MUSIC
Hello and welcome to Shur Foundation Baptist Church. Our Sunday morning service, if you'll take a seat and grab a hymnal, turn to song number 55 in your red or green hymnals. Welcome to Shur Foundation Baptist Church.
Our red and green hymnals this morning, 55 when the roll is called up yonder.
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When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound and time shall be no more and the morning breaks eternal bright and fair. When the saved of earth shall gather over on the other shore and the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
When the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
On that bright and cloudless morning when the dead in Christ shall rise and the glory of his resurrection share. When his chosen ones shall gather to their home beyond the skies and the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
When the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
Let us labor for the master from the dawn till setting sun, let us talk of all his wondrous love and care. Then when all of life is over and our work on earth is done and the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
When the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I'll be there.
Great singing brother Ramon will you open us in a word of prayer?
Amen. Our next song is song number 413.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus, 413.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus, ye soldiers of the cross. Lift high his royal banner, it must not suffer loss.
From victory unto victory, his army shall he lead, till every foe is vanquished and Christ is Lord indeed.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus, the trumpet call obey, forth to the mighty conflict in this his glorious day.
Ye that are men now serve him against unnumbered foes. Let courage rise with danger and strength to strength oppose.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus, stand in his strength alone. The arm of flesh will fail you, ye dare not trust your own.
Put on that gospel armor and watching unto prayer. Where duty calls for danger, be never wanting there.
Great singing.
Good morning everybody. Welcome to Shur Foundation Baptist Church. Let's take our bulletins and go through some announcements.
If you need a bulletin would you just lift up your hand one of the ushers will bring you a bulletin. Anybody need one?
All right. On our front cover we have there our verse of the week.
It says let everything that hath breath praise the Lord, praise ye the Lord.
Psalm chapter 150 verse number six.
And that's a great scripture there, great psalm.
And on our inside page there we have just a short message about what kind of church we are.
And if you have any questions feel free to come talk to me after church about it.
If you're not 100% sure you're saved of course we'd like to make sure that anybody that comes and visits our church is saved.
So if you have any questions about that please come see one of the ushers.
The guys with the pins on their jacket says usher on there or you can come talk to me of course after the service.
Pretty much anybody that regularly attends our church could probably show you how to be saved but definitely make sure if you're not 100% sure.
And also if you've never been scripturally baptized that means submerged underwater after you're saved is what the Bible teaches.
And so if you've never been baptized we'd love to do that for you.
Below there we have our different social media where you can find our sermons online.
And you can subscribe on YouTube or as long as we still have it anyway.
And our Facebook channel Rumble and X formerly known as Twitter.
I always kind of feel like that always reminds me of Prince who's you know the artist formerly known as or whatever.
And then we have that British flag there and I'm wearing a British tie here just in honor of our guest here from England.
And so you won't see that happen very often.
This is like one of those things.
It's like the blood moon at the tribulation time.
Me wearing a British tie.
No, I'm just kidding.
But I put that there.
Anyway, I'll mention everything else here in just a minute.
But our service times are 1030 a.m. for our preaching service.
Sunday evening is our other service on Sunday, 3.30 p.m.
And Thursday Bible studies at 6.30 p.m.
And our sewing times are listed there below.
Hello.
And we do have soul winning today at 1 p.m.
We are broken up into two groups today if we have enough soul winners.
And so plan on going soul winning.
See brother Sean Conlon.
And he is our soul winning captain on Saturdays.
If you're just planning on meeting on site and you're in the WhatsApp group you can just meet.
But just make sure you know which team you're on.
Team one or team two.
And that doesn't mean you're if you're on team two doesn't mean you're lesser than team one.
Okay.
It's just how we divide things.
If you're not in the soul winning group and you're planning on going soul winning just talk to brother Sean.
Brother Sean is back there. He's sitting in the back seat there.
So if you don't know who he is that's who he is.
So we also have many other soul winning times to choose from.
And you're welcome to choose one of those times to get involved.
And the respective captains that lead those times.
So we had a really fruitful month last month.
And we're already beginning a very fruitful month this month.
We've already had 20 salvations.
We had 11 last week after Easter service.
About an hour's worth of soul winning time.
Had about 11 salvations.
And then we had 11 on Friday.
And well we had 13 on Friday.
We had 11 in Longview or Kelso.
And then we had two out in Gresham.
And then we had some during the week.
So that makes 20.
But last month we had 103 salvations.
So that's really good.
So praise the Lord for that.
And you can see the comparison.
We're already halfway to our last year totals.
And so the baptism is we need to start coming in here and forcing people to be baptized or something.
Because we're behind on those.
But no I'm just kidding.
Anyway so our last week's attendance totals.
We had 103 in church on Sunday morning for our Easter morning service.
We had a nice potluck.
We enjoyed a nice ham dinner.
So thanks everybody for bringing food for that.
And making it a nice meal.
And let's see we had a good service on Thursday where we had 77 in church.
And so today we have Pastor Ian Tavner from Strong Tower Baptist Church.
And he's the first pastor I've ordained.
And he is from the UK or the United Kingdom or Great Britain.
Whatever you want to call it.
And he's preaching for us for both services.
I ordained him last September.
Was it August?
Okay yeah I was wondering.
We were there in August, September.
So yeah it was last August.
And so they're doing a great work over there.
And you know what people would think is a place who's going to start a church over in Great Britain.
But you know the light shines the most in a dark place.
So but the church there is doing really well.
And really glad that we decided to do that.
And so the church has thrived over there.
It's thriving now.
And we're very happy to have Pastor Tavner.
His daughter Ella.
We have Miss Amy.
And well what's his name over there?
Adam.
Brother Adam from their church.
So we're all going to the youth conference.
We're going to fly out tonight.
Later on tonight after the church services are done.
But yeah really excited about having to preach here today.
And we got to do some good old fashioned American gun shooting yesterday.
So and that was really fun.
So I just figured I'd take them to do something they can never do in England.
So that was one of those things.
And yeah it was pretty fun watching them shoot AR15s and M16s and all kinds of different things.
I think that you can only just like skeet shoot like clay pigeons is all they can do there.
So and it costs a lot of money too doesn't it?
Yeah it's pretty expensive just to shoot clay pigeons.
So yeah we had a lot of fun.
And I just want to say thank you to all the ladies that helped with the shower for Miss Stacy yesterday.
The baby shower.
So yeah we had a lot of fun.
Thank you Brother Sean for putting on the shooting range yesterday.
It was a great time.
So anyway yeah after so this week I think we have people from our churches traveling down to the Next Generation Youth Conference.
And if you're not going there's still going to be some great preaching that's going on there.
Pastor Pizarnsky is preaching on I think Tuesday morning.
And then I'll be preaching Tuesday evening.
And then Pastor Tavern will be preaching on Wednesday morning and Pastor Jimenez on Wednesday night.
So you're not going to want to miss those sermons.
And they are kind of geared towards the age 13 to 19.
But I'm sure you can probably pick up some stuff that might help you in your life also.
So and then April 21st we're going to have evangelist Jim Wiebe here from SFBC in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
Also another place where you think a church wouldn't do well.
But Brother Jim after being ordained he's just kind of really doing a lot of great things.
And he started a work over in Calgary which is in Alberta, Canada.
And they had they're kind of I think meeting in a house at this point right now.
But they're running between 17 and 20 right now.
So he's kind of picked up another big group of people.
And they're running about 30 right now.
So he's already kind of running you know if you combine the Sunday.
It's kind of like I don't know a Bible study group at this point.
But we're hoping and praying it's going to become a church plant here real soon.
But he'll be preaching for us on Sunday evening April 21st.
So and I'm planning on ordaining Brother Jim on June 9th.
So that's going to be a great time.
Pastor Burgess will be preaching Friday night up there.
So and then April 28th we're going to have our first anniversary for Sure Foundation Baptist Church in Seattle.
We're going to have some soul winning happening on Saturday the 27th right across the street from where the church building is located.
So if you're planning on going up there and spending a night there.
I would recommend that you probably stay in a hotel that's fairly close to the church just because you never know what the traffic is going to be like up there.
You have all kinds of people and all kinds of traffic and the wind can blow and traffic is backed up bumper to bumper.
So anyway and then Pastor Bruce Mahiel will be preaching both services on Sunday.
So we have our service times a little different down there or up there and we have a 9 a.m. service.
So that might as well be a sunrise service for our church members but if you're planning on going 9 a.m. is the service time.
And then we do have soul winning in between but you can kind of maybe you can take that time to maybe just go around and see the sites and stuff.
Hopefully it'll be a nice day outside and then 5 30 p.m. will be the evening service and we'll probably have some sort of meal afterwards.
So then we're a family integrated church so make sure that we're well as a family integrated church we're we're not separating children infants from the from their parents for any reason.
So we do have a mother baby room in the back there.
That baby room back there and we just have those rooms for your convenience during all the services.
Please take your children if they're being super distracting to other people and also just for your your needs maybe changing them we have changing tables we have the sermons can still be heard back there is comfortable seating so please utilize those for your convenience and make sure that you're not allowing children to be anywhere unattended and not letting them run in church.
And I do allow the ushers to tell children to stop running but that wasn't like a go between two for the it's the ushers job to parent your children.
Okay so just because I've allowed the ushers to do that doesn't mean that you have no responsibility to tell your children to quit running because there's still children running in church and it's like you're the parents you should know to tell them to stop.
So you shouldn't be like well the ushers supposed to be telling them now so I'm not going to say anything that's just not what I meant by that.
So just keep that in mind. All right. And let's see the offerings that came in so far down at the bottom for the whole month of March and then the April birthdays we have Alina Ritchie and Mikey.
Mikey and I got the 12th and the 11th and OK. That's my fault there. But Mikey's birthday is this week. And then we also have Jesse's birthday. So they're all like forty nine.
Right. Mikey and Jesse are forty nine. Now they're there in the early 20s. Right. So Mikey how old are you where you are.
How old are you going to be. Twenty two. Oh man it'd be nice to be that age again. Jesse brother Jesse where are you at.
Brother Jesse. Oh hey brother Jesse how are you doing. How old are you going to be. Man he's an old man now he's past his prime.
No I'm just kidding. Let's go ahead and sing happy birthday to all the birthday people.
Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday. God bless you. Happy birthday to you.
All right. That's all I have for announcements. Go ahead sing another song and we'll receive the offering.
Third song is song number one hundred and forty three blessed assurance.
One forty three blessed assurance.
On the first blessed assurance Jesus is mine.
Oh what a foretaste of glory divine.
Air of salvation purchase of God.
Born of his spirit washed in his blood.
This is my story. This is my song.
Praising my savior all the day long.
This is my story. This is my song.
Praising my savior all the day long.
Perfect submission. Perfect delight.
Visions of rapture now burst on my side.
Angels descending ring from above.
Echoes of mercy. Whispers of love.
This is my story. This is my song.
Praising my savior all the day long.
This is my story. This is my song.
Praising my savior all the day long.
Perfect submission. All is at rest.
I am my savior and happy and blessed.
Watching and waiting. Looking above.
Filled with his goodness. Lost in his love.
This is my story. This is my song.
Praising my savior all the day long.
This is my story. This is my song.
Praising my savior all the day long.
Great singing. We'll have our ushers come forth to receive the offering.
Brother Alex, we pray for the offering.
Dear Father God, we thank you for our church here.
We thank you for the opportunity you deserve.
May we ask you to bless the gift and the giver and put this money to work to further your achievement.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Thank you.
All right, go ahead and open your Bibles to First Corinthians 15.
First Corinthians 15, if you don't have a Bible, there should be a Bible under the seat in front of you.
First Corinthians 15.
First Corinthians 15, the Bible reads,
Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received and wherein ye stand, by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.
For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures, and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve.
After that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.
After that he was seen of James, then of all the apostles, and last of all he was seen of me also, as one born out of due time.
For I am the least of the apostles that am not meet to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God, but by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all,
yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach, and so ye believed.
Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?
But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen? And if Christ not be risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.
Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.
For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised. And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, you are yet in your sins.
Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.
But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.
For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
But every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ's at his coming.
Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.
For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.
For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, All things are put under him, it is manifest that he is accepted, which did put all things under him.
And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.
Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead not rise at all?
Why are they then baptized for the dead? And why stand we in jeopardy every hour?
I protest by your rejoicing, which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.
If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageeth it me if the dead rise not?
Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Be not deceived, evil communications corrupt good manners.
Awake to righteousness, and sin not. For some have not the knowledge of God, I speak this to your shame.
But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?
Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die.
And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be but bare grain.
It may chance of wheat, or of some other grain, but God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him.
And every seed his own body. All flesh is not the same flesh.
But there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds.
There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial.
But the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another.
There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars.
For one star differth from another star in glory.
So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption.
It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory.
It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power.
It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.
There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul.
The last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
Howbeit that was not first which was spiritual, but that which is natural, and afterward that which is spiritual.
The first man is of the earth, earthly.
The second man is the Lord from heaven.
As is the earthly, such are they also that are earthly.
And as in the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly.
And as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.
Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God.
Neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.
Behold, I show you a mystery.
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.
In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump,
for the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality,
then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written,
Death is swallowed up in victory.
O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.
But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord,
for as much as you know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.
Brother Drew, will you pray for us?
Dear God, thank you so much for this day of church.
Thank you for the blessing and the services.
Amen. Okay, so yeah, I'm pastor Ian Taverner from the UK.
For those of you that haven't met me before, I was first, well, I first met Pastor Thompson,
I spoke to Pastor Thompson, in fact, probably three and a half plus years ago now,
probably four years, and it was back in September of 2020,
and then over those sort of next few years, Pastor Thompson was training me up.
A lot of the time from afar, he came over to the UK a few times,
and he ordained me first as an evangelist, and eventually I got ordained as a pastor.
We became independent back in, like he said, August the 27th of the year just gone.
And before I get going with this sermon, I'd like to also just, thank you,
just thank everyone here, especially Pastor Thompson, Ms Sherry, the hospitality is amazing.
The bar's been raised up here, next time he comes over I've really got to up my game a little bit,
because this has been great so far.
Thanks everyone, thanks guys for the shooting as well yesterday,
that was an experience that we don't get to have, so that was great.
And the food's been great, the time's been great,
and we've got a little bit of time to go as well,
so I'm sure we're going to enjoy every minute of it.
I'd like to get going with this sermon then, so if you look down in your Bibles at 1 Corinthians 15,
and we're going to start from verse 58 there, 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 58,
I just want to look at before we get going, the Bible reads,
Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable,
always abounding in the work of the Lord,
for as much as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.
The title of my sermon this morning is, Your Labour is Not in Vain.
Your labour is not in vain. I'd like to pray before we get going.
Father, thank you for your Word, thank you for this Church, Lord,
and all the work this Church is doing, everyone here, Lord, today.
Please just help me to just preach this sermon that you've laid on my heart,
just in the right way, in an accurate way, in a clear way, in a bold way, Lord.
Help everyone to just be edified by the message that I'm preaching today,
filled with your Spirit please, Lord, in Jesus' name we pray, Amen.
So I was thinking about what to preach, my first time out here,
first time preaching to you guys,
what just kept going through my head is to try and get across to you guys
just how far reaching the work that you do here goes,
how far it goes, and I'm not just talking about to the UK,
just all over, just the lasting effects that the work,
every single one of you here does,
and I'm sure some here maybe have a fair idea,
but some maybe don't, and maybe some just forget from time to time
just how far that work goes across the world
and in terms of, you know, in eternal ways as well.
The labour that's been done in this small church up somewhere,
you know, in the northwest of Great Britain's colonies,
or were they, was it even, I don't even think it was here, was it?
I don't know, I'm going to have to find out about that.
I don't think you were, but a lot of you guys were part of that,
or at least you came from something that was part of that.
Might not have been British territory, but the work that you do up here,
the labour has resulted, as you know, in churches all over Washington State,
which I found out was, apparently, is the most unchurched state in the US,
and you've got, what, three? Three? Four? Four in Washington?
Yeah, it is four, sorry, four in Washington State.
You have, obviously, as well as that, you've got a church down in Indianapolis,
you've got two in Canada.
It's resulted in you supporting missionaries in the Philippines,
I think in Kenya maybe, am I right as well,
and now Poland as well.
And it's your labour that resulted in our church being planted in England,
and we're now reaching out to Switzerland,
we're reaching out to Africa and various places as well,
and hopefully further filled with time to come as well.
And in case anyone here is thinking,
well, some of those people are already soul winning, what's the difference?
Because sometimes people can think that,
well, they're already soul winning, they're already doing stuff.
Let me tell you, just from our experience, okay,
having a proper church in England made a massive difference,
a huge difference to our nation,
a huge difference to those that really wanted to soul win,
to wanted to come and hear hard preaching,
to just want to get involved with the things of God in our nation.
The church just was completely different,
because the soul winning increased from just sort of now and again
a marathon where some would turn up, some wouldn't,
some would get involved, high five each other,
they'd listen to some good preaching on YouTube,
and then go back home and get back to their normal lives.
That just completely changed.
Suddenly we're soul winning week in, week out.
Those that were at church, they're pretty up with churches
and trying their best and kind of wondering,
am I wrong, am I right here, I don't know.
I mean, they don't say repent of your sins,
but now they're kind of hinting repent of your sins,
I don't even know what to do.
It just kind of wiped away all of that.
Now we had a church, we had a church which was preaching the truth,
standing on the Word of God, standing on the Gospel,
and it was amazing.
What a difference it made.
It sorted out the wheat from the chaff,
those genuinely wanting to serve God from the fanboy fakes,
and I'm sure you guys have had a lot of experience
with the fanboy fakes, right, they're everywhere.
Suddenly we were just, wow, this is sorting it out now.
We can see who really wanted to get involved,
really wanted to do things with God.
We've added now over time and trained countless others
to go out and win souls,
and we've had people coming in from not just the local area,
we've had people moving down to our church from all over the UK,
we've had people coming in from Europe and others,
and they're getting trained up the whole time,
and people are just going out and preaching the Gospel more and more.
And I'm sure it's a similar story for you guys
with most of your other church plants as well.
There's just so much going on because of it being a proper church, right.
As every year goes by, our productivity increases at our church.
We hit a thousand salvations last year,
which was amazing for us, including our groups.
That was as well with our South Africa Soul Winning Group
and our Switzerland Soul Winning Group as well.
And all of that started because of the labour done here.
None of that would have been possible,
very little of that would have been possible
without the labour that is being done here in this church here.
And you might think, well, I've never met you before,
you know, Pastor Tavener,
and it was Pastor Thompson that put the work in,
and admittedly you do have a hard working pastor, all right.
You've got a grafting pastor and he's just non-stop.
I don't know how he does, the amount that he does,
I'm constantly questioning, how does he even do all this?
But he does a lot, he gets a lot done.
But he's only able to do that because of everyone here as well,
because it is a team effort.
So Pastor Thompson wouldn't be able to do everything he does
without this team of people here.
Okay, and that's the truth.
We have a slogan on the front of our church sign,
in fact, Ms Sherry mentioned it last night,
it says a strong tower built upon Pastor Aaron Thompson.
No, it doesn't, it doesn't, okay.
It says a strong tower built upon a shore foundation.
It's a strong tower built upon a shore foundation
because it's everyone here.
It's Shore Foundation Baptist Church
which has made our church strong tower,
in case you're wondering what's the strong tower bit about,
strong tower Baptist Church even possible.
Because we're very aware that our independent church in England
is only there because of Shore Foundation Baptist Church
in Vancouver, Washington.
And we wanted to make that clear on the front of our church
from going from Shore Foundation to a strong tower.
No, we're built upon Shore Foundation
and that will never change.
And I'm not trying to take anything away from Pastor Thompson
just to make that clear, okay,
because Pastor Thompson, like I said,
he does so much work, he does so many great things.
But again, it is only possible because of everyone here.
He couldn't do half of what he does without you guys here.
Look at 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 58
where Paul said, Therefore, my beloved brethren,
so he didn't say my beloved elder,
he didn't say my beloved bishop,
he was talking to the whole lot of them.
Okay, he said, Therefore, my beloved brethren,
be ye, that's a plural there,
be ye steadfast, unmovable,
always abounding in the work of the Lord
for as much as ye, plural,
know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.
What was the therefore, therefore?
You might have heard that term used before
with many preachers over the years.
Those are therefore, therefore, well, if you back up a bit,
Paul has just been correcting some false doctrine
being put about that there is no resurrection.
So he gives them this long lesson
which finishes with this in verse 51.
Behold, I show you a mystery.
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.
In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,
at the last trump, for the trumpet shall sound
and the dead shall be raised incorruptible
and we shall be changed.
So the dead in Christ will be raised
with an incorruptible glorified body
and those that are alive is coming will receive the same.
He then says in verse 53,
for this corruptible must put on incorruption,
this mortal must put on immortality,
so when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption
and this mortal shall have put on immortality,
then shall be brought to pass a saying that is written,
death is swallowed up in victory.
That's from Isaiah 25-8,
but he's saying that when that rapture happens,
when we receive that incorruptible immortal body
and if you died in Christ,
you're going to receive the same at that point,
it's victory.
And think about how this really applies.
When you're not trying to shoehorn in
a sort of pre-trib, false Jew worship sort of rapture thing
and all that nonsense that they come out with,
when you get that out of there,
think about how this applies.
When this happens, there's going to be a lot of death happening.
There's going to have been a lot of death happening.
Death happening everywhere, right?
Believers getting hunted down, persecuted, killed en masse, right?
And when believers are fleeing for their lives
and they look up and see the Son of Man come in the clouds
of heaven with power and great glory,
that will be a real victory, won't it?
That will be an amazing victory,
to be gathered by his angels and receive an immortal body
from the brink of death.
It said in verse 55,
O death, where is thy sting?
O grave, where is thy victory?
The sting of death is sin,
and the strength of sin is the law.
The sting of death is due to sin takest to hell.
And the reason for that is because as 1 John 3, 4 says,
Whosoever comitteth sin,
transgresseth also the law,
for sin is the transgression of the law.
But thanks be to God, verse 57,
which giveth us a victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
So that victory is only possible through faith,
obviously in the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And that's a sure thing, isn't it?
That's a sure foundation.
Therefore, or you could say,
because of the fact that we should give thanks to God,
or you could say because we're victorious,
or you could say because others can freely be victorious,
or you could say because of all three of these,
because of the certainty of that resurrection to come,
therefore, my beloved brethren,
be ye steadfast, unmovable,
always abounding in the work of the Lord
for as much as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord,
because whatever we do in the Lord is not vain.
It has eternal consequences for us in rewards,
and for those that we reach with the Gospel.
Because when it comes to things of God, when it comes to spiritual things,
your labour is not in vain.
Your labour is not in vain.
Everything you do is not in vain when it comes to those things.
The title is Your Labour is Not in Vain,
and number one, so be steadfast.
Your labour is not in vain,
so point number one is so be steadfast.
Look at verse 58 again.
It said, Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast.
Now, I know we hear that word a lot,
and obviously there's a famous church called Steadfast Baptist Church,
but what does it mean to be steadfast?
Now, I like this dictionary definition from Webster's 1828,
where it says, Steadfast is, number one, fast-fixed, firm,
firmly fixed or established,
and number two is constant, firm, resolute,
not fickle, nor wavering.
Now, it's often used in the context of faith
when it comes to being steadfast,
when we look at it in the Word of God.
Turn to 1 Peter 5 for an example.
Well, I read to you Colossians 2.5.
You're turning to 1 Peter 5,
but Colossians 2.5 says,
For though I be absent in the flesh,
yet am I with you in the Spirit,
joying and beholding your order,
and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ.
So, again, used there in the context of faith being steadfast,
the steadfastness of your faith in Christ.
He's talking about a constant, a firm, a resolute,
and not fickle, nor wavering faith.
And in 1 Peter 5, we see it used in the same context,
but we also see how important it is.
Look at 1 Peter 5 and verse 8,
it says, Be sober, be vigilant,
because you adversary the devil,
as a roaring lion, walketh about,
seeking whom he may devour.
Sorry, translation there, adversary.
The faster talks to the light, the way we say that.
But we like to say adversary, okay?
It's an adversary. Amen.
Thank you, brother Adam there.
Whom resists steadfast in the faith,
knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished
in your brethren that are in the world.
He said to resist steadfast in the faith.
He said be sober, didn't he?
And you've heard those people that say,
oh, this isn't about alcohol,
this is about being serious, being collected.
You've heard these guys who are trying,
you know, boozing Baptists that try and justify drinking.
Well, it is serious and collected as well,
but if someone's going to tell me how you can be seriously collected
when you're boozing, I don't know.
It's funny how these guys try any which way, don't they?
But sober obviously counts for the whole lot of that, doesn't it?
How are you sober if you're boozing
or on any other sort of mind-altering drugs?
He said be vigilant.
And by the way, that does mean with our kids too, doesn't it?
We need to be vigilant with our children, right?
In many ways, in many areas,
it's an important thing, isn't it?
Our kids are such a massive part of not just us,
but they're part of the future of this church
and many other churches.
We need to be vigilant around them.
Why? Because our adversary is walking about
looking for some fresh Christian to devour.
That's what he wants.
He's looking for anyone he can devour.
He's walking about looking for Christian to devour.
How do we resist him?
By being steadfast in the faith, by being constant,
firm, resolute, not fickle or wavering in the faith.
Because you know what people do, okay?
Look at the end of verse 9.
It says, first in verse 8,
Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary,
the devil, as a roaring lion,
walketh about, seeking whom he may devour,
whom resist steadfast in the faith,
knowing that the same afflictions
are accomplished in your brethren
that are in the world.
He's reminding us that life and affliction go hand in hand.
And we need that reminder sometimes, don't we?
Whether you're in church or out of church,
whether you're serving God or not,
there's just going to be affliction.
Peter's saying don't start doubting God.
Don't start doubting whether it's all worth it.
Don't get tempted by the pleasures of sin for a season.
Well, I'm going through some affliction,
so I might as well just give up.
I might as well just kind of backslide a bit.
He's saying resist him by being steadfast in the faith
because it's faith that will defend you
against the wiles of the devil.
That's what that faith does.
It defends you against all that false doctrine,
all those little whispers,
all those ways that the devil wants to turn your head,
pull you out of the things of God.
Keep a finger here and turn to Ephesians 6,
where Paul gives us the tools for our spiritual battle.
So Ephesians chapter 6, Ephesians 6 and verse 10,
where Paul says this.
He said, finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord
and in the power of his might.
Famous passage of scripture.
Put on the whole armor of God
that you may be able to stand
against the wiles of the devil.
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood,
but against principalities, against powers,
against the rulers of the darkness of this world,
against spiritual wickedness in high places.
And I don't believe it's just government devils.
Many people have preached these passages
and understandably, and for good reason,
talking about the wickedness high up in the world, right?
But I believe that the high-level devils
are likely to be focused on sure foundation Baptist churches anywhere else.
Sure foundation Baptist church planting churches
left, right, and center all over the place.
There are high-level devils
trying to destroy this church.
Not just up there in the government
and in the mainstream media
and in the banking industry
and all these other things.
They're trying to attack this church in various ways.
He said, wherefore, wherefore,
take unto you the whole armor of God,
that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day,
and having done all to stand,
stand therefore having your loins girt about with truth,
and having on the breastplate of righteousness,
and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace
above all, notice that, above all.
Most importantly, top thing here,
taking the shield of faith,
wherewith ye shall be able to quench all.
That's all the fiery darts that we can,
not just some of the fiery darts,
all the fiery darts with that shield of faith.
What's the most important part?
The shield of faith, you could say,
being steadfast in the faith.
Being steadfast in the faith, the shield of faith.
Why is it above all?
The picture here, to the Ephesian church,
in what was around now the 200th year,
I believe, of Roman occupation,
was the Roman soldier.
That was the classic soldier that everyone was obviously very aware of,
that they would see very often,
who at this point in history
were using the very large forefoot-long rectangular scutum shield.
And I think many people could probably imagine it,
having seen old movies and things like that,
where they have this long foot,
and forefoot's quite tall.
That's a shield about this high,
somewhere around here.
And it was a long rectangular shield that they used to use.
And they basically, what they did,
is they changed their military tactics,
I think it was a few hundred years before this point,
to the Manipular Legion.
I don't know if anyone's heard of this before,
with the famous defensive testudo,
or the translation of the tortoise formation.
And what it basically was,
and you might have seen the movies of this,
and maybe seen re-enactments,
and battle re-enactments,
in England they loved this stuff.
There's so much Roman history there,
there's all these weird guys that kind of all meet up,
with replica shields and swords and stuff.
You guys go shooting,
these guys just go and stand on the battlefield
and pretend they're fighting,
but they don't actually do anything, yeah?
I think some of them like wearing the miniskirts,
because they've all got to be carried away,
and not realise that they wore stuff underneath those tunics and those things.
Anyway, these guys, what they do is they have these long shields,
and what they do is they re-enact the formation.
The formation was that you'd have the shield on the front in a solid line,
and sometimes these are like big solid lines as well,
you're talking about thousands and thousands of fighting men there,
and then they'd have a shield over the top as well,
and they'd be looking through the gap between the top of this shield
as they crouched down,
and the one going over the top,
and this was a very tight defensive line.
You know when you see in the Bible it says,
well the battle was in array.
It's like they're lined up in formation,
it's very hard to break down.
You know, it's very hard to break that down,
and if you think about back with David and Goliath,
Goliath's calling out,
you know, why doesn't someone come and fight me?
It's very hard to break down that defensive formation.
Okay, so they have this testudo formation,
the shield, without the shield that whole formation breaks down.
Without that shield they can't survive.
In fact, it's a team effort as well.
If one guy is putting a shield over the top,
then they're going to start,
you know, some of the artillery is going to come through there,
and then you're going to start spreading,
people are going to start dying in the middle of that formation,
it's going to start to break up,
and then they're going to start getting destroyed.
So that was the most important part.
Why they had those short swords,
is not because they run out of, you know, money for steel or something.
The short swords were really effective in those formations,
because as people got close then to try and break down that shield,
the sword didn't need a lot of wielding,
it could just be stabbed through gaps, through cracks, etc.
And they're very sharp swords as well,
hence talks about that sharp, two-edged sword,
and the word of God being sharper than any of that, right?
Okay, so Paul wasn't saying above all because of physical warfare though.
So I find that stuff interesting,
but he equated the faith to that shield
because of the importance of faith.
Like that shield was so important to those fighting,
those military units, faith is so important to all of us.
It's so important in the spiritual battle.
And just to make it clear, this isn't talking about just saving faith.
Obviously you need saving faith to start with,
but after salvation there are levels of faith,
as I'm sure many here are aware of.
Stephen was described, for example, in Acts 6-5,
as a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost.
He was full of faith.
He had a high level of faith.
Okay, and not everyone has that.
They might be saved, but they have a low level of faith.
He was full of faith.
Now turn to Proverbs 30.
How do we take the shield of faith
or be like we've just seen, steadfast in the faith?
How are we steadfast in the faith?
How do we take the shield of faith?
How do we quench all the fiery dots, the wicked?
How do we defend against the false doctrine
in its various forms, in its various ways?
The attempts to weaken us, the attempts to tempt us,
the attempts to demoralize us?
Well, Proverbs 30 in verse 5 says it like this.
Every word of God is pure.
He is a shield unto them that put their trust in Him.
He's a shield unto them.
It's by trusting the Word of God.
It's by trusting your King James Bible.
Put your trust, put your faith in your King James Bible,
but you can't do that, obviously, if you don't read it.
You can't trust the Word of God
if you don't know the Word of God.
If you don't read the Word of God,
you can't trust someone that you don't know.
Or you're a fool to trust someone that you don't know.
You get to know someone, you start to trust them,
and how can you trust the Word of God
if you don't even know the Word of God?
But everything that you need to know is here, isn't it?
Everything is in this Word of God.
That's how you defend against the false doctrine.
That's how you recognize the slander.
Because there's so much warning.
I've been going through a study on the book of Proverbs,
and you know what it's like in the Word of God.
You can read through it countless times,
but it's when you just sit down and break down verses,
you look at them.
It's just warning.
It's time and time again about wicked people,
about really the contrast between wicked people
and the righteous serving God,
because we're constantly being warned
of the different ways that the enemy tries to attack us.
The Word of God is there to warn us.
It's there to give us caution.
And how do we do that if we're not reading the Word of God?
How can we have that shield of faith?
How can we have that trust in what God tells us
and warns us about if we don't read it?
The wickedness.
You otherwise just can't get your head around
without the Word of God,
because we just want to kind of justify and explain it away
and kind of look at it from a point of view that we would have.
But without the Word of God teaching us about these psychopaths,
about this sort of stuff,
you just can't really understand it, can you?
You can't get your head around it.
And like with that testudo, tortoise formation,
like I said, it's a collective defense as well.
So you need a whole group to have that strong faith,
because when the line starts getting weaker in different areas,
that's when the enemy manages to break through.
And the more you read it, you know it.
And the more you know it and you read it,
the more you see it playing out in your life,
the more steadfast you become.
And back in 1 Peter 5, I hope you kept your finger there,
we see steadfastness resulting in more steadfastness.
It said in verse 8, 1 Peter 5,
Be sober, be vigilant, because you're adversary.
The devil is a roaring lion.
Walketh about, see I'm a linguist, I can do both ways here.
Walketh about, seeking whom he may devour,
whom resist steadfast in the faith,
knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren
that are in the world.
But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory
by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while,
make you perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you.
That sounds like more steadfastness to me.
Perfect or complete, establish, strengthen, settled.
The more afflictions, the more tribulations that we make it through,
the more steadfast we become.
That's how it works.
The more you go through, the stronger you get,
the more stronger your faith gets,
the more you go through things and keep seeing God coming through,
keep seeing the solution, keep seeing things working out.
But we've got to make it through them in the first place,
because if you don't make it through the trial and the tribulation
and you drop out, you won't get stronger,
and we do that by having our trust in the word of God.
And for that, we need to labor in it.
You need to labor in it.
Psalm chapter one and verse two,
you don't have to turn the scissors of the blessed man,
but his delight is in the law of the Lord
and in his law that he meditate day and night.
It's graft, you've got to graft with the word of God.
You've got to put time, you've got to put effort in.
For me, I always just say to people,
just set an alarm, set an alarm.
I have on my phone, I have times a day
where I have on my calendar just comes up,
read Bible, read Bible, pray, read Bible,
just because when it's there and it's telling me as well,
I've got less excuse to then just,
oh, well, I will in a bit to put it off.
It's like, right, it's time to do that.
Set an alarm, set an alarm.
Get a routine, right?
Routine's important.
Get a routine, read your Bible, read your Bible,
read your Bible, and I'm sure you've got many people
here that read their Bible,
but in a group like this,
you're always going to have those that don't.
Read it, read it, read it.
Just get a routine, get it structured,
put God first, right?
Put God first for as much as you know
that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.
It's not in vain.
Go back to 1 Corinthians 15,
title is your labor is not in vain.
And point number one is so be steadfast.
So be steadfast.
Point number two is so be unmovable.
Be unmovable.
Verse 58 said, therefore, my beloved brethren,
be you steadfast, unmovable.
Unmovable.
Unmovable or we would probably say nowadays more immovable.
It's talking about someone that can't be moved, okay?
And where do our enemies,
where do God's enemies,
where does our own flesh want to move us from?
The house of God.
It's the house of God, isn't it?
That's where we need to be,
that's where we most need to be immovable
because this is where the labor is happening.
This is where it's going on.
It's not happening down at Back Slap Baptist.
It's not, is it?
Back Slap Baptist,
they ain't laboring down at Back Slap Baptist.
They just slap each other on the back.
Maybe that's a bit labor.
I don't know how hard the slaps are,
but it's not happening down at non-denom with the preacher mom.
You know?
It's not, is it?
Non-denom with the preacher mom.
There isn't really any labor going on there.
It's kind of feel-good stuff, isn't it?
It's just going down and community
and everyone's chatting and going,
we're so holy, we're so spiritual
because we go to church on a Sunday.
But it's not labor, is it?
The enemies and the flesh
would love you to be there, though, wouldn't they?
They would love you to be down at Back Slap Baptist
and the non-denom church
that can't even stand on anything,
just sits on the fence on pretty much everything.
They'd love you down there.
But when it comes to a proper church,
you need to be unmovable.
You need to be unmovable because you've got the flesh
that doesn't want to be there sometimes.
And that's the truth, right?
You've got even just your own personal enemies.
You've got people that claim to be your friends,
your family, your friends,
and everyone else that doesn't really want you there.
And then you've got the enemies of God
that don't want you there as well.
So you're fighting it on a few different fronts.
And that's what so often the attacks are about.
That's why your pastor gets slandered so often,
in case you're wondering.
It's not because they just don't like his personality.
He's got a nice personality, isn't he?
It's not because of that.
It's because they don't want you here.
Because they want to turn your head.
They want to put doubt in your mind.
They want you to think,
well, maybe he is whatever the latest slander is.
And they love to just try and just turn heads.
It's all about pulling you out of church.
That's what it's all about, really.
It's to pull you out of church,
pull you out of the things of God.
And it's funny, isn't it,
that even with false prophets everywhere,
I mean, you've got false prophets literally everywhere.
Who do they attack?
The people that are right on the Gospel.
The people that are standing on the Word of God.
The people that are sending out soul winners.
The people that are planting churches all over the place.
So why don't these people who seem to care so much
go and actually deal with some real false prophets somewhere
and go and spend their time with that?
You know why?
Because that's not what it's about.
Really, it's about pulling you lot out of church.
Out of a church which, like I said,
is doing so much because your labor is definitely not in vain at this church.
I mean, you can't look at it and go,
oh, I don't know, you know,
they seem to be doing a bit,
they seem to be getting some people saved.
I mean, look at the effect you're having.
That's why they don't want you here.
They want you pulled out.
They want to destroy this place.
That's why those oh-so-caring family members
are so concerned about you being in this church.
They preached the Word of God there.
Can you believe it?
I mean, you know, how outlandish it is.
I mean, how radical is this church?
Because they stand on the Word of God.
Because they preached the Word,
and they want you out, don't they?
Let's be honest.
Most of your unsaved family,
even some of your saved family and friends
who are down at Backstab Baptist and others,
they would love you out of here.
They'd love you out of here so they could just say,
oh, you're back in the fold.
That was such an extreme place.
It was terrible.
They even went soul-winning.
That's what it's like, isn't it?
Those ex-church members,
they just care so much.
They're so caring because they just love you so much.
They love you so much they want to pull you out of the soul-winning church.
They love you so much they just need to show you
somehow that it's wrong to be in a church,
preaching the Word of God,
standing on the Word of God,
planting churches, soul-winning.
It's unbelievable, isn't it?
But people still get their heads done by it.
It's like, well, maybe,
yeah, maybe there must be some truth
to whatever the latest slander is or something else.
But that's why the House of Bael
appeals to the flesh so much, doesn't it?
That's why these false churches
with their worldly music,
with their feel-good preaching,
with their ear tickling,
with the smiling devils when you come in,
you know, with the fake smile,
and they just smile with them.
You come in and it's like this.
The eyes are just like boring into your soul,
but the mouth's like,
you've seen these types of people in these false churches.
Oh, they're just so nice,
always telling you how much they love you
and how much they pray for you and everything else.
Oh, they want you there.
And it does appeal to the flesh.
Don't worry, we'll take your kids off you.
We'll take your kids and put them in the basement somewhere
with who knows who.
And the flesh sometimes sings.
Oh, that seems a bit easier, doesn't it?
And the attempts to move you from the house of God
come from every angle
because it's where the labor's happening.
It's happening in the house of God.
You know that your labor is not in vain, the Lord.
Turn to Acts 27.
Now, in case anyone was wondering, okay,
if you're sitting there thinking,
is this a real sermon?
Don't worry, it's time for a sports analogy, okay?
In case you're wondering,
although Pastor Thompson likes a sports analogy,
we need a sports analogy now and again,
so it's time for a sports analogy
with this sort of thing,
with being immovable, okay?
Now, in fight sports,
and we're on real sports here, just to make it clear.
Not rugby with pads on, okay, and helmets.
Okay, love that.
Call yourself football where you don't even kick it, really.
Okay, not that sort of thing.
I'm talking about real sports now, right?
Fight sports, yeah.
Okay, so in fight sports,
often the crowd favorite is the flashy fighter.
Yeah, he's the guy who does like the spinning moves
and he's so skillful
and he does all this cool stuff
and everyone's like, what's he gonna do next?
And it's exciting stuff.
And the crowd love it, don't they?
And there are people,
I even had a guy that I used to coach recently
message me and said,
I just wanna be like a crowd favorite.
I don't even care if I lose,
I just wanna give everyone a show.
Thinking a bit strange, but you know, whatever.
He lost a couple of fights,
he's thinking, now I'm gonna impress people instead, right?
But they're often the favorite,
but the toughest guys for me are the unmovable ones.
And if you've ever done any fight sports
and whatever type of fight sports,
even if you just trained,
even in like sparring or maybe some of your guys,
probably a lot of you will have
like wrestling backgrounds and things like that.
Those guys that just don't move,
those guys that you hit them,
maybe if it's a striking sport
and they just stare you straight in the eyes afterwards
and you've given them your best shot,
they're the worst ones.
The unmovable ones,
the ones that they just march you down
and they might not have the power.
A lot of the time they don't have that power,
they might not have that skill
and that technique and that speed
to really worry you in round one,
in round two,
but when it comes to round three, round four, round five
and they're doing exactly what they're doing in round one
and you're like this,
they're tough, right?
These are tough people to face.
Pretty soon you realize they're not going anywhere.
Pretty soon you realize they're standing there,
they're facing me down,
they're walking me down,
they're just gonna keep coming forward
and it starts to demoralize you as well.
And if you've ever been in anything like that,
those sort of,
and then it can be in any sport in a way,
maybe in a team sport even,
that team that just keeps coming,
keeps coming, keeps coming.
It's hard, it's the endurance that's harder.
And you know, we talk about it myself
and brother Adam a lot
because we both used to coach, fight sports
and Adam still does.
And there's all these guys
that just want the latest, greatest technique
and they want the trick
and they want the secret to getting there.
And you know what the secret is,
what the truth is,
is that they just need to graft.
And they need to graft in the old stuff,
they need to stop all this newfangled technique
and they need to just put the miles in
on the road with the running.
They need to put the rounds in on the bag,
they need to put the rounds in in the sparring,
they need to put the rounds in on the pads,
they need to put the rounds in shadow box,
they just need to do the simple bread and butter stuff,
put the graft in and be immovable.
And those guys, when they get in the ring,
they can last.
And they don't suddenly fade
when they get hit with a big shot,
they just keep coming, they keep coming,
they keep coming.
They've got it in the,
my old coach used to call it money in the bank.
Every training session is money in the bank,
he used to call it.
Because then when you get in and you fight,
it's just, it's there,
it's like this little bit of extra edge you've got,
that little bit of extra fitness you've got
because you've put it in in the training.
Well, now some, some are,
they'll say like,
is that a natural genetics thing
with those people that do just,
aren't, aren't movable?
But the reality of it is it's the training.
Like I said, it's all about the training.
Now there are some people
that may be a bit more natural
to be training hard,
but I've noticed there are people
that maybe did have that skill
and power and the speed
and then they're training hard,
training hard,
maybe they lose that little touch of that
because they're just training endurance,
training endurance,
but you can't move them
and they're a nightmare.
They're a nightmare to compete against.
And the spiritual warriors,
the hardest for the enemy to beat
are the durable, the solid,
the immovable objects.
That's what it,
that's what you want to be.
You want to be that solid,
immovable object,
that, that free to thrive.
You read your Bible,
nothing changes.
In the morning you get up,
you read your Bible.
At night you read your Bible.
You pray three times a day.
Nothing's changing that.
You're in church unless, you know,
unless there's emergency, right?
You're soul winning
and you say you're going to go soul winning,
you're just, you're just immovable.
You just put the graft,
you put the graft,
you know what?
You're so much harder to budge
than the Roman candle Christian.
So much harder to budge
than the one that comes in
and suddenly it's like,
you know,
it's all or nothing
with many people,
sadly, isn't it?
You just got to put the time,
put the effort in.
The spiritual warriors
that are hardest to beat
are the ones that are immovable,
that are putting the time in,
putting the graft in
and that's putting the shifts in.
That's turning up on the off days as well.
That's putting in the routine,
that's making it a routine.
It's being immovable,
or unmovable we see here,
because, why?
Because your labour's not in vain.
Because it's not in vain.
It's not vain in fight sports
to do that stuff.
It will have a result
and it's not vain
in the spiritual fight either.
If you put the graft in,
you put the work in,
you just keep going,
you will last in the long run.
Now there's another place
where we see the word
unmovable used in Scripture
and it's here in Acts chapter 27.
Acts 27,
Paul is on that voyage to Rome
and they get battered
by a storm called Euro-Clyden.
You know it's a real storm
when it's got a name like Euro-Clyden.
I don't know,
do they do it here
where they just name
a little bit of strong wind
and they just give it a silly name
and it's like,
what even happened?
A flag blew a little bit or something.
Well, this is different,
because when the word of God
is called Euro-Clyden,
you know this is a real storm.
Paul rumbles the ship men
trying to leg it.
He's like,
I've caught you out there,
they just want to leg it.
It dissuades everyone
who eats something.
They've been struggling
for 14 days without food,
it seems,
so this is some long fast as well.
They must be getting weak
at this point.
They've been really battling.
It says in verse 38 here,
Acts 27 and verse 38,
And when they had eaten enough,
they lightened the ship
and cast out the wheat
into the sea.
And when it was day,
they knew not the lamb,
but they discovered
a certain creek
with a shore into which
they were minded
if it were possible
to thrust in the ship.
And when they had
taken up the anchors,
they committed themselves
unto the sea
and loosed the rudder bands
and mixed up the mainsail
to the wind and made
towards shore.
And falling into a place
where two seas met,
they ran the ship aground,
and the fore part stuck fast
and remained unmovable,
but the hinder part was broken
with the violence of the waves.
So basically they found
a shallow spot
and drove the ship into it.
So it was stuck and unmovable.
And sometimes it's not
just some guy with cushions
on his hands
trying to bruise us, okay?
It's not like the fight sports
I was talking about.
Sometimes it's storms.
Sometimes it's a Euro-Kleiden.
Sometimes you're getting moved
by something a lot worse
than some guy, you know,
kind of throwing a few
haymakers at you.
Sometimes it's something like this.
You're getting battered
in a storm
where these guys are fasting
for 14 days
to get through this, right?
It's something,
it's like a storm
in your life,
a storm that, you know,
other people can't even
understand sometimes
what you're going through.
How do we survive
by being unmovable?
How do we survive
by being ground
That's how we survive.
And that's so often
the time when people
come out of the house of God,
isn't it?
When the hard things
are happening in life,
when they're going through
the stresses of being,
oh, that's the time
I need a break
from the house of God.
That's the time
you need to be
in the house of God.
That's the time you need
to drive yourself down
into the house of God,
into that ground,
into that pillar
and ground of the truth,
and not let yourself
just get blown about,
just get blown out of church.
And so often
they don't come back.
So often those people
that go through a storm,
that go through a problem,
come out of church,
think that's the solution,
they don't come back.
We've had that
in our short time already,
people that have gone
through something hard
and you don't see them again.
By being grounded
in the house of God,
that's the answer,
isn't it?
By lightening the ship
as well as Paul did
here in verse 38,
where it said,
And when they had
eaten enough,
they lightened the ship
and cast out the wheat
into the sea.
And I think
there's a spiritual
message there
by laying aside every weight,
by laying aside the burdens,
by laying aside the sin
which doth so easily beset us.
Laying that to one side
and you're more likely
to get through that storm.
It's hard to get
through the storm
because what do so many
people do when they're
in a storm?
They reach for the old sin,
whether it's the bottle
of booze,
whether it's the drugs,
whether it's whatever it is.
Whatever that sin is,
so many people in the storm
they reach for the sin,
but that's the time.
You need to make sure
you get rid of all that stuff
and you're more likely
to get through
and grind yourself
into that ground.
By being stuck fast,
verse 41 said,
Instead of falling into
a place where two seas met,
they ran the ship aground
and the four parts stuck fast
and remained unmovable,
but the hinder part
was broken with the
violence of the waves.
So by letting those things
behind us get smashed away
by the waves of reaching forth
unto those things
which are before,
by remaining unmovable,
that's how we survive
the spiritual storms in life.
Of being unmovable,
grounded in the word of God,
grounded in the house of God,
grounded in your prayer life,
and you get rid of
all that weight,
all that excess baggage,
all that weight.
That's how you get
through the storms in life.
Verse 44 said,
And the rest some on boards
and some on broke
a piece of the ship.
This is pretty rough.
And so it came to pass
that they escaped.
Some of them know
all safe to land.
All safe to land.
That labor wasn't in vain,
was it?
That labor wasn't in vain.
Go back to
1 Corinthians 15,
Therefore, my beloved brother,
it said in verse 58,
1 Corinthians 15,
Be ye steadfast,
unmovable,
always abounding
in the work of the Lord,
for as much as ye know
that your labor
is not in vain in the Lord.
What does abounding mean?
Well, one definition is
having in great plenty,
being in great plenty,
being very prevalent,
generally prevailing.
Paul said to be always
doing plenty of the work
of the Lord,
to always be prevailing
in the work of the Lord,
because your labor
is not in vain in the Lord.
Turn to Proverbs chapter 10.
Everything that you do for God
has eternal value.
And what's the most
important thing?
I think a church like this,
everyone knows what
the most important thing is.
It's soul winning, isn't it?
It's soul winning.
It's preaching the gospel.
It's pulling people
out of the fire.
Proverbs 10 and verse 11
says this,
Proverbs 10 and 11 says,
The mouth of a righteous man
is a well of life,
but violence covereth
the mouth of the wicked.
Now, notice that it didn't say
the hand of a righteous man
handing out tracts
is a well of life, did it?
The hand of a righteous man
is a well of life.
No, it didn't say that, did it?
Not the actions of a righteous man
who never opens his mouth
boldly to make known
the mystery of the gospel.
It's not about,
now don't get me wrong,
yeah, look,
we want to be a shining light,
but that's not a replacement
for preaching the gospel,
is it?
It's the mouth
of a righteous man
because faith comes
by hearing and hearing
by the word of God.
That's why.
And whilst we're still
able to speak,
we're still able to preach
the gospel to others,
aren't we?
If you're able to speak,
you're able to open your mouth.
You can articulate words,
you're able to preach
the gospel.
And whilst we're still
able to speak,
well, we know then
that our labor
with that speaking
is not in vain
in the Lord.
Now, some say things like this,
I'll let you probably
get this sort of stuff as well,
but they don't all
turn up to church.
I once said to a church,
could you imagine
everyone you got saved
turn up to church?
Not only would it be something,
it'd be a problem though.
That'd be a big problem.
Can you imagine it?
There'd be no room
for anyone, firstly.
Can you imagine?
I mean, the false prophets
coming in would have
a field day.
I mean, it'd be all over.
It'd be hard to
keep control of it all
because God builds
the church really.
God builds the church.
Some people get confused
by this going,
oh, well, I don't know.
Didn't they get saved
because they didn't
turn up a church
but they're two
separate things?
To those that were saved,
to those that believed.
And it's not about,
you know, our goal
when we go out
and preach the gospel
isn't getting people
to church today.
It's great if they do.
We want them to get to church.
We want to build them up
and get them out of poverty.
Our goal is to pull them
out of the fire.
That's goal number one,
isn't it?
Pull them out of the fire.
If we can get them along,
great.
If we can get them
baptized, great.
But don't ever be
demoralized because
they're not all
flooding the church
because if they
all flooded the church,
they won't.
Some say,
but I don't get
many people saved.
Because some people,
look, they don't always
get the salvation numbers.
Other people do.
But my Bible says,
believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ,
I shall be saved.
My Bible says to
preach the gospel
to every creature.
So, look,
if you get one person
saved in a year,
in two years,
isn't that
a great result anyway?
How amazing is that?
Five years,
you've got one person
saved, that's one person
not going to hell.
Can you imagine how
really eternally grateful
that person will
be?
And not that that's
what we do it for,
but it's about going
out and preaching
the gospel.
It says to preach
the gospel to every
creature and not get
every creature saved.
Because we can't
get every creature saved.
But we go out and
we preach the gospel.
And it is a team game
as well, okay?
Your labor is not
in vain because
it's a team game.
Because sometimes,
look, you might
have gone somewhere
which is like we did
on Friday, you know?
Me and Pastor Thompson
knocked the dog doors
and we knocked the
doors and the doors
and I think it was
someone going to tell me
about the Bible, it was
slam, you know?
He was telling me
this is a really receptive
spot and they didn't
like me.
However, there was like
11 other salvations,
weren't there?
And that's a team game,
right?
Because those 11 people
didn't knock on those
doors at least.
Or at least they didn't
have to be paired
with the Englishman.
They still managed
to get some salvations.
It is a team game,
you know?
Every time we go out,
every time you go out
as a church,
it's a team game.
You're all part
of that result.
All winning isn't the
only labour that goes
on in this church.
And it's the most
important labour but
it's not the only labour.
But it all has
eternal consequences.
Everything done in this
church has eternal
consequences.
Your labour's not in vain.
Proverbs 10 16 says,
The labour of the
righteous tendeth to life,
the fruit of the
wicked to sin.
So it said the labour of
the righteous tendeth to life.
Every job done in
this church goes toward
a fully functioning
church, doesn't it?
Everything done here
does.
And that results eventually
in more salvations.
So everything you do
here eventually results
in more salvations
because you have
a functioning church.
You have a church
where things are
getting done.
You have a church
where people walk in
and it's not just
covered in filth.
It's not like rubbish
everywhere.
You have a place
where people walk in
and they're not like,
is this the church?
It's not because
you've got ushers
on the door.
All those things.
And sometimes those
ushers will stop
and it's different here
as we were talking about
the other day.
People are talking about
their church guns
and stuff.
We're not even allowed
a weapon in our church.
We have to cleverly...
Anyway, I won't go into that.
Okay, but every job.
So, for example,
the men stepping up
when Pastor Thompson
is touring church plants.
And that's a full-time
job in itself, right?
When he's going
to those church plants,
there are men stepping up,
stepping up here,
stepping up into
church plants,
getting up and preaching.
Okay, because there
aren't church plants
without preaching
going on there.
I mean, that all eventually
aids towards more salvation.
Every job taken off
Pastor Thompson's hand
so he can pastor
those churches too
is all part of it,
all results in more salvation.
The live stream that,
by the way,
myself and others
were getting trained from,
I mean, I was listening
to three sermons a week
every week for that
three years
while I was training
in the ministry.
And on top of that,
sometimes your men's
preaching classes
and everything else as well,
that was all part of us,
myself, and it'll be
for others as well.
Everyone who's part
of that live stream,
everyone that's part
of getting this,
being a fully functioning
church to be able
to even preach
online as well,
that all results ultimately
in more salvations.
Without that,
without that,
it would have taken us
so much longer
to have got to the point
where we were,
we would have had
so much less salvations
over that time.
It all makes a difference.
The soul winning
captaining,
the ushering,
the offering,
the cleaning,
the organising,
the fellowship events,
which keeps people motivated,
keeps people in things,
stops people going out
and fellowshipping
with the world so much,
etc.
It all makes a difference.
It all results in
salvations.
Every single bit does.
It all tendeth to life.
The labour of the righteous
tendeth to life.
Everything you're doing
for the Lord,
everything you do ultimately
is tending to life.
Even you going out
to your secular jobs
to be able to afford
to still be in church
and still just be living
your life and getting
involved in the events
and everything else,
it all tends to life,
doesn't it?
If you're the righteous.
And now it's not just
talking about the saved
in Proverbs.
Often it's talking about
people saved and then
living for God as well,
who are trying to live for God,
who are trying to
do the things of God.
I turn to Hebrews chapter 10.
Now some will say,
but I don't have a job
in the church.
But you do.
You do have a job
because your job is
to turn up
and be a part of
to be one of those
lively stones.
You know, there isn't
a church without
the people here who make it.
And you just being here,
do you know that?
If you're here and you're like,
well I'm maybe new to this church,
or maybe I'm not new to this church,
I don't have a job,
maybe I haven't been so regular,
or maybe I'm not able to,
or maybe I'm just,
for whatever reason,
I'm not doing a job
in this church right now.
Just you being here
does more than you might think.
Just turning up to church
does more than
you might ever realise.
Hebrews 10.24 says,
Let us consider one another.
And now we often go to these verses
because they're just clear verses
about assembling in church, right?
And many preachers will go,
they're going,
look, the Bible's clear
you shouldn't be
forsaken or dissembling.
But the real point of these verses,
the clear point,
is about the effect
it has on the others.
About you being in church.
It's not just
thou shalt go to church.
No, it's let us consider
one another
to provoke
unto love
and to good works.
You coming to church,
you being in church
considers other people in church.
It provokes them to do more.
It provokes your pastor
to go on to more.
If your pastor is here
preaching to five, six,
seven people,
it's going to be hard
for him, isn't it?
But it's not just
your pastor, it's everyone.
And when you go
and there's more and more
people, it makes you
want to be there more,
it makes you want
to not miss those services,
whereas the more and more
people are dropping out,
not coming in,
you're not provoking
those unto love
and to good works.
Not forsaking the
assembling of ourselves
in a manner of summits
but exhorting one another.
And so much the more
as you see the day approaching,
just you being here
is encouraging others.
Just being here,
just turning up at church
and going,
oh look, brother so-and-so
is here again.
Sister so-and-so,
oh, they've come back
after having visited.
They've come back
having been here at Wictor,
it encourages others.
Every time,
how great is it
when someone that you have
got saved turns up at church?
It's great, isn't it?
Yes, you know,
maybe we can encourage
this person to go on
to live for God.
Maybe we won't,
but at least they got
it encourages you,
doesn't it?
And you sitting here
in this church
will encourage people,
you don't even realise
that it's doing that.
You're like,
well, they probably
don't even notice me so much,
I'm only new to this church.
No, it encourages others.
It encourages others,
it encourages them,
it exhorts one another
and all of that
tendeth to life.
Every single bit
of that tends to life.
He said,
and so much the more
as you see the day
approaching,
we should be gathering more,
we should be doing more,
we should be,
we should be
fellowshipping together
more and more
Turn to Psalm 92,
your labour is not
in vain in the Lord
so be always abounding
and that works
in two ways, okay?
So one,
one way that that works,
so be always abounding
is to keep doing
the work of the Lord
week in, week out.
Week in, week out,
doing the work of the Lord,
always abounding.
But number two,
the second way that works
is to keep doing
the work of the Lord
for the rest of your life.
For the rest of your life.
Psalm 92,
Psalm 92 is a great,
great Psalm for this
and we're just going
to read it from verse 12 though.
Psalm 92 in verse 12 says,
The righteous shall flourish
like the palm tree,
he shall grow like
a cedar in Lebanon.
Those that be planted
in the house of the Lord,
that's those that
unmovable people
shall flourish
in the courts of our God.
They shall still bring forth
fruit in old age,
they should be fat
and flourishing.
To show that the Lord
is upright,
he is my rock
and there is no
unrighteousness in him.
They should still bring
forth fruit in old age.
Those that are planted
in the house of God,
and there's no reason
to stop bringing
forth fruit, is there?
And you know,
our movement,
it's a fairly young movement,
isn't it?
You know the truth of it,
even people that are saved,
they can get a bit
set in their ways,
can't they?
And it's hard for them
to really start changing.
You know,
they've spent years
just giving out tracks,
for example.
They've spent years
just kind of talking about
the blessed hope
he could come any minute.
They hear it sort of
every sermon.
Every week they're in church.
It's hard for them
to kind of get used
to the truth, right?
But this is a young movement,
really, ultimately,
but it's a young movement
that will eventually,
hopefully,
just have a wide
variety of ages
and we need to make sure
that we're just
going to be planted
in the house of the Lord.
We want to be
always abounding
for the rest of our lives.
Always abounding
in the work of the Lord
because our labour's
not in vain.
And that will be
an encouragement
to others as well,
isn't it?
Because when you go
there's people
that are just
living it out
into their senior years.
That encourages people,
doesn't it?
It's like,
look at brother so-and-so out
just pounding the streets,
preaching the Gospel still.
Even if they get
to a situation
or sister so-and-so
gets to a situation
where, you know,
they're finding it hard
maybe to get out so much
they can still do stuff,
can't they?
Even if they can't
really get out on the
streets so often,
they can still be in prayer.
They can still,
even as they get
into their twilight years,
they can still be
just turning up at church,
getting into church,
getting encouragement
and trying to open their mouth
and declare the Gospel
when they do get the chance.
Like Anna,
the daughter of Phanuel
of the prophetess,
who was into some
ripe old years,
and she was preaching
the Gospel to everyone
that looked for the hope
in Jerusalem, right?
And we want to take a leaf
out of that book,
don't we?
We want to be always
abounding into our
later years.
It's not,
well, I'm going to do
my most now.
Just look forward.
We're just going to be
abounding all the way through.
The title is
Your Labour is Not in Vain.
Tip number one is
so be steadfast.
Your labour,
you know,
the reason I preach
this sermon to you guys
is because, look,
I don't know,
maybe you do,
maybe you guys
are just constantly
talking about all these
different church plants
and everything that's
going on,
but it's easy to just
get a little bit jaded
sometimes.
It's easy to forget
how far that work goes.
Our church,
especially those that
were in our church
from the beginning
and those that joined
during those years,
not so much maybe
the brand new people
that wouldn't know,
you guys are our heroes.
You're the reason
that we have a church.
You're the reason
that we have a solid church
in the UK going out
and reaching others.
You're the reason
that we have a French-speaking
group in Switzerland
that are part of our church
and hopefully will go on
to reach many parts.
I mean,
you know,
we need some
French-speaking churches.
I mean,
that is a massive language
all over Africa
and there's some receptive places.
We need some French-speakers.
You're the reason
that we have a group
in South Africa.
I mean,
are we in June
and we're hoping
to do some great work
out there.
You're the reason
for so much.
It's because
of this church here.
It's because
of even those people
just turning up here
week in, week out
has affected
not just the UK,
not just Africa,
not just Switzerland,
but all those other places,
Canada and beyond.
And it's because
of everything you do here
because your labor
is not in vain.
And next time
you kind of get
those doubts,
you have those problems,
you have the heads
getting turned
and far the work
that you do here goes.
Next time
you're thinking,
oh, well, it's a bit tough
because it can be tough
for the Christian life sometimes.
And sometimes
you're juggling work,
you're juggling family,
you're juggling
the things of God.
It can be tough sometimes.
Sometimes you get
a bit tired,
you get a bit fatigued.
But just remember
that labor is not in vain.
That labor that you do,
every single thing
that every single one
of you does here
is having an effect
all over the world.
And knowing your pastor
I don't think
he suddenly stopped
planting churches either.
I'm sure there will
be next.
But where there's a need,
right, where there's a need.
And there's a need
all over the world,
isn't there?
But he's only able
to do any of that
because of you guys here.
The title is
Your Labor is Not in Vain,
so be steadfast,
so be unmovable,
so be always abounding.
And on that
we're going to finish
in a word of prayer.
Father, thank you
for this church.
Lord, thank you
for your foundation
Baptist Church.
Thank you for
just all the work
that's done here,
Lord, in this church
and just how far
reaching that goes.
To just really
take that into
their hearts, Lord,
and to just know
that their labor
is not in vain,
that their labor
has just eternal
consequences,
not just here,
not just those.
They're reaching in
maybe the state
of Washington,
but just all
over the world,
Lord, and help
everyone here
to just really
appreciate that,
to think about that
as they go
through the struggles,
through the storms,
through the tribulations
of life, Lord,
and help them
to just be steadfast,
to be unmovable,
Lord, and bless
the evening service
in Jesus' name
for all of this.
Amen.
I have decided
to follow Jesus
on the first.
I have decided
to follow Jesus.
I have decided
to follow Jesus.
I have decided
to follow Jesus.
No turning back.
Though none go with me,
still I will follow.
Though none go with me,
still I will follow.
Though none go with me,
still I will follow.
No turning back.
The world behind me,
the cross before me.
The world behind me,
the cross before me.
The world behind me,
the cross before me.
No turning back.
Great singing.
Brother Bill, will you
end us in a word of prayer?
Men, you are dismissed.
Amen.