Missions Conference: Witness 1

[0:00] you will be listening to the recording of our 2012 witness missions conference so glad that you're here tonight glad to be in god's house together with you looking forward to what the lord's going to do tonight how many of you enjoyed last night say amen and then we had a wonderful time this morning uh in our class with brother starwalt and it sure enjoyed that and mrs sir walt we found out who runs the show at that house uh a man oh me and i found out that house is a lot like mine uh and so anyway so glad that you're here tonight i wanted to make sure you know that right over here at the entrance where it says foundations you can find some discipleship material and brother john pearson will explain all that to you brother john would you hold your hand up so the missionaries might talk to you and so there you there if you'd like to find out more about foundations uh we believe that uh it's important that they get good discipleship brother john runs leads that ministry in our church uh well uh i think we'll start with uh we'll just go ahead with brother marks how about you come on brother johnathan i was trying to figure out what we ought to do i'm glad you're here tonight and i'm excited about what god's going to do and i hope that you'll let the lord deal with your heart about world evangelism well we uh praise the lord that were able to be here tonight um we're thankful to worship god in his house and uh glad we can be a part of this conference been looking forward to it for some time uh we've been on debutation now for four months um we are at 14 we praise the lord for that uh we know he's been blessing leading us every step of the way and we are uh looking forward to uh perhaps telling you a little bit more about it in person um the slideshow was just going to be a presentation about the great need that's in japan um i would like to just tell you a little bit about the needs um since we're not gonna be able to get it running looks like um there's 6 852 islands in japan it's located in the pacific ring of fire 108 active volcanoes very extreme in many ways uh the people of japan are very needy for the gospel 127 million people less than one percent born again christians so that just to put into perspective for every 200 people that you would pass on the street maybe one would be saved that same statistic here is one in three so the need is incredible and they're packed into such a densely populated area i was telling brother peter's during uh uh dinner there that it's there's a great opportunity for the gospel to spread rapidly throughout that country if the lord will stir up just a hub in that one place in that one city of tokyo with 36 million people he could spread the gospel to the entire nation in just a short period of time because they don't travel outside of japan only 10 percent of the population of japan travels outside of the u.s and that number has jumped just in the past two or three years it used to be five percent but they do travel they just travel within their own nation uh so we're praying that the lord will do something that will prepare that he will prepare their hearts for the gospel uh so when we get there that leaders will be ready that their hearts will be that their hearts will be prepared for when we take the gospel to them uh we want to train leaders we want to start churches we want to do everything that we've already heard from the the messages here earlier and we want to do it with god's power and we know it's going to have to be in his time and so we're asking him to just prepare us as best he can and he's doing that on debutation he's teaching us by faith to walk with him he's teaching us how to trust him daily because we don't have everything that we that we need at the moment but we're we're trusting him and he provides every time exactly how we need it and we're so thankful for that and we're just privileged to be to be called to the place of japan um just a little bit about the call when i was in college i'd ask the lord specifically during a conference to take my life and do whatever he had wanted and it was it was in that conference where i come to the i came to the author and i surrendered my life but i didn't really understand much about missions it was just too great a task it was just too great of a responsibility for me to really think that the lord could use me and so i went home and i told my

[4:01] parents about it and they they didn't really uh respond like i thought i told a little people about they said well that's great and yeah it just wasn't what i thought it was and it was because i hadn't truly surrendered i come to the altar i told the lord he that he could do anything with me but after going to another conference and seeing what missionaries were actually doing and seeing pictures of their ministry i understood that i wasn't fully committed that i wasn't fully surrendered to go anywhere it was seeing pictures of poverty stricken areas seeing pictures of far away lands i realized that i was not willing to go anywhere that i was not willing to do anything that god wanted me to do and so with the same trembling and fear that i had the day i got saved i stood up from my seat and i came forward and with all the sincerity in my heart i told god i said from this day forward i'm going to seek after your will and i'm going to go wherever you'd have me to go and i asked him to put me in ministries where i could be used well he put me in a ministry at the university of tennessee this was at crown i graduated in 2006 and the lord allowed me to be in that ministry and i met people there that were of uh from japan and i was asking other people in the ministry that i joined if they were meeting people from japan and nobody was it was unusual i met probably eight or nine families from from japan and they kept meeting people from from africa and india and i was like i was wanting some variety but every door i knock on just about was japanese i worked with this one family in particular kiyoshi and yuko yamaguchi and i remember the first time i i looked at him i seen something in his eyes that was that was unusual he had a sincerity and he wanted me to talk to him he wanted me to tell him more so i asked him i said you know if you die today you go to heaven and he said i don't really believe in heaven it's like do you care if i take the bible with you and show you from the bible what it says about eternity so i don't believe in the bible it's like do you care if i tell you what god says about your eternal soul it's like i don't believe in god i never met anybody like that in my life and so i said uh well can i just tell you anyway can i just go through the gospel anyway went through it let the word of god do its work at the end of with all the sincerity that a person could have he told me that he was 20 sure that what i was telling him was true went home that night and i thought about it and i called him up went over the next weekend the next weekend the next weekend and just tried to pour the bible into him and yeah i was witnessing other people at the time but this one person i just had a burden for over two years period of time i went through four books of the bible and i wanted him to understand the truth time for him to get on a plane to go back to japan i asked kioshi the same question i said kioshi i've spent all this time with you and i was just really hopeful hopeful i just knew god was going to save him i had people in the ministry praying i was praying i knew god was using me i felt like this is what he had called me to do and i just knew kioshi was going to get saved that night well i asked him the same question i said i may never see you again kioshi and you may never see another christian again it's like do you care if i go through the gospel one more time with you this is the most important thing you've seen how it's changed my life and i went through with him and he bowed his head for the longest time after i asked him and i thought he was going to accept but he looked up and with frustration in his face and i think the frustration comes from his background you know from from his tradition he looked at me he said i'm 80 percent sure that what you're saying is true i want to believe but i and the reason he's giving these giving me these numbers because he was a scientist and he was very mathematical and so i didn't let him see it i gave him a hug i said goodbye and i went home with i had it out with god i hope you've never done that it's not a good place to be um and i was i'm ashamed of it but i went home and i was frustrated and i i pulled over on the side of the road before i made it home and i said god i thought you was going to use me i surrendered my life to do your will and i poured all my time into this one person and he didn't trust you i why didn't you use me and it was in that moment that he said son i did this person had nothing before you knocked on the door and now he admitted to you that he had 80 percent and it wasn't audible voice of god but i felt the tug on my heart i felt god before i got home the lord put pressed upon my heart he said would you give the rest of your life to see that this person had the other 20 percent and it's not just about him but it's about that people in in a in a general because they don't have the gospel they need somebody to go and to invest in their life and to become their friend and to show them that christianity is real because they have no knowledge of it whatsoever so i appreciate y'all praying for us as we go to japan it's going to be difficult but we're excited we know god can overcome every obstacle that stands in our way and we're trusting

[8:03] him we're looking to him and thank you very much god bless you here knows jonathan very well he led our singing uh he has led our music program and you all know him and i hope that you're excited about the opportunity we have to support him and the ministry god's given him and you'll pray for them that they will hurry on their way over to japan well we have a new man that we don't know yet brother mike peters where are you brother mike peters the missionary to spain uh we are introduced to him by scott newton and we're glad he's here so you uh meet brother peters amen well good to be here my name is mike peters my wife here in the front jen don't hold it against me that i'm friends with scott but uh we are we're definitely glad to be with y'all tonight we're missionaries going to spain the lord dealt with us about spain back in february 2011 at our home church missions conference over in illinois we uh surrendered to go that time went to spain the following month in march on our survey trip came back i quit my job on may the 20th and we had our first meeting on may the 22nd on deputation so god's been doing great things ever since and uh y'all are going to see about spain in a minute but the short time i got god is awesome and truthfully i could stand here the whole time just tell you blessing upon blessing about just the hand of god in our lives not because the peters or anything just a sinner saved by grace just like anybody else is but because he's everything psalm 74 let god be magnified and that's what spain needs to see that's what the world needs to see if they're going to want to know christ they got to see god magnified through us and our faith and what he's promised us in this book i mean it's a real book right here amen not just stories and things like that but a real book that's relevant for 2012 for the world so thank you very much pray enjoy our video in the year 1492 the spanish inquisition was established in the kingdom of spain to rid the country of all the christians and jews originally created to defend against the muslim invasion the inquisition lasted over 400 years and actually claimed hundreds of lives of those faithful christians who would rather die than renounce the name of christ death came through many avenues of torture and persecution the most common forms of this cruelty were the rack the guillotine the skull crusher thumbscrews sawing hanging beheading and burning at the stake the spanish inquisition was the pinnacle of satanic activity in that day most recently the country of spain has been ruled by a catholic dictator don francisco franco who was a contemporary of adolf hitler until his death in 1975 franco had made catholicism the official state of religion any defectors were persecuted or denied privileges today in spain there is no longer any martyrdom no inquisition and no ruling dictator god has supported the country with religious freedom and liberty as wonderful as this may sound it comes with a price the younger generation of spaniards has associated so-called christianity with a dead dictator they have become agnostic and atheistic in their mindset toward god this religious freedom has also been a breeding ground for the eastern religions and even the islam ultimately humanism reigns supreme in a nation that has nearly forgotten god with over 45 million people in spain there are only about 60 independent baptist missionaries in the country that's roughly 750 000 per each missionary also out of the 50 provinces in spain only 25 have an independent baptist church imagine 25 states in the u.s without an independent baptist church presence but even though spain is the least evangelized spanish speaking country in the world there is hope for spain hope is found through accepting jesus christ as

[12:06] personal savior and god has called the peter's family to go and bring the gospel message to the spaniard people please pray for them the truth found in his eternal perfect and inspired word can in fact bring liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound the peter's goal while in spain is to work with a veteran missionary for at least one year they will master the spanish language and learn to adapt to the culture while being involved in many ministries at the local church the lord has placed a burden in their heart to start a church and a bible institute in the city of vigo which has a metro area population of almost 500 000 people vigo is located in a region in galicia which has a total population of 3.5 million and not a single independent baptist church please pray that god will let them see many saved baptized and added to the church while we were in spain we were able to visit many different missionary families on one such occasion in madrid we had the privilege of assisting brother jeff andrews in distributing john and romans and gospel tracks door-to-door on a friday morning the following sunday a young spanish couple came to church for the first time due to the visiting efforts from friday it was exciting to see that god blesses soul winning in spain just as he does in the u.s only if christians are faithful to go during the sunday evening service that followed we were able to watch as five new converts followed the lord in believers baptism and then share their salvation testimony with the church family one of my prayers while on our survey trip was to speak with spanish people about their beliefs in god and eternity on one such occasion i met a young lady in her 30s named monica who spoke english and when i questioned her about her faith she told me this i'm agnostic i think the pope and catholicism has taken advantage of most people in spain the church is all about money while i work hard to make a living the pope lives like a king and unless i give my money to the church the priest won't help me if that's what god's all about then i don't want to have anything to do with him in another instance i was able to speak with a 23 year old man named pedro he asked why i was coming to spain and once i explained to him my desire to start a church he said this i don't believe a loving god would have allowed my sister to die when she was 15 years old and why should the priest be telling me that if i don't obey all the teachings of the church then i'll go to hell he's a man just like me why should i have to confess my sins to him the older generation of spaniards is catholic but only due to tradition the younger generation has become fed up with catholicism and is searching for real truth can god really break through the stony hearts of the people in spain hebrews 4 12 says for the word of god is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit the perfect and infallible word of god is strong enough to bring spain to christ but how will they know unless we bring his word to them well i want you to take this card if you don't have one maybe the guys will get you one and uh how many of you do not have one of these cards yet hold your hand up all right one or two people don't so to get a get those cards i'll hold your hand up again they'll get you one let me look at the card with you just a minute you know we're we're we're a very blessed church uh brother john sent me a text last night our goal was a hundred and two thousand dollars and we have given so far as of last night 108 000 is that correct brother john and so 102 000 we gave 108 and with the special gifts it's over 140 000 that you have given the world evangelism through vision baptist church and now we're getting ready to plan another year and so the purpose of this is that we would be witnesses and we would send the gospel around the world and it would be via our giving we we are training missionaries we are working at getting mysteries out but then we'll want to give

[16:10] and if you'll take the card you look at it uh you're going to have a part that you keep over here this big part you keep yourself and it just is a way to remind yourself there's not a place for your name you already know that you pick the amount you feel like the lord would have you to give and you plan on giving an amount this coming year uh to world evangelism uh we are supporting uh 42 missionaries if i remember correctly and uh we're going to add new missionaries and god's just been really good and blessed the expenses of the missions conference have been taken care of god even blessed especially with a mission offering last night god's just doing great things i want you to pray about what god wants you to do ask god what he'd have you to give and what part you'd have in getting the gospel around the world i'm excited i mean i'm excited somebody wants to go to spain my problem is i would go to every one of these countries my problem is i would go to everyone of these countries every time i hear one of these messages i think to myself man i wish i could go i wish i could see god do something great there and the only way we can do that is through our giving and our praying and our training and our sending other people so i hope you will pray for the peters and pray that god will hurry them on the way right now we're gonna have our very own brother wayne cook uh he's gonna come and you know they're on their way to the country of columbia and you listen as god speaks to us through him well amen it's a joy to be here tonight and it's always good to be here at my home church and first of all i want to thank you for all you guys do for us and for those you may not know us my name is wayne cook my wife lena here and we are on our way to columbia south america now just imagine tonight as one missionary gets up and one missionary sits down that some of you may look at us missionaries look kind of like firefighters going to a big fire with buckets of water and spoons trying to put it out because we talk about large numbers we talk about millions and billions of people you may say but that's futile it does it's not that important to me it just doesn't resonate it's not on my priority list and i would say this it wouldn't be a priority to you unless your house was in that city and your home was in that city and your children lived in that city and it would be very important to you if we got to to your house and we may not put anybody else's house out and they may perish but your family members would be very very important to you so i try to tell people brother chris as we go to church to church to try to prioritize missions in the right way put your family members name on that on that on that picture put your child's name if my son was over there in columbia without a gospel witness and if i couldn't get there brother jonathan i would want someone to go in my stead and someone to go and preach to him why because there's nobody else over there now there are very few missionaries if you think about the climate over there for many years because of the the danger people haven't went or because of danger they've had to leave and so there are people there but very very few over there preaching the lord jesus christ so prioritize it the right way and the missions will mean more to you if you prioritize it the right way and maybe a story that might help us and bring kind of home to us we're watching a documentary and i might have told this here before but we're watching a documentary on pablo escobar you know anything about pablo escobar he was the most notorious wicked vile violent uh drug cartel leader down there and the story goes on about the end days of his life and the funny thing to me that uh pablo escobar could could order you to be assassinated he could order your son or your daughter or your family members to be killed and most likely probably wouldn't lose a whole lot of sleep about it but the story goes on that as his days were numbered and he had already vowed that he would not be taken alive and he knew that the the uh american government along with the colombian government they knew of his whereabouts and so he began to try to send his family members out to other countries and it was even famous it was even noted that pablo escobar was a family man and i thought how could a man so so wicked and so vile and do all these treacherous things to my family members if i would live there or your family members if you lived there but he cared about his own family members and the story goes on and he was a very very wealthy man and as i sat there in my living room that day watching that video my mind went to a very very familiar portion of scripture another rich man who cared about his family and we know that story over there in luke chapter 16 and there's a story of two people on one side you have this this poor man he had to beg for things to eat the bible even says he sat out there and the dogs came and licked his sores but then the rich man the bible says he fared sumptuously

[20:10] every day if this rich man wanted something he could purchase it just like pablo escobar when he was alive forbes magazine said that he was the the seventh richest man in the world they said that he would have coffers or or cabinets of money that he couldn't spend fast enough that it had mold on that i'm sure some young people say man i would love to have that problem but death came to both men paulo escobar was assassinated and also this rich man in the story he dies and in hell he lifted up his eyes and basically he had two prayer requests for john number one he said can you send lazarus so he can dip his finger in water and cool my tongue because i'm tormented in his flame of course we know the story and and abraham says no that can't happen because of the great gold fix and he explains all that to the rich man and then the second prayer request we find there verse 27 he says then he said i'll pray thee therefore father that i would send him to my father's house now church i have a question this evening why would a rich man that the bible says fared sumptuously every day ask abraham to send a beggar to his family's house you know a lot of times we think of missions and missionaries as only going to the lower class of people and only going to the poor class of people you may ask me way when you get to columbia what class of people are you going to go to can i tell you i'm going to the class of people called sinners amen it doesn't matter they're rich it doesn't matter they're middle class it doesn't matter they live in the dumps of columbia they all are sinners and they all need the lord jesus christ but why would a rich man say abraham can you send a beggar to my father's house and this is the reason why he says therefore i have five brethren that he may testify unto them at least they also come into this place of torment you see paulo eschibar you see this rich man realized something just like i believe paulo eschibar realized when he opened up his eyes in hell you say oh when you're judging a man maybe i am but according to his testimony according to his life there was no salvation experience in paulo eschibar's life and this rich man says oh that someone will go i don't care if it's a beggar i don't care who it is i don't care what their name is as long as i know jesus christ and as long as my family members get saved and they do not have to experience the same torment that i'm experiencing day in and day out in church i believe if we could bring paulo eschibar up on this stage tonight just for a few minutes or just for 30 seconds josh and ask him to talk to us he would have the same two prayer requests basically can you make hell a little less like hell and we know that's not going to happen but i believe pastor here say can you send somebody i don't care if it's a beggar i don't care if it's a bald head a gringo i don't care who it is can someone brother jonathan go to my family members those people that i wanted to protect those people that i cared for those people that i tried to do everything i could to protect them while i was alive now i'm gone now i'm in eternity now my money cannot buy their security now my money cannot i know cannot buy their salvation can someone get there and so priority is this tonight if it was your family member that was over there if you were in eternity if you were a long way away and could not get there how important would it be tonight for missions how important would it be tonight for columbia and you know as i said before we're going to a class of people who we're going to sinners and the the the peculiar thing here the interesting thing here and i kind of have to agree with the rich man he said man you know if someone come back from the grave robert surely they would repent surely they would listen and i kind of follow his reasoning i mean if someone walked to the church house tonight there was that we that we had preached their funeral guess what we would all listen but he says they have moses and the prophets let them hear them so that's all we're about is preaching the lord jesus christ uh uh i believe that all of us are bible believers here tonight and we believe the word of god the question tonight is this is where's the rich man tonight he's still in hell where's paulo escuara tonight he's still in hell along with generation after generation after generation of people who have lived and died without the lord jesus christ so pray with us as we go to the country of columbia that is so true of us but can you think they don't have that they can't sing that song that song is not true to them they've never heard the gospel preached to them they've never heard about jesus they don't know how to go to heaven when they die and ought to be big on our hearts that we want to we want them

[24:11] to know the lord jesus as their personal savior i want to ask the young people to come and sing my heart and my desire uh and uh i think they have the video part ready for you tonight and that's like a theme song for us and i love this song and i love the fact that we can realize that young people and people from our church have been used of god in all sorts of different places right after this song brother richard jacob will come i'm looking for him you know there aren't too many there he is over there brother jacob you just come on up right after they sing brother jacob is a missionary to india india is kind of big on our heart the lord's uh it's the second largest country in the world and brother trent is uh honestly all the time thinking about what can be done to get the gospel to the country of india and uh now the lord's let us have brother paul talby and brother jim roberts is our good friend and uh now you get another one this man actually is indian he knows india he was looking at pictures and telling us all about where they were from telling brother trent where they're from and i asked him i said so brother trent says you know where they're from he said i'm pretty sure and so he can look at them and he knows and so you know i know too i can spot a yankee a mile away so i want y'all to know i can spot a yankee unless he's been converted amen it's all y'all being converted so i don't spot you except travis you still look like a yankee travis yes sir but anyway i want you to listen to brother jacob when he comes right after this song thank you pastor church family for letting us come i'm just privileged tonight uh pastor asked me if i knew a word verse in hindi and i i was like thinking about it all afternoon you know i said lord i need to learn worse and i learned worse yeshu merah charava hey mujay kuch gatnai na hoge the lord is my shepherd i shall not warn and uh quickly tonight in my little time that i have i want to share what god did with my life and what he's doing it's hard for me to say it without yours you know i just hope i don't really break down when i share my testimony you know god's been good uh 1985 to 89 was the year when i was wandering i didn't know what to do uh it was years when i was in church but i had no hope i never knew jesus i was in an anglican church for so long i never heard the gospel one time but i had a friend my wife's sister in my class and then she'd ask me questions you know would you come uh to bible college and i said uh maybe give it a try but uh four years had gone by had done nothing about it and one day i met her and she said why didn't you come and i said okay and i was working at a place in a campsite and at the time a canadian missionary was there and i was supervising the place and she asked me at the door she came to the door to ask me for some help and i said ma'am can i help you and she said uh no i didn't come here for any help but i i want to ask you a question richard if you die tonight where would you spend eternity nobody asked me that a couple months went by and it bothered me that question so i went to the college to pick up the farm and i was not doing anything four years of my life and and the lord tugged in my heart and i got saved i surrendered my life to jesus before that i was in the anglican church the pastor there was uh liked me a lot but never shared the gospel with me and he'd take me places and at times he'd go to he'd preach the message but before the message he'd be across the street smoking a cigarette and i said in my heart i said lord i never want to be a pastor ever and one day i remember two guys got saved there was a pastor that was excited about souls and he was sharing this testimony and two people got saved and he went to the secretary and said sir you know what two people got saved and i'm so excited i just came to share the news he said come on in come on in and the next thing he said was how can we celebrate pick a drink that you like i have all the drinks that

[28:14] you can think about alcohol we'll celebrate this event and i said lord i never want to be a pastor god by the grace of god i got saved god is so good god so great god so gracious to save me i don't know why even to this day i ask god god why would you pick on me i'm the most useless person ever you know but god was so good tonight i want to take very little time and share what god's doing god brought uh god trained me and allowed me to go to start a church in india pastored it for 13 years and god began to pluck me out of the church and i said god why i didn't want to come to america that was not my dream but god was doing something in my life i didn't understand i came to america in 2005 in 2005 there was no church in glendale i looked all over and my wife and i was so discouraged we cried because we left our church and now we had no church in america and then god brought us to church and a pastor came into our city and began to we began to help him start that church but pastor wilkeson came into our lives because we prayed and said god please send our kids to a christian school when you go to america we want to live right we want to have a home church where we can love and serve you and so god gave us that church i served as janitor there real for a couple years and pastor said brother jake you can come on staff you can serve as janitor i didn't know what it was so i dressed up the way i am and i went in there to his office he said hey brother jake you won't need that coat you wouldn't need those shoes just come on in i said sure pastor i'll do anything to serve god in this house and i worked as a janitor soon pastor said brother jake wanting to teach on staff be a full-time teacher i taught there for two years in the christian school i taught became the assistant pastor one of the assistant pastors there and started an Indian ministry and why i say all these things is not to brag on me but because god's so good god's so great but while i was doing all these things i thought about india it never left my mind and the people around india and so god began to tug in my heart and so in 2010 i began to shadow with pastor and we decided pastor said i don't think it's a good idea and then in 2011 he said brother jake one day we i went back to him said pastor what do you think about it he said let's go to india let's go and so we went and god did some amazing things we trained 120 pastors on that trip but god began to tug on my heart and so slowly we've been working hard to build a ministry of training men and the things that thou has heard of me in second timothy chapter 2 verse 2 it says among many witnesses the same cometh thou to faithful men and so uh the greatest thing is you know what i don't have to do this but i learned in my church i can i get to do this i get to serve god what a privilege you know and i have one life to live and i want to live it for jesus christ and so today you know the 1040 window has 2.76 billion people with approximately 5912 people groups that have never been reached for the gospel of christ and what i what can i do for india there's india has had the gospel of 2000 years but i don't know why it's not evangelized and i realized like pastor you know came by our church pastor gardner and began to share this vision and i and god just impressed my heart kept impressing in my heart you know the way to do it is to train men to let them go and do it i can be a channel through that and so tonight i just want to leave real quickly with one thought here two little lines i heard one day traveling along life's busy way bringing conviction to my heart and from my mind would not depart only one life will soon be past what's done for christ only what's done for christ will last oh let my love with fervor burn and from the world now let me turn living for thee and thee alone bringing the pleasure on thy throne only one life will soon be passed but what's done for christ will last only one life yes one life now let me say that i will be done and when at last i hear thy call i know i'll know i'll say it was worth it all only one life will soon be passed only what's done for christ will last you know what a great great god we have there's a lot of people like brother just shared that are dying and without god what are you going to do for

[32:17] that may god burden your heart and burn in your heart the desire to do something for the cause of world evangelism and thank god for my beautiful wife and my three children that love the lord and serve him as well my wife leo is with me tonight and i thank pastor in the church for letting me come pastor thank you how many of you enjoyed that say amen and uh brother jacob is the real thing he works on the church staff and brother john wilkerson gives very very high recommendations for this man and family and i fact is i understand from i think trent that when the pastor leaves town he only has eight living kids right and they all stay at your house and it's a two-bedroom apartment and he leaves eight children with their three children in that one apartment so pastor wilkerson must trust them a little bit amen i'm excited to have west gas away here he's going to egypt he loves the lord he's uh he's prepared he's excited he's dynamic and i hope that you'll pray that god will help us and help all these men to get to the field that god has for them i'm gonna look real quickly at romans chapter 15. we got to speak about egypt last night i also know this ministry is familiar with the country of egypt you're already supporting the only missionary that's living in the country today and we're honored to be at a place with that testimony if you have any other questions or things that you might like to ask about right now we'll do our best to help you out we stay in regular communication with our brothers in christ over there and they're very excited that more laborers are coming and we're honored to be a part of that we're going to read just a couple of verses real quickly romans chapter 15 we're going to start looking at verse 18 for i will not dare to speak of any of those things which christ has not wrought by me to make the gentiles obedient by word and deed through mighty signs and wonders by the power of the spirit of god i hope you take notice notice of the word power so that from jerusalem and roundabout unto a licrium i fully preach the gospel of christ pastor was talking about in one of the sessions we had earlier a phrase that you're probably very familiar with be do serve train and for y'all that is repetition for us it was something new a new philosophy that why it's biblical and i've heard it i don't believe i'd ever heard it quantified in that manner he talked about the area of be though who we are what's unseen in our lives and i began to think about that experiential experientially that's a bunch of inchlies in my life life and i asked myself this have we been praying about missions as much as we've been talking about it because the question while praying is doing can i say that praying will affect you on the b level that's where you're going to see the change you see after 14 months of deputation god's blessed us to be in more than 180 churches to be in a lot of places and while i don't have a lot of own field experience i'd say in the matter of deputation i'm fairly versed by this point in conferences and meetings of all sorts and manners and i'm going to tell you something from my experience over these past 14 months and they've been blessed and this is not a condemnation of any church can i tell you i've heard the discussion of traditional missions of national missions of appalling missions of translation difficulties of language and cultural fluency of insider movements and new cliques dynamic equivalencies equipping models apologetics i've heard all these different things discussed in many other theological areas in our life yet can i tell you that i've yet to go to a missions conference where the pastor said we've got five countries represented here and we want the missionaries to meet before and we're going to take an hour and spend a specific prayer on your mission field i've been soul winning for hours i have been bus captain doing for hours i have puttied floors painted

[36:22] doors painted walls helped in yards and lawns and praise god i need to learn all those things because by the way you get to do all that on the mission field can i tell you that i've spent very little time with churches in prayer about egypt why is that can i tell you something that we must realize and that you already know money has never preached the gospel we've spent one trillion dollars in africa since 1950 and you could probably ask mr how how many people have come and spent money i read of one story of an orphanage being repainted 20 times in 20 years so churches would feel like they were doing something all over the world today it is a racket for people to bring children into this world and to break their arms and their legs and scar their faces and set the children out to beg when missionaries come through money's never preached the gospel west what are you getting at i'm asking you the question tonight do you have a prayer life or do you have a life of prayer there's a dramatic difference between the two one is blocking out five minutes three times a day and trying to feel like you're doing something the other one is having a personal real i mean it's it's something special connection to god where you're constantly seeking his power can i tell you that paul was effective in preaching the gospel not because he spoke seven languages he was college educated that he had more zeal more fervor it's because he had power in his life i fully realized god's not going to send 10 000 missionaries to egypt and i think any one of you would that would try to believe that you're being foolish as a matter of fact there are no other missionaries right now with a call in their life to go to egypt if they were it'll be four years maybe starting tomorrow before they're going to get to the field so how is three families going to change 84 million lives it's going to have to be more than us isn't it it's going to have to be the power of god through us why is it today that missionaries are flocking home at a level unprecedented in the history of the independent baptist church we have veteran missionaries here that can tell you many logistical reasons why but can i also tell you why i believe they are i believe we have developed a group of anemic weak weak believers today that don't know what it is to tap into the true source of all power and that's jesus christ our savior can i tell you that in all my bible college that in all my experience no one ever emphasized we talk about prayer we love to talk about prayer but being prayer spending time in prayer spending time in prayer since i've been on deputation i know of three families my age they have come off the mission field i know of one that had a hundred percent support in deputation visas issued and didn't go it's not money what is it the question tonight is are you talking about missions as much as you're praying about them pastor well praise the lord i'm about ready to take an offer amen gentlemen if you're ready we're going to talk about money just a second that one worked out good i did that before when i was a missionary and he's right a hundred percent right money doesn't get it done we need to pray we need to get a hold of god we need to ask god to work i hope we are and i hope that we will do more so let me read uh two verses to you real quickly if i could second corinthians chapter eight and verse five

[40:26] second corinthians chapter eight and verse five look at what the bible says and we're talking about faith promise offering uh and i just want you to look at this it says and this they did not as we hoped but first gave their own selves to the lord and unto us by the will of god underline in your bible if you have it open right there that they gave their self you know this is a chapter about giving they were going to give to a need that was up in jerusalem it wasn't about getting mysteries around the world it was about helping other christians that were in trouble but real giving doesn't start with a wallet it starts with a heart real giving doesn't start with a budget real good giving starts with i want god to use me i love god and everything i have belongs to him they first gave their own selves the second thing that you'll notice in that verse and i guess i'm going to stop with that we'll get another verse tomorrow night but look if you would at the last part it says they gave themselves to the lord and unto us and it does you know what happened paul said the people love god and the people love the men of god the people love god and the people love the men of god and we have the honor and the privilege of having men here that are going to carry the gospel around the world i hope you love them fall in love with them care about them it is amazing how you feel about giving when it is your child that's the missionary it is amazing how you care about how they're going to get their their money and so what what if we were to fall in love with these mysteries how would god use us to give and to pray if it were our children father i pray that you bless this offering i pray that your name would be honored and glorified and magnified tonight and i pray god that you would continue to work in every part of the world i pray god for egypt i pray god that you'd use brother west as he goes there lord i thank you and pray for japan i pray god that you'd use jonathan i thank you for his fervor tonight i thank you for his heart i pray lord that you'd work in spain i thank you for brother mike and his heart and i pray god that you'd hurry him onto the field and use him there i thank you for wayne and his heart and his desire to get to columbia and i pray god you'd bless him and work in his life i pray god for india and i pray for brother richard i pray god that you do work there i pray that your name would be honored and glorified and magnified all over the world we love you and thank you and praise you for the privilege we have of serving you now god work through this offering and bring honor and glory to your name father we praise you in jesus name amen brother sir walt right after this uh special if you'll come and preach uh you're going to love brother sir walt you know they're leaving to go back to the field in about two weeks so spend your time get to know them a little bit music has been something special tonight it really really really has been there are 14 muslim countries that are on fire tonight let's just take a few moments and let's pray for missionaries that are there i know that in in each one of those countries there are missionaries and so we truly want to remember them god will protect them keep them safe there's also a family uh from savannah georgia that that is in sudan and they went there on a missionary uh survey trip and the family has not heard from them in two days and so let's remember this family then and pray that they're safe my daughter called my daughter's best friend when they were in college uh is from savannah and uh so her friend called her today and it is her um her father's brother's son so it would be her first cousin and they were on a survey trip to sudan into cartoon and so let's remember them in prayer that god will protect them tonight so let's go to the lord in prayer heavenly father heavenly father as we see the news reports and truly our heart is goes out to the family of those that were lost the ambassador and and those that were lost this week

[44:35] we pray for their families we pray father that through this the gospel of christ can reach these families and then father it's in our heart tonight i know that in many of these countries there are missionaries they are there undercover because the nations of islam would not allow them to be there but because of your grace and because they want to bring glory and honor into your name they have put their life to be in danger father is the wickedness and the evil of this world and then within these cities as they burn even tonight even today would have been nighttime their time father we pray for protection upon them we just ask you dear lord that you would protect each one of them we don't know them by name but we know they're there and so father we pray that you would put your hand of protection one and then father for this couple that had traveled to khartoum and they were to fly out today father may news come unto their family that they are safe and father we just pray again that you keep them safe you put your hand upon them but father whatever your will is we know that it will bring honor and glory to you whatever happens is going to bring honor and glory to you and that is what we want the most out of what is taking place today we pray these things in jesus name would you look with me in romans chapter 15 we're going to do a little bit tonight i thought well someone is going to do my introduction again tonight when he said go to romans chapter 15 uh and uh so i thought well we're going to have another short one tonight because 12 minutes of my introduction has already been preached and so i got to go to the one verse i wanted to look at anyway and uh and then you all got to go home early and so it was real good last night and i thought when he said go to romans chapter 15 i thought you got to be kidding me you got to be kidding me but he jumped right over me so so i'm not going to get a chance tonight to cut it a little short but i'm not going to take very long chapter 14 verse 1 we're going to go to 15 but go ahead and look at verse 1 in chapter 14 because chapter 14 and 15 are coming together chapter 14 verse 1 says him that is weak in the faith receive ye but not to doubtful disputation or he that believe it that he may heed all things another who is weak eateth herbs i want us to note that tonight that we are to receive one another with understanding now i appreciate the understanding that you've given unto me today i don't have all the answers and i don't know everything this is the way god has directed us this is the way we've done our work now um let us receive one another with understanding and that's what paul what paul is speaking of and if you go through the next down to verse number 12

[48:39] it deals that we receive each one with understanding we're not alike we're not alike now and we're never going to be alike and when you reach the mission field and when you're here within the church everyone is different we're not going to be alike but may we receive one another with understanding that is what paul begs of us and then look in verse number 13 of chapter 14 verse 13 says let us not therefore judge one another anymore but judge this rather that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother's way let us build one another up without offending let us build each other up without offending someone now can we can we not look at a brother and not and and and don't judge him i mean he's different than me and his thoughts are different and and maybe his programs are different and maybe his music is different and and and and maybe there's difference in us but but can we not build each other up without offending each other and that's what paul is asking he is asking those within the church of rome that that that this church he's never been to but he has the greatest desire in his heart to go to them and he reminds them let us build each other up without offending can we encourage each other if we're not alike can we encourage each other if we don't think alike let us build each other up without offending and then in chapter 15 verse number one he says he says we then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves can we please one another with christ as our example not to please ourselves but can we please one another to to to to to to to to as he says we that are strong enough to be one another using christ as our example not any time did the lord jesus now did he did he look unto himself to please himself but can we take the initiative to do what we can to please another to to to to to encourage them to to to to as he says we that are strong bear the infirmities of the weak i mean can we bear the infirmities of the weak without making an announcement now about how good we are now and and and and how they are how weak they are can we not just bear them beloved if we're going to reach the world for christ we have to work together we have to work together can we please one another with christ our example and then read with me verse number seven through verse 13 wherefore receive you one another as christ also received us to the glory of god

[52:43] now i say that christ jesus was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of god to confirm the promises made unto the fathers and that the gentiles might glorify god for his mercy as it is written for this cause i will confess to thee among the gentiles and sing unto thy name that's psalms 18 49 and then he says and again he saith rejoice ye gentiles with his people that's deuteronomy 32 43 and again praise the lord all ye gentiles and laud him with all ye people that's psalms 117 1 and again isaiah saith isaiah says there shall be a root of jesse and he that shall rise to the reign over the gentiles in him shall the gentiles trust now the god of hope fill you with all joy and peace and believing that you may abound in hope through the power of the holy spirit and that's isaiah 11 10 paul wanted to go through what the old testament says paul wanted to to show what it is can we rejoice with one another in the plan of god can we rejoice in god's plan beloved let's go back again do you know that that that the zeal for the glory of god is the primary reason for missions it is it is not that we go and save the world because we don't save anybody not one person i've never saved anyone never have never will i mean sometimes we take that we take we take credit oh i led this person to christ god did it all we didn't do anything he did it all our purpose is to glorify god god you that are going to egypt and you that are going to japan and you that are going to spain i'll let you in on a little secret 35 years from now you're not going to have 300 churches and 50 000 people in those churches you're not going to have it you won't you know let's be realistic i don't god can do anything absolutely god can do anything but we're also going to be realistic now but what is what is your purpose your purpose is to bring glory to god and every person that receives the lord jesus christ whether it's four or five muslims in that time whether it's 10 or 20 or whether it be a hundred or a thousand each one that is brought to christ will bring glory unto god and that is our purpose and that is our only purpose is to bring glory to god he says again wherefore receive ye one another as christ also received us he received us

[56:45] he saved us the holy spirit of god called us and drew us and christ received us that's our salvation and it was done for what reason to the glory of god verse seven to the glory of god jesus did it for the glory of god that's why he did it to bring glory to the father he did it for no other reason he didn't do it because sinners needed it now you don't misunderstand me all those things are important but all those things are under his purpose absolutely sinners needed it there wasn't any other way there wasn't any other way but his purpose was to bring glory to god my beloved my beloved if you bring glory to god you have accomplished everything that god asks of you there have been many missionaries who have gone before you many missionaries who have gone to egypt before you many missionaries who have gone to to to to japan before you many missionaries have gone to spain before you they're good people they're good missionaries but the numbers aren't there they're not there i don't know why but i know this that our purpose in going is not for numbers our purpose in going is not to be able to come back and show hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people on the on the slides so we can sit back with our arms folded and and feel good about ourselves and and watch that video over and over and over again and and and we feel good about ourselves and then we pity the next man that comes along who who has been in egypt and he's poured out his life and he's poured out his heart and everything that everything that he has and he shows two little muslim ladies that have received christ and we kind of sit back and we think oh boy poor him i'm glad i'm not him that's not our purpose our purpose is to bring glory to god and you bring glory to god with your sacrifice you bring glory to god with your sacrifice if god wills and you pour your life out and there are just a few that come but you have poured your life into it you have brought glory to god you brought glory to god and that is his purpose our purpose is to bring glory to god that was the purpose of the lord jesus christ this section we are to rejoice with one another because of god's plan god's plan is to bring glory to god jesus continued to say it again and again and again and again all through his ministry this is my work to bring glory unto the father this is my work this is my work

[60:48] this is what i'm doing is to bring glory unto the father beloved this is our work this is our work whether it's here in the atlanta suburbs or whether it is whether it is in kenya or whether it is in south america in africa or south america whether it is in asia our work is to bring glory to god bring glory to him verse number eight says and now i say that jesus christ was a minister of the circumcision the jews for the truth of god to confirm the promises made under the fathers again he says jesus christ was a minister to the circumcision to the jews and what was that purpose that purpose was to show that god is true that he's truth what he promised he will do you see beloved if we bring glory unto god then his truth the promises that he made he'll not break the promises that he made it says that the truth of god to confirm the promises made under the father god has made promises unto us and the promises that he has made is not here on this earth the rewards don't come here they don't come here somebody might walk around and slap you on the back and say oh man you're the best missionary there is and you and i absolutely know that that means absolutely nothing it means nothing nothing at all because the promise that is made by the father that promise that he'll not break just like he didn't break the promise to the circumcision he will not break his promises to you and to i he'll not break them and those promises are that there's a reward for our faithfulness there's a reward for those who bring glory to god that's the promise and that's what we live for we don't live for anything that we get here on this earth those things are not those things are not important to us yes pastor was talking today how many missionaries leave over little petty things things that don't make any difference in the world they don't they make no difference they're not important to anyone anything certainly not important to god but yet that's why they leave god god shows his truthfulness he confirmed his promises to the circumcision and he confirms his promises to you and i we bring glory to god we bring glory to him i absolutely guarantee you that there is a crown in heaven that waits for you oh but you say oh but but you know missionary uh you know in africa in kenya and in in in in sub-sahara africa so many churches are being built and so many people are coming to christ and and the numbers are staggering and we just have we just have a few muslims you brought glory to god

[64:51] you brought glory to god you spent your life to bring glory unto him when you do there's a reward that is promised he'll not go back on his word he doesn't look at you know we we get all hung up on the numbers all hung up on the numbers and i know i i i being an old missionary and i'm an old missionary and and you get with the young guys and that and you know the pressure sometimes they're under sometimes pastors look at you now and and those numbers don't match up to somebody else in their minds and you're under great pressure now and and and and so you're looking for any way that you can do it any way to boost numbers any way to show something any way to to be able to present something and all we need to do is bring glory to god look at verse number eight again he says then he confirmed the promises i'm sorry verse number nine and that the gentiles might glorify god for his mercy now that's got to be that that that that's got to that's got to bring chills up and down our spine doesn't it that the gentiles that the gentiles might glorify god for his mercy there are many people in kenya that make a profession of faith and that's all in god's hands anyway now on how many are are are true confessions or that's all in god's hands but you got to believe pastor you got to believe when someone is so deep in the islam i think there's got to be an extra shout in heaven when they come to christ there's god when someone's so deep in japanese culture that you can witness to them for two years and witness and witness and witness and you move them from 20 percent to 80 percent you got to believe there's an extra shout when they come to christ and i'm not belittling our people now man we we're we're excited this is where god has placed us we love our people and this is where this i couldn't be anyplace else i'm like the pastor i look at all these all these and i sometimes sit back and think you know well i could do that i could do that but it didn't take very long to bring me back to reality my heart is an african heart that's where i want to be let us let us let us may the gentiles glorify god for his mercy he goes on again to say as we finish now again he said rejoice ye gentiles rejoice now rejoice with his people he says again reach and again praise the lord all you gentiles and laud him applaud him cheer for him cheer for him all you people and isaiah says

[68:52] there shall be a root of jesse that he shall rise over the gentiles and in him shall the gentiles trust what a promise what a promise what a promise from isaiah what a promise hundreds of years before christ was born what a promise now the god of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that may that we may abound in hope through the power of the holy of the holy ghost what a promise our purpose is the same purpose the same purpose that jesus had the same purpose i come to glorify the father and that is our purpose let's pray heavenly father thank you again our heart is moved today about 13 countries on fire our heart is moved because there are missionaries underground in every one of those countries our heart is moved father we want to bring glory to you i know that's the heart of those missionaries whether they're in hiding whether they're whether they're they're up and they're they're they're closed up in their houses they want to bring glory to you they know what the dangers are father they know that that they have laid their life on the line they know that that that they could die because of because of the muslims they know that father let us bring glory unto you may that be our only purpose in our life i pray in jesus name thank you for listening to the recordings of our 2012 witness missions conference for more information log on to www.visionmaptist.com