His belt-eyes shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned.
And these signs shall follow them that believe.
In my name shall they cast out devils, they shall speak with new tongues,
they shall take out serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them.
They shall lay hands on the sick, they shall recover.
So then after the Lord had spoken unto them,
he was received up into heaven and sat in the right hand of God.
And they went forth and reached everywhere, the Lord working with them
and confirming the word with signs following. Amen.
Let us pray.
Our Heavenly Father, thank you for your word.
Thank you for the Bible.
Please bless the message that we might learn from this chapter, Lord.
Thank you for Mother Stuckey and this assembly we have today.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Alright, we're here in Mark chapter 16.
And the name of the sermon is 2019 Baptist Labor Day Celebration in Cavite.
And so I'm basically kind of preaching about our soul winning event coming up.
And I think it's kind of a good time because we just had a big soul winning event last week.
And we have a big one coming up here in just three days.
And so I'm going to preach a sermon about soul winning.
And a lot of these things are going to be very basic and reminders.
But quite honestly we need to be reminded about soul winning
because it encourages us when we know we're one of the few churches doing it.
We need to be encouraged and realize, hey, we're just doing what God wants us to do.
Just because other people aren't doing it, it doesn't lessen the importance of us doing it.
We still need to just labor and go soul winning and get as many people saved as we can.
So in Mark 16 verse 15, notice what it says.
And He said unto them, Go ye into all the world.
Go ye into all the world.
The first point is this, that we need to go to the unsaved, okay?
And so here's the thing, the unsaved are not going to come to us.
We have to go to the unsaved.
So the Bible says, Go ye into all the world.
Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every preacher.
Turn to Mark 1.
Mark 1.
Now it sounds like a basic point, but it seems like most Baptists don't really get it
because it seems like most Baptists kind of wait to bring visitors to church
and have a big fancy altar call and wait for them to come down to the front.
But what the Bible says is this, Go ye into all the world.
We're expected to go and do the work.
Look, we don't expect unsaved people to show up to our church from Cavite, okay?
We have to go to them if we're going to end up getting them saved.
It says, Go ye into all the world.
Now Mark 1 verses 16 through 18, the Bible reads,
Now as he walked by the sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew his brother
casting a net into the sea, for they were fishers.
And Jesus said unto them, Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men.
And straightway they forsook their nets and followed him.
And here in Mark chapter 1, Jesus is actually coming to Simon and Andrew
and he's trying to compel them to become fishers of men,
trying to compel them to become soul owners.
Now Andrew and Peter, they were fishers by trade.
That was their job.
What you notice when it comes to Jesus calling people to be his apostles,
he always calls people that have full-time jobs already, okay?
Now it's kind of backwards in the Philippines because people try to do it the opposite way.
Basically if you don't have a job, you basically just go to a church and beg to get hired.
But in the Bible, Jesus called his apostles.
They were people that worked full-time jobs.
And as a fisher, this is not an easy job.
It's a job where your schedule is not necessarily a 9 to 5 sort of job.
You've got to kind of just go at various seasons and be out on the sea for a long period of time.
It's a tough, laboring job.
Now when he uses examples in the Bible, he doesn't just use pointless examples.
He uses examples that we can understand.
When he talks about being a fisher, who likes to fish? Anybody in here?
We've got one person, all right? God bless that hand.
We've got one hand.
But when it comes to fishing, you don't wait for the fish to jump in the boat.
First you have to go out to sea, but you don't expect that fish to jump in the boat
and then just kill itself and grill itself.
You have to actually get the fish.
You have to go out there and catch the fish.
But see, most Baptists, they choose to do the opposite.
And so my question is, what's the point of God using the analogy of being a fisher of men
if we're just waiting for them to catch themselves?
It doesn't make sense.
He uses an example where we understand we have to go out there and get the fish.
We have to go out there. We have to do the work.
We don't wait for unsafe people to come to this church and to end up getting them saved.
Now, what's interesting about that is, as a church that goes out and wins the loss,
don't we do a pretty good job of winning the loss when they happen to visit our church?
See, these churches that have this altar call,
they have unsafe people that visit their church all the time
because they spend all their money and energy and time and all these gains and everything like that
to bring all these unsafe people in.
And when they come and visit, they don't preach the gospel to them.
Now, we as a church, yeah, we go out there and preach the gospel,
but we also preach the gospel to people that visit our church that are unsaved.
And so we're doing both, and that's what a church should do.
You should go out and preach the gospel as much as you can,
and if God blesses your church with visitors, you preach the gospel to those people as well.
Turn to Acts 8. Acts 8.
And so in order to catch fish, it takes time.
It takes work. It takes effort.
And to some degree, it does take skill as well.
If you're going to catch fish, you have to actually know what you're doing.
You have to know how to reel it in.
You need to know how to put bait on there and everything like that.
It does take some skill.
Now, it doesn't take a lot of skill to get the basics down, but it does take some skill.
Now, when it comes to soul winning, if you want to be an effective soul winner,
you do have to have some skill to a degree.
Look, if you don't know any of the verses in the Bible,
you don't know where to go in the Bible,
you don't know what to turn to, you don't know the order to do things,
you're not going to do a good job of preaching the gospel.
You do have to learn some basic skill in order to be a good fisher of men.
And obviously, the more skill you have, the more verses you know,
the more you can explain things in the Bible, the better you're going to be.
But you need to have at least the basics down.
Honestly, I believe that most saved people in this world,
if someone were to bow down in front of them and say,
what must I do to be saved?
I think they would screw it up.
I don't think they'd be able to get it saved.
Somebody who's just perfectly ripe for the picking
and wants to know, hey, how do I go to heaven?
And they'd be like, oh, well, Jesus died for you.
It's like, we've got to actually show them the verses and explain.
Because it doesn't matter how ready someone is to get saved,
they're not 15 seconds ready.
You have to actually spend more than 10 minutes to preach the gospel to them.
So it makes sense, and they can end up getting saved.
Most people, though, they don't know how to do it.
Now, we at this church, we stress soul winning,
we go out soul winning every week.
We should not be ignorant of letting people go.
We should know how to do that.
You need to memorize the verses you're going to use.
You need to know where you're going to go.
And once you memorize the basic verses, you need to memorize more.
Then you need to memorize some verses proving Jesus is God.
You say, why?
Because every once in a while, you'll run into a Jehovah's Witness
or an IMC or somebody else that doesn't believe that.
And if you're going to win them to the Lord,
you have to actually know the verses that are going to make them change their mind.
And I'd say most people in here, you know the basics,
that you're a sinner and then you go to Revelation 20 and Revelation 21, maybe.
But look, you might have to go to Mark 9.
You say, what's Mark 9?
It's a passage you should know where it is in the Bible about hell.
You should be able to go to Luke 16.
You say, what's Luke 16?
Luke 16 is probably the clearest representation of hell in the Bible.
You need to know that.
Because it is possible someone's going to tell you, I don't believe in hell.
And you need to know where those verses are.
You need to know how to prove that Jesus Christ is God
because there are some people that don't understand that.
Now once you get the basics down, you can catch the basic fish out there.
And most of them are just kind of the general fish.
But don't think, hey, I've arrived, I don't need to learn more.
No, you need to always learn more.
There's always more you need to learn to explain, more verses you need to know
in order to win them to the Lord.
Acts 8, starting in verse 26, the Bible reads,
And the angel of the Lord spake unto Philip, saying,
Arise, and go toward the south, under the way that goeth down from Jerusalem,
on the Geza, which is desert.
And so notice in this story, Philip is told to go.
Okay?
Verse number 27, And he arose and went,
and, behold, a man of Ethiopia and eunuch of great authority
under Candace, queen of the Ethiopians,
who had the charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for her to worship.
So in verse number 27, he arose and he went.
What that shows us is we must always be ready to preach the Gospel.
Not just on Sunday afternoons.
Not just on Saturdays at so many times.
Not just on Wednesday nights at so many times.
Not just this Wednesday as we're in Cavite.
No, you must always be ready.
Why?
Because here's an example where there's somebody at a specific time,
in a specific place, who needs to hear the Gospel.
And that person's going to be gone in five minutes.
You must be ready.
You must always be soul conscious,
meaning you're ready, you're aware, and ready to win people of the Lord.
Now, look, we live busy lives.
I understand that.
But, you know, honestly, it's a lot more exciting to win people in your personal life
than it is at so many times.
Why?
Because you know you put in some sort of effort to win them to the Lord.
We must always be ready to win people of the Lord,
just like Philip is here in verse number 27.
Verse number 28.
And it says,
Was returning and sitting in this chariot, read Isaiah the prophet.
Then the Spirit said unto Philip,
Go near, and join thyself to this chariot.
And so in verse number 29, the Spirit tells Philip,
Hey, go near, join thyself to this chariot.
Why?
Because he's going to be able to preach the Gospel.
And so we must always be ready to preach the Gospel at all times.
Now, this Ethiopian eunuch is ready to hear the Gospel.
This is like an Acts 16 situation.
Hey, what must I do to be saved?
Why?
Because he's specifically reading the part of the Bible.
Hey, ladies.
Ladies, we're having church here.
We must be calm and quiet.
Okay?
And so here in Acts chapter 8,
he's told to go and join himself to this chariot,
and he's joining himself to someone who is reading Isaiah 53
and is ready to hear the Gospel and get saved.
Verse number 30.
And Philip ran dither to him and heard him read the prophet Isaiah and said,
Understandest thou without readest?
And so Philip runs there to preach the Gospel.
He is ready.
He's prepared to preach the Gospel.
You say, why is it that the chariot didn't just come to Philip?
Because the chariot never comes to you.
You must go to the chariot.
Okay?
We must go and win the loss.
They're not going to come to us.
Hey, every Sunday afternoon, we have soul winning time.
But this is what we never do.
We never say, okay, we're ready for soul winning.
We've got a pairing.
Let's just wait for them to come.
And the first group that comes, you know, hey, brother Dustin,
you're going to talk to the first person that comes up through the stairs,
then the next person.
You know, it doesn't work that way.
We have to go and win the loss.
We've got to take in time to make the maps and be prepared
and do all the work to do that
and organize people and send people out in groups.
We have the supplies, the invitations.
We have to do all of that.
That's what we're supposed to do as a church.
You say, why is it that churches don't do a lot of soul winning?
One reason why is because it takes time to prepare it.
It's not that easy.
Look, I mean, it takes time to make maps
and to tell people where they're going to be heading and things like that.
That takes maintenance to do.
It's not just you show up and, hey, just go out there.
This is not resolved work.
The soul winning here takes some maintenance to do, honestly.
But, you know, we're always going to do this.
This will always be part of our ministry.
We'll let everything else slip if we must.
We're not going to let soul winning slip.
Now, turn to Nahum 1.
Now, as you're turning to Nahum chapter 1 in the Minor Prophets,
another thing we notice from Acts 8 is this,
that an unsaved person is not capable of getting saved on their own.
You say, why?
Because he's reading the specific part in the Bible about salvation
and he basically doesn't understand it.
Look, the truth is that an unsaved person
is never going to be able to get saved on their own.
You cannot read this book on your own and end up getting saved.
You actually need someone to preach the gospel to you.
Now, in Nahum chapter 1 verse 15,
Behold upon the mountains the feet of him that bringeth good tidings,
that publisheth peace.
O Judah, keep thy soul in peace, perform thy vows,
for the wicked shall no more pass through thee.
He is utterly cut off.
So in verse 15 it says,
Upon the mountains the feet of him that bringeth good tidings.
Now, let me ask you a question.
Is it easy to climb a mountain?
It takes work.
Why is it saying upon the mountains?
Because it's basically saying you go out everywhere where they are.
Look, yeah, in most areas it's really populated,
but there are some areas where you have to do a little bit of climbing to get to.
There are some areas that aren't the big city,
but we have to hit all of those areas.
We must find them.
We cannot expect them to find us.
We must try to knock every single door.
It takes time.
It takes effort.
Now, turn back to Mark 16.
And so, quite honestly, you know,
soul winning is a little bit different in different locations.
You know, where I'm originally from in West Virginia,
it's known as the Mountain State.
You say, why is it known as the Mountain State?
Because it's full of mountains.
Everywhere you go, it's just curves and up and down and up and down.
And driving is dangerous because, you know,
there are a lot of deer that get hit where I'm from, West Virginia.
Because deer, you know the phrase being a deer caught in the headlights,
basically a deer will run in front of a car and then get scared and just stop.
Right in front of your car.
And so it's like it's an obstacle course.
You're dodging to avoid deer all the time.
And so that's, in West Virginia there's always curves.
You can't really see around those curves.
Okay?
And so it's known as the Mountain State.
Now here's the thing.
In the Philippines, houses are like right beside each other for the most part.
Okay?
It's not like that in West Virginia.
In West Virginia, it's like, you know, a 45 second walk, you know,
off a kind of a steep hill to knock one door.
And then you come back down.
The truth is that in West Virginia you have to be in some sort of shape to go door to door.
You say, why don't the Baptist go soul winning in West Virginia?
Well, because the Baptist passage aren't in shape.
I mean, isn't that the truth?
I mean, most Baptist pastors just aren't really in that great of shape.
Because quite honestly, you get more of a workout going soul winning than playing golf.
And so by playing golf here in the Philippines, it's not really going to prepare you for soul winning.
That's the truth.
And so honestly, it takes some sort of conditioning to do soul winning.
Now, I'm not saying it's the most strenuous thing in the world.
But quite honestly, you know, in some areas where I'm from, it does take some effort to go soul winning.
It's kind of tiring.
And the better shape you are, the more soul winning you're going to be able to do.
And so I mentioned upon the mountains, and quite honestly where I'm from, the mountain state,
you literally are walking across those mountains to preach the gospel.
It takes work. It takes effort.
Now, in Mark chapter 16, not only do we see that we go to the people,
but I want you to notice at the end of verse 15 that we also preach to all people.
Okay? Mark 16, verse 15.
And he said unto them, go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
And see, the Bible tells us we're to preach the gospel to every creature.
We're to preach it to every person.
Not only do we not expect them to come to us, but we have to preach the gospel to everyone.
Now, the way this works as a church, the way our church is, where we're located,
our goal is to knock all the doors nearby.
That's one map that we have for other areas as well.
And we knock all the doors nearby and we slowly spread out from there.
We try to knock every single door.
We're to preach the gospel to every person.
Wherever a church is located, every church should just kind of put that upon themselves and say,
hey, it's our job to preach the gospel to all these people.
Now turn to John 3. John 3.
And so we're going to look at a couple of examples of Jesus preaching the gospel.
And we're seeing that he has preached the gospel to different types of people.
Now in John chapter 3, it says in verse number 1,
There is a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.
The same came to Jesus by night and said unto him,
Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God,
for no man can do these miracles, and thou doest except God be with him.
Jesus answered and said unto him,
Barely, barely, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
And so Nicodemus comes on to him and he basically tells Jesus,
hey, you know what, you're just a really great guy.
You are sent from God.
Now you might say, well, Brother Stuxpin, here's an example of that fish jumping in the boat.
No, it's not.
Because Nicodemus is not coming to hear the gospel.
He's coming to talk to Jesus and he says, hey, you must be sent from God because you're doing all these great miracles.
He's not coming saying, what do I have to do to get to heaven?
He's not coming saying, what do I have to do to get saved?
You say, why? Because he already thinks he's on his way to heaven.
He thinks he's got that figured out.
He probably thinks he repented of all the sins and he's a Pharisee, so he's doing everything right.
He's not coming to get saved, but Jesus sees there's an opportunity.
That shows us, once again, we must be ready at all times.
Because in our daily lives, you never know when somebody might come up to you and ask you a question.
They come up to you and ask you a question, then say, hey, sure, I'll answer your question as long as I get to ask you a question afterwards.
We must be ready at all times.
Now, I want you to understand that Nicodemus is a pretty powerful person.
I mean, it says that he's a Pharisee.
He's someone who's prestigious in the community.
Now, this is not someone that we would normally expect to get saved.
Now, when we go soul winning, we run into certain people of certain religions or certain people that have money, and we assume they won't get saved.
We all assume that.
Because if there's certain people that are in false religions, certain religions just aren't that receptive.
Or if they have a lot of money, we assume they won't get saved.
But the truth is, we give them a shot anyway.
Why? Because we preach the gospel to every preacher.
We give every single person a chance to decide if they're going to believe on Jesus Christ or not.
I'll turn to John 4.
And so whether or not it's somebody who's rich, whether or not it's somebody who's in whatever false religion, if they're Muslim, if they're Buddhist or whatever.
Hey, you know what? Muslims get saved too.
Buddhists get saved too.
Hindus get saved too.
It's not just Catholics that get saved.
It's people from all religions.
Now, Catholics are obviously probably the most likely to get saved.
It doesn't mean that you can't get somebody saved from another religion.
We can get people saved from another religion. We give them a chance.
John 4, verse 6.
Now, Jacob's well was there.
Jesus therefore, being weary with his journey, sat thus on the well, and it was about the sixth hour.
There cometh a man of Samaria to draw water.
Jesus saith unto her, Give me a drink.
For his disciples were gone away on in the city to buy meat.
And so Jesus is tired, he's exhausted, and his disciples are going to get food.
And he's also thirsty, and so he's getting something to drink from this woman.
Verse 9.
Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, ask his drink of meat, which have a woman of Samaria?
For the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.
So this woman says, Why are you talking to me?
You know, I'm a Samaritan.
The Jews don't talk to Samaritans.
Now look, the way she reacts, it's pretty obvious that Jews never talk to her.
Now look, when it came to Jews back in that time, a lot of those Jews were saved.
Now obviously it's always the minority, it's the Jew.
But obviously there was a lot of Jews that were saved.
Why didn't a Jew ever stop to give her the Gospel?
Because the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans.
Look, we can't look at a certain group of people and say that we're above them, or too good to talk to them.
You say, what about the areas where people live in squatter areas?
They need to hear the Gospel as well.
It doesn't matter whether they have money, whether they don't have money.
It doesn't matter what religion they're part of.
We give the Gospel whether they're prestigious, or whether or not they're not prestigious.
We give the Gospel to everybody.
Turn to Matthew 10.
This is the big reason why we have to go out and preach the Gospel,
because quite honestly, only certain people are going to visit this church.
Okay? Buddhists are never going to visit this church.
Hindus are never going to visit this church.
Muslims are never going to visit this church.
But we still run into them on the streets,
and we still need to give them the Gospel,
because it's possible that they might believe on Jesus Christ and end up getting saved.
Quite honestly, if you want to think about the altar call,
only certain people are going to walk down an altar to get saved.
Okay?
Look, I don't think I would walk down an altar to get saved,
because I'd probably be too shy to do it.
Look, a lot of people, they go to a church, like a Baptist church,
and the pastor is saying, if you really want to get saved, come down to the altar now.
Look, a lot of them aren't even going to go down to the altar,
because they're not prideful.
They're not trying to do things to be seen of men.
There's a good chance they just won't go,
not because they don't want to hear the Gospel,
but because they're embarrassed.
They're shy.
They're too scared to go down to the altar.
And this is why we must go out there to all areas and talk to people,
because quite honestly, there's a lot of people that are never going to come out
where we're going to be able to give them the Gospel.
Matthew 10, starting in verse 11, the Bible reads,
And in whatsoever city or town you shall enter, inquire who in it is worthy,
and thereby to the offense, and when you come into a house, salute it.
And see, the Bible says in verse number 12 that we salute a house.
You say, what does that mean?
Well, salute is a word that's used with the military.
It's a very respectful thing to do.
You salute somebody.
Now, when it comes to preaching the Gospel,
we are respectful of the people we talk to.
We try to be friendly to them.
We try to be kind to them.
And they don't always return that same thing to us.
Sometimes people are rude to us.
It doesn't change the fact that we try to be kind to them.
Now, look, I'm obviously not talking about someone who's some false prophet or devil,
but just your average, ordinary person out there that's not a devil,
that's not a false prophet.
They might not get saved today.
They might get saved in four months when we knock their door open.
So if we're rude to them today, do you think they'll listen in four months?
Probably not.
And so if they don't want to hear the Gospel, we're just kind of friendly
and just say, hey, we'd love to see a church sometime.
And then when we knock their door again, which we will in four months,
five months, six months, you know what?
We'll try to give them the Gospel again.
So we want to try to give everybody the Gospel.
We need to have the right attitude.
Now, in verse number 11, it's said to inquire who in it is worthy.
What does it mean by being worthy?
It means you're worthy to hear the Gospel.
There are people that are worthy, and there are people that are not worthy.
Okay, verse number 13.
And if the house be worthy, let your peace come upon it.
But if it be not worthy, let your peace return to you.
When it says peace, it's referring to the Gospel of peace.
If the house is worthy, you preach the Gospel to them.
If it's not worthy, you don't preach the Gospel.
You say, well, what does it mean to be worthy?
Verse number 14 tells us.
And whosoever shall not receive you nor hear your words,
when you depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.
So if someone's willing to hear our words, that means that they're worthy.
So basically we knock on a door, we invite them to church,
and if they want to hear the Gospel, they're worthy.
We give them the Gospel.
If they don't want to hear the Gospel, they're not worthy.
We don't let the Gospel of peace come upon,
which means we don't try to force them to hear the Gospel.
We just shake off our feet and go to the next door.
It's no good deal.
Now, if we start the conversation, though,
and somebody says they want to hear the Gospel,
and it's very clear in the conversation that they just don't believe the Bible,
or they just want to argue with you,
or they just spend five minutes telling you why you need to be a Jehovah's Witness,
look, if somebody's not listening, then you just move on.
I do not spend 20 minutes listening to somebody tell me what the truth is in the door.
When somebody tries to do that, I try to be respectful and just leave the conversation,
and if they just try to force you to listen, which happens sometimes,
I just say, well, sorry, I need to go and just walk away.
I'm not going to spend 20 minutes listening to somebody preach their version of the Gospel.
Now, look, I've been in conversations when I'm the silent partner,
and I'm the silent partner, and somebody's just preaching to my friend,
and it's just like after one minute, two minutes,
and I'm just praying in my head, God, just please end this conversation,
because as the silent partner, I believe I should be silent and be respectful,
but then I'm just like, what are we doing here?
It's just like this person is just preaching to us,
and then eventually, I just try to just say, hey, we'd love to have you come visit church sometime.
Usually, my so many partners happen that I did that,
but every once in a while, they still just kind of stand there
because they're too embarrassed to leave.
It's like, look, eventually, you've got to just move on.
I say, why? We have more important things to do.
If they're not willing, you say, well, that seems rude to me.
Yeah, well, you might think it seems rude,
but actually, the Bible just said if they're not willing to receive your words, you move on.
Sometimes, you do have to do what seems rude,
and look, when you do that, when you're talking to someone,
and they want to just talk to you for like 15, 20 straight minutes,
which will happen sometimes, no matter when you walk away, they're mad at you.
That's the way it works.
Honestly, when it comes to times people have been mad at me, out soul winning,
called the church to complain or follow me, it was usually during that time period,
whereas a conversation when they just wanted me to sit there and listen to why Jesus is not God.
Look, I'm not going to listen to someone tell me why Jesus is not God.
If they're not going to receive my words, I'm going to move on.
It doesn't matter how mad they get.
Now, look, this is not something that happens commonly.
If you always have someone who wants to fight you at the door, there's a problem there.
But look, you will run into people that just are bored,
so they just want to talk to you for like 45 minutes.
Don't talk to them for 45 minutes.
Move on to the next floor.
Now turn back to Mark 16.
And here's what ends up happening when you do that.
You have a conversation and they just want to talk to you and they just want to argue with you,
and you just kind of politely say, hey, you know what, we'll just leave you with an invitation.
We'd love to have you come visit church sometime.
What they pretty much always do is say, well, you knocked on my door
and you're not willing to sit here and talk about it,
and it's like they still want to try to bait you into that conversation.
No, just ignore them.
Just knock at the next door.
Just move on, because you will literally sit there for 30 minutes.
I don't want to hear, and I haven't known this to be a problem at this church,
but I don't want to hear that, you know, like we were in a conversation for like 45 minutes
because somebody preached the gospel to you.
You're like, yeah, we didn't get anybody saved.
We only knocked two doors because somebody preached the gospel to us for an hour.
That's bad soul.
You've got to just move on.
Okay, move on to the next door.
Another thing we see, though, in Mark 16, verse 20,
is not only do we go and preach the gospel,
and not only do we preach to all people,
but we also preach in all places.
Mark 16, verse 20,
And they went forth and preached everywhere,
the Lord working with them and confirming the Lord with signs following.
Amen.
And see, the Bible says here in Mark 16, verse 20,
that they preached everywhere.
Now, I want you to understand that in Mark 16,
they didn't preach everywhere immediately.
When you think about the story, they were told to go into all the world.
In Acts 1-8, there's a famous verse, which we'll look at here in a second,
where they're told to not just preach in Jerusalem, but preach everywhere.
But what do you see throughout the Bible?
You see that they only wanted to preach the gospel to the Jews.
Now, I don't know about you.
I believe we should preach to all people,
but that's like the last group of people I would want to preach to.
That's like the first group they want to preach to.
That's like the last group I would want to preach to,
because they're really not that receptive.
But they did not preach everywhere immediately.
They eventually did, but not immediately.
Now, the Bible tells us, though, we are supposed to preach everywhere.
Now, turn to Acts 1.
Acts 1.
And you see, you say,
what are we doing here on Wednesday when we're going to kibite?
Because that's a pretty long ways away.
Do we expect to get a lot of new members of this church from the soul-winning marathon?
I don't expect to get any new members at our church.
But quite honestly, the point of soul-winning is not really the Roman church.
Going soul-winning doesn't mean you're going to have this big, massive church.
We just want people to go to heaven.
And the truth is, I just don't know a lot of churches in Musan or Metro Manila
that are preaching the gospel.
And honestly, I don't really trust the Baptist churches that are in kibite to get the job done.
They're having all the Baptists come from around their big Baptist Day celebration.
I just don't trust them to preach the gospel to people.
I don't trust them to preach the gospel to people that visit for their Baptist Day celebration.
Honestly, I just feel like as a church, it's kind of our job to preach to every area that's even remotely nervous.
And that's sad, but it's reality.
And so we will preach everywhere. We will go to all places.
Now, this is sort of an extension of our Operation Turn Manila Upside Down.
What is Turn Manila Upside Down?
It's where we're going to have a soul-winning marathon in every city in Metro Manila
hopefully in the next two to three years.
Now, this is going to take time because, quite honestly, we can't do this every single month.
We can't rent 11 passenger vehicles and go every single month because it costs money to do things like this.
So it's something we're going to do from time to time.
And quite honestly, this marathon is really kind of stretching ourselves.
This is really going a distance.
But as a church, we're excited to do this.
And so Turn Manila Upside Down, yes, we're hitting all of Metro Manila,
but I would also like to see us hit areas that are just slightly outside of it.
Eventually, we'll have a soul-winning marathon in Bulacan.
Eventually, we'll have one in Antipolo City.
Eventually, we'll have some of the places in Pampanga.
We want to hit all those surrounding areas because, quite frankly, there's just not churches knocking those doors.
There's just not churches preaching to the gospel to those people.
Acts 1, verse 8.
But ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you.
And ye shall be witnesses on me both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and in Samaria and on to the uttermost part of the earth.
And so in Acts 1, 8, it mentions four places.
These places are in order.
Jerusalem is mentioned first because that's the nearby area.
As a church, our number one primary area is here in Casa.
That's the main area we go soul-winning.
That's the main emphasis we have as a church because that's where our church is located.
It makes logical sense.
Now the truth is, in order to reach the uttermost part of the earth,
that's not possible for one church to do.
It's not possible to do that through the internet either.
Quite honestly, when you talk to people that listen to a lot of online preaching,
usually you have to hear like 25 sermons to get saved on South Asia.
Quite honestly, talking to someone one-on-one is like a thousand times more effective.
That's the best way to preach the gospel.
You talk to them one-on-one, they're able to answer questions.
Even when you talk to crowds of like seven and eight people,
quite honestly, you're going to pray with a lot of people that didn't get it.
Because it's best to just talk to people one-on-one.
You say, well, how do you know that?
Because how did Jesus always preach the gospel of God?
He always preaches one-on-one.
That's how you see it.
Now, he got crowds of 5,000 people.
But if that was an effective way to evangelize,
he would have just preached the gospel to those 5,000 people.
Do you see him doing that?
When he feeds all of them bread, he feeds the thousands of people at one time.
Does he preach the gospel?
No, he doesn't.
You say, why doesn't he do that?
It's not an effective way to preach the gospel.
The most effective way is just to talk to people so they can ask you questions.
And so, yeah, it's great to preach to big crowds if we can.
The bigger the crowd, the less likely each individual person is to get saved.
One-on-one, people will probably get saved if they want to hear the gospel.
Most of the time, if they want to hear the gospel, they'll get saved.
But as you talk to one-on-two or three or four or five,
the chances of any of them getting saved start to slowly decrease with each added person.
So that's why you don't see Jesus preaching to large crowds
because it would honestly be an ineffective way to preach the gospel.
The best way is one-on-one. That's what you see throughout the Bible.
Now, in Acts 1-8, he says on to the uttermost part of the earth.
You say, how is it that we fulfill this then when he tells them to preach to everyone?
The only logical way to fulfill this is if you get churches started throughout the world.
That's the only way.
It's not possible as a church that we can...
Even though we're doing a so many marathon in Cavite, this is just one time a year.
We can't reach all the people in Cavite.
We do it for a special event, but the only real way to reach them
is to actually have a church in Cavite.
That's the only thing that logically makes sense.
In that church, Cavite can be their Jerusalem,
their area where they preach the gospel.
So when it comes to a church, the number one goal for any church
should be to duplicate themselves.
You say, why? That's the only way we can fulfill what the Bible says.
The end goal of this church is not to have this big sewing machine here and not duplicate,
but the end goal is that our church will duplicate itself
and we'll have great churches that start from this church.
It can't just be one church.
We need to get other churches started.
That takes time. It takes effort.
It takes men being ready.
It takes having a church that grows in size.
It takes people being ready in an area for a new church.
It takes effort. It doesn't happen overnight.
But that is the only way that you can honestly reach all of Jerusalem
and Judea and Samaria and on to the other most part of Europe.
Every church should have a goal of duplicating themselves
and getting more churches started.
Now turn to Romans 1.
And in Romans chapter 1 and verse number 13, the Bible reads,
Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren,
that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you,
but was led ahead of you that I might have accrued among you also,
even as among other Gentiles.
And so Paul is saying, you know, look, I wanted to come unto you.
I wanted to preach the Gospel.
But the reality was, you know what, I had to go other places as well.
Paul the Apostle was, you know, basically an evangelist
that actually had a job though.
He didn't just get money. He actually had a job as a tent maker.
So he provided his own means and then he did live off some of the donations.
But he basically went everywhere preaching the Gospel.
And what he was doing was either establishing a church
or helping a church build.
That was the thrust of Paul's vision.
It's not just going soloing in areas, but either helping a church out
or creating a new church and people getting ready
and then preaching and having an established church.
Verse 14, I am deader both to the Greeks and to the barbarians,
both to the wise and to the unwise.
So as much as it is, I am ready to preach the Gospel to you that are at Rome also.
So basically he says, I preach to everyone.
He says to the Greeks, the barbarians, the wise, the unwise.
Basically he says, I preach the Gospel to everybody.
Verse 16, for I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ,
for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth,
to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
So this same message of salvation is the same for the Jew and the Greek.
You've got to believe on Jesus Christ. Now turn to Romans 10. Romans 10.
Now I think this is an obvious point that all of us know.
As we're saying preach the Gospel to everyone in every place,
well even in Romans 1 when it says he preaches to all people,
the Greeks and the barbarians, there is one group of people later on in the chapter
that he would not preach the Gospel to and there's many reasons why
because if somebody is already a reprobate, which is a very small percentage of people,
which will preach that sermon another time,
they're past the point where they can get saved.
Jesus died for their sins. He paid for their sins.
But if people have become a child of the devil,
when you become a child of God, how long are you a child of God for?
Forever.
Once saved, always saved, right?
Internal security, everlasting life. How do we know that?
Because if you're a child of God, it logically makes sense you're always going to be a child of God.
If you become a child of the devil, how long are you going to be a child of the devil?
Forever.
Forever. It makes perfect sense. It's logical sense.
That's what the Bible teaches. Romans 10.
Let's just go down to verse number 18 for sake of time.
But in verse number 18, this is after the passages.
They're sent out to preach the gospel to everyone.
Verse 18.
But I say, have they not heard?
Yes, verily their sound went into all the earth and their words on the ends of the world.
As a church, the goal is that our message gets out to all of the world.
Now, look, as a church, we can only reach so many people.
There are churches that are like-minded churches that are doing the same work we are.
They're preaching the message.
And collectively, this message is getting out to the ends of the earth.
More and more with each passing year.
What we want to do as a church, though, is do our best to be a small part of it.
The truth is, in the Philippines, there aren't really a whole lot of churches like there are in the United States.
In the United States, there's lots of great churches.
And then when it comes to churches that are not great churches, there's a lot of decent churches.
You could be a member, you could grow, you could go soulful with the church, you could mainly hear the truth preached.
It's a decent church.
The truth is, here in the Philippines, there aren't a whole lot of decent churches.
Turn to Mark 16.
Say, well, how do you know that?
Because most of you came like an hour and a half away to get here today.
I mean, obviously, you don't think there's a decent church nearby.
I mean, it's not like I'm so cool to listen to, like, oh, we just love brothers.
Maybe you like my son, because I have a lot.
But it's not like everyone's like, man, I just want to see brother stuff.
No, nobody feels that way.
But you want to hear preaching, it's true.
And you want to go soul winning.
And you know what, you want to go to a church where they actually give you invitations rather than taking them away from you when you're trying to preach the gospel for that church.
And so the last point we're going to look at is this, that God works with us.
So not only do we go, not only do we preach in all places, not only do we preach to all people,
but we also must remember that God is working with us when we go out soul winning.
Mark 16, verse 20, and it went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them.
This is a very important verse that I think a lot of times we don't focus on, because this is the famous soul winning passage.
But the conclusion, the last verse of this chapter, the last verse of this book, okay, it says the Lord working with them.
When we go soul winning, we're not working by ourselves.
Philip was not working by himself to win the Ethiopian eunuch to the Lord.
If we try to do this on our own, without God being on our side, we're going to come back with zero people saved.
That's the truth.
We must rely on God to help us out in this work that we're doing.
Now turn to Matthew 10.
You say, well, how is it that God works with us?
Well, I'll be honest with you, when it comes to the spiritual battle that there is out there,
we can't fully comprehend the spiritual battle that's taking place out there, okay?
The Bible doesn't really give us a whole lot of information or wisdom about the spiritual battle.
We don't necessarily know the battle between good angels versus the devils that are out there.
We don't really understand it.
But the truth is the Bible says the Lord works with us, and we know we do have an enemy that's trying to withstand us.
He's trying to stop us from the work we're doing.
So we need to pray to God and get help and get him on our side.
Now in Matthew 10, verse 1, notice what the Bible reads.
And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them...
Now in Matthew 10, verse 1, notice what the Bible reads.
And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them...
Now in Matthew 10, verse 1, notice what the Bible reads.
And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them...
Matthew 10, verse 1, notice what the Bible reads.
And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them...
Matthew 10, verse 1, notice what the Bible reads.
And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them...
Matthew 10, verse 1, notice what the Bible reads.
.
They get an equal amount of rewards. You say, why? You're rewarded for the work you do.
So it doesn't matter whether or not you live in a receptive country or non-receptive.
And look, when we go soul winning, there are certain areas here that aren't going to be as receptive.
There are certain areas that they have a little bit more money. And you know what? Knocking those doors...
There's a place just on the other side of the street where they've got a gate and everything. It's not open on Sundays.
And so during the week, that's an area I'm going to knock. And quite honestly,
An hour of soul is probably not going to get somebody saved. Because there are people that have a little bit more money.
And it's going to take a little bit more time. But they need to hear the Gospel as well.
And you're rewarded for the work you do whether or not you come back from a lot saved or a few saved.
Matthew 28
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