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

Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, everybody. Welcome to Steadfast Baptist Church. Glad to have you here tonight. Let's go ahead and take out our hymnals for the first song. Go ahead and turn to song number 346. Bring your vessels, not a few. This should be a new one for us. Hopefully you know it. But if not, you can learn it tonight. Song number 346. 346. Bring your vessels, not a few. All together. Are you looking for the fullness of the blessing of the Lord in your heart and life? Are you looking for the fullness of the blessing of the Lord in your heart and life today? Claim the promise of your father. Come according to his word in the blessed all-time way. He will fill your heart today to overflowing as the Lord commandeth you. Bring your vessels, not a few. He will fill your heart today to overflowing with the Holy Ghost and power. Bring your empty earth and vessels clean through Jesus' precious blood. Come ye needy one and all. And in human consecration, wait before the throne of God till the Holy Ghost shall fall. He will fill your heart today to overflowing as the Lord commandeth you. Bring your vessels, not a few. He will fill your heart today to overflowing with the Holy Ghost and power. Like the cruise of old unfailing, is His grace forevermore, and His love unchanging still. And according to His promise with the Holy Ghost and power, He will every vessel fill. He will fill your heart today to overflowing as the Lord commandeth you. Bring your vessels, not a few. He will fill your heart today to overflowing with the Holy Ghost and power. Amen. Great singing. Let's pray a prayer. Dear Father, we're just thankful that we can be gathered together again to have good fellowship and hear the preaching of your word. I just pray to help the sermon to strengthen our faith in you and to serve you better. And please fill Pastor Shelley with your Holy Spirit right now. Give him boldness and clarity so he can preach unto us a edifying message. And just please continue to bless our church with soul winners and bless us as we go out preaching the gospel. We love you, Father. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Next song is going to be song number 296. Follow on. Song number 296. Song 296, follow on. Down in the valley with my Savior I would go Where the flowers are blooming and the sweet waters flow Everywhere He leads me I would follow, follow, walk Walking in His footsteps till the crown be won Follow, follow, I would follow Jesus Anywhere, everywhere I would follow on Follow, follow, I would follow Jesus Everywhere He leads me I would follow on Down in the valley with my Savior I would go When the storms are sweeping and the dark waters flow With His hand to lead me I will never, never fear Danger cannot fright me if my Lord is near Follow, follow, I would follow Jesus Anywhere, everywhere I would follow on Follow, follow, I would follow Jesus Everywhere He leads me I would follow on Down in the valley or upon the mountain steep Close beside my Savior would my soul ever keep He will lead me safely in the path that He has trod Up to where they gather on the hills of God Follow, follow, I would follow Jesus Anywhere, everywhere I would follow on Follow, follow, I would follow Jesus Anywhere He leads me I would follow on And then I'm going to go ahead and get a count for the last few days Was there anything on Thursday to report for soul winning? Five for Thursday, what about Friday? Anything on Friday by chance? Two for Friday, what about Saturday? Anything? Four for yesterday, what about today? I don't even think, was our van, we had four, okay Anything else? Is that five? Okay. Alright, 23 for today, praise the Lord on that And keep up the good work on our soul winning Also on the right we have the list of expecting ladies Please keep all of them in your prayers We have our prayer list as well if you have any prayer requests You can submit those via our email or you can submit a communication card We have the baby shower that's mentioned there below We have on the back the ladies tea Please make sure to sign up on the sign up sheet over here And it is for all ladies and their daughters And even if you want to invite a guest If you want to invite your mother or your aunt or whoever You can definitely do that, just please make sure to sign up That way we just have everything set up for everybody We know exactly how many people to plan for And we can have everything accommodated If you did not get an email, you're not going So you need to get the email If your name's not on the list, how are you going to get in the door? I know you're not once you are And so if you did not get an email and you said I thought I put my name on that list You got to make sure it's spelled correctly See my wife or make sure you sign it up If you did not sign up and you try to get the email Worst case scenario, just email us Then we'll have your email Pastor Jones is preaching May 16th Please make sure to come out for that It's going to be a great time of preaching And then also we have several sports days And our soloing marathons Just keep an eye on those things With that, let's go to our third song for the evening 261, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus, 261 In that song number 261, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus All together O soul, are you weary and troubled No light in the darkness you see There's light for a look at the Savior And life more abundant and free Turn your eyes upon Jesus Look full in His wonderful face And the things of earth will grow strangely dim In the light of His glory and grace Through death into life everlasting He passed and we follow Him there Over us sin no more at dominion For more than conquers beyond Turn your eyes upon Jesus Look full in His wonderful face And the things of earth will grow strangely dim In the light of His glory and grace His Word shall not fail you He promised, believe Him and all will be well Then go to a world that is dying His perfect salvation to tell Turn your eyes upon Jesus Look full in His wonderful face And the things of earth will grow strangely dim In the light of His glory and grace Look full in His wonderful face And the things of earth will grow strangely dim In the light of His glory and grace His Word shall not fail you 1 Corinthians chapter 9 the Bible reads Am I not an apostle? Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? Are not ye my work in the Lord? If I be not an apostle unto others, yet doubtless I am to you For the seal of mine apostleship are ye in the Lord Mine answer to them that do examine me is this Have we not power to eat and to drink? Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles And as the brethren of the Lord and Cephas? Or I only in Barnabas have not we power to forbear working? Who goeth the warfare any time at his own charges? Who planteth the vineyard and eateth not of the fruit thereof? Or who feedeth the flock and eateth not of the milk of the flock? Say I these things as a man? Or sayeth not the law the same also? 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? Or sayeth he it all together for our sakes? For our sakes no doubt this is written That he that ploweth should plow in hope And that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope If we have sown unto you spiritual things Is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? If others be partakers of this power over you Are not we rather? Nevertheless we have not used this power But suffer all things As we should hinder the gospel of Christ Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things Live of the things of the temple? And they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar? Even so hath the Lord ordained That they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel But I have used none of these things Neither have I written these things That it should be so done unto me For it were better for me to die Than that any man should make my glorying void For though I preach the gospel I have nothing to glory of For necessity is laid upon me Yea, woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel For if I do this thing willingly I have a reward But if against my will a dispensation of the gospel is committed unto me What is my reward then? Barely that when I preach the gospel I may make the gospel of Christ without charge That I abuse not my power in the gospel 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 am 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 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all But one receiveth the prize So run that ye may obtain And every man that striveth for the mastery Is temperate in all things Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown But we an incorruptible I therefore so run not as uncertainly So fight I not as one that beateth the air But I keep under my body And bring it into a subjection Lest that by any means When I have preached to others I myself should be a castaway Let's bow our heads for a quick word of prayer Father we thank you for this service here This evening at Steadfast Baptist Church I pray that you fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit And enable him to preach his sermon for us tonight With boldness Give him clarity of mind Lord And also I pray that you would Minimize distraction for us Give us ears to hear tonight So we can learn as much as possible From the message that our pastor has prepared for us We thank you for the soul winning that we did Earlier today and Lord I pray that you would bless Our future soul winning times And enable our church to continue doing the work of the Lord And in Jesus name I pray Amen Amen Look at verse number 1 again The Bible says this Am I not an apostle Am I not free Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord Are not ye my work in the Lord If I be not an apostle unto others Yet doubtless I am to you For the seal of mine apostleship Are ye in the Lord My answer to them that do examine me in this Have we not power to eat and to drink And we see here in First Corinthians chapter number 9 The apostle Paul is talking to the church At Corinth and He's bringing up this fact that some people Are attacking who the apostle Paul is They're attacking the motives They're attacking the fact that Some people are getting paid by the church There's a lot of different accusations That are being kind of hurled here Or things that he's at least addressing And specifically verse 3 He's saying my answer to them that do examine me Is this So there's a lot of people that are trying to Poke at the apostle Paul And they're questioning is this guy really an apostle Or you know they're asking questions like You know who is this guy You know why are we giving money to the church There's just a lot of naysayers And people kind of attacking his Position and the reality is There's no new thing under the sun This happens all the time Where people are questioning the authority And the legitimacy of a pastor Or can pastors get paid Or the legitimacy of ministry And the apostle Paul Is making it clear like to this church He's saying you know If I'm not an apostle to other people So be it but I'm obviously An apostle to you guys I mean there's no doubt or question whether or not I'm an apostle to you guys I got you guys saved I've reached the gospel I've done all kinds of wonders and works You've seen the works that I've done You know that I'm an apostle And if I'm an apostle Then he's saying in verse 4 Have we not power to eat and to drink Now he's not saying do I have the ability To physically eat food or to drink What he's talking about is money For the things that he needs Like eating and drinking We all need to eat and we all need to drink And he says in verse 5 Have we not power to lead about a sister A wife as well as other apostles And as the brethren of the Lord and Cephas So he's saying not only should I be able To have money To provide for eating and drinking I should have the money to provide For a wife I should have the money Like other apostles Like Cephas which is Peter This is the apostle Peter And he's saying these guys have families These guys have to provide for their needs And I should have the same right The same privilege Of being able to be paid To take care of that Verse 6 So he's pointing out Not only should they have the ability To get paid to eat and to drink And even provide for their family But even here specifically Not even having to work at all For bear means to not Or to stop doing something He's saying I should have the ability or the power To even just completely stop Making money And just being provided for By the church He says in verse 7 Who goeth the warfare at any time At his own charges Or who planted the vineyard and eateth not Of the fruit thereof Or who feedeth the flock Say I of these things is a man Or sayeth not the law the same also So he's saying Who signs up for the military And they're like alright we're going to need you to buy some boots We're going to need you to buy some camo You need to buy a gun You need to buy some bullets Buy a tank We need you to buy a plane ticket to the Middle East Like nobody's going to the military And paying their way He's saying they're going to pay for the things they need Don't they feed the military? Don't they even pay them wages On top of all the needs And the things that they're giving them He's saying not only that If you were to plant a vineyard Aren't you going to be able to eat Of the fruit of that vineyard that you planted I mean if you go out and you plant Some kind of an orchard Or you plant for tomatoes or whatever Shouldn't you have the right to then eat Some of those tomatoes and eat some of the food That's coming from that vineyard Or if you're taking care of a flock Or whatever Is it not okay for that guy to at least milk the cow And take some of the milk of the cow That he's literally providing for And then he says Am I just saying these things like it's my personal opinion Or just what I think He's saying doesn't the law of God also say this? Verse 9 For it is written in the law of Moses Thou shall not muzzle the mouths of the ox That treadeth out the corn He says, doth God take care of the ox And that's a good verse He didn't really care about cows so much That he was like, I want to give you guys This law of God I mean the law of God given by Moses Because he's just so He's just so concerned about cows Making sure they get fed Or is he saying it's another reason Well, let's see He says, or say thee it all together for our sakes For our sakes, no doubt He's saying, this was not about cows here I'm just proving a point Through a carnal example He's saying, this is written That he that ploweth should plow in hope And that he that threshest in hope Should be partaker of his hope If we have sown in you spiritual things Is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things He's saying, man, if I'm coming here giving you Carnal blessings And I'm benefiting people carnally Or I'm sorry, spiritually How much less is it for me to reap something carnally From you He's saying the spiritual things are way more beneficial More of value than carnal things So why is it such a big deal If I reap a carnal thing back When I'm sowing unto you spiritual things Verse 12 If others be partakers of this power over you Are not we rather? Nevertheless, we have not used this power But suffer all things Lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ And this is where I want to kind of focus My sermon on this evening Is this last little verse here But I'm just kind of building up the context And I'm helping you understand this chapter But he's saying, man, if If other people are able To take advantage of this opportunity Take advantage of being paid carnally Or taking care of their needs carnally He's like, then how are we not Able to take care of that But the apostle Paul says I didn't do that though He's saying I didn't get any money For my food I didn't get any money for my drink I didn't get any money to pay for my family I didn't get any money to stop working He says the reason why I didn't do that Is because I didn't want to hinder The gospel of Jesus Christ And the title of my sermon this evening Is this The problems with deputation The problems with deputation Okay Now what do you You may not know what deputation even is But what I'm talking about Is specific to missionaries Now a lot of churches have missionaries today And when we talk about Independent fundamental Baptists Deputation is a big deal It's a big thing It's really only in independent fundamental Baptist circles That deputation exists But I'll tell you I get emails I would say for sure every week Usually multiple times a week I get emails from missionaries Wanting to come present at my church Because they're on deputation Or they're trying to go into deputation Or they're wanting to do this And they're like hey I'm going to be Of course there's like a thousand Baptist churches In the Dallas-Fort Worth area So they literally hit up every single Baptist church In that area because they want to go to like four or five Or ten as many as they can while they're here Okay And if they're hitting me up They're hitting everybody up okay Just FYI alright But I get hit up a lot And I get calls I mean I've gotten all kinds of calls Emails, we've had them show up Like hey brother, hey pastor Can I present tonight, can I You know go in front of the congregation And I have yet to do that To allow that to happen But here's the thing I have a lot of problems with deputation Okay And here's my number one point For this evening is it's not biblical I'm sorry But deputation is not found in your Bible Okay I don't believe in it, I don't agree with it I believe you probably do But deputation is where a church Has a particular missionary And they want to send them out But the church cannot provide For that missionary Okay The church doesn't have enough money to provide for that missionary And the missionary is unwilling To work So what he does is He goes to other churches And basically tells them his plan Of what he wants to do Where he's gonna serve, where he's gonna go Whatever And hope that they'll also Provide him with support financially They'll also give him money And so essentially You have people go on what's called deputation Where they'll take a year or two years And they'll literally travel across America To as many independent fundamental Baptist churches As they possibly can And they'll present their plan Of what they're gonna do Asking for money For support Then they'll go and do their missionary work And then they'll go to this country or whatever A lot of them are told That they need to have like a scouting mission Initially where they go And they just kind of visit Take a bunch of pictures so they have something to put in their slideshow Okay But Where in the Bible Do you find this example Nowhere There is nowhere in the Bible And he's like okay I need to wait And I'm gonna try and raise money from a whole bunch of people Before I go And in fact this passage Teaches the exact opposite of Deputation The apostle Paul Who has every right, privilege And reason to take money from the church Is not taking it Okay Now I'm not saying that it's wrong to take money He's over emphasizing that it's totally fine To take money Look at the verses I just read to you again Okay what did he say He said in verse number 7 Who planted the vineyard and eateth not the fruit thereof He didn't say Who eats fruits and then later plants a vineyard He's saying He's eating the fruit of the vineyard That he planted right Or it doesn't say who's drinking milk And then later gets a flock No you feed the flock then you eat Look what he says in verse number 10 He that ploweth should plow in hope Now plowing in hope means You're doing work Hoping that you'll get a return Out of that plowing But again it's not receiving something And then planning to do future work Imagine you're going to your boss Or imagine going to a company and saying I'd really like to work for you guys in the future Would you be willing to pay me my salary now It's like What? Nobody does that Almost no one ever gets paid Before they do any work You go and work for two weeks And then you get a paycheck Maybe there's a signing bonus But it's usually still attached to that paycheck After you've done some work So why is it that a missionary Is then going to do the exact opposite Of every single one of these examples The exact opposite Of what the Apostle Paul is doing It doesn't make any sense Verse 13 says this Do you not know that they which minister About holy things Live of the things of the temple And they which wait at the altar Are partakers with the altar Even so that the Lord ordained That they which preach the gospel Should live of the gospel And you say well Pastor Shelley They're preaching the gospel Here's my problem with the deputation They're not preaching the gospel They're going around telling everybody How they're going to preach the gospel in the future It's like Why don't you just go and do it now What's stopping somebody From going ahead and preaching the gospel Now go to Acts chapter 13 for a moment Now that we've kind of got an idea Of what we're talking about They raise support before they're going to be a missionary But this is because They don't understand That according to the Bible Every single person in this room That is saved is already a missionary You're already a missionary And there's no one stopping you From being a missionary The only person stopping you From being a missionary right now is you You are the only person Stopping you from being a missionary It's not like well if I get money Look you can go up and down your neighborhood And preach the gospel for free You can show up at church And we'll give you everything We'll give you a ride We'll give you water We'll give you the Bibles We'll give you the tracts And you can go out and preach the gospel I've never charged anybody to preach the gospel At my church Never will You realize that you're a missionary And here's the thing A soul is a soul Why is a soul in Africa worth more than a soul over here? And it's like Well I just have a burden for souls And it's like okay Well there's a lot over here There's a lot right outside Why do you have to just go to Africa To preach the gospel to people And it's like well everybody here is saved Whoa no Everybody here is already a Christian It's like what? Wake up Our country is not Christian Even Barack Obama Said it's not Christian It's not I think that there was some article I saw recently It said finally According to some poll Less than half of the country even claims to be Christian We're talking about claims Like legitimately And honestly when we knock on doors Most of these people are not going to church Most of the people haven't got You ask them hey do you go to church Yeah which one It's like something It's like you don't go to church You can't even come up with the name of the church It's like where is it It's like over there Do you just drive by it And think that you go there every once in a while Did you think about Did you get a mailer one time That doesn't mean you're a member The reality is There's so many people that you can be preaching the gospel to While you're here It blows my mind These people that are like Man I need to spend years raising support So I can finally preach the gospel to someone It's like Right here You don't need any money Homeless people can preach the gospel Acts 13 verse 1 Now there were in the church that was at Antioch Certain prophets and teachers Barnabas and Simeon that was called Niger And Lucius of Cyrena and Manan Which had been brought up with Herod the tea-chark And Saul As they ministered to the Lord and fasted The Holy Ghost said separate me Barnabas and Saul For the work where into I have called them And when they fasted and prayed They laid their hands on them They sent them away And then they went to all kinds of churches That verse doesn't exist does it? Then the apostle Paul went Now here's the thing How much deputation did Paul do? Zero How is Paul going to go out and preach the gospel if nobody gives him money? He's going to work They didn't say hey Paul We have a special job for you to preach the gospel And he was just like Well I'm not going to do it unless people are going to pay me to do it Unless I'm going to get a ton of money And it's completely free to me And I don't want to do any work while I'm there You know I don't want to have to get my hands dirty or do anything This is a ridiculous idea This is so contrary to so many Bible verses Go to 2 Thessalonians chapter 3 Go to 2 Thessalonians chapter 3 And I love the fact that the apostle Paul Having every right To take a paycheck while he's out there Didn't even want to take a dime from so many different people To set some kind of an example Yet the biggest group of missionaries today They won't lift a finger Unless they have everything paid for It's like Paul is our example Not in any way We're going to follow the apostle Paul Not in this way 2 Thessalonians chapter 3 Look at verse number 6 Now we command you brethren In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ That you withdraw yourselves from every brother That walketh this orderly And not after the tradition Which he received of us For yourselves know how you ought to follow us For we behaved 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 you Not because we have not a power But to make ourselves an ensemble unto you To follow us So he's saying you know what When I showed up I sent from a single person That I didn't work for He's saying everything that I had I literally worked for I'm not taking any money of you guys I don't even want a dollar He says even though I had all the power And all the right to do so And he says you know why? Because I want you to do exactly like I'm doing Yet then you have a whole group of missionaries today Coming around on deputation Saying they're going to do the exact opposite Saying oh come give me money To go preach the gospel And it's like oh we got soul winning at two Well I don't have time to show up for that You can't even go with me to preach the gospel now But you expect me to pay you to do it supposedly in the future What kind of ridiculous nonsense is that? I'm not going to do that That's not biblical Hey if you really want to be the apostle Paul Why don't you find a way to work where you're going to do evangelism You know it doesn't make any sense to say I want to go on I want to go to this country I want to go to Hawaii and be an evangelist I want to work while I'm there That's called vacation That's called an all expense paid vacation That's not called missionary work That's not called being an evangelist It's certainly not following the steps of Paul He worked And not only did he preach the gospel And do just an amazing amount of work He worked with his own hands too Go to Acts chapter 18 Acts chapter 18 And you say well how do you expect them to travel to all these different places If they're paying their way Well how did Paul do it? Hey let me give you a list of some places Paul went Rome Corinth Ephesus Philippi Colossi Thessalonica Berea Seleucia Cyprus Salamis Paphos Antioch Pisidia Iconium Lystra Derby Athaliah Phinnis Samaria Cilicia Phrygia Mygia Troas Samothracia Neapolis I said Philippi Amphipolis Ampolonia Thyatira Greece Assos Mydalene Cayo Samos Trogillium Miletus They'd be like I need ten billion dollars or whatever Paul did it all for free! And a bunch of missionaries want to come and take money from a local church when they won't even walk outside and preach the gospel in many cases In many cases they're too lazy to even go out and preach the gospel to their neighbor but you expect me to believe that they're going to go into some foreign country, some foreign land and be an on fire evangelist Look You play like you practice Practice? We're talking about practice? Yeah we're talking about practice Hey show me show me some practice Hey you want to go to Africa? I know some apartments Let's go there Show me how you're going to preach them the gospel Hey you can reach any continent you want here in Dallas-Fort Worth area We got it all You going to go reach the Hindus? Come show me I'm going to reach the Muslims Good luck, let's go I want to see it You can come with me You know the apostle Paul was working a full time secular job Look at Acts 18 verse number 1 After these things Paul departed from Athens and came to Corinth and found a certain Jew named Akila born in Pontus Lately come from Italy with his wife Priscilla because that Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome I don't know it was because of the money lending or something He says and came unto them and because he was of the same craft He abode with them and wrought for by their occupation they were tent makers So does the apostle Paul stand with Akila and Priscilla because they're tent makers So we have the apostle Paul We have Akila and Priscilla Some of the greatest evangelists mentioned in the Bible And they all work a regular job And you know what? Some of the greatest evangelists in our church, they work a regular job They're a tent maker They're a plumber, they're an electrician They deliver mail, they do whatever Why? Because the same people that know how to work in the secular world are the same people that know how to work in the spiritual world And the same people that know how to be lazy in the secular world are the same people that know how to be lazy in the spiritual world And you know what? I'm sick and tired of all these muchinaries stealing money from churches You're the worst scum when you're getting paid by the church and you're not doing the work of God What a jerk I mean it's one thing to be lazy when you work for McDonald's or something, it's one thing to be lazy when you work for Target over here, but it's way worse to be lazy when you work for the church When you're working for God What a shame And you know what? There's nothing wrong with a church paying a missionary 100% There's nothing wrong with a church paying a missionary a really good wage I have no problem You know what? If the church is going to pay their way, they should take that very seriously And you know what? They should do things according to the Bible And if you want to be paid, well you better start plowing and plowing hope You better start threshing and threshing and hope You better start doing the work. Look, if you can't be great now, why would you be great later? And hey, I want I'd love to pay for an evangelist or a missionary to go out and do the work of the Lord, but let me tell you what You better show yourself worthy here If you want that out there Here's my point number two of the problem I have with deputation is it's a carnal preparation instead of a spiritual preparation It's a carnal preparation instead of a spiritual preparation And here's the thing I'm not up here just giving you problems I'm giving you solutions I have no problem with sending out missionaries Hey, if we have somebody that's on fire that's going to turn the whole world upside down with the gospel Let's pay his entire way I don't have a problem But you know what? There's nothing wrong with anybody in this room at any point saying, you know what? I'm just going to move to this place and work and just preach the gospel for the rest of my life You could be the Apostle Paul No one's going to stop you from being the Apostle Paul by yourself whenever you want So go for it But you know what? If you want me to pay for you You better do some great things here You better show yourself to be a faithful evangelist here You say, I've brought zero people to church here Well, why would I believe you're going to bring people to church somewhere else then? That's weird You know, it's weird what these people are proposing And in fact, when they show up they're not showing up saying, hey, Pastor Shelley We want to go in the neighborhood and preach the gospel and try to bring as many people to your church to show you how interested we are in growing churches and that in the future maybe you would maybe help us or maybe you could provide support for us We're not doing that. You know what? They're coming They're coming to show me a PowerPoint presentation that's boring Here's us with our hats at Disney World in Europe Oh, cool Here's us building a well Here's us talking to somebody We didn't even speak their language They didn't speak ours, but it was a really friendly conversation You think I'm joking They'll show this stuff And then they'll just show these pictures of just land The hills of wherever They'll show you just people walking in a busy area And you're just like, okay And then they'll show you all the TV commercials Poor kid playing in a puddle You know, and it's like Little Timmy needs someone to preach him the gospel or whatever, and I'm just thinking like What does this have to do with the Bible? This is just a carnal presentation I've been through sales pitches before I've seen the sad Sarah McLaughlin video for the puppy You know, they're way more sad than the African The puppies and they're like It's like, who's gonna save it? Who's gonna rescue it? You know It's just a joke, it's a scam They're just tugging on your heartstrings pretending like they're gonna save somebody You think that they save puppies when you give them money, they don't, they're just laughing all the way to the bank They don't really care about puppies, they're not saving any puppies, and they're not saving anybody in Africa And if you want to save somebody in Africa, there's an African apartment over here, let's go preach the gospel to them then Since you care so much They just travel to churches to sell themselves They travel to churches to sell them the idea of preaching the gospel And it's just a joke, my friend Why would I spend two years traveling around to a bunch of churches that I don't know them, they don't know me I'm just gonna get up and I'm gonna present the idea of preaching the gospel to a foreign land And sometimes they're like We want to go to North Korea And I'm like, what? They're like, we don't even know how we're gonna get in yet, but just think of how much they need the gospel And you're like Everyone needs the gospel Good luck getting over there Good luck I remember this guy, he's like Hispanic, speaks Spanish And he wants to go to like Morocco Where they don't speak Spanish And I'm thinking like, how about Mexico Mexico He's like, I'm Juan Carlos There was another guy who was Hispanic, he wanted to go to Japan And I'm like, do you speak Japanese? No Do you speak Spanish? Yes I'm like, I feel like the Lord's calling you to a different area of the world, buddy It's like it doesn't even make sense And so, why would it make sense to take someone that speaks Spanish and be like well let's spend a bunch of money trying to get you to learn Japanese to go to Japan Rather than you can just go to the apartment complex with me that speaks Spanish right now and get a bunch of people saved right now Well that sounds like doing something spiritual, you're right Why don't you have a spiritual preparation instead of a carnal preparation My problem with deputation is it's no spiritual preparation, it's a carnal preparation Raising money, asking for money Going around begging for money You're really a glorified panhandler And I don't like panhandlers Going around begging for money Not doing any work We'll work really hard when we show up at the one service We'll lead a song It's like, wow How much money Let's just start loading your pockets up with dollars now Let's just give you the whole, let's give you thousands to come sing us a song The come preach here are just one little sermonette that you preach every single church that you go and visit And it's going to be about how to get people saved and you won't tell us how to get people saved while you do it Hey you know if you really want to be a missionary you know what you should be doing? Reading the Bible Memorizing scripture Being fluent in the language that you're going to go Cause you already speak English Why don't, there's plenty of English people to give the gospel to Cause you want to go to an area where you're less effective at preaching the gospel That doesn't even make sense How about just go soul winning How about bringing people in the church you're already attending If you can't bring somebody into a thriving church Why would I expect you to bring people into a church that has nobody That doesn't even make sense Hey you want to be a Spanish missionary Why don't you get them to come to Spanish service We already have a great opportunity to bring people to a Spanish service and you're like well I'd just love to go to Mexico and go on the beach and drink pina coladas It's like well that's not the work of the Lord You, go do that on your time off But hey if you want to be a Spanish missionary it's right here In fact a majority, a large percentage of the people that live here are Spanish speaking I run into them all the time I'm going soul winning I think I get more people saved in Spanish than English honestly And I'm not great at preaching the gospel in Spanish I'm just barely good enough I'm a gringo okay I get it They laugh when I say that I'm like I'm soy gringo But the reality is Why would you not work spiritually instead of carnally Go to Matthew chapter 10 Let's just think about the Bible What did Jesus Christ do? Did he get 12 guys to go around with them and beg for money for three and a half years? Or were they doing spiritual works for three and a half years? He was about to prepare them to be the greatest missionaries ever What'd they do for three and a half years? Umm Spiritual things They're sitting there with the word of God Learning from the word of God on a daily regular basis And you know what they're also doing Look at Matthew chapter 10 verse 1 So he's giving his 12 disciples a bunch of power and authority Look what he says in verse number 7 Notice this He's saying hey come with me and let's do a bunch of work The disciples worked They went out and preached the gospel That's what they were doing They weren't getting an extra paycheck either They're just basically getting their needs met for while they're with Jesus Christ He says freely received Freely give They're going out and just making the gospel free to every single person Go to John chapter number 3 Not only are they preaching the gospel Not only are they doing great works They're traveling everywhere Look what it says in John chapter number 3 and look at verse number 22 John chapter 3 look at verse number 22 So the Bible says that Jesus and his disciples were baptizing Look at chapter 4 verse 1 Jesus himself baptized not but his disciples Not only are the disciples going out and preaching the gospel They're literally baptizing people They're literally doing the spiritual works I want to know how many of these missionaries show up and have baptized a single person in their life How many of these people are they getting saved and baptized on a regular basis here but they're going to baptize hordes in this foreign country, this foreign land that they're going to go to Why don't you do it here? Notice what Jesus and his disciples are doing They're doing the works here Go to Acts chapter number 1 Now when they're looking for a replacement for Judas because Judas was not a superstar apostle He was not doing anything beneficial He was wicked and he went straight to hell when he killed himself That was the only benefit he did to society is killing himself I wish every other false prophet would kill themselves Acts chapter 1, look at verse 21 Wherefore of these men which have accompanied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us beginning from the baptism of John in the same day that he was taken up from us must one be ordained to be witness with us of his resurrection So they're trying to pick a replacement for Jesus Christ What are the qualifications? The guy that's been working for three and a half years The guy that's been baptizing and been preaching and been doing all the works and has been with us and been laboring That's the guy that we're going to ordain That's the guy that we're going to send out with us That's the guy that's going to do the great works Don't tell me all the great works you're going to do Show me all the great works you're doing Why don't you do the works here? Go if you went to Acts chapter 6 Acts chapter number 6 Here's another group of people they want to ordain send out and do works for the Lord What are they looking for? And they give a list of other men But it's like who are they looking for when they're going to ordain somebody? Somebody that's already awesome already Somebody that's already doing the great works now Somebody that's already full of the Holy Ghost Somebody that's already preaching great sermons and doing all the works here It's like let's take this guy that's doing awesome and commission him to do even more and allow him to do it at full force Doing it even greater Go to 2 Timothy chapter number 2 Go to 2 Timothy chapter number 2 Instead of having all these carnal preparations why not spiritual preparations? I mean imagine, a person comes to me and says, hey, I want to be an evangelist in two years from now and I say, ok, well travel the whole United States and ask for money What's different between them and a bum? And look all the bums that come to our church they tell us that God sent them here They're like, I'm on a mission and God told me to come here and I feel like I'm led to be here and I'm going to do great works and I'm so excited to start going soul winning but then they never show up at soul winning time and then they're never getting anybody saved and they're never doing it They're going to tell you about all the great things they're doing Hey, it reminds me of somebody Oh yeah, muchinaries Going around telling you all the works they're going to do Look, there's two kinds of people People that work and people that tell you they're going to work The people that tell you that you're going to work aren't working Hey, in all labor there's profit but the talk of the lips tends only to penury Don't tell If you need to have someone just tell you how good they are and if they don't show you it's because they're not good People that are doing great works don't even need to tell you You can just see it You can just experience it by being in their presence 2 Timothy 2, look at verse 1 Notice, he says, hey, I want you to commission other people I want you to ordain other people but who does he say you need to do it to? Faithful men Now here's the thing How can I literally commission and give money to somebody that I just met five minutes ago? How do I even know this guy's faithful? Faithful in what? Show me that you're faithful before you want me to do anything with you He says Now here's the thing He says if you're going to go do a spiritual war you're not going to entangle yourself with the affairs of this life But what are they doing? They're entangling themselves with the affairs of life They're just going and asking for money A glorified sales pitch And they're entangling themselves with all these churches They're entangling themselves with all these different affairs Look, that's not a good preparation if you're going to go out and do great works for the Lord Going around begging for money asking for money No Also, it says in verse 6 So it's saying the guy that's doing all this work He's entitled to enjoying the fruit of his work the fruit of his labor first But here's the thing They're not enjoying the fruit of their labor Other men's labors The work that other men have done And the apostle Paul, when he's talking to the Corinthian church That's a church he founded That's a church that he built up And he's saying, I have power, of course to take of your carnal things here You know, it's not like I don't But at the end of the day, why would some random yahoo get to come in here and just reap the benefits of other ministers and other laborers when they've done nothing They've done no work No effort, no energy This is like a rich parent giving all of their money to their kid who's done nothing That is a recipe for disaster Look, it's nothing wrong with giving your children lots of money You know what? You need to make them work for it And you should make it hard on them And you should teach them how to earn the stuff that they work for Because if you just give people a bunch of money and they didn't earn it They won't care for it They won't treat it with respect And you know what? It's a sick carnal preparation to have people get all this money to go and do the work of the Lord Hey, why don't you do the work of the Lord for free for a while And then we'll see if we want to pay you to do it And because you want faithful men You know, the last thing you want is a compromiser And let me tell you what, these missionaries are all compromisers Because they have to go around And they have to get money from multiple churches And so their doctrinal statement is the lowest common denominator of all those churches That's a bad preparation Point number one, it's not biblical Point two, it's a carnal prep Point three, they're a bunch of compromisers These missionaries You know, they never come and ask me questions about doctrine They're never concerned about doctrine In fact, I can believe a completely different gospel than them, but as long as I give them money they're fine with that And it's interesting When I come and I start asking them questions about salvation They just start saying everything Until I start saying something And then they just hone in on what I'm saying I remember this family came And they came to our service And they sat through it and smiled And acted like it was the greatest thing since sliced bread And then he's coming up and asking me for money And I'm like So what do you believe someone has to do to get saved And what do you teach about salvation He's like, well you got to repent of your sins And you know, you really got to You really got to surrender And serve the Lord And I let him say that for like five minutes straight Before I said anything Then I'm just like, well don't you think it's like faith alone Yeah, it's absolutely faith It has nothing to do You don't have to repent of your sins Just totally 180 Why? Because these people just say whatever you want to hear So that you'll give them money They've learned to be a compromiser They've learned to be someone This is the worst person to send out To go take the world upside down With the gospel as a compromiser Hey, I want somebody That actually believes what they say That doesn't care What other people think They know what the Bible says And they're going to stand firm on the word of God They're a faithful man They're not going to be taken off of the doctrine They're not going to be persuaded in another direction They're not some reed shaking with the wind They're a John the Baptist Hey, they'll get their head taken off Before they'll change on doctrine Look in 2 Timothy 1 verse 13 Hey, it's your job To keep the things that you've been ordained with To keep the instructions To keep the doctrine Not go out and reinvent it Not go out and compromise At the quickest drop of a hat But rather to be faithful To what you've been taught To stick with what you've been taught What a shame if you get ordained as a Baptist And become a Pentecostal You get ordained as someone that believes in faith alone And you become a Pentecostal That's not a faithful person That's not someone that's keeping honest With what they've been taught Go to 1 Timothy chapter 1 1 Timothy chapter 1 How can I have respect for anybody that comes to my church And doesn't even ask a single doctrinal question When they don't even know us? How can I sit here and think That you have any doctrinal integrity When you don't even care to ask me doctrinal questions? That's not someone that cares about doctrine That's someone that cares only about money The only wants to know how much money I can give them How much financial support I can give them 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 3 That thou mightest charge some That they teach no other doctrine Neither give heed to fables And endless genealogies Which minister questions Rather than godly edifying witches in faith so do Now the end of the commandment is charity Out of a pure heart and of a good conscience And of faith unfeigned From which some having swerved Turn aside into vain jingling Desiring to be teachers of the law Understanding neither what they say Nor whereof they affirm There's all these pretenders out there There's all these yahoos That don't even have the right doctrine out there Timothy Don't be like that And tell your men to not be like that Well if you're constantly hammering people Like have the right doctrine Don't compromise Don't associate with the pretenders Then don't you think it'd make sense That someone that's going out Would maybe test people that they don't know On what they believe Like I don't know 1 John chapter 4 verse 1 You know what I've never heard of I've never heard of a missionary Going to a church on deputation And saying I didn't want their money Because they're not doctrinally sound Isn't that interesting The Bible's telling us that the majority are Compromisers and there's all these false prophets And false teachers Yet these missionaries seem to have no problem Every church they show up They'll take their money Isn't that interesting Yeah and obviously they're not going to Joel Osteen But every independent fundamental Baptist church Is not a good church my friend And to say that you can have fellowship With every single independent fundamental Baptist Is just a compromiser There I said it There's some bad independent fundamental Baptist There are some wicked unsaved independent fundamental Baptist They should take Baptist Off of the sign probably too Look at verse number 18 This charge I commit unto thee son Timothy According to the prophets as you went before on thee That thou by them mightest war a good warfare Holding faith and of a good conscience Which some having put away concerning faith Have made shipwreck Of whom is I am an ace in Alexander Whom I have delivered unto Satan That they may not learn to blaspheme He's saying look there's these guys They just shipwreck the faith Destroying the faith Yet these evangelists These missionaries they don't seem to care about that I never seem to be bombarded with questions Like hey pastor Shelly We would really like to know what you believe about anything They don't care I guarantee if they looked at our doctrinal statement They probably wouldn't have sent me the email in the first place They don't care about doctrinal integrity They don't care about what the word of God says They're not going to hold fast the faithful word Look at chapter 4 verse 16 Take heed unto thyself and unto the doctrine Continue in them For in doing this thou shalt both save thyself And them that hear thee The instruction to a pastor The instruction to the leader The instruction to the person that's going to go out And plant churches and start churches And lead people spiritually You notice the most important thing that they are Doctrinally sound Not willing to compromise on doctrine Yet these people They're such compromisers And they think they're going to go out and lead people spiritually Who cares that you have the money to go out and see them If you don't have a good message to give them Look it's all about the message Why are you going to go out and start a church When you don't even care what the doctrine is Look we need people that care about the doctrine more than the money We need people that care about the truth more than the money Those are going to be the people that turn the world upside down with the gospel Not the guy that's concerned if he gets his paycheck taken care of That guy is going to quickly change his doctrine That guy is going to quickly compromise That guy has no integrity Go to second Timothy chapter four Second Timothy chapter number four Look at verse number two Look there's going to be so many people that don't want to hear the truth It's your job to preach the truth And whenever you've already shown that you're just going to take the paycheck Over preaching what people need to hear And saying what people need to hear Why would you do it when it's your own congregation You're not The same compromiser here is the same compromiser there And the same guy that will preach you the hard truth here is the same guy that will preach you the hard truth there And look the pastor is supposed to be like an evangelist So if he's supposed to do the work of an evangelist I'm assuming the evangelist needs to be in the same like manner of not being a compromiser Of preaching the word Of preaching the gospel Go if you would to Titus chapter number three It might be flip a page once Point number four I have last two points quickly that I want to finish on Number one problem I have with deputation is not biblical Number two it's a carnal prep not a spiritual prep Number three it's a compromise They compromise to get as much money as possible from as many hands as give it to them Whereas the Bible is teaching the exact opposite The Bible is teaching you to start standing firm on the doctrines you've been taught On getting away from the high menaces and alexanders Of dividing away from the false prophets Of marking and avoiding them It's not telling you to join hands with as many people as you can It's telling you to preach the truth no matter who's on your side You should be becoming more independent Not more dependent I thought we were independent fundamental Baptist churches Yet the missionaries are dependent missionaries aren't they Dependent on all these churches to give them their handouts Here's my fourth point Of why I have a problem with Deputation is where's the accountability Where's the accountability You know who's the missionary really accountable to And you know these these churches they don't really keep tabs on all their missionaries I mean like the church I was going to that 150 missionaries You can't keep tabs on 150 missionaries Good luck They're not checking up on them and they send them letters And I read the letter and I'm thinking like if I read that letter I'd fire you in a second It's like they get these letters and it's like Well Susie she cleaned the whole house this month And you know little Timmy He's starting to say his first Japanese word And you know I'm in my third year of language school I've almost gotten to the point where I can say I love you Jesus And you know So and so you know Billy He was going to come to and it's not Billy Because it's you know it's like But it's like little Billy Billy he got an invite And he really said he said he was going to come to church Who's heard that? Please pray with us that Billy's going to come to church on Sunday And we'll get a chance to give him the gospel And it's like you talk to this guy and you didn't even give him the gospel I'm not joking This is read before the whole church As the example As the model of an evangelist And you're thinking like what in the world And you know what it discourages all the young people from becoming an evangelist Because they're like wow it's that hard I don't want to do that I don't want to go to Japan and struggle for years to try to learn the language And hope that little Billy's going to come You know They're like reading the book of Acts where people are getting saved on every single page And it's like you know no one ever gets saved In Siberia or Japan or wherever they're at Nicaragua Wherever they're going It's ridiculous Here's another thing Shouldn't the church have some accountability for the money that they give it to? And how responsible is it for me to give money to a random person I just met five minutes ago That claims they're going to do work Does that sound like a good idea? Does that sound like I'm being very responsible with God's money When I'm just willing to give it to any random person that just shows up? Look at Titus chapter 3 verse 10 A man that is an heretic after the first and second ammunition reject Hey some of these missionaries they show up They're literal heretics And you know you find out you ask them doctrinal questions But I guarantee these people are not used to being grilled on all the things that they believe I remember there was a guy he called me from Germany And I didn't realize this Don't answer calls from Germany because you get like $20 charge of your phone bill This guy charged me $20 I'm just getting a call I just answered I didn't realize it was from Germany Some missionary got her phone number somehow Calling me from Germany And he's like you know trying to get me to give him money or whatever In a couple years I'll come back to the United States Can I come preach for you or something? And I'm like okay well tell me about you know your church or whatever And he's like well my father started this church 20 years ago He was in a German village And I said okay well how many is your church running? He said 12 So you've been you've had this church for 20 years and you're running 12 He's like yeah we're in a village of 600 And I was like well do you go solo winning? And he's like yeah And he's like but we've already talked to every single person in the village And I'm just like have you thought about going to a bigger area? Thought about going to another area? He's like yeah I've thought about that And I'm thinking like what? So I started asking him questions on how to get saved And he's like well you've got to repent of your sins You've got to turn over your life He says in fact I don't really like the solo winning Because I don't want to just go to a door and pray with someone And they don't really mean it Because if they don't really mean it they're not going to get saved I only want to pray with people when they really mean it So they need to get in church for six months And start coming and being faithful or whatever And I'm just thinking like this guy is such a heretic And I kind of was asking these questions And I was like so where in the Bible says you have to repent of your sins? To be saved This is his next statement Do you believe in the pre-trib rapture? And I said what does that have to do with the gospel? And he's like are you post-trib? And I was like yeah I'm post-trib And he's like I got to go bye and hung up on me I kid you not These guys are such losers He knew who he was talking to after he asked that question didn't he? Are you pre-trib? He probably doesn't even care about the rapture But he realizes look he's a fraud Why would I give money to a guy that's been in an area of 600 people? He can't even give the gospel right They have 12 people coming to church after 20 years Yet I guarantee there's dozens of other churches giving him money Because he still exists How can you expect me to want to give that person money? This person has no accountability How could any of those churches giving him money still support that? And still say like okay I want to let you know about a missionary We're giving this guy a bunch of money He's been there for 20 years They have 12 people in their church They don't even have the right gospel Everybody in the church would be like why are we giving him money? Why do they give him money? Because they want to have a list in their bulletin of 150 names And tell you how great they are and how much money they give We give $500,000 to missionaries every year You give $500,000 to a bunch of lazy heretics is what you do And that's not being good with God's money That's not being a good steward And how many people are literally sacrificially giving to their church to support missionaries And just go into their Greek vacation Go into their German vacation Go into their vacation to Japan You know a lot of missionaries get a bunch of money to do deputation and they never even do it They end up just not going They end up just failing or quitting or whatever It's ridiculous Where's the accountability? Go to Revelation 2 for a second I'll have you one more verse after this Revelation chapter number 2 The Bible says that if someone's coming unto you and they don't have the right gospel and you bid them Godspeed You're a partaker of their evil deeds Why would I want a bunch of heretics showing up and just giving them money without asking them questions I'm literally blessing the devil I think the devil's brilliant because he gets people to come into Baptist churches and suck all their money out for the gospel And they do nothing with it But there is so many millions of dollars given to these missionaries every single year And I don't see the gospel thriving from all these missionaries You should go show them to me They're a bunch of frauds, they're a bunch of fakes You want to know who a real missionary is? It's Matthew Stuckey That's somebody our church gives money to And look that guy is turning the world upside down with the gospel That guy gets so many people saved Every time he gives his monthly update it seems like a 10 year update It's just like we got 5,000 saved this week and it's just like what? I don't know, don't quote me on that number but it's like huge numbers I mean they're just getting thousands saved and just tons of people getting in their church He's starting churches It's like the real book of Acts Cause he's a real missionary Cause he's a real evangelist And would to God we just get one person that wants to do that Hey I'll pay your way You know what? Don't tell me how great you're going to be Show me how great you're going to be You want to be an evangelist for my church? I'm all for it But you know what? How about you start showing me how great you are at evangelism How about you be an evangelist and then we'll start paying you for doing what you've been doing Why don't you plow in hope Thresh in hope Revelation chapter 2 look at verse number 1 Under the angel of the church of Ephesus write These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand Who walk in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks I know thy works and thy labor and thy patience And thou shalt not bear them which are evil And thou hast tried them which say they are apostles and are not and has found them liars Look there's a lot of people that will just pretend to be righteous Pretend to be of God and they're not You know what? It's our job to find the frauds Hey you're an evangelist, oh really? Get me saved Pastor Anderson has a story he had an evangelist show up and he's like get me saved The guy couldn't even give the gospel You're an evangelist? Look there's little children in this church that can give me the gospel right now They're real evangelists, you're a fraud, you're a fake, you're evil Coming and asking money from me, telling me how you're an evangelist And look it's not just them, I mean there's so many people They want to be a pastor, they want to do this They'll come tell you what they want to do But then it's like, okay, what does this book of the Bible say? And they're like, I don't know what that book is about, you want to be a pastor? You know? It's like, how many books are in the Bible? I don't know Do I have to know that to be a pastor? It's like, how many times do you go soul winning? What does this verse mean? Convince me to be baptized right now It's like, it's called a Baptist church You think I'm lying, look there's tons of people that want to do something Everybody wants to be in the NBA, everybody wants to be a football player But then it's like you look at it and you're like, you probably can't even run to the 50 yard line, bro And look there's tons of people that will tell you all the things they want to do That's great and wonderful, why don't you show me what you're going to do We need some accountability and missions This is God's money, this is God's work We don't want to just ordain some yahoo We don't want to just ordain some bozo We don't want to take God's money and just give it to anybody We want to find the right person and give that person the money And look, I'm all for, hey I'll pay you handsomely You're not going to suffer carnally if you're a great spiritual asset to this church You know what, if you're not a great spiritual asset, you're not going to get paid That doesn't make sense You want to do the work of the Lord, show us how good you are Go to Luke chapter 6 The results speak for themselves Look, I guarantee if the Apostle Paul came back and he just sat in our church and just started serving in our church We would eventually ordain him and send him out He wouldn't have to tell us he was the Apostle Paul We would just be able to tell The Apostles of Jesus Christ, the disciples of the church, they would be the best person in the church automatically They would already be preaching the best sermons They would be getting up and preaching sermons just like, let's just keep letting this guy preach Show me how to go soul winning Show me how to get things done Luke chapter 6 verse 43 For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit, neither does the corrupt tree bring forth good fruit For every tree is known by its own fruit Now obviously in this context it's talking about the things that they say But you can take this principle and apply it to anything That you can tell a tree by its fruit And if a muchinary comes to me and they have no fruit And they just want, hey my name is Jimmy, I'll take all you give me I know your fruit I know what you're like That German missionary You're not a missionary, where's your fruit bro? Twelve people? That's ridiculous You failed And hey, you know what, not everybody that gets saved comes to church and I get that And if he had told me, you know what, we went to this village There were 600 people, we preached them all the gospel Only 12 people want to come to church So we went to another village So we went to another town So we went to the biggest city in Germany So we found, like Find something to do Find someone to give the gospel to Find, look you're going to produce fruit You know, not every branch of a tree bears fruit You know what, some of them do And hey, in your life, if you're bearing no fruit Chop that branch off And start working on the branches that are producing fruit, spiritually And the reality is Look, there's too many problems with this deputation program We need to say no And not be afraid to say no Hey, when they email me or call me I just say, I don't do deputation I don't support it I said, if you want to be a missionary Come to my church and serve with me for a couple years And show me how faithful you are And I said, I will pay your way 100% But they don't do that You're guaranteed Hey, if you're awesome, I'll pay 100% What they would rather do Is go around for two years And not have to prove anything And just get all the money anyways Isn't that interesting Instead of proving how good you are You just want us to trust that you're faithful No, we need to Prove people We need to inspire people to work hard here And then commission and send them out That's the real missionary program Hey, you're already a missionary How good are you doing right now You want to be a full-time missionary Alright, show me Let your work speak Let your fruit speak Let's close in prayer Thank you Father so much for your word Thank you for your commandments I want you all to go out and preach the gospel of the whole world And work at the same time Not even taking a paycheck so many times I mean the incredible example The example of your son He had nowhere to lay his head And he just went out and just worked And just did all these great works And all the great apostles and disciples And all the men before us They freely received and they freely gave I pray that you would just stir men's hearts today Decide to just work And not worry about how things are going to be provided for But rather they would just work And they would just plow in hope And they would just thresh in hope And realize that if they're You know, going to follow you You're going to make them a fisher of men And I pray that you would just use this church to do great works And that you would bless brother Matthew Stuckey In the evangelism that he does And that if we could just stir the heart Of just one person To be like the apostle Paul That he could just do great works In Jesus' name we pray, Amen Amen, let's close it out with one more song Go ahead and take out your hymnal To song number 123 The Christian's Good Night Song number 123 Song number 123 Sleep on Beloved Sleep and take thy rest Thy head upon thy Savior's breast We love thee well But Jesus loves thee best Good night Good night Good night Calm is thy slumber As an infant sleep But thou shalt wake No more to toil and weep Thine is a perfect Rest secure and deep Good night Good night Good night Until eternal Glory lights the skies Until the dead In Jesus shall arise And he shall come But not in lonely guise Good night Good night Good night Only good night Beloved not farewell A little while And all his saints shall dwell In hallowed union Indivisible Good night Good night Good night Until we meet again Before his throne Oh then the spotless Robey gives his own Until we know Even as we are known Good night Good night Amen. Good singing. Thank you all for being here tonight. God bless. You are dismissed. Thank you.