And I want you to listen carefully to the sermon because this goes to the core of the whole...
The whole sermon this morning is wrapped up in the next really five minutes of what I'm saying.
This is the part to be listening to. I said to him this.
I said, "What if you, instead of doing that, instead of doing what everybody's telling you to do and man's wisdom..."
I said, "What if you went out and spent 40 hours a week just soul-winning?"
I mean, don't go out and just pass out flyers, but knock. Each door you knock, ask them if they know for sure if they died.
Ask them if you can show them how to be safe.
I said, "Then let's say that you were to go out for 40 hours a week knocking those doors, trying to get the gospel."
And I said, "Let's say you got somebody saved just one every three hours."
You know what I mean?
In three hours of solid door knocking and trying to witness to people, you would get somebody saved once every three hours that you spent out.
Pretty reasonable, right?
Because sometimes you'll talk to two people at a time and get two people saved.
So I said, "Averaging one per three hours is a pretty reasonable goal."
I said, "Now let's time that by the four weeks that you're going to spend doing it."
Or let's say three weeks.
You know, I think it might have been three weeks.
It was either three or four.
Let's say three weeks.
That's 120 hours.
You have won 40 people, the Lord.
40 people are saved.
40 people are going to heaven.
40 people will never perish but have everlasting life.
40 people's life has been changed forever.
The Holy Ghost lives in their bosom.
They will go to heaven.
They cannot lose their salvation.
You'll see them on the streets of golden heaven.
I said, "Let me ask you something.
If you knocked all those doors for three weeks and nobody showed up at your first service,
what have you accomplished?
Nothing.
You invited a bunch of people to something that they did not attend.
They didn't hear the gospel.
They didn't get saved.
They're all going to hell.
They didn't come to church.
They didn't learn the Bible.
What have you accomplished?
Nothing."
I said, "They labor in vain that build it, except the Lord build the house."
I said, "But if you went out there and won those 40 people of the Lord in three weeks,
what have you accomplished?
Was it a waste of time?
Was it vanity?
Was it worthless?"
I said, "Even if nobody shows up at your service, my friend, even if nobody comes to that service,
you have accomplished great things for God.
Even if nobody comes, even if your first service has nobody in it, you have accomplished more for God."
I said, "But it takes faith to do it the soul-winning way."
See, man's methods are tested and tried and proven.
I mean, I've even seen them give mathematical formulas, saying if you invite 10,000 people, on average you'll have 10 visitors.
Or if you invite 50,000 people, on average you'll have 50 visitors.
And they give you the math, but my friend, this is not a math book.
It's spiritually discerned.
Building a church is not working out a math problem.
Building a church is getting on your knees, begging for God's power, filled with the Spirit, preaching the Word,
preaching the Gospel, winning souls, and letting God do the work.
I don't want to attend a church that man built. I want to attend a church that God built.
And let me explain something to you right now.
Only God could build Faithful Word Baptist Church. It's true.
Only God could build this church. You know that's the truth.
I mean, look at what we preach. Look at what we stand for.
It flies in the face of everything that America stands for.
It flies in the face of modern wisdom, of modern society, of modern culture.
It goes against the grain with Baptists. It goes against the grain with non-Baptists.
It's the Bible. It's the truth. It's hard preaching.
It's zealous soul winning. It's on fire for God.
And it flies in the face of what's popular.
The churches that are succeeding today are not churches like Faithful Word Baptist Church,
but Faithful Word Baptist Church is succeeding because God is building it. That's why. That's why.
And so you have to understand that only God can build a church like this.
And if you don't have the faith, if you don't have the power of God, if you're not filled with the Spirit,
don't even attempt to start a church like Faithful Word Baptist Church because it won't work.
Say, "Well, I'll do what Pastor Stephen Anderson did. I'll follow his methods."
My methods, I mean, and when I say my methods, they're not my methods.
I'm just saying the methods that I used to start this church, they don't work.
I'm just going to tell you right now, they don't. It doesn't work.
"Oh, if I preach like Pastor Anderson, right, then I'll succeed at starting a church."
It will make you fail to preach like Pastor Anderson. It's true.
Unless God builds it. It's true. I mean, look, you can believe that or not believe it, but it's the truth.
The methods that work are going out and giving everybody a candy cane, inviting 20,000 people
and giving them prizes and having a carnival and a circus. That works.
It'll get people in. The way it works is to get the Christian rock and roll.
It'll bring people. It'll draw a crowd. It'll work.
The way to do it is to send out a glossy advertisement that makes people look like,
"Oh, this is come as you are and leave as you came and stay as you've been."
And that's what draws a crowd today, my friend.
You get up and preach on sin. You get up and don't compromise.
You get up and preach hard. You say, "I'm King James only."
You say, "It's easy. Believe ism. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
It's by grace through faith." You tell them the TV's out of hell.
That's a recipe for having nobody in your church.
And yet here we are. Here it is. Faithful word. Baptist church.
Here it is. The soul winning army.
The army of soul winners who knocks doors up and down this city every week
and wins souls to Christ seven days a week.
How? Who did it? Was it Pastor Anderson? No.
It was God that built it. I couldn't build this church.
Build this kind of group. I don't know how to teach people what I've taught.
It's God that did it. And if God doesn't do it, it cannot get done.
You can do it, man. Listen to me. You must decide.
Do it man's way. Give man's results. And succeed.
Succeed at being a phony. Succeed at being a watered down priest.
Or do it God's way, God's method. God will build it and you'll succeed.