...fearing neither clouds nor winter's chilling breeze.
By and by the harvest and the time are ended,
we shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves,
bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves.
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves,
bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves.
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves,
going forth with weeping, sowing for the Master,
though the loss sustained, our spirit often grieves.
When our weeping's over, He will bid us welcome.
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves,
bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves.
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves,
bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves.
We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.
Heavenly Father, Lord, I just want to thank you for this opportunity
to be gathered once again for this conference.
Lord, I pray that all that we say and do,
and our hearts, Lord, as we lift up our praises before you,
would be honourable, Lord, toward you, that you would receive it with joy
and receive it with gladness.
Lord, I pray that you'd be promoted in all that we say.
Lord, I pray for the preaching as well that's coming up.
Lord, I pray that you'd help the preachers to prepare,
bring to remembrance the things that they've prepared in their hearts, Lord.
And, Lord, I just continue to ask that you'd work in us.
And in us, Lord, I pray you'd help us to think about these other continents
and these other nations, Lord, and the brethren that we have throughout the world,
that would keep them in prayer.
And, Lord, thank you for the great family of believers that we have across this world.
We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.
Amen. Turn to the right in your hymnal to song number 401.
Set my soul on fire, song number 401.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, for thy holy word.
Burn it deep within me, let your voice be heard.
Millions rope in darkness in this day and hour.
I will be your witness, fill me with thy power.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, set my soul on fire.
Make my life a witness of thy saving power.
Millions rope in darkness waiting for thy word.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, set my soul on fire.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, for the lost in sin.
Give to me a passion as I seek to win.
Help me not to falter, never let me fail.
Fill me with thy Spirit, let thy will prevail.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, set my soul on fire.
Make my life a witness of thy saving power.
Millions rope in darkness waiting for thy word.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, set my soul on fire.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, in my daily life.
Far too long I've wandered in this day of strife.
Nothing else will matter but to live for thee.
I will be your witness as you live in me.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, set my soul on fire.
Make my life a witness of thy saving power.
Millions rope in darkness waiting for thy word.
Set my soul on fire, Lord, set my soul on fire.
Alright everyone, welcome to Asia Day of our Missions Conference.
You should have a schedule for the conference and I'll just go over a few of those things really quickly here.
So of course we have the preaching service now at 10 o'clock and I'm going to be preaching this morning.
And then we've got a seminar at 1 o'clock on how to organize a mission strip.
How to set up a mission strip, just kind of the nuts and the bolts of things that we've learned on some of the mission strips that we've organized.
At 2 o'clock there's going to be another one about the internet, technology and evangelism, social media, stuff like that.
And then at 3 o'clock there's going to be a soloing opportunity.
It turns out there is no Chinatown. We saw it and looked for Chinatown. It doesn't exist.
But we will be sending you to Little India and some places where a lot of Asian immigrants are.
And then at 5.30 we're going to have the testimonies from Asia.
We really would like you to sign up. If you are Asian, meaning that you were born in Asia, or you lived there for a long time, or you live there now,
or if you're fluent in any Asian language, sign up for the testimonies. Don't be shy, even if you just want to get up and say a few words.
You're going to have an opportunity to do that at 5.30 and the sign up sheets are in the back. There's a table back there with all the sign ups.
And then also tonight we're going to have another preaching service at 7 o'clock with Pastor Roger Jimenez preaching.
And so you don't want to miss that. And also we're going to have a few special lunches going on today for certain groups of people.
So meet for those lunches at 11.45. We're going to meet here at 11.45 for those lunches.
There's going to be one for all the Spanish speakers. Fluent Spanish speakers. You're going to have a lunch with Pastor Bruce Mejia.
All the Asians. Again, that's you were either born in Asia, you speak the language, you lived there for a long time.
Pastor Roger Jimenez is going to be taking you out to lunch. All those that are from Asia.
And then all those from Canada, United Kingdom, or Ireland. You're going to have a lunch with Pastor Tommy McMurtry.
So for those three lunches, meet here at 11.45 and we will get you sent to the proper restaurant for lunch.
So anyway, a lot of exciting things going on today. So before we proceed any further though, we're going to do a little bit of Asian trivia.
I've got some prizes here. Some White Rabbit Creamy White Candy from Shanghai, China.
And then we've got some Japanese Fruit Gummies and some Afghan Dried White Mulberries.
So this is kind of the healthier option, but these actually look like they're going to be really good.
So let's start with some trivia. If you know it, I want you to stand up. I want you to jump up and then I'll acknowledge you.
So don't yell it out. Let me acknowledge you. So jump up if you know it.
Which city, which major city, part of it's in Asia and part of it's in Europe?
Istanbul. You got it. Istanbul. You want the healthy stuff or you want the candy?
Yeah, all right. There we go. Very good. He's got it.
All right. Who knows what country contains the Gobi Desert? The Gobi Desert.
Boom. This is your second win of the conference. You're done for the day though. You know too much about Asia, all right?
All right. And then which country in Asia used to be called Burma? It has a different name now.
Got it. All right. I don't want to throw it at a lady. All right. Very good. Myanmar.
All right. Excellent. So we're going to go ahead and sing a song now. Take your song sheets. You should have these tan colored sheets.
We're going to sing Jesus Loves Me in Korean. Now yesterday I said we did the easiest one, which was Jesus Loves Me in Yoruba.
I think today's the hardest one, all right? So this one's a little bit tough. Brother Joseph Freeman is going to lead this one.
Now I do want to say one thing about the simplified version. Obviously, you need to be on the simplified version, all right?
So get on the back. Unless you're Korean, you want to look at the real stuff, okay? But the simplified version on the back, it's kind of a no-brainer.
You know, you got the long and short symbols. If you got an O, it's either O or A. But the one point I want to make is that there's an UH sound.
Whenever you see two O's, like two O's in the word good, so when you see O-O, that's your UH sound, all right? Everybody got that?
So Brother Joseph Freeman's going to lead us. Actually, yeah, you're going to have to use this, unfortunately.
Everybody can hear me? I don't have another mic. Just loud.
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, o
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh,
ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh,
ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh.
A servant of Jesus Christ called to be an apostle separated unto the gospel of God,
which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures concerning his son
Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh and declared
to be the son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection
from the dead, by whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith
among all nations for his name among whom are you also the called of Jesus Christ to all that
be in Rome beloved of God called to be saints grace to you and peace from God our father and
the Lord Jesus Christ. First I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all that your
faith is spoken of throughout the world for God is my witness whom I serve with my spirit in the
gospel of his son that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers making
requests if by any means now at length I might have prosperous journey by the will of God to
come unto you for I long to see you that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift to the end
that you may be established that is that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith
both of you and me now I would not have you ignorant brethren that oft times I purpose to
come unto you but was let hitherto that I might have some fruit among you also even as among
other gentiles I am a debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians both to the wise and to
the unwise so as much as in me is I'm ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also
for I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for is the power of God unto salvation to everyone
that believeth to the Jew first and also to the Greek for therein is the righteousness of God
revealed from faith to faith as it is written the just shall live by faith for the wrath of God is
revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth
and unrighteousness because that which may be known of God is manifest in them for God has
showed it unto them for the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen
being understood by the things that are made even his eternal power and godhead so that they are
without excuse because that when they knew God they glorified him not as God neither were thankful
but became vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened professing themselves
to be wise they became fools and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made
like to corruptible man and to birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things
wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness to the lust of their own hearts to dishonor their
own bodies between themselves who changed the truth of God into a lie and worship and serve
the creature more than the creator who is blessed forever amen for this cause God gave them up unto
vile affections for even their women did change the natural use unto that which is against nature
and likewise also the men leaving the natural use of the woman burned in their lust one toward
another men with men working that which is unseemly and receiving in themselves that
recompense of their error which was meat and even as they did not like to retain God their knowledge
God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient being filled with
all unrighteousness fornication wickedness covetousness maliciousness full of envy murder
debate deceit malignity whispers backbiters haters of God despiteful proud boasters inventors of evil
things disobedient to parents without understanding covenant breakers without natural affection
implacable unmerciful who knowing the judgment of God that they which commit such things
are worthy of death not only do the same but have pleasure and then that do them let's pray
heavenly father we thank you lord so much for this great missions conference and lord we thank you for
all the pastors and all the people from all around the world that have come to hear the word of God
and to just be like-minded when it comes to reaching other countries with the gospel we
pray that you bless pastor Anderson fill him with your spirit now in Jesus name we pray amen
amen amen title of my sermon this morning is the spiritual condition of asia the spiritual
condition of asia the first thing that i want to point out is that asia is in terrible condition
spiritually let me read you some statistics of some of these asian countries and in my sermon
i'm going to be focusing on east asia and i'm going to read these statistics now as i read
these statistics i want you to understand that when i say that this country is a certain
percentage christian that doesn't mean that that percentage means is that they're saved
it just means that they're claiming the name of christ this could be protestant this could be
roman catholic this could be baptist this could be evangelical and in some cases i'll break it out
but i just want you to realize that when we say this percent is christian that doesn't necessarily
mean that they're saved of course but thailand today is 1.1 percent christian 94 percent buddhist
cambodia 0.4 percent christian 97 percent buddhist vietnam is 1.5 Protestant and 6.9
catholic most of them believe in either vietnamese folk religion they have no religion or they're
buddhist mianmar 6.2 percent christian 88 percent buddhist mongolia 2.2 percent christian 53 are
buddhist 38 have no religion china 2.53 percent the most common religion in china is no religion
okay and then you also have the chinese folk religion and buddhism japan uh estimates range
from one to two percent christian most of them are shinto or buddhist and or buddhist indonesia
is seven percent protestant three percent catholic 87 percent muslim so you can see here
that this is a very non-christian place that is in terrible condition spiritually now let me give
you a few they're a little bit more encouraging malaysia is 9.2 percent christian so we're getting
into a little bit more uh christian culture there and then we've got 61 Muslim 20 buddhist
south korea is 19.7 Protestant and 7.9 Catholic 56 percent and south korea have no religion so the
biggest religion in korea is people just not having a religion and then north korea is 1.7
percent christian 64 no religion the philippines is 80 Catholic and 8 Protestant okay but we can
see that in general when we look at east asia and southeast asia we're seeing that there's a very
small percentage of christians in many countries some of them it's just one percent or less and
you just have this overwhelming influence of buddhism so number one asia is in terrible
condition spiritually but number two it is not because they have not been evangelized this is a
myth to say oh the reason asia is in such terrible condition is because no one's ever told them the
gospel they haven't heard about jesus you'll even hear people claim that they've never even heard
of the name of jesus over there and so folks that is false people have heard the name of
jesus worldwide and these places have been evangelized again and again throughout history
look down at your bible in romans chapter 1 verse 21 i'll explain to you why asia is in spiritual
uh condition that it's in today it's because that when they knew god they glorified him not as god
that's why it's not that they haven't been evangelized it's that when they knew god they
glorified him not as god neither were thankful but became vain in their imaginations and their
foolish heart was darkened professing themselves to be wise they became fools and changed the glory
of the uncorruptible god into an image made like buddha an image made like corruptible man or the
laughing buddha or mahavira or whoever it is that they're worshiping over there with all these
statues and idols of false gods in the shape of a man false gods in the shape of an animal or a
beast what does the bible say they change the glory of the uncorruptible god into an image
made like to corruptible man and to birds and forfeited beasts and creeping things wherefore
god also gave them up to uncleanness through the lust of their own hearts to dishonor their own
bodies between themselves who changed the truth of god into a lie and worshipped and served the
creature more than the creator who is blessed forever amen earlier in the chapter we read the
whole chapter before the sermon and he said they're without excuse right they knew god and
they glorified him not as god that's how you get in a terrible spiritual condition go to romans
chapter 10 romans chapter 10 is a pretty popular passage at missions conferences there's probably
never been a missions conference in the history of mankind that hasn't turned to romans chapter
10 so we don't want to start now all right so in order to just make this uh bonafide missions
conference we have to read the classic verses romans 10 13 for whosoever shall call upon the
name of the lord shall be saved how then shall they call on him in whom they've not believed
and how should they believe in him of whom they've not heard you see pastor honestly they just
haven't heard well let's keep going and how should they hear without a preacher and how should they
preach except they be sent as it is written how beautiful are the feet of them that preach the
gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things but they've not all obeyed the gospel
for as i said lord who has believed our report so then faith cometh by hearing and hearing by
the word of god but i say have they not heard has vietnam not heard has thailand not heard
has cambodia not heard has japan not heard has china not heard yes yes they have heard
yes verily their sound went into all the earth and their words under the ends of the world they
have heard now i i printed out an article that i found online about the history of christianity
in asia and again this is just the history of christianity in general and of course a lot of
people writing the history books are catholics and protestants so that's who they're going to
emphasize but look folks we don't even know about all the soul winning that's gone on throughout
history because let me just explain something to you every time somebody goes soul winning
the media doesn't report on it every time a soul is one to christ every time a missionary goes out
and wins a bunch of people to christ and maybe spends his whole life winning people to christ
non-stop guess what chroniclers and historians don't grab their pen and paper and say oh here
let me just document every bit of soul winning let me document every bible preacher most most
99 of great men of god are as unknown and yet well known well known to the lord well known in heaven
when people are rejoicing when people are being saved when they're looking down that
great cloud of witnesses but as unknown in this world the vast majority of spirit-filled men of
god soul winners missionaries are unknown to history period just because just like today i
mean do you think if a if a spiritual history of illinois were being written that pastor tom
mercury is going to be in that book if someone wrote a religious history of illinois
or if a religious history of australia were being written you think you're going to be featured
brother sepulveda i mean do you think you're going to be featured in the annals of florida
or what and look i might be featured in the annals of arizona but not in a good way they won't if
they were writing about the spiritual history of arizona yeah they might mention pastor anderson
you know he bit the heads off of snakes and chickens and and you know they'd make up all
kinds of stories about how we're you know just some horrible hate group and cult they wouldn't
tell the truth about us look the bbc came and did a documentary about our church and that
reporter from the bbc she shadowed us for weeks she got on a plane with us when we flew to atlanta
to do the soul winning marathon in atlanta she followed me around that day for 13 hours
she was at she was at the breakfast she was at the soul winning she was just watching me win souls
all day filming me winning souls all day i told her i'm like hey don't cramp my style you have to
be really far away so get your longest zoom lens because i didn't want her messing with my soul
winning but she was like you know 100 feet away like the paparazzi you know she was like in the
bushes filming me soul winning everything hey she saw the testimonies she saw the soul winning we
had 150 soul winners or something we had like 120 salvations we had 26 people baptized big event
everybody's having a great time she's filming us for 13 hours guess how much of that made it into
the documentary not even one second she wasted three days of her life she flew out there followed
me around for 13 hours flew back and didn't even put one second in the movie why because it's too
positive because it's all about the gospel and people being saved and so all they want to talk
about is what fits their agenda well let me tell you something there's nothing new under the sun
that's the way history has always been that's the way the media has always been hey god's people are
going to be marginalized lied about forgotten there as unknown and yet well known so we don't
even know but even history itself bears out that the gospel of jesus christ has gone through asia
repeatedly you can even point to different uh movements and so forth and i'm just going to read
from this article just to give you a feel for this uh the article starts out hudson taylor may have
entered china's provinces in 1865 but the gospel got there at least 1500 years earlier the
missionary finds it hard to meet the eyes of the new convert he's been asked the question he
dreaded but if the missionary works in east asia he doesn't need to feel ashamed on behalf of
christians in previous eras he can reply with confidence the gospel has repeatedly come to east
asia but it hasn't always been received right china uh there's a syriac breviary that mentions
a visit of saint thomas himself to china right the disciple thomas but the first reliable witness to
the christian message having reached the land of the silk people is the roman christian historian
arnobius writing in 303 ad he talks about the gospel going to asia and again a lot of these
are catholics or whatever i'm just saying they talk about the christian message going to these
places and uh the tibetan invasion and buddhist revival under ming empire seemed to have marked
the end of many churches that existed in china in mongolia folks i've extensively studied the life
of jenga's khan and i've studied the mongolian empire and one thing that jumped out at me as i
was studying that is that many of jenga's khan's sons married christian wives many so many of the
emperors of the mongolian empire had a christian wife and when you read about the mongolian empire
you'll read about a robust community of christians in mongolia in china and we're talking about 13th
14th century ad where you have a whole bunch of christians in mongolia whole bunch of christians
throughout the middle east whole bunch of christians in the past if you study history you'll
find that there have been christians i'm not going to read through this whole article but it's a
pretty good article just documenting uh evidence for christianity in mongolia in indonesia birma
thailand japan just china i mean you you know you go down the list folks the gospel has existed in
these places now i it's funny i wrote this sermon and turned to exodus chapter 20 i had already
written the sermon but when i woke up this morning you know sometimes you sleep on something and then
it just something pops into your mind i was working on my sermon last night and i woke up
this morning and i remembered what my parents taught me when i was just a little kid and i
hadn't thought about this in so long but i can remember it like yesterday i can picture the
face of my dad i can i can picture our old house and i remember him explaining this to me when i
was just a little kid and here's what he explained to me he said when you see these parts of the world
where christianity is just barely existing or totally non-existent and you know like
some of these places in asia where it's just everybody's buddha is just non-existent
christianity less than one percent or whatever he said whenever you see a group of people that seem
like they've just never heard the gospel or they just seem like there's no christianity there he
said what that means son is that in the past their parents and their grandparents or great
grandparents have hated god and rejected the gospel and these children are suffering for what
their parents and grandparents and great grandparents rejected that's the way my parents
explained this to me when i was a kid that's how they explained it they said it's not that the
gospel has never gone to these places they said throughout history missionaries have always gone
all over the world throughout history just like they're doing right now it's just that a lot of
these places their parents and their grandparents rejected it and they're suffering for that now
and we have to go reach the new generation with the gospel look at exodus chapter 20 verse 4 says
thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image and boy that immediately brings what to mind asia
whether it's buddhism or hinduism or shinto or jainism you know what it's a lot of idolatry
thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above
or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth thou shalt not bow down
thyself to them nor serve them why why don't you want to serve them for i the lord thy god am a
jealous god visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children under the third and fourth
generation of them that hate me cambodia thailand berma hey if you're gonna hate me
and not even want to retain me in your knowledge and you're gonna turn my glory into the image
like a man or a beast you're gonna have all these idols and worship idols and bow down to idols i'm
a jealous god and i'm gonna punish you and your children and your grandchildren and your great
grandchildren folks an idolatrous nation suffers for three to four generations that's what the
bible says you know we often hear this verse of well you know the iniquities of the fathers
are visited upon the children under the third fourth generation put it in its context what's
the context graven images idolatry and and you know what here's the key them that hate me
yeah folks when people hate god they're not just hurting themselves they're hurting their children
and their grandchildren and their great grandchildren now look i don't want you to to
get the wrong idea here and think that you know oh they're doomed they can't be saved folks they can
be saved but it's going to be harder to get them saved it's an uphill battle to get them saved why
because of the sins of the fathers because of the idolatry because of god-hating grandparents
god-hating great-grandparents god-hating parents folks what do you think is going to be more likely
for you to get saved growing up in a christian home or growing up in a home that hates god that
should be obvious so even though we all have our own free will even though we all make our own
choice obviously someone is way more likely to get saved if they're growing up in the united states of
america than in these places that have just rejected god for centuries missionaries came
they rejected them missionaries came they rejected them folks it's hard to get them saved but they
can still be saved folks there are nations that are cursed by god today but even a nation cursed
by god you can still have the individual get saved and even become a great man of god how
about simon the kainanite kainanites were a nation that was not blessed by god god cursed the
kainanites but jesus in his hand-picked assortment of disciples specifically chose a kainanite
why just to show us that the individual can still be saved and do great things for god
so number one we said asia is in spiritual a terrible spiritual condition i'm not going to lie
to you and get up and tell you that asia's conditioned spiritually is okay it's in terrible
conditions spiritually number two it's not because they've never been evangelized
they've been evangelized they rejected the gospel number three it is not because god doesn't want
them to be saved go to first timothy chapter two and folks there are people in this world who have
this philosophy that is just sort of god's will that asia be a heathen land and god planned it
this way and you know well god just planned he chose the united states right after he chose
israel he chose the united states or you know the point is that's why we have the two flags
you know we got the american flag israeli flag actually we got a palestine flag anyway so
never thought you'd see that in an ifb church huh
we're gonna pose for pictures with it afterward like the easter bunny
but look here's the thing god is not up in heaven saying well you know i just i just like white
people i just like black people i just don't really like asians you you really think god's
a respecter of persons folks god is not willing that any should perish but that all should come
to repentance and so it's not that god doesn't want them to be saved it's not that god doesn't
like asia hey god likes asia as much as he likes europe or america look god is not a respecter of
persons god wants all men to be saved it's not god's fault that asia is in the the the condition
that it's in it's asia's fault that asia's in the condition that it's in i'll read you a few
verses while you turn to first timothy 2 matthew 24 14 jesus said this gospel the kingdom shall be
preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations and then shall the end come matthew 28 19
go ye therefore and teach all nations mark 13 10 the gospel must first be published among all
nations that's god's will luke 24 47 that repentance and remission of sins should be
preached in his name among all nations beginning in jerusalem romans 1 5 by whom we have received
grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for his name look at first
timothy 2 3 for this is good and acceptable on the side of god our savior who will have all men to be
saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth god wants to have all men to be saved and to come
into the knowledge of the truth for there's one god and one mediator between god and men the man
christ jesus who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time whereunto i'm ordained
a preacher and an apostle i speak the truth in christ and lie not a teacher of the gentiles
in faith and verity god wants all nations to be saved god is not willing that any should perish
so don't get this calvinistic type view that basically well god is just ordained god just
planned for you know the u.s and europe and different places maybe to have had these great
christian movements throughout history but you know he's just got a plan for these people to
just be doomed and all go to hell wrong his plan is for those people to be saved he is not willing
that he should perish now number four i want to say this that they are cursed by god these asian
countries that are non-christian are obviously cursed by god if you would flip over to acts
chapter 14 acts chapter 14 the bible says in second thessalonians chapter 2 verse 12
that they all might be damned who believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness
the bible says in acts chapter 14 verse 16 who in time passed acts 14 16
who in time past suffered or allowed all nations to walk in their own ways
now stop and think for a second if god says here that in time past god
suffered all nations to walk in their own ways is he doing that now
in time past he suffered all nations to walk in their ways is he doing that now no it's saying he
but nevertheless verse 17 he left not himself without witness
they still had no excuse he left on himself without witness
in that he did good and gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons filling our hearts with food
and gladness go to act 17 acts chapter 17 says in verse 29 for as much then as we are the offspring
of god we ought not to think that the godhead is like unto gold or silver or stone graven by
art and man's device that's not like the idolatry of east asia and the times of this ignorance god
winked at but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent folks how can you get away from this
in acts chapter 14 and act chapter 17 that god is now in the new testament calling all nations
to repentance he's not he's not saying okay i'm going to have one pattern nation and anybody who
wants to get saved can look to this nation of israel you know they're going to be the light
no no in the new testament god is calling all nations to repentance in the new testament
god's not winking at that ignorant idolatry in the new testament god is not going to just suffer
them to walk in their own ways no god is calling cambodia to repentance he's calling taiwan to
repentance he demands that japan and china repent and you know what happens if they don't they face
the wrath of god they get punished they receive a curse from god because it's not just okay
for them to do that they're going to be punished these nations are cursed by god and by the way
let me just come right out and say it a lot of these places that are the most non-christian in
this world are some of the crummiest places to live where people are miserable where people's
quality of life is in the garbage can okay folks they don't live the same lifestyle in india that
we live here in the united states or in china or you say well what about japan they're really
prosperous yeah until they kill themselves folks prosperity isn't the blessing of god
gain is not godliness many people today in japan are miserable and depressed and living strange
lives because they're not being blessed by god in vietnam cambodia laos thailand they're not being
blessed by god you know people want to get out of those places people would love to come to the
united states from those places you think north korea is being blessed by god right now you think
that's a happy place it's not and so that's why buddhism even makes sense to these people folks
i've studied a lot about buddhism okay i've had an interest in studying hinduism and buddhism just
trying to wrap my mind around what is wrong with asia and what is wrong with it why do they believe
it's like how can we get these people saved you know how can we show them the light of the gospel
so i've tried to wrap my mind around and i've studied and studied and studied i've listened
to to just hours and hours and hours of college lectures on buddhism i've read books about it i've
looked into their scripts i've talked to buddhists and can you explain this to me and just tried to
talk to them and you know what no matter who i ask no matter what i read no matter who i listen to
it's all you know what it's just the same it's it's a death cult is what it is it is a death
worshiping cult is what it is let me tell you the goal of buddhism and this makes no sense to us
and i kept thinking i'm missing something but then i kept asking and asking and asking it's
like no you're not missing anything that's what it is is a death worshiping cult let me explain
something to you as a westerner as as as an american christian i can't even wrap my mind
around this and and by the way i'm not alone have you noticed that buddhism isn't popular in the
united states knows that buddhism isn't popular in europe except a few rock stars or rap artists on
buddhas already and you know what i guarantee you real buddhists wouldn't even say that they're even
a buddhist but let me explain something to you friend the goal of buddhism is to stop the cycle
of reincarnation same thing with hinduism to die and never come back i mean that was that was
buddha's goal was to just die and never be real now when we as american christians or american
even just you know white people europeans whatever when we hear about reincarnation
the last thing on our mind would be like oh man how do we stop this
and make sure that when we die we stay dead
am i right
i mean you know when americans hear about reincarnation their thought isn't like oh
stink i have to come back and do this again how do i just die and never come back
that thought why because we don't live such a miserable horrible life where we're just like
just make it stop you know what you know what appeals to us the message of the bible eternal
life i mean look you know i'm glad that jesus didn't say hey if you believe on me you get to
die and never come back it's like thank you jesus folks our goal is not death as christians you know
what our goal is as christians life i'm come that they might have life and that they might have it
more abundantly buddha is like i've come that you might have death and then it might come sooner and
be more permanent i'm serious folks study it folks and you know other similar religions because these
religions you can kind of put them in the same cat hinduism buddhism jainism folks the founder
of jainism you know how he died he starved himself to death because he didn't want to he wanted to
burn off that last bit of karma and so he just completely starved himself because he just wanted
to burn off the last karma and his goal was just to die and never come back and you know what even
today giants in india will do that they'll starve themselves to death they don't want to harm
anything they don't want to create any karma so they they do all these good works and they do all
this stuff and they get rid of all the bad karma and then they just like they're like okay now i
just gotta spend the last few weeks just naked and eat nothing and just die without you know
causing any reason to come back isn't this weird to you doesn't this just sound weird to your
christian mind like how death could be such a goal i mean look if if i were just let's say i'm just
american joe plumber and i'm not a christian and somebody comes at me with this message of
reincarnation i'd be like sweet let's do it again great i get to keep coming back great
let's do it again folks they don't think that way and you know what goes to show you is that
they're living a miserable life that's why the doctrine of buddhism appeals them you know what
one of the key doctrines of buddhism is that all of life is suffering
even when you're having fun it's bad everything is suffering
basically basically buddhism teaches life suck it doesn't teach life sucks and then you die
it basically teaches life sucks and then hopefully you die
if you're a real good buddhist and then you never come back and look go ahead try to sugarcoat
buddhism all you want at the bottom of buddhism that's what you find a death worshiping cult
well you just don't understand it well you know what i don't understand you're right i don't
understand it but you know what it's not because i haven't spent hundreds of hours talking to
people reading it studying it folks i'll tell you who doesn't understand it buddhists don't
understand it they don't understand it that they're in the clutches of satan that has got
them brainwashed into a death worshiping cult and that we as christians we are uh receiving eternal
life which is the exact opposite of buddhism buddhist will even tell you hey the christian
god makes something from nothing but our goal is as buddhist is to make nothing from something
that's what buddhists will tell you folks it's backwards it's wicked it's wrong these miserable
parts of the world is where are where buddhism thrives buddhism thrives in places where people
are miserable but you know why they're miserable because they're buddhists and you know why they're
buddhists because they're miserable and you know why they're miserable because they're buddhists
folks it's a cycle of rejecting christ living a miserable life and then instead of saying hey
my life's miserable i need jesus instead they're just like oh well here's a a religion that just
tells me hey it's normal to be miserable yeah we're all miserable let's make sure we just die
and never come back all right let's do it anyway let me move on from that and let me just give you
one more verse in case you you're not convinced that these countries are cursed by god how about
if any man love not the lord jesus christ let him be anathema i mean that's pretty clear right
there's a curse associated with rejecting the lord and there's a blessing associated with
receiving the lord happy is the nation whose god is the lord blessed are they that put their trust
in the lord well what does that mean if you don't put your trust in the lord you're not blessed
okay so number one we said asia is in terrible condition spiritually number two we said it's
not because they haven't been evangelized it's because they got evangelized and they rejected
the gospel number three it's not because god doesn't want them to be saved god does want them
to be saved okay number four non-christian nations are obviously cursed by god there's
plenty of scripture to to prove that number five there's always a remnant simon the kainanite
there are christians today saved born again children of god that are truly saved in cambodia
laos vietnam thailand china japan there are saved born again christians there and and you know some
of them are in this room you know we have saved asians here today you know we're gonna hear some
testimonies later today god willing from some of them and uh so there's always an exception so i
don't want you to think that i'm just saying that they're all doomed or something no god wants them
saved they can be saved many of them are saved there's a remnant as always but the last point
i want to make and this is the most important point is the strategy for reaching asia so this
has been a pretty negative sermon up to this point of just they're doomed they rejected god
they're cursed they're worshiping death buddhism is bizarre to our western mind because we actually
live in the land of milk and honey being blessed by god we don't understand this this hatred for
life we love life because we love having eternal life i mean i don't just sit around thinking oh
man it kind of stinks that we have eternal life like we just it's like this is just never gonna
end we're like great thank you jesus you know we're not like how do i make it stop buddhism is
literally how do i make it stop that's literally the religion in a nutshell what's the strategy
though that's all the negative side right what's the strategy for reaching asia and i want to start
out by giving you an illustration and if you would turn in your bible to where is my scripture there
we go go to uh luke chapter 8 in your in your bible there luke chapter 8 so before i get into
luke chapter 8 i want to give you an illustration to help you understand what i believe is the right
strategy for reaching asia let's pretend that phoenix represents the whole world so phoenix
is a microcosm of the world right so just like we want to evangelize phoenix we also want to
evangelize the whole world right well guess what the same way that we go about evangelizing phoenix
is the same way that we go about evangelizing the whole world and here's what i mean by that
in phoenix there are places that are a lot more receptive than others now when we think of
unreceptive places the places that would come to mind would pretty much be paradise valley
scottsdale maybe parts of chandler or some of the wealthier areas but even sometimes it's not even
a wealthy area sometimes there's just a certain area a certain region a certain demographic that's
just not that receptive right and then there are other parts of phoenix that are really receptive
you know when we went to guadalupe we had tons of people saved south phoenix tons of people
saved you know so we've had certain areas that were receptive and certain that weren't some of
the indian tribes that we went to the apaches were super receptive other tribes we get into
certain pockets on the navajo or tono odom that weren't that receptive you know other parts of
the navajo reservation were receptive you know it's just there's different geographies right
it's pretty obvious if you've been soul winning some areas you're just getting salvation after
salvation other areas you're just going for hours and hours and hours you can't even get
into conversation okay so let me ask you this what is our strategy for evangelizing phoenix
what do we start with do we start with the hard area paradise valley scottsdale or do we start
with the easy areas south phoenix guadalupe isn't it kind of a no-brainer to go to the receptive
stuff and the easy stuff first now here's why this makes sense number one you don't know how
much time you have we could die tomorrow so we want to make our life count let's go where we can
do the most good now let's get the bird in the hand let's win souls that we can win today it
doesn't make sense just waste our time in a hard area now but at the end of the day are we going
to just skip scottsdale or are we going to do the whole thing we're going to do everything so look
i'm for evangelizing all of phoenix just like i'm for evangelizing the whole world but it makes
sense to go to the receptive areas first now listen when i started the church there are only
about two or three people going soul winning in the church pretty much me my wife amanda those
are the soul winners in the real early days you know i'd go out by myself my wife and amanda would
go out as a team i mean that's our soul winning force so are we able to cover huge amounts of
ground with with that soul winning force no we can barely cover anything you know because it's
just so few people so we want to we want to go to the receptive areas so we can get the salvations
okay because if we had that small of a soul winning force and we went to an unreceptive
area we could go months without even getting anybody saved we only have two teams we could
easily go two months with zero salvation so in the early days we focused everything toward the
receptive areas just makes sense right now now that our church is running like 400 and we have
about 200 people going out soul winning every week now we're biting the bullet because we've
already hit guadalupe seven times we've already hit south phoenix seven times now we're biting
the bullet and we're starting to hit some of these really unreceptive areas so you'll see us
on that map plowing through large sections of awatuki chandler scottsdale and we're plowing
through a lot of that stuff and it's a lot less painful when you have 200 people doing it than
two people doing it if two people are doing it man you'd be parked there for 10 years and just like
you know just beating your head against the wall whereas when you got 200 people
you just you crank through it because you have a bigger team you just you crank through it okay
so let's take that philosophy which i think is obvious and by the way i believe it's taught in
scripture because jesus said if you come to a town and they don't receive you shake off the dust of
your feet move on we see the apostle paul saying hey since you jews don't want to get saved i'm
going to the gentiles they will hear it they want to listen it's it's biblical to go to the people
that are the most receptive so if we take that philosophy that we apply here in phoenix now
let's apply that to the whole world folks the world is sort of like phoenix it has rich areas
and poor areas it has receptive areas and unreceptive areas it has areas that are
predominantly christian areas that are predominantly not christian it's the same
thing so where do we start we start in the receptive areas what's the strategy for reaching
asia go to the receptive pockets in asia and don't beat your head against the wall
in the areas that have traditionally rejected the gospel again and again and again and again
and again folks go to the areas that have a track record for being receptive and start there folks
our church i believe and i sure hope is in its early days i hope god gives us many more years
and decades and as a quote unquote movement this movement is really new and most of the pastors
that are in this building have been a pastor for like two years one year three years five years
now some guys have been pastoring longer but in general this is a pretty new movement pretty young
movement and and as far as missions we're just kind of just getting started in missions we're
but we've barely even started doing a lot on missions i mean hopefully god willing
we're going to have big days ahead of just doing way more with missions
and some of that we're going to talk about this afternoon when we talk
about some of the missions trips and things that we want to see happen
but we're in the early days so look what did we do when we're in the early days of faithful word
what we do we focus on what's receptive well guess what as a movement and as a church i think
since we have limited resources right now we should channel those resources where we're
going to get the most bang for our buck not beating our head against the wall in a difficult
place when there's all this easy stuff to do folks it's like when you take a test what do you do when
you take a test first you go through and you answer all the easy questions so you don't get
hung up on some hard question and run out of time well you know what i don't want to run out of time
getting hung up in japan or something you know what i mean when the philippines is right there
the low-hanging fruit or other places that are low-hanging fruit you see what i'm saying
like we need to start in the easy places and here's the thing if we can go to the easy and
receptive places first which i believe is biblical anyway if we go to those places first you know
what we're doing we're building our team because if you can build a bunch of churches in the
receptive places you can build up churches of hundreds of people you know that's your army
that's going to reach the rest of asia with the gospel asians reaching asians
but you got to start with the low-hanging fruit it's just common sense that's the strategy
now a lot of people have taught the opposite strategy they've taught the strategy of well
here's this godless place where almost nobody's a christian well they need it the most that's
kind of their logic their logic is well look i mean i mean the philippines already has a bunch
of people preaching the gospel you know these people over here man they need it the most because
look how few christians they have but let me explain some of you there's a reason why they
have so few christians because they don't want to hear the gospel because they've historically
rejected the gospel and hated god okay and again i'm not writing these people off look i'm not
writing off scotsdale i'm not writing off paradise valley but you know what though i'm not going to
start there it doesn't make any sense to start there now here's the thing we still reach people
even in the places where we've never knocked a single door how do we how do we reach people
in places where we've never set foot and never knocked a door how do we do it through the
internet i mean so look through the internet we're having an impact and look some of these
countries that are the difficult really hardened to the gospel countries we're already having an
impact through the internet but when it comes to the boots on the ground when it comes to the
resources we want to put that toward that which is most receptive and then once we can get that
going and get a big army built of solar from there then it spreads and then we start working
on the tougher nuts to crack but you know what it doesn't make any sense to say well i got to go
across the world i'm going to sneak into north korea as a hidden commando and i'm going to be
there for 10 years my life's going to be in danger every day i'm going to be dodging bullets
over there and avoiding being captured and tortured to death and after 10 years i got
five people saved but it was worth it for those five people well let me explain something to you
you could get five people saved today if you spent all day soul winning in a receptive area in phoenix
you could get five people saved in one day why would i get five people saved in 10 years if i
can get five people saved in one day i mean this should be a no-brainer because you know what as
far as i'm concerned as far as god says there a soul is a soul is a soul it's not like you get
some bounty in heaven on like a north korea soul oh you got a cambodian soul saved that's worth a
hundred american souls that's that's that's worth a thousand filipinos you know it's like folks a
soul is a soul and you know what get get the the hundred americans saved get the thousand
filipinos saved and you know what there's your soul-winning force to eventually go get the heart
and i look i'm for reaching vietnam and thailand and some of the maybe heart i'm for reaching japan
which has historically been very hostile to the gospel i'm for reaching japan i want to see us
reach japan in our lifetime but you know what japan's not like all right let's start with japan
and that's where we're going to focus all our energy because they need it the most
folks it's a fool's errand is what it is
so start with that which is receptive and you say well pastor anderson
go where they need it the most okay let's see if that's biblical look down at your bible
in luke chapter 8 verse 18 take heed therefore how ye hear
for whosoever hath to him shall be given and whosoever hath not from him shall be taken
even that which he seemeth to have so you know who do we give the preachers to who do we give
the soul winners to who do we give the gospel to you know what he that hath more shall be given
and he shall have more abundance from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he
seemeth that and what's the context again because we hear a lot of these concepts a lot and i do
believe that these concepts can be applied in other ways but it's always good to get the actual
context right what's the actual context what are the first words of verse 18 take heed therefore
how you hear better take heed how you hear india because whosoever hath to him more shall be given
and he shall have more abundance but whosoever hath not from him shall be taken away even that
which he seemeth to have you better be careful how you hear japan you better be careful how you
hear china you better be careful how you hear thailand because you know what you're not just
dooming yourself you're dooming your children and your grandchildren and your great-grandchildren
when you reject the gospel don't worship those idols take heed how you hear because the one
who's receptive gets more the one who's receptive gets more truth that's not fair he already has 10
talents why are you giving him another talent because whosoever hath to him shall more be given
and the have-nots well you know what let's strip him of the one talent that he has left
and leave him with nothing because he doesn't deserve it i know it's a hard truth but it's
it's the truth now let me give you some examples of where i think are the places that we should
start in asia you know i want to get practical in the sermon look i want to reach asia with the
gospel you know but look if i'm going to plan a missions trip you know if these if these other
pastor friends of mine they're going to plan missions trips and and if they're going to send
out evangelists and plant churches in these places you know a big question is where do we go right
where do we do the next business trip you know where do we plant the church
what's the criteria how do we make those decisions
well let me let me just give you the example and i want to use india as an example now india has
1.3 billion people in it 1.3 billion people and just to put this in perspective that means one
sixth of the population one out of six people live in india one out of six people on this planet
live in india and if you include other countries of the subcontinent like pakistan and bangladesh
you know pretty much one out of five people live in in the indian subcontinent okay
how can you evangelize the world without evangelizing india
how can you say hey we're gonna evangelize the whole world well you better include india in that
it's one fifth of the world in that subcontinent does everybody understand what i'm saying
it has to factor into our thinking if you're going to reach the world with the gospel
but let me explain something to you hardcore hindu india northern india
new delhi india has a track record for hating and rejecting the lord jesus christ
they're unreceptive and folks i've tried we've translated our materials we've translated our
films into so many indian languages we go soloing in little india we've done everything we can we've
tried and tried and tried but let me tell you something these are not receptive people
they're just not it's just the it's just the the hard truth that we have to accept
so how do we reach india well look i have a burden for india i hope that we can do great things in
india in my lifetime and i would love to be a part of it even personally if they don't ban me
because you have to actually apply for a visa so the chances of me being allowed into india are
probably slim if i have to actually apply for a visa because one of the questions on the visa
application is so have you ever been banned from any other country and if so if so please list
those countries and i'm like why do you guys only provide eight spaces you know so i'm kind of like
i'm like see attachment a and i have to like attach these you want that alphabetical
or by region or you know so that's kind of an opposite any country that requires a visa
i'm you know usually i don't i'm not going to get in right but i would love to go and
hopefully god can work a miracle and i and i'd love to get in there and do some preaching
and uh i've made i've planned different things and and but when it comes to india
where do you start with a country like this 1.3 billion people 2.3 percent christian
80 percent hindu 14 percent muslim right i mean it's a tough nut to crack and historically it's
been unreceptive and by the way the 2.3 percent christian that's a lot of charismatic faith
healers roman catholics i mean that's a lot of the wrong things but let me explain something
there's a port there's a part of india that has been receptive to the gospel in the past
and there's a demographic of india that has been receptive to the gospel in the past
for example in northeastern india and if you know anything about geography there's a nice map of
asia over here go take a look at that map after the sermon and what you'll see is that india has
this little kind of appendage hanging off of it on the northeast side it's like this little
weird shape kind of hanging there and that part of india and that weird shape right there has
been receptive to the gospel in fact let me give you some stats on it there are three main
provinces one of them is called nagaland okay the predominant religion of nagaland is christianity
is in india the state's population is 1.98 million out of which 90 are christians
more than 98 of the naga people ethnically identify themselves as christian
and along with meghalaya and misorum it's one of the three christian majority states in india
and the only one where more than 90 are christian
nagaland became an overwhelmingly christian state known as the only predominantly baptist
state in the world among christians baptists are the predominant group
constituting more than 75 of the state's population thus making it more baptist than mississippi
where 55 of the population's baptist it's in india here's a state in india with two million
people that's more baptist than mississippi there's another state called misorum 87 percent
christian mostly presbyterian in the north baptist in the south the majority 87 percent of mesos are
christians in various denominations predominantly presbyterian then baptist uh there's another one
meghalaya 75 of the population practices christianity with presbyterians baptists and
catholics being the most common denominations in that particular state there's another state
a fourth state called manapur where it's 41 percent hindu and 41 percent christian i mean
that's still that's pretty good though i mean that's a good start so look if i'm approaching
india with the gospel right hey we want to do great work in india i'm not just going to
parachute into hardcore hindu india on the banks of the ganges river in north india with a bunch
of naked long-haired ascetics and just be walking up to the most hardcore folks you'll literally
probably get killed the hindus could literally kill you over there they persecute christians
over there and uh i was talking to brother baron he said that the current government the current
regime right now is very anti-christian and pushing hinduism but folks imagine the impact
imagine the effect i just want to share my vision with you today imagine the impact of taking a
mission strip to nagaland to northeast india to these places mizoram manapur to these places that
have historically had a lot of baptists and presbyterians right and going there and i guarantee
you we could probably preach in the schools we could probably preach in baptist churches we could
go soul winning up and down the streets and folks i get we could get a lot of the people a lot of
these baptists aren't saved let me ask this are all the baptists in mississippi saved is every
baptist in mississippi no way well guess what not every baptist in nagalan saved either and not only
that we know the catholics aren't saved you know even less of the presbyterians are going to be
saved than the baptists we can get a lot of the presbyterians saved we get catholics saved and
here's the thing it's not just northeast india there are other segments of the population
throughout india known as the adivasis that historically the adivasis which are like they're
sort of like the we have the native americans here in india they have the adivasis which are
supposedly it's debatable but they're supposedly the indigenous people of india so they're like
indian indians they're like both kind of indian in one feather and dot right casino and liquor store
both rolled into one so these are like the indian indians okay so look folks if if if a bunch of
baptist missionaries and a bunch of presbyterian missionaries in the past went to northeast india
and were able to just turn around whole segments of the population turn whole segments baptists
turn whole segments don't you think it could be done again in other parts of india too but folks
start there folks i'm not going to start in new delhi i want to start in nagaland and then you
know what and by the way when i've i've preached about this in the past and i got emails from
people living in this place who listen to my sermons people said hey i live in nagaland i
live in manapur i've heard from it and you know what they said they said you know what you're
right pastor anderson everybody here is baptist everybody here is christian but they said the
churches are dead soul winning is dead we need revival and they said the hindus are going to
take back over they said i'm telling you this place is eventually going to go hindu that's
what's happened throughout history people let christianity die how many times in the bible do
the children of israel let the worship of the lord almost practically die and then somebody has to
come and rebuild the altar of the lord or take the image of bale out of the temple and stuff
folks there are places that went in a few generations from worshiping the lord to just
totally forgetting the lord it's in the bible well guess what that's what i mean about asia
it hasn't always been non-christian it hasn't always been 99 percent buddhist folks a lot of
these places used to have strong christian communities where christianity died let's not
why we don't want to let christianity die in northeast india the last outpost of baptist in
india don't let it die and you know what hey people like us people like the preachers in this room
we could go reinvigorate that area man if we went on a tour preaching in those churches
preaching in those schools and they probably put us behind the pulpit realistically just as
american uh missionaries coming in they'll just because when you go to third world country soul
winning they're just like can you preach they just met you it's like i just met you and this
is crazy but can you preach on sunday morning seriously i'm not kidding you go to the public
schools oh you're a preacher from the united states you're wearing a suit and tie and looking
sharp hey can you preach to the student body it's true folks can you imagine the impact of some of
the preachers in this room would show up in that part of india and light that place up with the
gospel and then you know what you can see happen if you could get that place on fire for the gospel
you could watch it radiate out right and then you know what then you'd research okay where are the
adivasis throughout india let's go do with them what baptist missionaries did in northeast 100
years ago let's go do it everywhere else and you know what i'm not saying you're going to turn
india into the bible belt but you know what you could create some little bible belts throughout
india and at least everybody and you know what the hindus will at least hear about it
and at least hear the gospel and they can make their choice and folks that's just one example
with india but you know what it's not just india i guarantee you that other countries if we were
to look at laos cambodia vietnam china japan i guarantee you that there are other people groups
and areas that have historically been the most christian that's where you start and then you
radiate out from there that's that's what i believe is the strategy because unto him that
hath more shall be given he shall have more abundance and it's not folks the great commission
is not just about winning souls the great commission is also about teaching them to
observe all things that christ commanded so if we can go find a bunch of dead lame christians
and if we can light them up and turn them into a soul-winning fire-breathing fundamentalist baptist
you know we have just fulfilled the great commission by doing that and in many ways firing
up a christian is almost better than winning a soul because the fired up christian will win 10
souls so sometimes by firing up one christian you just won 10 souls you just won 100 souls because
that's what that guy's gonna go do now that you've taken him from being just this sleeper doing
nothing to actually doing something great for the lord so look i'm not here to preach doom and gloom
to you about asia i'm here to preach reality about asia i'm here to just be realistic with you about
asia and i'm here to say that at the top of my list for a soul-winning marathon sorry it's not
japan north korea and cambodia those are not my top three okay my top three are going to be the
philippines northeast india south korea i think could be a great place you know who here's from
south korea today put up your hand if you're from south korea we got how many koreans here one two
three four five we got a bunch hey you know what south korea it's legal to preach the gospel and
you know what i'm not saying it's the most receptive place in the world but you know what
you can get people saved in south korea you can build a baptist church in south korea missionaries
historically have had success in south korea say how are we going to reach north korea you know
how to reach north korea by reaching south korea you know when you tell me when you're done reaching
south korea and then let's talk about north korea but let me tell you something you got
to clean your plate before you get dessert why would god you say oh i just wish god would open
up north korea i promise you i'll make you a promise right now evangelize everyone in south
korea and god will open north korea the next day i promise yeah you meet you really think for one
second god's gonna let us just evangelize south korea and then just leave north korea closed off
no way you know what but but but you're you know when we're not even doing the job that's right
there and then we want to worry about the job that we can't do you're not even doing the job
you can't do it's like oh man how are we gonna evangelize this place on the other side of the
world are you even evangelizing your own city here are you even going soloing in phoenix
and you want to talk about evangelizing the other side of the world how about evangelizing across
the street and by the way you know that's why you know the caribbean is right there how are
we doing on the caribbean guys have we evangelized all the caribbean folks let me tell you something
do that which is easy do the low-hanging fruit do that which is receptive and you know what god'll
start opening doors in laos cambodia thailand japan china north it'll all just open up it'll
be like dominoes folks but we've got to do what we've got in front of us right now
and so you know i i would say hey there are places in asia there are pockets
that are going to be receptive we're going to have some amazing mission strips god willing
that's our prayer that's our hope amazing mission strips throughout asia
amazing works that will be done god willing in south korea philippines but you know what then
then we'll start radiating it out and you know what eventually we'll hit every country
god willing it's god god it's god's will all nations let's bow your heads and have a word
of prayer father we thank you so much lord for this church and people who have a heart for
missions and and they love winning souls and lord i i hope everybody understands my sermon doesn't
get the wrong idea lord i love the people of japan the people of china the people of southeast asia
lord i love india and lord my i my heart's desire is that they would be saved but lord just give us
wisdom and common sense lord and guide us and direct us to what would be the most effective
strategy in the long run to reach these places by starting with that which is receptive and ready
to hear the gospel right now lord lead us to those people that today are ready to get saved
so that they can be the great soul-winning army of tomorrow to evangelize all of asia possibly
even in our lifetime lord i know that that would be your desire and lord let that be our desire
as well and in jesus name we pray amen all right this time we're going to sing our song one more
time i want to hear you belting this out in korean i'm going to ask brother joseph freeman
to come and lead us again but i want you to belt this out in korean you already had one practice
round so uh this should be a piece of cake the second time through where's my song leader
he has left the building do i have to do i have to lead a song in korean all right give me a song
sheet i'm doing it all right i don't see my song leader so let's see where's the microphone okay
let's have the korean ladies back me up over here korean ladies here's a microphone you gotta you
gotta be my backup singers on the mic over here all right that way something right will be coming
through the speakers all right very good all right we're gonna we're gonna sing this out i'm in the
same boat as you folks i don't speak korean we all are looking at the simplified version right
so get the simplified side let's sing it out give me the intro
ah
all right thank you so much for coming we're dismissed remember for the lunches we're going
to meet around the pulpit here at 11 45 that is for the spanish speakers the asians and uh uk
ireland and canada all right so meet us for lunch here at 11 45 we'll go off to the restaurants from
there
so
all right
so
happy birthday to you happy birthday to you happy birthday
happy birthday
all right now we're going to sing happy birthday
so
all right
so
okay
so
here
all right
so
all right
so
do it
so
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.