(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

All right, we're here in Acts chapter 2, and of course we preached on street preaching in the first sermon, and we looked at kind of just the differences in refuting street preaching from a logical standpoint of sowing versus street preaching, and in this sermon I'm going to refute street preaching arguments, so we're going to look at five different arguments they used to try to support street preaching and why they are wrong, and it's not going to be a logical reputation because kind of the first sermon kind of covered that, like I talked about how, you know, in church I preach sermons and that's for people that are saved that want to listen, but I'm going to basically look at five different people in the Bible or chapters or passages where they say, here's a street preaching example and we're going to refute that, and perhaps the biggest one is when Acts chapter 2 with the day of Pentecost, and this is a story that people are very confused by. There's a lot of tricky verses, of course we don't have time to cover the whole chapter, but go to verse number 41. Verse 41, and the Bible says in Acts 2 verse 41, then they that gladly received his word were baptized, and the same day they were added unto them about three thousand souls. Now, when it says three thousand souls were added, it's saying they were added unto the church. They got baptized and they joined the church. Now, there's probably a lot more than three thousand that got saved, but those are the ones that took that step of gladly receiving his word. But when people explain this story, some people will say, well see, Peter stood up and preached and led three thousand souls to the Lord, okay? That's the way a lot of people use this story. That's what I commonly heard in Baptist churches, but when you really break it down, that's not actually what's taking place. This is the famous chapter where people had the ability to speak a foreign language that they didn't normally know how to do, and so if Peter's just the one preaching the gospel to three thousand people, what's everybody else doing speaking in random languages? It doesn't make sense with this chapter, okay? And so let's go to verse number one. Let's break down this story. Acts 2 verse 1, and when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. Now, when it says they, that's indicating more than one person. So this is basically the early church. They're meeting together. They're on the same page. They're with one accord. Basically, they made the decision, let's go out there to preach the gospel. Now, why did they pick this area? Well, they pick it, it's a public area, but not for screaming against people, but meaning you can stop people and talk to them one-on-one. Kind of like, you know, we go to parks. Parks are a great way to preach the gospel because many people will meet, and you can talk to more people at once than going door to door. We try to do a mix, and of course, I don't know what the perfect balance is, but if you can go to parks with lots of people, you can get a lot of people saved. Remember when we went to CDC, was it CDC park? Is that the name of it? You know, I would love to do that again if things open up, and everything would be a great event to do, because you get a lot of people saved, you have good fellowship, and you know, praise the Lord for stuff like that, right? I hope the parks will open up more here in the coming months, but that's basically what's taking place. Verse 2, And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as a fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak other tongues with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. So everybody's filled with the Holy Ghost. Now, this does not mean that they're indwelled with the Holy Ghost. It's saying when the Spirit of God comes upon you, you can have boldness to do mighty works. When we go soul winning, many times the Holy Spirit will come upon us so we can be more bold and better as we preach the gospel, or preaching sermons, that can happen, but the Bible is saying they're filled with the Holy Ghost, they're going to do some great soul winning campaign, and then God fills them with the Holy Ghost to do a better job, okay? It's not talking about what Pentecostals would say, they're filled with the Holy Ghost, and then, or like, you got that holy laughter. That's not what it's talking about when they're filled with the Holy Ghost, okay? Verse 5, and they're dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. Now when this was noise abroad, the multitude came together and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all amazed and marveled, saying one to another, behold, are not all these which speak Galileans, and how here we every man in our own tongue wherein we were born. What's taking place is all these people are filled with the Holy Ghost, and they're going up to people and preaching the gospel to them. You got a big group of people, a big soul winning event, they're going out and preaching the gospel. Now, we don't have a perfect understanding of this situation or application here in the Philippines, but let's say we were in Ermita, okay? Let's say we lived in Ermita, and we were going to so many in Rizal Park, because that was a common spot we went to when our church met there the first couple weeks, Verity and Manila, because obviously in Rizal Park there's a lot of people, and sometimes you have people from different nations. See, imagine a place where you have people from like 50 different nations. You have people from China, you have people from France, you have people from, you know, Korea, you have people from all over the world that speak different languages. And see, God gives them the ability to speak to those people to preach the gospel, because, you know, none of us are able to preach the gospel in Chinese or Korean or whatever, you know? There's all these different languages, and in certain parts of the world that's the only language they speak. We won't be able to preach the gospel because we don't know that language. God gave them the ability in this situation, okay? So this is what's taking place, but then notice what it says in verse 9, Parthians and Medes and Elamites and the dwellers of Mesopotamia and in Judea and Cappadocia and Pontius in Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia in Egypt and in the parts of Libya, about Cyrene and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, Crete and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God, and they were all amazed and were in doubt saying one to another, what meaneth this? Others mocked and said these are full of new wine. So there's this great event, all these people are getting saved, and the people that are in this area are questioning what is going on, right? Because normally we wouldn't just walk up to, you know, random people from other countries that don't speak, you know, English or Tagalog or whatever, and just start preaching the gospel, but that's what's taking place here. Then it says in verse 14, but Peter standing up with the 11 lifted up his voice and said on to them, ye men of Judea and all ye that dwell at Jerusalem be this known on you and hearken to my words. So what you're seeing is that Peter is speaking to a specific group. He's not speaking to everybody, right? What's taking place is they're going out and preaching the gospel, and there's a specific group that is confused like what is going on, and then Peter is addressing that group of people, those that dwell at Jerusalem. So let's say we're at Resolve Park preaching the gospel, and then all the local people start to question what is going on, and then somebody stood up to basically round up that crowd to stop distractions from the soul owners going out to preach the gospel. Now Peter, I don't believe, was planning to do this, but this is just kind of the situation how it happened, okay? They're preaching the gospel, all these people are kind of mocking it and questioning it, so Peter rounds them up and basically he's talking to the people that have questions and are distracting just random people from listening to the gospel. This is not Peter speaking to 10,000 people one time. He's speaking to those that are questioning, and it's a specific group of people, okay? Many languages were being spoken, and look, Peter was speaking one language at a time. He wasn't up there speaking all these languages for all these people to convert. He's speaking to a specific group of people, the men of Judea and those that dwell in Jerusalem, but this was an event where there's people from all over the world. We just saw that. They're from all over coming to this event, and they're soul winners preaching the gospel and getting people saved, and then Peter is addressing a specific group of people. So Peter's not standing up winning 3,000 people to the Lord. Now I believe he probably won some people to the Lord. This is a miraculous event and people are willing to listen, but he didn't stand up and win 3,000 people to the Lord. All these people are filled with the Holy Ghost, preaching the gospel, and people are getting lots of people saved. Look, if you have a church of 120 people with a miraculous event, and you're going out and talking to three people and four people, a lot of people are going to get saved, especially because they're probably surprised when they're speaking their language during this time period, like, whoa, I didn't expect you to speak Mandarin Chinese or whatever the languages were that existed back then, and so people are very willing to listen. They're a captivated audience. Obviously Christ has just died, so this is very fresh in people's minds. A lot of people get saved, but what you are not seeing is Peter standing up and preaching this sermon to 10,000 people and everybody getting saved. That's not what's taking place. He stands up to preach to those that would have been a distraction from the soul winners doing the work. So the 3,000 saved, did Peter get some of those 3,000 that got saved and baptized? Maybe so, but the vast majority were just soul winners going out and getting people saved. You have some churches who have this idea that basically the preacher stands up and preaches this sermon, people walk down to the altar, and then the preacher was the result of getting like 1,000 people saved, right? They try to apply this to Acts, too. That's not what the Bible ever teaches, though. We get a lot of people saved because there's many people going soul-laying. It's not like I gave 90% of the salvation to our church. It's not like I have some special ability where basically you just bring them to church and I'll get 10,000 to walk the aisle, right? That's not reality. That's not what the Bible teaches, and that is not what is taking place in Acts, too. There's actually a lot of soul winners preaching the gospel, and Peter stands up to preach to prevent distractions from taking place. Go to Matthew chapter 5, Matthew 5, Matthew 5, Matthew chapter 5. So one of the big arguments is Acts 2. They take this story to say Peter stood up and preached the gospel and led 3,000 people to the Lord. Well, that's not what's taking place in Acts chapter 2 when you actually read it. He's speaking to a specific group of people, but there are many soul winners doing the work. I mean, does this make any sense? If you had a church meeting together, let's say you had 150 people on a Sunday, and then all of a sudden the preacher just goes out and he's like, man, I led 3,000 to the Lord, and everyone else is just kind of hanging out. You have an ability to speak other languages, but you're not getting anybody saying. Are you talking about the weather? I mean, it doesn't make any sense, right, when you're looking at Acts 2. Peter's speaking to a specific group of people. Argument number two they have is this. Jesus was a street preacher, right? Isn't that what they say? Jesus was a street preacher. Well, let's see if that's the case. Matthew 5, verse 1, and seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain, and when he was set, his disciples came on to him, and he opened his mouth and taught them, saying. Now here is a multitude, right? If God's technique was for one man to stand up and preach the gospel to thousands of people like a Billy Graham crusade, why didn't Jesus do that? Here is his opportunity. Thousands and thousands of people, but when he sees the multitudes, he goes up to a mountain, and then his disciples, the ones that actually want to listen, come up and he preaches a sermon. He teaches the Word of God. But he doesn't go and just preach to 10,000 people at one time. You say, why? It's just not an effective method. It's not what you see in the Bible. Jesus, when he sees the multitudes, he avoids the multitude. Now look, Jesus preached sermons, and people listened, and by all means, if I preach sermons, and our next-door neighbors heard it, they walked in in the middle of the sermon. Praise the Lord for that, right? With Jesus, he preached sermons, and you know what? A lot of people would come, and they would listen. But what he's doing is not preaching the gospel. He goes up into a mountain, and look, this is the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount is not about salvation. He talks about it a little bit, but it's not like the Sermon on the Mount is about salvation. He's preaching doctrine. He's just teaching the Word of God, okay? So he avoids the multitudes, does not preach the gospel, and he goes up into a mountain and just teaches the Word of God. Of course, the Billy Graham Crusade is, Billy Graham's very famous, there's other people like him, and they have this idea, well, let's just get some, you know, popular musical artists, and they'll just sing some songs, and gather together everybody from every background. Satan worshipers, atheists, do whatever we have to do to bring in a crowd, and then we'll just have a Billy Graham stand up and just preach, and thousands will walk the aisle and get saved. Well, you know, first off, at Billy Graham Crusades, people that actually attended those, what they do to try to motivate people to walk the aisles is the first people that walk down the aisle actually work for the Billy Graham Crusade, so they're lying. They're just like, pretend like, it's like the same guy walks down every single Billy Graham Crusade just pretending, like, you know, that touched my heart, and then he walks down to try to get other people to walk down. Then when you get to the front, this is what happens, and of course Billy Graham's passed away already, but you walk to the front and you're Catholic, and they say, hey, what church are you from? It's like, oh, you know, I'm a Catholic, and then they send you to a Catholic priest to talk to, or some Catholic religious person. They don't have a Baptist preaching the gospel because they work with Pentecostals and Methodists and Lutherans, and when you get to the front, if you're a United Methodist, it's like, go talk to that United Methodist. They don't have you talking to a saint person, so unless, you know, a Baptist who walks the aisle, they send you to someone who's a fundamental Baptist, you're going to hear a false gospel. It's a joke, right? You get to the front, you know, you're a Mormon, well, here's a Mormon for you to talk to. It's like, what in the world? And you say, well, brother, I'm not sure if that's true. Well, anyone who's been there will say that's a fact. You can look it up online, but Billy Graham was close friends with the Pope, Pope John Paul. He was close friends. Go to Google and look up pictures, you can see Billy Graham hanging out with Pope John Paul. And then Billy Graham talked about how Pope John Paul should have been the man of the century, like he's the greatest man who ever lived. I mean, Billy Graham was a fraud, and this is the Baptist representative, so to speak, right? It's a fraud, it's fake. I wish I could find this clip. I saw this clip over ten years ago, and I wasn't making YouTube videos or whatever back then. It would have been a good clip, but Bill Clinton had some sort of ceremony, he was being honored or whatever, and Billy Graham was one of the speakers because Billy Graham was friends with Bill Clinton, right? They both have the same first name, your name's Bill, my name's Billy, let's be friends, right? You know, you support murdering people and abortion and stuff like that, but you know, I'm a Baptist preacher, hey, we can let bygones be bygones or whatever. But what Billy Graham said was that if Bill Clinton had picked a different field of work, meaning as a missionary or evangelist, he believes he could have been one of the greatest evangelists in the world. That's what Billy Graham said about Bill Clinton. It's like, how do you even, what in the world, right? Billy Graham was always close friends with every president that came out in the U.S. And look, I'm sure it's no different today with whatever the famous Christians are or whatever. I know with Billy Graham, Johnny Cash used to play music at a Billy Graham crusade because Johnny Cash was famous, and then, you know, he'd sing about something, and then all of a sudden people would walk the aisle, you'd bring in more people, Johnny Cash was playing for you, right? But look, this is not what you see Jesus doing. He doesn't bring in some popular rock artist, right? And when there's a multitude, he doesn't even preach the gospel because he realizes, if I'm going to preach the gospel to 5,000 people at one time, they're not all going to be quiet. It's not going to work. So here's the thing, I will just preach a sermon to those that are willing to listen. Look, just imagine if at our church there were people that were constantly making noise. Of course, we understand there's kids and kids make noise from time to time, but let's say we had people that are just always like talking and being distracted. We wouldn't be able to pay attention, would we? And think about if you had a crowd of 5,000 people and most are not saved. It's going to be madness. It's not going to be effective. Then when you get to the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 7, verse 24, notice this. Matthew 7, verse 24. Therefore, whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell not for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it. So Jesus preaches a lot of different things in the Sermon on the Mount, and he's preaching about surviving the storms of life is kind of the recap that he's giving. It's not about salvation. He talks some about salvation, but that's not the primary goal of the sermon. And the same thing is true when I preach sermons. Do I talk about salvation in sermons? I do from time to time, but not usually full sermons because you're saved. I'll preach against false doctrines during a sermon, but it's not like every sermon is about salvation because guess what? It would be boring, right? If every sermon was about salvation, you'd be like, man, have you ever read anything besides John 3, Brother Stuckey? Is there something else you could talk about? There's so many books in the Bible to talk about just always about salvation, it would get boring. And see, Jesus is actually preaching doctrine. He's not just preaching about salvation. Go to Matthew 9, Matthew chapter 9. And notice what it says in verse 35. So all of a sudden, there's a great multitude, and all of a sudden, Jesus says, you know what? We don't have enough laborers. You say, why? Well, let's say 2,000 unsaved people showed up at our church today. We don't have enough soul owners to get the job done. Right? And what Jesus is saying is, hey, we've got a group of people that are soul owners here, but there's a great multitude. We can't praise the gospel to everybody. We don't have enough people. Well, why didn't Jesus just stand up and just preach a sermon about salvation? Why didn't he just preach the gospel to the multitudes? Because it wouldn't work. There'd be distractions. There'd be noise. People would have questions, and he'd preach a sermon, and guess what? People would not get saved. Because you need laborers to preach the gospel, and that is all of us. That's what the Bible says, go ye therefore and teach all nations. It's plural, go ye therefore. Preach the gospel to every creature. That's a command for all of us that are saved. Not just one person, but all of us need to go out and preach the gospel. And that's what you see with the ministry of Jesus Christ. What's interesting is then you go to Matthew chapter 10. The laborers are few, and how does Matthew 10 verse 1 start off? And we had called unto him his 12 disciples. He gave them power against unclean spirits to cast them out and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease. Now the names of the 12 apostles are these. The first, Simon, who was called Peter, and Andrew his brother. James the son of Zebedee and John his brother. Philip and Bertholomew, Thomas and Matthew the publican. James the son of Alphaeus and Levius, whose surname was Thaddeus. Simon the Canaanite, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him. So you're seeing it's kind of broken down into groups of two, and you feel bad for Simon the Canaanite if Judas Iscariot was his sowing partner because, well, he got to reprobate with you, right? But this is a passage as he sends them out to preach the gospel, and in a parallel passage in Mark it says he sent them out two by two. So they're going out to preach the gospel. The labors are few, there's a great multitude, then he sends people out to preach the gospel. Why? Because one person preaching a sermon to thousands of people is not an effective way to get people saved. What is effective is a church that preaches sermons in the church and teaches the Word of God, and then you have so many times to go out and get people saved. If our church changed and canceled the so many times, and just every sermon was about salvation, or we had an over-call, our salvation would plummet. It doesn't work. It's not an effective way. Now look, I understand logically it seems like it should work because you think, man, if I could just preach to thousands at one time, how effective would that be? But you know what? When I was in college, I got to preach a few times at churches, and I would always invite, you know, unsaved friends of mine at college to listen to me. And I had people show up to listen to me preach. I'd have like eight unsaved people come to listen to me preach. And this was really before I talked to people about the gospel, I did some soul winning, but I didn't have everything organized in a great fashion or whatever. But I just figured, if an unsaved person listens to me preach about salvation for 40 minutes, surely they're going to get saved, right? Doesn't that seem to make sense? Let's say an unsaved person came here today, and I preached for 45 minutes on salvation. Doesn't that seem like it should work? But it doesn't. And I learned that when I had unsaved people listen to me. One of my friends who was Mormon, he came to listen to me preach. I asked him afterwards, hey, what did you think of that? He's like, man, that was great. I agree with all of it. But he still was Mormon. It's just like it went over his head. I'm like, really? The part about, you know, whosoever believeth, the gift is eternal life. It's not a word. It went straight over. It just doesn't work. And look, you know, I thought it would work. So every time I got a chance to, yes, preach, I preached on salvation. Never got anybody saved from it. It doesn't work that way. But what's amazing is when we talk to people one on one, it works right. And so Jesus doesn't get up and preach the whole sermon to a multitude because he knows that it's not going to be effective. Now, of course, if you have opportunities to preach at weddings and funerals, take those opportunities. Sometimes I have people ask me to preach like my wife's mom asked me to preach at a birthday party where there's like 50 Catholic relatives. And I got up and I preached about salvation, you know, took the opportunity. And of course, at weddings, I'll preach the gospel and stuff like that. I'm not saying that someone cannot get saved. I'm just saying it's not the most effective method. I'm saying make sure you take the time to talk to your unsaved Catholic member one on one and don't just trust. Well, they heard the gospel at a wedding. They're just not likely to get saved from that method. Go to Jonah chapter three, Jonah three, Jonah three. I've met people that are, you know, new IFP people or whatever that, you know, they listen to preaching for a long time and they didn't get saved from it. It took them a super long time. I know somebody from West Virginia, and you know, he grew up in the same city as me. We both went to the same United Methodist Church, but I didn't know him. He's like a year younger than me. But years later, you know, I saw that there was someone from my hometown that was, you know, a friend of Pastor Anderson. So I sent him a message. He came up to church the next day in Morton town, 40 minutes away. Well, he goes out soul winning with me. And you know, we talked and we get a couple of people saved. And all of a sudden, you know, he told me a couple of years later, that when he first went soul winning with me, he said, he's like, actually, I wasn't saved. He's like, you're actually the one who got me saved. I'm like, really? So why didn't you tell me that a couple of years ago? But he had been listening to Pastor Anderson for over a year. And he didn't get saved from it. You say why? Well, people can get saved from preaching. But I'm just saying it's much more effective, just the gospel presentation. It's just far more effective. It's just the way it works. And so this is the way God's designed it. And you know, I think there's reasons we talked about some of the logical reasons of why it's like that. He listened to a sermon online, realistically, you probably usually don't sit there captivated for an hour paying attention, taking notes, you listen for 10 minutes, you take a break, you know, you get something to eat, you go back later on, right. And it's the same thing if people are going to hear a sermon, when it's preached among Jews, people tune in and tune out. Right now, some of you are not listening to me, but you're going to come back in a couple of minutes, right? That's the way it works. You hear sermons, and sometimes your mind just fades out, you're distracted with things. It's just not the most effective method. And look, Jesus understood that. So you don't see him preaching the gospel to these multitudes of people. But you do see john three, and john four, you see him talking to the rich young ruler, you see conversations one on one. Jonah is another example. So Peter was not a street preacher, Jesus was not a street preacher. But they'll also say that Jonah was a street preacher. And this is one of the most famous, this could be the most famous example where they say Jonah preached to one nation and one man led an entire country to get saved. Well, let's see what Jonah three actually says, Jonah three, verse one. And the word of the Lord came on the journey the second time saying, Arise, go on the Nineveh that great city and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So Jonah rose and went on the Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days journey. And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey and he cried and said, yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Now realize Jonah is warning Nineveh that they're going to be destroyed. He is basically street preaching in this example. He's not trying, I mean, he's not preaching on salvation, he's preaching that Nineveh is going to be destroyed. Now, considering that, you know, this is not something Jonah probably normally did because he talked to people one on one, he's probably wondering because people like Jonah in the Old Testament, God spoke in diverse ways. He had prophets preach to his people, like at one time, which is sort of like a church service. But here, Jonah's being asked to preach to Nineveh, which is going to be unsaved people by and large. So it's kind of strange, but let's see what takes place. Verse five. So the people of Nineveh believed God and proclaimed the fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest of them, even to the least of them. So the people believed God. What did they believe? Well, they believed that Nineveh was going to be destroyed. That's what the context is in verse four, that they believe Nineveh was going to be destroyed. Now, why would they believe that? Because one man says that while verse six says this, four. So four is giving us the explanation. Why do people believe for word came out of the king of Nineveh and he arose from his throne and he laid his robes from him and covered him with sackcloth and sat in ashes. And notice verse seven. This is the important verse chapter and he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles saying, let neither man nor beast, bird nor flock, taste anything, let them not feed nor drink water. So here's the thing. Everybody in Nineveh hears this message because the king believes what Jonah is saying and the king is in a position of power to cause it to be proclaimed and published everywhere that our country is going to be destroyed. And so I don't know exactly how this took place. Jonah's, you know, screaming and maybe somebody walks up to the king and says, there's this crazy guy outside. Looks like he got swallowed by a whale and he's screaming Nineveh is going to be destroyed. And then the king hears it and he believes it. He believes that this message is true. I mean, God allowed the king's heart to be touched where he believed this and he is the one who causes it to be proclaimed and published everywhere. Look, one man could not preach to a hundred thousand people at one time, right? I mean, Jonah's getting up there and screaming. And guess what? The message gets back to the king. But Jonah was not preaching to a hundred thousand people at one time. That doesn't even make sense, right? But Jonah preaches that Nineveh will be destroyed. The king hears word of it and the king causes it to be proclaimed and published everywhere. Now, here's the thing. I cannot prove this to you. But one thing I can prove is there was definitely some safe people in Nineveh because there's safe people everywhere. However, I would say, logically speaking, if the king makes a decree that everybody is going to hear this message of Jonah, I believe soul winners would have risen up and taken the opportunity to preach the gospel in Nineveh. So I do believe a lot of people got saved in this situation, but not because one man was preaching about salvation, because Jonah was preaching that Nineveh was going to be destroyed. But I do believe that safe people would take this opportunity. I mean, imagine if you lived in communist China. Imagine if you lived in a Muslim country. Let's say you lived in a Muslim country, Saudi Arabia or Iraq. And let's say the king or the leader of Saudi Arabia said, you know what? I believe what this bible-believing Christian said. And then he said, you know what? I want everybody to listen to this message. That would probably be the perfect opportunity for safe people that live in Saudi Arabia to take the opportunity to preach the gospel to Muslims when they would not normally have an opportunity. That's probably pretty similar to Nineveh, where anybody who's saved is like, man, here's my chance. Let's preach the gospel. So I do believe a lot of people got saved. But the main context of Jonah 3 is that Nineveh will be physically destroyed because of sin and wickedness. And that's what Jonah was preaching against. And then the king hears it. He believes it. And he causes it to be proclaimed and published everywhere. Then it says in verse eight, But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and pride mightily unto God. Yea, let them turn everyone from his evil way and from the violence that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn and repent and turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not? And God saw their works and they turn it from their evil way. And God repented of the evil that he had said that he would do unto them. And he did not. God does not destroy Assyria because they turn from their sins. They turn from their wickedness. Do I believe a lot of people got saved? I do believe a lot of people got saved, but not by turning from their wickedness, which would mean if a lot of people got saved, there must have been saved people in Nineveh who took this opportunity to preach the gospel. Assyria was a very wicked country in the Bible. They were the most brutal of all of the empires. So if you lived in Assyria as a saved person, if you're an OFW in Assyria, but you're saved, guess what? Here's your chance to preach the gospel. And I do believe that happened. But it's not like Jonah was standing up preaching about salvation. And the reason why people turn was because of the king who got word of this message. Now turn in your Bible to Matthew 3. Matthew 3. Matthew 3. Matthew 3. Now here's the thing. You know, God has not told any of us that any country is being destroyed anytime soon. If God tells us this country will be destroyed in a month and you believe that the president is going to hear your message and stand on the corner and scream or whatever, but I would not take this story to say, well, let's just do this in the modern day, because for one, he did not have a message that a country is for sure going to be destroyed. Every country is very sinful today. The whole world lies in wickedness. And obviously God's very long suffering. I don't know when God would drop the ultimate hammer on some of these countries because they're all filled with wickedness. Okay? So I don't believe that you can take this story and just say, well, let's just do this in the modern day and just preach against sin. And then maybe the heart of the president or king will be touched. And then everything's going to change in the country. I think that's very unlikely. I think this is a bit of a miraculous event. And the reason why it's so successful is simply because the king hears the message. Jonah probably thought he was on a suicide mission. No wonder he didn't want to do this. Right? I mean, imagine if your enemy, because this was the enemy of God's people during this time period. I mean, imagine if during the cold war between the US and Russia, you know, you were told by God, go to Russia and just stand on the corner and say how Russia is going to be destroyed. I'd be like, no, I'm leaving. It's not that shocking that Jonah says no to this message. It's like, what in the world? It's like, I'm going to be killed. Right? Or during World War II, when the US and Japan are at war, it's like, yeah, you're on a kamikaze mission. You go to Japan and preach against Japan when they're at war. Right? I mean, so when you're looking at this story, it's just like, this is obviously a pretty miraculous event that God must take place because the king's heart was touched. If the king's heart was not touched, then Jonah could have been stoned to death, potentially, honestly. So number one, Acts chapter two, the day of Pentecost, that does not prove street preaching. Number two, Jesus was not a street preacher. You don't see that in the Bible. Number three, Jonah was kind of a special situation, but it's not like he led thousands of the Lord with his message. And it happens because the king's heart is touched where the country turns from the weakness. Number four, they'll say that John the Baptist was a street preacher. They'll say, well, John the Baptist was out in the wilderness just preaching against sin. And then people came from a hundred miles away just to hear him scream against sin. Well, notice what it says in Matthew three, verse one. In those days came John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness of Judea and saying, repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Now he says repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. When it comes to John the Baptist preaching, there was kind of two types of preaching John the Baptist did, which is the same two types of preaching that any man of God is going to do. One of them is soul-winning telling people how to go to heaven. Another one is preaching sermons, and you're going to see the mix in the Bible where John the Baptist, when he's preaching and screaming in the wilderness, what is that? It's a sermon. But when he's trying to get people saved, he's preaching the gospel. The same is true for everyone in the Bible, right? When it says no was a preacher of righteousness, did Noah preach sermons? Yes, he did. But don't tell me he never let anybody in the Lord over 900 years of his life. He got people saved, but he also preached sermons and they didn't believe the judgment coming because they didn't get into the ark, right? And so John the Baptist, he says, repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And here's the thing, when people get saved, they've got to repent of their unbelief and put their faith on Jesus Christ. Verse three, for this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah saying, the voice of one crying in the wilderness, preparing the way the Lord make his path straight. So what takes place is John the Baptist, he gets people saved and he's basically got a church. Okay. And then he would preach sermons to the people at his church. And look, sometimes people think John the Baptist was just this one lone man in the wilderness, but actually he had disciples that followed him. So he had members that would be taught by John the Baptist. And guess what they did as a church. They went so many and got people saved. And then John the Baptist baptized the converse. It's not really any different. And did he cry in the wilderness, which would mean to scream out? Yes. When he preached sermons and he also talked to people one on one and got them saved and got them to join their church. Right. It says in verse four and the same John had his Raymond of Campbell's hair and a leather girl about his loins and his meat was locust and wild honey. Then went out to Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region round about Jordan and baptizing him in Jordan confessing their sins. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits made for repentance. So what you see here is false prophets show up to his baptism. Pharisees and Sadducees show up and John the Baptist is baptizing people. And then all of a sudden a Pharisee is coming. He's like, well, wait a minute. It'd be like, for example, if we're doing baptisms and then all of a sudden, you know, a Mormon elder shows up, you're like, well, wait a minute. Well, who warned you? Who got you saved? Right? You would want to make sure that they're actually saved because you would obviously have question marks because it's not just a random person, but the Pharisees and Sadducees were fighting against the message John the Baptist said. So John the Baptist doesn't believe them. He thinks that they're just there to cause problems or do whatever. And you know what? He's right. He's smart. John the Baptist realizes bad people will try to link up to our ministry and destroy it. There's nothing new under the sun. This is reality, right? And John the Baptist said, well, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? And he's like, first, what I want to see is actual proof that you got saved. Meaning you are preaching a false gospel. Bring forth your fruits. Bring forth those that you have led to the Lord that you have converted. Show me that you've actually changed what you believe because he figures these guys are just showing up to get baptized. And you're like, they're not actually saved. And he was right. He was a smart guy. Okay. So when it comes to John the Baptist, you need to realize as you're reading him, he would either be preaching to people one-on-one and preaching the gospel, or he would preach sermons to the members of basically what was a church. Go to Acts 19 and let me prove to you that John the Baptist would preach to people about the gospel. So when it's saying repentance, it doesn't necessarily mean turn from your sins. Now, here's the thing. When I preach sermons against sin, I will tell you to repent of your sins, but that's not to get saved. If I'm going to give you the gospel, I would tell somebody, Hey, repent of what you believe. Repent of this belief and believe on Jesus, meaning change what you believe. Okay. Acts 19 verse one, acts 19 verse one. And it came to pass that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul, having passed through the upper coast, came to Ephesus and finding certain disciples, he said unto them, have you received the Holy Ghost since he believed? And they said unto him, we have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost. And he said unto them, unto what then were you baptized? And they said unto John's baptism. Then said Paul, John barely baptized with the Baptist baptism of repentance. And people would like to stop there and say, well, see, repent of your sins. But wait a minute. What does it say? Saying on the people that they should believe on him, which should come after him. That is on Christ Jesus. When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. So they got baptized after they believed on Jesus Christ. That's the baptism of repentance that John the Baptist was preaching. OK, go to Acts chapter 17, Acts 17. Acts 17. So, yeah, you know, he can point to things where John the Baptist is crying and screaming, screaming out. That's not what he's preaching the gospel. And he was operating like he had a church. He was baptizing converts. He had disciples that were there listening to him. And they're doing that to learn God's word. But then they're also going out and getting people saved and bringing people to the church. And then those people would get baptized. So realize that he's not just standing in the wilderness just screaming. And, you know, we get this in our heads because that's what you see in the movies where John the Baptist is out here in the wilderness, just screaming at the top of his lungs. Repent! And then people are coming and everything like that. And he's just always screaming. Repent! Repent! Repent! Right. But that's not really what you see with John the Baptist. When he's screaming, he's screaming because he's preaching a sermon just like I do on Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays, right? Lastly, we see Paul with Mars Hill, right? Now, when we say this, we say, Brother Second, why would false converse, people that didn't even believe, why would they just come up to get baptized? Well, you know, we had our missions trip. We had a lot of different people that got baptized. And there are several of them that clearly were just faking it. One person got baptized by Pastor Jimenez, and he just tried to latch on to our ministry for money. He came only a couple times and he was trying to give people the church to give him money. And so he faked getting saved just to try to get money from the members. There's another guy, this one guy was strange. This guy, you know, he and it turned out, you know, once we found out what this guy was doing, it answered it. But this guy got baptized by Pastor Jimenez, but he came to like the church services that are meeting in the hotel. He kept like walking in and out during the church service. Now that's strange when someone keeps walking in and outside, what is this guy doing? Right. And, you know, this guy was doing this really weird. And then all of a sudden he was like asking us, you know, questions and stuff like that. And he asked me a question and this was right after, you know, there was a pastor in the US that got caught with prostitutes and all this stuff. And he's like, so, you know, he's like, I just wanted to ask you a question. Let's say there's a pastor who got caught with prostitutes. Does that make him a rep for me? And I'm like, what kind of a question is that? Like, why are you asking me that? I was like, first off, you know, I'm not the pastor of this church. So it's like, you know, I have no opinion probably on this matter. There's absolutely nothing to do with me. But I was like, what was the purpose of this guy? And he's taking all this footage. I know so many with my friend. This is after we had just moved here to the Philippines. And all of a sudden he comes to us. He's like, Hey, do you mind if I just film you guys? It's like, okay. And this guy brought this married woman with him. We said he was married to some other guy to come be a part of the church to hear a couple of sermons or whatever. This guy was with us for like a week. He's like, what is this guy doing? But it turned out this guy gets a lot of film footage from every Christian under the sun and he compiles it together. And he's like a missionary, a source where it's like, look at this. I'm reaching people here and doing this. And he makes it look like it's all of his own work. So he got baptized by pastor minutes. He probably got baptized by somebody else the day before. And he just links up with the ministries so that way he can get money from people as they look at this. You know, I'm getting Pentecostal saved and Baptist saved and Mormon say it was fake. This guy was strange, but what is this guy doing? What is the purpose of this guy? But he pretended to get saved to get baptized by pastor minutes. There's also two other people that got baptized. I mean, probably over half of people that got baptized. Two other people got baptized and you know what these people were led to the Lord by someone who was visiting. And you know, they got baptized, but they had gotten saved supposedly at the earlier missions trip that we had done before he moved here. Then the next missions trip, they came back, got baptized by pastor minutes. It was very obvious. They wanted to link up to Americans because they wanted to move to the U S and they were just faking it because they were hoping to be able to move to the U S and get someone to sponsor them. And you know, a long time later, this one guy, one of these two people, and you know, my wife and I already knew this, but you know that it's obvious they're just trying to use Americans to move to the U S but this one guy messages me and he's not from, you know, Manila. He's not from Arimita, but he said, Hey, you know what? I got stuck here in Manila. I ran out of money. I need to get back to my province. Can you just send me some money, please? I'm desperate. And I unfollowed this guy a long time ago because he put up all these weird things, but I went to his Facebook to look at it. He had all this pornographic stuff on his Facebook. And then he would, you know, he had messaged me a couple of times, like, I'm trying to get people saved in my life. Yeah. While you're posting a bunch of pornography on your Facebook, it's like, you're a phony. It's like, yeah, you probably did get stuck in Manila getting, you know, on some part of your day, but it's like, it's clear that you're just faking it, right? Look, people will fake getting saved just to link up to a ministry for various different reasons. And it should be no surprise to us today because I've experienced, we experienced it at a missions trip and that's what's happening with the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Why did they do it? I don't know if they're trying to destroy the church or they're trying to do it for Miami. Who knows? But John the Baptist is like, whoa, wait a minute. You're a false prophet. You're a Mormon elder, right? You're a pastor at one of these false churches and you showed up to get baptized by me. It's like, what's going on here? Right. And the last example that I'll give you is with Paul and Morris Hill. They'll give the story of Paul preaching to Morris Hill and they'll say, well, see, this is what we should do today. Well, notice what it says in act 17 verse 17, therefore disputed he in the synagogue with the Jews and with the devout persons and in the market daily with them that met with him. So in verse 17, he's disputing or arguing, you know, he's going back and forth with those that met with him. It's kind of like preaching the gospel in a public area. And he talked to anyone willing to listen to you. So he's disputing with those that actually met with him. Those that are willing to listen to him. He's not getting up and preaching a sermon on safety verse 18. Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans and other Stoics encountered him. And some said, what will this babbler say? Other some he seemed it to be a setter forth of strange gods because he preached under the Jesus in the resurrection. And they took him and brought him on the arrow. Peg is saying, may we know what this new doctrine, where of those biggest is that bring a certain strange things to our ears. We would know therefore what these things mean for all the Athenians and strangers, which were there, spend their time and nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing. So Paul, Paul, the apostles preaching the gospel, people find out about it. And this group of people say, Hey, we also want to listen to what you're saying. When we would go so many in resolve park, there's this one section, which is sort of like the religious section where the people will preach and then people will just listen to them. And it got all these chairs set up and like 50 people sit down and listen to people and they'll have many debates and stuff like that between various religions. Now, if I was preaching in resolve park and there's 50 people there, and then they basically all said, we just want to listen to what you have to say for 20 minutes. You know, I would stand up and preach the gospel for 20 minutes. That's basically what Paul the apostles was doing. People had said, they're willing to listen or hear anything new. And people say, Hey, can you just listen to us? And Paul says, I'm going to take that opportunity. So he's preaching the gospel one-on-one and an opportunity arises where people are willing to listen. And look, if those opportunities arise, preach the gospel at the funeral, preach the gospel at the wedding, preach the gospel to a group of 20 people that are willing to listen. Absolutely. Okay. It doesn't mean that it's our template where that's all we're going to do. This is an opportunity that arose football verse number for verse number 22, verse 22. Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars Hill and said, he men of Athens, I perceived that in all things, you're too superstitious for that pass by and be held your devotions. I found an altar with this inscription to the unknown God whom therefore he ignorantly worship him declare I have you. So Paul is preaching the gospel. He's not standing up saying, repent of your sins. He's not saying, quit drinking. He's saying you're ignorantly worshiping God. You got the wrong belief. He's trying to get them to change their mind. Go to verse 32, verse 32. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked and others said, we will hear the again of this matter. So Paul departed from among them. How be it, certain men, clay bond them and believe among the which was Dionysus, the Arab pay guy and a woman named Damaris and others with them. So some people listen to what Paul say says, and they get saved. Most do not get saved. It's a good opportunity, but once again, it's not the same as talking to somebody one on one. So look, if opportunities arise in our lives, for example, if they said, Hey, you know, brother Stuckey, we want you to speak at this radio station, the gospel tomorrow. Great. I'll preach the gospel at the radio station. Brother Stuckey, we want to put this on TV for 20 minutes. You're going to be on an APS CBN. We just want to hear you preach the gospel for 20 minutes. Great. I'll preach the gospel. Absolutely. I'm not saying it's wrong to take good opportunities. Sure. I mean, if, if, if there's some, some group that says, Hey, can you come in and just speak to these 50 people? We'll listen to what you have to say. Sure. But if you're going to argue with me and yell at me while I'm trying to talk, I'm just going to move on to something else. Right? See what street preaching is not speaking to a captive audience that wants to listen. You're speaking to people that don't want to listen. And that argue with you. That's not the same thing as 20 people saying, we are going to listen to everything you have to say. Right? So when it comes to street preaching, there's a lot of passages that are pull out and they pretty much all fit in this category. It's what Jeremiah was a street preacher. Isaiah was a street preacher. It's the same argument over and over again. And look, when it comes to preaching, there are really two types of preaching from any man of God. Number one is so many. Getting people saved one-on-one with small groups, and that is for all of us. And number two is preaching sermons. And look, every person that they point to in the Bible, yes, he did both of those things. Now, here's the thing. Sometimes they'll show somebody in the Bible and it doesn't show them preaching the gospel one-on-one, but they obviously did preach the gospel one-on-one because so many has always been around. We see it in the Old Testament and God is not going to use someone unless they are a soul winner. So just because we don't see Noah talking to someone one-on-one, obviously he did though. They also preach sermons and you have the people that didn't want to listen to his sermons, although I'm sure he got a lot of people saved one-on-one. Bottom line is with our church, we are always going to be a soul winning church. We are never going to have a street preaching ministry. We're never going to stand on some corner with a megaphone. We're never going to scream at anybody on the streets. We're just going to talk to people that want to listen. Someone will get saved and someone will. Let's close the word of prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today and just getting to see this topic and understand more thoroughly what we mean by soul winning and what the Bible teaches God. Help us to always be a soul winning church, zealously preach the gospel. And we do ask you to give us opportunities to preach to large groups of people if those opportunities are available. But help us to always be a soul winning church God. We pray this in Jesus' name.