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2024 Conference Ep. 013 Tom Payne

Potter's House Church - Salmon Arm, BC Canada

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  1. Hello and welcome back to the PHSA Podcast. My name is David Bigford. I'm the pastor

  2. here at SalmonArm. This is a very special podcast series where I'm going to be sharing

  3. with you messages from our most recent conference in Prescott, Arizona, the Beyond Limits Conference

  4. with a theme of to preach the gospel in the regions beyond from 2 Corinthians 10-16. I'm

  5. going to share all of the sermons from this conference series to include Greg Mitchell,

  6. our head pastor, Joe Campbell, Richard Ruby, Tom Payne, and many, many others during this

  7. series. So I'll be sharing these with you over the next couple of weeks, and I hope

  8. you really enjoy these messages. If you'd like to see these messages in a video format,

  9. you can go to prescottpottershouse.com where all of these will be available for you to

  10. view in a video format. So without further ado, I'm going to pass, I'm going to go ahead

  11. and move on to the messages and I hope you enjoy them. God bless.

  12. Amen. What a privilege to be a part of this fellowship and be able to attend these conferences.

  13. Can you say amen? It's a great honor to be asked to preach and it's very humbling to

  14. preach on Thursday night. So let's believe God together. Amen. Matthew chapter 28, if

    Matthew 28 chapter mention

  15. you'll turn with me. The word of God. In my opinion, the Jesus People movement was God's

  16. response to the hippie rebellion of the late 60s. It really was a bitter failure, had,

  17. you know, much idealism. And our version of the Jesus People movement got started at the

  18. end of 69, but properly 1970 is where we, is where we mark that. And it's predictable

  19. that the people, the young people of that era were bankrupt of anything like a solution.

  20. There was a need for change. There was lots of things happening. But here I came across

  21. a very interesting example of this that some of you will remember. In 1969, they had the

  22. Woodstock Festival in New York. One of the bands that performed there was called Ten

  23. Years After. And that band featured a singer, guitarist named Alvin Lee. In his day, he

  24. was amazing. But two years later, he wrote a song titled I'd Love to Change the World.

  25. And I was revisiting this song a couple weeks ago. And I thought the lyrics today would

  26. be considered extremely right wing. Here are some of the lyrics. Everywhere is freaks and

  27. harries, dykes and fairies. Tell me where is sanity? Tax the rich, feed the poor, till

  28. there are no rich no more. But the hook is really what got me. And you're going to love

  29. this. This is so 70s. Go ahead and play the hook.

  30. Sorry. That was a little more lead break than we needed. But it was fun. I'd love to change

  31. the world, but I don't know what to do. So I'll leave it up to you. Well, that's nothing

  32. if not honest. And I'm thinking it's kind of prophetic. As if it was sung to the converts

  33. of the Jesus People movement. And even more so to our part of that movement that God had

  34. birthed a year before in Prescott, Arizona, because God gave us a solution. And in reality,

  35. when it comes to world evangelism and changing the world, the title of my sermon is we know

  36. exactly what to do. And I want to read a very familiar portion of scripture for us. Matthew

  37. 28, let's read verse 18 through 20. When Jesus came and spoke to them saying all authority

  38. has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the

  39. nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

  40. teaching them to observe all things I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always

  41. even to the end of the age. Amen. We know exactly what to do. I want to look first of

  42. all at God given principles. Memorial stones reminds us of Pastor Mitchell's journey.

  43. It's so valuable and you need to take the time to watch those. And it tells of his beginnings,

  44. his progression through ministry all the way to our fellowship. Here was a frustrated pastor

  45. hungry for fruit for something that resembled New Testament Christianity as it pertained

  46. to the Great Commission. So he began to pray and he began to seek God. He began to desire

  47. the glory of God and asked for a strategy to fulfill the command of world evangelism.

  48. And because Pastor Mitchell prayed and because he sincerely sought God, God heard and answered

  49. that prayer powerfully. In response, he choreographed events, circumstances. He began to help Pastor

  50. Mitchell to regain the scriptural truths, got breakthroughs which resulted in what we

  51. would call our pattern or our vision. It was God given. It was a design and a template

  52. that could be used to change the world. In our text, verse 19 and 20, go therefore and

  53. make disciples of all the nations. Verse 20, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded

  54. you. So Jesus by preaching and teaching, by making disciples, by sending them, commanded

  55. us to do the same until the coming of the Lord. And because Pastor Mitchell sought God,

  56. he would say he rediscovered evangelism, discipleship, and church planting. And the powerful thing

  57. is these things can be taught. This is what Jesus said. You're going to teach the nations

  58. is what King James says. And that's what a disciple is. A disciple is somebody who has

  59. become a pupil or a student of a man who is seeking to fulfill the great commission. He

  60. said, you are going to make disciples. And in the King James, he says, commanding them,

  61. that literally means to guard. It means that you're building a fortress, that you're going

  62. to keep a sharp eye out. And the idea is that when we seek God to fulfill his purpose, God

  63. provides principles and patterns and fundamentals that can be taught and can be learned because

  64. God really wants to help us. I really recently became aware of an example of this that goes

  65. back to the 1700s. And this is in the realm of music. A man named Johann Sebastian Bach.

  66. I know in Germany they would say it different, but I attempt to speak English. And so I'm

  67. going to pronounce it like you would in English. He was a musician. He was in a family of musicians.

  68. He decided he wanted to be a composer, but he had a firm belief that music is from God.

  69. And that music must be used to glorify God. So here's a man that is seeking God to glorify

  70. God. Here's a picture of Bach. This is a portrait. And here's a man that in those days they didn't

  71. have cameras. So he would sit in front of a painter and they painted him. And that's

  72. one of the, I think, two portraits of him. And you can take that down for now. But the

  73. story of Bach, if you've never studied this man, you should take the time. This is fascinating

  74. that this man who began to seek God and glorify God, as a result, God gave this man musical

  75. revelation. He all of a sudden came into possession with some principles, some fundamentals, and

  76. literally changed the world of music. Bach converted to Christ, sought God, wanted to

  77. worship God. And he said these words, all music should have no other end and aim than

  78. the glory of God and the soul's refreshment. Where this is not remembered, there is no

  79. real music, only a devilish hubbub. Bach sought God and it became obvious that God gave, put

  80. something in this man. If you read the historical record about him, he proceeded to write worship

  81. music. This is what he wrote, worship music. In doing so, he revolutionized music. His

  82. output was prolific. He wrote worship music, but he also wrote instructionals and taught

  83. people about music. He composed at an incredible frenetic pace. And he introduced some concepts

  84. that are still very much at use today in many, many different genres, counterpoint and harmony.

  85. And they say that he brought this to a level that did not exist. He produced volumes. One

  86. historian said Bach enriched the established German styles through his mastery of counterpoint,

  87. harmonic, and motivic organization. Counterpoint is one of the most complex aspects of music

  88. theory. His ability here seems almost supernatural. At one point he became the worship leader

  89. for a church. He wrote what was called a cantata every week. Every week he would write this

  90. composition with a quill pen and a jar of ink. He would draft a musical score for each instrument

  91. by hand, and there were dozens. He composed the musical score for all the singers by hand,

  92. and there were often dozens if not hundreds. He would make copies for each individual instrument

  93. and each singer by hand every week. And as they study this man's body of work, the result

  94. is some of the most beautiful, the most complex music ever written. It is divine genius. And

  95. in addition to this, he wrote guides and variant exercises. In his lifetime they credit him

  96. with over 1,100 compositions, and they hold musicians in awe today. One historian, John

  97. Sebastian Bach, 1685 to 1750, is unquestionably the most revered figure in the entire history

  98. of Western music, having been called the father of music himself on several occasions, and

  99. often being referenced to by other composers like Chopin, Mozart, Hayden, and Beethoven,

  100. who all admired him and collected his music, they considered him as key inspiration. Mozart,

  101. I learned, was trained by two of his sons. We're going to get to discipleship in a minute,

  102. because we're talking about revelation from God. Mozart said of him, Bach is the father,

  103. and we are the children. 1922 modern-day accomplished guitarist Pat Metheny said, compared to Bach,

  104. we all suck. I know I said I'm using English, excuse the French. The point is that what

  105. God did for music, for a man who wanted to glorify him, God has done for those who seek

  106. to fulfill the Great Commission. And you can find this in the Gospels, in the Book of Acts,

  107. throughout church history, all the way to the Jesus People movement and Pastor Mitchell

  108. and our fellowship. The principles that God gave our pastor are beyond human wisdom. We

  109. have a template so that when it comes to world evangelism, we know exactly what to do. I'm

  110. going to look secondly at the public domain. One of the great struggles of modern music

  111. industry are the endless lawsuits, copyright, royalties, lawsuits, everything from the estates

  112. of the old Delta Blues musicians that most of the white rock and rollers ripped off directly.

  113. Sampling. And even, you know, how ridiculous, church worship songs now, you know, at one

  114. point, how many of you remember that, where you had to buy a license, you know. What's

  115. interesting is I studied this and I began to delve into Bach and this amazing man. When

  116. you study the effect of Bach on modern music, it's amazing how many modern musicians openly

  117. admit that they wrote songs directly copying him with no fear of lawsuit. And the reason

  118. simple all of Bach's material is in what is called the public domain. That define means

  119. creative materials that are protected by, that are not protected by intellectual property

  120. laws such as copyright, trademark or patent laws. What I believe, and this is where I'm

  121. going with this, is I believe that God not only gave Bach revelation about music, because

  122. music comes from heaven, that he intended it to help anyone who woke up and decided

  123. they wanted to succeed in music. I was reading about the 1970s, a man named Ron Altbach with

  124. the Beach Boys. He's just over one of his friend's house in the band, Al Jardine, and

  125. he's just on the piano. He had gone to school and studied classical music and he's playing

  126. Bach's Jesus Joy of Man's Desire. Because if you're going to play Bach, you're going

  127. to play worship music. Al Jardine heard this, got excited. He said, man, we need to turn

  128. that into a song. Let's write a song. So they altered the tempo and they wrote a song called

  129. Lady Linda, which became the name of their next album and gave them a hit song for their

  130. band. Back in the 70s, it became trendy. If you want to have a hit, add a little Bach.

  131. Because it's genius and it's available and it works and it's in the public domain. I

  132. think that most people are unaware of the impact this man made on Western music. When

  133. I was in Gallup the first time around 2005, Pastor Greg came back from South Africa and

  134. he was here in Prescott. He called me, he said, Tom, stop what you're doing right now

  135. and you need to go buy a CD called Play. It's guitar. I said, who is it by? He said, Brad

  136. Paisley. I never heard of him. Brad Paisley. I looked him up. He's a country Western player.

  137. Like I'm not a country Western player. I'm like a humbucker kind of guy. You know, I'm

  138. like Brad Paisley. And so I finally got around to it. I finally, okay, all right. I went

  139. and bought this and I'm listening to this and I'm like, whoa, this music is profound.

  140. One of the songs that I remember and I still have it on my phone called Departure. I listened

  141. to this and I was like, this is complex, man. This has layers. This is moving. I learned

  142. just within the last week or two that he stated somewhere that Bach was his inspiration. This

  143. man studied music. So we're talking about a cowboy hat and a telecaster and cowboy boots.

  144. Another point, I want to tell you something. God is generous with people that seek him.

  145. And if that's true in music, how much more in reaching the world for Jesus? In verse

  146. 19 again, go and make disciples of all the nations. That's our marching orders. And here

  147. we are on Thursday night. Thousands of us just, that's just a small representation of

  148. our fellowship. People on online. God wants every person to succeed in world evangelism.

  149. So much so that he is generous with revelation. He is generous with the wherewithal to succeed.

  150. And it's all in the public domain. Mark 16, 15, the companion verse, go and preach the

  151. gospel. Go ye and preach the gospel. And it talks about getting filled with the Holy Spirit,

  152. speaking in tongues, healing, deliverance from demons. Verse 18 of our text, all authority

  153. has been given to me in heaven and on earth. You go there for. In other words, all the

  154. authority that I've gained from the death, burial and resurrection and the ascension

  155. to the right hand of the power, I am now vesting in you. I am generously offering this to you

  156. because I want you to succeed. Think about preaching, discipling, baptizing miracles.

  157. Everything we need is right in the word of God. And if that's not enough, if that's

  158. not enough, God in our fellowship has given us a clear pattern. Think about think about

  159. what informs us about sending churches internationally or planting churches domestically. Ninety

  160. percent of it's in the public domain. You know, there's still old recorded sermons.

  161. You can go back and into how many of you still got cassettes? I mean, I got cassettes of

  162. some of the best preachers on earth, man. Warren Johnson, Pastor Mitchell. You know,

  163. these these preachers, if you don't know what that is, you can go to the Smithsonian and

  164. find out. But I'm telling you, man, it's out there. And then CDs, MP3s before there was

  165. the World Evangelism video, there was the World Evangelism movie. How many of you remember

  166. the World Evangelism movie? I remember that when God called me to be a missionary was

  167. at the end of one of those movies. And Pastor Mitchell said, the reason I bring these young

  168. preachers to the Philippines is I want them to stay up at night. I want them not to be

  169. able to sleep till they do something about the nations of the world. And I'm telling

  170. you, something came on my life. We know exactly what to do. And we've known it for decades

  171. because God gave our leader revelation. And if that's not enough, you know, books, we

  172. can take the land. The open door, Mitchell and his men. I loved hearing Pastor Greg talk

  173. afresh about Richard Brooks, you know, here's this guy, he's an American, he tried to smuggle

  174. some drugs into Australia, gets caught, goes to prison. So in prison, he's given a Bible

  175. and he's given a copy of the book, We Can Take the Land. And long story short, he ends

  176. up getting saved. He gets out, goes back to the US, finds a gospel church that took him

  177. on a mission trip to Romania. And while there he met a girl and married her. As Nigel would

  178. say, as you do. He stayed and using the Bible and his dog-eared paperback copy of We Can

  179. Take the Land began to build a work for God. And was being successful because he was like,

  180. let's read the Bible and then let's read We Can Take the Land and let's do this. And he

  181. did it. And it was years later that God's sovereignty caused him to meet Jeff Renz

  182. and then meet Pastor Mitchell and then Pastor Greg went there, they did a crusade and a

  183. thousand people were saved. We heard a testimony tonight from our brother. Today there are

  184. ten churches there and seven missionaries in four other countries because we know exactly

  185. what to do. And it's in the public domain. It's where you can get to it. It's there

  186. generously provided by God so that we can fulfill our destiny. You know, I was remembering

  187. the 90s. You know, thank God for the breakthroughs that we've had in healing. Thank God for that.

  188. How many of you remember the 90s when we were all reading books? We were reading the books

  189. by these different, and some were good and some were not so good and some were really

  190. not good at all. And we're trying to break through and we're believing God and look where

  191. God's brought us. You know, Pastor Greg just finished a book on healing. And I want to

  192. tell you something, I haven't read every book on healing that's ever been written on planet

  193. earth, but I've been enough, I've read enough to know that's the best I've read anywhere.

  194. I mean, if you want to break into the healing, it's right there. We know exactly what to

  195. do and not because we're special because God wants us to know. It's in the public domain.

  196. I want you to put the picture of Bach up again. You notice he's holding a piece of paper there.

  197. And if you can move it to the next one where it's the close up, the next picture, it's

  198. called a Canon Triplex. I'm not going to go into all what that means, but that six VOC

  199. means six voices. And a voice would be an instrument or a line of music. And the thing

  200. that's puzzling about that, there's only three lines. So each line is one voice or one instrument.

  201. So this was a mystery. It took years for people to figure this out. Somebody finally decoded

  202. it. The issue is he's handing the musical score to us as the viewers and we see three

  203. lines, but he's looking at it from a different view. He sees the same three lines upside

  204. down. Let's go to the next picture. That's the way he sees it. Somebody figured it out.

  205. They said each line, if taken the upside down inverted line from his view, placed above

  206. itself in our view, this is what you get. Go to the next picture. And I'm not going

  207. to play that, but you might Google that. That is profound. That each line is in perfect

  208. counterpoint harmony. And what you have there is a very simple, complex, profound piece

  209. of writing. If I wasn't saved and I was studying Bach, I'd think this guy is an alien. He's

  210. got like other worldly IQ from another galaxy. Or he's had a direct download from God.

  211. And that's what he claimed. But go back to the portrait. One historian said, what Bach's

  212. doing here is he's handing future generations his business card. He's saying, listen, God

  213. help me with some things and I want to help you. I'd love to teach you this. Try this.

  214. Here are some fundamentals and this works. I did an AI search on all the musicians over

  215. the years that reference Bach as a source for music they copied, directly, shamelessly

  216. copied, or have used as influence for their songs. And the list came out to hundreds,

  217. if not thousands. Many of the Beatles songs, Led Zeppelin, Stairway to Heaven and others,

  218. Edgar Winter, The Doors, Simon and Garfunkel, Sting, said every day we sit at Bach's feet.

  219. I made a short video of artists and songs they admit copied or inspired and it switches

  220. to a shorter list of churches inspired by Pastor Mitchell. Let's just look at that real

  221. quick.

  222. That list was a month ago. I'm sure it's outdated already. But I promise you'll be

  223. outdated before this night's over. Hallelujah. So I want to close with whosoever will. The

  224. mystery, there are people that are enthralled with how God has helped us, but actually resist

  225. doing what we do. Pastor Mitchell used to say of some, they want to be like us, but

  226. they don't want to be like us. He said you can't be what we are if you don't do what

  227. we do. 29 Palms, California, Jake and Jennifer Snyder, you know they're there, disciple from

  228. Prescott, Arizona, replicating the pattern, amazing results. I think the church would,

  229. something like, gone from 15 to 130 people. And recently, you know, within the last year

  230. or two, God opened a door for them to rent a church building. This isn't just any church

  231. building. You know, you think about, well they're renting a church building, I think

  232. of one of these old gothic brick things that's about to fall over. I got to visit there,

  233. and they got eight acres, 12,000 square feet, from a congregation that's been dying for

  234. years. It's now a congregation under 20 people, and the ages of the people in the church are

  235. like between 60 and 90 years old. And they're good Christian people. But this church has

  236. been there for decades. So they go in and they're, you know, they're allowed to do

  237. some remodeling and painting and they're functioning in the sanctuary. And the church itself actually

  238. meets, you know, on Sunday morning for a little while before the regular services, but they

  239. have it for revivals morning, evening. But there's offices and there's desks and there's

  240. bookshelves. And one of the people in the Snyders Church, converts, was looking through

  241. the bookshelf and they found a book. This is the book, this is the open door. They found

  242. this book on this old dying church's bookshelf. And they asked the people in the church, so

  243. they said, where did this come from? They said, we don't have any idea where it came

  244. from, but it's likely to have been sitting there for 15 or 20 years, because we haven't

  245. touched those bookshelves in a long, long time. Wow. This church, like Richard Brooks,

  246. had the book, but unlike Richard Brooks, they ignored it. And now they're dying. And in

  247. the meantime, they're renting to a couple who had been discipled, has the revelation

  248. exploding with revival and they didn't even know this book existed. Jennifer is my daughter.

  249. She called me, she said, dad, have you ever read this book? I said, Jennifer, I would

  250. have thought this was required reading, man. I lost track. That was a, I went to bed too

  251. many times since this book came out. Of course I've read this book. An old church totally

  252. ignored it. They said that they've decided recently that their method to grow their church

  253. is to sponsor a little league team. Mark Olson said, it's not that our pattern has been tried

  254. and found wanting too often. It's just not been tried. And I want to tell you, my experience,

  255. I was privileged to be saved in the Prescott church and trained for ministry and sent out

  256. in the Prescott church. And I had a fundamental understanding, you know, that we have a pattern

  257. and our job is to reproduce the pattern. I remember going to the Philippines the first

  258. time and I had never been that far away from the United States. I couldn't believe it.

  259. I got on an airplane in LA and we just kept going west for 13 hours till I thought my

  260. brain was going to leak out my ears. We land in Manila. We spent the night. The next day

  261. I was asked to preach in one of the baby churches. They put me on a bus and we went into the

  262. jungle for, it seemed to me like two hours. They brought a guide with me, which was good.

  263. We got off the bus. We had to walk probably a half a mile to the church that had already

  264. started their song service. And I got maybe a half a block away and I heard the music.

  265. It was just like it was in a different language. I walked into that iron shack and it was like

  266. I was in any fellowship church on planet earth. I preached through an interrupter. We had

  267. an altar call and then the pastor, proud as punch, walked me back to the bus stop. He

  268. said, Pastor Payne, I am a disciple of Pastor Mark Hurley and we are reproducing the Prescott

  269. congregation in the Philippines. So proud of that. You know, there's people, you know,

  270. in our fellowship, you just, you blanch at that. For some people the fellowship becomes

  271. the F word. Whose disciple are you? Who would you proudly say you're patterning your life

  272. after? Who's your teacher? What are you reproducing? Just before I had the privilege of going to

  273. Kenya from Farmington, New Mexico, I had the privilege of going first to the Netherlands

  274. and then to Davao City where Mark Olson was. And at the time I considered them two of the

  275. most profound and exciting examples of the Prescott vision reproduced in the earth and

  276. I returned convinced what we do works anywhere in the world. Amen. This is genius. This is

  277. amazing. And I went there determined. It is not our talent. It is a divine spark. It is

  278. a gift. We need to learn. You need to learn what we do and do it with God. And the problem

  279. is some people birthed in this are actually attracted to and tempted by the religious

  280. world. Come on, man. Are you kidding me? In Perth I had a good natured debate with some

  281. of the church kids about music and I would show up to the outreach. We had it going on,

  282. Murray Street Mall, North Bridge. We could do these outreaches outside and pump music

  283. and gather two, three hundred people and preach to them. And I showed up at one of the outreaches

  284. and I'm listening to the music and my heart's thinking, that's horrible. What the heck are

  285. they playing here? And it didn't work. We didn't draw a crowd. And I said, what in the

  286. world are you guys doing? I'm not saying that you've got to be playing Leonard Skinner or

  287. anything. I'm not insisting on the 70s, but whatever you're doing, what is that? And I

  288. had to ask around. I found out they were all listening to this government funded radio

  289. station. Could you imagine getting your inspiration off an NPR? I said, guys, listen, with all

  290. due respect, the reason the bands are on that station is because they suck. They can't make

  291. it in the marketplace. There's nobody that wants to listen to them. There's no sponsors

  292. that want to affiliate with them. And so they're on music welfare. Oh, but isn't that the rub?

  293. No, but we're musicians too. Who needs Bach Schmuck? Who needs to be confined by the boundaries?

  294. We have our own inspiration. You suck. I'm sorry for my French, but it's just a better

  295. word than you stink. I'll say that if I should. You know, they have a term for people like

  296. you. It's called starving artist because only you and seven of your weird friends like what

  297. you're doing. What you really need to do is find the peak of the bell curve, right? What

  298. are humans like? This is what heavenly music is about. This is what Bach discovered. There's

  299. certain, you know, there's certain harmonics and chords and scales that move human beings

  300. and God knows what he's doing. Everything else is devilish hubbub. You're serving up,

  301. you know, it's, I don't even just stop me here. Help me. I, I was having a hard, I was

  302. telling them music has a math, it has a symmetry. What's wrong with you guys? We ended up picking

  303. a song that was, you know, like number one for two years. I rewrote it. We put some music

  304. to it, got some singers on it and immediately, man, we start playing that in Mercy Street

  305. while we draw 300 people. It wasn't like my cup of tea was, it was kind of boy toy Bruno

  306. Mars stuff from the nineties, man. I'm like, I can't even relate to this, but at least

  307. they're obeying some sort of sanity. You know, that experience caused one of those church

  308. kids, one of these men, he said, pastor pain. It was that experience. I decided to become

  309. a disciple. Why? I said, he said, because I realized our leaders know what they're doing.

  310. We know exactly what to do. I'm not being proud. I'm not being arrogant. I'm telling

  311. you, if you want to succeed in world evangelism, if you want to exceed in church planting,

  312. I tell men, those that ask questions do the best. It's not just what we do. That's the

  313. principle. It's you got to know why we do what we do. There's reasons we do morning

  314. prayer. There's reasons for our altar calls and the correct way to do an altar call. There's

  315. reasons for our leadership as male. There's Lee. There's reasons for standards of ministry.

  316. Why didn't somebody ask pastor Yohan Sebastian Bach? What are you holding in your hand there,

  317. man? Like, you know how long it takes to paint those pictures? Months. He's standing there

  318. holding that picture. And then after he was alive for how many years after not money said,

  319. pastor, with all due respect, you know, what's with the six voices thing? You said, oh yeah,

  320. you want to see something cool? Look at it from my point of view, turn it upside down,

  321. put it together like this, and you're going to get a lot of people saved. Hallelujah.

  322. I'm going to close with one more illustration of this. People ask, what do you preach on

  323. World Evangelism night? I always said it really comes down to what I call the give and go.

  324. I don't understand basketball the same way, say, Joe Campbell and Jeff Day does, but I

  325. do remember in my youth a coach talking about the give and go. Many people don't know that

  326. the man that invented basketball, his name was Dr. James Naismith. We can see a picture

  327. of him. He was a Christian missionary. He decided to create a sport to attract young

  328. men, win them to Christ, invented basketball in 1898, developed into a worldwide phenomenon,

  329. not exactly reaching people for Christ. But the give and go is still a fundamental. The

  330. question is, is the give and go still relevant? You know, the Hollywood Showtime fast break,

  331. run and gun. I put together a little give and go video. Let's take a look at that.

  332. There's the give and go. One player gives or passes the ball to a teammate and goes

  333. or cuts to the basket to receive a return pass for a shot. Let's check it out.

  334. There's the give. There's the go. Hey, it's Pastor Harold Warner. There's the give. There's

  335. the go. These are NBA professionals, man. There's the give. There's the go. This last

  336. one's amazing. There's the give. There's the go. He's just throwing it where he's supposed

  337. to be. That's called faithfulness, being where you're supposed to be, when you're supposed

  338. to be there, and God will throw you the ball. That's what we're going to do tonight. We're

  339. going to do the give and go. It's a basic. How do you reach the world? There's going

  340. to be people that go and everybody's going to give. We know exactly what to do. And when

  341. you do, God's going to bless you. Pastor from Holland, dear Pastor Payne, when we decided

  342. to invest in Kenya and make the trips every year with the other pastors, God began to

  343. bless our church. A woman in our city deposited 50,000 euros into our bank account. Another

  344. pastor, inspired by a statement Mark Olson made about our faith and believing God for

  345. family to get saved, he said, you took the world of evangelism offering. When I gave

  346. the offering, I prayed for my son to get saved. I'm going to abbreviate this. He said he did,

  347. but shortly after that, got into an accident and went home to be with Jesus. And I wonder

  348. what would have happened if I didn't participate. Kevin Foley, after a Thursday that I preached

  349. and talked about our descendants blessed by our obedience in the offering, he said he

  350. gave very generously to believe God to not only meet the need for the missionaries, but

  351. to bless his baby churches and his descendants. He said somebody shortly after that gave a

  352. check three times his offering. And that year, the Northwest Conference had more than enough

  353. to pay for itself. Unlike the misguided youth of the seventies, they admitted they didn't

  354. know what to do. God gave us revelation. We're called to change the world and we know exactly

  355. what to do. And God is expecting this of you. I'd like every head bowed and every eye closed.

  356. Heads are bowed, eyes are closed. We know exactly what to do. We need to go into all

  357. the world and we need to give generously tonight to facilitate that. What a gift. What an amazing

  358. revelation that God has given us. And we're going to open these altars and I believe God's

  359. not done calling people to the nations of the world. We're going to see a demonstration

  360. of our vision tonight, but there's always tomorrow night. And we know exactly what to

  361. do. Heads are bowed, eyes are closed. Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins and

  362. rose from the dead and he's alive. And by faith and repentance you can be born again.

  363. You can have a brand new life. And if you're in here and you're not saved you know exactly

  364. what to do. God brought you here and you understand you're not ready for eternity but you want

  365. to be. Somebody's going to pray with you and if you want to get saved, you want to get

  366. right with God, I want you to signify that by raising your hand all over this place quickly,

  367. all over this place. How many would there be? Amen? All over this place. Praise God

  368. quickly, quickly, quickly. Hands unsaved, backslider, man or woman, God's dealing with

  369. you. Thank you for that hand. Somebody else, thank you for that hand. Somebody else, join

  370. these. Say, pastor, I don't want to play games anymore. I need to get right with God. Here's

  371. my hand. There's another hand over here. There's another hand over here. How many more? You

  372. join these. You want to be a part of this prayer. Don't hesitate. Only way to be made

  373. right with God is through the blood of Jesus and faith and repentance quickly. There's

  374. another hand over there. Every one of you that raised your hand, I want you to stand

  375. up right now. Just stand to your feet. Unsaved, backslider, young or old, stand to your feet,

  376. stand to your feet, stand to your feet. I want you to come to the altar. Just come from

  377. where you are. And we need some altar workers to meet them. Meet these precious souls as

  378. they come, as they come. Men with men, women with women. Changing the appeal. I'd love

  379. to change the world, but I don't know what to do. So I leave it up to you. You know who

  380. he's talking about? He's talking about us. Fifty years. The Jesus people converts have

  381. been taking that responsibility. We know exactly what to do. What about you? Whose disciple

  382. are you? How do you process the revelation that God has given to Pastor Wayman Mitchell

  383. and passed down to the leaders of our fellowship and now Pastor Greg Mitchell? Is that infringing

  384. upon your creativity? Is that somehow an impediment? I want to tell you, if that's the way you're

  385. looking at it, that's extremely foolish. Because it's a gift. That means common people like

  386. me, common people like you can have a viable part. There's fundamentals in our fellowship.

  387. And tonight, we're going to give and go. And every person in this room, I'm live.