Thank you so much Pastor Anderson for this opportunity to preach tonight and it's a really great conference.
I really love this mission conference, especially the first day. It was awesome to be here, just the great spirit and it was so motivating.
And tonight obviously I'm going to preach about the country of Germany. We've heard a great sermon by Brother Dylan Oz.
And he just kind of gave his experience going soul winning in Germany. He kind of gave the good side.
I'm going to give you the bad and the ugly side. I'm going to give you the background about our sowing ministry in Germany.
And thinking about our ministry in Germany, one thing really comes to mind which is the heavy persecution and oppression by Germany
and the resilience and strength of a group of spiritual Christians just serving God against all odds.
This is the title of my sermon, "Serving God Against All Odds." And you're here in 2 Corinthians chapter 11.
It says in verse 26, "Often in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by my own countrymen,
in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren."
So the Apostle Paul is basically defending himself.
And the idea here is that you can really see who's legit. You can really see the character of a person by letting him go through persecution, through stress.
If you want to test someone, let them go through stress. Let them go through a test and you'll really see if they are legit or not.
So all these people leaving our church, it's either because they are weak, wicked, or both. That's it.
And you know what? That group in Germany, that is the real deal. These people are the real deal. They have stood the test.
And I'm specifically thinking of my friend in Germany. He has wife and kids and his house got raided by the police.
And he didn't even preach, he didn't even get up. He was just psychologically supporting, I guess, because he wasn't in a WhatsApp group. That's it.
And yet he is soul-winning every week, consistently. Every single week he's out there soul-winning in the city of Pforzheim.
And I'm talking sometimes to him and he's like, "Well, it was so great when I was going soul-winning twice a week."
And I'm like, "Dude, it's okay if you just go once a week. It's okay. What you're doing is awesome. You don't have to go twice a week."
Like you have wife and kids, you receive persecution without even any cost whatsoever. Being in a WhatsApp group, that's it.
And not only that, but at the same time, in three different cities, homes were raided of our brothers at the same time.
So it was like a coordinated attack, coordinated raid in January of this year, I believe.
At the same time, three brethren got their houses raided for hate speech or whatever.
And both our preachers, Brother Moses and Brother Andy from Austria, they lost their jobs multiple times.
These people are really going through legit tests, legit persecution, legit perils.
And also just thinking of brothers who are coming to our soul-winning group, they maybe go to a church that's just near them, that they can reach by car or whatever.
And they are getting pressured in the church every time they go there, "Why are you part of that group? Why do you go sewing?"
That's stressful, going to a church where you want to be among brethren and want to be encouraged.
We're here to have fellowship, right?
But then people in Germany are going to a church and also attending our soul-winning marathons, and they're getting pressured at the church.
That can be stressful because you want to go to church to be at least once a week in your Christian bubble and be among like-minded people.
And also just thinking of my brothers and sisters in Germany who are leading a godly life in a crooked and perverse generation, which is Germany.
It's a crooked and perverse generation over there.
That shows character. And just to give you some stats, from January 2022 to November of this year, our soul-winning group in Germany had 638 salvations,
which is only counting salvations of our official soul-winning times, official soul-winning events.
This is not counting salvations just from personal soul-winning.
So it's probably like a thousand. If you count all the personal soul-winning every week, plus the marathons and other soul-winning events, it's probably like a thousand, if not more.
And all the people that got saved through the Bible Way to Heaven online and everything, probably over a thousand and sixteen baptisms so far.
And at least 131 sermons were preached in total. This includes sermons by Brother Moses, Brother Andy, by myself, and obviously Brother Dylan Oz,
and Brother Mateusz from Poland who came and preached for us and baptized seven people this year, covering 40 books of the Bible.
That's a good amount of preaching. That's good, solid spiritual food that they're getting there.
And I've counted seven full-length Bible documentaries that we translated from English into German, fully dubbed into German.
Sometimes, it's funny, in Europe and some countries, like in Poland, they don't actually dub their movies. They just talk over the movie without any acting.
So you hear the English version, and then it's like Polish talking. But they don't really act. It sounds weird.
That's how they watch movies sometimes. But we actually fully reenacted the movies with our voice.
At least seven full-length Bible documentaries that have also earned us persecution.
In verse 26, it says "and perils by my own countrymen." And that is especially true in a nation like Germany. That is a nation of oppression.
I was kind of going back and forth about the sermon title. Should I call it "Germany, a nation of oppression" or something?
But I wanted to focus on the people, on the work that has been done. So I think "serving God against all odds" is a better sermon title, but it could also be "nation of oppression."
At the same time, though, even though all this oppression and persecution is happening, at the same time, Germany and Europe in general are known as the Christian Occident.
So we have the Orient, which is the East, and the Occident, which is the West. So Europe in general, especially Germany, is known as the Christian Occident, which is just really a traditional cultural thing.
It's not a religious thing anymore. Germany is not a Christian nation anymore. It's just a cultural, traditional thing.
And we have these people in Germany. They are all against Muslim immigration and everything. We are the Christian Occident.
But then they probably don't go to church, maybe some Protestant church. Most of them obviously aren't saved. It's really just a cultural thing.
But Germany really does have a long-reaching Christian history that goes back, you could say, to the 4th century.
So even very soon after Christ, and obviously back then Germany didn't exist in the way it exists today, but even very soon after Christ, there was a Bible translation done into the Gothic language.
And the people who translated this Bible translation, it's disputed if that was one guy or a group, but they actually developed the Gothic script just for the purpose of translating the Bible into the Gothic language.
And I love this kind of fact because the Bible really stands above all history. Every time you check the history, the Bible stands above it. You can always find something.
Also, Germany has a history of persecuting Christians. The Catholics, obviously, the Lutherans, they persecuted Christians.
During Nazi Germany, there was no real religious freedom, obviously. In the German Democratic Republic, which was socialism, no religious freedom, needless to say.
So you turn to Psalm 1, turn to Psalm 1, and this history has left its mark on Germany. It has really left its mark in the sense that people, especially in Eastern Germany, have turned away from the faith.
And when I started soul winning in 2018, I went soul winning in my hometown, Gaulitz, which is the easternmost town in Germany, close to Poland.
And this was in the former German Democratic Republic, which was a socialist state. Germany was divided into West Germany and Eastern Germany.
And I knocked on this lady's door and I was asking her if she was a Christian or something, and she basically told me, "I'm a citizen of the German Democratic Republic."
So I'm asking her like, "Are you interested or something? Are you a Christian? I'm a citizen of the German Democratic Republic."
And so she's basically saying, "No, I'm not interested in Christianity because I grew up in a socialist state."
And this socialist state has turned many people away from Christ, away from religion in general, but most importantly, biblical Christianity, obviously.
And over a year of going soul winning there, I had no salvations. Now, that sounds pretty lame.
So why am I saying this in a missions conference? We're about missions, right? No salvation is cool. But it gets exciting, though.
It gets exciting if you stay with it. Things always get exciting if you don't give up, but if you stay with it.
That's something you need to know just for your life in general. If you stay with something, it will get exciting someday.
So look at Psalm 1, and we're going to proclaim with a palmist. The palmist who wrote these following words.
It says in verse 2, look at verse 2, "But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season.
His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper."
And what I want to focus here, it says that bringeth forth his fruit in his season.
There are seasons for plants to bring forth fruit. So you're going to have a season in your life when you're bringing no fruit forth.
When you're not getting anyone saved. But you need to get through that season and just stay with it and don't give up and don't die.
You need to stay alive as a tree. And eventually you will bring forth fruit. You need to stay with it and it will get exciting.
So then in 2019, I met a brother in Dublin, Ireland, out of all places.
It was a soul-winning event that originally Pastor Anderson wanted to come to, but obviously he was banned from that country.
But I went to that event, it still happened, and I met a brother from Germany.
Oh, well you're from Germany too, that was kind of cool.
And we basically started a group called "Deutschlands Seelengewinn", which means "Winning the Souls of Germany".
Basically it was just us two, so it wasn't really something huge.
And we just went sewing together in different cities and I would meet up with him in Pforzheim.
And he would come to me, to Biolitz.
And eventually in Pforzheim we did start for some time a church plant, and I'm going to touch on that later.
And Western Germany proved to be more receptive than Eastern Germany.
And part of the reason is socialism in Eastern Germany. That's part of the reason.
And Western Germany is just more Catholic, especially Southwestern Germany, where Pforzheim is in, it's just more Catholic.
And we get Mexicans saved here, and they are Catholics.
So it's generally more receptive.
And my wife told me that when she was there in Pforzheim, she sometimes saw houses with some Bible scripture over the door.
You can sometimes see that here, where Mexicans would have some Bible verse on their house.
It's kind of the same thing. I don't see that in Eastern Germany at all.
So then the group grew and faithful work listeners would join, and we organized successful soul-winning marathons.
And then in 2020, Brother Moses joined, and he had this crazy idea to start preaching.
It wasn't even my idea. Where is he? Oh, okay.
So Brother Moses had this idea, "Hey, when we do a soul-winning marathon, you could preach in German, I could preach in English."
So he came up with this idea to preach the Bible, and oh boy, that was a good idea. That was a crazy idea.
I'm going to turn to Jeremiah chapter four, verse three. Jeremiah four, three.
I'm going to read to you from Ezekiel 34, two. It says, "Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel.
Prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God unto the shepherds, Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves.
Should not the shepherds feed the flocks?" And you know, that's the situation in Germany where pastors, shepherds are feeding themselves.
They are not feeding the flock. They are not giving good Bible doctrine. They are not preaching the whole counsel of God.
Most of them are damnable heretics. There are some safe pastors in Germany.
There are some old IFB churches in Germany. Praise God.
Most of them are not serving God. They are damnable heretics and they are leading people astray.
And it needs new people to rise up, men to rise up and preach the whole counsel of God in a nation like that and rebuke false prophets.
So then in February of 2022, we had a great soul winning marathon with nine soul winners come out and had eight salvations.
So almost one salvation for every soul winner. We had a great experience.
You know, it was one of the best events that I've been to. Just great spirit and new people joined and so many salvations.
And it's just a great experience to start something new, especially in a place like Germany.
Starting something new and knowing finally people are actually going soul winning.
And I'm sure there's some guy out there. I hope so. But you know, finally there's a group that you can even find online.
Because back in 2017, I was trying to find a group online, soul winning Germany. I just typed it in. Nothing.
So a couple of years later, the dream came true. We had a soul winning group.
And in that event in 2022, you know, I preached a sermon called Woe to the sinful nation.
And you turn to Jeremiah, verse chapter four, three, actually. Let me just read you that to you.
It says, For thus sayeth the Lord to the men of Judah and Jerusalem, break up your fellow ground and so not among thorns.
So the idea here is you need to break up the ground that has been all grown over with thorns, with all these weeds that you don't want to have.
You need to break it up and do something new. Don't sow among thorns. Don't try to reform German Christianity.
Don't try to reform the church or something. Just do something new. Just get over with it. Burn all the thorns.
You know, they need to go away and do something new. And I'd like to compare that to Matthew 13, 22.
It says, I'm just going to read that to you. He also that received seed among the thorns,
a seed that heareth the world and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the world and it becometh and he becometh unfruitful.
So the world gets choked and we don't want to have our efforts choked by false Christianity.
We don't want to try to reform the church or something. We just need to do something new.
Just get rid with the old stuff and do something new.
And that is obviously just a cool experience being in Germany, which is a heathen nation. It's not a Christian nation anymore.
And just doing something new. That is very motivating and it always motivates me when I preach a sermon.
Hey, I'm giving doctrine to Germany and it's something that is lacking. And German Christianity as a whole is kind of thorns.
You just need to do something new. And like I said, during that sewing marathon, I preached a sermon,
I preached a sermon and I kind of knew that this would get me into trouble. I already knew that.
Because in Germany there's this law called Volksverhetzung, which means like steering up the people to hate or something, hate speech basically.
And I knew this existed, but you know what? Preaching the Bible is always right. It's just right.
And before that, I'm just going to go over a couple of points, just our history, how everything started, just to give you some background.
Before that we translated the Sodomite Deception into German. We fully dubbed the whole documentary and that got us into trouble.
And Brother Moses did a great job with that. He's really talented with dubbing documentaries. He did a great job.
And there were multiple articles written about the documentary and for some reason I got all the persecution.
I didn't even do most of the work, it was mostly Brother Moses, but then I got mentioned because you're basically, you're guilty if you're spreading hate.
You don't have to be the author. If you're the one who's spreading it publicly, you're guilty and you can get charged.
Then fast forward to March 2022. My home where I lived with my dad got raided. Police showed up.
And I lived with my dad at home and I just want to mention that because it's kind of cool. Back in 2017, I sent an email to the church.
I was asking, "Hey, is it better for a single guy to stay with his parents or is that okay to move out?"
And Brother Daniel Reiter, he answered that email actually. I still have it.
And he was saying, "Based on that verse, it's better to stay with your parents. I don't know, you were volunteering for the church or something?"
And I took that advice and I stayed with my dad. It's not only old people telling younger people to stay with their parents.
It's also a young guy like me telling you to stay with your parents until you're married. That's the right way.
And you will get blessed and God blessed me.
So after a priesthood sermon and before we did the Sodomite Deception translation and all that stuff, multiple articles were written and my employer got contacted.
And he showed me this email on his phone. It was like, "Come over here. Yes, sir. What's happening now? This is the day."
So he showed me this email on his phone which said, "Stop the hate 666. Define irony." That was the email address.
He showed this email to me and said, "Your employee, he's spreading hate on Twitter."
And he quoted this tweet where I said, "LGBTQ, let God burn them quickly."
And then my employer was like...
He didn't even say something. He was just like, "Whatever."
So that was the coolest day of my life.
Then in March 2022, like I said, police shows up. So I wake up. I wanted to go to work. And police is in my room.
So one of the police officers, he's like, "Are you Anselm Urban? Yep. So did you spread hate against homosexuals or something? Yep."
So here's the, I don't know, what's the English word for that, but the letter that said, "We're going to raid your home. This is what we're going to do."
So he showed it to me and obviously I couldn't resist. There were at least five police officers in my room.
And they took all my electronic devices, phone, computer, whatever, every storage media like hard drives, disks, everything they could find to do an investigation on something that is online.
Everything we've ever done is publicly available. That's the reason why you're coming to my house, because it's publicly available.
And you want to investigate? What are you talking about? It's madness.
And so this guy that first talked to me, I know him back from high school. That was the weirdest moment in my life. I know the guy's name.
We had PE lessons together. And in that year, 2022, we saw a total of 134 people getting saved. That was great results.
Shortly after March 2022, I don't know exactly the day, I don't remember, Pastor called me.
And so what you need to know is, even shortly before that, we were kind of adopted as a soul-winning outreach ministry by Faithful Word.
Pastor told me, "Hey, you need to get out of there. Get out of the European Union as fast as you can." And I'm like, "Okay, this is my ticket, I guess. I'm just going to leave."
So I left everything behind and came to the U.S. through Mexico, jumped on a bus where the lady said, "No galas." That's something I understood.
I just hoped it would take me to no galas, so it did. But yeah, that year was a successful year anyways.
On November 11, I'm sorry, in November of that year, we had 11 soul-winners and 24 salvations. That was a great event.
24 salvations in one day. That's a great result. You don't have to go on a cruise ship and fill your belly with all that good food to get 24 salvations.
You can do it in Germany. Sometimes it happens, but you can go on a cruise. I mean, that's cool.
At the end of 2022, I had this idea to maybe turn the soul-winning group into a church plant. So I brought it up to Pastor and she was like, "Yeah, sounds like a good plan."
So I was like, "Okay, I guess we have a church plant now. That's cool. Amen."
Obviously, I made a plan. Would this be viable? Can we do this? What do we need to do legally? Do we have the people?
And this worked out for some time. Now we're back to a soul-winning group, which I think is the right decision.
We should just stick with that and just continue going soul-winning in Germany. And I'm always saying "we" because I kind of count myself in.
It's obviously something I care about, but yeah, I'm not physically there, but I still care about our soul-winning group.
It says in 1 Corinthians, chapter 16, verse 9, "For a great door and a factual is opened unto me, and there are many adversaries."
Obviously, if you try to build a church plant in Germany, this is something where you're going to have a lot of adversaries.
It's a great door that opens, but there are a lot of adversaries. We have perils or opposition by our own countrymen.
You can turn to 2 Chronicles 16. It says in Matthew 13, verse 57, "And they were offended in him, but Jesus said unto them,
A prophet is not without honor, safe in his own country and in his own house." Especially in Germany, you will have opposition, you will have perils by your own countrymen.
Especially if you want to start a soul-winning group, let alone a church plant where actually the Bible is preached. Everything in the Bible.
We never had any problems with Muslims. Not once. In fact, almost the only people who ever let me in into their house were Muslims.
They were super hospitable. They let me in. We sat down, drank our tea. It was kind of awkward because we couldn't really communicate a lot.
But they were hospitable, nice people in general. Never had any problems with Muslims. Seriously. Only problems with Germans.
And I say "we" because back in Germany when I was going soul-winning, eventually I had a silent partner from my church that I was going to.
So yes, I went to church all the time. When I got saved in 2016, I always went to church. And you don't have an excuse to not go to church.
Don't say something like, "Well, but, you know, this and that." Just go to church. Just do it. You will survive, even in a liberal church.
I survived many years in a liberal church. I always prayed that I would just learn something and be a blessing. It wasn't great, but I survived.
And yeah, with my silent partner, sometimes we were let in by Muslims and I would try to talk to them, but it wasn't really fruitful anyways, obviously.
The only other people who ever let us in were Catholics. There was this one very traditional type of Catholic couple they let us in.
And then they were like, "Well, we're going to ask the father at church about what you told us."
So I think, yeah, go ask your daddy at church who dresses like mommy. OK. Obviously I didn't tell him that.
But it's kind of weird to say, "We're going to ask the father." Young people are very receptive in Germany. That's the good part.
Very receptive, especially in Eastern Germany. Polish people, Polish young people who are kind of Catholic, but not really, they just almost always get saved.
I mean, I had great results going there just talking to young people. Old people, super unreceptive, and there was this one story.
A journalist came to our church band in Pforzheim and he was asked by someone if he is saved.
And then he wrote his article and he was saying in the article, "And then they asked me if I was saved." As if that was a crazy question.
So obviously Germans in general are kind of disconnected from Christianity. But young people are receptive.
We never had any problems with Muslims, only with Germans. Not the young Germans, but German government obviously, our own countrymen.
"Paralleled by the heathen," you were there in 2 Chronicles 16 verse 10, it says in 2 Chronicles 16 verse 10, "And then Asa was wrought with a seer and put him in a prison house, for he was in a rage with him because of this thing.
And Asa oppressed some of the people at the same time." And what stood out to me when I read that verse?
A king, a ruler, who is oppressing the seer, who is oppressing the prophet, who is oppressing Christians, he is also oppressive to the people.
Oppressing Christians is oppressing the people. And you kind of see that in Revelation chapter 12 where it jumps from the birth of Christ all the way to the tribulation.
Where the devil is obviously trying to kill Jesus and he is persecuting whole mankind.
And kind of the picture there is that persecuting Jesus, persecuting Christians is persecuting whole mankind.
But it's as bad because obviously as Christians we are truly on the side of people. We're truly on their side, we're in their boat, we want to get them saved.
We're not against them, but it's them not realizing that we're for them. That's really it.
We're controlled by the heathen, heathen rulers obviously being against us. Heathen like Sven Lehmann trying to stop us.
Sven Lehmann is the queer commissioner of the German government. So Germany has a queer official who has millions of euros at his hands to indoctrinate people.
Seriously. And I preached against this guy. I called him out obviously.
And Germany is a country that literally has a homosexual in their government infiltrating brainwashing people and it's state sanctioned.
He's given millions of euros. And obviously these people who sued us, he's one of them, other government officials, they're always trying to find some false witnesses or bearing false witness.
You can turn to Acts chapter 6 if you can real quick. Acts chapter 6. I'm going to start reading in verse 9. It says, "Then there arose certain of the synagogue, which is called the synagogue of the libertines and Syrians and Alexandrians and of them of Silesia and of Asia disputing with Stephen."
Acts chapter 6. I started reading in verse 9. It says, "And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spake.
Then they suborned men, which said, 'We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and against God.' And they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes and came upon him and caught him and brought him to the council and set up false witnesses, which said, 'This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place and the law.'"
And so on. So, obviously they have to find some false witnesses, they have to bear false witness to condemn a righteous person.
And we were, what's the word, basically media reported about us that we're delegitimizing the state and delegitimization of the state is actually something you can do in Germany.
It's a crime. And I'm like, I told this one journalist who called me, I told her, it's like look, what we're saying is that the state should have the power to put sodomites to death.
So we're saying the state should have the power, but we're delegitimizing the state? We're like doing the opposite.
And both mayors of Pforzheim sued me. So German cities, they have like two mayors, like a head mayor and a deputy mayor, I don't know.
Both mayors sued me because I called them out in a sermon because they were supporting a pride parade in Pforzheim.
And the patron or patroness of the pride parade is the female dean of the Protestant church in Pforzheim.
I mean it's a church official being the patroness of a pride parade. And you know what she said in an interview? She said, you can't just rent a space and just say whatever you want.
I'm like, shut up. Yes, actually we can. That's what we do. You can't just rent a space and like say whatever you want. You can't just do that, right?
You know, how about she keeps silence? Isn't that what the Bible says? That women are to keep silence in the church?
Perils among false sisters. Perils among false sisters. 2023 is the year when a church sued a church for preaching the Bible.
I'm not kidding. A church, Protestant church, suing our church plant or people of our church plant. I don't even know it. Whatever, I'm here so I don't care.
As far as I'm concerned, right? I mean nothing's happening to me. Suing us for preaching the Bible, for anti-Semitism or something.
That is Germany, my friend. You can go to Ezekiel 33. Ezekiel 33. I'm going to read to you from 1 Samuel 14 verse 6.
And Jonathan said to the young men that bear his armor, come and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised.
It may be that the Lord will work for us. For there is no restraint to the Lord to save by many or by few.
And I was thinking of this verse regarding our former church plant. Why would he even do something like that?
But obviously if you want to do something like that, it's like, well we can try. We can give it a shot.
God can work something out. And if it doesn't work out, well then it is what it is. We've tried it.
And I told the people of our soul winning group, I told them, look, we don't want to be like the apostles in the book of Acts who are trying to get the Jews saved.
Like if they don't want to get saved, if they are against us, whatever, okay. We don't want to be so stubborn and just try to go to the Jews.
So if it doesn't work out, we can just switch back to being a soul winning club. Because soul winning, that works in Germany.
It's perfectly legal. You can go soul winning. You can get people saved. But obviously you will have problems if you're preaching the whole council of God.
So having a church plant in Germany, it might not be as of now 100% viable.
But you know, we're still preaching the Bible. Not only the Gospel, but we're planning for Christmas, like a Christmas party.
And brethren from our soul winning club, they could take turns in preaching and have like a small preaching service.
We can do stuff like that occasionally, obviously. And every month we're still having soul winning marathons like before.
And I'm still preaching every month in German live over YouTube. So we're still doing that.
I think that's great. And I think having come to the US is actually kind of a blessing because I can say everything I want.
And don't have consequences like, oh, hate speech. And now you're getting sued and have to pay a fine of a thousand euros.
And I can still be a blessing to people in Germany. That's cool.
In Ezekiel 33 verse 6, it says, "But if the watchmen see the sword come and blow not the trumpet and the people be not warned.
If the sword come and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at the watchman's hand.
So thou, O son of man, I have set thee a watchman unto the house of Israel. Therefore thou shall hear the word at my mouth and warn them from me."
And when we're reading these verses, obviously it kind of stands out that a watchman or you could say a preacher has a very big responsibility.
But also what I noticed is, and I'm going to call this spiritual oppression, you know, people are dying or going to hell without even getting a warning.
That's the other part in these verses. And that's sad. Think about it. There are people who are dying, they're going to hell, and they're not getting any warning at all.
Because preachers fail. Preachers in Germany suck. They're not preaching from the housetops.
You know, Baptist churches exist. There are some good Baptist churches, I would even say, but they are still kind of dead.
Like, show me the Baptist church in Germany with a strong, soul-winning program.
Show me the Baptist church in Germany where the whole council of God is preached.
And I'm saying preach from the housetops. Like, yeah, maybe behind closed doors they're saying everything, but not on YouTube, because it would get them consequences.
But you know, it's great that these churches exist, because there need to be churches like that, that are kind of dead and kind of watered down for people to go to, who don't necessarily want to have all this persecution in their lives.
And we need to break people free from spiritual oppression. People going to hell without getting a warning, we need to give them a warning.
And many people in Germany need to get warned. And many need to rise up in Germany and bring true spiritual liberty to people.
And they have to just not care about perils by their own countrymen, perils by heathen, perils by false brethren or sisters or whatever.
They just need to serve God against all odds.
And you know, our soul-winning club in Germany, it's really a group of people who have been through a lot.
I mean, I'm thinking of my friend who got his house raided. I'm thinking of two other brothers, brother Moses.
Police also came to his home. And people losing their jobs, they are still going soul-winning every week, consistently soul-winning every Saturday.
There's soul-winning happening in Germany and they are not stopping. And that is awesome. That is great.
And they just need to keep doing what they're doing. Consistency is the key. Just keep on soul-winning.
And I just want to say this in closing. Obviously, you could ask yourselves, well, how does that apply to my life?
I'm here in the U.S. What could happen here? But what the Bible says is still true that in 2 Timothy 3 verse 12, it says,
"Yea, and all that will live God in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution."
That is still true. You will still eventually suffer persecution. And persecution can be very different for a lot of people.
It can be different based on your personality. It can be different based on your circumstances.
Obviously, a single guy getting persecuted in Germany having to leave everything, that is still kind of easy in the sense that he doesn't have a family to care for.
But either way, it's still true that getting persecuted is something we should be happy about based on what the Bible is saying.
We should live for joy. That is what the Bible is saying.
And you might be stressing, well, how could I ever go through persecution? I don't think I can do it.
But you just need to think about the fact that the Bible is saying in 1 Corinthians 10 verse 13, it says,
"There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to men, but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted about that you are able,
but will with the temptation also make a way to escape that ye may be able to bear it."
So it doesn't really matter in what circumstances you are. If you have a big family, if you have no family, what your circumstances are.
The kind of persecution that God may bring into your life, that God allows in your life, is the persecution that you can endure.
It's the persecution that you can endure. That's why it's happening. God allowed it in your life.
So you don't need to stress about it. And obviously that's easier said than done. I know that.
But you need to be mentally prepared. Meaning, not just holding on to the things of this world.
You can't be prepared for everything. But you can be prepared in the sense that you're not just holding on to the things of this world.
And I thought of an illustration. You know, years ago I was in a swimming team.
And our coach explained to us how you can dive through a whole swimming lane, from one end to the other.
And if you have never done this, it kind of seems impossible. Like, how can I dive from one end to the other?
But here's the trick, what he told us. Once you feel like, I don't have enough air, I can't make it, you need to actually blow out.
You need to let go of air. And it sounds extremely counterintuitive.
Like, this does not make sense. But it actually works. Like, I've tried it.
And if you feel like, I can't make it to the end, you know, I can't dive to the end, you need to blow out and to let go.
And you will make it to the end. So you need to let go of some things in your life.
You need to not hold on too tightly to the things of this world. And you can make it.
The Christian life is counterintuitive. And sometimes you need to serve God against all odds.
And you need to be able to let go of things and sometimes even people.
And there are a lot of times when I prayed back in Germany, God, if you want me to go to whatever place, I will leave this and that person.
And I thought of specific people. Like, God, if you want me to go, I will go and I will leave them.
That is what God wants for you. You need to be mentally prepared. Yes, I'm going to go.
And I hope that, you know, what Brother Dylan Osz preached and, you know, kind of the history and what we've been through, what I've talked about,
that would be an encouragement to you to serve God better and to truly be blessed by not just reading the Bible,
but living the Bible and by serving God even if everything seems to be against that. Let's pray.
Dear God, thank you for this wonderful conference, Lord, and Lord, I thank you for this opportunity to preach, Lord.
And I thank you for our soul-winning club in Germany and that people are getting saved in Pforzheim and all over Germany, Lord.
I pray that you would still bless our ministry and would allow us to continue doing this.
And please bless everyone in Germany who is soul-winning, who is faithful to church.
Bless the churches that are there, that are good churches, Lord.
And please stir up people in those churches to go soul-winning and serve you better, Lord.
And please bless every one of us when we go our separate ways. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.