Thank you very much.
Thank you.
May we welcome you to Bautista, Bautista?
I will be meeting Bautista, after the second service.
Welcome to Bautista, the Baptist Church.
If you don't know how to read it, you can read it on the page 95 of the Tagalog.
First Sansa Putayo.
Si Christoy a Tinkan Lumen. First Sansa, ready? Sing.
Si Christoy a Tinkan Lumen.
Aitik Sivir Sahabu Hai.
Si Christoy a Tinkan Lumen. Aitik Sivir Sahabu Hai.
Si Christoy a Tinkan Lumen. Aitik Sahabu Hai.
Aitik Sahabu Hai.
But if it is something that the world is asking of you,
look for the anchor for the amplifier of the living.
The other way us we will pray it.
Take it away and it will be ring underscore.
Jesus name you pray.
Amen.
All right, good morning everybody,
welcome to Verity Baptist Church.
Take out your bullets
and we'll go through a couple of things real quickly.
First, let's count up any salvations from this past week that I'm not aware of.
Any salvations in the back? Any salvations to report to? Anybody else?
How about in this section? Any salvations? One? Anybody else?
How about here? Anybody else? Salvations? Four?
Anybody else that I'm missing?
Seven more salvations for the bulletin.
Of course, we do have so many this afternoon around 1.45.
I didn't know until this morning that on Friday, Muslims are celebrating the end of Ramadan,
and our country decided to also. It's a holiday, so we're going to have a soul-winning marathon.
We'll celebrate with them by trying to get them saved.
Anyways, we'll have a soul-winning marathon on this Friday.
Next week is our monthly prayer meeting. I don't have this in the bulletin.
I think we're going to start the Mother's Choir next week.
Mother's Day is coming up in four weeks, coming up here shortly next month.
One other thing to mention is that at 12.30, the ice cream will arrive because we smashed all of our records.
It's good news, bad news.
Because we smashed it by so much, it's going to be hard to break it again.
This might be the last ice cream you eat for a long time, right?
We broke a record of 107 people, 83 soul-winners from our church last week.
That is amazing. That's great.
507 total salvations, which averages out to roughly six salvations per person.
Because 507 sounds like a lot.
Well, when people are going out every day, six salvations per person is actually pretty believable,
especially here in the Philippines.
So anyways, that's it for announcements.
We'll have Brother Rafi lead us in another song.
Page number 25, the region's behind.
First hands already sing.
To the region's beyond, I must love, I must love,
To the story as there were before,
To the village, the giver, the bird of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds.
To the region's beyond, I must love, I must love,
To the land of the world,
Peace of vision shall hold us again,
To the heart is a place of singing,
I think we have no more fear,
The world may pronounce me a dreamer,
We are in the master and his first,
To the region's beyond, I must love, I must love,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds,
To the village, the giver, the bird of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds,
To the region's beyond, I must love, I must love,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds,
To the land of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds,
To the land of the sea,
I must love, I must love,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must love, I must love,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must tell as good story of all the worlds,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must love, I must love,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must love, I must love,
To the world, the bird of the sea,
I must love, I must love,
Amen. For a scripture reading,
please open your Bibles.
book of 2nd Chronicles, 2nd Chronicles chapter 18. You have the first five books. You have
Judges, Ruth, 1st, 2nd Samuel, 1st and 2nd Kings, 1st and 2nd Chronicles chapter 18.
And we will only be reading verses one down to verse 13. 2nd Chronicles chapter 18. Please
say Amen if you are there. Amen. 2nd Chronicles chapter 18 verse 1. Now Jehoshaphat had riches
and honor and abundance and joint affinity with Ahab. And after certain years he went
down to Ahab to Samaria. And Ahab killed sheep and oxen for him in abundance and for the
people that he had with him and persuaded him to go up with him to Ramoth Gilead. And
Ahab king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat king of Judah, Would thou go with me to Ramoth
Gilead? And answered him, I am as thou art, and my people as thy people, and we will be
with thee in the war. And Jehoshaphat said unto the king of Israel, inquire, pray thee
at the word of the Lord today. Therefore the king of Israel gathered together prophets
four hundred men and said unto them, Shall we go to Ramoth Gilead to battle, or shall
I forbear? And they said, Go up, for God will deliver it unto the king's hand. But
Jehoshaphat said, Is there not here a prophet of the Lord besides, that we might inquire
of him? And the king of Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, There is yet one man by whom we may inquire
of the Lord, but I hate him, for he never prophesied good unto me, but always evil,
the same as Micaiah the son of Imlah. And Jehoshaphat said, Let not the king say so.
And the king of Israel called for one of his officers and said, Fetch quickly Micaiah
the son of Imlah. And the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat king of Judah sat either of them
on his throne, clothed in the robes, and they sat in a void placed at the entering end of
the gate of Samaria, and all the prophets prophesied before them. And Zedekiah the son
of Shenana had made him horns of iron, and said, Thus saith the Lord, With ease thou
shall push Syria until they be consumed. And all the prophets prophesied so, saying,
Go up to Ramoth Gilead and prosper. For the Lord shall deliver unto the hand of the king.
And the messenger that went to call Micaiah spake to him, saying, Behold the words of
the prophets declare good to the king with one assent. Let thy word therefore I pray
thee, be like one of theirs, and speak thou good. And Micaiah said, As the Lord liveth,
even what my God saith, that will I speak. Bless the ring of God's word. Let us pray.
Lord God in heaven, we thank you, Lord, for this day it is given to us. I pray the Lord
that you would please bless the Lord for this day, and I pray the Lord that you would please
bless the preacher, and the preacher of your word, Lord, this day. We love you, Jesus,
and we pray. Amen.
All right. We're here in 2 Chronicles chapter 18, and this is part of the Alphabet of Bible
Doctrine series, and we're talking about missions in this sermon. And so when you look
at this word mission or missionary, you actually don't see this word in the Bible. You do have
the Great Commission, but this is kind of a word that people are going to have a lot
of different opinions of. For example, here in the Philippines, when they start what we
usually call a church plant in the US, I'll hear people use the term, yeah, you know,
it's a mission. And you know what, it was kind of a new terminology I'd never heard,
but it's kind of what a lot of Bible Baptist churches will call it. So I'm going to talk
about missions, and the idea in this sermon is being a missionary, church planting, and
all things associated. So point number one is pre-mission. Pre-mission. Now let me just
say this before I start also. For example, in February we're going to have our annual
missions trip. And kind of the idea is we're going to be doing extra soul winning. What
I would say with like a mission or a missionary is it's an ability to get extra soul winning,
lower souls saved, and reach more people that is outside of your norm. So for example,
if we did a three day trip to some province and did all day soul winning, we'd call it
a missions trip, right? So anyways, point number one, pre-mission. Before you go out
on the mission field, before you become a missionary, what is the process? Well in most
Baptist churches they use something called deputation. Deputation. And here's the definition
of deputation. Deputation is the process by which churches deputize missionaries to go
out to other parts of the world on their behalf. Deputation mainly involves a missionary traveling
around to churches to present the ministry God has laid on his or her heart, and raising
prayer and financial support. Now there are a lot of issues with the deputation system.
Number one, it's not in the Bible, and that should be a big kind of red flag to what you're
doing, right? But I'm going to give you four issues with this process of deputation. And
look, I listen to a lot of stuff on church planting and being a missionary from different
opinions. There are a lot of different opinions out there, but generally every Baptist will
pretty much agree the system is broken. It's not working. A lot of money is being spent
to send missionaries out, and the churches just disband after a couple years. Things
are just not going according to what they expect. One problem with deputation, the system
they have is this. The system promotes compromises. The system promotes those that are willing
to compromise on the message. 2 Chronicles 18 verse 10, And Zedekiah the son of Canea
had made him horns of iron, and said, Thus saith the Lord, With these thou shalt push
Syria until they be consumed. And all the prophets prophesied so, saying, Go up to Ramoth
Gilead and prosper, for the Lord shall deliver it into the hand of the king. And the messenger
that went to call Micaiah spake to him, saying, Behold, the words of the prophets declare
good to the king with one assent. Let thy word, therefore, I pray thee, be like one
of theirs, and speak thou good. It's like, Please, Micaiah, can you calm down a little
bit? Please don't be that big of a hate preacher, okay? Everybody's saying something good. Can
you just say something nice? Why do you always have to be negative? And what Micaiah said
is, As the Lord liveth, even what my God saith, that will I speak. He said, Brother
Sukkiah, what's your point? Let me ask you a question. Do you believe Micaiah would be
supported by Baptist churches if he went on deputation? No, he would not. I mean, all
the prophets are prophesying good, and you've got this negative message, Micaiah, right?
He wouldn't be supported. Because here's the thing. If I were to preach like one sermon
to let people know what I am or who I am, it would be similar to the sermon I just preached.
That's not going to get you a whole lot of money from churches. Because they don't agree
with me. I mean, literally, what I just preached, almost every Baptist church in the Philippines
would disagree with all of it. They would. They'd disagree with it. They certainly wouldn't
give money. And here's the thing. To be on the deputation process, you must be willing
to compromise, or you're not going to get any money, right? Look, if you listen to old
friends, Pastor Anderson talks about that he had a desire to be a missionary, and he
chose not to because he knew he could never get supported if he went out on deputation.
Why wouldn't he get supported? Have you heard his preaching? I mean, I love his preaching.
But not most people. Most people don't love his preaching. Baptist churches wouldn't give
any money. And look, they wouldn't give any money for our style of church either. Because
they don't agree. Go to your Bible to 1 Thessalonians 2. 1 Thessalonians chapter 2. And let me ask
you a question. What's the secret to a politician getting elected? Compromise. Right? You know
what the secret is to getting money on the deputation trail from Baptist churches? Compromise.
If you're not willing to compromise, you're not going to get a whole lot of money. Why?
Because most churches wouldn't agree with what I'm saying. That's just the way it is.
And look, I'm not saying that most independent Baptist churches are unsaved. You know, the
pastors in the United States, I'm not really sure. But I'm still saying they wouldn't support
me whether they're saved or not. Now, I would say that the majority of Baptist churches
here are certainly unsaved because they're teaching repensive sins and Calvinism and
all those things. But my point is this. If I went on deputation from church to church,
do you really think those Bible Baptist churches would support our mission work? It's like,
hey, can I present our work? It's like, sure. And I preached a sermon I just preached. It's
like, I'm sorry, we're not going to support you. Right? You preach against the LGBT. That's
a little bit too intense for us. Right? They're not going to give any money. And see, deputation
supports people that are compromising on the message and are not clear about what they
believe. You just use that word repent. It's going to divide a crowd. You can't divide.
You need votes. That's why politicians, they don't say anything controversial because they
want to get elected. Right? Number two, the system promotes covetousness.
The system promotes covetousness. The Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 2 verse 9, for you
remember, brethren, our labor and travail, for laboring night and day, because we would
not be chargeable unto any of you. We preached unto you the gospel of God. And what Paul
says is, you know what, we didn't want to be chargeable unto any of you. We worked and
made it ourselves. Now I don't want you to misunderstand what I'm saying because I'm
not saying every missionary is bad. I'm not saying that everyone has the wrong intent.
And I'm not saying it's always wrong to ask for money for certain situations. I'm just
saying to the average person that's a good person, inside of you there's kind of that
feeling to beg I am ashamed. Look, I'm not going to go from Baptist church to Baptist
church and beg them for money. Right? I would never do that. Right? I mean, and here's the
thing about it. They'll say, no, no, no, we don't ask for money as we present our work.
But that's the whole reason why you're there. To hope for money. It's kind of understood.
You don't have to say the words. It's like I would feel weird going from church to church
saying, and this is why you should give me money. It's like, look, I would feel weird
about that. No, I'm not saying it's sinful. I'm just saying that Paul didn't feel like
that. He didn't want to just go around and say, hey, you need to support me. He felt
weird about it. He said I would not be chargeable onto any of you. But if somebody's covetous,
they would have no problem begging for money from various people. And see, the system itself
promotes compromising and it promotes covetousness. Go in your Bible to 1 Timothy chapter 3. 1
Timothy chapter 3. It supports compromising. It supports covetousness. The system also
promotes Christians who are babes in Christ. Novices. Not experienced. 1 Timothy 3 verse
5, for if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church
of God? Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of
the devil. If you're going to be a church leader, you better not be a novice. You better
not be a beginner. There's nothing wrong with being a novice. I mean, if you've been saved
for six months, nothing wrong with that. But you're a novice. You haven't been saved long
enough to have experience. It's just the way it is. And the Bible's saying, those in spiritual
leadership, they better not be a novice. Right? Well, here's the thing. This is how deputation
usually works. And we don't support this system. We would never do this system. But let's say
somebody from our church had a desire to go to the foreign field of Vietnam. Okay?
And they wanted to get support from various Baptist churches here. I would start by writing
a letter and say, you know what, I recommend Brother Ehrman to go to Vietnam. He's got
a skill at languages, so I'm picking Brother Ehrman. Okay? And then what would take place
is they've got kind of the endorsement from me as the leader of the church. And then it's
like, yeah, we'll accept you in because we like or we know Brother Stuckey. Now, of course,
my letter of endorsement wouldn't help you much. But I'm just saying, that's kind of
how it starts. And then basically, churches will have them in to present their work and
have like a video that's emotional and touchy feeling to get to your heart. And then they'll
have like a 30-minute sermonette or 20-minute sermonette that is not controversial, that
is just very basic. It's generally how it works. Here's the thing. If somebody comes
into our church and they're recommended by somebody else and I let them in, here's the
thing, I don't know that person. I don't know anything about them. I don't know how
much they know the Bible. I don't know how faithful they are to church. I mean, pastors
in general are going to put a letter of recommendation out for anybody. It's kind of like, you know,
if you have a job and you go to a different job, almost every company you work for will
give you a letter of recommendation. Almost every single one, whether or not you're a
good employee or not. It's like, hey, if you're a bad employee, we want you out of here, here's
your letter of recommendation. If you're a good employee, they'll usually give you one
as well out of respect, right? But here's the thing. In general, churches will write
that letter of recommendation, but that doesn't tell the church that is hosting that person,
do they know the Bible? Do they go soul-winnings endlessly? How long have they been saved?
It's just not really possible to know that. And here's the thing. I can make a speech
here and say, I've been saved for 20 years. I've been soul-winnings and such and such.
I still don't know someone based on the words coming out of their mouth. That's just what
they're saying about themselves. And here's the thing. You know what? You would kind of
feel weird promoting yourself as being the greatest thing since sliced bread. And the
system itself, it supports people that are Christians that are babes in Christ. So basically
people that don't have experience, but they have a desire. It's like, you have a desire?
We'll send you to the mission field. And this is often how Baptist churches operate. You
don't have to be saved for a long time. As long as you have the desire, that means God
called you, and you know what? We'll send you to the mission field. But what takes place
is they go on this two to three years of deputation where they're asking for money.
And what they learn over the course of two or three years is how to beg for money and
to compromise in order to get money. So what's going to take place when your church starts?
You're going to compromise on what you say to bring more people to church for money because
that's what you've been learning for two years. Whether you're a good person or a bad person,
that's what you're teaching yourself for two years. Compromise to get money. And that's
what the system promotes. It's not a biblical system. You don't find it. Go in your Bible
to Proverbs 27. Proverbs 27. As I said, I listen to a lot of stuff from pretty much
every Baptist on missions and missionaries and church planting. It's a topic of interest
to mine and important. For example, someone I listened to recently, someone sent me this
video series I listened to, and there's often at least a little bit of wisdom you can glean
from stuff even if you don't agree with the overall message. And honestly, I didn't really
agree with the overall message, but one thing this guy said is he was a missionary and he
was 19 years old when he went on the mission field. And he's like, and people told me you're
too young. You've only been saved for a couple years. You're not married. It's like you're
not ready. And he was basically criticizing that attitude. It's like, of course you're
not ready. You're 19 years old. You've been saved for a couple years. I was like, I agree
with them. And the guy's a lot older now. I'm not saying he isn't a good guy. I don't
know that much about him. But it's like 19 years old and saved for two years? And you're
going to be a church leader? I'm sorry you can't learn that much in two years, being
saved just for two years. The system promotes those that are babes in Christ. It's just
a fact. It promotes compromising, covetousness, Christians who are babes, and also the system
promotes carelessness. Carelessness in a couple different ways. One way it's careless is in
regards to money. The Bible says this in Proverbs 27 verse 23. Be thou diligent to know the
state of thy flocks, and look well to thy herds. For riches are not forever, and doth
the crown endure to every generation. The Bible says to be diligent, work hard to know
the state of thy flocks, and what's going on. Now, it links into verse 24 with riches
are not forever. And the idea is, if you don't pay attention to where your money's going
and your financial well-being, you can find out, wait a minute, I'm in trouble. Right?
You say, well, how does this apply? Because if someone's going from church to church to
present their work, somebody pays for the hotels, somebody pays for the restaurants,
somebody pays for the gasoline to travel. These things are expensive. There's a better
way to spend that money. You say, well, what better way than to support missions? To pay
for people going soul-winning all day on Friday. Right? I mean, do you realize how much money
we spend on soul-winner's lunches? Do you realize how much, and I'm not criticizing
it. I praise the Lord for it. God has blessed us, and we have the ability to do that. And
so we'll pay for the people going soul-winning all day, every Saturday. Because we had a
lot of people say, what, 61 salvation's yesterday? And it's like, you know, some weeks we get
more than 100, and we have a lot of soul-winners. It's like, we'll pay, but it's just like,
here's the thing. I know the people soul-winning. I know what you're doing. We support this,
but if we were to pay to have somebody come in and pay for their hotel for a couple nights,
pay for their restaurant, that's a lot of money that's being spent. I'd rather just
spend it on people doing the work. Once again, we wouldn't even know anything about that
person that's coming into town, but somebody's paying for that. Either the sending church
or the church that's hosting, somebody's got to pay for that. That is a careless way to
use the money that God has blessed you with. There is a good way to use money that God
has blessed you with. That is just a careless way. And it doesn't even promote the best
people. It's going to promote people that are compromisers, people that are covetous,
and often people that are just babes in Christ. Another reason why it's careless is because
the general system, and you might not know a whole lot about missions, so maybe some
of this is kind of going over your head, like deputation. If you've never heard of this,
maybe some of these things are new concepts. The average church in the United States, and
also a lot of Baptist churches here in the Philippines, but in the United States, you'll
have a big map on your wall. And what you're going to have is a safety pin with different
colors in every area where you support a missionary. So what comes in is you walk into the church
and you see on the wall, wow, this church supports 50 missionaries. My old church in
West Virginia had less than 50 members and it supported like 40 missionaries. You say,
how could your church support that many missionaries? Were they made up of millionaires? No, you
give $5 a month. You give a very small amount of money. Now, I'm just trying to be logical
here and not get emotional. Why not just give the money to the best missionaries rather
than just giving to a ton of missionaries so you can say, look at how we're reaching
the world for Christ? Now, my old church in West Virginia, we had people come in all the
time that wanted to go out to the foreign field somewhere. And so, you know what, when
we started going to that church, the pastor's very solid on salvation. He preached a whole
series about how repentance of sins has worked salvation. You've got to believe in eternal
security to be saved. When we first started going there, kind of the zeal had been lost
a little bit. We started going there and they're getting really excited about doing lots of
soul winning and everything that, you know, like-minded doctrines, things like that. And
the church is doing a lot of soul winning. And so the pastor said, I've got a new thing.
When people come in and they want to get supported, a requirement is we take them out soul winning
on that Sunday. And we're going to see how they do. I think that's a great idea. But
it's amazing how people that are going to be full time soul winners and missionaries
on the foreign field, I'm busy. Over half of them said they could not do it. They came
and said, hey, you know, you're going to come soul winning with the assistant pastor after
church. I don't have time for that. How do you not have time? I mean, you're going to
be a full time soul winner. And I get it. In deputation process, you've got to make
a lot of phone calls. I'm not saying it's easy. But what I'm saying is, it's just like
if we're going to be a full time soul winner and just preach the truth and start churches
and you can't go soul winning here, something doesn't add up. And usually when we had them
come with us soul winning, some of the worst soul winning I've ever seen in my life. Horrible.
I remember very vividly, me and the assistant pastor, we went soul winning with this one
guy. And so of course we make them take the first door because we don't want them to try
to mimic what we're saying. First door, the woman answers. And he's like, hey, we're from,
you know, I'm not going to say the Baptist church, but such and such Baptist church.
And the woman's like, I don't believe in God. She's saying she's an atheist, right? Now
in the Philippines, you don't get that that much. In the US, you get that plenty of times.
People that don't believe in God. And then all of a sudden, you know, he talks to her
for about five minutes and he half quotes various verses. He says, you know what, we've
all come short. That's all he says. We've all come short. Right? You know, nobody always
does good. You know what, there's a penalty for our sins according to the Bible. And he
talks for about five minutes. And then he's like, and doesn't use any other verses that
I remember. And then all of a sudden he says, but in Romans chapter 10, the Bible says,
if you call on the Lord to save you, He'll save you. Do you want to call on the Lord
to save you right now? She's like, I don't believe in God. It's like, what are you talking
about? Now here's the thing. That's the sort of soul winning I'd expect from someone who's
new. Not from someone that's going to be a missionary and be the one leading. I mean,
if the person leading the church doesn't know how to go soul winning, what's going to happen
to everybody at the church? It's garbage. It's horrible. I mean, just bad soul winning
just did not know what he was doing. And it's like, well, here's the thing. I wouldn't have
known he was bad at soul winning if we didn't take him soul winning. Because in his presentation,
he's like, you know what? Salvation's a free gift. You know, love souls. We're going to
get churches started. I mean, it sounds good. But that doesn't tell you that much. You don't
really know just because that's what he said. You've got to actually find out, okay, we
take you out of soul winning. How do you do? And then usually what we saw is it just wasn't
very good. You say, well, why are you talking about carelessness? Because if you support
40 churches, let me ask you a question. Is it really possible to know what's going on
with all 40 churches? No, it's not. Because we're going to talk about it here in a second.
There's like a cousin to deputation called furlough, which is when you come back from
the foreign field. And I remember somebody came in from the foreign field, and you know
what? We had been supporting him for like 15 years. He preached a sermon. Four times
he said repentance of sins for salvation. We vividly remember this because people are
like turning and looking. People are looking at us, and it's just like, I mean, I can't
throw them out of the church. What am I supposed to do? And four times he said that. And he
made the statement that a person can go soul winning for, he said, don't lose courage with
soul winning. A person can go soul winning for more than a decade without getting a convert.
What? You can go soul winning for more than a decade? We've got a few people in this room
that are from either the United States or Europe, and those are tougher areas by far.
No question about it. But a decade? It's like, man, I've done 15 years since my last salvation.
And what they'll say is, hey, but you know what? Don't let it lose hope. I mean, Jeremiah
is the weeping prophet because he never let a single soul to the Lord. Where does it say
that in Jeremiah? Yeah, Lamentations is the Book of Mourning. He's not saying, man, I
can't get anybody to say my life is horrible. Where are we getting that from the Bible?
Jeremiah is the weeping prophet. I mean, why would we support someone who isn't getting
anybody saved for years and years? It's like, well, what are you doing? Well, soul winning
doesn't work in our country. Well, then why would we support someone to go soul winning
in that country if it doesn't work? I get it. If you're a full time missionary in North
Korea, you're not going to have many results. You know what? We're not going to support
someone in North Korea because it's not an open field. I mean, you got to use some common
sense with this stuff. You can't just go off of emotions, right? Turn in your Bible
to 1st Timothy 3. 1st Timothy 3. As I said, the cousin to deputation is furlough. These
things go hand in hand. Deputation is to ask money ahead of time. And so what will take
place is you have a set amount of money that you want to raise. And let's say it's $5,000
per month. You need $5,000 per month, you say. And you want to get at least like 80
or 90% of the way. And here's the thing. If you pick this amount, you will not get
this amount each month. Because certain churches will pledge or promise an amount, but it doesn't
necessarily mean they come through. So the expectation on deputation is you raise this
much money knowing that you're only going to get this much. But what also takes place
as the years go by, some of the churches that support you, they quit supporting you. Some
of the churches that support you, they disband as a church, right? Your money will go down
over time. It doesn't go up. So what do you have to do? Well, you've got to go back and
start begging for money again. What you've got to do is go back to every church that
supports you to present your work and let them know, hey, this is what we're doing,
so they keep supporting you. And you've got to go to new churches to get more money. Why?
Because you're not getting as much. Now here's the thing. Missionaries are different, and
there's different countries and all of these things. And here's what I would say. As a
church, as a ministry, God has greatly blessed our ministry. When I first had a desire to
go to the foreign field, I did not know there would be the opportunity to be a full-time
missionary. And underneath Verity Baptist Church, I am a full-time missionary. Pastor
Menes pays my salary, and basically he's my boss, okay? But as much as God has blessed
our ministry financially and people donate online that support the work we're doing,
we get nothing compared to the average Baptist missionary that's out there. I mean, literally
from day one, it's like they've got all these cars, they've got their own church lot and
a building, and it's like, man, where are they getting all this money from? And here's
the thing. I'm not trying to compare or be upset because God has blessed us. I mean,
we pay for people to go to soul-winning all day. Friday, Saturday this week, hey, we'll
pay all day for soul-winning for you for your lunch, not your dinner, not your breakfast.
We'll pay for your lunch, okay? But it's like, obviously, and you know what? We get to eat
at a nice place. Bacolod-Inasal is a nice place. We own stock in Bacolod-Inasal, right?
We single-handle. That place will never go out of business, I promise you. Not while
I'm here, right? I mean, God has blessed us. We can't be upset. I mean, we're here and
I look at the things God has given us. I mean, God has blessed us. We're able to have nice
activities and all these things. But I'm just saying, in comparison, it's like a lot of
these Baptist churches, they have an insane amount of money that's coming in. I'm just
thinking, how are you able to do that? Now, there's no need to compare. We're happy with
what we got. God has blessed us. I would not expect that a new church would have a fancy
building on day one because if you started a church in the U.S., you wouldn't have a
fancy building from day one, right? I mean, you'd probably meet in a house. Verity Baptist
Church, guess where they started? In the house. Nothing wrong with that. Verity Baptist Pampanga
started in the house. Verity Baptist Pico started in the house, right? Now, this church
started in a hotel that we just rented by service because it's like, hey, you don't
know what's going to take place. You've got to be wise financially. I'm not complaining
about it. God has blessed us tremendously. I'm just saying it's like there's a ton of
money that they're raising from Baptist churches. But they have to go on furlough because they've
been gone for a while and they've got to raise up more money. So let me ask you a question.
How would you feel if, because you know, my family's planning to visit the U.S. later
this year. We don't have the exact time, but we're probably going to visit the U.S. and
it's been a long time at this point. Anyway, I'll probably be gone since it's been a long
time, probably a month. It's been a long time since I've seen my family. Obviously, I've
got to go back to Verity Baptist Church. But how would you feel if I said, you know what,
I'm going to be visiting the U.S. I will be back in 10 months. That's insane. But that's
what takes place on furlough. And I knew what furlough was and I just didn't really
stop to think about, you know, what this entails. But I remember when I was in Guyana because
many years ago there was a missions trip that Pastor Anderson put together. And originally,
you know, it was going to be preached at this one person's church. And this pastor said
he got linked with a new IFB and now everybody's dropping him financially for support. So we're
trying to help that church out. It turns out he got dropped for being a sexual pervert
and he was just pretending to be new IFB because there's nothing new under the sun and people
always pretend to be new IFB for money. That's just the way it is, right? So we kind of changed
the plans to try to preach in as many schools as we could and just do a lot of soul winning.
So we're going soul winning and we have no plans of any church to go to because the only
church that we knew turned out the pastor's a pervert, right? So we're going soul winning
and I remember I ran into someone who was saved, clearly saved, and they went to such
and such Baptist Church. I thought, great, maybe that church is right on salvation. Later
on that week I ran into somebody else. Clearly saved, they went to the same Baptist Church.
I met a third person from that Baptist Church. Later that week, clearly saved. I said, that's
the church we should visit, right? Makes sense. So I went and visited this church and look,
I like the missionary pastor at that church. He's a great guy. I would have no problems
recommending his church in Guyana. I thought he was awesome. I went soul with him. He's
a great guy. And as I said, I'm not saying every missionary is a bad person. I don't
want you to take stuff out of context, what I'm saying. He's a great guy. He went to
Hylos Anderson College, very solid on salvation, very zealous for soul winning and everything.
But you know what? What he told me was that, you know what? I haven't been back to the
US in a while. He's actually from Guyana originally. And he said, I got to go back on furlough
and I haven't been able to do this because I didn't have anyone at my church I could
trust to run the church in my absence. And he said, I'm going to be gone for, I think
he said, eight months. And this is not a criticism of this guy. This is just the system that
is in place. And it's like, but can you imagine me being gone for more than six months from
this church? Now there's men at this church I trust, but I don't trust you that much.
Right? I'm gone more than six months? When I visited the US, you know, and it was 2019,
I mean, I was gone for three and a half weeks. We had people step in to preach and I felt
comfortable with that. I'm not going to be gone for six months. That's too long. And
it's like, that's just the system that's in place. And look, the guy was a great guy.
And I remember, you know, he asked about Pastor Anderson because, you know, he said that Pastor
Anderson organized this trip. And he said, yeah, I've heard a lot of controversial things.
And I told him, you know what? Pastor Anderson has gotten a ton of people saved I know through
his ministry. And he helped me become a good soul winner. And what he told me, to show
you this is a good guy, he said, you know what? When I was younger, a lot of people
criticized Brother Hiles. And he said, you know what? I understand where you're coming
from on that. Now, I'm not saying he's the biggest fan ever, but this is a good guy.
But there's a system in place that is failing. Because here's the thing, you know, the guy's
a good guy. He needs to be at that church, not gone for a while. Now look, it makes sense.
I've got to go back to the US from time to time to go to Verity Baptist Church, check
in on everything, get various work assignments, explain what's going on. I mean, a lot of
new people in the church, they need to know who I am. But if I was going around to 40
different churches in the US, when I when I visit later this year, I would be gone for
a long time. That's the system that is in place. It's a broken system. It's actually
was never correct. It was always broken, because it's not biblical. Right? So for starters,
there's the pre-mission. Secondly, there is the present mission, the present mission.
To understand this, you need to realize, sending churches in general, and mission churches
have a symbiotic relationship. Symbiotic means they need each other to survive. The classic
example, bees and pollen cannot survive without each other. If there's no pollen, the bees
can't survive. No bees, the pollens can't survive. Pollen can't survive. You say, why
do sending churches and missions churches need each other? Well, the mission church
needs the sending church for a very obvious reason. Money. Right? I mean, they go around
asking for money. That's the reason why they're doing it. They need the sending church financially.
Right? And look, I get it. There are some countries that you would not be able to work
a full time job if you went to. It just would not be possible. I get that. There's some
places where it just wouldn't be possible. And that is a possibility in certain places.
But it just might be an area. Maybe it's just not the best area to start a church at that
time. Maybe it just wouldn't be the right opportunity. Right? But the sending churches
need the mission churches. You say, why? Because churches in the United States, in England,
in Australia, and these big countries with a lot of money, they don't do a lot of soul
winning. So what do they need? They need to be able to put a map on the wall saying, look
how many people we're reaching with the Gospel. Because the report in the bulletin is, oh
we got one salvation last month. That's good. That's an improvement from March. Right? It's
like that's reality. I mean churches just don't do a lot of soul winning anymore. So
they need the mission church to get big results. And so generally as a result of this, needing
each other, the mission church needs to impress all of these sending churches. Here is how
you impress them. You report a big number regardless of how thorough your soul winning
is. That doesn't matter. What matters is the number you report. And you need a giant picture
with a massive children's ministry because it looks like you're reaching a ton of people.
You need to be able to take a picture with 100 people and have like 70 kids. I mean look
at how many people they're reaching because it gets you emotional. You see the kids are
reaching a man. They're reaching these kids. But wait a minute. Do we have a kids ministry
at this church? Do we have a children's ministry? Not at all. You say why? It destroys the church.
Destroys the church. It changes the culture. And as a result of having a big children's
ministry, guess what? You've got to shorten the sermons quite a bit. Why? Because it's
going to get pretty rowdy and makulit in here. You're going to have kids running around making
all kinds of noise. I mean we've allowed a few kids to come in here from time to time
and just with a small group, it's like they're distracting. Slow. Now we support kids coming
to our church with their parents, with a parental authority. But why is it we don't support
a bunch of young kids? Because if nobody's responsible to watch them, what happens? Well
nobody watches them and they make a lot of noise and they destroy the church. And what
takes place on the foreign field, and I don't understand this, but the mindset is that things
that don't work in America work on the foreign field. So you could never get somebody saved
in five minutes in the U.S., but on the foreign field, preach the gospel in five minutes.
In the U.S., you preach a long sermon. But you go to the foreign field, I mean they're
not Americans. They're just kind of a little bit simple. You know what I mean? That's the
mindset. I mean it's a fact. That is the mindset, even though they would not admit to this.
So they expect churches to have very short services on the foreign field. Now you could
accuse me of a lot of things. Could you accuse me of having short sermons? Could you accuse
me of sermons without a lot of Bible? Because here's the thing, I don't believe in this
mindset, wait a minute, you want to learn the Bible? Listen to this pastor online to
learn the Bible. I don't believe that. I believe you ought to be able to come to this church
and learn the Bible. So what am I saying? I'm saying whether you're a church in the
U.S. or a missions church or whatever, you ought to operate the same way. Same way! What
works there works here. Long sermons with the truth and here's the thing, it's not like
we're starving for members, but here's the reality, in our first couple years there's
a temptation, man it would be nice to have a lot of kids here because it would look like
our attendance is much bigger. But it's in artificial attendance. We've done things the
right way at this church and we packed this place with 107 people last week by doing things
the right way. Today is a small day, probably in the 60s, right? 70s, I don't know, something
like that. Right? We ought to do things the same way you would do anywhere. You say why?
Because what works there, works here. Zealous soul winning, preaching the truth, same thing.
The Bible says in 1 Timothy chapter 3 verse 15, But if I tear along with thou mayest know
how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living
God, the pillar and ground of the truth. If this is a bona fide church, you ought to be
able to come to this place and say hey, this is the pillar and ground of the truth here
in Metro Manila. I go here because I learn the truth. I get motivated to serve God and
I learn things I would not learn at other churches. Go to Matthew 28. Matthew 28. Matthew
chapter 28. And look, I've been a part of a lot of old IFB churches in the US that have
a big children's ministry and I'm not saying they are bad churches. I am saying it's an
unbiblical system. It's not the right system. It destroys the church itself. You say why
would it, because what takes place is when you have all of these other ministries that
are not associated to soul winning, all of your time and energy and effort is poured
into them and you don't have the energy for soul winning. Now of course, there's a balance
because we need fellowship and we get that. And there's a balance that we try to strike,
but if I'm a little bit overboard on one area, let's go a little bit overboard on soul winning.
I'd rather go overboard on soul winning and have a little bit less fellowship than we're
supposed to have if I have to be a little bit off balance. You say why? Because soul
winning is the heartbeat of this church. And it's the first works that the Bible speaks
about. And we must always be about the first works of soul winning and getting people
saved. Matthew 28 verse 18, And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is
given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. And if you go to
other nations, make sure the sermons are short and just tell them, well just listen to this
sermon online to learn the word of God. Is that what it says in verse 20? Teaching them
to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you all the way, even
on to the end of the world. Amen. So no matter what the church is, they ought to be getting
people saved, getting people baptized, and seeking to multiply themselves as a church.
Turn in your Bible to Acts 1. Acts 1. Now I'm not almost done, but this will be the
last verse we look at. There's still a lot to say, okay? I get it, the ice cream, you
know, it's like if we let it sit out too long it's going to get cold, but that's kind
of the point of ice cream, right? I guess it will get warm, right? Ice cream is always
a little better when it's a little bit melted though, right? Am I right? So that's good.
Number one, we talked about the pre-mission. Number one, we talked about the present mission.
How should our church operate? We should be all about soul winning. We should have long
sermons. Now we did recently shorten the sermons a little bit, like four months ago shorten
the services by fifteen minutes. Here's the reason why we did this. Because of the fact
it's very hard with young kids at this church to sit through back to back services. It's
very hard on the moms, very hard on the dads, and I like the new change. Just shortening
it a little bit I think has helped us a lot, but here's the thing, you can never say my
sermons are short though. They're still over fifty minutes long, right? Today's sermon,
my first sermon was like five hours long, right? So anyways, point number one, the pre-mission.
Point two, the present mission. Point three, what about the post-mission? Basically, okay,
this is how we operate as a church, but what is our plan looking forward as a church that
is a missions church, or however you want to say it? Our church here has been around
for four and a half years. Our church is financially stable. We are very financially stable as
a church. We've been saving up money for a long time, and we're seeking to have our
own lot where we can build our own church building. We're financially stable. We always
operated where we didn't just spend all of our money because we had a purpose that we
were looking toward. Our church is physically stable, and what I mean by that is we don't
have a small church at this point. We have a good number of people that are here every
single week, and what we would call a low day would have been a very high day a year
ago. It's not like just a couple lucky attendance. We've broken our attendance record three
times in the past three months, and average we usually run in the 70s. We're a very stable
church at this point. No matter what would happen, I can't foresee us becoming as small
as we used to. We've grown quite a bit. We have great people at our church. Eighty-three
people went soul winning last week. How many Baptist churches around the area could say
that eighty-three people went soul winning? Eighty percent of the church went soul winning.
That's amazing, right? Now, here's the thing. If I'm telling you everything that's wrong
with getting churches started, it doesn't really do much good unless I give you an alternative
system, right? That's kind of what I'm planning to do, just kind of tell you what is the vision
that we have to get new churches started. Now, here's the thing. I'm not saying that
this plan is perfect. I'm not saying that we couldn't make improvements. I'm not saying
it would never need any adjustment. I'm just stating that where there is no vision, the
people perish. And as a church, I don't have a goal to let's just get the biggest church
and never have anybody start new churches. No, I mean, that's what they kind of did in
Acts 1, and God's like, okay, you're not going to start new churches. Let's end the persecution.
And then they start churches because they're going in various areas. Acts 1, verse 8, it
says this, But ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you, and
ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and in Samaria and unto the
uttermost part of the earth. Now, there's a lot of different interpretations of this
verse. I do not believe personally that this verse is stating that every single church
should strive to reach the world with the Gospel. I don't believe one church can reach
the world with the Gospel. For example, we have no ministry to reach Muslims in the Arab
countries right now. I mean, we put sermons online, but we don't really have a big outreach
to reach them. I believe this is something that has to be done in unison with all good
churches, where basically every church should say, okay, we start here in Jerusalem, and
then all of Judea, and then Samaria, and then to the uttermost part of the earth. And see,
if every church has the mindset of multiplying and duplicating, then you can start reaching
the world with the Gospel. But no one church is going to reach everywhere with the Gospel.
Now, it's interesting because in the book of Acts, once they start getting persecution
and they're not doing what God is saying, what takes place? They get churches started
in Samaria and in the parts of Judea, and basically the persecution causes them to spread
out. But there's logic in this verse, because the Bible is basically saying is you start
in your area, and you kind of slowly spread out as far as you can get. That's kind of
the logic behind it in general. So let me just say this. When it comes to, now I'll
give you an example. Pastor Jimenez's main vision is to reach California with good churches.
To be honest, he wanted me to start a church in California. And he knew that my desire
was to start a church here, and of course he ordained me to start a church here, but
his first thing was to start a church in California, because he's from California, that's where
the church is, and California's a big state, a lot of people, and it needs a lot of good
churches. Now, my main vision is to reach Luzon with the Gospel. Honestly, there's over
50 million people in this island. Now, this is not stating we would never start a church
anywhere else, because obviously Pastor Jimenez sent me outside of California to start a church,
outside of the country. I'm just saying my main vision, it's like reach Luzon with the
Gospel. If you say, Brother Stuckey, I want to be a pastor, where do you want me to go?
Somewhere in Luzon. Now, if that's not what God has in your heart, I'm not going to hold
you back. I'm just stating my main goal, because to me this is big enough. I'm not saying we'd
never start a church in Visayas or Mindanao, but I just feel like this is a big enough
zone for us to reach, and look, if one day in 20 years we had a ton of churches, then
maybe we could branch out past that, but in reality, what is there, 13 million people
in Metro Manila? One church? That doesn't really reach all of Metro Manila, right? So
my main idea would be the area of Luzon, okay? Now, let me give you various possibilities
of starting churches. One valid method to start a church is that somebody is ordained
as a pastor from day one, and they are sent somewhere to start a church, and from day
one they're independent, day one they're doing their own thing, and most likely from day
one they'd just be working a secular job, because they'd have to build the church to
be full-time. That's the way it is. There's nothing wrong with that, because guess how
Verity Baptist Church started in Sacramento? Pastorman has had a full-time job. You say
why? Because there was like eight people that met in his living room, right? I mean,
the church had to grow before he was able to be full-time. There's a lot of good pastors
that are full-time secular jobs right now. Pastor Joe Jones was ordained from Verity
Baptist in Sacramento as a pastor from day one. As far as I know, he works a full-time
secular job, because the church is not yet at the point for him to be full-time, right?
Nothing wrong with that. That's a good method to start a church. Number two, someone could
be sent out as an evangelist to oversee a church, but they're still underneath the authority
of the sending church. So for example, I am underneath the authority of Pastor Hermanus.
It's like, who's the pastor of this church? Pastor Roger Hermanus is the pastor of this
church. I am underneath his authority. Now I'm the person in person to run it, but here's
the thing. When Pastor Hermanus started some other churches, like Hold Fast Baptist Church,
or Jared Pozarnsky, he wasn't ordained as an evangelist from day one. You say, why?
Well because the church is only a couple hours away, and Pastor Hermanus did the baptisms.
Look, Pastor Hermanus isn't going to show up to baptize you. It's a long trip. And so
by virtue of the fact me being so far away, it's like I was ordained as an evangelist,
and that's a biblical system. There's nothing wrong with it, but we're still underneath
the authority of the sending church, right? Another thing that could take place is a church
could be started that is a bit of a co-laboring effort. For example, Verity Baptist Pampanga.
When it started from this church, it was kind of a co-laboring effort. I did not know if
I would be able to preach five sermons a week. I was like, I don't know if my voice is going
to be able to take it. And it's like, it's hard. I mean recently my voice, like every
other week, it's like I have no voice. It's hard, right? So we had various men go down
to preach, and many men in this room have gone down to Pampanga to preach because of
the fact I was like, I don't know if I can preach five sermons in a week. And we were
having the services on Sunday. I was like, I don't know if I can preach four sermons
in a day. And quite honestly, that's a bit insane, but that's what we were doing, right?
And so it was a bit of a co-laboring effort. And you know what? If our church started a
new church, we could have that situation of a co-laboring effort of various men taking
turns to preach from the sending church, but only if the church is within vicinity to reach.
That's kind of the idea of slowly spreading out, because if the church is six hours away,
nobody can really go from our church to preach on a Sunday. Do you understand? When it was
in Pampanga, it wasn't that hard, because it's like, okay, it's like an hour and a half
down. It's on Sunday, so getting back to Metro Manila is four hours, which was the problem.
But I mean, it's not that far away, okay? Now, when we started Verity Baptist Church
Beekle, there is a group of people that for a while, I never really mentioned it, but
they were doing what we called a Bible study fellowship. And basically, we were trying
to get some organization to the group, but it wasn't a bona fide church by any means.
We were just trying to help organize the soul winning a little bit to try to help out. This
is why in the past in the bulletin we've had, we still have Hong Kong listed, but Singapore,
it's not a bona fide church, but we just try to send them supplies from time to time, encourage
them, try to make it a little bit more official just to get more soul winning going. But quite
honestly, they're not in a position to get a church started in those locations, at least
at this point. And after about six months, Verity Baptist Beekle had a lot of people
soul winning, so we ended up just making it an official church. But for a while, it was
kind of a Bible study fellowship where the idea is, if it doesn't work out, it's not
really a big deal because it wasn't really a bona fide church. It was nothing we publicly
were announcing because we were just kind of seeing how things go. Now, I'll give you
some examples to help you understand what I'm saying. I talked about this yesterday
obviously in Pampanga, and obviously Pampanga is a different church. This church is a lot
bigger than Pampanga. There is no way at this point, as a church in Pampanga, we would be
ready to start another church. It would just be illogical. We don't have a big enough church
at this point. But an area that's kind of close to Pampanga is Tarlocke, right? It's
not that far away from Pampanga. If the church in Pampanga reached, let's say, 60 people,
and let's say you have 15 people coming from Tarlocke, which say this is the best church
we could find, then you could say, well, wait a minute, we got people coming from this area,
maybe we should consider trying to do something over there. Now, I don't know a single person
in Tarlocke, so I'm just giving you a hypothetical example. I'm just saying if the church grew,
we can't do regular soul winning in Tarlocke as a church because it's just outside of our
realm in Pampanga. You know, it's far, other than doing like a one day event or something
like that. And so, let me look at my notes here. So, and I'm not saying that this is
something we're going to do now, I'm just saying this is a sort of mindset for the future
of getting new churches started. What do you need in an area to get a church started? Number
one, you need people. Right? So for example, if we started a ministry in Tarlocke, I mean,
there's probably people in Pampanga that would go because it's exciting, but there's nobody
there. So it doesn't make any sense. So of course, number one, you need people. You need
people that would say, hey, I would make this my church. And you need people that actually
live in that area that would say, hey, this is the church I would go to because it's convenient
for me. Right? For example, I'll give you an example, Brother Fabian's with us and Faithful
Word started a church in Tucson, Arizona. I mean, that's, you said two hours away, one
and a half? One and a half. And you know, that's in an area where it's like, hey, that's
kind of close. And there's people that were coming up to Faithful Word, but one and a
half hours away, it's kind of like there's wisdom in a local church. Right? Being close
to the church you go to. Now at our church, we have people that drive up an hour and a
half to come to church. People, I don't know how far everybody comes, but some people come
from further away than an hour and a half. Some people come a long distance. Right? You
say why? Because you can't find a church like this in your area. But the goal would be to
eventually find a church in your area. You say why? Because of the fact as a church,
we can't reach all of Luzon with soul winning in all of these things. So you need people
in an area and you need regular soul winning in an area. Because if there's not regular
soul winning, what I would question is are people committed to the church? I mean, all
the time people say, hey, I want to have a new IFB church right by me. The church starts
and then they don't attend. Now if they're going soul winning on a weekly basis, then
I would say, hey, actually maybe they are really looking for a church. This happens
all the time. I mean, our first day when we met at Bayview, there were people there that
were there for the first service and they never came back. They were waiting for years
for a church just like Verity, just like Faithful Word. Churches started and they made it to
one service. They weren't committed. And it's kind of like, okay. And of course we
know that. I mean, if you're at this church, you understand that. I mean, people say, hey,
I want a church just like this. When the church starts, actually you don't really want a church
because it takes some work. It takes effort, right? So you need people in an area. You
need soul winning. You need a place to meet from time to time for a church event or church
service. Now what I'm describing to you right now is kind of an intermediate step from
starting a church on a weekly basis and basically saying, well, we're kind of testing the waters,
but we're not really ready necessarily to start a church. Now I say from time to time
because basically you can invite friends and family. You get people to say, hey, we're
having an event in this area. We would love to have you for this date. And you can invite
them for something specific. And kind of the idea of that is just kind of see how it
goes. Here's the thing. Let's say you don't get anybody to come and nothing ever comes
of it. It's still a fun event. Soul winning. It's a nice time. Nothing wrong with it. But
if you start getting more people, it could be something saying, well, maybe God's kind
of moving here and maybe there is a need for this to start, right? This is the vision we
ought to take in our minds because of the fact we've grown as a church. And because
whether or not we're ready for this at this moment, we do need to be a church that duplicates
not just be one church here, but actually grow. I mean, I've said this and I'm not lying
about this, but we have people that come from a long distance and I do not want you your
whole life to drive this far to come to church. Eventually it's better to have a church near
you. You say why? Because there's wisdom in a local church, right? What are some things
you might need? Well, as I said, a place to meet for church. Now here's the thing. Most
churches in the U.S., not in the U.S., but in the Bible, they start in a house. It meets
in a house. Verity Baptist Pampanga, met in a house. Verity Baptist Beekle, met in a house.
What's the benefit of that? No contract. Doesn't cost much. And it also kind of shows whether
people's hearts are in it or not. If it's like, man, we need a fancy building. It's
like, okay, then you're probably not going to like this church, right? Basically you
start on a very low level to kind of test things out to see how things are going, right?
We need a place to meet. Obviously you need somebody to preach the sermon. Now ideally
it would be somebody who lives in a location because if you start a church in an area,
you know what? You're not going to be able to necessarily send people all the time to
that area to preach sermons. But there could also be the need of people at our church to
step in and say, hey, if we start a new church, I'd be willing to go down once every two months,
once every month and a half or whatever, and preach a sermon. Now a lot of people feel
like, man, you know what? My sermons, you know, I'm just not confident. People wouldn't
like it. Let me explain something. They would like your sermon a lot better than a repentance
of sins preacher. I'll tell you what. The church in Pampanga, they talk about how awesome
it was when you guys were going down and preaching sermons, and you might not have felt like
you did a good job, but to them it's like, man, they didn't mention repentance of sins
once. Amen. They said we got to go sowing, and they were excited about it, right? This
is reality. And the other thing you would need is kind of a team effort atmosphere.
You say, why a team effort? Well, because of the fact if people at our church are getting
involved in a work, and they volunteer at this church, there's kind of like an opening
of volunteering spots that need to be done here. What it will require is more work to
be done. Now here's the truth. You can like it or lump it, but I'm not preaching more
than five sermons a week. I can't. I mean, literally, I don't think my voice can take
it. It's like just recently, you know, Brother Ronald recommended this, you know, this weird
vegetable liquid thing, and it's been working. It's the worst tasting thing I've ever had
in my life, but I'm like, man, it's really helping my voice because like week after week,
I lose my voice, and my voice actually feels pretty good right now. It's like, man, that
is disgusting, and that teaches you, you know it's healthy, right? But anyways, I decided
to preach this sermon. There's a lot of things you could preach for M, and I decided to preach
on missions, so just kind of refresh your mind. Well, what is the vision of our church?
You know, basically, we want to get new churches started. Now, I would say this, like, I don't
really have a vision to start a church anytime soon in Metro Manila, outside of this church.
Even though this is not enough to reach all of Metro Manila, you know, a church in Metro
Manila is going to be a lot more expensive. It would take away a ton of members from here.
It just wouldn't be the wisest thing. In the future, that would be great. What I'm talking
about is basically kind of surrounding provinces, areas where people come from a long distance,
and we could use a church in those areas because of the fact there could be more soul winning
done, reach a new group of people, and quite frankly, we're just not able to reach right
now. In our soul winning marathon from the last week, we had over 25 soul winners from
this church outside of Metro Manila soul winning, and over 150 salvations, which is right on
the same average. Six salvations per person, basically. Six, seven salvations per person.
But if it's outside of Metro Manila, unless we're talking about Cayenta, which is still
Metro Manila in my opinion because it looks just like Metro Manila, it's like, you know,
we're not really reaching a new area. So I'm saying, like, from something that's far away
that, you know, honestly, we're just not going to be doing too many events there because
it's just too far. Right? But every church should have the mindset that we want to duplicate
as a church. We don't want to just be one church with a big attendance. You know what?
If there's guys at a church that have a desire to start churches and prove themselves worthy
and practice preaching and want to become a preacher, I don't want to force you to stay
at this church. No, I eventually want to just help kick you out of this church. Not kick
out as in you committed a sin, but go to Mission Field, right? You say, why? Because
as a church, you need to duplicate yourself. And here's the thing. Christians beget Christians.
Good churches beget good churches. I don't believe we can count on the Bible colleges
or the seminaries. What's going to be required is a church itself says, okay, let us just
help you out. This is how we started. This worked for us. This didn't work for us. And
we just basically helped get that new church started. Let's close in a word of prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today. And I ask you to help
us understand this sermon and kind of the context and the point. And help us to understand
that what we mean by a missions church and missions and what our goal is. And help us
as a church to just grow with more soul owners of this church and grow in attendance. But
also not be like in the book of Acts where they were staying in one location, but just
have the mindset, how can we branch out? Are we ready for this? And we ask you to bless
us in that way. And we just pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.
It is well, ladies. It is well. Okay. First, let's sing this praisefully. First, let's
already sing.
Let peace, life, and freedom rise again and again.
Let sorrow, life, and freedom rise again and again.
Let love, peace, and freedom rise again.
Let the soul of heaven rise again.
Let peace, life, and freedom rise again.
Let the soul of heaven rise again.
Let peace, life, and freedom rise again.
Let the soul of heaven rise again.
Let peace, life, and freedom rise again.
Let the soul of heaven rise again.