Let's stand together and open our Bibles to Revelation 20 verse 11. We've been talking about our call to share faith with the people that we know and love. The invites are a very simple thing. I get an invite and I talk to a waiter or waitress or a neighbor or a friend and I just hand him an invite and say, hey, we'd love for you to come.
It's not a big deal. Most people are pretty kind about it whether they come or not. But what you're hoping that invite is maybe they get four or five of them. The hope is that they got layers of things across in their life that encourages them to come and be a part of things and that opens the door for greater things to happen.
And so we pray that they'll come but we pray that if they don't come the message will begin to get through to them. God will begin to move in their life. And so we just encourage them to fill our community with these invites. That's easy.
It's easy. You know, put them in a, you know, get the invitations and mail in people. It's easy. It's simple.
It's not threatening. And just do that. But what we really want to look at this and this series is how do we have this serious talk with people who we love and that we know without it being this confrontational thing where they feel like we're yelling at them, or preaching at them. But we really just show the love of Christ to them in a way that they can receive and God can begin to work in their life.
So look with me here in Revelation chapter 20 verse 11. It says, then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it from his presence, earth and sky fled away and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead great and small standing before the throne and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life.
And the dead were judged by what was written in the books according to what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades gave up the dead that were, who were in them. And they were, and they were judged each one of them according to what they had done.
Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. Father, we thank you for your word that gives us fair warning.
We thank you for your grace that gives us a way of escape. And Father, we recognize that our greatest mission on this earth as people who know you, love you, believe in you, trust your word, is to warn others of this day and to call them to consider the claims of Christ in their life. Help us to do that in this city. Help us help our church father just to push together with all of our strength to call people to Christ.
Let us be an evangelistic group of people in Jesus' name. Amen. When Stephen the first martyr was being stoned to death for his faith, he prayed for God to forgive the people who were doing it. And he commended his spirit to the Lord.
This is one of the key things for us to understand is when we die, we don't cease to exist. Our body ceases to function. And our spirit goes to stand before God. When I stood the graveside of my father, I knew his body on this earth ceased to function.
But his spirit was before God. That's the first death. It's destined unto man once today. It is not destined unto man twice today, but some people will die twice.
This will not be a separation of man from his body again. This is a separation of man from God, the giver of every good and perfect gift. And the only place for him to go at that point in time is to this place of judgment. And the Bible calls it the lake of fire.
And so we have to understand this as we look at this is one of the most awesome pictures, most stirring pictures drawn in the Bible. John the revelator sees this picture of all of mankind coming before God. And at the end of the day, the question is, is your name in the book of life or isn't it? The picture of eternity is drawn here.
That every living soul, every person we ever see and ever know is going to spend eternity someplace. If you ever have someone that says they don't believe the Bible teaches anything about hell, take them right to the scripture. This is very, very clear. Name's not written in the book of life.
You call it by whatever name you want to call it. But they are cast in the lake of fire. That does not sound good to me. So every person is going to spend eternity someplace.
We are going to spend it in the presence of God doing the work that he has for us for eternity. Or we are going to spend it separated from him for eternity. The lake of fire is not a place where you go hang out with your buddies. It's not a place where you go drink beer and party with your friends.
The lake of fire is a place of absolute punishment for our rebellion, for being broken creatures and instead of giving glory to God, live our own way. And I always like to remind folks, you won't stand before God ten seconds before you'll know without a doubt when you see his glory and his power and his wonder until our whole mind set will change. And it will not be a wonder that anybody was sent to hell. It's a wonder that anybody gets to go to heaven.
You'll understand the grace of God that allows us to go to heaven and how much we really deserve to be separated from him for eternity. The picture of judgment is here for all mankind. This is why as a parent I became so crystal clear focused that the most important thing I do as a parent is prepare my children for eternity. The most important thing is how great I help them become athletically, not even close.
The greatest thing is how good grades they get, not even close. The greatest thing is how socially, not even close. The most important job I have is to help them be ready for eternity, to stand before God to know who he is and to receive the grace of God on their life. That is my single most important job.
Everything has to be absolutely submitted to that. Nothing else takes that place. Everything else has to be subjected to that. This picture of judgment is for all mankind.
So we think about the people that we love, a brother that we love, a sister that we love, a mom or dad that we love, an aunt or an uncle that we love, a co-worker that we like and we find to be a great person. We think of all these people that we know around us and that great and small, this scripture says, great and small are going to stand before God. Great and small. They're going to stand there in that moment for judgment.
It is the most serious and awesome of thoughts that everyone's going to stand there in that moment. If your name's not written in that Lamb's book of life, popularity pulls me nothing. How much you accomplished on this earth means nothing. Don't know how many good deeds you did on this means nothing.
Know how much money you make and even gave away. It means nothing. Nothing means anything until your name's written in that Lamb's book of life. Your name's not there.
It's a matter how nice a guy you were. You've either accepted Christ, you've either been drawn to Him or you've rejected Him. And the picture that is drawn here is one of only, as of one and only hope is drawn here. This is what the picture is about.
There's only one hope. There's not many ways. There's not several ways. There's not a couple of ways.
There's one way. That is your name's written in the Lamb's book of life and the Lamb being Christ who paid the price for us on Calvary so that we can be born again. We will all have our time here at the Great White Thrown Judgment. Every one of us will stand there solely before God someday.
And so will everyone we know. Now let me ask you. At the moment you hear well done and grateful, good and faithful servant. How's that going to feel?
I don't think there's anything in the world going to feel better than that. I think every going to have an experience that's going to feel better than that moment. And you've been faithful to God. You've been faithful to trust Him.
You've been faithful to obey Him. You've done the ministry He's called you to do. You've been a witness He's called you to be. You've given the way He's told you to give.
You've served the way He's told you to serve. You've let your spirit get cleaned up and your life get cleaned up the way He's called you to. You put your full trust in Him the way He's called you to and now you stand before God and you hear well done, good and faithful servant. That's going to be an awesome moment isn't it?
You've just been confirmed that your name is in the book. So you're feeling pretty good at that moment. It's a pretty good moment. And your brother's name is called who doesn't know Christ.
Your friend's name is called, your sister's name is called. Your co-workers name is called. And you watch them walk before the great judge. And instead of hearing well done good and faithful servant, they hear it apart from you.
I never knew you. See, I hear people say from time to time, oh there's no tears in heaven. I hear say it fiendles sometimes. Well, there's no tears for them anymore.
It's not what the Bible says. Tears don't get wiped away till after this. Through the millennium, after through the Second Coming of Christ, all the way through the millennium, there's tears in heaven. There's sorrow as we watch, the judgment of God, and there's sorrow for our part in it.
You know, I'll tell you, when I think about this, I carry some guilt that drives me to prayer for some people that I've known over my life that I haven't been as faithful of witness to as I should. I have friends from high school that I could have been a better witness to, and I still pray for them. Whenever I think about them, I pray God, wherever they're at today, whatever they're doing today, since somebody was a more faithful witness than I was. Because they're going to spend eternity someplace.
We can't let our discomfort and how somebody may react keep us from saying and doing the right thing. Whether God points it out to us, I don't know if he will or not. Whether they look at us in that moment and see us in that moment who knew them and set next to them for 20 years in a workplace or lived next door to them for 15 or 20 years or set at the Thanksgiving table with them all of our life, it's going to be an awesome moment. Not awesome, good, awesome, bad.
When we think about loved ones, separate from God. I think the one soul that we're going to have in that moment is if we try to share faith with them. I think the terrible thing in that moment is when we never try to share faith with them. I know, I know.
They're just not interested. They're not interested. They're not interested. I know.
They're resistant. They get upset. I know. I know.
They make a joke of my faith. Some people do. I just don't want them to feel like I'm preaching at them. I don't want them to feel like I'm preaching at them either.
They had their own faith. I could be insulting because they had their own faith that we know is false. I didn't know what to say. Or I was afraid that they would have a question I couldn't answer.
At that moment, at the great white throne judgment, how powerful do you think those arguments are going to feel at that moment? All of our excuses will ring hollow at the great white throne judgment. At the great white throne judgment, I don't even think that simply inviting people that we know well to church will be enough for us. I think the people that God put in our life that we have relationship with, if I just meet somebody on the street or there are waitresses, I don't know them very well, I don't have much of a relationship to do much more than hand them and invite and encourage them to come.
But wow, what about the people I'm around all the time? Well, that had been enough. Is that the ultimate call that God has on us? To simply hand them an invite.
It might be a start. But I think if we love them, they need more than that. They deserve more than that. So what should we do?
We should share our testimony. Our testimony isn't preaching. Our testimony isn't condemning. Our testimony isn't attacking.
We're not looking at them saying, oh, your faith is wrong. We're not looking at them at that moment saying, oh, your actions are filled with sin. We're not saying any of those things. We're talking about our faith.
We're talking about how God changed us. We're talking about the hope that we have in Christ and we want them to know about it. And we're praying that the Holy Spirit will do His work as we do that. I want you to see this in two times.
One, just in the process of life. In the process of life a couple of weeks ago, we took time to write down the names of people in our lives. And if you weren't here a couple of weeks ago, I would encourage you to do this. Sit down and think about your family.
Think about your coworkers. Think about your friends. Think about your associates. Think about all these things.
All these places. And the people that are there, there's some you know are saved. Thank God for them to pray for them. There's some you know are not saved.
And there's some you don't know anything about them. Do you think it's our responsibility to know? I think guys tell me, guys who are great salesmen say, I don't know how to do this. You're a salesman.
What do you think I gave you that gift for? Do you think it's just gave you that gift to make money? You can present an argument and win an argument. You think God gave you that ability just to win some arguments?
You know all about baseball. You can talk about all the baseball teams. You think God gave you that ability just to learn about baseball? God gave us our abilities for his kingdom.
Sometimes he uses them to help us make some money to be a salesman, to do some other things. But ultimately the ultimate call is to take all of our gifts and use them for God's glory. I want to challenge you. How are you using your gifts to maximize the kingdom?
To move into the kingdom? Your charisma, your ability on computers. How are you using it to draw people to Christ and help them know this message? So one is just the process of life.
And two, I would tell you this other aspect is let's say this Easter, you give somebody of the card and you invite them and they're your co-worker and you invite them to church. Now what? They come. They show up on good Friday, they show up on Easter.
And you know, they're kind of, hey, thanks for coming. I hope you enjoyed, hope you come back. And they kind of walk out wondering how important is this thing to them anyway? I want to tell you, this is a couple of things you can do this year at Easter especially.
One, we're going to have the welcome center open at all four of the services over here on Easter Sunday. There'll be people over there. Walk them, hey, let's walk over to the wellness, let's go get your gift, let's go over here and talk to these folks and just let them meet some people that are friendly. Let's walk them over there and talk now.
Here's one of the great things you can do. Hey, before we leave, before we leave out here, can I just share with you why I come here? Can I just share with you what I believe? And you share your testimony with them.
I'm going to tell you, if we learn to do that, there'll be a lot of people that will get saved right then. Let me tell you something, thank you, glad you shared that with me. And that's the ones you look at and you say, hey, watch my life, I'm going to keep praying for you. I'm going to keep, can I ever do anything for you?
Let me know. I'm going to invite you to some other things. I have questions about this. You keep that at the place where it's not at, oh, you've got to accept Christ right now.
No, God, maybe you're doing to work there. Let him do his work. But I'm telling you, if we'll share our testimonies, if you'll take that moment and share your faith with them, take a minute with them. And we'll talk about doing this in three minutes.
This will be that moment. Even when the welcome center's not open or doing anything, take around and introduce them to some of your friends. But when you brought a friend to church, I want to encourage you to be bold enough to trust God enough that when it's over to share your story with them. Now that's especially true if they get saved.
If they raise their hand for salvation, that's especially true. Now I'm giving you permission tonight. If you get a friend to church and you're sitting with them or if he seeks away from them, during the prayer time and we're making the appeal, you can open your eyes and watch, okay? You can kind of peek around and see giving you permission.
And if they do that, if they raise their hand and they ask Christ in their life and then we say, hey, come around. If you want to come down to the altar and pray for one of our prayer teams, just walk over to them and say, hey, Joe, if that's their name, why don't we go down to the altar together? Why don't we go down together? I'm glad to go with you, man.
Would you like to go down and pray with somebody? Listen, just that little step, just that little urge, just that little help. It can help somebody take a, just really begin to take some steps in faith that'll be good for them. And walk down to the altar with them and pray with somebody with them and pray with them.
That becomes a real, that's a perfect time then to say, hey, let's, you know, the other crowds come in here and say, before they get in here, let's sit down here and let's talk about, let me tell you my story. We tell what's going on with me. And all that does is begin to pour more faith into their life and more power into their life as we share our story. Remember, there's power in our testimony.
This is primary for us to understand. There is anointing and power inside of our stories and how we came to Christ. Again, some key points for you to think about. What was my life like before Christ?
What drew me to Christ? What is my life like afterwards? Now that I've come to Christ, why does this matter? And what is the hope that I have now?
I've asked Pastor Paul if he would to come. I'm going to ask him to do this right now. And just three minutes, this is three minutes, friends. You don't have 20 minutes.
When you share your testimony, you got three minutes. If he gets past three minutes, then it begins to feel like you're preaching at him. And that's what we don't want to do. We want to share our story with him and let the Spirit of God do his thing in him.
So Paul, share your story with us tonight, would you? My grandfather was a minister and didn't go to his church too much because we weren't around him. My mom, she did missionary work when she was 18 for a number of years. And we traveled and moved around a lot.
Before I was 10, we moved eight times, lived in a few states. But then we ended up in Pittsburgh, went to a Presbyterian church for some reason. I think it was just the closest church to where we lived. And I'd go to church and it was just, say it was dry, it was dull.
And it wasn't anything there. I'd go home on Sundays to watch the Steelers and as I'm flipping through the stations, I'd see these churches that really loved God. And sometimes it was a black church. They were just excited to see the worship.
And I'm like, that's the kind of church I want to go to. And so I would see these and then I'd go back to Presbyterian church the next Sunday. And just sit there waiting for it to get over with until some things happened in my family's life. My mom and dad had fallen away from God.
Something happened with my dad at the workplace and ended up that they both rededicated their lives in the same day because it was really kind of a tragic thing. But it ended up moving us to Illinois. And so I came out after first year of college, moved into a house that cousin mine was living in in Jacksonville. And my dad was traveling to state and he says, Sunday I'm going to take it to church.
I said, OK, he hadn't been in church a little bit. And he brought me to Calvary. And so I come into Calvary and the worship's going on. I'm like, all right.
This is when I saw on TV. I've never seen this before. This is good. And I really enjoyed it and went back to Jacksonville.
And then the next Sunday he said, want to go to church? And I said, yeah, we came back to Calvary. That day there was an altar call at the end. And it was something that just compelled me.
It just drew me down to the altar that day. And I went down and I gave my heart to the Lord. Now I wasn't a bad person really before. I got saved.
I was good. I behaved. I was good at you and go with girls who do. And I was a pretty good kid.
But I realized that I wasn't going to heaven. After I accepted Jesus Christ in my heart and then studying the Word of God and getting to know God and having a relationship instead of a religion. Because that's really what I had. I had a religion before I got saved.
I was just going in punching the clock, going to church, punching the clock, going home. There wasn't anything in between Sunday and the next Sunday. And then when I came here, I got into a relationship with God which I saw other people who really loved God. And it changed my life and then God started speaking to me and then later on called me into the ministry.
And I'm still learning, still growing, still wanting to see God do things in my life. But it's all because I have a relationship. Because God touched me in such a way on a Sunday morning because my dad invited me to come. I could have told him no, but I thought I would just go and hate to say to appease him.
One of the greatest decisions I ever made in my life. Amen. Yeah, thank you Paul. If you go to McDonald's to buy hamburger, that's one thing.
If you go to McDonald's because you work there, that's another thing, isn't it? Responsibilities are different. I just want to remind you, believers, when you come to church, you work here. You're part of the kingdom.
You're under the call of our Lord. And what that means is a couple of things. One, I would tell you, if there's a piece of paper on the ground, pick it up. If the sinks and the kitsch in the bathrooms are all wet, before you leave, pick up a paper town, dry them off.
Take ownership. This is our church. Amen. If there's somebody you don't know, if you were at home and there was somebody sitting in your living room and you didn't know them, you wouldn't just go about your business, would you?
This is our home. Amen? This is our home. Treat it like our home.
Treat it like our home. Love you. I want you to listen to what Paul just said here. When it's worship time, listen, worship time is not critique time.
Oh, the guitar is a little loud today. Let's write that down. Oh, Danny, you know, he missed that cue. Okay, we'll write that down.
It's not critique time. Worship time is what? Worship time. Worship time.
And when we worship, we worship because he's worthy of it. We worship whether we feel good or don't feel good. We worship whether we had a good week or a bad week. We worship because he's worthy, not because everything is just going good for us.
And as we worship, the presence of God gives us the strength to get through things that aren't going good for us. And as we worship, God inhabits the praises of his people. And things happen when we come in and say, today, I'm going to worship God. Let me tell you, on the way to church, you need to be getting ready for church.
I will enter his gates with thanksgiving in my heart. We come getting ready. When I come to church on Sunday morning, I don't turn on the radio. I'm getting ready.
I'm thinking about what's going to happen, what we're going to do. That we want to be pleasing to God. I just want to challenge you. This is one of the great things that church can do, is be this great church of praise and worship that enters into the prayer time, that does the things that are at, that takes the word of God seriously and listens and comes to the altar easy.
Come to it easy. You're going through something. Come get prayer. I've been down there before the last five Sundays, people think something's wrong.
You know what? Everybody knows something's wrong. There's something wrong with all of us. Come get prayer.
Amen. Come and see God together. And on top of all, be friendly with people. Amen?
All right. Is there one or two other people who would be willing to come share their testimony tonight? I'm going to give you a chance here. Come and share who's bold enough.
You've done it a couple of times with groups who's bold enough to come and share it with everybody tonight. Come on, Terry. Come on, Ruth. I'll give you guys the first two.
Come on down. Let's welcome these guys as they come tonight. This is a bold thing to do. Some of you have heard this before.
Whoa. I was an alcoholic and a drug addict. I talked to the Christian talk. I didn't walk the walk.
I lived in 24, 7 guilt and shame for a long, long time. I hit it from my wife, from my kids. I was real good at it. And then I get caught.
Around the year 2000, I started hearing a voice. And I said, you've got to go killin' yourself. I said, leave me alone. And I kept going about my business.
I worked hard. Didn't like people. They were in my way of getting to my addictions. And a few months later, the same voice.
You've got to go killin' yourself. I said, leave me alone. And finally, I should have started the story with this. My sister at this point had been praying for me for 35 years.
Finally, on September 17th at 7.30 at night, it was a Sunday night. I walked into my kitchen. I opened my last three miller beers, poured them out in the sink. And surrendered my life to God.
I hope you heard that. At that very instant, he delivered me from my addictions. Gone. Never looked back.
And from then on, I started doing my best to serve God by serving people who I actually really like now. And he keeps giving me the opportunity to serve. I have people, I mean, before this, I didn't even know what prayer was. I have people calling me now from Florida to pray for them.
I lead a small group as best I can and got a question for that. It just keeps getting better. Second, to get to the microphone. Listen, was there anything in that to make you mad?
Nothing in that that was condemning to you? No, there's nothing in that to make you mad. Now, the devil will make people mad. He will get people upset.
I'll tell you a quick story. I was in England years ago, and I spoke at the National Youth Conference there and was with Ian Green. We were going to be doing a lot of schools, some more schools that week. And it was really a great, great experience.
And we had driven back to the city he lived in several hours away. Probably midnight at night, we had anything to eat. He said, I know this all night, Chinese place. Let's go in there and we'll grab something and take it to the house and eat.
We'd gone in. And right behind us, we'd ordered, we'd wait on our food and a couple guys come in. They came in separately, one was dressed in a really nice suit. One was dressed pretty rough.
Had a hate tattooed on his, hate and kill, if I remember right, on his fingers. And I get to talk to him and he is just out of prison. I mean, just been out of prison less than a month. And Ian gets to talk to the guy in the suit.
And I start sharing faith with the guy who's just got out of prison. And God is just breaking him. God is just working on him. And then all of a sudden the guy in the suit goes, this ticks me off.
You'd come in here and start preaching at me like this. And with that, this guy went, well, yeah, it makes me mad too. And I'm sitting there going, I don't want a guy with hate and kill on his hand. You know, just out of prison getting mad.
And I'm like, man, you weren't mad a second ago. The enemy will stir people up sometimes. Even if it's just your story. You might make a brother, so they might get mad.
And when they did, just, hey, I'm just telling you my story. Tell you what happened to me. And I told this guy, you know what, I think the reason you're getting mad is because this guy said it and you're feeling convicted. You don't know how to act.
So mad sounds like the right way. Really, you're just getting convicted. Okay, we'll share with you this story. My name's Ruth, most of you know me.
Past of all, I went to a Presbyterian church too. A little town 20 miles from here, Tallulah, and went with my mom and dad and two brothers. And I think we started when I was about three. Tallulah started going to church and went for four, five, six years.
The church burned down, so we started going to the Christian church. And I'm not sure how long mom and dad continued to attend, but eventually they just dropped us kids off of church. And we went faithfully for three or four more years. And somewhere I got the message, if it's not important for them, I guess it's not important for me.
And I remember one night leaving the youth group, I was 12 years old, and nothing had happened. I just thought, I'm not going back. And I didn't. And it wasn't too long before some unfortunate things happened to me.
I was raped, I got into drugs and alcohol, and it continued for 16 years. And the first eight years, I thought it was having fun. And then I was addicted by that point, and when I wanted to quit, I couldn't. And for the next eight years, I just begged and pleaded, you know, foxhole prayers to get out of this drug addiction.
And God knew that I didn't really mean it. I was just wanting out of that situation. Finally, February 17, 1986, Terry, I did kind of what you did. People at work witnessed to me.
I mean, prim and proper, sweet little ladies, and I didn't speak to them very kindly. My reactions were not very nice. But that might, well, let me back up a little bit. The whole time I was out there, the only thing I heard from God was, it doesn't have to be this way.
And I just, I did the same thing you did, Terry. And it's the only thing I heard. And February 17, 1986, I called out to him. I said, God, I cannot do this anymore.
Please change my life before I end it. Set free, instantly, just like you were, Terry. Glory to God, I have not looked back. I've never had any temptations with drugs and alcohol.
And I live for the moment when God will speak through me when I don't know about it. Okay? This is a really stretch for me to get up here like this. But when I'm going just about my daily business, it happens a couple times a week.
But one day this week I got it, hoped for it. A young man was there. Well, I woke up till the morning. My electricity was off.
I got up. The house was cold. I had no intention to go out to hope that early. But I went out to hope because I could get coffee and get warm.
And got to talking to this young man. And it was just a God moment, you know? When I don't think I'm going to walk over and start talking to somebody, I stay out of the way and God can speak through me. And that's what I live for, is opportunity to share with others what God has done for me.
And you can too. Amen. Thank you. This is right there.
Ruth, don't mind. Yeah, right there. Thank you. I think it's so important to hear that people shared with Ruth.
And probably in your story, people shared with you before you came to Christ. One of the stories that I love is a story of a friend of mine. And he was standing in line. He was high, standing in line, talk or drink up.
And African-American guy was standing behind him and he turned around. They got to talk and the guy said, I can tell you're high and started witnessing to him. And my friend told him to shut up and never talk to him like that. Never saw each other again.
My friend, though, knew a girl. And the girl was married to a daughter of a guy by the name of Ruth Mann. Some of you may remember Ruth Mann. She's passed away, gone home to get the Lord.
Ruth was one of the most consistent witnesses of anybody ever known. If you got around Ruth, you're going to hear the gospel. She was going to tell you. And I don't think I'm exaggerating.
Am I exaggerating? It was just there. And in fact, my friend would tell you that they all knew to stay away from there because she would corner him. And he'd gone over this night to get to pick up her daughter and the daughter was gone.
And she said, come and sit down on this swing next to him. Now what that guy had told him at the Taco Green go had been eating on him, spirited, been working on him. And now Ruth takes off on him. And sitting there on that porch, he gave his heart to Christ years and years ago.
Now that guy, here's what I wish him. That guy in Taco Green go never knew what his role was in that guy's life. He witnessed and was told to shut up, leave me alone. But he was a part of a process that before that week was over, my friend was saved.
It come to Christ. We have to be willing to be part of that process. That one that witnesses and witnesses and doesn't see. I always think about this.
I think about the two people who walked down the street Sunday school teachers in my dad's neighborhood when he was a boy and invited him to church. And he came to church for a short time and then he was during the Depression. My grandfather moved him out of town and didn't do much church after that. To the point that when he went into the Marine Corps, they asked me if he was a Protestant or a Catholic, he didn't know what the difference was.
He didn't know what to tell him. But when he got shot on Terrawa and that island and didn't know what he was going to live or die, what did he remember? I brought back to his memory a song he learned in that Sunday school a few weeks that he went there. And it was a song based on John 3 16 and he cried out to God for God to forgive him.
And that was the beginning of his walk with God. Now those Sunday school teachers never knew that story. They never discovered what they had been a part of planting in his life. This is why VBS is important.
You never know what you're planting in a life that God will harvest 20 years later. It's why teaching Sunday school classes are important. Because you never know what you're planting in a child's life that you may not see. They may be a terror with you, but 20 years later, 10 years later, 30 years later.
At a moment in time, God brings back to their memory. A lesson they may not even remember who taught it to them. We have to be willing to be a part of that story. Amen?
Let me tell you, there's a couple things we need to make clear. One, we need to make clear. And here's the way I like to put it to folks. I have discovered that the Bible teaches that God loves us all.
That takes a lot of the pressure out of this thing. And if somebody asks me, what do I say? I take it to John 3 16 for God to love the world. And so I tell you, as you work on your testimony, keep honing it down.
Keep working it being clear. I would say the same thing over and over again, so it's so comfortable that no matter how nervous you are, it just begins to come out of you and then work some of these things into it. I discovered that the Bible teaches that God loves us all. He loves me.
He loves you. He really does. He really does. I would encourage you to work into it.
I discovered that the Bible teaches us that each person has a choice to make about Jesus. I had to make a choice about Jesus. We all have a choice to make about Jesus. We have to decide.
I discovered the Bible teaches that the only way to go to heaven is by asking Jesus into your life by putting your belief in him and that everyone who calls on his name will be saved. Everyone who calls. He's going to work that into your story. Boy, that was so relieving to me that I could be standing at the sink in my kitchen.
Calling the name of the Lord, I'd be saved. What a great moment that was for me. What a wonderful moment that was for me. And I discovered the Bible teaches that we'll all spend eternity someplace.
And if they ask you, what is there heaven or hell? Revelation 2014. And just show them that this is what the Bible teaches. Understand the process.
When you understand it, it's not that hard. If it's awkward, it's just because we haven't done it enough. The more you do something, the more you practice something. I remember when my son was little and I tried to play basketball and he tried to teach him how to do a left handed layup and he said, I can't get this.
I kept telling him, you know what, it just feels awkward right now. You'll get it. And by the time he was in high school, it was no big deal because he'd done it over and over again. And then we've got to realize that the role of the Holy Spirit, it's his role, it's his job to convict.
It's not my job to convict them. It's not my job to drag them across the line of faith. It's not my job to defeat every one of their arguments. You probably won't be able to.
It's the Holy Spirit's job to convict them and to tell them that what you're saying is true. That what you're saying is true. For those we know, actions and words are required. We talked about this last week.
My actions have to be right. If I discredit the gospel with my actions, then I have no testimony. If I discredited my life with my actions and there's people I want to witness to, I've got to make it right with them, challenge them, just watch my life from now on. I've got to live differently because my actions destroy my words until my actions and my words line up with the gospel.
And then I've got to go about this process of understanding that there's planting and watering that goes on in this process. And I may be planting today, I may be watering today. It's up to God to bring the harvest. It's up to God to grow this thing.
So the simple invite is a good place to start. We invite them to church. We invite them to come. And then you get that opportunity to share faith.
But I would tell you, if it's somebody that's not there yet, if you want to have a talk with a friend or relative, set it up. Sometimes the opportunity just comes. But I would tell you, most of the time you've got to set it up. Sometimes you're waiting for an opportunity.
And 30 years later, they're still waiting. They're standing by the person's casket saying, you know, I waited for an opportunity and never came. It's too late then. We've got to, the Bible doesn't tell us to wait.
The Bible says, go out and compel them to come into his house, to talk to them, to speak to them. So setting that time to talk by simply saying to him, hey, let's go grab a cup of coffee, let's grab lunch together. Hey, I want to have some fun, but there's something I want to share with you. Some I want to tell you.
Now you just set it up. There's something I want to tell you. There's something I want to share with you. And many, many times if you do that, before the lunches, they'll say, you get something you want to tell me.
Oh, yeah, yeah, I do. I just want to share something that's really important to me. And I just want you to think about it and just, you know, hear about it. And at some point, it's a conversation.
You find out what's their story. What's their church background been? What's their faith background been? What's going on in their life?
And then you tell them your story and what the faith background is in your life. Now, next week we're going to talk about some really important questions to ask. But I really want to challenge you to work these things into your testimony. So here's what we're going to do.
We're going to do two things before we go home. I'm going to ask you all to stand and find somebody you haven't talked to in the last two weeks and share your story with them. Amen? And then we're going to come around the altar and we're going to pray before we go home.
So is this good tonight? Yes. It's helpful? Amen.
So let's talk to a couple of one folks. Find one person who's only got three minutes and six minutes and then we'll come back and we'll come down around the altar and pray and go home. All right, folks. Time is up.
Time is up. Let's come down around the altar. You know, I hope you know how much I love you guys. I'm so blessed and honored to be able to share life with you and share this journey with you and so grateful you come out on Wednesday night.
And just, you know, my prayers that in this was just that you'll just become so confident in your story. And so assured of the Holy Spirit that you're just fearless with it. And I'm just telling you that that fearlessness comes just by stepping out in faith and beginning. And before long, you're just like, oh, this is this a piece of cake.
We're going to pray for that boldness in just a second. We're also going to pray some of you, you know, are new here, but there was a night before we moved into this building before the carpet went down before the tile went down that we gathered in this place and a lot of us did and we wrote names on the floor of people we want to see saved and we're going to pray for those names again tonight. Amen. We just joined hands with somebody standing next to you.
Father, as we close this night, I pray, first of all, for my brothers and sisters, my friends here tonight, that Father, we would have a spirit of ownership over our fellowship so that every Sunday we would present ourselves in a way and present you in a way and walk and live in a way that the lost among us and the new people among us would just be convicted and drawn to you. Father, we pray that you would put a new spirit, your spirit of boldness upon us, fearlessness upon us, confidence upon us, courage upon us. That Father, we would share our testimonies. For Father, we know that as we share our testimonies, you'll do a convicting work in people's lives.
Help us to be bold and clear. Father, the enemy lies to us about this. Let us rebuke Him and be free from it. Father, we pray for our invitations and invites and Facebook posts and all the things that we do in social media and other places that they will bear fruit in a tremendous way.
Lord, we're really stepping out and trying some new things this year to help us reach out to our community, let them be mighty and powerful. We pray. We're trying to go above and beyond and we pray you to help us in that. Father, for these names underneath this carpet and underneath this tile, Father, we lift them up before you in Jesus' name.
Father, there's some that we should go share our testimonies with. I pray you give us courage and strength to do that. There's some that you just need to stir in their heart and we pray you do that. We pray that even this Easter season, we see a harvest of them, Lord.
Move for your glory, move for your honor, and let this be a soul-winning place in Jesus' mighty matchless name. Amen. Amen. Amen.
You know, I've been counting since the first of the year. We've had about 84 people respond to salvation on Sunday mornings. And we seem to be praying for them that God will give them assurance of faith, that God will draw them to maturity and faith, that they will just grow in the kingdom. That's a birthing point.
They've got to grow in the end. He tries to rob that seed. He tries to rob that seed. Now, you know, I was a youth pastor for a long time.
If I was a youth pastor, this is what I would say to the youth group. I would say there are six stations around this building. You cannot leave this room until you've got to pray to every one of them. I know you're adults and I can't say that to you.
I can fake teenagers out with that. They thought they really couldn't leave until they did that. Now they would hang out and pray. I want to encourage you, if you're going to fellowship, go out and enter your way in fellowship.
For the next five or six, seven minutes, pick one or two of these stations and just go over and take a minute and pray for the prayer requests that are at those stations. If you want to pray for all of them, take all the time you want. They won't chase you out. They'll pray for a couple of them before you go if you can.
I love you. God bless you. Go on name of the Lord. May His joy be in your heart.