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

Alright, now the part of the scripture I want to focus in there this morning in Genesis chapter 1 is in verses 20 through 28 where the Bible reads, And God saw that the waters bring forth abundantly and the moving creatures that hath life and follow that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created whales and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let the fowl multiply in the earth, and in the evening and in the morning were the fifth day. And if you would just go ahead and jump down to verse 28 where God creates man. In verse 27 and verse 28 God blessed them, and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply. And that's what I want to talk about this morning. You see twice in that short passage where God says to the creatures and also to man, He tells them, He gives them a very clear command in the scripture, He says be fruitful and multiply. And that's the title of the sermon this morning, Be fruitful and multiply. Now what does it mean to be fruitful and to multiply? What does that even mean? Well, it's kind of two words that are used synonymously. They're used interchangeably. They're both being the same thing. To be fruitful is to multiply. And if we're going to multiply, that is the definition of being fruitful. You see to multiply simply means to increase or cause to increase greatly in number and quantity. So that's what it means to multiply. It means to increase greatly in quantity. So God is telling the creatures here of the sea and the foul of the air, and He's telling mankind in the passages here that when He tells them to be fruitful and multiply, what are you saying? He wants them to be fruitful. He wants them to increase. He wants them to multiply greatly in number. He wants them to reproduce of their own kind to a great degree, not to just create one or two likenesses of them, but to create a multiplicity of offspring. That is actually a commandment scripture we see there where God is telling man that we are to be fruitful and multiply. He says we are to be fruitful and multiply because it is a commandment of God. Now how are we to do that? Of course we know we're supposed to do that physically, but we're also supposed to do that spiritually. We're going to be fruitful and multiply both physically and spiritually if you would turn to Galatians chapter 4. You see there's two aspects to being fruitful and multiplying this morning. One is to multiply physically as we see in this passage, but there's also the concept of multiplying or being fruitful spiritually. We'll look at both very quickly here this morning, but we'll focus in mainly on just the aspect of multiplying spiritually. Both can warrant a whole sermon, but we'll talk about both here in the beginning and focus in on just the one there about multiplying spiritually. So first of all, we see that it is God's will that we multiply physically. While you're turning to Galatians 4, I'll read from 1 Timothy 5, the Bible says, I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully. So we see that it's another commandment towards women in the New Testament even that God tells them that it is His will that they bear children and guide the house. So we see that having children or bearing children, as the Bible says, is a commandment scripture. And that's what it means to multiply. That's what it means to be fruitful in the earth. Psalms 127, the Bible reads, lo, children are in heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is His reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are the children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath a squiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate. This verse is interesting because yes, being fruitful and bearing children is a clear commandment of the scripture, but this Psalm here is also telling us that having children, having a multiplicity of children to be fruitful and to multiply is something that should make us happy. It's as happy as the man that hath his quiver full of them. The Bible says that children are in heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is His reward. It's a blessing of multiple children. And that flies in the face of the world today. We'll look at that a little bit, but the world would look at us and say, you know, we shouldn't have but just one or two children, you know, but the Bible is very clear that we are to, one, because it is a command, we are to be fruitful and multiply. But not only that, we should look at that as some kind of drudgery or some kind of, you know, task that we have to just carry out. And no doubt there is a lot of work that goes into such a thing, but it also should be a source of great joy that brings meaning into our life. So that's what I mean, there's some clear commandments here and there in Galatians 4. Let me see if I'm going there just right now. I'm sorry, we'll move on to, let me read to you spiritually also. The Bible says, you know, we are not only to physically multiply, we are also to spiritually multiply. We are spiritually to be fruitful and to multiply. What does that mean? What does that look like to do that spiritually? Well, that means that we would win others to Christ. The Bible says in Proverbs 11, the fruit of the righteous is a tree of life and he that win its souls is wise. So we see that this verse, one that, you know, we're members here at Faithful Word Baptist Church, you know, this is something that we've heard many times from across the pulpit, you know, that if we're going to be fruitful, if we're the righteous, which we are, righteous in Christ Jesus, if we are the righteous and we are to bear fruit, you know, as a tree of life and he that win his souls is wise. We see that the fruit of the righteous is a tree. It's another fruit bearing Christian. That is what it means to be fruitful. We are to reproduce spiritually and then it says that he that win his souls is wise. So that is how we bear fruit spiritually is that we go out and we win souls and those people in turn, you know, they become a tree, as it were, that's what the Bible is liking it under here. The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, right? So it's like it's liking it into another tree where the seed, the fruit falls to the ground and it's planted in the earth and another tree springs up and it comes up out of the ground. So it's a multiplication, it's a reproduction of itself. And if we are to be fruitful spiritually, we have to go out and produce other Christians as well. So you're there in Galatians 4, look down in your Bible, verse 13, where I'm showing you how to reproduce spiritually in a biblical sense is to go out and to win others to Christ. The Bible says in Galatians 4, verse 13, you know how through infirmity of the flesh I preach the gospel unto you at the first, jump down to verse 19, my little children of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you. So we've seen here that Paul, you know, he's talking with these Galatians here, and he's saying that he preached the gospel unto him at the first. And then he goes on and says, verse 19, of whom I travail in birth, in Christ again, and of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you. So he's saying he feels like he's going through this whole process again, of having, you know, preaching the gospel unto them, you know, he's saying he's doing it again, because he stands in doubt of them. He says, I desire to be present in you, to change my voice, for I stand in doubt in you in verse 20. Because of some of the things that were taking place, Paul was, you know, gave, Paul paused to say, you know what, I wonder if you're even saved. I wonder if you've even received the gospel in truth and sincerity when I preached unto you. Therefore, I feel like he's feeling that he has to travail in birth again until Christ be formed in them. So we see again that preaching the gospel is like, you know, travailing in birth until someone is born again. John 3.3, that's a phrase that Jesus even used. He said, Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, accept a man and be born again. So there's a spiritual birth that takes place, you know, if we're going to go into heaven. Jesus is saying, a man has to be born again. Accept a man and be born again. He cannot see the kingdom of God. Then he goes on and says, down there in verse 6, he says, that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. Marvel not that I say unto thee that he must be born again. So it's foolish to think that this isn't, you know, that there isn't this concept in scripture where, you know, preaching the gospel to somebody and leaning them to Christ is like unto a spiritual birth. I mean, at every birth there's somebody who has to bear. There's somebody who has to, you know, every child has a mother. And so every person who believes the gospel has to have somebody who preaches it to them, as Paul, Paul said, you know, well, anyway, moving on, I'm losing it, but the Bible says that also if you turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 6, 2 Corinthians chapter 6, verse 11, the Bible says, O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open to you, our heart is enlarged, you're not straightened in us, but you're straightened in your own bowels. For I recompense in the same, I speak as unto my children. So Paul again here is speaking to the Corinthians people as if they were his children. Now of course it would be foolish for him to say, to liken that unto a physical sense. They say, I speak unto my children as if, you know, I produced you physically. Now he's saying, what he's saying here is I speak as unto my children as those that he had birthed spiritually, you know, because that's what Paul did. Paul went about preaching the gospel throughout all the regions of the world, you know, and brought many people to Christ and they were his spiritual children. But we see here, so we see here two examples of what it means to be fruitful. It means fruitful, you know, what it means to multiply and be fruitful as the command is. Who would want us to do it physically and want us to do it also spiritually. We are to be fruitful physically and spiritually. So what's the point of this, you know, what, why does that matter? Why is this even being preached? Why do we need to understand this concept? And that's because in both of these areas, in our country, and even in the world, in most places, people are failing to meet, to live up to this commandment. People are failing to reproduce and be fruitful physically and spiritually. There's a, there's just a lack of fruitfulness among people today in the world. Americans in particular, you know, we'll focus in on that one group, but this, you know, we could, we could talk about probably any, you know, modern, westernized civilization across the, on the earth, this would apply to, you know. We see people that are failing to multiply to be fruitful physically. And I'll read for you very quickly from an article that I found online from the Pew Research Center that was published in 2015. And I will read the whole article, I'll just read a quick snippet here. I know it's early and there's going to be facts and figures involved, but if, you know, I'll try to read it in such a manner that it's easy for you to follow along and grasp what it's showing us here with these figures. So just perk up for a second and we'll, we'll get through this. But the Bible says in the late 1970s, excuse me, I said the Bible, it's the article, I always do that. In the late 1970s, the average mother at the end of her childbearing years had given birth to more than three children. So back in the 70s when a woman reached the end of her childbearing years, when she was no longer able to bear children, she had already by that point given birth to more than three children. That's the average that she had given birth to more than three children. Now the article goes on and says, since that time, average family size has declined, driven largely by declines in families with four or more children. So we see that people who have four or more children are, are, that has gone down drastically. Now the script, this article is saying moms have 2.4 children on average. So that's almost a reduction by half, you know, in that time. A number that has been fairly stable for two decades. So this, this drastic reduction in childbearing has something that's been going on for, you know, 20 years the article says. In 1976, four in ten mothers, that's 40% of mothers, four in ten mothers, ages 40 to 44, I know that's a lot of fours, right, but it's 40, four in ten mothers, ages 40 to 44 had four or more children. Again, lots of fours coming at you. We have four in ten mothers, 40% of mothers who are 40 to 40 years old had four or more children. That was in 1976. So by the time the woman reached, was in her early 40s, she had more than four children and that, that represented almost half of women in America at that time. Goes on in 1976, excuse me, one fourth or a quarter of women, that same age bracket, 40 to 44, had three children and a similar share had 24, a similar share or 24% had two children. So we see that the vast majority of women back in the 1970s had more than two children and of that majority, even the majority of that, most of them had more than four children. Now, and then it goes on, it says only 11% of mothers at the end of their childbearing had only one child. So only 11% when they got into their 40s had only had one child. Now the article goes on, it says flash forward to 2014 and the situation has changed dramatically. The once dominant four child family has been replaced by the two child family. A plurality, 41% of moms at the end of their childbearing years now report having two kids. So instead of having four or more children, now they're reporting they only have two. That was the, that would, and that was the, that would have been the, the minority of women that would have reported that number. Meanwhile the share of mothers at the end of their childbearing years who have had one child has doubled from 11 to 22%. As has been the case for many decades, about one fourth of mothers have three children. So that number has remained pretty consistent, that there's at least 24% that have always had three. But we see this drastic change, how women, the majority went from having four children to having just two. So we see that Americans, we're falling behind, you know, and other parts of the world that have adopted this Western culture, this idea of having a small family, has caused us to not be fruitful physically, and that's a big deal. That's something that matters because God has commanded us to be fruitful and to multiply physically. Now the sad thing is, you know, what causes this? Why is it that people have fallen, and I'm sure there's a lot of variables that go into it. There's a lot of cultural things that we could say, you know, the advent of birth control being legalized and promoted, even to girls as young as 14, you know, are being told here, take this pill, it'll prevent you from becoming pregnant. And this idea, you know, feminism is to thank for that as well. Where having children is just being taught to be just this form of slavery, that it's robbing you of your independence, you know, your meaning as a woman, that your value is found in the workplace, you know, pushing a mop or cleaning a hotel room or doing something. That's what matters. That's what you ought to do. You ought to aspire to these great things. You know, you shouldn't be a mother, that they lighten that role, they make it less important. They say it's more important that you go out and be a lawyer or a doctor or a senator or, yeah, even the president, you know, you should have these high hopes. You should be the biologist, the university professor. These are things that are going to add to value as a woman, you know, to go out and behave as a man would. Go out of the workplace and act like a man, and somehow that's going to make you more of a woman. Well, there's nothing more womanly, there's nothing more feminine than bearing children. You know, that's a unique thing that only a woman can do, and it's a powerful thing. And it's something that is necessary for women to do if we're going to fulfill the commandment of God and be fruitful and multiply. So why is that happening? All those reasons, but I believe primarily one of the main reasons why we see this decline in childbearing is because Christians are not only, they're failing spiritually to reproduce. You see, because the Bible commands that we be fruitful and multiply, and the Bible speaks of the blessings of having children, so when we're not out there preaching and reproducing spiritually, those people are not given an opportunity to learn the commandments of God. They're not given an opportunity to understand the blessing of having children as taught in the scriptures. They're not hearing the preaching of the word of God, and they're hearing the message of the world only, and therefore, they're not producing. So we see how one hand kind of washes the other. You know, if we go out and we reproduce spiritually, and we preach the gospel and teach them to observe all things as Christ has commanded us, one of those things that we're going to teach them is that they ought to bear children, that they ought to keep the home, that we ought to have as many children as the Lord give us, and that yes, that birth control is a sin, that it's a sin before God for you to put something in your body that's going to turn your womb into this nuclear, you know, just wasteland, this killing machine of your unborn children. And that's what it is. Maybe that's some harsh language, but that's the reality of it. And a lot of women today, they don't even understand how this stuff works, and they just take it ignorantly, thinking, well, it's just going to keep me from being pregnant. You know, the way it works is it is killing. We believe that life begins at conception. It's destroying that child in the womb before it even has a chance to grow. Now, the reason all that's taking place is because Christians are failing spiritually to reproduce. And here's the reason why they're failing. It's because most churches in America today, they do not go soul winning. They mock soul winning. They scoff at soul winning. And they have all these excuses as to why they don't go soul winning. You know, often, you know, I desire the office of a bishop, so often, you know, I like to think about where I might go potentially to start a church one day. That's my desire one day, to go out somewhere in the United States to a major metro area and reach out to a city and plan a Bible believing, independent, fundamental, soul winning church and see a work done for God. And often, when I've looked at several different areas, what I'll do is I'll go on Google maps and I'll look up all the independent, fundamental Baptist churches. That's my search terms, independent, fundamental, Baptist church. And normally, you'll find a King James church. And I'll start to look at these churches' websites and it's so disturbing how many, how lame they are because you go on their websites and you can't even find soul winning. You can't even find it on their website. And if it is there, you know, it's called visitation or it's buried somewhere deep in their website. You got to do, you know, several clicks, several links to get several pages on the website to find something listed somewhere where they go out on a Saturday for 10 minutes, you know, or excuse me, they go out for like, you know, their 59 minutes and 59 seconds. They call that soul winning. When all they're really doing is just putting a flyer in the door, they're just knocking on the door, running away. They're just inviting people to church that are not opening their mouth to make known the mystery of the gospel. That's not what they're doing. And it's a shame to me. And that's why Christians today are not reproducing spiritually. And I'm here to tell you, that's part of the reason why we're not reproducing physically. Because people are not being reached with the gospel and they're not being taught the commandments of God. They're not being taught the commandment that God expects them to reproduce and multiply physically as well. You know, and it's a sad thing because soul winning is such an important thing. That's what I love about Faithful Word North and Faithful Word Baptist Church and other churches in this movement. Is that, you know, our soul winning times are on the first page, you know, the second page in. You got your cover. Listen, there are every week soul winning times with names and times and days of the week and locations. This is the north location, so we only have the two, but if we were to hold up a flyer from Faithful Word, the main campus down there in 10B, we would see that there's 11 different times listed of soul winning throughout the week. It's a soul winning powerhouse down there. And that's why, and you know, we have a lot of large families in our church too. Because people are being taught the commandments of God. We're reaching out spiritually and reproducing and then people are learning, you know, that they need to reproduce physically as well. And the sad thing is, the reason why we see such a decline in physical reproduction and physical fruitfulness today and multiplying and having children is because Christians today are not going out and preaching the gospel. Most churches, they don't even list soul winning on their websites. That's if you can find it. It's sad and pathetic how underemphasized it is. If it's even there at all. And I'm not saying amongst the Methodists, I'm not saying amongst the Presbyterians, or the non-denominational, evangelical, just, you know, Chuck E. Cheese churches out there. These big churches. I'm saying amongst independent, fundamental churches. Churches that, you know, were part of a movement that one day, that one time was characterized by soul winning. By going door to door and knocking doors and talking to people face to face and sharing the gospel. And most churches don't even do it. And that's why we see that decline. I got another article here I'll read from you, also published by the Pew Research Society, and it was also published in 2015, regarding the state of, you know, religiosity in America. The Bible, or excuse me, the study here says, to be sure the United States remains home to more Christians than any other country in the world, and a large majority of Americans, roughly seven in ten, continue to identify with some branch of Christianity. So the vast majority of people in the United States still do identify as Christians in some way. The article goes on, it says, but the major new survey of more than 35,000 Americans by the Pew Research Center finds that the percentage of adults ages 18 and older who describe themselves as Christians has dropped by nearly 8 percentage points in just seven years. So that's about 1% a year. We're seeing people who are not identifying as Christians. Over the same period, the percentage of Americans who are religiously unaffiliated, describing themselves as atheists, agnostic, or nothing in particular, has jumped more than 6 points from 16.1% to 22.8%. So that 7 points that we're losing in Christianity, it's going somewhere. And it's going, you know, to the agnostics, it's going to the atheists, it's to those who would say, I don't believe anything in particular. And the share of Americans who identify with non-Christian faiths has also inched up, rising 1.2%. So that makes up that 8% that has been lost. This is just over seven years. I'm sure if we were to go back and this study were to go out farther back into our history, and I'm sure as time goes on and other studies are done, we're going to see that this trend continues, that there's going to be a major decrease in the Christian faith. And you know, what they categorize as the Christian faith, I mean they're loving everybody together again with that, but it just goes to show you where the average American's mind is, what their minds are on, what they're thinking, what they're believing, and how it's affecting this country. It says that those who are with non-Christian faiths have inched up rising 1.2% from 4.7% in 2007 to 5.9% in 2014. And here's the thing about that, you say, well that's not a big deal, why is that such a big deal? Well, it's because it says this, that growth has been especially great among Muslims and Hindus, albeit from a very low base. So it's those, the Muslims, the Hindus, those who have a very small base group, they're the ones that are increasing, they're the ones that are growing, you know, from 4.7 to 5.9%, so almost a whole percentage point in those few years. But they're able to jump, and they're able to see the growth from a very small base, but the Christians, those who identify as Christians, those who lay claim to the name of Christ or identify as a believer, they're losing, though they have the vast majority, though they make up the majority of the population of this country, they're the ones that are on the decrease, and it's the ones who are the smallest minority that are on the increase. And that should be alarming, that should be something that wakes us up to it, and that is an explanation as to why we are not being fruitful, that we are failing to multiply spiritually, and as a result, we are failing to multiply physically. You see, if Christians would multiply, they would produce obedient converts, so I know not every person is going to get saved, in fact, probably the vast majority of people who are going to pray and receive Christ as their savior, they're probably not going to jump into church and start living a godly Christian separated life. They're not going to do that. But there would be those, and it's a numbers game, the more you go and the more people you see saved, you're going to start to reach those people that are going to come out from amongst the heathen and are going to walk by the commandments and precepts of God. They would win souls who would in turn win souls, and that would continue, that would have that snowball effect, they would multiply. And those one souls would be obedient to the scriptures and they would have many children. And we would see this trend reverse if the churches, if independent fundamental Baptists in this country would get serious about their soul winning, if they get serious about multiplying spiritually, we could turn the tide. But here's the thing, you could tell them all this, you could show it to them, and they have all these excuses ready as to why everything is defined and the way it is. Well, it's just the day and age we live in, it's the sign of the times, brother. It's the loudest thing you'll ever see in church age, everybody's Luke Ward. And they have just this list as long as there are of why they don't need to go soul winning, of why they don't need to go out and preach the gospel. They have the excuses not only for the spiritual lack of reproduction but also the spiritual, the physical lack of aspect, excuse me, the physical, they have excuses for not reproducing physically is what I'm trying to say. They have excuses for both. They'll say things like, you'll say, well, you know, only underdeveloped countries, they have large families. And it's amazing, you know, I have three children and people would even not, even that, they would already say, okay, that's enough, you know, you guys are getting crazier at hand, you know, buy a television, I'd say, do something else. You know, you've already got three kids, you know, there's only so much air, there's only so many resources, what are you doing? You're crazy. But three, I mean, I had three girls, I was a family of three. My wife was, you know, number seven out of 11 kids, she came from a large family. But I'm here to tell you that, you know, that's what God's will is that we have these large families. You know, God will. It's not God's will for everybody. Some people, you know, they have physical ailments, they're unable, although they desire a large family, they can't have it. But I would say on the whole, you know, by and by, God wants everybody to have a large family that is able to. But people today that, you know, and I heard another preacher in his sermon recently talking about kind of the same subject, where he read an article where it's like having three children is this trendy new thing. Like you're breaking the two child barrier. Like you're not just replacing you and your, you know, your spouse. Now you're even going so far as to adding another human being to the face of the earth. You know, there's actually going to be more people here as a result of you having existed. You know, not just you just dying off and, you know, you just have only replaced yourself. You've just reached critical mass. No, it's going beyond that where you've actually, you know, helped increase the population by having, you know, an extra child. Just one extra one. Having a third child. You know, in this article, it was so ridiculous, it was talking about how, you know, Madonna's doing it and how all these Hollywood stars are doing it. You know, Madonna adopted. She didn't, you know, she wouldn't dare actually go through the process of having a child. But you know, the point is they're like making this thing like, man, you know, people are, and how to cope with it, how to cope with the criticism of having three children, all this. You know, we've got people in our families, in our church, that have like a half dozen kids. Five, six, seven, yay, even 11, you know, I don't know if anybody got to 11 yet. I'm sure they will though. They've got pastors under 10, and people are, you know, are right behind them. And other churches, you know, in our movement where people have large families. That used to be the norm. That was not something that's frowned upon. You know, to be perfectly honest, you know, even when we first got here, I remember we went and visited, one of the first families we visited, they had a larger family. They had like six, five or six kids at that time. And I'd never been around a family that large. And when you first see it for the first time, it's a bit of a shock. I remember walking out thinking, I can't do that to my wife. I mean, she, the lady, you know, we just came, we blew into town on like a Thursday night. We wanted a fellowship with somebody. You know, we're fresh off of a road trip. These people have been working, you know, going through their daily routine. And you know, being a mother is no easy task, especially when you got five or six kids. And I remember showing up, you know, the Thursday evening for a barbeque and just looking at this mother and seeing him, she was exhausted, she was tired. You know, we were coming over on a Thursday night, but you know, thank the Lord they were so hospitable and kind to even have us over at that time. But I remember just walking and I was like, I don't know if I can do this. I remember the first time, you know, I went and visited Pastor Anderson in his home. And that was the first time I was around that many kids, you know. And they're, you know, when kids are at home, they're different than they are at church, which is the way it should be. You know, that's the way it might show them. My people are, you know, do your kids ever talk? You know, you should be seeing them at home, man, they don't shut up. Which is great. I love them. They're sweet. I love when my kids are running around and making noise and doing all that. But I remember being at Pastor Anderson's, you know, house and being around that large family and quite frankly a little noisy. Because you have that many kids, you know, there's going to be some noise involved. It just comes with the territory. And I remember leaving there and thinking, I don't know if I can do this. But you know, and that's just me coming out of a mentality of thinking, well, you know, we should only have a few kids. That's me coming from a church where the pastor said you shouldn't have any more kids than you can afford. Whatever that means. You know, which is a sad thing to tell somebody. You know, if you, God will provide. You know, and people want to act like having kids is so, you know, just so expensive. Like it's just, and it is expensive, there are expenses, don't get me wrong. But you know, but everybody wants, they want to have their two token children. They want to give them all the violin, piano and soccer and ballet and do all these amazing things with them. Invest all this money and send them to college and all the money it takes. You know, but is that really what matters? Is that a really important thing? You know, what if we had a lot of kids that just love God, that just love the Bible, that just love soul winning, that just love, you know, having, living a godly and content life. They didn't have to have all these frills and be entertained every moment of the day with all the, all the, these just luxuries that, that, that children have today. And the point I'm just trying to make is that, you know, people, at least as an excuse, they'll say, well, you know, only these poor, uneducated, underdeveloped countries have large families. And that's, that's true, you know, the average fam, the, the, the average, you know, worldwide, the average size of a family is, is shrinking. It's below three. And it's, it is, it's, it's like the African countries where, you know, Zimbabwe I believe is the highest, whereas like the average family is 5.8. That's the average though. That used to not be the case. It used to be that there was always a lot of families who had a lot, large children. And I know I have a, a, a great, great, great, great, great grandparents, I don't know how far back, in Michigan, that had one man, one woman had 21 children. 21. 19 of them survived. Two of them died young, but they had, they had 21. One woman gave birth to 21 children. And back then that was not something that was frowned upon. That was just like, you know, that, that was necessary for survival, to have that many hands on deck to go out and, you know, work the field and to, to, you know, live and, and, and provide for your, your sustenance. But they have all these excuses, right, for, for not having children. They'll say, you know, but the thing is having children requires sacrifice. It means you're going to have to give something up. You know, you're going to have to give up the vacation, you're going to have to give up the new car, you're going to have to give up, you know, living in a three-story, you know, house with a two-car garage, you're going to have to give up some of those things potentially unless you're blessed, you know, to have all that, have the, have the wealth and the, and the abundance to where you can do both. But, you know, if it's one or the other, if it comes down to either having a large bank account or a large family, I'm going to take the family because it's my children that are going to be in heritage of the Lord. They're the reward, God's reward to me. And they're the ones that I look to one day, they're my retirement plan. You know, I'm not saving for retirement, you know. You say those words and it's like blasphemy day that you're not, you know, why aren't you investing in your retirement? I am investing in my retirement. They're called my children, you know, I've got a 401c, 401 children, you know. I don't have this 401k business. So that's a lot of some excuses, but really what I want to focus into in this last little bit and I kind of went off on a rabbit trail there, but, you know, they have, they have excuses why they don't have children spiritually, physically. They have it spiritually to say, well, you know, we can't reproduce spiritually because soul winning just doesn't work anymore. Well, I'm sorry, you're wrong because I've seen it firsthand. Yes, it does work. If soul winning isn't working, it's because you're not working. You know, we've heard pastor Anderson say that and that's the truth. And that's something that we need to remember as we go out or we run into those that would criticize soul winning and would say, well, it doesn't work. Why, you know, there's other methods. No, it's the method. It's the biblical method. It's the one that God himself prescribed in the scriptures for us to be fruitful and to multiply spiritually is to go out and preach the gospel. So it does work. The problem, if it's not working, it's because you don't work. As it's been said, you know, either the gospel isn't being preached or the gospel has lost its power. And I, you know what, we know that the gospel has not lost its power and will not lose its power. If it's not working, it's because it's not being preached. And isn't that the case? Well, it doesn't work. Yeah, it doesn't work when you're not doing it. Of course you're not going to see the results of reproducing spiritually by means of soul winning when you're not soul winning. And they replace it. There's another spiritual excuse. They replace it with other ministries. You go on these websites, these independent fundamental Baptist churches, and they have this list of all these different ministries. First you have to choose what age bracket of ministry you want to be in. Do you want to do the adult ministries? Do you want to do the teen ministries? Do you want to do the children's ministries? Do you want to do the jail ministries? You've got all these different ministries, but you can't find soul winning. Turn to Galatians chapter 5 if you would. Now here's another one. This is one of these spiritual excuses I want to focus in on because this one drives me nuts and this is one that I was taught in a church. This is one that I've heard pastors say and I've heard other Christians that I know say. They have this excuse for not being fruitful because they say that, you know, being fruitful means just having the fruit of the spirit. That's their fruitfulness. That's them obeying the commandment of God to be fruitful spiritually. And to get that from Galatians 5 16, look there, it says, this I say then, walk in the spirit and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusted against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary one to the other so that you cannot do the things that you would. But if you be led of the spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, adultery, fornication and cleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envies, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such life. Of the which I tell you before, as I have told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Verse 22, but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance against such there is no law. So they'll say, well, see there, I have love in my life. I have joy in my life. I have peace and long suffering. They say, that's how I know I'm fruitful. That's me bearing fruit in my life. No, friend. That's the fruit of the spirit. And you tell them that, look, it's the fruit of the spirit. That's not your fruit. That's the spirit's fruit. And they will still stick to their guns on this. And they'll come up with some, just, they want to, this is their crutch. Because if you take this crutch away from them, they fall over. They don't have anything else. Then they'd have to admit, you know what, I don't have any fruit. I am a fruitless Christian. I am not reproducing spiritually. I am not fulfilling the commandment of God to be fruitful. They say if we walk, you know, if we have the fruit of the spirit. But let's look at here. Verse 16. It says if we walk in the spirit, it goes on, it says if we are led of the spirit, then we will see the fruit of the spirit. So it's our obedience to the spirit that, through which the spirit is able to produce its fruit in our life. The fruits of the spirit do not make you fruitful. They make the spirit fruitful. It's the spirit that is making you fruitful. Let's say, well I have joy, and it's ironic, because these people that I know that say that they have the fruit of the spirit, they're some of the most unjoyful people I know. And you know why that is? Because the Bible says that there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repented. Some of the greatest joy moments in my life is when I'm, you know, either myself doing or yeah, even when I'm standing at the door listening to another Christian open up the word of God and lead a soul to Christ. That's a powerful thing. That's a birth that you're watching there. A spiritual birth. It's amazing. It's amazing. Excuse me. And it's some of the greatest joy you'll ever have. And you know, when I go soul-witting, I talk about this with people that I go soul-witting. It always amazes me how many times I'll, you know, come around times and go soul-witting and I'll get in the flesh and I'll start to think about how hot it is and how hard I've been working this week and how I'd like to just stay home and take a nap and relax with my family. But I know that, you know, that's just my flesh and I force myself to get out there and go soul-witting and that first person I get to talk to, that first person I get to see somebody else talk to and lean to the Lord and get saved, my heart fills with joy and I say to myself, there's nothing else I'd rather be doing and I want to stay out there all day at that point. And that's joy. And these people that say that they have the fruit of the Spirit, that they are fruitful Christians because they have these attributes of the Spirit in their life. They lack joy because they don't get to see people get saved. And they have this facade of peace and long-suffering, this just this, you know, just this fake spiritual quality that they hold up. You see, the fruits of the Spirit belong to the Spirit. It's the Spirit's fruit, it's not your fruit. And the reason they get, and it's a thing, it's grammar, they need to understand something or let's nail this down because I'm tired of this excuse. You need to understand the phrase, the fruit of the Spirit, of, that's the word there that they're tripping over, of. Now what does the word of mean? It means indicating an association between two entities. Okay, so you have the fruit and you have the Spirit and the word of is indicating a relationship between the two and it says an indication of an association between two entities, entities, typically one of belonging. So the association between the fruit and the Spirit is one of belonging and one belongs to the other. Belonging, for example, we would say the son of a friend. Now who is that guy? Well, he's the son of a friend, meaning that son, that guy, that entity belongs, he's of a friend, another entity, right? Another way of defining of would be the expressing of a relationship between an author or an artist or a composer and their works collectively. For example, the plays of Shakespeare, right? There are two entities, the plays and Shakespeare. The plays are of Shakespeare, he is the one who produced the plays. It would be foolish for us to get up, you know, for the actor on stage acting out one of Shakespeare's plays, you know, to be or not to be, that is the question, right? I thought about doing some Romeo and Juliet, but all I know is Juliet's lines and that would just be awkward. But the point I'm trying to make here is that it would be foolish for an actor to get up and act out one of Shakespeare's plays and then lay claim that that was his play. Oh, great job out there, thanks, yeah, that's my play. No, you were just acting in it, you were just a part of it, that play is of Shakespeare. So if the fruits of the spirit are of the spirit, can a Christian lay claim to those fruits as his own? If it's us walking in the spirit, if it's us being led of the spirit that produces the fruit of the spirit, can we then say that those fruits are ours? No, they're the result of our obedience to the spirit, yes, but is the spirit working through us and giving us those attributes of the spirit that are, those are fruits of the spirit, those are not our fruits. You see, it's foolish to think that a Christian can lay a claim to those fruits of their own as if they're going to be rewarded for love, as if they're going to be rewarded for joy or peace or long suffering. They're not going to be rewarded for those things, not in heaven. God's not going to get to heaven and say, I know thy love, I know thy peace, I know thy long suffering, I know thy temperance, I know thy, you know, and the Bible says that Jesus said, you know, I come and my reward is with me to give every man according to his works, not according to his love, not according to his joy, not according to his peace. You see, love, joy, peace, long suffering, these fruits of the spirit, those are not things that you will be rewarded for as fruits. Those things are rewards in and of themselves. When you are obeying the spirit, when you're walking in the spirit, when you're led of the spirit and the spirit bears fruit in your life, that is a reward in and of itself. Having joy, having love, having peace, having long suffering, those are things that we get to enjoy here on earth. Those are things that we can enjoy now. They are their own reward. I know I'm going a little long here, but I want to just wrap up by saying this. I wanted to deal with that excuse, but why is it so important that we understand that we are to be fruitful spiritually? It's because that our eternal reward in heaven is determined by our fruitfulness. All the temporal work that we do is what's going to determine our eternal reward. We have this one life to be fruitful, this one life to go out and accomplish things for God. And if we don't do it, we're going to suffer loss, the Bible says, when we get there. And that is why God has commanded us to be fruitful for our own good. Bible says in John 15, 16, ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you and ordained you that ye should go and forth and bring forth fruit. Jesus said that we should go and bring forth fruit. Let me ask you something. To bear the fruit of the Spirit, do you have to go anywhere? Do you have to go anywhere to have love, joy, peace? You can do that anywhere you want. You can do that in the shower. You can do that sleeping. You can do that driving around the road. You can do that by brushing your teeth. You can do that when you're eating breakfast. You don't have to go anywhere to do that. But if being fruitful is going out and multiplying, being fruitful is going out and producing other creations, you're going to have to go somewhere to do that. You're going to have to go ye into all the world, as Jesus said. See the fruit of the Spirit doesn't involve going anywhere. And this is in the book of John. So at this point, which comes after Mark, which comes after Matthew, we should understand what he means by go. His Bible says in Matthew 22, go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, get into the marriage. In Mark 16, and he said unto them, go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. In John 4 35, say not ye there yet for months, then cometh the harvest. Ye old I say unto you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for they are white already to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal, that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. See, he's saying you have to go into the field, and you have to reap if you want to receive wages. If you want to reap and you want to gather fruit unto life eternal, you're going to have to go into the field and work. And when you go there, you're not going to harvest love. You're not going to harvest joy. You're not going to harvest peace to longsuffering. You're going to go out there and you're going to plant the seed and you're going to break up the fallow ground and plant the seed of the word of truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and you're going to produce another tree of life. That is the fruit of the righteous. You see, fruitfulness requires work and effort. It's hard work to go out soloing. It's hard work to go out there faithfully, day in, week in, week out, and put forth the effort and understand the scriptures well enough to go out there and talk to people and put up with the door and rude people and doing all these things. That's difficult, and that's why people make up excuses that they don't want to go. You see, the fruit of the Spirit, well I'm fruitful because I have the fruit of the Spirit. You know what that's for? It's for lazy people. It's a cop-out for lazy people. Being fruitful requires the hard work of soloing. Galatians 1.9. Turn to Romans 1. I'll read for you Colossians 1. For this cause we also sense the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you in the desire that you might be filled with the knowledge of His will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding that you might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work. Where are you going to be fruitful? In your work and increasing knowledge of God. Romans 1.13. Romans 1.13. Now I would not have the ignorant brethren that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you but was let hitherto that I might have some fruit among you. He wanted to come to them. He wanted to go and bear fruit among them. He had to come to them that I might have some fruit among you. Also even as the Gentiles, I am deader both to the Greeks and to the barbarians both to the wise and the unwise. So much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you. How is he going to have fruit among them? Because he's ready to preach the gospel. That's how you're going to bear fruit in this life. That's how you're going to be fruitful and multiply to God is by going out and preaching the gospel. It's not by sitting back and pontificating about how spiritual you are and thinking that you're really something special because you're so meek and long suffering and you have so much love and joy and peace and trying to convince yourself of that. No, it's by going out and doing the hard work of sowing. So we need to go if we're going to be fruitful and here's the thing about being fruitful. Being fruitful requires the right ground. Our hearts have to be right. In Matthew 13 you know the parable of the sower where Jesus gives the examples of the seed that is sown on different types of ground and the last type he says is the good ground. In verse 23 in Matthew 13, but he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word and understandeth it which also beareth fruit. So if we're going to bear fruit we have to have good ground and it says it bringeth forth some hundred fold some sixty and some thirty. So our level of fruitfulness is determined on the ground that the sower is seen on. It's determined on the soil of our heart. What are your motives? What is it that we desire? What is it that's driving us? What is it that we want to see accomplished for Christ today? Is our heart in the work of Christ? That's what's going to be required if we're going to be fruitful. We have to get our hearts right and we must prepare the ground if we're going to be fruitful. And here's the thing you know one way of preparing the ground is if a farmer were to go out and plant seed he doesn't just go out into some field and start throwing seeds everywhere no you got to break up the ground you got to get all the stuff. I was fortunate enough to work on a dairy farm for a few winters and I got to see how hard it is to go out and to make cows fruitful how to make them reproduce and produce milk and part of it is you got to feed them you got to give them grain and all these things so you have to go out and you have to sow fields you have to go out and grow the hay and the corn and you have to so that you can harvest it and feed it the cows so if you're going to go out and sow a seed you just don't go walk out into the field no you got to first of all on this farm there would be these huge piles of rocks on all these fields and you know how they got there is this the farmer went out there and he broke up the ground and he physically pulled the rocks out of this thing out of the field and you have to get all the rocks of the big stones out of the way so that so that you can plant the seed so that's hard work and then you have to make you know you have to make the straight furrows you have to plow the ground so that you can have the lines where the ground is broken up you can put the seed in and bury it and you have to make sure you've got efficient you're gonna make the most use of your field you have to make sure that you're gonna have a straight furrow your lines have to be straight and the way to do that you know I learned this just by because when I lived in Michigan in our yard we had a front yard back then and it had grass in it not like here where it's all rocks but we actually had grass in our yards in Michigan and ours I had the biggest yard of the block in Michigan I was kind of proud of that wasn't huge but you know comparatively speaking it was something a nice house was set way back when it had a nice long front yard the big tree in it and I would have to mow that lawn and I remember you know someone telling me how to mow that lawn to make sure you know you wouldn't want it we would mow at this at an angle because you want to make it look nice you know because it leaves the little tracks in there and you make it look nice when you mow the lawn if you're gonna do something might as well make it look nice but a way to make a straight line when you mow the lawn or in a way it's the same way you make a straight furrow when you're plowing your field is that you don't look at the edge of the mower you don't look here you look way down you look at the end of the lawn you look at the end of where you're going and that's where you focus and if you do that you'll keep a straight line if you make a focal point and you and as you go and you just focus on that one point you'll make a straight line to that thing and then the next one you know you can do the same thing in the same thing and that's how you make a straight line by looking forward now isn't it interesting that Jesus in chapter 9 Luke chapter 9 said this he said and it came to pass that as they went the way a certain man said unto them the Lord I will follow thee where there so ever thou goest and Jesus said to him foxes have holes the birds of the air have their nests have the air have nests but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head they said to another follow me but he said Lord suffer me to go first to go and bury my father Jesus said unto him let the dead bury their dead go thou and preach the kingdom of God and another also said Lord I will follow thee so let me go and bid let me first go and bid them farewell which are at my home in my house and Jesus said unto him no man having put his hand in the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of heaven see Jesus understood that if you're gonna go out and you're gonna sow if you're gonna be efficient if you're gonna have a fruitful life if your field is gonna be fruitful and it's gonna bear fruit hundredfold 60-fold 30-fold you have to prepare that ground that you need to make straight furrows in your life meaning that when you put your hand of that plow in your life and you start to plow for God you got to look forward you got to keep your eyes forward and where you go you can't be looking back it's just like if we were to go out and plow that field or mow that lawn if I had started looking around my lions would have gone they would have wandered I would have been inefficient it would have looked at it would have been a waste of space as it were God wants us to be efficient God wants us to be as fruitful as we can and if we're gonna do that we have to prepare the hearts are the soil of our hearts and to do that we got to make we got to plow the straight line we got to go we got to make a straight furrow in our lives so that we can be the best fishing as we can and by in the what then what does that mean it means not being distracted like you told all these other guys all these other guys had these excuses for all the things they want to do and Jesus said you know what forget about it if you're gonna follow me come follow me quit looking behind you now let's get this thing done that's what he's saying we need to prepare our heart you see preparing your heart to be fruitful requires focus on the task at hand if you're going to be a fruitful Christian if you're going to be both if you're going to multiply and be fruitful you need to focus on that task and keep your focus on it you make furrows to the furrow straight you need to keep your eyes forward to the end of the field and very quickly no bearing fruit it requires the right seed we're going to bear fruit we have to make sure we're using the right seed and that seed is a King James Bible Bible says in 1st Peter chapter 1 verse 23 being born again not a corrupt corruptible seed but a incorruptible by the Word of God which liveth and abideth forever so if we're going to be fruitful and multiply spiritually we're going to go out and sow the seed we need to make sure we're using the Bible the King James Bible we go out and sow that seed we're not going to go out you know and with lifestyle evangelism we're not going to go out and try to like you know with some creation seminar and a fossil in our pocket you know and try to convince people and apologize for the Word of God and try to you know explain away supposed contradictions now we're going to go on faith understanding and believing that we have the entire Word of God that we have an incorruptible seed that if we plant it in the right heart we'll bring forth fruit you see being fruitful physically and spiritually it's a command it's a command God said be fruitful multiply it's a command and also it's a source of reward you know our children are the Bible says the fruit of the womb is the Lord's reward you know it's God's rewarding us in this life and it requires effort as we've seen here it requires us having put our hand in the plow and not looking back and that's why people make so many excuses but being fruitful it's a sure thing we will be fruitful we will bring forth fruit if we will go and we will sow the Bible says in Psalms 126 they that they that sow in tears shall reap in joy you know if you have your hearts right if you have that burden the lost as you should if your desire to see soul saved if you have you know you sow in tears you shall reap in joy you want the joy you want the peace you want the joy of the Spirit you should go out and you should sow some seed he that goeth forth and weepeth bearing precious seed bearing the Word of God taking it out shall doubtless come again with rejoicing bringing his sheaves with him and that's what I want for my life that's what I want for every Christian's life is that and that's what God wants for all of us is that we be fruitful and multiply because it's a source of joy it's it brings God I believe God the lights in it and that's why God has commanded us to do it so let's just keep that in mind as we as we live our lives and just remember that being fruitful and multiplying is something that we need to do physically and spiritually let's break