A Biblical View of Missions - Mark Yoder | CGS 2021

Lesson Transcript

It's good to be here with you today, and the subject I'll be sharing is one that's close to my heart, a biblical concept of missions. And this subject is a very wide subject, and I for sure will not be able to cover it all. I'd like to look at some things with you, and this is true in Latin America, in Costa Rica, or Peru, or in Pennsylvania. Praise the Lord. The Lord gave us instructions in the Bible. We have examples.

And the most wonderful thing about the work of Jesus is that Jesus said, "I will build my church." Who builds the church? Jesus himself. Jesus himself is the Lord, the head, and the director. I'm sure I know Brother Dale. I'm sure he did. And Brother Ernest, I met you for the first time. I'm sure everyone that's here today has prayed, has spent time in prayer. I've laid awake in bed at night thinking, and I have received inspiration from Jesus through the Holy Spirit.

Because Jesus still leads and builds his church. He's the most important person in this project. So we need to follow his instructions. We need to know how he wants to work. And we have a problem. We tend to sometimes imitate and learn from others. And I want you to know we can learn a lot from others. We all do. We all have learned so much from others. But sometimes it is easy for us to copy some of the Protestant methods.

And the difference when I talk about Protestant methods, I'm not being critical of Protestant missionaries. There have been some admirable, wonderful examples, men committed to the word of the Lord and to the work. But there is a difference, and I'm not criticizing that. I'm simply saying there is a difference in the Protestant method and the biblical method. And that's what I'd like to help us with.

I think I have seen some missions who basically adapt the Protestant method, but along with that, they want to teach the veiling, non-resistance, and a few things like this. But the basic, the method is Protestant. And I'm not being critical of that. I just want today, I want to talk about this difference comes all the way back to the Reformation.

If you studied history, I love history, you studied the difference of the two philosophies, the two ways of looking at things, the Protestants and the biblical, we can call them Anabaptists or however you like to call them, there's a difference. And that is still affecting our mission approach today. And I do not feel like I have the answers to all this. I'm still learning. I've made a lot of mistakes. The church sent me, attended us to a new work six months after we were married.

I've given my 36, 37 years of life to that. But I've made a lot of mistakes, and I'm still learning. I've got a lot to learn. But I do want, and I want to encourage us today, is that we should look at Jesus and his methods, and not just read books and follow other men's methods. I want to start off looking at some basic things, some foundational things that help us, that give us direction in how we do the Lord's work. First of all, I want to ask you a question. Why did Jesus come to the world?

I'm not asking you to answer me. I just want you to think about it. Why did Jesus come to the world? I imagine a large percentage of us, and if I would have been sitting there, maybe I would have too, said he came to die for our sins. That's true. Another question. What is salvation? If you could say that in just one little phrase, what is salvation? Many of us would say, quick, forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness of sins is very precious. I hope I never lose the wonder, the marvel that God forgave me my sins.

I'm not putting that down. But forgiveness of sins is simply a means to a purpose. I like to use this example. I've used it before. At home, my boys like to grill meat. And sometimes we get together and have a little grilling of meat. And I enjoy that. But let's say someone, I don't know if any of you here have worked in a hog barn. Before I was married, I worked at a sale barn, and I hauled hogs, and I got so dirty sometimes. One time, I took my clothes off at the door of the house, the back door.

There wasn't anyone around. I left my clothes on the outside because I was so stinky, even in my hair and everything. It smelled like hogs. Okay, let's say there's someone like this working with hogs, and we want to grill meat. What do we do first of all? Hey, please, go bathe. Wash your hair. Bathe yourself well. Put on new clothes. Clean your fingers. Get yourself clean your nails. Get out here. And then we grill meat. Forgiveness of sins, this is a poor example, is like the bath and cleaning up.

But the reason for forgiveness of sins is we have something to do. Now, let's stop and think a little bit about Jesus. Have you ever stopped and thought about, and a few years ago, I was asked to do some teaching on Jesus as King, and I read the Gospels over and over and over again to find the real Jesus. We often don't realize it. We have certain pictures of Jesus that we like and we use.

But I would encourage you to, all of you, take time and read the Gospels over and over and over again and find all of what Jesus said. You know, we have some of those beautiful stories of the parable of the prodigal son. That title, I should say, should actually be the waiting father rather than the prodigal son. We have the parable of the lost sheep. And I would say the better title would be the seeking shepherd. We have so many things like this. But do you know which writer in the Bible spoke most about hell?

Do you ever do that? I don't have the numbers with me. I would have them home somewhere. I did that. I checked it out. It took me so easy on a laptop, you know. Check out, all the time someone talked about hell. Who do you think talked the most about hell in the Bible? Who do you think gave us the most instructions or told us more what hell is like than anyone else? Paul? No. Revelations? Revelations has more than Paul. But the person who talked most about hell and what hell is like is Jesus himself.

You know, the Old Testament, the concept of hell was sort of vague. They were learning. And Jesus brought that, and he taught that so much. So we need to see the total picture. And I'm not trying to scare anyone. We need a total picture of what Jesus says. How much did you're all students of the Bible. I'm not going to take the time to do this, but how much of Jesus' teaching was about forgiveness of sins? It's there. The prodigal son, the story of the adulterous lady.

I used to cry when I was going to stress inconvertido. I'm sorry. I'd rather preach in Spanish. Would it be okay if I'd switch? But the adulterous lady, when Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn thee. Go and sin no more." When I was newly converted, I would cry singing that song, the song, "Neither do I condemn thee." Wonderful word, divine. Jesus talked about forgiveness. Yes. But what was the emphasis of his message? Let's stop and think about the Sermon on the Mount.

Does the Sermon on the Mount talk about forgiveness? Yeah? It mentions it? The Lord's Prayer, it says, "If we don't forgive others, he will not forgive us." The Beatitudes, the beginning, give the conditions of a heart that's repentant and that God can forgive. But what I'm trying to help us to see is that the emphasis of God's teaching was not, I mean, Jesus' teaching was not forgiveness of sins. That's an important part. Please don't quote me as saying that. I'm saying it's not important.

Without forgiveness of sins, without the new birth and the finding of new life, we cannot serve him. We cannot. You've been memorizing, some of you, I think. Well, that's tomorrow, I guess. The Romans 8. Without the Spirit of God, we cannot be his. And Jesus said, what was Jesus? What was the first thing he'd say? He'd say first, what did he say? "Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand." Repent. Why? We need to repent to have forgiveness of sins. But you know what?

We need to repent to be able to work as a brotherhood. The repentance is not only to be forgiven. Repentance is a, what's the word I want? It's something we need in our hearts to be able to function in the kingdom of God. That's such a problem when we have people trying to serve God and don't have a repentant heart. Pride and anger and so many things. So repentance, yes. We need repentance for forgiveness of sins.

But we need a deep repentance, like Brother Dale said here at the end, a broken heart to be able that God can use us to grill meat. You know what I'm saying? To build the kingdom of God. What is the emphasis of the Sermon on the Mount? You don't have to look it up. Chapter 5, verse 13. "Ye are the salt of the earth. But if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? It is stands forth good for nothing but to be cast out and to be trodden underfoot of men. Ye are the light of the world.

A city that has sit on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick. And it giveth light to all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works." And what's the rest? "And glorify your Father which is in heaven." That's why we were saved. That's why Jesus came to this world was to take people out of the kingdom of darkness, rescue people out of the kingdom of darkness, and transfer them to the kingdom of light.

And the purpose is, you know, if not, he'd just take us home right away. It wouldn't have been nice as soon as we come converted, just take us home to heaven, each one. As soon as we get converted, go back to heaven. I mean, go to heaven. But that's not why we were saved. We were saved to be a light. And the U.S. needs it. Costa Rica needs it. The whole world needs it. It's so we are a light that people see God. It says that, "Let your light so shine before men." Don't put it under a bushel and hide it.

Let it shine that they may see. See what? Your good works. "And glorify your Father which is in heaven." Jesus spoke a lot about the kingdom of the earth, of the kingdom of God here on earth. That's what it's all about. And I feel so privileged. I want to encourage it's such an honor to have been called to the kingdom of God. Who am I? Who is Mark Yoder that he can be a part of the kingdom of God? I mean, this is the biggest thing that ever happened on the earth. You know that?

Kingdoms come, kingdoms fall, that poem that the brother read earlier. Kingdoms come, kingdoms fall, kingdoms. The most important thing that happens on the earth is what God is doing in his people. And you and me are called to that. Isn't that wonderful? To live by his teaching. Why are we so different from the world, our people that are ashamed to be different from the world? Well, that's what it's all about. If you're not different from the world, you have nothing to offer.

We're different from the world because we are following a different king. We have different values. We think different. We're not different just because I'm part of a Mennonite church. I hope not. But we are different because we think different. Our values are different. And that God wants that to be evident, seen. You want excitement. Think about that. Is your life boring? Think about that. You were called, you, you were called to show the glory of the king on the earth. That's what Jesus is talking about.

Now, I want to step back another step backward. Brother Ernest pretty well touched the three points that I want to touch here to start with. Now, let's step back a little farther. Let's look at the whole picture. We were talking about Jesus. Now, let's look at the whole story. What's the whole story of the book? Some of you say Jesus Christ. Amen.

Ever since God took Adam out of, took Eve out of Adam's side, the husband, the wife, the bride, and Christ, I think everything that and all the way through Revelations, the last chapter, the theme is Jesus Christ. Yes. But what is the whole purpose of this? What is the story all about? What's God doing? Some years ago when I was young, I appreciate a brother. He was an older man. He took me aside. And he sat down an afternoon with me. And he had some charts he showed me.

And he told me, and he showed to me how the whole story through the whole book is God's wants to have a people of his own here on the earth. Adam and Eve failed. Then we have the story of Cain and Seth and their descendants. Then we have Noah and Noah's descendants. And then we have Abraham. And Abraham, in your descendants will all the kingdoms of the world be blessed. Because all through the book, the purpose is God wants a special people to show his glory. I love nature, flowers, birds, trees, clouds.

All of this shows the glory of God. But the most beautiful representation of the glory of God and the best image is in our lives when we follow his directions. In the Old Testament, Deuteronomy 4, I'm just going to read it. If you want to look for it, you can. Deuteronomy 4, verse 5 to 8. This is what the purpose was in the Old Testament. Behold, I have taught you statues and judgments even as the Lord my God commanded me. This is Moses talking.

Behold, I have taught you statues and judgments even as the Lord my God commanded me that you should do so in the land whether you go to possess it. Keep therefore and do them, for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations which shall hear all these statues and say. Now, notice, these are the pagan cultures around them. They're going to look at them and see the way they live. And they're going to say, "Surely, this great nation is a wise and understanding people.

For what nation is so great who hath God so nigh to them? As the Lord, our God, is in all things that we call upon him for. And what nation is there so great that hath statues and judgments so righteous as all this law which I set before you this day?" You remember the story of the queen of Sabah in Spanish, Sheba, the crown of Sheba that went to see Solomon's heart? This is Old Testament, of course. And he says, "Wow." When Daniel was in, I'm going to confuse them the story. And let's just say it this way.

And he said, "There's some men in the kingdom of Babylon. They have a different God and they have different laws. They're different because they have different laws they follow." And then Deuteronomy 7 says like this, "For thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy God. The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself above all people that are upon the face of the earth. The Lord did set his love upon you." No, sorry. Let's start there.

"The Lord did not set his love upon you nor choose you because you were more in number than any people. For you were the fewest of all people. But because the Lord loved you and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto his fathers." There were people that were different. He has a different God and different laws. Now, let's jump to the New Testament. That's the story all through the book. The New Testament, what did it say? It says the same thing.

First Peter 2, "But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people that you should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light, which in time past were not a people but now are the people of God, which have not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy." There's forgiveness. There's the calling into the kingdom. But the purpose of the kingdom is to show forth the praises of him. You want excitement?

Mother with the children, fathers, young men at the work and jobs, young people, young ladies, you are called to show the glory of Jesus in your character, the way you live. Now, here's another exciting point. I'm just going to throw this out about you because I don't have time. We looked at Jesus. We looked at the total story of the book very briefly. And now the next one. The whole concept of this is built on God's character. This is a deep, deep... You can dig on this one.

We need to do missions according to the way God's character. And any teaching, any teaching that you ever do that's worth teaching is based upon who God is. I'm not going to take my time with that. But you think about that. Seeking the best method for missions is to see God in the word and then in Jesus. To see Jesus, God's heart, and follow his heart. But God wants us... wants to call out a special people. That's the job we have. You know, you compare this to... Have you ever seen his tracts?

Maybe you've given them out too. And on the back of the tract, it says, "I can't say exactly something about you. If you want to become saved, read... say this little prayer." And then now you're a Christian and now find yourself a church or something. Read your Bible or something. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, I'm not saying that no one can become saved reading that tract and reading that prayer. But in my experience, it's not that easy. Brother Ernest was talking about this lady.

Just hearing about it, it's exciting because you know what? In that lady's life, the Holy Spirit was working. It was the Spirit of God. And you can't just lead people to Christ by repeating this little prayer or come up to the front and raise your hand or, you know, do this and do that and now you're a believer. It's not quite like that. Now, I'm not saying that in those campaigns were some... you know, how many people were saved?

There's one man, he was riding the bus and I heard him telling something to the distance. I was in this country and I had so many campaigns and there were... and he had a number, I forget the number, it doesn't matter, a few hundred I think of people that were saved and there were more people that were healed. In these campaigns, so many people were saved and so many people were healed. Well, I praise the Lord. I hope so. But so many times in a situation like this, people respond. They come.

They're sincere seekers and they do call out. But if there's no backup, no working with these people, a lot of those people drop back out and fizzle out again because it's not that easy. And the purpose, again, in Acts, in Ephesians 2, a beautiful thing. For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is a gift of God, not of works as any man should boast. Do you know what the verse says before that?

The verse before that says that in the ages to come, the ages here on the earth, 2021, 2022, 2023, until the Lord comes, and then in the ages to come, he, he might show forth the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us. The purpose of salvation is that we show him. And then the verse after this one says, "For we are his workmanship." That means we are recreated. The work of regeneration within us is his work. The work that I... exciting to hear about that lady. I know what it's exciting to see.

The Holy Spirit is doing that work. It's not something I have done. I've just been a vessel. But the Holy Spirit is doing that work. We are his workmanship. It's a work of his Spirit in our lives. And if we don't have people being changed and transformed by the Spirit of God, we're losing our time. But when that happens, it says, "For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus." Why? "Unto good works." And listen to this. "Which God hath ordained..." Excuse me.

"Which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." God has, before we were converted, way back already, he decided what were the good works and we should live. Do you want to make this interesting? This is all related back to his name and his glory. He decides. The character of God decides how we should live. You can think about that one. I'll just throw that one and you think about it. So, our work. Now, let's look at Matthew 28. I think Ernest talked about that one too quickly here.

I started at 11, right? Yes. Okay. I'm going to try to. Matthew 28:18. The great commission we all know so well and we all love this commission. Not a few months ago, my father is very old and weak. He can hardly walk. He's a different man than what he used to be. But not too long ago, we were there at the family. And I forget did I ask him something, but anyway, he leaned forward in his recliner.

And he got that shine in his eyes and he quoted the scripture because I've heard him preach hundreds of times about this passage. And he was telling us and my children this is the message we need to follow. Okay? Let's look at it. Let's read it. We all know it. You probably know it by memory. I could say it easier in Spanish than in English. But anyway, "All power is given to me in heaven and in earth." Wow. "All power is given to me in heaven and in earth." Excuse me. Sorry.

"All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore... therefore, because of this..." I mean, we go with the backing of all the power of God. All power is given to us. "So then go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." Amen. Let's just look at that. Just cut... break it up a little bit.

Number one, all power. The work is done. The work over the defeat of the powers of Satan. Satan is defeated. Satan has lost his power under the power of Jesus Christ. If we have... we're with Jesus, Satan is defeated. God is with us. Let's move forward. Then he tells us, "Go ye therefore and teach all nations. Go ye therefore. Because of this, Satan has been defeated. The kingdom of darkness has been defeated. We have a message.

Be it the mountains in Peru and Costa Rica, Pennsylvania, wherever you're from, we have a message. The Lord Jesus Christ has overcome the powers of darkness and every human being that repents and has faith in Jesus can be saved, can be translated from the kingdom of darkness, taken out into the kingdom of light." Jesus said, "I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail." We've got that promise behind us.

But then he says, "Go and teach all nations." Now, I'm not going to argue here with your King James Version that the word here about teach is a good word. It's true. The Spanish said, "Make disciples." And I checked it again just this morning to make sure that I was not going to say something wrong. I checked on my laptop again. The word... the Greek word there is more than just teaching is... teaching is part of it. But the purpose of teaching and...

have you ever seen someone speak when I taught school and we'd have a brethren of church come in and give devotions? And we have men that would communicate with the children, you know? They communicate and the children sit there like this. We have some older men and God bless them. They're wonderful men, but they're not used to communicating with the children. So they'll get up here and they'll read the scripture here and they will give a lecture and they're talking like to adults. It's fine.

I appreciate so much they'd come to school, you know? But they didn't communicate with the children. They just read the scripture and they preached like a little message to it and the children didn't catch on. You ever seen that? So teaching is more the... you have not taught much until the people you're teaching have learned something. So the teaching, yes. But making disciple, the call here is we should take these people and I should first be a disciple.

Just reading that the other day and Paul says that again and again. "Follow me..." Look at my example. Can you say that? Paul said that repeatedly. "Follow me as I follow Christ. Learn from Him." If you're... what? Older brother. Here's Brother Ernest. If you're living close to Ernest, you see he's following Christ, learn from him not to follow Ernest, but to follow Christ. I have not accomplished much till I have taken someone and then he is following Christ. I can lead him. I can help him. You can take that lady.

You can show scripture to her. But the goal is that she now is a disciple of Jesus Christ. Each one of us personally. That's a... wow. We get a church and everyone is excited and each one is being led by Jesus Christ. Something is going because all power is behind it. So make disciples. Lead them to Jesus. Then it says, "Baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost." And I won't go into this, but you know so the Bible says, "Baptized into His body." Jesus is the head.

But Jesus is not a headless being. Jesus, at least here on the earth, the way He wants to function, He is the head and it's so exciting. I'm sure... I'm not going to ask you to raise your hands. How many of you prayed this morning? How many of you sought the Lord this morning? How many of you in the last week have received a word from the Lord? A word of encouragement. Just the other day again, I went to visit... the last day before I was home, I went to visit two people. I went to visit before I...

and I said, "Lord, what do I share with Him?" I got a whole Bible in front of me. When I pray something like that, God usually gives me something. Do this. I prayed a lot about this meeting. This message today is for me the most exciting one I'm going to be sharing this weekend. Don't tell the next people. But in my... I spent some time in the hospital with COVID.

In my bed in the hospital in COVID, I was not sure if I'd be able to get here and I was praying and I received some inspiration for this down in the hospital. Jesus leads us. Does Jesus lead you? Making disciples is to lead people to having Jesus lead them. And we're all following Jesus together and worshiping Him. We're just servants. Ministers are just servants. But Jesus leads the church. We're all baptized. It's so much easier to have an individual faith, just me and myself. But Jesus leads us into a body.

Study your New Testament again. Read it over. Sometimes it's sort of like they say, "You can't see the forest because there's too many trees in the way." If you... you know, if you read your Bible carefully, the Bible is full of a thing of a body working together, relationships, forgiveness. He even says, "Bearing with one another." That implies that we're going to have weaknesses. You know, working together. Have you ever done a study of the phrase? If not, do something.

You know, preach some next Sunday or whenever you're going to preach it. Do you preach ever? Make a study of the words "one another" in the Bible. And it's the New Testament. Of course, the main one is love one another. But then it's exhort one another daily. Encourage one another and there's a whole list of those. And how do you fulfill those? The only way to do this is when you're working with a body.

And when Jesus said in Matthew 16, "I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." That's 16, 17, and 18. Remember what it says in 18? He says, "If in the body there is sin..." implying that will happen. And he tells us how to take care of it. One person go alone, then two or three. And if he keeps resisting the help, then the church. And if not, what does Jesus... this is Jesus talking. Did you realize it's not the Mennonites, it's not the Amish, it's Jesus talking.

And so in the context of "I will build my church," he is right away showing us that we are accountable to each other. We're responsible for each other. If I'd be working with Brother Ernest... Ernest, you'd soon seen some of my mistakes and some of my weaknesses and I need you. My brethren at home need me. My children have corrected me. Darkus, my daughter that's here, the youngest one, she's told me, "Dad, are you sure? Dad, I need that." We need each other. We need accountability.

We need a body to work together with. It's all through the New Testament study. So when we bring people to the Lord, we're bringing them to His body, to His... that is the fulfilling of the purpose. And I know there's some exceptions. I heard what Ernest was saying about this lady. She went somewhere else and, you know, there's cases like this that we pray. But our goal is to lead people to the church of Jesus Christ and to function as a brotherhood.

And then teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I've commanded you. Oh, what? What did he say? Now remember, who is saying this? Jesus says. Teaching them to observe all things. Have you ever heard people say, "Well, I had people tell me this. I focus on the most important things." I had one man tell me... he was a pastor, not Anabaptist pastor, but he told me, "I I I teach the most important things.

I never have time to get to those other things that that you Anabaptists teach." Your Bible students, does the Bible anywhere imply that some of the teachings of Jesus or the teachings of the New Testament are more important than others? Hebrews, it talks about the foundation. We build on the foundation and Paul said, "Let's move on to the others." But does he tell us... now do you hear that here at home?

We say, "Bueno, esa doctrina no es de salvación." Or this doctrine or this teaching is not something for salvation. I mean, it's optional. But you can be saved without following this one. And I'm not saying... I'm so glad that I don't have the ability and it's not my responsibility to decide who's saved and who's not. God takes care of that. But the teaching is that Jesus Himself says, "Teach all the things that I have taught you." We don't have the right and there's...

I don't think there's any information in scripture that we can say, "Well, this is more important. This is... when I get time to it, we'll..." But this is not as important. He simply says we should teach the whole package and all of it, like I say again, is so powerful, is so beautiful, especially when you think about how His teaching is an expression of the heart of God and what God wants here on this earth. Another one right along with this one is what is doctrine?

Oh, soon after I was in Chachagua years ago and I've heard it lots often... very often since too. One evangelical preacher told me, "Pentecostal." When I say evangelical, Pentecostal, Protestant. We say evangelical, but maybe you don't... the Protestant preacher. He said, "You know, the Catholics are criticizing... we're criticizing the Protestants because they're divided up in so many groups." That's a problem. It's true. Protestants and Anabaptists too. And he said... and we're going to have a march in San Jose.

That's a capital city of Costa Rica. We're going to have a march in San Jose and we're going to forget our doctrines. We're going to all forget our... we're going to go into San Jose and we're going to march down Central Street. A large group of Protestants... we were going to march down the streets and show the Catholic world that we are united. Do you think I should have joined him on that one? I tried very kindly to explain to him that I have some serious problems with some of their teachings. I was...

tried to be careful and I didn't emphasize it, but he did find out that I'm not going to go and say that I'm united with some of these things. And then there's this thing... and the thing... there's a doctrine divides and love unites. So we get this idea that doctrine is negative. Well, doctrine can be negative. Doctrine... like the doctrine of the Pharisees, the doctrine of the wrong type of doctrine, that's true. But what is doctrine? What is doctrine? Doctrine is simply the teaching. You have a doctrine.

You teach. Another have a doctrine. And every doctrine... we need to make sure it's a doctrine out of the Word of God, you know? We think about certain doctrines where the Anabaptists are different than the others, but the doctrine... you know, the doctrine of salvation. How do you become saved? That's a doctrine. What is sin? That's a doctrine. What is Jesus' work? I don't just... usually I don't just lead a person to Christ enough to... Holy Spirit is doing the work, I will and pray with Him right away.

But I usually ask people, "Would you like to hear some Bible studies?" If I can get them... let them come to their living room and I sit in their living room and we have some Bible studies. And the first one is about the holiness of God and then about the condition of the sinful man and then about what the work of Christ... and we lead them to understanding, but all that is doctrine. Whatever you know about God is a doctrine, the teaching of who God is. Doctrine is not negative. We have a wrong concept sometimes.

And where do... where do we get doctrine? There's the next thing goes right with it. They start pushing this book aside. We need the Holy Spirit. We don't need the book. Well, what do you know about God that didn't come out of here? If you know something about God that didn't come out of here, it's in doubt. What do we know about God? What do we know about Jesus? What do we know about sin? What do we know about the church? What do we know about anything about the Christian life? It's here and it's doctrine.

Now, there's a misuse of doctrine. There's a misuse of this book, obviously, and that happens a lot. But... take heed unto thyself and to the doctrine. What he's saying there is not... keep the doctrine of... that's in that black book upon the shelf. He's saying, "Keep the doctrine of who Jesus is, Jesus' message, how we can become saved, how we can be forgiven, then how we live, how we should work together as a brotherhood." That's all teaching. It's all doctrine and it's all... we get it here.

Take heed unto thyself and to the doctrine, unto your teaching. Continue in them, for in doing this... what does he say? Do you remember? "For in doing this, thou shalt both save thyself and those that hear thee." He's implying by that that if we have a wrong teaching and a wrong doctrine, a wrong teaching, we might not be saved and we might be leading people to the... that are not saved either. And that's a serious problem in our world today. Years ago... I'm not sure it was this in the 1980s. John Wimber...

I'm not sure the date now. John Wimber, he's the founder... one of the founders of the Vineyard Churches and his thing was, "We need another paradigm." The old paradigm we've been using of just teaching the Bible and teaching the... we need another paradigm and his basis was because the Oriental churches... and he has some... I'm not saying he doesn't have... some reason that they're more sensitive to the spirit world and to what happens in our experiences.

And so he said, "We need to change the paradigm." And it was a way of just saying, "Let's put this aside and let's use praise and worship and move forward." And that gave birth to the Toronto Blessing. If you've read that or not about that, the Toronto Blessing, the Brownsville Revival in Florida, where there were things that happened where we're way out of the book because we were following experience and we do not want to go that way. We do not want to go that way. This is...

if you don't have this, you have nothing to go by. And as the older I get, the more I love this book. I have an office full of books and I like books and I... but the older I get, the less I read my books. I could burn most of them. And I just get excited about this book. This is the book we need to look at and read and study and from this, learn God's heart of what He wants to do. There's good books. You know, there's good books. It's not... I'm not saying it's against writing books.

But sound doctrine is in the Word of God and this is precious. Of course, there's a misuse of this. Of course, the Bible itself tells us that we can... there's dead law and the life of the spirit. The Bible tells you that and that's a doctrine. Do you know that? That's a doctrine. It's a teaching that tells you that the misuse of the Word of God can become just a dead law and doesn't change any hearts.

People just become hardened hypocrites by misusing the Word of God or you lead them to the spirit of God and the spirit of God works in their life. That's a doctrine. That's a... it's a teaching and we need that and it's here. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world. Isn't that wonderful? Where's God going to call you? Where are you going to be involved when you're doing His work, His way, under His direction? Did you know all heaven is behind you? You ever go somewhere...

maybe some of you are going to be sort of new to go the first time to witness someone. I know that feeling. I still get it. And I go to talk to them... Lord, what am I going to tell this person? They want to talk to me or I want to go witness to him. What am I going to tell him? Yesterday coming on the plane, there was this... I met this young lady from Spain. She lives north of Madrid and I was in Spain a few years ago doing research on a book and so we got on a good subject.

And of course, my book about Spain was about the time of the Reformation, the man that translated the Spanish Bible. But anyway... and but she caught on soon and she said, "Yes. The young people in Spain are ashamed of how Spain... some things in their past." It was a wonderful history of the... I had two weeks of a course of history and I love Spain. I love their big... well, I love them... my love of history. And she told me she lives close to El Escorial, but anyway, that's off the subject.

And we started talking. Then later... and I said, you know, the thing is there's a real personal faith. When we have a... no one can force faith on you. The Catholic Church did. The Protestants did the same thing. John Calvin and Martin Luther, they tried to force people to be... to have a faith. You can't do that. And she understood that very quick. Faith is something that is personal. And then after we laid back and took a nap and slept a while and I was...

and when I woke up, I said, "You know, I wish I could tell you a little more to her." And just as we were coming into Pittsburgh, just getting ready to land, I said, "Lord, if she..." and she was real intent looking out the window, looking outside just like I do sometimes. And then I said, "Lord, if she turns her face and looks this way, I'm going to say something." I waited a little bit and she turned her face. And I talked to her about the sad story of faith, the... of of religion, power religion and all this.

And I told her, "But there is a real faith. There's a personal living faith in Jesus Christ that's real." I had a man from India. We met him on the bus some years ago and I... same thing. All he knew about Christianity was the stories about the Catholicism in Europe and all these big stories and the holy wars and all this. And I told him, "Mister, there is a different faith." He says, "Really? You know what I ended up doing? I ended up inviting him to my house.

He spent three nights in our house." And he interviewed... not Dorcas. He was my oldest daughter. This has been a few years ago. He interviewed you. He said, "Are you happy?" And I don't know what all he asked her. He asked Anita... Anita, "What about your faith? What about this?" He says, "Really?" Because he caught on. I don't know where he is right now. I forget his name even. I prayed for him for a while. I haven't for a while. I should probably.

But anyway, that there is a real faith and I told this girl that yesterday too. There is a real faith and we can share that with them. But Jesus is with us and Jesus leads us. Jesus directs us. Hey, you're going to have an exciting life. Bring every thought, everything you do under Jesus Christ. That's exciting. Your children might notice a great difference. Maybe not. Maybe you're already doing it. The people at work, the people you go to school with all at once... wow. I had one time the honor.

I was visiting a home. We were going from house to house and the lady looked at me and she said, "There's something in your eyes. There's something in your face. You have something. You have... I sense a peace in you." That was a blessing to hear that. This man from India... oh, I'm so stuck. This man from... I'll say this yet. He was going to leave one day and we had a chorus at that time. A chorus among the congregations.

Dwight's brother, Dwayne, was leading the chorus and we'd get together and I was an old man with white hair and... but I like to sing. And I went with the family. We used to do this with the family. We went together and we sang with this chorus. So I told him, "We're having a chorus to practice tomorrow. You want to go along?" "Oh, yeah, yeah. May I? May I? May I?" "Yeah, okay." So he went along and he sat back there and boy, he was really watching. And he was impressed.

And when he got back, he told me, "Listen, those young people have something. I can see they're singing from their hearts." But you know what else he said? He said, "But there was a man here on the right, on the left side. There's a man here that he was not with it. There were some young girls in the group. They were not with it." And he was right on. The young man left the church not long after. He sensed it because you know a real part of your testimony... do you know this? Is your face.

A clean conscience, the joy of the Lord, your way of relating to people. That's exciting. Do you know that? You go to the store, you go to meet... wherever you go meet people that we are representing Jesus Christ. I'm sorry. I had some more practical things I wanted to go talk into but talk about, but I'll just say this one to end. There's other things that I left. This afternoon, I don't know Brother Ernest. I'm just going to be telling stories about some practicing of this very thing.

But another thing about the... is God's method is you study the Scriptures, what it says about prayer, about Jesus Himself. How much time did Jesus spend in prayer? And Paul says, "Pray for me." The Apostle Paul, "Pray for me that the Lord would open doors." You know, I consider that lady I met on the airport yesterday an open door. I was glad for the opportunity. I have no idea where she's going. She's studying here in a university in Pittsburgh. I don't know where she is, but that was an opportunity.

But God has called us into the battlefield. Oh, Paul prayed... I'm sorry. I got sidetracked. Paul prayed for open doors and then he says, "Pray that I would know what to say." You know, you ever see that? I admire Brother Dale. Brother Dale, I've seen it again and again and again that at the right moment, he has the right words. There's so often times that I sit there and what should I say? What should I say? And the opportunity goes by and I didn't say anything. Do you ever happen to do? It happens to me.

But that prayer... I'll just say this. Prayer is not only praying for the battle. Prayer is the battle. Prayer is part of the battle. It's not all of it, but prayer is part of the battle. And if you want to have the Lord work in your life and use you, you need to pray. You need to spend time with God. And it's not only a time of sitting there and... and you run through all these names and you run... it's a time of quietness in His presence, a time of connecting with Him and a time of listening to Him.

I like that the first thing in the morning. Some people do it later in the day. That's fine. You decide when. But a time when I read the Word, when I pray and I listen to Him, that is very important and it's part of the battle. God bless you.