Connect With God and Other - Pastor Brad DeLong

I want to preach to you from a slightly varied mission statement. connect with God and other other if we could just reach one, it'll make all the difference in the world for that one and all of heaven will rejoice. I feel the Holy Ghost pressing in this room right now. I don't think we could get any more of him in this room. Would you lift your hands up right now and respond before he ever allows me to present the word of truth? Would you respond, oh God, whatever it is that you want to say today?

However you want to speak, whatever you want us to do, you've already blessed us with your glory and your power and your presence. And now we want to respond to those things and respond to the word of truth. I pray you'd open every ear and every heart in this room to hear what it is that the spirit is saying to the church today. We thank you Lord in Jesus name. Amen. And you may be seated. The great commission of Matthew 28. It's the core scripture text.

It's the root passage for our core value of mission here at APC. It reads like this. And some of you could likely quote it. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I've commanded you. And lo, I'm with you always, even to the end of the age. Amen. Just a short time after Jesus said that, he is quoted again as saying to his disciples in Acts one, hey, you're going to receive power.

After that, the Holy Ghost comes upon you. the Holy Spirit comes on you and you'll be witnesses uh to me in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and also to the end of the uttermost parts of the earth. And then we read in Matthew 24:14 where we're told in this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations and then the end will come and as a result of these even our mission statement of the United Pentecostal Church of which we're a part and affiliated reflects this.

The mission is to preach the whole gospel to the whole world by the whole church. This is our stated mission and goal and calling as the church. We want to reach every nation. We want to reach to the uttermost parts of the earth. We want to see the gospel preached in the whole world to see every creature and every person respond to and receive the gospel and its lifechanging truth. We recognize as a worldwide church, this is our goal, our calling, our aim. The whole world must be reached if at all possible.

All eight plus billion people should know Jesus and they should experience the freedom of the plan of salvation. Every living person, every imagebearer of God should know the word and the love of God. Even the ones we don't agree with. Even the ones that we don't see eye to eye with, they should know this God that's in this room. They should know the love of God who's not willing that a single person would perish, but that all would come to repentance. This is the mission. the one that Jesus gave his disciples and to the rest of us as he placed the weight, the eternal weight of the world, at least partially on our backs and and in our laps, knowing the responsibility of it all would uh would and even could overwhelm us at times and cause us to need him and need his spirit and need his help to fulfill it, to accomplish it, and even just to wrap our brains around it and conceptualize it.

Truth is, if you really think about it, making disciples of all nations, that's an overwhelming mission if you mull it over truly. And it seems to be almost certainly out of the grasp of our human intellect and our wisdom and our reach, even the collective wisdom among us. It confounds even the most evangelistic, even the most faithfilled among us. How do we reach all nations in the uttermost parts of the earth? How do we make disciples of them all? How do we see to it that the gospel is preached to every creature and every person and human?

How do we truly and sincerely respond to the call of God and to the great commission? My premise today is simply this, that we do it one other at a time. Our mission is to connect with God and others, all of them. And we fulfill this mission one other at a time. One other. Everyone say one. One. There's a familiar anecdote that helps me visualize this one that's not entirely wasn't written by a Christian, but it still helps me wrap my brain around this worldwide, this often overwhelming mission.

Many have probably heard it already. The title of it of this short story is called the Starthrower. Says, "Once upon a time, there was a wise man who used to go to the ocean and he did some riding there. He he had a habit of walking on the beach before he began his work each day. And one day he's walking along the shore and he looked down the beach. He saw a human figure moving kind of like a dancer on the beach. And he smiled to himself to think of someone who would danced to the light of the day.

So he began to walk faster to try to catch up to this person. As he got closer, he saw that it was a young man. And the young man wasn't dancing. Instead, he was reaching down to the shore, picking something up, and very gently tossing it into the ocean over and over again. As he got closer, he called out, "Good morning. What are you doing?" Young man paused, looked up, and replied, "I'm I'm throwing starfish into the ocean." The old man said, "I guess I should have asked, why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?" Young man said, "The sun is up.

The tide's going out. If I don't throw them in, they're they're not going to make it. They're going to die here on this beach." But young man, don't you realize there are miles and miles of beach, and there's starfish all along? You can't make a dent. You You can't make a difference for all of these. The young man listened politely and pondered. And then he bent down, picked up another starfish, threw it into the sea, passed the breaking waves, and looked at the man, and he said, "It made a difference for that one." This mission is all-encompassing.

It's overwhelming. and as overwhelming as that beach full of starfish and more. Jesus himself said, "The harvest truly is plentiful. The but the laborers, the starfish throwers, they're they're few." He said this after he saw a large multitude that that were shepherdless. And and he notes that there are more nations and people and starfish than than we have labors and the mission is vast and it's substantial even to the master. But even in the midst of those masses and those multitudes, Jesus did not sit on his hands.

Jesus did not throw up his hands. Jesus did not come to the table empty-handed. Instead, he went about his father's business, one town at a time, one synagogue at a time, one conversation at a time, one disciple or two at a time, one starfish at a time. Some days presented crowds of 5,000, 4,000 hungry people wanting a meal. Other days he spent time with one lost sheep of which heaven over which heaven itself rejoiced. this mission of millions and billions and multitudes. I believe today it can be boiled down in many ways to just one.

One other, one neighbor, one cyrofanician woman, one disciple, one tax collector, one co-orker, one centurion, one rich young ruler, one thief on one cross next to the only one who could save him and redeem him. Maybe we can't reach all the others at the same time or even all the others period. But I've come to encourage someone and remind someone. I've come to spur someone. You can reach one. If all you do is connect with God and other, you have made a difference for an other.

That one and the ones that are going to follow them and the ones on the beach next to them like those starfish. We can't do this. We can connect with God and others. We can reach somebody. If you can reach somebody, raise your hand. If you can talk to somebody, we can make a difference for one. Truth be told, this is usually how the kingdom works. This is how kingdom math works. Many times it just starts with one or two. In fact, I I traced things back and went back to Jesus's first disciple, who many believe was his first recorded disciple, and I I found out that his first one was actually the first two at the same time.

It kind of threw water on my whole title and premise, but you know, he's Jesus. He can he can do anything. But I want you to note, it was one conversation with Andrew and and an unnamed follower of John. Some believe it was John the Beloved. It was one invitation that started the group of disciples that would grow into a worldwide church. one interaction in John 1:39 eventually turns into 12 disciples and then 72 and then 120 or 500 and then then over 3,000 and 5,000 and whole cities like Ephesus being turned on in and eventually the world being turned upside down and it all starts from what we can tell with one conversation.

Master, where are you staying? And he says, come and see. The church started with come and see. What could start in your life and community with one? Come and see what God's doing. We got eight miracles in the last two or three. Come and see for yourself. Come and experience it for yourself. And we're reminded in these stories of Jesus that this mission, it can start with a crowd and with a family and with a congregation of 5,000 hungry. But typically, it starts with one conversation, one invite, one one prayer in the office cubicle, one God moment.

Even Jesus, who had such limited time on this earth to fulfill his mission, he's often found going after one sheep in the midst of 99 others and even millions of others. John chapter 4, we find him doing the same. If you know and recall the story tells his disciples, hey, I got to go through Samaria. And this was not probably the most popular decision. It was expedient, but uh that was not they didn't like to go through Samaria. I don't like to go through Illinois particularly, even though I love all you Illinois people.

You're wonderful. All the Missurrians are laughing. All the Illinois people are like, "Oh, I'm going to talk about that." They journey a couple days and he eventually makes his way to Jacob's well where he's tired. Aren't we all tired? Jesus just walked probably 20 miles. So, he's really tired. What's our excuse? He rested. He waits for a lost sheep that we call the Samaritan woman. Verse 7 says this woman with the checkered past comes to draw water and Jesus engages her with a conversation.

If we could just talk to somebody and see what happens. Despite the rift between Jews and Samaritans, even her reputation for a short time they just talked about water. Jesus was opportunistic weather. St. Louis talk about the weather or talk about their high school. You're going to make I mean you're going to have a conversation. They talk about water and at the well and Jesus says, "I've got living water for you." I want you to notice Jesus makes the turn in the conversation. And we need to note here.

Jesus knew that he had exactly what this woman needed. She was indifferent to him. She acted like she didn't want anything to do with him. She She was put off by him. I can tell you in every single conversation that you're ever going to have with someone who doesn't know the Lord, you have exactly what they need. They may act like they don't want to talk to you and they may be indifferent and obviously you're not going to chase them down and grab them by the arm unless the Lord tells you to and even then be careful.

They're out there looking for water and they're parched in their at death store looking for this living water and you've got it in your hands and in your heart and they're looking. They may not say they're looking. She said nothing about needing what Jesus had. She actually said, "What in the world can you give to me?" And he says, "I've got some." You've got what they need. You have the keys in your hand for their eternity. We just have to talk to somebody. This is Jesus's response after he connects with this woman and she receives the words of of life and the invitation that he gives.

John 4 says the woman left her water pot. How ironic. She found a different kind of water. She went on her way to the city. She says to the men, "Come and see a man who told me all the things I ever did. He's probably the Christ." and they went out to the city and they they came to him. In the meantime, his disciples come and they got Taco Bell and they said, "Rabbi, eat." No. Yeah. They got your favorite food, not Taco Bell, unless that's your favorite.

He says, "I've got food you don't know anything about." Therefore, disciples said, "Who brought him Taco Bell? How did door dashed it?" I want you to notice what Jesus says. My food, my fulfillment is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. I need to pause here. Someone in this room has felt like you're not fulfilled, like you're not doing anything valuable or a purpose. You're looking for purpose. Can I tell you it's right here? Jesus, almighty God, you can read the commentaries that many of them say the same thing.

He's saying the greatest satisfaction that God Almighty could get is at the well reaching a lost sheep. And we think we can find fulfillment in things other than the mission of God. The most fulfilling thing that Jesus could do was reach one woman and the acquaintances that would follow. His food was not the tangible bread that they were hiding or or holding rather in their hands. But Craig Kenir says it was fulfilling the the fulfilling nature of his calling to seek and to save those who were lost.

One of the most fulfilling things Jesus could do was sit at this well with the lost sheep of Samaria and share with her living water that would change her entire life. He had what she needed. He went to find her. He had one conversation with her and his inmost and her inmost being were filled. He loved his neighbor, even a Samaritan, just as he loved himself, and he fulfilled his mission and purpose. Hear me right now. I know we're called to reach the whole world, but I can tell you from experience that even just reaching one brings all the fulfillment and all the joy in the world itself.

I know we're talking about them, but can I tell someone that's looking for joy and looking for fulfillment? I really don't know of a place where you can find it. That's quite like reaching a lost person and reaching a soul. Jesus reach or just reaching and connecting with one is going about the father's business. Just sitting with one at a well or across a table and sharing eternal truth. There's nothing like it in all the world. It's better than fresh bread itself. sharing the bread of life with someone who is starved of it.

But the Ben knows it. There's nothing like it, right? There's nothing like it. We want to reach them all, but it starts with one. And I may not be able to reach all of Samaria or St. Louis for that matter, but I can pick up a starfish as it were. And I can make a difference for that one. And I can make a difference for this one. I can talk to somebody. I can text somebody. I can share a scripture with somebody. I can give an invite card to somebody.

I can pray in public for somebody. I can reach and make a difference for somebody. The whole gospel of the whole world by the whole church. It starts with one. Maybe just one lost sheep, one neighbor, one other. One Bible study with a man named Apollos like we read about in Acts 18 changed everything. one praying gentile in Acts nine named Cornelius who starts a connect group in his home and waits for Peter to arrive to open the door for salvation for the entire Greek or the entire rather gentile world.

I'm telling you the reason that you and I get to be here is because one man went looking for another and responded to the spirit of God. It started with one other calling on the Lord in prayer. one man on a street called Straight in Damascus who's met by a spiritfilled believer named Ananas. Eventually, that man's name would be changed to Paul the Apostle because a believer and a brother went looking for him. And Paul would spend his life reaching others, sometimes one at a time, one man from Macedonia in a dream leads Paul to Europe where he meets a lady named Lydia, whom many believe the first European convert ever.

and he baptizes her at Lydia's Creek and she starts a church in her home and a work is carved out in Europe. Just one other one Apollos, one Cornelius, one Lydia, one Paul, one Timothy, Phileiman, Paproditis, one or in our case and my personal perview, maybe maybe it's just one Antonio at a time. Told a story a few weeks ago. I ran into Antonio at Aldi collecting shopping carts. He's as kind as could be. He had a pen in his hand and a pad and I asked him, I said, "Are you out gathering signatures?" And he just lit up.

He said, "No, it's my art. I'm an artist." I said, "Oh, that's awesome." And he shows me some of his art. I said, "Man, that's awesome. Keep it up." I get back in the van and the feeling that gripped me, the one I pray grips all of us. It's like I couldn't put the van in drive. Holy Ghost says, "Get out and go talk to him." Okay. Told Mariah said, "My heart is like turning in me." I go to Antonio, "Hey," said, "Can I?" He was out there collecting quarters with the Aldi carts and needed help.

And I said, "Can I just pay for some of your art, man?" He says, "I don't have a phone." I didn't have cash. He didn't have a phone. It wasn't working out. And he said, "You don't have to pay for it." He said, "I'll just I'll just give it to you. Just give you my heart." Like, "No, I got to find a way. I got to He's like, "No, please just take it. Just take it." We get back in the car and me and Wesley went got a prepaid phone, went back to find him.

He's gone. He's a man on the move. I'm telling you this. We spotted him all over South County. I have people texting me. I found Antonio, but he's gone the next minute. I had someone text me on uh Friday. Before I could even text back, he was gone. I've been driving up and down Limme. We've been going to Aldi so I can find him. One other one other I'm going to find him. If you see him at South County Mall, text me. Someone like a Robin who I talk to every Wednesday morning at MA school.

She said, "I'm coming to your church." Said, "Thanks for the warning." Someone like her husband Keith and our friend Diane who's our chapel buddy. Diane goes to her own church, but she came over to me a couple weeks ago. She said, "I need you to pray for my husband. Please have your church pray for him, Michael." Maybe a neighbor like Mel who gave me free tomatoes. He said, "I'm planning to come to your church and I've been planning to come." He said, "I see what you all are doing in the community.

I see what God's doing in your church. He's been here longer than this building has been here. He's a precious other along with Roger and Jason Suad, the guy who ran past our front window the other day in a full-on ninja suit." Mariah Mariah's at the table. She said, "It's a ninja." I looked out the window and he was halfway down the street and I thought, "I got to meet that guy. That's my neighbor. I'm going to meet him. I'm going to find him." Whether it's him or the guy who rode up to me on his bike trying to give me that free cat.

You feel that? If you don't, I pray you do cuz they all got names. The Lord knows the number of hairs on their head. Calvin sold me some shoes on Thursday night. Talking my ear off. I loved it. Just moved to the city. Comes to Silven Springs from time to time. reached in my pocket to get my contact card and this thought came to me. I don't really know him. If I give him my contact info, might not be wise. I've done it until he said, "Man, I'd really like to connect with you." They may not say our mission statement to you overtly, but they're hungry, starved for it.

I want to connect with God and others. Compelled to do so. Apparently, Paul was as well. This is what he wrote. The love of Christ compels us. Because we consider this that if one died for all, then all died. And Jesus died for all that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but they would live for him who died for them and rose again. Therefore, from now on, we regard no one. We don't look at them according to the flesh. Even though we've known Christ according to the flesh, now we don't know him thus any longer.

Therefore, if anyone's in Christ, he's a new creation. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new. Now, all things are of God who has reconciled us to himself through Jesus Christ. He's given to us. Now, the ministry of reconciliation, what does it mean? It's it's that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. and he wasn't putting their trespasses on them, but he's committed to us. He's put it in our hands. The the ministry, the word of reconciliation, it's in your mouth.

Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ. It is as though God were pleading through us. I wonder the last time that the Lord pled through you to someone else this message. We implore you on Christ's behalf. Be reconciled to God. He made him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him. We are compelled because of what Christ has done for us. Because of his love, because of the call and the commission he's placed on every one of us to be ambassadors to carry out the ministry he has put on us.

Part of that ministry is to make disciples. Even if it's just one at a even if I just Brother Bachman taught it. Even if I just move the football two yards down the field and I get the conversation going. I may not get them to church every time. But if I just keep planting seeds and I keep telling them of the testimonies of the goodness of God and I keep telling them the scriptures that have anchored my entire life, some way or another, I'm going to reach one.

Even if I got to go through Samaria, if I got to eat with some tax collectors like Jesus did, or if I got to sit in a garage with a group of men that speak an entirely different language and inhale more secondhand smoke than I have in my entire life, it happened just so I can teach two of them a Bible study. I'm going to connect with God and other. If I got to chase their mail truck twice, I'll do it. I already did it once.

Told a story a couple years ago. Jenny, this best male lady in the planet on the planet. If you see Jenny dropping mail off, you stop her. Tell her I told you to pull in front of her. She's used to me. I ran ran went running after a mail truck one Saturday, I think, and I got up to the edge of Jenny. Jenny. It wasn't Jenny. It was Dave. And Dave doesn't know me. I think Dave skipped four houses cuz he hit the gas and took off.

Jenny told me, she said, "Dave squirly." Said, "Okay, I would be too if someone I didn't know was running after me." As habit would have it, a few weeks ago, I saw Jenny on a Saturday. We were doing the cornhole tournament. You would think I'd learned my lesson, but I haven't. I yelled out for Jenny. She was down at the end of the drive. Jenny, Jenny. Started walking faster. I see her about to turn and I'm just Jenny. I'm running. I get to her window. It was Jenny.

It wasn't Dave. But I scared her half to death. She like screamed. She said, "I thought I ran over you." I was like, "I'm sorry." She knows by now I'm the crazy guy that I feel like I'm in good company. Jesus went chasing after people. I've got Bible for this. me and Jesus and Philillip, not for really my antics, but for what God would do for somebody. One of the greatest examples of what God would do for just one lost sheep. It's in a desert. Acts 8, the Ethiopian unit.

Verse 26 says, "An angel of the Lord spoke to Philillip." You think God cares about that one person? An angel says, "Phillip, get up. Go, go toward the south along the road which goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. And I love this next line. This is desert. In other words, there ain't nothing out there. Just go out there and see what happens. I've heard stories about people doing this. He's not told what to do there, who he's going to find. He's told to head into a wilderness.

He arose. He went and behold a man of Ethiopia, unic of great authority under Candace, queen of the Ethiopians. He had charge of her treasury. He'd come to Jerusalem to worship. He was returning and sitting in his chariot. He was reading Isaiah the prophet. The spirit says to Philillip, "Go near and overtake that char. Get him, Philillip. Run after him. Catch that chariot." Chariots were fast, but he might have been going slow. So, Philillip ran to him. He heard him reading the prophet. He's eavesdropping. He's reading Isaiah.

He says, "Hey, do you understand what you're reading?" This line got me. The Unix says, "How can I unless someone guides me? There is someone in your life." And they're so starred. I talked to a guy who literally slept he he was tormented. He slept with four or five Bibles open in his room. He didn't understand them fully. They thought maybe this Bible will give me an answer. They don't even know what they're reading sometimes. He says, "How can I?" He asked Philip to come sit with him.

The the place in scripture which he read was this. He was led as a sheep to the slaughter and as a lamb for it shears is silent. He opened not his mouth and his humiliation his justice was taken away. And who shall declare his generation? for his life is taken from the earth. I want you to notice the Ethiopian unic is reading about a man who had sacrificed much for the sake of his own people and a man that was despised and rejected. A man that bore shame.

A man that had no descendants to speak of. Just three chapters later in Isaiah 56, we're told of a God who would welcome foreigners and unix and give them a place in his house. And for a man who is likely not welcome to go into the temple that he just came from to worship. For a man like this who could have no descendants who sacrificed much for his people. This is the man to whom Philillip is sent in this critical moment as he reads from Isaiah.

Do you think God knows where that person is when he says go? Here's my response. Well Lord they they don't want to hear. Do you think he knows? Your flesh ain't telling you to walk across the yard and talk to that neighbor. Just not. Your flesh is saying go inside, put your feet up, and relax. But the love of Christ compels, get out of the van, Brad. That Antonio, I know him. I I knit him together in his mother's womb. And I've watched every pain. I've watched every struggle.

Go find him. Philillip, the Ethiopian unic asks him, "Who's he who's the writer talking about?" And Philip, I love it. Preaches Jesus. And then they come to a place of water. And he says, "Who's this water? Should I get baptized? What hinders me? Let's do it." The next verse says is one of the only times we see this in the Bible if not the only. Philillip is translated caught up and dropped about 30 miles away and starts preaching again. The lengths God would go to that once his assignment is over, he would break all of physics, his own laws, pick up a man and drop him 30 miles away.

The Holy Ghost is here stirring your heart. And I believe even now there's a name coming to your mind. There's an action plan. The Lord's not leaving you without answers. You may be like, "I don't even know how to talk to people. I haven't I haven't talked to a single one of my neighbors. I've lived there 15 years. They're going to think, what's this guy all about?" The Lord is going to lead and direct you and help you. You just have to listen. One conversation can change it all.

Musicians, you can come. It begs the question this morning if the Lord would be willing to go to those links for Philip given a Bible study in a chariot. I love that. I want to do that someday. Anyone got a chariot? Anybody? If God would be willing to send us those great leaves, if he himself would be willing to allow himself to be nailed to a cross, a cross that happened to be next to a man whose heart was indifferent and torn, but who eventually acquiesed and said, "Lord, remember me." If God would be willing to do those things, what am I willing to do?

I get schedules. I get the busyiness. I get it. There's just an other out there. And if I don't explain to them the word of truth, who will? Romans 10. How then shall they call on him on who they've not believed? How shall they believe in him of who they've not heard? How shall they hear without a preacher? Oh, that's you, Pastor Brad. Yes. But it's also as brother Bachmann taught it's you proclaimer someone who pro pit Philip didn't have a pull pit had a chariot.

How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things. You have glad tidings of good things. You don't need a pull pit. Maybe you just need a table at lunch where you sit across from somebody and you don't have to have you can have your chart. You can have search for truth. You can have the in-depth Bible study. Those are great. But you could just be armed with your testimony and the scripture to back it up.

How many of you are here because someone reached out to you or your family member? Anybody? I think about every hand should be up. How are they going to get here without us? I want to reach another. We're going to pray a prayer in a moment. One that I've adopted from one of our national heroes. Many of you probably heard it. It's a man named Desmond Doss who received the Medal of Honor, one of 431 recipients out of 16 million soldiers in World War II. He was a conscientious rejector, 7th Day Adventist.

He wanted to serve his country. He wanted to serve. How many of you want to serve the kingdom? Anybody? Again, every hand. I want to serve. But he didn't serve in the way that he thought he would serve. He wanted to be a medic. He was a conscientious objector, but he signed up anyway. He was apprehensive, but he served anyway. He signed up anyway. You may be apprehensive, but sign up anyway. You're in the Lord's army. Yes, sir. That's a song we used to sing. Still, his fellow peers didn't like him.

One of the fellow soldiers told him, "Hey, if we get in the battlefield, I'm going to make sure that you don't make it back." Because he wouldn't pick up a weapon. He wanted to be a medic. He got assigned to the rifle uh platoon, but he ends up in Okinawa, place called Hacksaw Ridge. They took the cliff face, but there was a counterattack and only onethird of the men made it back down that cliff. Twothirds included Desmond Doth. It's an incredible story that they told him to go down that cliff, but he said, "No, I've got to stay put.

There are people up here who need me." And over the next 12 hours, he would save 75 men on his own back, making sure they made it to safety. Eventually, he was wounded himself. He took a a grenade and then was wounded in his arm. And even then, they're trying to get him out of there. And he says, "Please take these other guys first. I'm okay. Consider others greater than yourself. This is the prayer that he prayed and the one that I I want us all to model ours after.

Later documentary, they they said, "What was your compulsion? Why why would you stay up there? Why would you risk your life for that long? 12 hours under enemy fire. 12 minutes would be enough to scar you. 12 hours. Why would you do it? What motivated you?" He said, "I prayed for 12 hours under my breath. Lord, please help me get one more. Please help me get one. Lord, please help me get one." We're not in Okinawa today. This battlefield, take one look at a social media stream.

This battlefield is just as brutal. And there are people lying nearby you that are at death store. And I'm not trying to exaggerate the point. This is where we are. And you may be the only one who can pick them up and carry them to safety. Would you stand with me right now? And I wonder if you just stretch your hands to heaven. Maybe you don't feel comfortable. Maybe you maybe you're not extroverted. Maybe you don't even know what to say. But would you just pray that prayer?

Lord, please help me find one person. Please help me reach some. I pray that the love of God would wash over us right now. That the love that drove you to a cross for us would wash over us right now. That we would be so compelled, Lord. That we would be able to do nothing but pray right now and then respond in just a few moments, Lord. Oh, Jesus. that we wouldn't be able to sit idly by while our brothers and our sisters and unsaved loved ones and prodigals are lying.

Lord, they're lying helpless and hopeless. I pray that you would ignite a fire and a passion in us that the love of Christ truly would compel us for those neighbors and those others that are around us. And if all I can do is share a testimony or give them a scripture or bring them a loaf of bread or bring them some free to whatever I got to do. Oh God, through each one Jesus name. Fear the Lord calling us further today. If you want to respond and you want to reach somebody and you need the Lord's help to do it, I wonder if you just step out of where you are.

If you don't even know where to start and you don't even have a name, would you just step out and respond to the call of God right now? There may be a name on your heart and mind and you can start to pray along these lines. Lord, help me to have a conversation with them. Help me not to put it off. Help me to know what to say. Help me to know what's going on in their heart and mind. Help me to see them the way that you see them, oh God.

Oh, if you want to reach somebody, would you call out to the Lord? We're going to do more than this, but we're going to ask for God's help in the name of Jesus. Help me to reach one more. Lord, which one? The next one. Oh God, I want to reach the next person. I want to reach someone who doesn't know your name. They don't even know the truths of scripture, oh God. They've heard about this book, but don't know what it means. I pray that you'd help me, Lord, to find somebody at Shnooks, oh God, that you would help me, Lord, to find somebody.

Oh, God. Oh jeez. I give myself away. I give myself away. So you can use me. I give myself away. I give myself away so you can use me. I give myself away. I give myself away so you can use me. I give myself away. I give myself away so you can use me. Here I am. Here I said, Lord, my life is in your hands. Lord, I longing to see your desires revealed in me. Give myself away. I give myself away so you can use me.

I give myself away. I give myself away. know you can use me. Give myself away. I give I give I give myself away so you can use me. I give myself away. I give myself away so you can use me. Take my heart, take my life as a living sacriice. All my dreams, all my plans, Lord, I place them in your hands. I give myself away. I give myself away so you can use give myself away. I give myself away so you can use me.

a message like this. Obviously, we could pray and pray for hours. And I believe some of us, I mean, it would always do good to pray for hours. I also know that at some point, we're going to stop praying and we're going to go and do Let me encourage you when you do this story. It just reminded me a couple weeks ago on a Thursday, my iPhone brought up a picture of someone uh that I had taken a picture with two years ago. And I thought, man, I miss that guy.

I hope he's doing all right. And I couldn't recall if I had his uh phone number and I uh I I failed to text him that day. It was a Thursday. Friday, I'm walking through Shnooks. I look up and there he is. I walked over. I said, "Do you remember me?" And he's like, "Pastor Brad," he said, "I was thinking about you yesterday. These things happen far too many times for them to be coincidental. Sometimes the Lord has to translate us and place us somewhere and I might still miss it.

In fact, that day I saw him. He was going in line. I'm like, "Oh, wow." And then I started to walk out and the Lord said, "Go back. What are you doing?" stopped him in the selfch checkout line. He blocked the whole line. It was all right. God is after people that are around you. He's willing to send you. Here's what we're going to do. I'm going to have my help come. We've got some cards. All right. So, Tony, would you mind bringing me one of those cards?

I'm going to have these ushers come and just line the front. You know what, Caleb? Help me out here. You'll see that on the bottom part it says my name and there's a line drawn in my other the one that the Lord's calling you to reach. If you don't know of a name that you can put in that other slot, this message is for you today. Not to condemn you, but to remind you why we're here. So, I'd like you to do this. Okay? Do this for me.

Write your name and then write the name of the other. And then whenever you see that person on the pew next to you baptize in Jesus name or at a Bible study, you can turn this card in. And we're going to keep these as a reminder of the good things of God. All right. Take a moment. Uh ushers, you can go ahead and disseminate those. You can pass those cards out. Come forward, please. Every person that's wanting to reach somebody, we got pins all across the front here.

Every person willing to reach somebody, grab one of those cards, you can help pass them out. We've got plenty. Take a moment, write it down, and then you put this card somewhere you're going to remember it. All right. I think we could fill every one of these cards and the Lord could use us. So, I encourage you if you can't come and get it, have the ushers flag them down. and they'll come and help you. Write that name down, pray on it, and then go and talk to them.

Share the truth with them. Tell them about the healings that have happened. And then turn it in.