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You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You You Good evening and welcome to verity baptist church. Let's go ahead and find our seeds this evening Find a seat find a hand roll close to you turn to page number 227 Saw number 227 We will open the service with save by the blood saw number 227 sing it out Saw number 227 sing it out on the first Say by the blood of the crucified one Now ransom from sin and a new world begun Sing praise to the father and praise to the son Say by the blood of the crucified one Say say my sins all pardon my guilt is all gone Glory I'm saved glory I'm saved I'm saved by the blood of Saw number 227 say by the blood sing it out on the second Say by the blood of the crucified one The angels rejoicing because it is done A child of the father joined there with the son Say by the blood of the crucified one Sing it out glory I'm saved glory I'm saved my sins all pardon my guilt is all gone Glory I'm saved glory I'm saved I'm saved by the blood of the crucified one Saw number 227 gonna sing it out on the third but I just want to notice on the chorus there's two Two words you can sing over there for the ladies you guys can sing save and for the man I want you guys to sing glory I'm saved Glory I'm saved alright you're gonna I'm going to help you guys sing with that Alright saw number 227 say and glory I'm saved alright saw number 227 sing it out on the third Say by the blood of the The father he spake and his will it was done Great prize of my pardon his own precious son Say by the blood of the crew alright here we go Glory I'm saved glory I'm saved my sins all pardon my guilt is all gone Glory I'm saved glory I'm saved I'm saved by the blood of the crucified one That's good I'm gonna ask you guys to sing out with this last one saw number 227 we're gonna finish it strong On the last Say by the blood of the crucified one All hail to the father all hail to the son All hail to the spirit the great three in one Say by the blood of the crucified one One last time glory I'm saved glory I'm saved All pardon my guilt is all gone Glory I'm saved glory I'm saved I'm saved by the blood of the crucified one Amen great singing we want to welcome everyone here to Verity Baptist Church we are so glad that you are here with us tonight Let's open the service with a word of prayer Dear heavenly father we love you and we thank you for a great day you've given us and thank you for Again just for the opportunity to be in your house this evening and thank you for these dear people would come Lord and sing praises to your name Learn from your words Lord and we pray that you bless everyone we pray for the singing The preaching and the fellowship and we hope Lord that everything that we said and done this evening will only bring glory and honor to you in Jesus name I pray Amen All right it's now time for favorites where if you're selected we will sing a stanza from the song that you picked Go ahead Dalia 143 song number 143 blessed assurance great song We're going to keep the good singing going song number 143 sing it out on the first Blessed assurance Jesus is mine Oh what a foretaste of glory divine Heir of salvation, purchase of God Board of his Spirit, washed in his blood This is my story, this is my song Praising my Savior all that day long This is my story, this is my song Praising my Savior all that day long Miss Edith 112 112, song number 112 Be still my soul, song number 112 sing it out on the first Be still my soul, the Lord is on thy side Their patience we, the cross of evil pay Leave to thy God to order and provide In every change, the faithful will remain Be still my soul, I pass thy heavenly fan Through thorny waves, into a joyful end Miss Al go ahead 478 478 what is this? Song number 178 onward Christian soldiers I think he meant 412 Yep, 412 Onward Christian soldiers, song number 412 Sing this one out with some passion on the first Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war With the cross of Jesus going on before Christ the royal master leads against the fall Forward into battle, see his banner go Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war With the cross of Jesus going on before Miss Ava 452, song number 452 All I need, song number 452 Jesus Christ is made to me all I need, song number 452 on the first Jesus Christ is all me, all I need, all I need He alone is all my plea, he is all I need Wisdom, righteousness and power, holiness is very hard My redemption full and free, he is all I need For the glen, 140, what was it? 143, go back to song number 143 We're gonna sing it out on the second for this one Perfect submission, perfect delight, sing it out on the second Perfect submission, perfect delight, visions of rapture now burst on my sight Angels descending, ring from above, echoes of mercy, whispers of love This is my story, this is my song Praising my Savior all that day long This is my story, this is my song Praising my Savior all that day long Alright, let's sing one more song, brother Matt, go ahead 138, this will be the last song for favorites The haven of rest, y'all did a fantastic job Sing, selecting songs this evening but we have to sing it out with this last one Alright, song number 138, sing it out on the first My soul inside exile was hard on life's sea So burdened with sin and distract Till I heard a sweet voice saying, make me your choice And I entered the haven of rest I've anchored my soul in the haven of rest I'll sail the wide seas no more My tempest they sweep o'er the wild so busy In Jesus I'm safe evermore Amen, great singing Amen, and we want to welcome you to the Sunday evening service here at Radio Baptist Church We're so glad that you are with us Aren't these musicians doing a great job? They're all doing a good job, I've taught them everything they know I gave brother Andrew and brother James piano lessons, no I'm kidding Let's go ahead and take our bulletins and we'll look at some announcements tonight If you do not have a bulletin raise your hand, one of our ushers can get one for you And the verse this week, Psalm 65, 11 Thou crownest the year with thy goodness and thy paths drop fatness And that's a good verse there, we like that Let's take our bulletins and you'll see our service time Sunday morning service 1030 a.m. We had a wonderful service this morning, we're glad you're back out tonight for the evening service And we do invite you to be with us for our midweek service We do want you to make a note that the midweek service this week is moved from Wednesday to Tuesday So no Wednesday evening service, there will be a Tuesday evening service at 7 p.m. And of course that will be in conjunction with our New Year's Eve service, we'll talk about that in a minute If you look at our soul meeting times, our main soul meeting time is on Saturday mornings at 10 a.m. And then we have additional sewing times on Thursdays and on Sundays at 2 p.m. And we'd love of course for you to join us for any of those times If you are a soul winner, please don't forget to add your salvations If you have any salvations, add those on your communication card And you can drop that into the offering plate so we can put that in the bulletin Also if you have a map that you did not finish, please clearly mark what was done and what was not done And put it in the bin in the foyer so that we can get that recycled through and get it done And then of course if you're running late to one of our soul winning meetings, you can call us or text us at the number there 916-868-9080 Let us know that you're planning on being there but you're running late That way one of our team captains, our soul winning captains, excuse me, can have a map and a partner and everything that you need If you look at the announcements and upcoming events, of course this week, the big announcement is our New Year's Eve service On Tuesday, December 31st at 7 p.m. So again, this will be on Tuesday, not Wednesday this week And we'll have a normal service like we normally do at 7 p.m. We'll have singing and prayer and preaching After the service, we're going to have a potluck So if you can, please bring a dish to share And then of course if you want to stay until midnight, then we'll have board games, we'll have a time of fellowship As we get closer to midnight, we're going to sing some favorites, kind of like we do here on Sunday nights And then we'll pray in the New Year together So we want to encourage you to be here for that if you're interested But even if you, you know, don't want to stay up until midnight on New Year's Eve We would love for you to be part of the service though at 7 p.m. And you can just head out after the service or after the potluck You don't have to stay until midnight So just make a note of that And then of course starting January 1st is our 9 chapters a day challenge And we hope that this will be one of the goals that you do for the new year And we challenge our entire church family to read 9 chapters in the New Testament Every day in the month of January Now you have a chart there in your bulletin that will help you with that If you take the challenge, you can track that You'll notice that there's two grace period days just in case you get behind You've got some time there to catch up If you finish the task, you of course will not only have read the New Testament in the month of January But will also put your name on a nice plaque And we've got plaques from every year And it shows all the different people that have read through the year My wife and I have always noticed that January just seems to be a very sweet time Generally at our church And I think it has to do with the fact that so many people are in the word of God and reading So we want to encourage you to be reading 9 chapters a day in the month of January Make a note of the fact that we have a Spanish service coming up on Saturday, January 11th If you'd like to participate in that Make sure that you put that on your calendar And then also we have the wedding coming up for brother Adam Ritchie and Miss Emily Gessler On Saturday, January 18th at 2.30 PM And again, if you're planning on attending and you've not yet RSVP'd through the communication card Please make sure you do that So that we can give that number to them And it will help them to know about that Choir practice for the adults begins next Sunday And they're going to start practicing for I Love My Church Sunday So just make a note of that There's other things there for you to look at If you look at the back of the bulletin, birthdays and anniversaries For the month of December This week we have Penelope Pompa's birthday is on December 30th Miss Diane DePasquale has a birthday as well on December 30th Brother Aiden and Miss Ruby Rolden have an anniversary on December 31st And Brother John and Miss Irene Reed have an anniversary on December 31st And Brother Ron Edwards has a birthday on January 1st And Amaira Holland has a birthday on January 2nd Praise Report, Money Matters, all of those things are there for you to look at Don't forget about the Christmas Kiss for Jesus If you've not yet participated you can do that Through Tuesday if you'd like to pick something up from this list These are things that we use on a regular basis And you can drop it off in the drop off section there And then of course I just want to remind you that If you'd like to sign up If you ladies would like to sign up to help Bring a meal for Miss Laura Beth who just had her baby this week You can see my wife after the service And she has a clipboard and she has the things that you need In order to get signed up for that And if you are a first time guest If it's your first time here at Verity Baptist Church We're so glad that you're with us We have a gift we'd like to give you As you walk out of the church building this evening As you go out to the main foyer You'll see a little table set up And on that table you'll see these little gift bags Please grab one on your way out As a gift from us to you for being our guest tonight We appreciate you being here And we want to make sure you take one of these There's lots of different resources in this bag The one I like to highlight is this documentary that our church made It's called Being Baptist Very well made, very interesting We think you'll like it And we wanted to give this to you as a gift So please make sure you don't leave here Without grabbing one of these gift bags on your way out And if you are a guest we'd ask that you please take a moment To fill out the communication card Which is inserted in your bulletin And if you would take a moment to fill this out We would appreciate it You need a pen You can raise your hand And one of our ushers will bring you by A Verity Baptist Church pen We would love to have a record of your attendance And we actually would like to send you a little gift in the mail But we need your information to do that So please take a moment to fill the card out When we're done with the announcement We're gonna sing a song When we're done singing We're gonna receive the offering And as the offering plate goes by You can drop this card in the offering plate Or you can hand it to me after the service I'll be standing at the back door Greeting people on the way out And I hope you'll come by and say hello I think that's it for all the announcements So we're gonna go ahead and sing the chorus of the week Which is the insert in your bulletin And we're gonna sing I Know Who Holds Tomorrow It's a good song to sing right before a new year And let's go ahead and sing it out on the first I don't know about tomorrow I just live from day to day I don't borrow from its sunshine For its skies may turn to gray I don't worry or life's future What Jesus said And today I'll walk beside Him For He knows what is ahead Many things about tomorrow I don't seem to understand But I know who holds tomorrow And I know who holds my hand Good singing out on the second I don't know about tomorrow It may bring me poverty But the one who feeds the sparrow Is the one who's left by me The path that is my portion May be through the flame or flood But His presence goes before me And I'm covered with His blood Many things about tomorrow I don't seem to understand But I know who holds tomorrow And I know who holds my hand Amen. Good singing. Before the guys come up to help us with the offering, just a quick reminder that we of course are a family integrated church. We've got mother baby rooms and daddy rooms available for your convenience. Make sure you use those if you need them. And then of course don't forget to turn your cell phones off or place them on silent during the service so that they don't go out in the middle of the preaching. We'll have the guys come up and help us at this time. Let's go ahead and bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, Lord, we do love you. We thank you for lying us together together tonight. And it's just a sweet time to be with God's people, singing praises. And Lord, we pray that you bless the offering, the gift and the giver. Lord, we pray that you bless the time set aside for the preaching of your word. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. We'll read the entire chapter as our custom. Amen. Jesus passed forth from thence. He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the receipt of custom. And he saith unto him, Follow me. And he arose and followed him. And he came to pass. As Jesus sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and sat down with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw it, they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your master with publicans and sinners? But when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. But go ye and learn what that meaneth. I'll have mercy, not sacrifice. For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Then came to him the disciples of John, saying, Why do we in the Pharisees fast oft, but thy disciples fast not? And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the bridegroom of the bride chamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast. No man putteth a piece of new cloth unto an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it up taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse. Neither do men put new wine into old bottles, else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish. But they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved. While he spake these things unto them, behold, there came a certain ruler, and worshipped him, saying, My daughter is even now dead, but come, and lay thy hand upon her, and she shall live. And Jesus arose, and followed him, and so did his disciples. And behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment. For she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment, I shall behold. But Jesus turned about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort. Thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour. And when Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the minstrels and the people making a noise, he said unto them, Give place, for the maid is not dead, but sleepeth. And he laughed in the scorn. When the people were put forth, he went in, and took her by the hand, and the maid arose. And the fame thereof went abroad into all that land. And when Jesus departed thence, two blind men followed him, crying, and saying, Thou son of David, have mercy on us. When he was come into the house, the blind men came to him, and Jesus saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this. They said unto him, Yea, Lord. Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it unto you. And their eyes were opened, and Jesus straightly charged them, saying, See that no man know it. But they, when they were departed, spread abroad his fame in all that country. As he went out, behold, he brought to him a dumb man possessed with the devil. And when the devil was cast out, the dumb spake. And the multitudes marveled, saying, It was never so seen in Israel. But the Pharisees said, He casted out devils through the prince of the devils. And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were as scattered abroad as sheep, having no shepherd. Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labors are few. Pray, therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labors into his harvest. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this evening. God, I thank you for your word, for our church. As you please, meet with us tonight, and as you be the pastor, we strengthen him. And if you're in the spirit, we love you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Alright, well we're there in Matthew chapter number 9. And I'd like you to look down at verse number 35, Matthew chapter 9 and verse number 35. These are well-known verses. The Bible says that Jesus went about all the cities and villages teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were as scattered abroad as sheep, having no shepherd. Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labors are few. Pray ye therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labors into his harvest. And of course, tonight, today is the last Sunday before we enter into a new year. And usually around this time of year, during this type of service, I like to preach sermons to prepare us, as we end an old year and begin a new year. And this morning, I spoke to the individual, and I talked about being a time to change individually, for us to grow as people in the new year. Tonight, I want to speak about our church. And this might be a little bit different of a sermon than something I would normally preach on, but being the fact that we're beginning a new year, I think it's appropriate. And I believe that this coming year, 2025, could be the greatest year of our church's history. I think it could be the greatest year of growth of our church's history. And we are coming out of a difficult year, no doubt about it. I believe that this year, 2024, has been a purge, a bit of a purge on many different levels. But I believe that purges are there to help us, to prepare us for future growth. And what I can tell you is this, by God's grace, over the years, we have grown. And my wife and I started this church 14 years ago in our living room with a handful of people. And over the last 14 years, the Lord has allowed us to come this far. And I believe that the same God who has led us thus far will lead us in the future. And the same ideas that have helped us to grow in the past, I believe will help us to grow again. Tonight I want to speak on the subject of how we can grow and how we should grow in this coming year. And if you're there, again, I want you to just notice Matthew 9, 37, the Bible says this, Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous. The harvest truly is plenteous. And of course Jesus is not talking about a physical harvest here. He's talking about a harvest of souls. He's talking about what we would call the great commission or soul winning. He says the harvest truly is plenteous. The word plenteous means abundant. He says, but there's a problem. He says the laborers are few. He says the problem is not with the harvest. There's enough people out there that need to be reached. The problem is with the workforce. He says the laborers are few. There's not enough workers. And for that reason he says, pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that he would send forth labors into his harvest. And our church has always emphasized this idea of soul winning and reaching people with the gospel. Remember when we used to be a soul winning church? And I say that jokingly of course. But we've always emphasized this idea of soul winning. I've often said to our church family that everything we do around here needs to fall under two categories. Reaching people and teaching people. If you ever want to know what the mission statement of Verity Baptist Church it is just that. We are here to reach and we are here to teach. And as a result of that we've had these values. These what we might call core values for our church family. And I want to speak about these just quickly tonight. And if you want to jot these down then maybe you can go ahead and jot them down if you want to take notes. And this shouldn't be surprising to you. These have been the core values of our church from the beginning. And maybe I've never stated it quite this way. But these should not be new to you. You say what is the core values of Verity Baptist Church as far as the things that we value the most that are the core, the DNA of this place. Number one, soul winning. Number two, discipleship. Number three, fellowship. And number four, serving. And again that shouldn't be a shocker to any of you if you've been at our church for any length of time. The things we value here are soul winning, discipleship, fellowship and serving. Soul winning, discipleship, fellowship and serving. These are the things that we set out to do when we started this church. These are the things that we will continue to set out to do over the coming year. And I believe that these are the things that God will use to help our church. It's what we've done to help us grow to this place. And it's what I believe God will use to help us to continue to grow. So let me just deal with these real quickly tonight and we'll do this as quickly as we can. Number one, I want to speak or I want to just highlight for you this idea that I believe that our church can grow through soul winning. I believe that our church can grow. You say what's the plan for growth in 2025? We can grow through soul winning. Let me just say this, personal evangelism still works. Soul winning still works. Anything the Bible says to do is always going to work. And what we need to realize is this, that there is no lack of people out there that need to hear the gospel and that need to be reached with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Look at it again. Matthew 9, 37. Then saith he unto his disciples, the harvest truly is plenteous. The harvest truly is plentiful. The harvest truly is abundant. He says the problem is not with the harvest. The problem is with the laborers going out to reach people with the gospel. There is no lack of people that need to be reached with the gospel of Jesus Christ. There is no lack of people that are out there who would get saved if somebody would bring the gospel to them. And by the way, let me just say this. And tonight I'm going to give you a lot of different things. And again, this might be a little bit different of a sermon than I normally would preach. But not only is there not a lack of people that need to be reached out there. Let me just say this. There's no lack of people coming to Verity Baptist Church or coming to check out this church from our outreach. In 2024, here of course at our church and with our staff, we like things to be organized. I like things to be organized. And we like to keep track of what our church is doing and things that are being accomplished. And we track of course our guests. We have guests that come to our church every week and we appreciate that. If you're a guest here tonight, we're glad that you're with us. And I think it's good for us to maybe look at these numbers sometimes and be reminded of these numbers. In 2024, our church, and this is not counting this week. This is not counting today. We've had guests this morning. We have guests tonight. But let me say this. In 2024, I think this is an interesting number for you to know. Our church has had 373 first-time guests come to Verity Baptist Church just in the last 12 months. We've had 281 come on Sunday mornings. We've had 55 come on Sunday night. We've had 37 come on Wednesday night. 373 first-time guests. And some churches have problems with trying to get guests in church or get visitors in church. Our church is not one of those. We don't have a problem with having guests. In fact, we do a pretty good job at it. 373 for a church our size is a good number. As far as keeping guests, every church has problems with keeping guests. Even Rick Warren, who pastors probably one of the largest churches in America, obviously is a liberal pastor, seeker-sensitive, rock band, fund center type church. But even a church like that, who's never going to offend anyone and who's never going to hurt anybody's feelings, they talk about the fact that if they can have one out of 20 guests come back, they consider that a success. So when you think about these big mega church, fund center type, seeker-sensitive type, even they say if we can get one out of 20 visitors who come to their church, if we can get one of them to come back, they consider that a success. So every church, of course, is going to struggle not only with getting guests, but also having guests come back in return. And our church does a good job with that. I mean, even this morning, I think we had several guests here this morning that it was their third week and fourth week and fifth week. And of course, we track those things. But 373 guests that have came to Verdi Baptist Church this year. And I say that to you to say this, the harvest truly is plenteous. And there is no problem with the harvest. In fact, there's not even a problem necessarily with getting people saved and getting people in church. And I just say to you that soul winning works. It still works. It has worked. The Bible teaches to go, Jesus taught, to go you therefore into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. The Bible tells us to go out by two and two to get people saved. And of course, we emphasize here at Verdi Baptist Church not only to get people saved, but to follow up, to do our best to follow up and bring guests to church. And I'm here to tell you it works. And you might be thinking, I don't know about this soul winning thing. I don't know if it works. Sometimes we have dry spells and people go out for a while and they don't have anybody saved. And they don't have anybody come to church. And I understand that happens from time to time. And in fact, I'm going to be teaching lessons on Saturday mornings on things of this nature for a little while. And one of the lessons I like to teach is on the subject of what to do when you're experiencing a dry spell, out soul winning. But let me just say to you, soul winning works. The Word of God works. It still works. I remember years ago, Brother Jose and I were out soul winning. And we knocked on a door. And the lady opened the door and her name was Nicole Johnson. Of course, you know Ms. Nicole. And I remember talking to Ms. Nicole and leading her through the Romans road. And she got saved. And I remember asking her if she would like to be a guest at our church. And she said she'd love to, but she had a problem with transportation. And I said if we sent a van out to pick you up for church, would you be interested in coming? And she said absolutely. I don't know how many years ago that was. I think she's been coming to our church for almost a decade now. And she started coming to church. And of course since then she got a license. Since then she got a vehicle. And now she drives herself. But I'm here to tell you that soul winning works. Getting people saved works. Following up on people works. I remember years ago knocking on Brother Salvador's door. And getting him to come to church. And having him come to church. And I don't remember this. He tells the story. I'm not sure if he's making it up or not. But he tells me that not only did I get him to come to church. But I got him to come to become a three to thrive. You know Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. That I walked up to him after a Sunday morning. And I said hey it's good that you've been coming on Sunday mornings. But you should come on Sunday night. And he said alright. And he started coming. And he started coming on Wednesday night. And he's been coming ever since. And I'm just here to tell you. It works. It still works. I remember years ago. Getting Brother Montel Johnson saved. And I knocked on his door. And he got saved. And it took him a while before he came. In fact our church had to knock on his door. He kept moving around in Natomas. And our church had to knock on his door several times. But eventually he got here. And Ms. Lindsey got saved. And the rest is history. And they've been with us for a while. And you say oh you're telling all these old stories. How about something more recent. Well just not too long ago. I knocked on her door and Brother Warren got saved. And look at this beautiful couple sitting here. Brother Warren and Ms. Brittany. If you don't know them you need to get to know them. And I knocked on her door. And I had my sons with me. And Brother Warren got saved. And it took a little bit. Brother Warren and Ms. Brittany. Ms. Brittany told me that after we knocked on their door and they got saved. They actually were just watching sermons online for a while. And then they started watching the live streams for a while. And when they were watching the live streams. I was preaching a series on how to help people reach their potential. And it finally got to the point where they said. You know what we need to just get down there. And they came. And Ms. Brittany got saved. And they've been growing. And they've been coming. And they've been serving. Following up on people works. Loving people works. I mean I thank God for all of these personal converts that I have here in our church. I'll tell you the greatest convert I've ever had is my wife. I got my wife saved. As a 17 year old kid. Got her saved. And of course we got married. And you know the story. What I'm telling you is this. Soul winning works. Don't tell me it doesn't. And it can work for you. Many of you that are here. And somebody knocked on your door. I think we have a guest here tonight. Came because somebody knocked on their door. We had a baptism this morning. Because Brother Johnny knocked on somebody's door. Brother John got somebody saved. And followed up with them. Brother John actually. And I don't mean to put him on the spot. He's actually really good at this whole follow up thing. And I was talking to him this afternoon. And I said Brother John. Can you tell me the secret. You know and I asked him. I said what's your secret? Tell me your secret to getting guests in church and getting them baptized. He said here's my secret. Two things. Be nice and follow up. You know what that means? Here's what he was telling me. Just do it. It works. Just get their information. Call them up. Send them a text. Put something in the mail. And we will continue to build this church together. Soul winning works. And I believe that in 2025 we can grow this church through soul winning. Go to John chapter 1 just real quickly. John chapter 1. You're there in Matthew. Mark. Luke. John. And you know when I see these converts here. At our church. People that our church reached through soul winning. We knocked on their door. You know what it does for me? It makes me think I want to go get another one. I want to go find another one. I want to go soul winning next week and knock on a door. And who knows who we might meet. And who knows who we might get saved. And who knows who might come. And look you ought to have a goal as a soul winner at Verity Baptist Church that in 2025 you want to have a convert sitting here in church that you got saved and you knocked on your door because this works. It works. And the only time it doesn't work is when we don't work it. Personal evangelism still works. There's no lack of people out there that can be reached. There's no lack of people out there checking out churches. There's no lack of people out there to do it. What we lack as a soul winner is to go out and knock doors and do the work and get people saved and maybe you need to get involved in soul winning. Maybe you need to take the next step and learn how to preach the gospel I want to have a convert. You're getting saved. Maybe you got to just make a goal this year. I want to have a convert in church 2025. I want to have a convert in church. But I'm here to tell you it works. Not only does personal evangelism work but let me say this inviting friends and family still works. You know there's a biblical principle in the Bible we actually see this John chapter 1 if you look at verse number 40 the Bible says this John chapter 1 and verse 40 one of the two which heard John speak and followed him. Notice this the Bible says was Andrew Simon Peter's brother. Now notice Andrew Simon Peter's brother he hears about Jesus and the Bible says in verse 41 he first findeth his own brother Simon. Simon of course becomes the great apostle Peter. How did Simon come to Christ? He came to Christ because his brother invited him. He first findeth his own brother Simon and saith unto him he have found the Messiahs which being interpreted which being interpreted the Christ. Notice verse 42 and he Andrew brought him Peter to Jesus. Not only does knocking doors still work but let me say this inviting friends and family still works. How's the great apostle Peter brought to Christ? His brother brought him. His brother invited him. He brought him to Jesus. When Jesus beheld him he said thou art Simon the son of Jonah thou shalt be called Cephas which is by interpretation of stone. The day following Jesus would go forth into Galilee notice this there's a theme here in verses 40, 41 and 42 we see that Andrew Simon Peter's brother first findeth his own brother Simon he goes to him and he brought him to Jesus. Then in verse 43 we read this and the day following Jesus would go forth into Galilee and findeth Philip and saith unto him follow me. Now Philip was of Bethsaida the city of Andrew and Peter Philip notice these words findeth Nathanael. Do you see the theme here? Andrew finds Simon Peter his brother Philip findeth Nathanael and saith unto him we have found him of whom Moses the law and the prophets did write Jesus of Nazareth the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said unto him. Now notice here's an objection Philip finds Nathanael and Nathanael said unto him can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? And look when you're out and you're inviting your friends and your family I think you ought to invite your friends and your family I think you ought to invite your co-workers I think you ought to invite your neighbors I think you ought to live your life maybe at work with such a testimony that you can invite your friends and you can invite your family and look you ought to invite them to church and they say to you well can there any good thing come out of Norwood? You say how do I respond to that? Here's how you respond Philip saith unto him come and see can any good thing come out of Nazareth? come and see come and see when they say to you well I don't know can any good thing come out of that? come and see and I'm here to tell you that soul winning still works and personal evangelism still works and knocking doors and preaching the gospel and following up on guests and praying for your converts all of that still works and inviting your friends and family that still works too and we want to create an atmosphere here at Verity Baptist Church where you feel comfortable inviting friends and family every week of the year that's one of the reasons why we stress professionalism so much around here one of the reasons that we try to serve with excellence now the main reason we want to serve with excellence is because we're doing it for the Lord and anything we do for the Lord we ought to do with excellence if we're going to do something for God we ought to do it right whatsoever thy hand findeth to do do it with thy might but you know another reason that these musicians and these song leaders and this orchestra that they put so much work and energy into the things that they do one of the reasons is because they want your friends and your family to be impressed when you invite them to your church we want them to walk in and say wow we want them to be like the Queen of Sheba when she walks into Solomon's Temple and she says look at how this place and look at how this place is rented look at the ushers and look at the safety team and look at the musicians and look at all these different things hey we want to create an atmosphere that welcomes people so that you can feel excited about inviting your friends and family every week of the year but let me just say this as well we also want to give you opportunities to invite your friends and family and we want you to take these opportunities this is one of the reasons why at this church at least four times a year we put on certain events that are meant to help you invite friends for example we have I Love My Church Sunday coming up that would be a great opportunity for you to invite your friends and your co-workers, your family members we of course have Easter in April, we've got Family Friend Day our church's anniversary in September we have Christmas services of course we just had that for this year but for next year we have all opportunities for you to invite friends and look you and I have been left on this earth to reach people with the gospel what is the purpose of this church? to reach people and to teach people and the way that you and I can do that is by going out there and knocking doors and preaching the gospel and following up on guests and inviting them to church and bringing them to church and every soul when I have to have a goal this year I want to have a convert in church I want to have a convert baptized in church but you know you can also say I want to invite a friend I want to invite a co-worker I want to invite a family member we had 373 not counting today visitors come to our church in this last year let me give you the breakdowns how did these people come? and again this is not including today of the 373 visitors that came to church this last year 138 of them were invited by a friend or family member 138 of the 373 visitors that we had in church 138 of them were invited by one of you invited by a friend or a family member a church member of our church went up to their brother their sister, their co-worker their neighbor and said come and see praise the lord for that let's make sure we keep doing that 173, 138 were invited by friends and family 135 were invited by a soul winner 135 had somebody knock on their door and invite them to church or leave literature at their door and they came as a result 138 came from someone in our church inviting them a friend or a family member and 135 came from soul winning those are the two major ways that we've had people come to church in the last year and over the years 34 of the 373 came as a result of our connection to the new IFP 28 came from church mailers 21 from social media 16 just because they drove by and saw this building and saw that there was cars in the parking lot and children playing outside and they said something's going on there one came because they saw the church van brother Shaw takes full credit for that one they just saw the church van drive by and it says follow me to Verity Baptist Church or something and they just followed and we asked them how'd you come to church and they wrote down I followed the church van I'm here to tell you that the things that have brought us to this place will continue to help us to grow because we can grow through soul winning personal evangelism still works and you say well you know my soul winning doesn't go well and I don't get a lot of people say well maybe you gotta change some things go to Acts real quickly Acts chapter 18 if you're there in John Acts and maybe you gotta work on some things maybe you gotta change some things up maybe you gotta spend some time in prayer brother RJ just preached the great soul winning challenge about how he led a soul winning marathon in San Jose and he spent every day leading up to that soul winning marathon praying that the Lord would give him some converts and he had 3 people saved maybe we need to start praying every day 4 converts and 4 are converts maybe you need to read how to win friends and influence people be a little nicer and smile we can work on those things what I'm telling you is we need to realize that these things work soul winning works we can grow through soul winning let me give you a second thought tonight not only can we grow through soul winning we have grown through soul winning but let me say this we can grow through discipleship through discipleship in Acts 18 I think we find a story that highlights this very well Acts 18 in verse number 24 the Bible says this the word instructed means this man was instructed means that he had some initial training he had some things that he had learned this man was instructed in the way of the Lord and being fervent in spirit he spake and taught diligently the things of the Lord knowing only the baptism of John so Apollos the Bible tells us he was instructed but his knowledge was limited knowing only the baptism of John and he began to speak boldly in the synagogue whom when Aquila and Priscilla had heard, notice these words took him unto them they connected with him they provided fellowship they took him unto them and, notice these words expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly and the word perfectly there means more completely they provided full instruction because remember he had been instructed in the ways of the Lord but knowing only the baptism of John the instruction that he had received had been limited so what Aquila and Priscilla said they took him unto them and they expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly, notice verse 27 and when he had disposed to pass to Iki the brethren wrote exhorting the disciples to receive him who when he was come, notice these words helped them much which had believed through grace so they took him they expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly and then the Bible tells us that he became valuable the result was that he was accepted verse 27, they received him and, verse 27 he helped them much he became very valuable to them and what we see here what is it that Aquila and Priscilla were doing they were engaging in discipleship they were taking this new convert this young convert, Apollos who had a lot of potential he knew some things but he needed more instruction they needed to balance him out they needed to kind of fill him in on some things and they expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly and what were they doing? they were discipling him and as a result of discipleship their ministry grew and you know our church has always engaged in discipleship we've always had an emphasis in discipleship and at times we've emphasized it more than others and at times we've gotten busy and not done things and I understand that but let me just say this every time that we've emphasized discipleship our church has grown it's helped people it's helped people to get connected it's helped them to become valuable and to learn and to grow you know over the last few months I've been doing this my wife and I have been doing this I don't know it's not I don't know what the right word is it's not formal it's not formal at all but we've kind of been doing this little exercise where we've been thinking about people in our church you know the good ones and we've been kind of just dissecting like what is it that worked with this individual and we've been talking about different people and kind of looking at characteristics of things that have worked and again just kind of this informal study because what I wanted to figure out is this what have people done naturally what have people just done out in the wild that has helped them grow that has helped them get connected because if we can figure that out what people have done naturally to grow then let's try to systematize that and just try to get everybody on that same agenda and you know as we've been doing this we've been thinking about people we've been talking to people we've been kind of surveying certain people and you know what we've learned is that in one way or another there's about three different things that have helped new people get connected in our church over the years and grow I'm talking about people that are sitting here tonight great church members that are here you know these are the three things that we've kind of learned is that early on they binge watched a lot of sermons now for those of you that came through the online ministry a lot of you you know you just watched a lot of sermons and watched a bunch of documentaries and things of that before you ever came to church and that's been true of you but you know it hasn't just been that I mean I think about the people that we've knocked on their doors even the people that I mentioned I know with brother Montel he tells me when he first started coming to our church and he had a job where they would drive a lot and travel and his wife would go with him and his kids and they were just they were just listening to every audio sermon on the website of Verity Baptist Church they just got a lot of knowledge real early on in their walk with the Lord I think of brother Warren and Miss Brittany and they said the same thing they were just watching a lot of sermons at the beginning and just getting a lot of knowledge and that's you know that's one thing that in different ways people have done this idea of kind of just getting a lot of sermons binge watching not everyone but that has been a characteristic and if we ask the question tonight I think that a lot of you would say yeah you know you're just listening a lot learning a lot kind of grabbing a lot early on that has been one characteristic another characteristic that we've noticed with people that have done well is that they had some sort of a connection already in church you know this comes of course when somebody invites a friend or a family member but somehow they got connected and they had a connection and that helped another thing that we've learned is that this has happened a lot and it's happened with people that had a connection but it's also happened with people that didn't have a connection but maybe they just weren't shy and they just made sure that this happened but one thing that I've noticed is that new people that got connected early and are doing well in the Christian walk is that they found someone that could answer a lot of questions for them because a lot of times when people started coming to our church all of this was new everything was new and they had a lot of questions and depending on their background if they grew up Catholic they might have had a lot of questions that had to do with Catholicism or they grew up in some other type of religion or no religion at all there was just a lot of questions and just as we kind of surveyed people and talked through the testimonies of different people we just kind of realized these are three main characteristics that people have had over the years that do well they somehow some way binge watched or binge listened to or got a lot of preaching into them early on a lot of teaching early on they had some sort of friend or some sort of connection some connection already in church that helped them or they just found someone that they were able to call and text and get a lot of questions answered early in their walk with the Lord and you say why do you bring this up? I bring this up because for our church for years I want to say the first time we kind of launched our discipleship program I'm not sure of the year exactly but it had to have been like 2013 or 14 and I wrote a discipleship course many of you have gone through our discipleship course and of course we've revamped it through the years but what we did was we did discipleship in a group setting like a class setting and people came and that's worked every time we've done it it's worked well I feel like people that go through discipleship they really just get solid and stable and it's been a good thing but one thing that I didn't like too much about the class setting is that when you've got several people going through these lessons you know if somebody misses a lesson we kind of we can't wait for them we just kind of keep going because we got a whole group and also it limits the amount of questions that people can ask because obviously you've got five or six people sitting in a discipleship class they're not just going to sit here and ask you know every question about everything in the Bible so one thing that I'd like for us to do in this coming year and I'm just explaining to you tonight you know how are we going to grow how are we going to continue to expand here at Verity Baptist Church well one way is what we've always done soul winning we're going to keep soul winning we're going to keep knocking doors we're going to keep inviting friends and family we're going to keep creating opportunities for you to do that but you know another way is that we're going to keep soul discipleship but I want to change our discipleship a little bit in the sense that I want to try to cover these areas you know we've been I've been teaching through this series which I'm not done on Rooted and Grounded we've gone through about half of it we've done 12 lessons in Rooted and Grounded when we begin the new year we're going to start it back up and we're going to finish it up when it's all said and done it's going to be about 20 lessons and the reason the way that I've kind of came through these 20 lessons and these 20 sermons that I'm going to preach is I wanted to be able to take an individual who just got saved and take them through these 20 lessons and by the time they get to lesson number 20 they're one of us I mean they just they know everything they need to know I'm not saying they know everything about the Bible I'm not saying that they have everything but I'm saying they know everything they need to know as far as what we believe what the Bible teaches I mean and we start gradually faith versus works repent of your sins eternal security baptism Bible reading prayers but I mean we're going to get into separation and modesty and standards and you know all sorts of things and that has been the goal and one thing that I'd like for us to do and one thing we're going to try this coming year and look we ought to never be afraid to try new things we ought to try things and sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't work but one thing that I'd like to do is change our discipleship from a class setting to a one on one setting where we can take an individual that walks one of these 373 people that walk through these back doors on any given Sunday and say hey we have a discipleship program we will connect you if you're a man we'll connect you with a man if you're a lady we'll connect you with a lady if you're a couple we'll connect you with a man that can lead the couple through this and we'll take you through these 20 lessons and you say well what's the point of that what are you trying to accomplish we're trying to make them binge watch 20 lessons binge learn 20 lessons right up front and we want to give them a friend and a connection and a mentor and someone who can be there and try to answer questions for them and for some people some things are going to be more important than others some people are going to go through a lesson on eternal security and they're like oh yeah no problem I believe that other people are going to have a lot of questions because maybe they grew up in a church that taught something different than that and they're going to need somebody to kind of walk them through that and talk them through that and this is something that we want to do we're going to start it slow in fact just starting out I'm only going to be using brother Oliver Deacon Oliver and my wife to help us with this but if it goes well and I'm hoping it goes well in the future we can have lots of people connecting with new converts and helping them taking them through these lessons teaching them these things creating an opportunity for them to have a connection learn the things they need to learn and get connected in the things of God because discipleship has always worked I think it will continue to work and I believe that in 2025 we can grow through discipleship you're there in Acts 18 go to Acts chapter 2 Acts chapter 2 and by the way let me say this and part of me is I'm telling you some of these things just so you can be aware of what's coming but you know I don't want to burn people out so honestly one of the things that I'd like to do I mean we'll do discipleship with anybody whenever they want but one of the things I'd like to do is even provide discipleship even during a Sunday night service and letting a church a new convert come to church and they can come in on a Sunday night and they can sit there and sing and go through all that but when it comes to the preaching then maybe we could just dismiss them and they can go with their discipleship mentor and they can go through these lessons because honestly you know what a new convert probably needs more these 20 lessons that we've gone through in the Rooted and Grounded Series are going to need that more urgently than whatever I happen to be preaching on a Sunday night now they need what I'm preaching on a Sunday night too but you know what a new convert needs? They need to just be really thoroughly taught what the Bible teaches about repent of your sins and they need to just be really grounded on this idea of eternal security and they need to be taught about the King James issue they need to be taught about the reprobate doctrine they need to be taught about Zionism they need to be taught these things they need to be taught about dress standards and music standards and what fornication is and what the Bible teaches about alcohol and honestly I can't just preach these things every week and we can't just afford for them to wait three years or two years until I get to that subject so we're just going to have them binge watch it all in the first 20 weeks give it all to them right up front give them a friend and a connection give them a mentor to answer their questions and look you say well what can we do with that you know pray about that and encourage if you know of someone that's coming to church once we launch this thing say hey you know we got a discipleship program you ought to sign up so we can grow through soul winning we can grow through discipleship but number three let me say this we can grow through fellowship in Acts chapter 2 and verse 42 I want you to notice these words the Bible says this and they continued they continued and that's the goal the goal is that new converts would continue and they continued notice these words steadfastly in the apostles doctrine so they continued in the doctrine they got the teaching they got the preaching they got the lessons they continued in their doctrine but notice it's not just doctrine they continued in the apostles doctrine and fellowship they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of bread and in prayers look at verse 46 Acts 2 46 and they continuing that's the goal and they continuing daily notice these words with one accord they were united one accord in the temple breaking bread from house to house they eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart singleness of heart that is referring to unity and I believe that fellowship is an aspect of discipleship and for us discipleship is and look discipleship is not just a course you go through obviously sitting in church on Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night and reading your Bible at home and all those things all of that is discipleship but what we want to do is we want to create a system if look if we're looking at the greatest church members our church has and we're thinking okay all of these people just binge watch a bunch of sermons they found someone to connect with they had a lot of questions they asked a lot of questions they got a lot of questions answered if they kind of did this naturally on their own and we see that multiple people who got connected got rooted got grounded and they were all kind of doing these same things then we would be idiots to say well let's just systematize that let's just create a system that helps people get all the 20 lessons they need upfront get a mentor and a connection get someone that they feel comfortable asking questions to answering questions having questions answered that's what we want to do with discipleship but then along with that we want fellowship it's not just the apostles doctrine it's also fellowship what does fellowship do fellowship allows them to connect and fellowship allows them to continue they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship they continuing daily with one accord in the temple the bible says the result was gladness and singleness of heart so we want to grow through fellowship keep your place there in in acts we're going to come back to it put a ribbon or a bookmark there and go with me if you want to the book of Ephesians Ephesians chapter 4 Acts Romans 1 second Corinthians Galatians Ephesians Ephesians chapter 4 and look when it comes to fellowship we provide a lot of fellowship opportunities here I mean just on Tuesday we're having our New Year's Eve service but when we get into the new year you know we're going to have our homeschool Valentine's Day party we're going to have I love my church Sunday and we're going to give out popcorn in the morning bags of popcorn to everyone who comes that'd be a great time for you to invite a friend or a family member in the evening we're going to have a potluck we have our annual ladies tea that my wife puts on for all the ladies we have the annual church picnic we've got family and friend day we've got the harvest party and the pie social and the hot chocolate and Christmas cookie fellowship and the senior saints breakfasts and all the team events and all the events that you guys have with your teams and the different holiday parties and the picnics and all those things look we've got a lot of opportunities for people to fellowship and we want to continue to create those opportunities here's the thing that I've learned is I can't make anybody be friends and I can't even make some of you be friendly as much as I try but what we can do is we can create atmospheres where hopefully connections can be made and where people can can be a part of these things you know again this is maybe a little bit more of like a state of the union for our church address but let me just give you some things that are coming back in the new year this is something that we've kind of let go a little bit but in the new year we want to bring the youth activities back and bring back the teen activities for the young people one thing that we'd like to do in this coming year is bring back the family fun nights now you probably have no clue I don't think I don't know that any of you were here I mean other than like my family obviously my wife, my family brother Ray and miss Denise but years and years and years and years ago we used to have these family fun nights and they were really geared towards the kids and of course we're family integrated we never separate children from their parents so parents would come with the kids but they were kind of like our church's version of Vacation Bible School and we would have songs for the kids and a lesson for the kids it was just a time to kind of focus on the kids and we wanted to bring that back we're going to bring it back a little different but we want to bring the family fun nights and I hope you'll look forward to that I hope that the young teenagers the young people will look forward to these activities what I'm saying to you is these are all things we've done in the past and we need to continue to do them because they will help us to grow we can grow through soul winning we can grow through discipleship we can grow through fellowship number four we can grow through serving we can grow through serving Ephesians 4 and verse 11 the Bible says this and he gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers why? here's why for the perfecting of the saints the word perfecting means the completing or the maturing of the saints notice the Bible says for the work of the ministry and then it says for the church for the edifying of the body of Christ it gives us these three statements for the perfecting of the saints for the work of the ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ the statement for the perfecting of the saints has to do with spiritual growth and do you know that serving is part of discipleship and serving is part of spiritual growth and if you are going to grow spiritually you need to find a place to get connected find a place to serve but not only is serving part of individual growth it's part of corporate because it says for the perfecting of the saints it says for the edifying of the body of Christ what's the body of Christ? it's the church and in the middle of these two statements the perfecting of the saints the completing of the saints the maturing of the saints the growth of the individual saints and the edifying of the body of Christ the corporate growth of the church in the middle of these two statements is this statement for the work of the ministry What does that tell us? It tells us that the work of the ministry helps the individual to grow and the work of the ministry helps the church to grow. Serving helps you grow spiritually and serving helps the church grow as well. Our growing capacity is limited by how many people serve. See, oftentimes, I just I heard this recently. I thought it was interesting. Oftentimes the church will think, they'll say, oh well, you know, we have 50 people serving and I don't, I didn't count it, but our church has way more than 50 people serving. I mean, we actually have a lot of people that serve and praise the Lord for it. But sometimes people will get this idea. They'll say like, oh, we have 50 people serving because our church has like 200 people. But the truth is this, you don't have 50 people serving because your church has 200 people, you have 200 people because you have 50 people serving. Because like we talked about this morning, if we're going to grow, we must grow our capacity. We must grow our ability. We must grow. That's why I'm so excited that this, you know, the whole, these song leaders, I mean everybody, the song leaders, the pianists, the orchestra, everybody's just kind of stepped up their game. You say, what's exciting about that? Hey, when we, when we grow our capacity, it grows our ability to do more and accomplish more. Growth is always a good thing. Growing personally will help our church grow corporately as well. Our growing capacity is limited by how many people serve. And if we can increase our capacity, then we can increase our ability to grow. Now let me just say this because some of you have servant's hearts and I appreciate you and, but I, let me just be clear. When I'm talking about getting more people to serve, I'm not talking about getting the same people to do more. Okay, because I get that there are people out there that, they'll do everything and I appreciate them and their hearts in the right place. But we're not trying to get, you know, the same 20 people to just do more. But you know what we are trying to do is to get everybody involved in serving. Everybody doing something. Everybody serving in some capacity, somewhere. We don't want the same people doing more. We don't want to burn everybody out. And in fact the more people we can get to serve, then the more rest times that we can allow. Obviously many hands make for a light load and the more individuals involved. But what I'm saying is this, we want to have everybody serving, everybody doing something, everybody engaged somewhere. Why? Because serving will not only help you grow, it will help the church grow. So we can grow. We can grow through serving. We can grow through fellowship. We can grow through discipleship. We can grow through soul winning. Go back to Acts real quickly. Acts chapter number 6. So I'm just saying to you, these are all the things that have brought us this far. And I think these are things that will take us to the next level. We can grow through soul winning. Soul winning still works. Preaching the gospel to people still works. Getting their information and praying, obviously asking for permission to get their information and praying for them, following up with them, all of that still works. Inviting your friends and your family still works. Discipleship still works. Getting people connected, giving them someone to connect with, giving them somebody that can answer questions for them, getting them some important lessons right up front, all of that works. Fellowship will help people get connected, it will help people continue, it works. Serving will still help Christians grow themselves individually and it will help the church grow corporately. Now you might be asking this question, with all that said, what does that have to do with me? Well, let me tell you exactly how you can help. Because remember, we can grow through serving and we need your help. You say, well, what are some things that I can do? Here's some things that you can do. I'm talking about just the average member here. You say, I can't play an instrument and I can't, you know, do some of these things. Okay, here's something that you can do. Here's something everybody can do. Number one, show up. Show up. You know, in the New Year, you need to make a decision that I'm just going to be faithful to church. Maybe you've allowed the holiday season to kind of take you out, and I realize people are traveling, I'm not talking about that. But one thing you can do is to just say, hey, you know what, I need to just be faithful to church, I need to be a three to thrive, I need to have Brother Salvador walk up to me and say, hey, you ought to be here on Sunday night, you know, and show up to church. That's something you can do. Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, three to thrive, show up to church. That's something you can do. But, you know, here's something else you can do. Not only can you show up to church, but you can show up early. You can show up early or, you know, at least on time and not late. You say, why? Because it's exciting when you're here. The party doesn't start till you get here. So show up, be here. You say, why should I show up early? So you can talk to people, so you can fellowship with people, so you can develop friendships, so you can grow. You ought to show up. You ought to show up early. Let me say this, you ought to sit up front. Now, I'm talking about those of you that don't have babies. If you have babies, obviously, you sit towards the back. We get that. But if you don't have little children, you know, sit up front. Sit closer to the back. You know what human nature is? Human nature is to just sit, you know, as far back as possible. And look, I'm not mad at you guys sitting in the back, all right? What I'm saying to you, if you don't have a baby, you know, I get it. You have children. You got a wife, whatever. I'm not talking about that. But if you're able to sit closer, sit up front, hey, that's good. Because you know what that does? Is that frees up the back rows for the moms with the young children that needs to deal with those things. Look, if you're asking how can I help, here's how you can help. Show up. Here's how you can help. Show up early. Here's how you can help. Sit up front. Here's how you can help. You know a singing service is more exciting when you sing? And you ought to sing. You ought to open up your hymn book. You ought to open your mouth. You ought to sing and sing praises to God. And you say, well, I'm not a very good singer. You know what the Bible says? The Bible says, make a joyful noise unto the Lord. And if the noise that comes out of your mouth is not that, you know, nice, that's okay. Just make a joyful noise. But you ought to sing. The singing services are exciting when you sing. You ought to serve. You ought to find somewhere to serve. If you, and again, I'm not talking to those of you that already do a lot, but if you're saying I don't really have a place to serve, I don't have something I'm doing, you ought to figure out a place to serve. You know in a couple of weeks we're having a training, an audio video training for people that want to learn about doing live streams and helping us with the live streams. You know, if that's something that you could do, you're into technology or whatever, you ought to sign up. You ought to go. Find somewhere to serve. Here's something everybody can do. You ought to go soul winning. You ought to get involved in soul winning. Remember when we used to go soul winning? And by the way, when you go to soul winning, show up early and sit up front and sing and get involved. Get involved. Look, I'm just telling you that we're not going to come up with some new secret of here's the secret of how our church is going to grow in the next year. No, we're going to grow next year the same way we've grown every year. Soul winning, discipleship, fellowship, serving. But what we need is your help to get involved. Are you there in Acts chapter 6? Let me just show you one verse and we'll be done. Acts chapter 6 and verse 7. The Bible says this, and the word of God increase. And the word of God increase. I love that phrase because, you know, it might be a little bit of a confusing phrase. And when the Bible says here that the word of God increase, it doesn't mean that they got more of the word of God, although they were still writing the New Testament when this was being addressed here. But what the Bible is saying here, when it says that the word of God increase, the idea is this, that as a result of their ministry, more people were exposed to the word of God as a result of what they were doing. The word of God and the influence of the word of God increase and, notice this, the number of the disciples multiplied. So what's our goal in 2025? For the word of God to increase and for the number of disciples to multiply. How are we going to do it? We're going to do it through soul winning. How are we going to do it? We're going to do it through discipleship. How are we going to do it? We're going to do it through fellowship. How are we going to do it? We're going to do it through serving. And if you're sitting here this evening and you're saying, Yeah, I've heard this sermon before. I've heard all these things before. Soul winning, discipleship, fellowship, serving. I've heard you talk about all these things. You know, maybe you're sitting here tonight and you're thinking, brother you know here we go again with the soul winning discipleship and the fellowship and serving you know let me say to you it's not here we go again it's here we grow again because these are all the things that God has used over the years to help us grow and they'll be the same things that help us grow next year so how about you get involved how about you find somewhere to serve and actually show up for soul winning and start singing start being friendly and maybe connect with someone and invite someone and help someone and pray for someone and get engaged in all these things because in 2025 I think we're gonna be able to say that we grow again it's why I had to not go to prayer Heavenly Father Lord we do love you Lord we thank you for these principles these timeless principles for church growth and personal growth and Lord I pray you to help us to grow what I pray that in 2025 there would be a revival of soul winning at Verity Baptist Church that soul winners will get excited and get on fire and start following up on their converts and and getting them in church and getting them in the baptistry and getting them in discipleship Lord help us to reach people and Lord we pray that as a result of the ministry of this church at this area that it would be said of our church in this area that the Word of God increase and the number of the disciples was multiplied Lord I pray you'd help us help us Lord to keep the main things the main things and Lord help us to continue to grow as you see fit in the matchless name of the Lord Jesus Christ we pray amen we're now brother RJ come up and lead us in a final song just want to give you a couple of reminders first of all don't forget that if you'd like to bring a meal for Miss Laura Beth if you've not signed up to bring a meal from Miss Laura Beth and you can see my wife after the service she has a clipboard and she can get you signed up I think she has some slots that are still open so if you're able to help with that we would appreciate that and of course that's just part of loving our church family and that's all of that is is connecting with people so if you can help with that would appreciate it and then just want to remind you again that we have a New Year's Eve service this week so no Wednesday midweek service the midweek service is being moved to Tuesday 7 p.m. normal service like we normally have singing prayer preaching at 7 p.m. on Tuesday afterwards we'll have a potluck and of course we hope that you'll come be a part of that and please bring a dish to share and then if you stay past that we'll have board games and a time of fellowship if you stay till midnight we're gonna sing songs we'll pray in the new year and we'd love for you to participate but even if you don't want to stay till midnight we have church that night you can come to church come to the potluck head out after that but just be aware of that that is on Tuesday December 31st at 7 p.m. that is a Tuesday for the New Year's Eve service and then of course if you wouldn't mind looking around if your kids made a mess or anything like that if you could pick up your row or put your handbooks back we'd appreciate your help with that we hope you know my wife and I hope you know that we love you we're praying for you and if there's anything that we can do for you please let us know why brother RJ come up and lead us in a final song a mouse carver songbooks and turn to page number three hundred and forty-three you heard pastor this evening right so we ought to be involved and one way you can be involved is by singing all right song number three hundred and forty-three by bus again sing it out on the first we praise the Oh God for the son for Jesus who died and is now gone again song number 343 on the second we praise the Oh God our Savior and scattered our night hallelujah revive us again see it out on the third and that was saying who has born all our sins and has cleansed every stain a man hallelujah revive us finish on the last revive us again fill his heart with thy love may his soul be rekindled with fire from above hallelujah thy name amen great singing before we dismiss if anyone here has questions about salvation baptism or church membership pastor will be at the door and would love to talk to you directly to someone who's trained to do that as well I'll ask brother Matt would you dismiss us with the word of prayer God bless you you're dismissed