which is basically another Indian language that was spoken in the country.
[25:18] But she spoke enough Spanish to talk to me. And she came in the room and she said, missionary, we want a missionary. I said, man, that's fantastic. I said, this reminded me of when I was a little kid.
[25:30] I said, but we don't have any missionaries. I don't have enough. I'm sending them everywhere I can now. I'm doing everything I can to cover every place I can. I just don't have enough. And I remember when she left through my center thinking, I heard this when I was seven years old.
[25:45] Now I've lived it. But I think God might strip your heart. I think you might be older than you think you ought to be, but you could if you wanted to. God could use you.
[25:55] But then he said, there's some of you that aren't going to go. Now that's the majority of us. We're remainers. We stay here. We stay in our house.
[26:06] I'm going to sleep in my bed tonight. In just a few minutes, I'm going to get in my car and drive to my house. I remain here. I am not having to deal with China. I'm not having to deal with Chinese.
[26:18] I'm not having to worry about my visa. I've not had any immigration official visit my house in the last 12 years that I've lived here. Not a one. I have not even had to worry. I did have a language problem here at this church.
[26:31] When we were starting the church, some of the people told me, you say wash. Wash. I see I trained myself. They said to me, they said, how come you always say wash? I said, I'm from Tennessee.
[26:42] Give me a break. And so they said, well, it doesn't sound good. So I said to practice. For a long time when I preach, I go wash. Because I want to make sure I say.
[26:53] That's the only language difficulty I've had recently. I can't hear you when you talk sometimes. But other than that, that's not funny. It's even worse when some of you say, well, why don't you get a hearing aid? I'm like, why don't you shut up?
[27:05] Ezra chapter 1 and verse 4. That wasn't funny. That was painful. Ezra chapter 1 and verse 4. Whosoever remaineth. Whosoever remains in any place where he sojourns, where he lives.
[27:19] Now, the interesting thing about sojourn is a, that's an old-fashioned word and you don't get it, but it's basically like where you're camping out. It ain't where you really live. And if you were a good Christian, you'd know this world is not your home.
[27:31] You're just a passing through. Your treasures are supposed to be laid up somewhere beyond the blue. Basically, all of us are in a motel room right now. Because you're either going to spend eternity in heaven or you're going to spend eternity in hell.
[27:42] And this is a temporary spot. Sojourners. He said, so y'all are hanging around here. This is where you're living right now. And you're staying here. Let the men of his place, if you want to stay here where you're hanging out, let the men that belong to this very area help that guy that's going with silver and with gold and with goods and with animals and freewill offerings for the house of God that's in Jerusalem.
[28:07] Okay, here's what he did. Hey, who'll go? All right. You're going, you're going, you're going, you're going. All right. We've got some good lists to go. Now then, those of you that are staying, we need to talk. You want to stay, it's going to cost you.
[28:20] You need to give so they can go. I just finished watching a History Channel thing about Teddy Roosevelt. And Teddy's daddy didn't sign up in the Civil War because his wife was a Southerner from Roswell, Georgia.
[28:37] And he was a Yankee. And she said, you cannot sign up in the war and kill my people. And so he hired a substitute to go for him, which was a legal thing. If you had enough money, you didn't have to go.
[28:48] You just pay a soldier to go in your place. Basically, Cyrus is saying, all right, you want to hang around here? You better pay somebody to go in your place. Somebody, you stay here, you need to be helping them that go.
[29:00] Look at it. Help them with silver. Help them with gold. Help them with goods. Help them with beasts for animals and free will offers. Look at chapter 1, verse 6. He said, and they that were about them strengthened their hands.
[29:10] That's what they did. They helped them that were going to go with vessels of silver, with gold, with goods, with beasts, and with precious things besides all that was willingly offered. They gave and they helped them go.
[29:23] The remainers. That's really what we're going to do in our Faith Promise Conference. We're going to hear about all that God's doing. And they're the ones that live the adventure, but we're the ones who fund the adventure.
[29:34] They live it. We pay for it. I just put my tithe and offering check in the offering plate just a second ago. It's always so funny. I sit on the front row and I'm the pastor of the church and every week the ushers shove that plate in my face.
[29:48] And I'm like, I only give one to someone. I tell you what? A monthly check because I get paid monthly. You were supposed to laugh at that. That was a joke. Now it's painful you didn't laugh. What are you doing to get the gospel around the world?
[30:05] How are you affecting things all over the world? Who are you helping to go to the world? I mean, I know our church has paid a severe price. I know, man, our first like three or four song leaders all went to the mission field.
[30:19] People used to come to me and say, sign him up to be a song leader. Where is he going to be a missionary? And your children's workers left. And different people left to go to the ministry.
[30:30] But we got to get the gospel to the world. And if you stick here, how are you impacting the world? What are you doing? How would you most hurt the United States military if you wanted to hurt them?
[30:43] You know what you'd do? You wouldn't kill the soldiers. You'd kill the bases, the training bases. In World War II, when our people were going to attack Japan before they thought of the bomb, or while they were really thinking of it, but before they did, they sat down with Britain and decided it would take one and a half million people to take the island of Japan.
[31:05] And they said within the first month, over 300,000 will be killed. And here's all we do. If you kill them, we'll send some more to take their place.
[31:16] But if you really want to stop it, you'd stop where we train them. You know where we train people? Church. You know where missionaries are born and raised and taught what to do? Church.
[31:27] You know where young men spend their life to be missionaries? Church. And as a church, you and I have got to get behind getting the gospel to the world. You are behind it. You are behind it.
[31:38] We can get a little more behind it. We can do a little bit more. Some of us aren't even given. The truth is, you haven't given a faith promise all year long. You like it. You're like, man, I go to Vision Baptist Church.
[31:49] That's a missionary church. The other day, somebody came in and were talking to me, and they said, yeah, he's heard of our church. He knows about our missionary emphasis. Everybody knows about our missionary emphasis. But you're a part and you're not a part.
[32:01] I mean, $5? If you haven't got anywhere else to start, start with $5. But you could do something to get the gospel around the world. You ought to surrender to go. And if you don't go, you ought to give to go.
[32:12] We got a job to do. Understand, we gave a quarter of a million dollars, so I'm not like sitting up here going, I don't know how we're going to get it done. You're getting it done more than any church I know of. But then we got a lot more to do.
[32:25] We're not doing as much as we ought to do. There are whole sections. Talking to one of the men of the church this week, Montreal, no gospel witness almost. I'm going to go to Montreal with him. We're going to see what we can do.
[32:35] Let's get a missionary there. We ought to break our hearts. So Cyrus starts up the conversation. Guys, I'm fixing to make an announcement here. And my announcement is that y'all need to go back to Jerusalem and build a house.
[32:47] And the reason I want to do that is because God told me. I was in the book of Jeremiah, reading the book of Jeremiah. My spirit was moved by the Holy Spirit of God. And so I'm now making a proclamation. You guys, I need you to go to Jerusalem and build this house.
[32:58] He told me to build that house. So I want y'all to go. By the way, I'm going to give you all the stuff we stole. You can take it back. Now, not only that, I'm going to give you some money and give you some letters. I'm going to help you get the job done. I want you to go do it. And so who will go? Somebody stand up and say, I'll go to Jerusalem and I'll build the temple.
[33:12] All right, that's great. Got all you that are going. That's wonderful. Now, the rest of you, it's okay if you want to stay here, but I need you to help them. I need you to help them. I need you to give some money. I need you to do a work.
[33:22] I need you to make a difference. I need you to help here. Would you help some? Would you give to help those missionaries go? Let the Lord deal with your heart to go or to give, but let the Lord deal with your heart.
[33:33] When's the last time you've been sensitive about that? When's the last time you've been saying, I want what God wants. I want to honor God with my life. I want to honor God with what's going on in me. Today's that day. Today's that day. Some of you here and you're like, well, what's the big deal about sending missionaries?
[33:47] What's the big deal about sending the gospel around the world? That's probably because you don't know the gospel yet because it changes lives. And you came to vision today and you're weighed down and burdened down by your sin.
[33:59] And though you put on a nice facade and though you look real good on the outside, on the inside, you know you're wrong. And you know you've sinned against the Holy God and you know that things aren't what they ought to be in your heart.
[34:09] You know that. No one has to tell you you're not saved. Your sins aren't forgiven. You're still living with a load of guilt. But he loves you. The Bible says, but God commended. God showed.
[34:20] God manifest. God proved his love toward us. And that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. He died for you. He paid your sin debt so you could go to heaven. The Bible's clear. You sinned against the Holy God.
[34:32] The wages of sin is death. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And the wages of that sin is death. But the gift of God's eternal life through Jesus Christ the Lord.
[34:42] He loves you. He wants to save you. And today you can know Jesus. Today you can understand the free forgiveness, the free pardon of all your sins. You can know that today. You can be saved.
[34:53] I want to ask you to do that. Trust Christ today. Be saved. Be sure that you go to heaven. Some of you, you're already saved, but you ought to surrender. I'll be a missionary. Some of the others ought to say, well, I'll pray about what God wants me to do, but I know I'm going to either go or give more.
[35:08] Why don't you decide today?