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

Alright, we're in 1st Corinthians chapter 9, and the name of this sermon is Goals of a Missionary. Goals of a Missionary. Now, the reason why I'm preaching this sermon is, if you know the time of the year we're at right now and when we started our church, the first sermon was on November 25th. And so it's going to be six months here, just coming up in less than a week. So I was either going to preach this sermon today or next week, and my wife and I, we moved here as either on the 20th or 21st of November, so we're basically right at the sixth month. When we started the church, one of the first sermons I preached about basically the vision of Verity Baptist Church Manila. Now this sermon is going to be kind of similar, but it's not going to be the exact same. There is different material, but there is some crossover. But I think it's good at the six month mark to just kind of reset ourselves and think about what is the goal of a missionary or a missionary church. I could have called this the goals of a missionary church because all of us are partaking in this. It's not just me up here, it's all of us. Now I want you to notice 1 Corinthians 9 verse 9 to start, and the Bible reads in 1 Corinthians 9 verse 9, for it is written in the law of Moses, thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? And so what the Bible says is this, that basically if an ox is producing vegetables, if an ox is actually helping out and working, the ox deserves to get paid. Now doesn't that make sense? Now if God cares for oxen, how much more does he care for us? Because it's basically saying he really doesn't care about oxen that much. But what the Bible is saying here is this, that if there is somebody who is doing the work, someone who is producing something, a missionary or an evangelist or a pastor is actually working, they deserve to get paid. Now look, I've been an independent fundamental Baptist for a very long time. When I got saved at the age of 18, when I was 19 I started going to an independent fundamental Baptist church. And you know what? I'm 34 now. I'm not that young. So it's been a long time. I've been in IFP pretty much half of my life, okay? And we would have missionaries that would come into our church in West Virginia and various churches I went to, and they'd have their big presentation on the wall of how they're going to turn the country upside down, and they'd show all these starving children in the country. And they would say, you know, look at this place, you know, there's all these starving kids and everything. Now that doesn't really make a whole lot of sense to me because the point of a missionary, as we said in the bulletin, is not to feed the starving children, but to preach the gospel and get the word of God out there in that region. Now obviously, you know, we care about people that are struggling financially, but look, you're never going to solve all of the world's financial problems. The Bible promises the poor are going to be among you. But they always have this presentation where they have these starving kids, it's like a seven or eight minute presentation, and they have this really emotional, touchy-feely music and everything like that. But the sad reality with most of those missionaries is they're lazy. That's the truth. Because, you know, we have missionaries come in, and it's like you're going to be basically a missionary and you're going to be paid from day one to be full-time, okay? They're not getting a secular job, they're going to be full-time from day one. Now that's an interesting concept to me because all the pastors I respect in America, they started out with full-time jobs. But you know, these missionaries are going to be full-time from day one. And they have this emotional music and they say how they're going to reach the country and everything, and you invite them to come out solely with you that afternoon, and they always say no. They always say no. It's very rarely an exception. And when it is an exception, basically what you do is this. If you're smart, basically you go solely with them and you let them do the talking at the beginning. Why? Because if you're going to pay them to preach the gospel, you want to see can they do it. Because if I do it first, they're going to try to just repeat what I did. Let's see if they actually know what they're doing. And so basically you're quiet, and I've done this a lot of times. Me and the assistant pastor in my old church, we take them out solely, and then they'd be the ones preaching the gospel and it was clear they didn't know what they were doing because they were misquoting Romans 3.23, they were misquoting the basic verses. And it's like, look, if you're going to be a full-time missionary from day one, you better know what you're doing. But there's kind of the attitude, well, you know what, in America it's tough to go soul-winning. But if you go overseas, you're just going to turn the world upside down. No, if you're not doing it in America or wherever you're from, you're not going to do it where you're going to be. And so when it comes to people going to preach the gospel, there's a philosophy that's kind of a wrong philosophy. And I'm going to explain it in the sermon, and it might surprise you, but none of the points of this sermon is the goal of a missionary is to win souls forward. That is none of the points. And I'll explain to you why it's important to make a distinction here. Because kind of the attitude, at least coming from America, is basically that in America the purpose of a church is not to win souls. The purpose is to kind of just build up churches and have these programs. And soul-winning doesn't really work in America. That's interesting because I've been soul-winning for a long time, ever since I became an independent fundamental Baptist. And it's not as easy. You don't get three people saved per hour, but you still get people saved. Yeah, there's areas where you have to go six, seven, eight, nine, ten hours to get one saved, but you still get people saved. But kind of the attitude is, well, soul-winning doesn't work in America. So what we do is we just send all the money to someone in a foreign country, they get all the soul saved, and we're partaking in it. We're not doing the soul-winning, they're doing the soul-winning. That philosophy is a wrong philosophy. But part of the philosophy as well, which they're not going to be honest about, is this, that when there's a church started overseas in the Philippines or Mexico or whatever country, that basically your sermons are supposed to be short and very shallow. Because the whole purpose of that church is only to win souls. Look, that is not the whole purpose of our church here. I'm not going to get up and preach to you a 15-minute sermon. I'm going to preach to you a real sermon that can change your life. Because you guys deserve real preaching. Because basically the attitude is kind of like this, that basically, hey, in America we're better than other countries. So over there basically they'll get the soul saved because everyone in those other countries are kind of just simple people that need basically the basics. Don't talk about anything important. No, you need the same sermons you get in America. Amen. You need real preaching. And so the reason why soul-winning is not one of the goals of a missionary is because a goal you're implying that it's something you're hoping to achieve. Yeah. So we're not hoping to get souls saved. We're guaranteed we're going to get souls saved. Amen. God promises that if you go soul-winning you'll get people saved. So it's not really a goal of a missionary. That's just the goal of any church. Right. That's just any church that's supposed to go soul-winning and preach real sermons. That's true. It's not something we're striving and hoping. Man, I hope in these four soul-winning times this week we have like 35 soul winners. Hopefully one person will get saved. It's a guarantee people are going to get saved. Amen. How many people in this room get somebody saved every single week? Why? We have four official soul-winning times. Right. And unless there's a monsoon every single time we're going to get some soul saved. Amen. Okay. And so when it comes to this being a church it's not just that we're about soul-winning. No, we're about everything any church is going to be about. Really the way we operate as a church is really not much different than a church in the U.S. Say why? Because we are a church. Amen. Okay. Yeah. We do the same thing that other churches are going to do. The same things we do in the U.S. are going to be the same things we do here. Now are there some differences? There are some differences. And that's what we'll talk about here in this sermon. But for the most part it's not really much different. Okay. Now look at verse number 19 in I Corinthians 9. So here's the thing. The Bible says that if an ox is basically producing they deserve to get paid. But most missionaries that are going out from the U.S. they get paid a really, really high salary and they do no work. They do no work. It's laughable. It's a joke. They don't do any soul winning. The sermons are shallow. And it's like it's hard to do any soul winning because they can't preach the gospel to anyone because they're going to Russia and they don't speak Russian. Right. That's true. Okay. And they can't preach sermons at the church because guess what? They don't speak Russian. Yeah. Okay. Now notice what it says in I Corinthians 9. And so the first goal of a missionary is simply this. To adapt to the culture that you live in. Okay. Adapt to the culture that you're going to. Verse 19. For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all that I might gain the more. And unto the Jews I became as a Jew that I might gain the Jews. To them that are under the law as under the law that I might gain them that are under the law. To them that are without law as without law being not without law to God but under the law to Christ that I might gain them that are without law. To the weak became I as weak that I might gain the weak. I made all things to all men that I might by all means save some. And this I do for the gospel's sake that I might be partaker thereof with you. Now Paul the Apostle was talking about how he tried to fit in in every environment he was in. I don't believe he's saying that every time he went to the door he tried to fit in with that person at the door. Because 90% of the time somebody at the door is going to listen if they're interested. Right. There are some exceptions but usually if they're interested they'll listen to me, they'll listen to Brother Marlon, Brother Raffi. It usually doesn't matter that much who's giving the gospel. There are just some people already somewhat. Now there are some exceptions but by and large that's not the way it is. Usually there's not many exceptions. What I believe he's saying is this, that basically as I went to one country, I went to one area, I adapted to the environment I was in. I went to one culture, I tried to fit in in that culture. I went to another culture, I tried to fit in in that culture. Wouldn't we say that Paul the Apostle is the best example in the Bible being an evangelist or a missionary? It's true, yeah. I don't think there's any doubt. I hope I achieved half of what he did. I don't expect to ever be Paul the Apostle. He turned the world upside down, we're going to see exactly how he did that in the sermon. But Paul the Apostle was basically saying, I went to another culture and I fit in in that culture. Basically he didn't try to stand out and be different. If you're going to live somewhere else there's going to be differences. No matter where you go, there's differences. Even in the US, when I lived in West Virginia growing up, look West Virginia is an old country town. It's not very populated. In a lot of places you drive from house to house to preach the gospel and you say why? Because it would take a couple minutes to go from each door. So you literally drive up to one house and go to the next. It's known as the mountain state because everywhere there's just mountains and hills. Now look, California is a 40 hour drive from West Virginia. It's a long distance away. California is like a whole other country than West Virginia. I remember when I looked online before my wife and I moved to California and we looked online at the most diverse states in the nation and they had three different categories. And when they're saying diverse they're mainly talking about in terms of people from other countries or other areas. West Virginia was voted the least ethnically diverse country state in the US. Basically everybody was white. Everybody looked like me and it was just kind of a matter of if you have a bit of a southern accent that means you're down south and if you don't that means you live up north. So I don't have that much of an accent in terms of a country accent because I lived in north central West Virginia. That was really the only difference. It was the least diverse state. So we go to California and it was voted the second most diverse state behind Hawaii. They're basically completely different areas and even going from West Virginia to California there's a transition. Now look, the Philippines is a lot different than West Virginia or even California. There's a lot of differences and whenever you go somewhere you've got to adapt to the culture that you're going to go to. That's what Paul the Apostle is talking about. Turn to Acts 21. And so one aspect of adapting to the culture or the place you're going to live is quite simply this. You must learn the language of that area. Now look, I am not completely fluent in Tagalog. I am able to preach the gospel pretty decently in Tagalog. But quite honestly I don't really think I have a gift of languages where I could basically just have learned to be able to preach sermons in Tagalog. Maybe 10 years from now or something but it's not really a natural gift for me. I have to work at it. I spend time every single day memorizing words in Tagalog and practicing, looking at the sentences and studying and I make a lot of mistakes. And slowly I'm learning. It's not easy for me. But look, if in this country nobody spoke English I would not have come here. Even though my wife is from this area, why? Because of the fact how effective would I be if I can't get people saved and I can't preach sermons. From day one I'm able to preach sermons in the language this church is mainly in, English. From day one I'm able to preach sermons. From day one I can still get people saved even though there's some people I wasn't great at preaching the gospel to. From day one I'm able to be effective. You say, why are you saying that? Because most missionaries go to a place where they cannot preach at all. They don't speak the language. And it's like you're fluent in French and then you go to Mexico. It's like, you know, there's a country called France, maybe you've heard of it, where they speak this language called French. You're fluent in a language and you say, brother, I know I'm fluent in Spanish but I got called to Russia. I got called to Serbia. So I'm in this country and I know that I can't, it's going to take me three years of classes and I'm going to get paid to learn the language, it's going to take me three years. There's a lot of problems. One problem is that some people are just never going to be able to learn the language. And quite honestly if it's going to take you that long, if that's all you're doing is just learning the language, you're not writing any sermons, you're not going soul winning, all you're doing is handing out invitations one hour a week because you can't speak to the people at all, then it's like you should be able to learn the language quicker than a couple of years. And if you can't, then you know what, I don't think that you were called to go to that country. And so one of the big things is just simply learning the language. And this seems really basic, but look, most people don't seem to get this in Baptist churches in America because they send missionaries to a country where they don't speak the language at all. And even in their presentations they'll talk about how they're learning the language and they're not even embarrassed by it. Notice what it says in Acts 21 verse 37. And as Paul was to be led into the castle and set up to the chief captain, may I speak unto thee, who said, Canst thou speak Greek? Verse 38, Art not thou that Egyptian which before these days made us an uproar and led us out into the wilderness, four thousand men that were murderers? But Paul said, I am a man which am a Jew of Tarsus, a city in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city, and I beseech thee, suffer me to speak unto the people. And when he had given him license, Paul stood on the stairs and beckoned with a hand unto the people. And when there was made a great silence, he spake unto them in the Hebrew tongue, saying. So we're seeing kind of this thing with Paul the Apostle that, you know, he spoke a lot of languages. Here he's going to speak to them in the Hebrew tongue. The reason why he was able to be an effective evangelist in many locations is because he spoke many languages. If he didn't speak all of those languages, he wouldn't have gone there to be a missionary. He needs to be able to communicate with these people. Acts 22, verse 1, men, brethren and fathers, hear ye my defense which I make now on you. And when they heard that he spake that in the Hebrew tongue to them, they kept the more silence. And he's saying, notice how it says they kept the more silence. Why are they keeping the more silence? You're surprised he's speaking to them in Hebrew. That's the reason why. You're seeing that his language ability actually was very effective for him. And people were really interested in hearing what he had to say simply because of the fact he was speaking to them in Hebrew. Look, when I preach the Gospel in Tagalog, sometimes this is good, sometimes it's bad. Because sometimes I'm preaching the Gospel to them and, you know, I get to Acts 16 after I've explained Jesus rose again and I'll ask them, you know, in Tagalog, you know, what do they think it takes to be saved? And then they answer something like, go to church or be a good person. And in my mind I'm thinking, you're not even paying attention to what I'm saying. You're just kind of curious why is this white guy speaking to me Filipino, right? So it's kind of annoying sometimes, but, you know, the truth is that if you're speaking in their language, they're going to be more receptive. They're willing to listen to you. They're curious, you know, why are you speaking that language? That's what we see here with the Holy Apostles. Turn to Acts 2. Acts 2. And so the more you can adapt, the more people are going to be willing to listen to you. Now, you know, obviously it takes time to do these things. I'm not saying that a missionary has to be perfect from day one. I'm certainly not perfect with adapting 100% of this environment. But it is something that I'm working on to try to become even more and more, you know, familiar with this culture and adapting to this culture. But, you know, honestly most missionaries, they kind of stick out like a sore thumb in places they go. Because they're going to places, but they don't know how to fit in at all. And they're not even trying to. Acts 2, notice this in verse 6. And so it goes through all of these different languages here in Acts chapter 2. This is the famous story in Acts 2 where there's a lot of people out soul winning and they get a ton of people saved and 3,000 of those that get saved get baptized. And we don't know how many got saved, but we know 3,000 of them ended up getting baptized. Now, was not Peter just standing up here and preaching a sermon and getting 1,000 saved? That's not what we see in Acts 2. What you see is that there's a lot of soul winners out there doing the work. That's the way it is with soul winning. It's not one person preaching a sermon. It's everybody doing the work. And that's what you see in Acts chapter 2. You see the ability to speak multiple languages is able to get a lot of people saved. I'll turn to 1st Corinthians 14. Obviously in Acts 2 this is a miracle that God allows. I'm not saying that they all spoke these languages, but the ability to speak the language is able to win a lot of people to the Lord. Now, I'll say this, that you don't have to be fluent in Tagalog to be a missionary here in terms of preaching the sermons, but I believe everyone, if they're going to move here, needs to become fluent in Tagalog. You say, why? Because there's a lot of people out there that will not get saved unless you preach them in Filipino, in Tagalog. Now, there's a lot that will get saved preaching in English, but quite honestly, I get a lot more people saved now than I did months ago. You say, why? Because I'm able to explain the gospel in Tagalog a thousand times better. The more you speak it, the more you're going to get saved. So you don't necessarily have to be fluent in it from day one, but you better become fluent in it. At least with the gospel. There's nothing more important. You need to at least be able to preach the gospel. And if you're not able to learn to preach the gospel in that country, then how are you being paid to be a missionary when you can't even go sowing? That's one of the basic requirements of being, whether it's a pastor or evangelist missionary, you have to be leading the charge. If you're never going sowing, then you're not going to be that effective at that job. 1 Corinthians 14, verse 18. I thank my God I speak with tongues more than ye all, yet in the church I'd rather speak five words with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach others also, than ten thousand words and an unknown tongue. So Paul think possibly he speaks a lot about the importance of speaking languages, but he says the most important thing is in the church to be able to speak a language that people actually understand. Now turn to Isaiah 58. So when it comes to adapting to the place you're going to live, the first thing is quite simply just learn the language. That's a big part of where you're going to live. You need to learn the language. Look, you might not be able to be fluent in a language before you move somewhere because you have to actually be speaking it to make it kind of second nature to you, where you don't think about it. But look, you can memorize words in the language before you get there. There's this invention, I don't know if you've heard about it, called the internet. And see, on this thing called the internet, if you want to learn a language, like let's say you want to learn Tagalog, you can go onto websites and find pronunciation of all these words and meanings and definitions. And you can start memorizing those words. Check it out if you want to talk about the internet. I-N-T-E-R-A-K-T. You would think that people would actually do that, but you know what they actually teach at a lot of churches is that you should not learn any of the language before you go. They tell you you should not. They don't say, well it's not necessary. They tell you you should not. You say, why? Well they say that if you're not there first you're going to mispronounce stuff. That's retarded. Of course if you're learning a new language you're going to mispronounce stuff. But look, you'd have to live there a really long time to get the accents down perfectly. Look, I cannot pronounce M-G-A. That word when I pronounce it, it doesn't sound right. And I might never be able to pronounce it, but when I say the sentence they still understand what I'm saying. It's understood if you learn a new language, you're not going to be able to say it perfectly. There's things that if you don't learn at a young age it's impossible to actually be able to pronounce that. Maybe one day I'll be able to, but look if you don't learn it at a young age you might not be able to. You know when people learn Spanish a lot of people can't roll the R. A lot of people couldn't say something like rojo. They couldn't do that. Now that's part of how you pronounce in Spanish when you do the letter R, but some people when they learn the language they cannot do it. It's impossible. But look, people can still understand you whether you say rojo or rojo. They still understand what you're saying. They understand that somebody's learning the language they're not going to be perfect. You should learn as much as you can before you go there. Even if you do pronounce stuff wrong, even if you do say co instead of a co sometimes, which I've done a million times. Even if you get the verb form wrong, look people can still understand you. You don't have to be 100% perfect from day one and if you're waiting for that then you're kind of 20 years too late. Because you had to grow up in that country to be able to do it perfect from day one. But the other reason why you have to adapt to the culture is quite simply this. You must understand and preach on the issues of that culture or country you're going to. It says in Isaiah 58 verse 1, cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet and show my people their transgression and the house of Jacob their sins. See the Bible's specific to their transgression, their sins. You say why? Because different areas, different countries, different cultures have different issues. Now there is some crossover and some issues are the same everywhere. But there are some issues that are an issue here that are not an issue in the US. And there are certain topics that are issues in the US but they're not an issue here. Let me give you an example. How about the topic of divorce? Look, in the Philippines it's illegal to get divorced. It's the only country, unless you consider Vatican City a country, which I don't. It's the only country in the Philippines where divorce is illegal. Now that doesn't mean that you never preach on marriage because just because you stay married doesn't mean you have a happy marriage. But look, it's illegal to get divorced in this country. Now if I were preaching to a crowd this size in the US, I promise you there would be at least a few people. Probably several that are divorced. But here when I'm preaching to a crowd, nobody's divorced because it's illegal. So it's a different issue here versus the US. Obviously the way you preach on certain topics is going to change a little. It doesn't mean you never preach about marriage, but the way you preach is going to change a little. That's what I told some people before I moved here that I said, Hey, if you listen to my preaching back in the US, it's going to be a little bit different when I go to the Philippines. You say, why? Because Catholicism is not that big a religion in the US. I mean, it's a big religion, but it's not like here in the Philippines. And so, yeah, I'll preach on Catholicism a lot more here. You say, why? It's a real issue in this country. I mean, 80% of the country is Catholic and then half of the others still have Catholicism in them. Even though they've changed religions. I mean, it's a big issue in this country. I mean, idolatry, actual idolatry is not something you really see in the US that much. But here, it's like everywhere you go. You know, every holiday, every celebration, there's these massive statues of whatever saint or Mary or Jesus or whatever. It's different. When you go to different areas, it's different. You know, here in the Philippines, there's a lot of Catholics, but you know what there's not a lot of? There's not a lot of Protestants and Orthodox. Protestants and Orthodox are very common in the US. Extremely common. Now, the other day, this was very shocking to me. I took a taxi ride to the mall and the driver was a Methodist. And on the ride back, I had a different driver and he also was Methodist. And I was like, two Methodists in one day? Because there's not that many Protestants here. I was like, man, I grew up Methodist. I've never met anyone. And in the same day, there's two drivers. They're both Methodists. But that doesn't happen that often. Usually when we talk to people, they're born again, they're CCF, they're Baptist, they're Catholic, they're INC. But you're not going to run into too many people that are Protestants or Orthodox. And so look, you know, in America, yeah, you preach on Protestants. You preach on Orthodox. There's really not going to be that much of a point to do that. Now, as I said, you know, there's a lot of issues that do cross over and you preach on them no matter what country you're in. Sermons like being bitter or patient and stuff like that, that's universal. Everybody struggles with it. Everybody struggles with things like this. But, you know, there's certain issues, though, that are issues in this country that are not issues in the US. Let me give you a couple of examples. One issue that's an issue here that's something you have to know about is being an OFW, an Overseas Filipino War. There are not OFWs in the US. Now, look, you know, you can preach on this different ways, but you must have an opinion if you're going to preach sermons here in this country. Because if a lot of people are overseas Filipino workers, you must be willing to preach what you believe the Bible says. Now, it doesn't mean everybody's automatically going to agree, but you must have the guts to actually preach on it. I don't just merely preach the sermons that you hear from Pastor Mendez and Pastor Anderson in the US. There are certain sermons I preached that I said, you know what, I never preach this in the US because it's not an issue. But if I'm here and this is an issue in this country, I must have the guts to preach on it. And sadly, most missionaries, they don't preach on those specific topics. And if those missionaries don't have the guts to preach on that specific issue, who's going to do it? It's not going to be the other churches I named. But you know, they'll go from the US and basically there's certain topics they're allowed to preach on and still get financial support from the US. And basically they don't touch anything controversial. Look, your job as a preacher is to preach on stuff that's controversial. Now, I don't intentionally do it, but look, I'm not going to shy away from a topic. There are topics that are issues, and you know, when it's an issue, you must preach on that. You know, when it comes to preaching on the Baptist in the Philippines, there are plenty of Baptists in the US, but the way Baptists operate in the US and the Philippines are quite different. They're quite different. So when it comes to pastors in the US that are Baptists, you know, there's a good chance that they're saved usually. Now, when it comes to preaching on Baptists here in the Philippines, unfortunately, from what I've found, most of them are preaching a false gospel. And so the way I preach on those sermons, it's going to be a little bit different. When it comes to the normal Baptist pastor here in the Philippines or missionary, basically, you know what the Bible talks about greedy dogs? That's pretty fitting. That's pretty fitting because of the fact they don't do any work and they're just getting a bunch of money. They're never going to sow money. They're never preaching on what needs to be preached. By and large, most of them are like greedy dogs. And look, you know, I'm not just going to avoid preaching on it because of the fact, well, you know, I offend somebody. Well, you know, half of this church came from Baptist churches. We're more than happy. Before you were here. But have I shied away from preaching on the issues from your own churches? I haven't. Now, I'm not intentionally trying to cause controversy, but it honestly doesn't matter to me that much if I say something that might offend somebody because of the fact they came from a church that did things differently. I'm just going to preach what the Bible says. And look, you know, the way preaching is, you know, it steps on your toes sometimes. When I went to Verity Baptist Church, my toes got stepped on sometimes. And I worked for the church. Okay, and I was going to be sent out as a missionary and there's still things that sometimes it steps on your toes. That's not the end of the world. All you do is basically make the change you need to make. What you do is when you hear it, even if it offends you, you take it in, you think about it and do what the Bible says, you study it, search the scriptures daily whether those things are so. It's not the end of the world to me if I say something and you disagree with it. But what I would ask you to do is if I say something and you say I don't agree with that, at least see what the Bible says. Check it out for yourself. And if you come to a different conclusion, that means that's okay. I'm not offended by that. Turn to 2 Thessalonians 3. Now the first point was a pretty basic point. I mean just adapting to the culture you live in. And quite honestly, the next point is pretty basic. It makes sense. But quite honestly, this is the one that a lot of people would be offended by, not necessarily in this room. But I'm just saying kind of in this Baptist missionary sort of realm. And number 2, another goal of a missionary is to become self-supporting financially as a church. That should be a goal of a missionary. Notice what it says in 2 Thessalonians 3 verse 7. For yourselves know how ye ought to follow us, for we behave not ourselves disorderly among you. Neither did we eat any man's bread for naught, but wrought with labor and travail night and day that we might not be chargeable to any of them. Not because we have not power, but to make ourselves an example on youth to follow us. Now according to the Bible, did Paul the Apostle work a secular job? Yes he did. Now what's the attitude here in the Philippines? That if you're a Baptist and you're starting a church, that if you're not full-time from day 1, then you're not right with God. Isn't that what they say? If you're not full-time from day 1, you're not right with God. Well I guess Paul the Apostle wasn't right with God. Because he actually worked a job. Why? He did not want to be chargeable to anybody. That's what the Bible says. But when I was planning to move here, my original plan was to work full-time as a teacher when I moved here. Now thankfully I was able to keep working remotely for Verity Baptist Church, but look, I'm not 100% full-time working for Verity Baptist Church in the military. I still spend, depending on the week, 15-25 hours doing stuff for Verity Baptist Church in Sacramento, working remotely. There's days, I think it was on Thursday this week, I just spent 8 hours at my computer doing stuff remotely for Verity Baptist Church. I guess I'm less of a missionary because I'm not full-time from day 1. But no matter what job you do, you're still working for the Lord. But Paul the Apostle says, I don't want to be chargeable to any of you. And you say, why is he saying that? Now first off, it's good that he gives us an example like this, because if he didn't give an example like this, then no one would even try to follow him. But you have to understand that if you're being sent out from a good church, if they don't send the money to you, they can use it for another great cause. Now look, when this church started, when it came to paying for the Bayview Hotel for the first couple of months, and the handmills and stuff like that, Verity Baptist Church covered that. We're very thankful that they're an established church, they're built off of it, they decided to use the money to invest in us as a church. But look, I don't want to be just bleeding money from Verity Baptist Church for 25 years. You say, why? Because they're getting churches started in Washington. They're getting churches started in Boise, Idaho. They're getting churches started in Fresno, California. They can use that money for another good cause. And whether it's a church in this country or another state or another location, praise the Lord for any work that's being done for God. And so we don't want to just permanently bleed money from Verity Baptist Church. We want to be as much as we can financially independent on that. And this was the attitude that Paul the Apostle had. He wanted to try to be financially independent as possible. And so when it comes to the current system of missionaries, most missionaries never even try to become financially independent. They never even try. And the reason why is because these missionaries have a symbiotic relationship with the pastors in America and the churches in America. A symbiotic relationship is basically where you need two things to survive. Bees and pollen. Pollen does not survive without bees. Bees do not survive without pollen. These things need each other to survive. It's called a symbiotic relationship. It's one of the great proofs that evolution is retarded. Because there are so many symbiotic relationships in nature and it's like just magically all these things evolve simultaneously. It's amazing and it's just a side topic, but it's like when you think about evolution, I mean what evolved first, the man or the woman? The female of that species or the male? They kind of have to come at the same time. It doesn't make much logical sense. But even in nature there's a lot of symbiotic relationships. Why do they have a symbiotic relationship? Because basically the missionaries don't preach anything controversial at all. There's about a month ago this person asked us to support him as a missionary here in the Philippines. And I've never met this guy in real life. To this day I've never met this person in real life. And what he told me was this. He said I'm kind of working with a church here in the Philippines. And he said they're pre-trip, but he told me that the rapture just doesn't really matter. The doctrine just really isn't that important. It's like the doctrine's not important. I mean if you're going to pay somebody to spread a doctrine throughout that country, doesn't the doctrine matter? And that goes back to the original attitude that basically with missionaries they don't preach on anything controversial. They honestly just preach on generic sermons on salvation. But there's a lot more to the Bible than just salvation. How about raising your kids? How about any manner of talking to them about it? There's a lot of the Bible besides just salvation. And so basically the missionaries kind of agree not to do anything controversial. And so basically they report back these huge results because they have these altar calls. They get 700 people saved in like five seconds. You know these ridiculous numbers. A system that is not the biblical system. And basically the pastors though, they need the missionaries. Because as I said at the beginning, most pastors do zero soul winning in the U.S. They do none. They don't really do any soul winning. But they're still partaking because they're spending the money for these missionaries. So the pastors don't even want these missionaries to be separate. Why? Because that's their soul winning numbers. And they're paying them as if we've partook in like 500 salvation this past month. They're not doing any soul winning but they're giving money to someone. So basically the missionaries are kind of agreeing with the pastors. Hey, we won't even try to become independent. And they don't want to because it makes it pretty easy for them. They have the symbiotic relationship. Well that's ridiculous. Those missionaries ought to seek to become financially independent. They shouldn't want to just be permanently on the books of their sending churches. They should want to become independent. Now what happens with Paul the Apostle is he's going everywhere to get new churches started. So there are times he basically asks for money but what he's doing is he's basically working a job and basically paying his own way. He gets a new church started. He's basically not fully on the books of his old church. But look, if our church over the next 10 years gets lots of churches started, then there might be a church that wants to support us because it's not just sending money to the same original project. The project was successful and the new project is getting started. But if there's only that one church and it's like 10 years you're still getting money, it's like eventually you ought to seek to become independent. Now the secret might be for that missionary to work a full time job if the church can't be independent. Because it's a burden to pay the salary from day one for that missionary and pay for the rent and things like that. So yeah, the secret might be that the missionary needs to work a full time job. Look, when it comes to pastors in the US, all of them, guess what? They start with full time jobs, don't they? One of my big prayer requests for the pastors in the US, the pastors I know, love and respect, I pray that they'll be able to be full time. Because they can devote more time to the ministry. But when they started they never even had that intention. It really shouldn't be any different here in the Philippines either. Now there are some places that you can go and you can't work jobs, but look if you're able to work a job you ought to try to do that. Because you don't want to become financially dependent on somebody else. And Paul the Apostle, he didn't want to be chargeable to anybody so he tried to be financially independent. Now turn to Matthew 16. And so basically, if possible, it's great if the missionary can be full time, if he's going to do the work. But if not, it's not the end of the world. Look, if there comes a day when maybe I'm ordained as the pastor in four or five years or something like that, and if I don't work remotely compared to the next church, I might start working full time here. Why? Because we might not be in a position to pay my salary, so I might have to work a full time job. I'm not above working a full time job in the Philippines. You say why? Because if the church can support me that's great, but if it can't, then it can't. It's just like the US. Pastors start working full time jobs and they start at church. You say that sounds pretty busy. That's pretty busy for the pastors in the US. To work 40-50 hours a week and run a church, it's pretty hard. It's not easy, but whenever it comes to doing the work for the Lord, it's not going to be easy. Of course it's going to be difficult. Basically, the step to becoming independent, you want to try to at least become as independent as possible. For example, if you're able to become independent in terms of paying your rent, that's a big step. Our church, from day one we had 40 members at our first service. We had people that were ready for this church from day one. We were very blessed to be a part of that. I'm blessed to be a part of that. Quite honestly, the people at our church are generous. Our church is able to pay for our rent. I still work and we're actually going to be... I didn't finish it this past weekend, but I'm going to have reports for all of our finances spent over the first six months of the church in every single category. What you're going to see is my salary is not there because my salary comes from Mary Baptist Church. It doesn't come from here. All the money that comes into this church is used on other things. None of it was used on my salary. It is expensive running a church, but God's blessed us and we're able to have AC units. These chairs are pretty comfortable chairs. Originally, I thought we had just basically really wooden hard chairs that aren't very comfy or whatever. God's blessed us more. We're able to buy equipment and stuff like that. We're able to use it for the work of the Lord. We're able to do so many trips and we're able to pay for that. God definitely has blessed us. I'm not saying this is because of me because we were fortunate with the Mary Baptist Church name and people listening to sermons online that from day one, people were ready for this. People were ready and they want to be a part of this. From day one, we had a decent amount of donations that came in just from the church itself. But look, we're not going to extend ourselves above our means and enforce our sending church to send us more money. We're going to use the money that comes in from the church itself and online donations. We're not going to go above our means though and then ask for Mary to send us more. If they choose to send us more and say we want to give you money for something, that's one thing. But look, you want to try to become independent as much as possible. You don't want to be fully dependent on your old church because they can use that money for another good cause. Whether it's a church here in the Philippines or the U.S. or wherever. We want to try to become independent. Another reason why this is important is that because one day, Lord willing, we'll be able to start another church. If we're going to be starting another church, we have to be financially in a position that that's even possible. Whenever you're starting a church, there's expenses associated. If you're going to run a company, it's not just how much money comes in. You want your company to be stable. Our finances are pretty stable. The reason why is because we have a decent number of people that go to this church that tie it with their money. And there's kind of a set amount that comes in. So we're not relying on an outside source where that source ends, we're in big trouble. You want to be financially stable. It's a smart business model. But you want to become financially independent as much as possible. And then any extra money that comes in, you can use that to send a couple buses down to Ibiza to do a solo in America. You can use that to buy nicer chairs than you were originally going to buy. You can use that for the work of the ministry. You can use it for some good cause. But you don't want to just be relying on somebody else to support you permanently. In Matthew chapter 16, when it comes to being financially independent, there's a couple aspects to this. One of them is that you need church growth, both numerically and spiritually. Obviously if you're going to be able to support a church, especially from the inside out, you need to actually have members that actually can give money. If you have nobody here at church, then you're not going to have that. Now when it comes to being a missionary in a foreign country, a lot of times people start a church and they have nobody to begin with. That was what my original plan was. I didn't expect there to be anybody here. Our original plan, we're going to start a church in the Philippines. And I figured it would be my wife and I and however many kids we had. That's kind of the plan a couple years ago. And so of course I would have to work a full-time job because we wouldn't have members to pay the amount of money. It would only make sense. But when it comes to supporting a church, for this to work you have to grow from there. Matthew 16 verse 18. And I say also unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. You say, does this teach that Peter is the first pope? If that's what you think, you've still got that little Catholicism in you. That's another sermon. Another sermon for another time. And what the Bible says is, I will build my church. The Lord is saying He's going to build His church. Now obviously we need to do our part in that. We need to go solo with it. Because that's the part of any church. That's not a goal of this church, that's just what this church is. Every church is about soloing. It's not a specific goal to us. A specific goal is becoming financially independent because we were sent out by a church and we don't want to permanently be on their books. But when it comes to being a goal, soloing, that's just what a church does. And if we're not going soloing, we're not a church. Because we've lost our candles. Now we count on the Lord to build our church, but obviously we still have to do our part. Basically that means we do a lot of soloing. We try to bring people into this church. We try to preach people the word of God and help them to grow spiritually and things like that. And so when it comes to church growth, yes we rely on the Lord, but we also have to do our part as well. It's not a matter of just necessarily getting people to come to this church though. It's also that they grow spiritually. When it comes to most people in this room, most people in this room tie their young money to this church, but the average person who just gets saved out on the streets, that hasn't been a Baptist for a decade, that was taking your first and second and third fruits offering or whatever, the average person just out on the streets that comes to this church, tying might be a pretty new concept to them. Unless they go to the church down the street, then tying might be a new concept to them. And so it's not just growing numerically, it's also growing spiritually as well. Because the reason why people donated this church, it's not that it's easy for you, because obviously a lot of people struggle financially, but you say, you know what, that's what the Bible teaches and I love God. I'm just going to do what the Bible says. Trust in God. That's the reason why you tie them to this church. But if somebody's new to this church, a lot of that's going to be new to them. They're going to need to grow spiritually. Now turn to Ephesians 6. When it comes to our church here in the Philippines, we're pretty unique even for being a life-minded church here. Because there are churches here in the Philippines, there are pastors that are doing great works for God, but they're not necessarily in a location where they're ever going to be a mega church. And I'm not saying we're going to be a mega church, I don't think we're, actually I hope we're not a mega church. But I believe our church has the capacity and ability to grow, but there are certain pastors that are doing great works for God right now, and they're in areas where their church might never grow to the point where people can support them full time. And that would be an example where that might be a good exception, where people would be able to support that person, because they're known and they're doing great work. Obviously here in Manila though, it's kind of different, we have a decent sized church and everything like that, we have decent ties that come in. So I'm not saying that if a pastor doesn't become fully independent that there's something wrong with him. Look, Pastor Mendez was a pastor for a long time before he was fully independent, and he was doing just as much for God before and after. When it comes to pastors in America that are doing great works for God, whether or not they're independent or not, they're still doing great works for God. Quite honestly, it makes me respect them a lot that they're able to work full time and run a church. Because one thing I've learned these last six months is it's not easy running a church. It's difficult. It takes work, it takes effort. Now notice what it says in Ephesians 6 verses 21 and 22. Another part to becoming financially independent is to basically produce a product that people outside of your church like. As in church, we do get donations online, and we do have people that listen to our sermons, and they visit us from time to time, and they do give us donations. Now notice what it says in Ephesians 6, verse 21. But that ye also may know my affairs and how I do, Tychicus, a beloved brother and faithful minister, and the Lord shall make known to you all things, whom I have sinned unto you for the same purpose, that ye might know our affairs, and that ye might comfort your hearts. And it says that Paul sent his Tychicus to basically let them know how things are going. You say, why is he doing that? This is something Paul the Apostle does in the Bible. The reason why is, in his day, you couldn't make a YouTube missionary update video. So basically, you had to report back results every once in a while. You couldn't just every single week just make a basic update video or send an email saying, hey, this was our attendance, this is what I've preached on, this is how many souls got saved. In today's world, this is actually pretty easy to do. It's not that hard. Now look, if this church was started before the internet, it would be hard to bring reports back to the U.S. all the time. It wouldn't be something where I could just send out an email at 9 o'clock at night. It might be something where it's like, oh, I got this thing to send back this information in several weeks. It's going to get back there. In today's world, it's pretty easy. In Paul the Apostle's day, though, it wasn't as easy. And so basically, he would send back people to let them know, hey, here's how things are going, and to also comfort them, the Bible says. You say, why? Because of the fact if somebody's going to financially support you or donate to you or give you money, they want to know actually what you're doing. It'd be like if I owned a company and then I had somebody working on a project. Well, I wouldn't come to that person six months later and say, hey, how's the project going? You know, what you do is every week or every couple weeks you have a meeting to kind of check in on things. How's this going? How's this going? How's this going? It only makes sense. And so he's sending somebody back to basically tell the results. This is how things are going. Why? Because if things aren't going well and you're getting zero soul saves, you're probably not going to want to support you. Or they're going to probably say, hey, I know Paul the Apostle and you were very successful in the past. You might want to move to a different location because otherwise you're not going to be able to get anybody saved. OK. And so basically it says that he might know our affairs and that he might comfort your hearts. Now turn in your Bibles to Titus 1. Titus 1. And this kind of leads to the last point, which is kind of the main point, though. It kind of ties in with our verse, which we'll cover here in a second. The last point, the goal of a church, it's kind of the end goal, is to get other churches started. This is not merely a goal from Verity Baptist Church in Sacramento. They get churches started in Washington, in the Philippines, in Idaho, and in other places in California. It's the goal of any church. That is your number one goal. Now, yes, we do a lot of soul winning and, yes, we have goals to get tons of souls saved. But just getting souls saved in general, that's just part of what you do as a church. Getting churches started, that is the end project. That's what we want to achieve. Now, we're only six months in, but it's good to know what we're actually striving for. Titus 1, verses 4 and 5. To Titus, mine own son, after the common faith. Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Savior. For this cause left I be in creeds that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting and ordain elders in every city as I have committed. It says set in order the things that are wanting. Basically, what he's saying is there are certain areas that are looking for a good church. There are certain areas that are already waiting for a pastor or church to be started. This church was like that. Things were wanting in this area. That's why this church was started. Then he says ordain elders in every city. Now, here's the thing about this, though. To get these churches started, you have to go back to the point of becoming financially independent. If we're not financially independent, we can't get any church started. We can't say, well, we want more money to do something else. First, you have to become financially independent at that before you're going to start another church. We have to become financially independent and financially stable. Otherwise, it doesn't even make sense to try to start a new church. That's why point 2 is very important to tie into point 3. Now, turn to Acts 1. There are a couple of aspects to this. It talks about ordaining people in areas that are wanting. You want to go to places where there actually is a need for that church and a desire for that church. When it comes to ordaining elders, this is not something that you just do overnight. It's like, well, we need a church. I'll just ordain you. It's like, no, you have to actually have both. You have to have the things that are wanting. You have to also have the person ready to be ordained. Now, it is possible that someone could be a pastor from day one and go to an area where there's nobody looking for the church and he's going to start a work because that's how pretty much Verity Baptist and Faithful Word were started. But doesn't it make sense that if there are areas where there are people waiting for it, then that's where you would start the church? Obviously, we ought to do things logically. It's not just that fuzzy feeling you get of being called to Russia. You have to actually do things logically. So you have to find areas where it's wanting, but also you have to find people that are ready to be ordained. Now, the Bible clearly says, lay hands suddenly on no man. Now, look, I don't necessarily have a standard for the exact time frame, but I go off the word pastor Mendez and his time frame was basically someone would need to be at the church for at least two years in the perfect situation to be ordained. Now, look, I don't know if that's the perfect number, but it makes sense that there's at least some period of time. I say, why? You have to know that person for a period of time before you're going to ordain them and put a stamp of approval and say, this is our pastor that we sent out. If you've only known him for a month, you don't really know him. So two years does make some sense. There's certain rules of how many times you need to read the Bible and things such as that, how long you're at the church, how many years you've been saved, obviously you need to be saved more than just a year before you get ordained. You have to actually prove it yourself. And so it's not necessarily easy to find these things, to find somebody who's ready to start that church and to find areas where it's wanted. But whether or not that's an easy thing to do or not, that is our goal to do. That must be our goal. It is our goal that there are men in this church that one day I will lay my hands on you and say, this person has been in this church, that one day I will lay my hands on you and say, this person has been in our church, they've been a blessing to our church, they know the word of God, they know how to preach, they know how to go soul winning, they have a desire, they're bold. I believe they're going to be successful. I have confidence in this person. That is the goal one day. There are many people in this room that I can lay my hands on and that's someone I can trust to do a mighty work for God and that will not quit if it gets tough. That is the goal that we have. Acts 1 verse 8. But he shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you. And he shall be witnesses on me both in Jerusalem and in Al-Judea and in Samaria and on to the uttermost part of the earth. Now this is not a verse for just a specific group of people for one period of time. When it says witnesses on me both in Jerusalem, that is their local area. It's not that there's something magical about Jerusalem. It's just that's where they are. First you go soul winning in your home base and you spread out from there. But this is the goal of every church. Acts 1.8 is really the theme of every church. Because basically, hey, reach your area for Christ, but eventually reach further out. Eventually reach outside of that church. Eventually reach outside until it moves on. Eventually reach outside to all of the world. That's the goal. Now the reason why this is not really just referring to soul winning is because you can't reach the whole earth by soul winning without a church. How are you going to do that? The way you reach an area is to establish a church and go soul winning in that area. That's the only thing that logically makes sense. We're not going to logically be able to reach some place hours and hours away. Why? Because it's too far for us. We can't have a midweek soul winning time meeting at that location right before church service. So you say, what do you need to do? We need to take it upon ourselves to say that, you know what, we'll eventually I want you to retain someone to start that church map. Eventually start that location a couple hours away and slowly spread out from there. That's the goal. That's what it's saying in Acts 1. Turn to Ephesians 4. Now I want you to understand something about Paul the Apostle. We would look at Paul the Apostle and say he's the greatest evangelist who ever lived. That's what I would say. I think most people in this room would agree with that. I'm not saying he was better at Christian Gospel than the Lord Jesus Christ, but I'm saying in terms of starting churches, after Jesus Christ was here, who's the person who's doing great works for God? But look, I promise you Paul the Apostle is not the only really dedicated soul winner out there. The difference between Paul the Apostle and the other great soul winners is this. The book of Corinthians, he is writing to the church at court. The book of Galatians, he's writing to the church at Galatia. The book of Ephesians, he's writing to a church. The book of Thessalonians, first and second Thessalonians, he's writing to a church. Then he's also writing to other people that he personally trained to send out to start churches. Look, I'm sure there was a lot of great soul winners that our names are never mentioned, and praise the Lord for all they did, but the reason why Paul the Apostle was remembered so much is because he got those churches started. It wasn't merely the soul winner. That's why I said the goal of the missionary, it's not really saying that someone is the goal of the missionary. That's part of being a missionary. That's part of any church. That's part of any Christian is to go soul winning. Any Christian should be going soul winning. But in terms of how is a church supposed to operate, we're supposed to operate like any other church. Our goal is to eventually get other churches started. To accomplish this, there are many things that need to be done. We're obviously a young church at six months. We're slowly adding more things as we go. I'm sure eventually we'll have training classes and things like that, but we have the Sunday afternoon preaching, which is always going to be there. Why? Because a lot of young men at this church do have a desire to be a pastor one day. I want them to have the opportunity to get a chance to preach. When it comes to volunteering and running ministries and stuff like that, that's good training ground. That's the things that I did before I was sent out here. I ran ministries even before I worked at the very best church. I worked on bus routes and whatever the church had. Just being involved in the ministries. Those are things where people get experience. You don't get experience in terms of how to run a church unless you're actually working in a church. This doesn't necessarily mean you work full time. It could mean volunteering. You don't learn this at Bible college. See why? Because that's not a church. If you're going to learn how a church operates, doesn't it make sense to work in a church and volunteer at that church? That's how you learn. Ephesians 4, verse 28. Ephesians 4, verse 28. This is what the Bible says. Let him that stole steal no more, but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that need. When it comes to starting a church, this kind of ties back into this last point. We don't want to always be sucking money from our sender. We want to eventually be able to self-produce. Any money we get, we can use that for the Lord. Basically, we want to be able to give to others in need. If we start a church one day, we want to be able to say, we'll buy your chairs, we'll buy your hymns, we'll buy this, we'll buy that. We'll help you get started just like we had a church that helped us. That's the way it works. That's the way it should work. Basically, a church puts themselves in a good position. They have someone ready and they're very generous and they help get a church started just like that's how it worked with us. Hopefully, we can do the same thing to other churches here in the Philippines one day. That is the goal. You don't want to permanently be just bringing money from your sending church. We can get a lot of money online that people donate. Praise the Lord. We'll use it for God's work. We can use that money to get churches started and things like that. You don't want to permanently be sucking money. If you are, you're never going to be able to get your church started. You're already basically in debt to your sender. You can't just say, I know I'm in debt $600 every month, but it's going to be $400 more per month plus an initial payment of $4,000. You can't do that. You shouldn't want to do that. You shouldn't want to become independent. This is something that pretty much no missionary wants to do. It makes sense why you don't want to become independent. Because if you become independent, it's going to be a little bit more stressful. That's the stress that pastors deal with in America. Basically, they have to look at their finances and find out how much money is coming in and how much can we support for various things. It shouldn't be any different with our church. We're in the same position as them. You say, why? Because I hope that one day we can be a church that can say, hey, we've started all of these churches. How does that work? It works with the same system that works in the U.S. If it works there, it works here. When it comes to being a missionary, in the Bible, all the apostles were either starting a new church or really helping establish a church. They helped build it up. Any money that's used for mission trips and soul winning is great. One thing I love about our mission trip here in January is that when people were soul winning with our church, they actually were helping our church out. That's the best system for a mission trip because you're actually helping produce something and we're still reaping the results of other people helping labor with us. That's the main purpose with a missionary. They're either getting churches started or they're helping them build and establish. Now obviously with Paul the apostle, he's someone who knew how to preach. Obviously with Barnabas or anyone else that was with him, these are people that could have stood up and preached a sermon. They knew the Word of God. When it comes to someone being a missionary, there must be someone that can actually preach the Word of God. Obviously if you're going to be going soul winning full time, part of learning and growing is that you can eventually preach sermons. At our church we have a lot of young men that know how to preach sermons. They're getting experience, they're getting practice, and you learn by practicing. A lot of young men at our church, it's not just me, a lot of young men at this church, they could get up here and if I was sick one Sunday, I'm confident they could step up here behind the pulpit, they could preach a sermon that could help change people's lives and people can learn and grow. Why? Because there's many people in this room that love the Word of God. Many people love God in this room. That's great experience because one day that experience is going to be necessary if you do start a church one day. So when it comes to this end goal of getting churches started, one of the big things is financial independence, but another thing, the point to reaching the Philippines or wherever a missionary is, you must train them locally. Now it's great if anybody else comes here to be a missionary, they get involved in the same work and getting churches started, but the best way to reach people in the Philippines is to train people that live here locally. You say, why? Because they don't have to adapt to the culture, who won? They've already got a lot of it out of the way. They already know the language, they know how things work, they know where to go and things like that. The adaptation process is going to be pretty easy for them. That's a big change. Moving to a new country is not easy. I'm glad I lived here in the Philippines, I'm glad to be here, I don't regret it, but look, there are definitely changes. These last six months, there's a big change that takes place. It's not the easiest thing in the world. It's great to train people that are the local people, because for one, they know the language, they know the culture, they've already adapted. One thing to reaching, which is our end goal of getting churches started, in order to reach those in the Philippines, is train people that are at our church, and train them how to be pastors and how to run ministries, and basically one day they can start a church. The other aspect is, as much as we can, to try to create an interest in areas for a church. Remember it said, ordain elders where things are wanted. In today's world, it's a little bit easier to do. Back then, obviously after Jesus rose again, a lot of people were interested in Christianity, and there was a demand for churches. But then there was a long time here that died out. In today's world, that kind of demand is back due to the online ministry. That is great, because what we can do is do so many events in areas, and find out, hey, are there people here looking for a church, and eventually we know, hey, that's where we're going to start a church. There's a pastor I know, and I didn't ask him, so I'm not going to name his name, but he was basically debating on two areas to start a church. The way he determined it was, which area has more people that are going to be in that church than they were. It makes sense to go to an area where things are wanted. When it comes to the goals of a missionary, one thing is you need to adapt to the culture, which is pretty obvious. Another thing which pretty much no missionary is going to say is this, that they need to try to become financially independent. The other thing, your end goal is not just to be here and go soloing and have a church, but to actually get churches started. You say, why? Because if this church is around for another 40 years, and I'm here, and eventually no churches get started, and I die, then basically the work could be done. We want to use this as basically the building block to start other churches, and then the works remain. That is what made Paul the apostle of the greatest missionary. It was not simply that he went soloing. It's because God and churches started. Let's close the word for it. If you're having a father thing, if you're allowed to be here today, and you just came to see the word of God and what our goal should be as a missionary church or as a missionary, God, I ask you to help us to apply these things to our lives and help us to just grow as a church spiritually and numerically each and every past week, God. We ask you to continue to bless us. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.