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Alright, we're here in Romans chapter 15. We're going to finish up Romans 15 and then we've got two sermons in chapter 16 before we're done with the Romans. And the name of this sermon is How to Treat a Missionary. How to Treat a Missionary. Now, this is a bit of a misleading title because this doesn't apply to me at all. Because Paul is traveling around to different locations, I'm already stationed here, so this is not about me at all. It would more apply if a like-minded pastor visited us and he was with us for a time period to labor with us and go soul winning and preach. But for me, I'm not traveling around. I'm a missionary from the U.S., but here it's my home, so I'm not a missionary to you, okay? So I guess it applies to people in Sacramento more than, you know, I don't know. But what I'm talking about is let's say we had somebody who would visit our church that was like-minded, that is someone of reputation, maybe a like-minded pastor. You know, we've had missions trips before, which obviously has been kind of impossible for a while now. But in the future, you know, if countries open up, I wouldn't be surprised if people that you've listened to for years would come and visit us. People that just want to labor with us and maybe stay for a couple weeks and preach for us and go soul winning, maybe pastors that you listen to. So how should we treat those people if they were to come, okay? Point number one is about reception, giving a good reception, a warm welcoming, a good reception. It says in verse 23, verse 23, But now having no more place in these parts, and having a great desire these many years to come on to you, whensoever I take my journey into Spain, I will come to you. And Paul says for years I've been wanting to come to you. Now it's not because there was like lockdowns that prevented him from coming, but he was doing a big work for God and he was going to different areas. And look, you know, Paul had been a part of getting a lot of churches started and bringing people to church, and he would preach at churches. He was someone in reputation because he was basically ordained and commissioned from the Church of Jerusalem, which we'll see later on in the sermon. So when he's going to Rome, Paul already knows a lot of these people. I'm sure many of these people had gotten saved or taught the Word of God and preached, and he says he has a desire to come on to them, okay? He says, And he says he trusts to be brought on his way thitherward by them. And I believe when he's saying that, he's indicating a warm reception. And part of that would just be that people would be a blessing giving him rides or giving him a place to stay or food. But he's kind of indicating, I'm planning to labor with you, and I trust that there's people that are going to help take care of me during that time period. Go to Philippians chapter 2. Philippians chapter 2. Philippians chapter 2. Look, I trust that we would do this as a church if we had someone like this visit us and everything like that. We'd make sure that they feel welcome. But you know, I'll tell you, I have guests preach at churches before, and you know what, I'm not really someone who expects like a lot because I'm happy to preach and I love to fellowship and labor with people. But whenever people offer you to preach somewhere, they'll give you a place to stay. They'll take you out to eat. They'll often give you a gift bag or whatever. And look, I'm happy without those things, but that's just kind of giving a warm reception. And it kind of makes sense. Like, hey, can you guest preach for us? It's like, oh, but you've got to sleep out in the street. Well, that wouldn't really make a lot of sense, right? So it's the same thing here. If we had someone who was, you know, someone we really respected, a like-minded pastor, or someone who had donated or contributed to us or whatever, you know, we would help them out if they were to come. You know, if a like-minded pastor were to come visit, we would make sure they had a place to stay and take care of them. And I trust that, you know, we'd be willing. Families would be saying, hey, you know what, you're welcome to come over to my house to eat. And you know what, depending on your situation, you might not be able to give someone a place to stay, but you might. I know in Sacramento at the Red Off Preaching Conference, oftentimes families will give actually people a place to stay when they're in town, and it's a big blessing to them. Philippians chapter 2 is an example. Verse 25. Yet I supposed it necessary to send you Epaphroditus, my brother and companion in labor, and fellow soldier, but your messenger and he that ministered to my wants. Verse 26. For he longed after you all and was full of heaviness, because he had heard that he had been sick. For indeed he was sick not unto death, but God had mercy on him, and not on him only, but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. And so the Bible says here that Epaphroditus was basically to the point of death, he was very sick, okay? Not just kind of a common cold or he's sick for a week, but he was extremely sick to the point almost to death. And when you're reading this, it's kind of understanding, it's because of the work he's doing laboring with the gospel. Verse 28. I sent him therefore the more carefully. You say, why carefully? Well, because he's sick. You want to make sure that he's okay, that he's able to make that travel, right? I sent him therefore the more carefully, that when ye see him again ye may rejoice, and that I may be the less sorrowful. Receive him therefore in the Lord with all gladness, and notice this, and hold such in reputation. See, Paul says, I know you know who I am, and you've heard of me before and everything, but look, Epaphroditus is someone you should hold in reputation, okay? Now look, of course, if you're believing in Jesus Christ, you're a child of God. At the same time, though, if there are like-minded pastors or people that are doing great works for God, we should hold those people in reputation. Now, that does not mean that we bow down before their feet, and they force us to say, come up, I myself also am a man. But, you know, there would be nothing wrong with saying, hey, you know, man, I appreciate your ministry. I've learned so much from your sermons. They've been a blessing to me. It's like we should treat them well. We should make them feel at home. We should make them be like, man, you know, this church is great. And the thing is, they would walk away with a good report of our church, which would benefit us in the long run. It says in verse 30, because for the work of Christ, He was nigh unto death. So the reason why He's close to death is because of the work He's doing. Now, we need to put ourselves in the place of 2,000 years ago of what Christianity was, because during this time period, it was actually dangerous to be a Christian if you were a zealous Christian. Now, I mean, I don't think the Bible's really trying to scare us, because it doesn't mention all the apostles and people that were killed and tortured to death. But if you go off historical records, which I presume are probably true, most of the apostles were brutally killed. They were martyred for what they believed. And there was kind of two different enemies. You had the Jews, which were really after God's people, but then Rome became very evil as well. I mean, both of those sides were attacking Christianity, and they were trying to destroy Christianity. And look, if you're doing big works for God, you're kind of nigh unto death all the time, right? You have the potential of being killed for the things that you believe. And look, we live in a day where there really is not much persecution, but in some parts of the world, if you publicly get baptized, hopefully you don't get killed. It used to be like that in Catholic countries for people that were Christians, that they would get killed for getting baptized. But you know, that exists in Muslim countries for sure. You're legally allowed to be a Christian, but you're not legally allowed to convert from Islam to Christianity. Or you're not legally allowed to get baptized. I mean, in North Korea, you're allowed to be a Christian, but they have government workers that will watch the sermons and make sure you don't say this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this. Or criticize anything the government stands for. And so many parts of the world, it's dangerous to be a Christian. And during this time period, that is the way it actually was. Okay? Now, when it says he's near on to death, though, for preaching the Gospel and the work, I actually don't think it's because of potentially being killed. I think it's because he's exhausting himself with traveling all over and preaching. And look, traveling is tiring. I mean, many of you know this because you travel a long distance to come to church and you know, it's tiring. It's exhausting. Right? Now, I'm not trying to preach about myself, but I just probably got up and then he preached the sermons. It's like long travel and then, I mean, it's tiring. And look, traveling is a lot easier in today's world than 2,000 years ago. I mean, we're not using, you know, chariots, you know, or an old-fashioned wagon or whatever where there's no air conditioning. No, we had air conditioning in the car on the drive, so I can't really complain too much. During this time period, though, it's physically draining. And then, of course, if you're part of a real church, what do you do after church? You go soul winning. Right? So it's just like I'm sure it was exhausting and so Paul says he sent them the more carefully. Okay? Now turn in your Bible back to Romans 15. Here's the thing. If there's a pastor, though, that takes his vacation to come and be a part of us just to go soul winning, we should treat them well. It's like their vacation is preaching the gospel and going soul winning and laboring and fellowshipping with us. We should certainly treat those people well. And look, I do believe in the next few years as long as the world allows it with whatever's going to happen, I do believe we'll probably have some of those pastors that you listen to will probably visit us. Now, it is a long trip from the Philippines to the U.S., but even more the reason if they do come to fellowship with us, we should treat them very well. Right? So point number one is just having a warm reception. And this is not going to be the longest sermon. My first sermon was the marathon sermon. This is more of a sprint, okay, to finish Romans 15. But I lose my voice. When I preach against atheism, I'm screaming. I'm like, man, my voice is killing me. I'm like, wow. Right? So point number one was reception. Point two is a reward. And when we're talking about reward, we're talking about in a financial sense, okay? Romans 15, verse 25, But now I go unto Jerusalem to minister unto the saints, for it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia to make a certain contribution for the poor saints which are at Jerusalem. And to understand this, what you need to realize is the church was really kind of located in Jerusalem, all of God's people. And God told them to branch out. In fact, go to Acts 1. I'll show this to you. Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. Now I want you to realize, because there's so much persecution during this time period, it probably would be very difficult to be a Christian just from a financial standpoint during this time period. Because of the fact, you know, Jews aren't going to hire you. The Romans probably aren't going to hire you. I mean, it would be very difficult. And honestly, being a Christian during this time period, it would have been more difficult than it is in today's world. I mean, in today's world, you don't have people that say, I won't hire you because you're a Christian. But during that time period, it's like, that would have been a pretty common thing. And so the result is, during this time period, you see there are a lot of churches. There's a lot of people struggling. Right? And it says in Acts 1, verse 8, So what Jesus says is, you're starting here in Jerusalem. So wherever your local church is, that's kind of your local Jerusalem. For us, it's here in Pasig or in Metro Manila. It's in this area. Okay? Then it says in all Judea. So it goes from Pasig to Metro Manila. Then it says in Samaria, which is kind of like a church in the province or something. Then to the uttermost part of the earth. Then it's everywhere. So basically, a church starts, and the goal of a church is not just to be one church that just is only one church and never starts any other churches. But the goal is that you have a church, and once it grows, it's able to start other churches. Starting church plants. That's kind of the end goal. Because if you just have one church that's a good church, after 30 years, you know what? Who knows? Whoever takes over to replace, whether he's good or bad, you know, could destroy that church. I mean, churches don't last for hundreds of years. They eventually end up just fading off. So if you don't make new churches that are good and thriving and excited, then you're going to just kind of fade off. Right? So the purpose is you start a church, and then you start other churches eventually. Now, you do it in practical ways. Right? If you're going to have a church here in Pasig, you don't start with a part on the other part of the world. Right? You try to slowly branch off where the sending church can be a blessing or a help. For example, when we started the church in Pampanga, we had various men go down to preach. And it's an easier thing to do because of the fact, you know what, people are within distance to do that. Or when I got sick a couple weeks ago, and then people went down to preach kind of on a moment's notice, it's like, well, you have the ability to do that because this church is pretty close to that church. But it's far enough away that you're not expecting people to travel back and forth. Right? So that's kind of the pattern. Now, go to Acts 15. Acts 15. Acts 15. You say, what's your point? Well, here's my point. It talked about a contribution for the poor saints at Jerusalem. Jerusalem started these other churches. They had a large part to do with that. We don't necessarily know all the details, but they started in Jerusalem. Persecution comes. Then there's churches everywhere. Some of them might have had ordained pastors from day one. I tend to believe a lot of them just had rotating preaching schedule or various men leading them, but not necessarily they're fully on their own. But Jerusalem's starting all these other churches. It kind of started from there. And so basically then, people end up being struggling financially in Jerusalem. So doesn't it make sense if this church starts this church that this church helps this church if they fall on tough times? It makes perfect sense. Now, I don't foresee this happening, but if our sending church in Sacramento really struggled financially, then we should be willing to go and try to help them out. Send them money because they're going through a really tough time. Right? Now, I don't foresee that happening, but that's kind of the situation that's taking place. Now, let me just show you here in Acts 15. I want you to understand something. That pole was underneath the authority of the church of Jerusalem. Okay? Acts 15 verse 3. And being brought on their way by the church, they passed through Phoenice and Samaria declaring the conversion of the Gentiles, and they caused great joy unto all the brethren. And when they were come to Jerusalem, they were received of the church and of the apostles and elders, and they declared all things that God had done with them. So basically they travel around in these various locations just to talk about the work that's being done. Okay? You say, why is this? Because they weren't able to do missionary updates weekly on YouTube. So they had to actually go in person. So sometimes you're seeing Paul will send somebody, and the purpose is to report on what's going on and to help labor with them and encourage them because you're not going to see them all the time. There's a distance between you and traveling's not very easy to do. So basically from time to time they go to various areas and kind of report on how things are going. Now, Paul was basically a traveling missionary though, so he's getting churches started and he's kind of all over the place, but then he'd kind of go back to labor with some of the churches and kind of report on what's going on. And some of these churches we know are financially contributing to them, but it doesn't necessarily give all the details with all the churches. Verse 12. Then all the multitude kept silence and gave audience to Barnabas and Paul declaring what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them. Now there's this big discussion that takes place, verse 13. And after they held their peace, so everybody was quiet, James answered saying, Men and brethren hearken unto me. So James says, I want you to listen to me. Hearken unto me. Verse 19. Wherefore my sentence is that we trouble not them which from among the Gentiles are turned to God. So James listens to everybody. He says, then I want you to listen to me and he says, my sentence is. A judge in a court. The court, he hears everything that takes place and everything, then all of a sudden he says, okay, order in the court. Here is the sentence. This is my determination. Here is the final answer. Why did James say that? He's the pastor of the church of Jerusalem. He's the head of the church of Jerusalem. So when you're reading this, Paul is under the authority of the church of Jerusalem. Paul's under the authority of James because James says, my sentence is, he's saying, you know what? Here's my decision. Here's what's going to take place. I've heard the sides and this is what we're going to do. Why? Well, you need one person in authority at a church. Now, I don't think any of us, though, would say that James was more godly than Paul the Apostle. I don't think that was the case. Now, obviously, James was a very godly person as well. But I want you to realize, it's not about who's more godly. It's just about the authority structure. It's the same thing in a family. Sometimes the wives disagree on things and sometimes the wives are right, sometimes the husbands are right, but there's an authority structure. Or even with parents with children. Sometimes, you know, you're wrong in your decisions with your kids, but the children are in subjection to their parents. Paul was in subjection to the church at Jerusalem where this was all kind of starting. Now, go to Romans 15. Romans 15. And so basically, Paul's telling them, explaining, how there's a lot of people really struggling and so they gave money to Paul to basically give back to the church of Jerusalem because there are people that are really struggling. And so it'd be like if we started a church and then for whatever reason we fell on tough financial times that that church would end up helping us out. It makes, you know, logical sense you would do that. So Romans 15 verse 26. For it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia to make a certain contribution for the poor saints which are at Jerusalem. It hath pleased them verily, and their debtors they are. And it says they're their debtors. You say, why are they their debtors? Well, if the church of Jerusalem started this church and got you saved and taught you the Word of God, you're sort of in debt to them is what he's saying. For if the Gentiles have been made partakers of their spiritual things, their duty is also to minister unto them in carnal things. So basically if the Gentiles have heard the preaching and gotten saved and learned how to serve God, then they're debtors when it comes to carnal things. And what this is going to be referring to is financially. That's why we said a reward. Verse 28. When therefore I have performed this and have sealed to them this fruit, I will come by you into Spain, and I am sure that when I come on to you, I shall come in the fullness of the blessing of the Gospel of Christ. Okay? Go to 1 Corinthians chapter 9. 1 Corinthians chapter 9. 1 Corinthians chapter 9. Now, I don't really preach on finances a whole lot. That's not really the point of the sermon. We're just going verse by verse and covering what the chapter is talking about. All God requires of you is to give your 10%. That's what God asks. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man, and the Bible teaches 10%. But what I'm talking about here, and look, you know, I don't talk about this a whole lot, but you know, I choose to work. I don't take a salary from this church or the church in Pampanga. I do all the bookkeeping, making the soul-winning maps at Verdi in Sacramento, so I do the work remotely and I pay from them. But at the same time, it wouldn't be wrong if one day I did decide to get a salary from the church. Because if you're teaching the Word of God and you're organizing soul-winning, then it makes sense if people are benefiting spiritually that, you know what, from a carnal standpoint, financially, that you could benefit from that. That's what the Bible's teaching here. So look, I have never been against someone being full-time in the ministry. Now, some people hear my preaching and they feel like I'm saying that, but I've never said that. I'm not against, I mean, are sending pastors full-time. And praise the Lord for that because He's able to do more work being full-time. He's able to spend more time on sermons, do more soul-winning, organize more events. Because here's the thing, if you're working full-time, you know what, it is work. It's hard. It's difficult. I mean, it takes time to do all this stuff, get it organized and go soul-winning. I mean, many churches probably don't go soul-winning because it's not even just the soul-winning, just the effort to organize the soul-winning. It takes time. It takes effort. It's not easy. It's hard. And so look, if you're benefiting people spiritually, it wouldn't be wrong to actually get a financial benefit from that. Now, as I said, I don't take a salary at this point from either of the churches, but I don't want people to be one day, if like five years from now I started to take a partial salary or something, people are like, oh, man, I can't believe this. Stuggie's just like those other Bible Baptist pastors. It's like, no, that's not the same thing at all. But here's the thing, I wouldn't be against those pastors. I'm sure some of them are saved. Those that are actually doing a good work for God and preaching the right gospel, it's not wrong for them to take a salary. It's not wrong for their job to be being full-time. And here's the thing, if a church grows, it's kind of a necessity. Now, our church has certainly grown from the beginning, and it becomes more of a necessity to get volunteering and people potentially being hired and things like that. But look, if our church had 400 people, of course you have to have workers. I mean, there's no way you could do everything if you don't have full-time workers. I mean, it's going to be a requirement. It's going to be a necessity. And look, it's not wrong to be paid by a church because some people preach it's wrong to be a full-time worker of a church. You've got some people who say it's wrong not to be a full-time worker of a church if you're a pastor or whatever. It's wrong. I'm not called by God because I'm not full-time. But then you've got the other extreme where it's like it is wrong to be paid. No, it's not. And I'll tell you what, if we have lots of money coming in, the best thing we could use it on is the spread of the gospel because the big thing they say is, well, it's wrong. I mean, people are being paid to preach the gospel. Isn't that the best thing to do with our money, to preach the gospel, get churches started, preach the Word of God? It's like, what better thing to do with our money? And look, this is not just my opinion. This is what it says in 1 Corinthians 9. Notice what it says. 1 Corinthians 9. Am I not an apostle? Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? Are not ye my work in the Lord? Many people question Paul the apostle and they didn't think he was really an apostle because he kind of came late to the party and so people said, I don't really know if this is valid. So he's kind of defending himself oftentimes. And he's saying, you know what? I saw the Lord Jesus Christ, okay? But then he says, are not ye my work in the Lord? And what he's referring to is the church of Corinth. And the indication is Paul had more involvement with the church of Corinth than any other church, okay, when you're reading this. Are not ye my work in the Lord? Paul takes complete ownership. Many churches, he doesn't take complete ownership. He obviously knows the people and obviously had something to do with it. But with the church of Corinth, kind of the indication is he got the things started. He brought the people to church. He didn't baptize them because it's not the physical hands that are necessarily important, but he brought them to church, right? And he got them saved. He preached the gospel to them. And he was teaching them the Word of God. And that's why when he wasn't even around the church of Corinth, he said, here's my decision, because kind of the church of Jerusalem seems to have put Paul as the authority to kind of run that thing. And I'm sure at the church there's various people that would have been underneath the authority of Paul, but Paul was basically, hey, you know what? This is what you're doing, right? And so Paul says, are not ye my work in the Lord? Verse 2, if I be not an apostle unto others, yet doubtless I am to you. So Paul says, maybe with other churches, they can claim that, hey, you have nothing to do with us, he says, but you can't really claim that. I mean, Paul even said in the book of Corinthians, I think it's 2 Corinthians, where he talks about how he didn't need a letter of commendation. Basically, I don't need something to say I'm the real deal, because my proof is you. What he's saying is, I got you saved. I brought you to church. And of course, you respect the person who gets you saved. Isn't that true? I mean, I still think back to who got me saved. There's going to be that love and that respect for what they did for you. And so Paul was able to say, hey, you know what? I don't need anybody saying I can oversee this church because you're my proof. So if anybody were to try to criticize, people would say, well, you know what? Paul got me saved. Paul got me saved. Paul got me saved. It's like, he's going to win that battle, right? It says, and by the way, that also shows you don't need a Bible college degree, but that's a side point, okay? As long as you're proving, the proof's in the pudding. The proof's in the preaching, the soul winning, and things such as that. It says in verse 2, If I be not an apostle unto others, yet doubtless I am to you, for the seal of mine apostleship are ye in the Lord. Verse 3, Mine answer to them that do examine me is this. So Paul's saying, there's people that are examining me. They're trying to find a flaw in me. They're trying to criticize me. Here's my answer. Have not we power to eat and to drink? He's saying, look, I have power to live off the gospel is what he's saying in this context because you're my work in the Lord. Have not we power to lead about a sister or wife as well as other apostles and as the brethren of the Lord in Cephas? So Paul there is saying in verse 5 that, you know, he wasn't married. Now, he had the ability to do it, but he was not married. Now, I've heard people say Paul was married. I don't know what they're trying to use to argue. I guess they're trying to say he was a pastor or whatever. But he says very clearly in verse 5, he does have the power to lead about a sister and a wife, but he's not doing it, okay? He's not married. Verse 6, Or I only in Barnabas have not we power to forbear working? So he says, me and Barnabas, we don't have to work because of the fact we could live off the gospel is what he's saying. Verse 7, And Paul says, if you're going out to battle, if you're going out to war to represent a country, you don't bring your own gun. You don't bring your own supplies. They provide that for you, okay? I mean, if you sign up for the military in the U.S., they're going to give you your weapon. They're going to give you your armor. They're going to give you the training. They give you a place to stay. I mean, they provide those things. And Paul's saying, you know, if you're going out to war, which if you're serving God, you're in a battle, right? You're going out to war. And Paul's saying, who goes to war? Because when you go to war, you're risking your own life. And Paul's kind of indicating, hey, I'm risking my life out here on the battlefield. It's like, people want to kill me. I've been stoned. All these things are happening. It's like, would it really be much to ask that people could financially contribute to him if he's gotten all these churches started, especially if he started that church? Because if he started that church, then of course that church is a bit in debt to him, okay? Verse 8, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn, doth God take care for oxen, or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt this is written, that he that plows should plow in hope, and that he that threshest in hope should be partaker of the coke. That if the oxen produce the food, they have a right to eat the food. But it's not because God cares about oxen. It's actually just an example for us, because God doesn't really care that much about animals, okay? They don't have an eternal soul that goes to heaven or hell. He cares about us, and it's an example. And if the oxen produce the food, they get to eat the food. Common sense. Verse 11, If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? He's like, if we sow unto you spiritual things, it's not a big deal if we reap your carnal things. I believe one reason why Paul is saying this is there is a lot of problems in this church, and I think he's basically showing his authority because it's necessary in this situation. There's sin in the church, somebody needs to get kicked out, and he's declaring, I'm an apostleship, you're my proof of the pudding, I brought you to church and everything, and he's saying, I'm not even taking a paycheck. And it's just like he's basically showing his authority, and people are kind of taking advantage of the situation. Verse number 12, If others be partakers of this power over you, are not we rather, nevertheless we have not used this power, but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ. And so what it says in verse 12 is this, other people are getting a financial benefit from this church. Now I don't know if they're going to give it to charities or what it is, but Paul's like, shouldn't I be the number one person that would deserve to be gaining from this church? But he said we've not used this power. What he's saying is, I'm just working a job. Now this is proof, it's not wrong to work a job. I don't understand why people would preach, well it's wrong, I mean Paul the apostle would work a job for the most part, we don't know how many hours he was working, but he was obviously staying very busy, and he was providing his own needs. And he says he didn't use this power, because he didn't want to hinder the gospel of Christ. Now from a logical standpoint, in my opinion, I would think during this time period, churches probably weren't super rich, and so taking a paycheck would be a big financial burden on new churches being started. I mean, a new church gets started and they have 20 people, they're not going to be able to support a full-time salary for somebody. Even as a single person, I'd call the apostle. So I would say, that's probably a large reason why he didn't take a salary, is if he's getting churches started, he's like, I'm going to provide my own needs. Verse number 13. Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things liveth against the temple? And they which waited the altar are partakers with the altar. Even so, have the Lord ordained that they which preached the gospel should live of the gospel. Look, they're saying in verse 14, it's not wrong if you're preaching the gospel to live of the gospel. Now I want you to, the reason why this is important is because there can be kind of two extremes. There can be a lot of Baptist pastors that take advantage of their church members, and they have very rich lives, and they aren't really doing much for God at all. And look at their heretics, praise the Lord, they're not preaching the gospel. But there's a lot of Baptist churches and Baptist pastors that take advantage of the members, but you don't want to go to the other extreme and just say, because this is wrong, well you should never take any salary whatsoever, because that's not scriptural. That's not biblical. Many of the pastors that you listen to online and you respect, I mean some of them are full-time in the ministry, and some are not full-time. Some are not full-time because their church is too small, it would be too big of a burden. Others are not full-time because they choose not to. They either like their job or they have a good salary with their job, you know, it's a career that they've gotten. So they choose not to be full-time. And look, any one of those is fine, and any one of those would be scriptural. Now my choice at this point at least is not to take a salary, because there's nothing sinful about that. I don't even understand how someone could argue that sinful to preach sermons and not require to get paid for it. I don't see how you'd think that's wrong, but some churches say, well if you're called by God, full-time from day one. Well where's your Bible to support that? And let me explain something to you. If you're called by God at full-time from day one and your wife supports you to be full-time, I mean talk about changing everything the Bible says. It's like man, I'm full-time from day one, but my wife's working like 70 hours a week in overtime just so I can do it. Well then you're not full-time from day one. You should be the one providing. Okay. Go to 1 Timothy 5. 1 Timothy 5. 1 Timothy chapter 5. 1 Timothy chapter 5, verse 17. 1 Timothy 5, verse 17. I mean I believe the best model for most churches in most situations is if you're going to start a new church, you'd expect the person running that church to actually work because unless you have a lot of people at that church, I mean unless our church grew to be like 250 people and then when we started a church plant, we sent 75 people to that church or whatever. Like we'll start a church at the end of Coggen Huan because it's in Rizal and it's like competing with our church. Got two churches. I mean unless you have that sort of situation, then it's like you're probably not going to be able to support someone to be full-time from day one. But if somebody is able to be full-time, praise the Lord for that. That's good. And so I'm not against it. I mean if a church is able to do that, praise the Lord for that. But if they're not able to do it, it's just like I always just had the idea. It's like the pastors I know worked a job when they started. I always just intended to work when I started. I was probably intending to be a math teacher and then I'm able to still work for Verity so it worked out. But it's just like I figured I'd be like a math teacher or something here because my actuarial career doesn't transfer over. You've got to take different exams or it's not certified or whatever. But I just kind of figured I'd work when I started here because I just figured you're starting a new church. And quite honestly, I figured when we started a new church, I figured it would be me, my wife, and our kids. Like I didn't think we'd have anybody. But I figured I'll definitely have to work and just run the church, go soul winning, and work a job. That's how most churches, and that's what Paul the Apostle was doing. If a church is able to be full-time, the pastor can praise the Lord for it. But that's not what Paul was doing. Now, I do believe, though, everything should be run out of the local church. And the reason why is because we see Paul who's under the submission of the church of Jerusalem in Acts chapter 15. And that was his church that he was underneath. And so I believe that there's nothing wrong with working full-time in the ministry or going soul winning. I do think it should operate out of the local church, though, because you need to have structure. And that's what we see with Paul the Apostle. He was underneath the authority of the church of Jerusalem. He didn't have 100% free reign to do what he wanted because he had an overseeing church above him. You see, but Brother Stuckey, why wasn't Paul the Apostle, why did he have an overseer? Well, he wasn't a pastor. He wasn't a pastor of a local church where he was the head of. He wasn't married. You have to be married with kids. You say, you have to be married? Yes. It's like people try to give Paul the Apostle this proof that you don't have to be married. Well, he wasn't a pastor. He doesn't say he was a pastor. He was getting churches started, which also shows why what we do is biblical. Me coming here and starting this church, it's biblical because we're underneath the authority of a church in Sacramento. Amen. Okay. Now, there is a link, though, between 1 Timothy 5 and 1 Corinthians 9, and this is why I'm going to show you when I think the context of living of the gospel is not just someone going soul winning but also like preaching the sermons and running a church. 1 Timothy 5 verse 17, Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially they who labor in the word and doctrine. For the Scripture saith, Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn, and the laborer is worthy of his reward. Do you see how in verse 18 there's similar wording from 1 Corinthians chapter 19 of the muzzling? Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. And so I believe the context, because in verse 17 it's talking about a pastor, is referring to someone who's basically running a church. Okay. Now, there's nothing wrong with a church hiring people to be full time, though. But I do believe the main context in 1 Corinthians 9 is not just, you know, someone who's working for a church, but someone who's actually running a church because we see a link in 1 Timothy 5. That would be my opinion on that. Okay. Now, in 1 Timothy 5, it does say, Let the elders in verse 17 that rule well be counted worthy of double honor. Now, I do believe that the double honor is referring to finances, and that is the context in verses 17 and 18. And so once again, there can be kind of two extremes to this. It would be wrong for someone to be super rich as a pastor and just take advantage of the members. At the same time, if someone's full time in the ministry, they don't have to be dirt poor, barely surviving for their lives. Right. I mean, it's a job. They deserve to get paid an adequate salary. Right. And this is one reason why I've never really pushed to, like, you know, I don't know, one day maybe I would decide to be full time, but, you know, honestly, you know, I do a lot of work for Verity, and, you know, it's a good job for me. I just, I'm fine with that. I'm fine with working in the secular. I don't know if it's considered secular field, if it's for a church. You know, it's like, but, you know, there's nothing wrong with working a job. Okay. And there's nothing wrong with getting paid. And look, you know what, if somebody does become full time, you know what, they should be able to survive off that amount. I've always thought that if we hire someone, we're not going to, like, cheat them and say, well, here you go, 100 pesos a day. Well, how are you going to live off that? And it's like there's a lot of churches, they hire a lot of people to be full time, but it's like how can they even live off that salary? And what happens is the people are kind of, kind of forced to be in bondage under that church, and they can't really get out of the situation. I mean, it's not right. And they take advantage of the zeal and the excitement of people that want to serve God. And quite honestly, in the long run it's better just to get a job so you can have a family and have a career and everything like that. And it's like, I do believe if we ever hire someone to work for our church, you know what, and we've done this before. We've hired people. We gave them a fair salary. Now, we didn't make them rich, but at the same time, we're not going to make them dirt poor either. Why? Because you deserve to get paid for the work you do, and if you're doing it right, it's a lot of work. Right. They shouldn't be dirt poor. And look, so we're extremely rich. We're just like, look at how rich I am, and God's blessed me and everything, and then you're just taking the money from all your members. There's a balance here, and sometimes we can make the mistake of going too extreme on one direction on stuff. Okay? Now, turn in your Bible to Romans 15, and we'll close off Romans 15. Romans 15. Look, the truth is, as the church gets bigger, you know, I mean, our church, it's not a small church at this point. You know, it's not a big church. I wouldn't sit here and say, well, this is a mega church. Well, I doubt we're ever going to be a mega church. But, you know, it's not like I feel like I'm preaching to an empty room. Like, I can only look to one side. Because, you know, whenever you have a small church, everybody sits on one side of the room. It's like, you know, in the early days of our church, I was just like, why are 20 people here, and then there's two people on this side? This always happens at churches. Everybody sits at the very far back with a small church, and they're always on one side of the room, and it's just like, well, we're not a super small church. Right? We have plenty of people here at church. You know, we're not a small church at this point. So, look, as a church grows, you know, out of necessity, there's work that needs to be done. And look, as we're doing all these soul winning marathons, there's a lot of work that needed to be done. Now, I mentioned recently that for the time of your brother, he's going to be starting a new job in a couple of weeks, getting back into his career, but he's been working for the church since kind of the beginning of the year. We had a lot of accounting and bookkeeping we needed help on, organizing soul winning. And I'll tell you what, on weeks when I said you don't have a whole lot to do, if you get all that done, I said the rest of the time, soul winning. You say, is there something wrong with paying someone to go soul winning? What better thing could you do? It's like, you know, all the stuff we don't want to do, just get that done as soon as possible so you can go soul winning and get people saved. Right? There's nothing wrong with that. That's a great thing to do. And look, if our church is blessed financially in the future, you know what, we're going to try to use it for the spread of the gospel. Now, of course, there's a lot of things you've got to factor in because I envision us one day to have our own building and that takes a lot of time of savings and you can't just spend up every peso every single month. That's kind of my idea and that's kind of what our plan is, which takes a lot of time and stuff like that. But as we have extra money that comes in, of course we have fellowship activities, but I'll tell you what, if our money ran dry, then we're still going soul winning, we're still getting invitations, we're still doing soul winning events, and the fellowship activities are going to have to suffer. You say, why? Because soul winning's not going to suffer at this church. And there's nothing wrong with someone being paid to go soul winning. What better thing could we use for money than preaching the gospel? So point number one is reception. If somebody comes into our midst that's someone who is like minded but is like a pastor, someone we deeply respect, or someone we know, we should give them a warm reception. Number two, also a reward. And what does that mean? Well, it probably means getting them a hotel room to stay and not just the cheapest one we can find. It's like, man, we found this hotel room, it's like 200 pesos a night. It's like, here's your place for the night. It's just like, no, I mean, actually giving them an adequate place, giving them nice food, treating them well. I mean, it's like they would deserve that if it's someone who's a pastor who's taking time out of their schedule that we respect. I'm not just talking about a random person, okay? I'm not just saying a random person. I mean, obviously our church can't just afford, if we have a missions trip, to get hotels for 50 different people. But, you know, if it's someone who's a pastor, you know, honestly, they would deserve that. And we deserve to treat them well and treat them with respect and actually care about those people. And the last thing is request. And when it says point one, reception, point two, reward, point three, request, we're saying request on behalf of God for them, praying to God for those people. Romans 15, verse 30, Now I beseech you, brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake and for the love of the Spirit, that you strive together with me in your prayers to God for me. So Paul's closing up this chapter saying, I'm asking you, can you pray for me? Now, here's the reality. With someone like Paul the Apostle, you know what? Of course, they should treat him well and including financially, but not everyone necessarily would be able to help him financially. Not everyone's able to necessarily have that sort of money that they could help him other than maybe taking him out to eat or something like that. But, you know, you could at least pray for them, though. I mean, and it sounds kind of basic because everyone says, well, just pray. But, you know, yes, prayer. I mean, prayer is a very important thing. There's a lot of people that tune into our ministry and probably most of them don't donate anything, but at least they pray for us. At least they share the sermons. At least they tell friends that they know here in the Philippines, hey, you know what? You should go to this church. You should visit this church. You know, you're nearby. Come to this church. Yeah, you know, pray, right? That's an important thing. And when it comes to our church, I believe our church should pray, especially for the pastors that financially contribute to our church. We should pray for the pastors that are sharing our sermons or talking about us and stuff like that. Yeah, we should pray for those people specifically, right? Why? It's a benefit to our ministry. And there's many pastors in the U.S. I'm not necessarily trying to single anyone out, but recently Pastor Burson's been sharing the missionary updates on his channel, on the Stronghold Baptist channel. He's got a lot more subscribers than us. Praise the Lord. Because it could tell people that are from the Philippines that might not know about our church, man, there's a church I can visit. It's like that's a big benefit to us. And so when people are benefiting us, the least we could do is actually pray for them, right? Verse 31, that I may be delivered from them that do not believe in Judea. So here in verse 31, the main reason why Paul needs prayer is basically pray that I don't get killed by the Jews, okay? So obviously, that's not the same. I mean, there are some pastors who can pray that they don't get murdered by the LGBT maybe, right? But, you know, praying for people and specifically here, he's saying, you know what, there's actually a danger to preaching the gospel. And of course, when you're reading the New Testament, you see that. And you know, I'll tell you what, I don't believe the Bible always focuses on it. It talks about it, but I don't think it overly focuses because I think if it was all the time, it might be too much for us to take. You know, reading about people. The Bible doesn't really go in detail other than the Lord Jesus Christ, really, for people how they were martyred. Now, I believe many of the apostles were martyred. I mean, Peter, it was prophesied about him, but it doesn't go in great detail because quite honestly, it might be too much for us to take, right? Even the apostles, when they looked on the Lord Jesus Christ, it was something, you know, that it was just too hard, really, to even behold, right? And so the Bible talks about it, and we know there's this persecution. It also doesn't overly focus on it, but yet you see verses like this, and Paul's like, pray I don't get killed. Pray I don't get arrested for preaching the gospel. And then my service, which I have for Jerusalem, may be accepted of the saints. Verse 32, that I may come unto you with joy by the will of God, and may with you be refreshed. Now the God of peace be with you all. Amen. So that's the close-up we have in Romans, chapter 15. Paul is basically addressing how to treat a missionary, which, as I said, doesn't really apply to me, but applies to someone who would be a traveling missionary, or even a pastor that would visit us. And as I said last week, or a couple weeks ago, we're getting to the end of Romans, and I get that this is not preaching against the Zionists and about salvation. It's kind of closing up, but you know, every chapter, every word in the Bible is important, okay? So I encourage you to read Romans 16 as we're going to be covering it the next couple weeks as we're finishing up the book of Romans. Let's close on the word of prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today and getting to see your word on this topic of Romans, chapter 15. And we do thank you for all the pastors and like-minded churches that are donating to us, or sharing our sermons, or praying for us, God. And thank you for all the like-minded people that are out there that are serving you just as zealously as us. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.