Back to the Basics

Welcome to the Rheem Sound Church of God podcast.

Wherever you're listening from, we hope you are blessed by

today's message. So yeah, it was good.

It was good to be here yesterday.

I want to thank the pastor for allowing me to come and share.

I've been blessed to equip over 46,000 people in 4 / 40 states

to begin sharing their faith in Christ every day as a lifestyle.

And as he said, Sunshine is really my last name.

Let's just say it was a great name when I was in sales.

It was a terrible name when I was a police officer on a SWAT

team in New Jersey. OK, I'm not a minister, don't

have any seminary degree, no Bible college degree.

God taught me this through the school of Hard Knocks, and I'm

blessed to be able to share this a little bit with you today and

challenge you. How many of our football fans

people like football. OK, cool.

Can tell you a little football story.

One of my older brothers played on our high school football

team, and we were the Verona Hillbillies.

Oops. That's not what's supposed to

come on. There we go.

I'm entitling us back to the basics.

OK, so he was on the football team, and they won a state

championship at Verona High School.

Now, we were the Verona hillbillies.

You didn't know there were hillbillies in New Jersey, did

you? Is this the most politically

incorrect logo you've ever seen? As the PC culture came into

being, they said, whoa, whoa, whoa.

This guy's got a gun on his shoulder.

We can't have that. So he took it off.

They put a fishing rod on and they said he's got moonshine in

front of him. We can't have that.

So he took that away and put a puppy there.

Then he said he's got a pipe in his mouth.

He can't we can't encourage smoking.

So he put a a piece of grass sticking out of his mouth.

And finally they said, let's just trash the whole thing.

And the new logo now has a big V and it just says hillbillies on

it. But anyway, between the time my

brother graduated from high school and I got into high

school, we had amassed the longest losing streak in New

Jersey State history. And we brought a football coach

in from Erwin. Erwin, TN.

His name's Al Rotella. He came into the fall of 1968 to

turn our program around. And I remember as a freshman

going into the cafeteria and he went around and taught every one

of us how to shake hands like a man.

Stick your hand in, lock your thumb and shake.

None of this dead fish stuff, OK?

And then he took us out. We had a week of conditioning at

football camp. That's all we did was

conditioning, nothing else. A lot of limping, a lot of

dragging of limbs. OK, but that's what we did.

Went back to Verona and we started doing basics of

football. We got back to the basics.

We learned how to protect the ball, how to hand it off, how to

block, all the things you need to do to have a successful

football team. And then in the fall of 1968,

November of 1968, there was an article written in the Newark

Evening News, and here's what it said.

The Hillbillies long losing streak of 32 games was the

longest in New Jersey State history.

And what made losing even worse was the manner in which it

happened. Opposing teams ran roughshod

over the Hillbillies by embarrassing scores of 75 to

nothing, 64 to 661 to 0, and 59 to 6.

Things became so bad at Verona two years ago that Sven

Peterson, the AD, had to recruit players from the student body.

We didn't have too many boys on the team to begin with, recall

Peterson, and with injuries and illnesses it left us with only

about 16 players. So we had a forfeit our game

with Milburn. I really hated to have to play

Verona, said one of the more merciful Suburban Conference

coaches. I was afraid we'd injure some of

their boys. So we punted on 1st and 2nd

downs, drew deliberate penalties, used every substitute

we had and just ran simple plays into the line to keep from

beating them too badly. Rival coaches still hate to play

Verona today, but for a very different reason.

Verona. Verona's lost losing streak is

all but forgotten. Verona has won six of his first

eight games this season. The following year we won the

New Jersey State championship. OK, and what happened?

Well, we went back to the basics and so first, second.

Peter 112 says. Therefore, I will always remind

you about these things even though you already know them and

are standing firm in the truth you've been taught.

And it is only right that I should keep on reminding you as

long as I live. So you believers must not

neglect the basics of our faith even as we go on to study deeper

truths. And just as an athlete needs

constant practice, we need constant reminders of our faith

and how we came to believe in the in the beginning in the 1st

place. So here's a tough thing, if some

were to ask you what's it like being a Christian?

If your answer immediately isn't it's the greatest adventure on

planet earth, you are not going back to the basics because when

you go back to the basics, that's going to be your answer.

You know when I say the word copilot or Co worker, some

thoughts come to mind, right? It's a partnership, people

working together. When Matthew 28 God gave us or

Jesus gave us the great Co mission.

Sadly, it's more actively called the Great Omission or the Great

Suggestion or the Great Commission for him.

But it's not a Commission because we're not involved in

it. And every follower of Jesus

Christ is commanded to be involved in that.

And a more accurate storm. We talked about that.

So, you know, here's the question, who's that command

given to? It's getting to every single

follower down through the centuries, including you and me,

young and old. There's no excuse.

We are part of that Commission and our purpose in life is to

know Christ and to make him known.

That's why we're on planet Earth and understand this is a

command, not an option for every follower of Jesus Christ.

And sadly, a lot of us aren't doing it.

So here's a question. Are you being obedient to this

command? Making disciples begins with us

actively talking about Jesus. How many people did you talk to

about Jesus this week? How many people did you have a

little conversation with or they asked you a question and you

didn't recognize that that was a divine appointment by a

sovereign God? He constantly connects us with

people every single day in hopes that we'll recognize why we are

where we are and say this is a divine appointment.

Let me tell him about Jesus and let me give him something to

read that they can take with him.

You see, if you're not doing this, if you're being

disobedient to this command, do you really believe that when you

stand before Him at the judgment seat of Christ, you're going to

hear him say, well done, my good and faithful servant.

See, in Acts 18, Jesus told his disciples that they would

receive power from the Holy Spirit to help them tell others

about him and make disciples. God's given us this same power

through the Holy Spirit for the exact same Commission.

And this verse indicates that the evidence of being filled

with the Spirit is the power to witness.

So if we claim to be filled with the Spirit, and we really are,

we have the power to witness. So why aren't we doing it?

What are the fears that are stopping us?

And see, there's a problem there.

See, a disciple is someone who has moved from being the

recipient of the church's mission to being responsible for

the church's mission. And Jesus has instructed his

followers down through the centuries to evangelize the

world. However, the church in America

has largely forgotten this mission because we're giving our

attention to lesser things like running the church and raising

money and buildings, and we've got all kinds of meetings and

activities, and few people go. Therefore, there's little church

growth. And Barna recently did a survey

that a survey, I don't know how many 10s or hundreds of

thousands of pastors, but they said only 1% of all the pastors

surveyed in the United States said their people are very

effective at evangelism. That means 99% or not.

That's kind of scary. It's a sad fact that only 2% of

professing followers of Jesus Christ consistently tell others

about him. Where do you fit in As a result,

only 1% of all the quote evangelical churches in America

are growing numerically because the congregation is being

obedient to the commandment of Christ to go and make disciples,

which begins with us talking about them.

See, healthy churches grow when every person, every member is

leading people to faith in Christ and discipling.

So we must get back to the basics of what Jesus left us

here to do. So the first part of God's plan

is to go from the previous stats I mentioned.

Most Christians don't go to others with the gospel, and the

best definition I've ever heard of successful evangelism is

this. Successful evangelism is simply

taking the initiative to share Jesus Christ and the power of

the Holy Spirit and then leaving all the results to God.

It takes all of the pressure off of us and puts it on His Holy

Spirit. See, understand, it's not our

job to convince people. It's not our job to convict

people. It's not our job to convert

people, nor is it our job to save people.

Our only job is to tell them. And the Holy Spirit does all the

hard work. Now we've fallen into rock call,

the corporate Christianity trap, because it's easier to serve on

a board than it is to go and make disciples.

It's easier to give money to send others.

But Jesus didn't say write a check and you're absolved of any

responsibility. It's easier to leave it to the

pastors, right? They're the professionals.

They got all the training. Well, I'm living proof you don't

need all the training to do this.

Well, I average about 35 people a month every month that I share

the gospel lift. Last month I shared with 41

people and I am nobody special. Every single person in this room

who follows Jesus Christ can do that if you let the power of the

Holy Spirit work through you and take away the fears that keep

you from doing this. And so we're so busy with

schedules that we forget why we are here to share the good news,

effectively keeping the church solvent instead of sinners out

of hell. It's easier to do almost

anything than to go. But when the church begins to

go, it's going to begin to grow. David Platt wrote a book called

Follow Me. I love this book.

He said you'd take a big chance if you ignore your assignment

given to you from your boss at work.

Most of us would never consider it.

So how can we ignore the King of the universe who one day return

as judge? You read the Bible and believe

that Jesus is the only way to heaven.

You fear that those who die apart from Christ face a

horrifying future. Yet for whatever reason, you've

made little effort towards your family and friends.

You have neighbors, coworkers, and others who pass by daily

without saying a word to them about Jesus.

So you look at your life and you think this doesn't make sense.

Either I really either I really don't believe the Bible or I'm

extremely unloving because I'm more concerned about being

rejected than I am about someone else's eternal destiny.

All of this makes me wonder what we're missing.

When I look at the church today, it seems like we've caught taken

the costly command of Jesus to go baptize and make disciples of

all nations, and mutated into a comfortable call for Christians

to come be baptized and sit in one location.

And if you ask individual Christians what it practically

means to make disciples, you'll likely get jumbled thoughts,

ambiguous answers, and probably even blank stares.

We seem to have exempted one another from any responsibility

to fish for men, and I'm convinced that the majority of

professing Christians would not say that their purpose in this

life is to make disciples of all nations.

Biblically, isn't every single disciple of Jesus intended to

make disciples of Jesus? Those first disciples on the

mountain in Matthew 28 didn't have to be superficially cajoled

into making disciples. They were supernaturally

compelled to do it. So what is keeping us from doing

it today? I mean every single one of us.

So, I mean, so many of us supposed Christians are sitting

in the church on the sidelines, maybe even involved in the

machinery of the church, but not wholeheartedly, passionately,

sacrificially, and joyfully giving their lives to make

decisions to make disciples of all nations.

Could it be that so many people in the church have settled for

superficial religion instead of supernatural regeneration?

If you are truly a disciple of Jesus, you'll be supernaturally

compelled to make disciples of Jesus.

True followers of Jesus do not need to be convinced, cajoled,

persuaded, or manipulated to making disciples of all nations.

Everyone who follows Jesus biblically will fishermen

globally. So why don't we go?

Let me suggest three possible obstacles #1 we got the wrong

priorities. We're often focused more on life

chasing the American dream. We've keeping up with our busy

schedule, we got family, we've got work, we got chores,

socializing, parties, meetings, sports dinners, recreational

pursuits. And the good things often crowd

out the most important things. In John chapter 15, Jesus gave

John 15 · chapter mention

kind of his last will and testament to his disciples in

the garden. And Bruce Wilkinson wrote us a

book, a little short, hard covered book called Secrets of

the Vine. It's very interesting.

And what he talks about is the vine dresser pruning healthy

branches off the vines to make room for greater growth.

And the challenge is look at your life, look at the good

things you're doing. Could you prune any of those out

to make room for what's really important, eternally important.

So I looked at my life. I was a deputy game warden in

Pennsylvania and I moved from Berks County up to Tioga County.

And the the full time officer up there wanted me to be in, wanted

me to be one of his deputies really badly.

And I said, I'm sorry, I can't. I said, I read this book and I

realized this is a good thing to do.

We're protecting the wildlife. I'm I'm enforcing the law, but

there are more important things I need to do.

And I was taking a lot of time. So I pruned a bunch of things

out of my life so I could make room for what's really

important. And sadly, if we're to raid our

priorities, the Great Commission is very low on our list, if it's

even on there yet. It's a command of Jesus to do

it. Why is it the churches will fill

every single seat for Tim Hawkins comedy show, but only a

small percentage of the people in the church think it's

important enough to show up to learn how to be obedient to a

commandment of Jesus Christ? You see, we have apathy.

That's another hindrance. There's no real interest in

winning souls or the eternal needs of others.

Charles Spurgeon said, mark my words, if you are not concerned

about the lost, you are not saved.

And he said you have never truly found Jesus until you tell

others about him. Boy, that not is scary.

If you're not doing this, see if your heart doesn't ache for

people who don't know Christ. You may not know Christ

yourself. You may think you know him.

And how about fear? There's a whole host of them.

What if they reject me? What if they laugh at me?

What if they make fun of me? What if they won't be my friend

anymore? I haven't memorized enough

scripture. That person's really smart.

Maybe it'll ask me a question. I won't know the answer to it.

I'm going to look stupid. These are all lies from the pit

of hell, and you can beat every single one of them.

And it's not hard to do. I do the exact same training in

Christian middle schools and high schools. 7 year olds and 10

year olds take this training and go out, start sharing their

faith in Christ. It's not that hard to do.

So how do we overcome these obstacles?

Well, priorities. We need to refocus on biblical

priorities. The Lord has set our example in

Luke 1910 where He said for the Son of Man came to seek and to

save those who are lost. If I put my hand up and say I'm

a follower of Jesus Christ, that's exactly what I should be

doing, yet we're not doing it. How about the worth of a soul?

Matthew 1626? And what do you benefit if you

gain the whole world and lose your own soul?

Is anything worth more than your soul?

Matthew 419 Jesus calls us to be fishers.

As I'm walking out the tarmac towards the towards the plane,

the Holy Spirit popped this thought in my head said tell the

man in front of you about Jesus and he said I blew it off.

He said I don't know this guy. I haven't had a conversation

with him all what am I going to do?

Welcome say Sir, Speaking of Jesus, how am I going to do this

went up into the plane. God put these two men right next

to each other on the plane. They put their luggage or the

computers in their overhead compartments and they sat down.

The Holy Spirit saying tell him about Jesus and he says, Lord,

it goes. I, Ivan said 2 words.

This guy, the turbo props are starting up.

It's getting really noisy in here.

I don't want to yell at this guy.

So they take their 15 or 20 minute flight, they land, they

take the stuff out of their overhead compartments.

They walk down the aisle, down the steps, across the tarmac.

And he dropped dead right in front of that guy.

He started to weep and he said, I stood there and begged God to

bring him back so I could tell him they couldn't save him.

We don't know how much time we have left or the people we care

about have left. You know, every one of us has an

hourglass and our sand is slowly drilling out and only God knows

the date and the time that you're going to stand before

him. And the people that we love and

are concerned about, we don't know their dates and times

either. So there's a sense of urgency

here. Obedience demands commitment.

First Samuel 1522 What is more pleasing to the Lord, your burnt

offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to the Lord?

Listen, obedience is better than sacrifice and submission is

better than the offering of the fat of Rams fear.

Sadly, almost every day we believe the lies of the devil

that you can't do this, everybody can do this, it's not

that hard. And God has not given us a

spirit of fear and timidity, but a power, love and

self-discipline. So never be ashamed to tell

others about the Lord. Do you ever notice that new

converts are often the most zealous soul winners?

You know, I remember I was raised Catholic.

When I heard the gospel at Premarital council in 19.

I was a raving maniac. I wanted to tell every single

person I knew you can know for sure you're going to heaven.

All these people thought I went crazy.

I lost a lot of friends because I had no tact.

And then I moved into the secret agent Christian position where

if you give me the secret password and a handshake, I'll

tell you about Jesus. Otherwise, I'm not saying a

word. And then I moved into where I

should be, which is just recognizing why I am where I am.

I know that when I go out into the lost world, God's going to

bring me people every single day, and all I want to do is

plant a gospel seed in their heart.

I'm 100% successful. The Holy Spirit takes it from

there. Go and tell people what Christ

has done for you. No one can argue with your

story. The second part of God's plan is

weeping. Jesus wept over the city of

Jerusalem. Yet most of us don't go because

we don't care. Do we care enough to weep for

those who don't know Christ? Jonathan Edwards, probably the

most famous American theologian, described Hill vividly.

Think about this, he said. Consider the torment of burning

like a livid or a living coal, not for an instant or a day, but

for millions upon millions of ages, at the end of which they

would know that their torment was no nearer to an end than

ever before, and that they would never, never be delivered.

I got loved ones. They're headed there.

I've got friends that are headed there, and that breaks my heart.

And I beg God, do whatever you have to do to get their

attention. Draw them to yourself and save

them. Do you have that kind of love

and concern for your friends? It should frighten you See, a

genuine concerns for souls is needed.

Paul had a broken heart for his lost brothers and sisters in

Romans 9/1 through three, he said, with Christ as my witness,

I speak with utter truthfulness. My conscience and the Holy

Spirit confirm it. My heart is filled with bitter

and sorrow and unending grief for my people, my Jewish

brothers and sisters. Here's the key.

I would be willing to be forever cursed, cut off from Christ if

that would save them. Wow, I don't have that kind of

love. I want to have that kind of

love, and I hope you do too. Paul showed a rare depth of

love, and like Jesus, he was willing to sacrifice so others

would be saved. How concerned are you for those

who are lost in your life who don't know Christ?

Are you willing to sacrifice any of your time and of your money

and of your energy and of your comfort or safety to see them

come to faith in Christ? These are tears of the heart,

seeing the lost as God sees them.

The third part of God's plan is sowing.

We don't know. The parable is sowing, sowing

the seed. We don't know the site, type of

soil that the seed is being planted on, so we must spread it

liberally. Greg Laurie wrote a great little

book called Tell Someone. He said, hopefully you've

discovered that sharing your faith is not an option for us as

follows of Jesus Christ. The Lord has commanded us to go

into all the world and preach the gospel.

In other words, He's told us to tell someone, and each of us has

a strategic part to play. Some sow the seed of the gospel,

others water the seed, others have already sown, and even

others reap or other people have already sown and watered.

First Corinthians 3, five and six.

I planted a policy word, but God gave the increase.

That's right, God gives the increase.

Here's the key. The Lord does not hold us

responsible for how many come to Him through our sharing.

That's His job, not ours. We are called to faithfulness on

that final day. Jesus will not say well done my

good and successful servant, but rather my good and faithful

servant. We are to be faithful to share

this message and leave the results in the hands of God.

Do you ever notice how hard it is to talk about Jesus?

Oh yeah, God's OK, but Jesus seems to be the threshold that

we have a hard time crossing to say it's Jesus Christ that

changed my life. We choke on the name of Jesus.

But see for 2000 plus years the order from hell has been edit

out Jesus and he's telling us to do that today.

Now the challenge is with those of us who love the name of

Jesus, be as bold to speak that name as those who defile that

name. Unbelievers are bold.

They'll talk about Jesus all day long, irreverently.

Isn't time we quit choking on that name?

Jesus is a stranger in our world because we don't talk about him.

We don't talk about his love, his life, his personality, his

death, his explosion from the grave.

And if there was ever time for boldness, we are living it

today. So then where can we go?

Well, there's no limits. We can go to all the world.

We go and organize visitation programs.

We can go through those who are hurting in hospitals.

These people are often low hanging fruit and their hearts

are ready to hear the good news if we'll share it.

What I teach is we can go to people that God brings to us

every day. Every person in this room has

multiple divine appointments every single day.

You just don't know why you are where you are.

So when someone comes to you and they ask you a question, you

have a little simple conversation.

You need to have your spiritual radar and go, wow, this is a

divine appointment. And be prepared to say something

and give them some gospel literature.

So you're 100% successful and the Holy Spirit can take it from

there and cause the growth. But the key is to go.

Don't leave sharing the gospel to others.

Get on. Get in on the excitement and the

blessing. So what will happen if we start

going? Number one will become obedient.

The guilt of not going will disappear.

And you're going to find out that evangelism is the greatest

adventure on planet earth. And our fears will be replaced

by joy. And you look, you can look

forward to hearing say Jesus say, well done, my good and

faithful servant David Jeremiah was commenting on the on the

church in Acts chapter 2. And here's what he said.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

Evangelism was not a program in the Jerusalem church.

It was a way of life. Whenever a group of believers

return to their foundation to the basics, they find the

strongest connection to the heart of Christ, and seeing His

heart on display will draw others to Him.

Believers have but a few days to serve the Lord, and then He will

return. Whatever they should do for him,

they need to do it now. We need to get back to the

basics. There's very little time in the

last days that we're going to have on planet earth.

Think about some of these questions.

This is from Kyle Adelman's book One at a Time.

These are haunting questions. Can you imagine how it'll feel

to look back at your life and realize they were adventures God

intended for you to have, but you never experienced them?

There was a purpose God made you for, but you never lived it.

There were opportunities got in front God put in front of you,

but you never took them. There were stories you were

meant to be a part of, but you turn and ran the opposite

direction. I don't want that to be any.

Anybody have to think on that. So I'm assuming you're a Christ

follower and you're going to stand before Jesus at the

judgement seat of Christ. He says He gave you something to

do, and if you're being disobedient, that's called sin

by not doing it. And you know, God sent one of

his servants, me here yesterday to help equip you to do what he

commanded you to do. A lot of people weren't here,

but it's pretty consistent when we do this on a Saturday.

So assuming you're going to stand before Jesus at the

judgment seat of Christ, if you want to hear, well done, my good

and faithful servant, then you need to get back to the basics

of what Jesus commanded us to do and left us here to do.

See, I believe there's three kinds of believers.

They're true believers who surrender their lives to the

lordship of Christ. They've repented of their sins.

They've put their faith and trust in Christ alone to save

them, and they've committed to follow him and they follow Jesus

when everyone is looking and when no one is looking, then we

have the unbelievers. We all know who they are.

Unfortunately, we have lots of them in our lives.

The third group is the group that I would submit to you,

Phil's churches in America. And this third group is going to

hear these 7 scariest words in all the Bible in my opinion from

Matthew Chapter 7 where they stand before Jesus at judgment

Matthew 7 · chapter mention

day and give amazing reasons why you should let them in.

Lord, I cast out demons in your name.

I perform miraculous signs in your name.

I healed the sick. I served in VBS for 36 years.

You know how hard that is? And he says depart from me.

I never knew you. Now, sadly, I call this group

the make believers, and I think our churches are full of make

believers. And so the question is, which

one of the three of these are you?

I don't know this between you and the Lord.

The apostle Paul said, examine yourselves to be sure you're

really in the faith. Test yourselves.

And how do you do that? Well #1 acknowledge to God that

you're a Sinner #2 repent of your sin.

That's a Greek word called metanoia.

It means you change your mind about sin.

You have a heart's change about sin.

From Romans 10/9 and 10 your life is going to change, you're

not going to live like the world anymore, you're going to go

against the flow and your purpose for being on planet

earth will change. What is my purpose for being on

planet earth? Pre Christ?

There's a beautiful wife, a nice family, a nice house, a nice

job, a vacation, good salary and retirement.

How did it change? When I became a follower of

Jesus Christ, the Bible said I was a slave to sin and he

purchased me with his blood. Now he, I have a new master.

You know we throw the word Lord around.

Don't you think about what it means?

It's a Greek world called curious and it means owner,

master, someone in control of me.

So when you acknowledge Lord in a prayer, you're saying you owe

me Lord, you're in control of me.

I'll follow you and that changes your heart and your life.

The Holy Spirit comes in and dwells you.

He gives you a new title. You become a full time

ambassador for Jesus Christ. So you share the gospel wherever

he takes you. That's what an ambassador does.

He represents someone, in this case the King of Kings and the

Lord of Lords. So my challenge to you is get

trained. You blew it yesterday.

If you didn't come, I can't change that.

But there's training online. Let me suggest there's a what

real good one on YouTube called 3 Circles in 3 Minutes.

Anybody can do that. You watch that 3 minute video

and you'll learn how to share the gospel in 3 minutes.

You don't have to memorize any scripture to do it.

It's awesome. I taught some of that yesterday.

You can go to Just witnessing by Ray Comfort on YouTube, another

way to go, or we have a a mini mad training out there on

YouTube called Make a Difference light version.

That's like 90 minutes. Get trained because if you're a

follower of Jesus Christ, you're going to have to stand before

him and give an account and ain't going to be pretty OK.

And sadly, I mean, this is epidemic in churches across

America. I mean, we average 10% of the

Sunday morning attendance no matter where I go in the United

States on a Saturday. It was, it was equally true

yesterday. We had about 10% plus some

guests from some other churches that thought it was important

enough to come from other churches to come and be trained.

So let me close in prayer and I'm going to turn over the

pastor. Oh, by the way, before I go and

pray, I give these out to everybody.

These are what I call, they're called pretender cards, and

everybody in Tennessee believes they're a Christian unless you

ask him a few questions beyond that.

OK. And on the back are 5 fruits

that should be in your life if you're following Jesus

biblically. If these five fruits are not

evident in your life, you better make sure you're really saved

because you're probably not. OK?

I have these in the welcome center out there.

I've got over 300 of them out there.

Everyone should take one of these, take it home, look it

over, examine yourself to be sure you're really in the faith

and then make a decision. Now, if you realize that I

wasn't saved before I thought I was, I was a make believer, you

need to confess with your mouth. You've done that.

That's Romans 10/9 and 10. You tell your pastor, you tell

your friend, you tell your loved 1 Today I gave my life to Jesus

Christ. It is nothing to be ashamed of.

It's the most important decision anybody can make.

So these are for free out there. I'll leave them out there and

let me pray. Father, I want to thank you for

the privilege of being here and God, I can't examine hearts.

Only you can. And you know every single heart

in this room and God, I'm sure your Holy Spirit has been

present here. I'm sure he's spoken to hearts.

And if there are people that are convicted because they are not

following Jesus Christ, they realize I am a make believer.

I've been fooling everybody, but I can't fool you.

And they want to make it right right now.

I pray that they would make that decision with their heart to

repent of their sins, put their faith and trust in Christ alone

to save them, and commit to follow Him as Lord.

And Lord, for those of us who are your children, you've told

us in Your word that if we confess our sins, you're

faithful and just and will forgive us and cleanse us from

all unrighteousness. So we need to confess.

We have not been full time ambassadors for Jesus Christ.

In fact, we have not even been part time ambassadors for Jesus

Christ. We've been ashamed to name His

name among the people in our lives that you've connected us

with, and we've been downright disobedient.

So we pray right now that you'll forgive us for this, that you'll

fill us with Your Holy Spirit. We know that power will give us

the power to witness and we pray that you will open doors, open

hearts for each of us. Help us to see those doors open,

and then give us courage and boldness to open our mouths and

engage people in conversation and share some literature.

And we're going to thank you in advance for what you're going to

do in Jesus name, Amen. Thanks for joining us today.

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