Transcript for:
Galatians 6:6,10 -The Harvest- Pastor Rick Beaudry 2025-11-23

Please stand with me as we read God's holy word together. Galatians chapter six verses six through 10. Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teaches in all good things. Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For whatsoever man sows, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption, but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially into them who are of the household of faith. Father, thank you for your holy word. Thank you for your faithfulness in our lives, Lord. Thank you for the pastors and moms, the dads, the folks that you placed within our lives that taught us the scriptures, Lord, that have been teaching us the scriptures, sowing your word within our hearts and lives. And Lord, we pray that we're bearing fruit, that we'll continue to bear much much fruit for your kingdom and glory, Lord, as you transform and change us into the image of your dear son, Lord. We pray that the word that's going forth into the lives of our children and our grandchildren presently would continue to transform and change them also, Lord. We pray that, Lord, we not rely upon the things of the world to try and reform who we are, but Lord, we'd rely upon you to be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of our minds, Lord, that we may be able to prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of the Lord. So help us, Lord, we pray as we study this morning. Make us disciples this morning. Minister unto us, we pray in Jesus name. Amen. Would you please be seated? Paul continues to explain the practical application of what it means to walk in the spirit. He now speaks of the fruit of our lives as a harvest. A harvest predicated upon the laws of sowing and reaping. He emphatically declares that whatever man sows, that shall he also reap. And so the harvest of our lives will be based upon the choices we make, the seed we sow in the field of our lives. Walking in the spirit is a choice that we make and so to ensure a good harvest to glorify the Lord, we wanna point out four things that we must do. Number one, we must sow the word. The word is the seed that we sow. And so verse six, let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teaches in all good things. And so those that have dedicated their lives to teaching the word, sowing of God's word into the lives of others will positively, absolutely reap a good harvest. Cathy and I, 30, over thirty years ago, began to sow the word of God into people's lives. And such a such a blessing to receive from pastor Chuck and many other pastors that we sat under and listened to and continue to listen to. And then that word germinates in our hearts and lives, and then we take that which we learn and we invest it into our children and now grandchildren. Cathy's homeschooling them each week, and and it's just such a blessing to see Wayne and Brittany raising them the nurture and admonition of the Lord. And then all the bible studies that we've done, the Sunday school that we've done, the church service that we've done, it's it's just amazing that the Lord would privilege us to be entrusted with the unsearchable riches of Christ, and then seek to invest these riches, the riches that are ours in Christ Jesus of his word into the lives of others. God's word's living and powerful and sharper than any two edged sword, dividing us under soul and spirit, joint and marrow that is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. You know, you can't You just cannot make a better investment than the word of God. There's no greater investment than that of the word of God in your life and in the lives of others. Everything is gonna burn. The wood, hay, and stubble's all gonna burn. It's all gonna come to nothing. Jesus said, store not up for yourselves treasures upon earth where moth and wrath does corrupt, where thieves break through and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven. Right? Where thieves can't break through, you know, and and it won't it won't succumb to, you know, the moss and the rust and and all that. And so lasting fruit and the people that you've been able to share the gospel with. One man sows another waters and God brings the increase. No greater, greater, greater investment than that of sowing the word of God as the Lord has told us to go and make disciples. Disciples are learners. We first receive and then we give. And so we teach God's word to people. We teach and we preach. And at Calvary Bremerton here, we might teach on a high school, maybe a college level. And we recognize there's people coming in who are starving for the word of God. They haven't been taught the word of God. They may have been a Christian for forty years. They've never even read the book of Revelation. The pastor's been afraid to teach prophecy and such. And which wasn't wasn't the case, you know, about thirty years ago. But in the last twenty five years or so, this whole Rick Warren purpose driven thing that's come through is just radically dummy down all the churches that are rebranding, and it becomes a social gospel. And he's point pointing out to people that it's deeds, not creeds. And so the Protestant church that prided itself upon, you know, great great teaching, you know, justification by grace through faith alone, you know, Martin Luther's thing as he's coming out of the Catholic church. Well, the Catholic church can be commended in many churches like that for a lot of the good things they're doing, feeding the homeless or whatever, but it doesn't mean that we as Protestants, that we don't feed the homeless and and do good things too. But we don't want to fall into a trap of saying, it's deeds not creeds as Rick Warren did. And it's none of your business, the timing of the Lord's coming. You know, he doesn't care about you looking up and and watching for him drawing near. And so you've got a whole generation of people in the church growth movement that are biblically illiterate. They don't know their bibles. They don't know prophecy. They don't know what's going on. And it's it's gonna erode. It's not gonna be able to prop them up. It's not gonna be able to get them through difficult times that that that are coming. And so then they have to incorporate a whole lot of psychology and self help and humanism and all other sorts of isms to try and prop them up. And what do we do? We just keep it simple. We just give them the word of God. Jesus said to Peter, do you love me? Feed my sheep. That's the description of the pastor. Paul said that he was innocent of the blood of all the Ephesians, the church in Ephesus that he planted for three years because he ceased not night and day to give them the full counsel of God. So he's reaching back to Ezekiel three and Ezekiel 33 that says, you don't warn people, if you don't give them the word of God as a pastor, even as a disciple, all of us, then their blood is on your hands. And so for me as a pastor, I wanna make sure that I've done my best to present, to pour out from my heart that which I learned, that which I study, to bring it forth so that the Holy Spirit can plant it within your heart. And that it would germinate and grow, and that your life could be transformed and changed through the study of God's word. God's word's so incredibly powerful and able to change the way a man thinks. There's a transformation. It were being born again Christians, the word of God begins to change the way my brain thinks. And so I come in as a worldly person, as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he, and the word of God's able to lead and guide me into all truth with the help of the Holy Spirit. And so I I look at it as a tremendous tremendous investment. I don't see it as a life that's wasted. I'm not looking at it from the standpoint of a monetary reward. Obviously, I'm a fool if I did that. I'm looking at it from a standpoint of an eternal reward, and the reward of watching the light bulb goes on. As Kathy's teaching the grandkids, it's so incredibly rewarding when you invest in the lives of somebody, especially your grandkids, to see them getting it. They learn the a b c's, you know. They learn how to do some arithmetic. And for me, as a as a pastor teaching the word of God, it's just incredibly exciting to see you adding to what you already know, your reservoir of truth. And knowledge puffs up, but love edifies, but even beyond the knowledge, it's the transformation in our hearts, the love, the fruit of love that we're able to exhibit and glorify the Lord. Jesus said they'll know your Christians by your love, you know. And so we we look to that in that regard and we give the Lord the glory. We we don't live at a time where in this church here, where we think that the gospel's inadequate. Where we think the word word of God's inadequate or antiquated like somehow the world is coming up with newer methodologies to make people whole, to change sinners into saints. No. We still look to the word of God that God by his spirit, through his word is able to transform and change us. Only he can do that. We're not into transhumanism or chips or any kind of methodology that the devil's helping the tech giants learn and such. We are still looking to the word of God that the Lord has laid out and we know that as we sow God's word, it's not gonna come back void. That God's word is going to do what God intends it to do. And so in Isaiah fifty five ten, it says, as the rain cometh down and the snow from heaven and returns not hither, but waters the earth and makes it bring forth in bud that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater. So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth, it shall not return unto me void, But it shall accomplish that which I please and it shall prosper in the thing where to I sent it. So God's word is always paying dividends. God's word is always fruitful if you will. It never returns void. The word stock goes up up up up up. The more you sow, the greater return on your investment. And so but if you sow sparingly, you're gonna reap sparingly. So if you're a biblically illiterate or a babe in Christ, and you've been going to church fifteen, twenty, thirty years, and you don't even know the books of the bible, You don't even have a working knowledge of the scripture? Don't don't come up to me and tell me that your previous pastor didn't teach the book of revelation because he'd never studied it. By the job description, he needs to study it. He needs to be a student of prophecy, and then take what he learns and teach others also. As I've said a couple times over the last month, there's this picture I have of standing before the Lord and watching pastors stand before the Lord. And the Lord asked them, why didn't you tell them of my coming? Why didn't you tell them of the blessed hope and glorious appearing of your great God and savior? Why were you afraid? Why would you neglect prophecy? What were you doing? What is it you think you were doing? That wasn't building a church. That was bringing in a whole lot of unbelievers and trying to pacify them and get them, you know, marshaled out there to do some good deeds and and building your own kingdom. That's what that was. These people are going to hell because you didn't warn them. Their blood's on your hands. Can you imagine? Can you imagine being responsible in that way? Because you wimped out? Because you're afraid to use the word sin? Because it might offend a gay or a lesbian person? You know, you're going woke. You're afraid to use the word repentance. You're afraid to use the word hell. You're trying to convince people that they get to heaven by being good? So write more checks so that we can get more people into heaven? Man, I don't wanna be that guy. To much is given, much is required. You know? And I feel grossly inadequate being a pastor, but one thing I have confidence in is God's word. I know that God's word is not coming back void. I know that if I stick with God's word, no matter how big the other churches are getting with their methodologies with less and less of the word, and more and more stories and little whatever, that to me is not church. Without the word of God, it's not church. That's not discipleship. God's given us his word. And I would I would hate to stand before God and have to answer for why I didn't teach his word. Why'd you call yourself a pastor? Why'd you go into the ministry? Who called you into the ministry? What did you think that I wanted you to do? You think I wanted you to follow Rick Warren and go to pastors.com each week and get his little homily? Really? Didn't you see where I told Timothy, study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth? Didn't you see where I told you there'd be an apostasy in the last days? But don't be afraid of that. Don't shrink from your responsibility because of the people's departure from the truth. Where men would not endure sound doctrine anymore, They would heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. You don't give into that. You teach my word. Whoever shows up, you teach my word. And you have confidence in my word, that my word will go out and do what it's supposed to do. For some, it's gonna convict them. For others, it's gonna prepare them for judgment. Because when they leave here all angry, they will not be able to say, I never heard that before. Knowledge brings responsibility. I'm not here to convert anybody. I can't convert. We sow the seed, another waters, and God brings the increase. But we stand firm like Jeremiah did, like Isaiah did, like John the Baptist did. Our job's to tell the truth, to teach the truth, and not give in to any kind of marketing or methodology or church incorporated. Teach the word. Teach it simply to babes in Christ, to the Sunday school or brand new believers. We preach for the new believers. Our job is to build you up, to edify the body of Christ. It's building you up that you might be a part of the work of the ministry. That you too can invest the word of God in other people. You have to first receive before you can give. You have to be a student. You have to be a disciple before you're a teacher. And we're all teachers. We're all teaching. We're all we're all taking and giving back out. Otherwise, we're the Dead Sea. There's a flow in and nothing flowing out. You wanna really grow, take in, but then give it out. And then God gives you more. In Mark chapter four, it talks about the illumination where God reveals to you. And you take what he reveals to you, and you give it out, he gives you more. But if you don't give it back out, then you're left in an arrested state of development. You're just a hearer of the word, not a doer of the word. And you dry up. You get sterile. And you're wondering what's wrong. What's what's going on? Maybe there's some good deeds I can do that make me feel good. And and again, especially at the holidays here, I'm not against good deeds. I think it's a both. It's obviously, absolutely both. We love and we minister to folks. Silver and gold have I none. Name of Jesus Christ, stand up and walk. That'd be great. But a lot of the methodology is marketing, and it's a marketing of a social gospel, and now it's morphing into his three legged stool of a one row religious system, where business joins with religion and with government. It's it's it's real easy to see the seven mountain mandate and the projections of the golden era moving into the millennium. You can see it. You can see the church, you know, getting ready for the tribulation period and the one row religious system. And another thing we have to factor in is the AI technology. The AI technology, I mean, the devil knows the word of God. And the devil twists the word of God. The devil's able to say to Jesus, has not God said? You know? He'll give his angels charge over you, lest you dash your foot against a stone, you know? Psalm 91, the devil's quoting to Jesus at his at his temptation. And Jesus reaches back and into the scriptures, and he said, it is written. Man shall not put the Lord thy God to the test. If you're the God, then command these stones be made bread. And Jesus says, it is written. Always it is written. Man shall not live by bread alone, by every word that precedes the mouth of God. Hey, Jesus. How about a shortcut? How about I how about I give you all the kingdoms of the world, and you don't need to go to by way of the cross? You just bow down and worship me, and I'll give you the kingdoms. And Jesus didn't refute or challenge the veracity of Satan telling the truth in that regard. As the first Adam forfeited federal headship over the planet, and the usurper, the the the demon, the the devil, Satan, the adversary, he's the little g god of this world. Instead Jesus said, it is written, thou shall not tempt the Lord thy God. Be gone Satan. Right? Get out of here. And so we we too are in a spiritual battle, and in that spiritual battle, as we sow the word of God in our heart, we're able to take every thought captive through the obedience of Christ. And with AI technology and all this stuff going on, we're gonna have to really be on our game. We're gonna really need to be students of God's word or we too are gonna be deceived. We've gotta be able to have the word of God already in us and sown within us. And if you don't know, if you're unsure, you've gotta be able to go to the Bible and search your Bible and find out with a bible dictionary or concordance, whatever, why there's that red flag going off in your head about what somebody just said. You don't know exactly where that is in the Bible, but you know it's not right. The holy spirit's ministering, that's not right. That's not that's not me. But you need to be a student of the word and to to be able to counteract the lies of the wicked one. And so we we we place great emphasis upon the study and teaching of God's word here at Calvary Chapel. And my pastor, he was the most consistent guy you ever saw. You always knew when when he was in the pulpit that you were going to get a good meal. That you would have something you could put your teeth into and and be nourished with milk and veggies and meat and and go away from there knowing that the holy spirit just spoke to you. That a lot of what you're wrestling with through the week and having questions and things are answered there during worship, and during the teaching of the word, and during prayer, as God is ministering by his spirit to his people. And again, he didn't rely upon the rudimentary understanding of of men of the world of psychology and existential humanism, relativism. No. He taught the word of God, line upon line, precept upon precept. Take us from Genesis to Revelation through the bible. And you become stronger. Your marriage has become stronger. Probably one of the greatest insurance for your marriage is a bible teaching church. That your husband, your wife will hear the truth. That the holy spirit be able to minister to your husband, your wife, your children, your family. That's one of the greatest insurance policies you could ever have for your family. And you know what? It was me. I'm not boasting, but I gotta get this through to you men. It wasn't my wife organizing to get my family to church. Many a times, because she's tired, I'd say we're going. We're going. Because I knew what a knucklehead I was. I needed the Lord to help me as a father, as a husband. It wasn't something I could put in cruise control. And I needed my wife as she's home with the kids. And when wives are home with the kids or even at work, there are a whole lot of influences coming at them every day. I remember one time a guy knocked on the door and wanted to sell her a vacuum cleaner. And boy, he also instilled within her sales resistance. This is what your husband's gonna say when he gets home. You get ready when he says this, and you let him know that this is a good thing, you know. So Kathy was already ready for my my whatever. Now remember this, I was a carpet cleaner. Do you think I knew a little bit about a vacuum cleaner, you know? The guy's messing with the wrong guy. And but it illustrated to me what can happen when people have access to her. I'm not saying, you know, she's naive or anything, But in any event, it's it's important to be a covering. It's important for the husbands to cover their wives and to talk things out and bring the word of God into the equation. The word of God, everything you're going through, everything you're thinking about, bring the word of God in. You're thinking about buying a house or a car or whatever, can we afford it? The borrower is slave to the lender. Is this a good kind of debt? Are the interest rates okay? And you look at the word of God to determine and to evaluate how you're gonna spend your money. How you're gonna spend your time. Where you're gonna go on vacation? Where you're gonna move to? If you're gonna move, do you wanna first check out? Is there a church that teaches the bible there? Or do you wanna go to a place where there's a famine in the land? There's no bible teaching church there. Do you really wanna do that? Do you wanna expose your kids to a to a season in their life where mom and dad can't find a church that teaches God's word? Where it's all the social club, it's the youth group, it's the fun and games, but what happens when they get into high school and college? Is their faith real enough to withstand the temptation of the world in these environments? You've gotta get them rooted and grounded in the faith in those especially in those formative years. This isn't a game, and it's the word of God. When we had the youth group, I was I had a couple youth pastors, and and pretty much I was the youth pastor, and Brittany was the organizer of things, but we just simply taught them on Thursday nights the word of God. We sent them to bible camps and places where they teach the word of God, not fun and games. It's okay to have some fun and games after they've been in the word and worship. Part of being a kid. But the primary the primary priority is get them rooted and grounded in God's word. And then on Friday nights and Saturday, we tried to do outreach to win their peers to Christ. So evangelization and all. And it was a wonderful wonderful season, and but I'd never ever ever wanted that youth group that God entrusted to us. 15 of them went down to the Bible College after that. And I never wanted them to go to the high school camps where it was just fun and games. Where they take a bowl and somebody chews on something, they spit it into the bowl, and it goes to the next person, they gotta eat it, and you know, stuff like that. I mean, I chew on the word of God, you know. They you have all these stories of what they do at summer camp or these places, and and and again, it's a lot of fun and games, but did you meet Jesus? Did you hear from Jesus? Did the people that are teaching you, did they challenge you in your faith? So incredibly important. Because a very very high percentage of kids when they reach college fall away from the faith. And in many cases, they didn't they didn't learn the word of God. It used to be that we'd have the 10 commandments in school. It used to be we had the bible and prayer in our public schools. And even worldly people were were getting the basics of the faith all over the country. And it created a a standard of morality, a Judeo Christian ethic. And it made us good. It made our country a a good country. And you don't find that with the other isms. The Islam, the Mormonism, all these different pretend religions. What's their doctrine? What's their ideology? If they don't believe, we're gonna kill them? We're gonna force them with the sword? We're gonna infiltrate, then when we get the upper hand, we're gonna enforce Sharia law in Dearborn, Michigan? Really? What happened to the word of God? What happened to the churches being being lit up all week long? Why is it Most of our culture enjoys entertainment now. The movies, the Netflixes, the bars. How well are we doing as a church in comparison to the bars? How well are we doing as the body of Christ in comparison to the casinos and various sports events and things that people can spend their money and spend their time at. Is church a have to? I really don't wanna go, but I have to. It's Sunday morning. Heard a story of a guy that was just really hard getting him up, getting to go to church, and and he's just whining, complaining. His mom went in there and woke him up and said, Billy, time to get up. Time to get up. You're gonna be late to church. And and he went back to sleep. And Billy, you better get up. You better get up. You gotta get your shower. You gotta get ready. It's almost time. It's almost time for church. You can't miss today. Finally, a third time she comes in and he's still in bed. Oh, mom, why do I have to go to church? Because you're the pastor, Billy. Get up. I love being here. I'd pay you guys to let me teach God's word. Proverbs eleven twenty four says, there is that scatters and yet increases, and there is that withholds more than his meat and tends to poverty. Kinda like when we watch Stingy Scrooge, you know. He's so impoverished spiritually. He's afraid to let go with any of his wealth. And we can just take the word of God and we can get it out there. We don't need to be stingy with the word of God. We can get his word out there and we know that it's gonna pay dividends. We know that the seed is just ripe. It's ready to sprout and to grow and explode with productivity. What are you investing in? How are you investing? Verse six, let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teaches in all good things. Are you investing in the teaching of God's word? Do you value spiritual nourishment? One of the things we did when we first came here to Bremerton years ago is we applied for the Calvary Satellite Network radio station. The home church, Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa, invested millions and millions of dollars to put satellite feeders all over The United States so that the word of God could go everywhere. That's an investment from a church. What was their objective? To get pastor Chuck's teaching and other pastor's teaching in every community. And when it first came here, it was it was mind blowing because I felt like I have help. I felt like I have a standard that people are gonna have to hear and answer to. It was it was it was amazing at first as people began to realize, that's what I'm hungering for. I'm I'm hungering for the word of God. I don't know what it was, but now that I'm hearing that message, I'm hungering for it. You go to 89.9 and you're tuning in these bibles, that's how I grew up. They invested in a radio station in Orange County called K Wave. Everywhere I went, I had K Wave on. That all the traveling in the car, my wife and I, we're getting bible teaching. We didn't listen to oldies music. We listened to worship music and bible teaching. We're getting a systematic theology poured into us, but somebody has to pay for that radio station. And it's you, it's me. It's people that ties and offerings, they go in to invest in a radio station. Imagine that. And then you have to run that radio station. But your vision is we're gonna get the word of God out all over America. And sometimes the pastors, the big pastors, they'll take and they'll pay $15 a month to invest in the East Coast on a radio station there, or CSN, or whatever. It goes all over. And so it can be very expensive, but they they look at it as, hey, we're missionaries, and we're gonna get the word of God out there, you know? And and it and it bears great fruit because in these regions, then you have little churches popping up. You have other pastors going out who are, you know, in school like I did, school of ministry, they're learning. Now they wanna go somewhere. And if you go somewhere, like I came here, we had the radio station other side of the water, but it's it doesn't have bible teaching. It's a lot of fluffy music. It's really fluffy today. And that's fine. It has its place, guess, for fluffy time, but we need the word of God. And so we immediately, I I began to check out the radio stations. Man, I had a big vision. I I didn't think there was anything we couldn't do. And there's an AM station over there by the fairgrounds, and it was available, but I didn't have any financing or ability to buy it. And when pastor Chuck came and dedicated our building a couple years ago, told him about it. It was really inexpensive to buy that AM station. Relatively inexpensive. But I had nothing. And he is it still available? And it was kinda like I got the feeling he'd have bought it for us. If if it was, I oh, no. It went back to the world. But then the CSN came into the area, and it was $500 to make the application with the FCC to get the ball rolling to get the CSN here, the Calvary Satellite Radio Network. And and so one of the other pastors in the region said he had no vision, no desire for it. So we did it. Brand new church. We we applied. And it took a few years, and they they put it up there on top of Gold Mountain, and I just went up to Gold Mountain last month to put in a new receiver and stuff. And and so we've been caretaking that ministry to try and get the word out there. For years, we supported it financially. And and we also we applied for our own radio station with the FCC. And we were approved, but it was right at the time we were going bankrupt. And it took so long to be approved. Took years. And finally, the lawyers called and said, you guys, it's time to build it. And when you build it, you gotta have the money to build it. We got no money. We're losing our building. And they're they're the guys on the other end of the phone, they've never heard that before. County chapels don't go bankrupt. They don't go out of business. What must be sin in the camp. Must have done something wrong, and you're just trying to hang on. And now as people describe our ministry, we're just a one trick pony. All we have to offer, there's only one thing we have to offer, and that's the teaching of the word of God on Sunday and Monday. Get a little podcast here and there. Before we tried to be a full service church, you know, hit all the all the spots like the church I came from. You go any night of the week and be ministered unto. I can't do that anymore. But what I can do is be faithful to what God's called me to do and continue to teach the word to those that show up and see what God might do. But it wasn't a lack of vision. Certainly had the vision, certainly had the faith to step out. So what are you investing in? Do you esteem the words of his mouth more than your necessary food? What's your appetite for? Flesh or the spirit? Jesus told Peter, do you love me, Peter? Feed my sheep. Tend my lambs. Tend my sheep. Sunday school, church, the job of the pastor, the job description is to feed his sheep. And Paul said, take heed over the flock which he has purchased with his own blood. You're responsible. These are blood bought sheep, and you're just an under shepherd. What if there was a famine in the land for the word of God? We hear all over America, people who love God's word are having a hard time finding churches that teach God's word. And Jammer Kell and Brendan Hothos, they describe them as remnant churches. People calling them willing to drive twenty, thirty miles, 40 miles to a church because a church alive is worth the drive. Right? Nowadays, can do it on Facebook and there's people that watch us. Tiny tiny group of people watch us from other places. Nothing real big, but it's it's always stimulating to me. Clovis will take and give us a report on the website of where people are watching. And we're not a mega church, we're still a micro church. But it's exciting that, you know, maybe somebody in Russia's watching us, somebody in Africa's watching us, and being taught God's word. Then you got the hits on YouTube, and Rumble, and Telegram, and it's exciting to see, you know, that people outside of this room here are tuning in, and and the word of God continues to go forth. So when you evaluate the needs of your family, what priority is the word of God? What are you sowing into their lives? When you evaluate your community, what place does the word of God have is valuable? I want you to think for a minute. Over the last hundred years, is there any great ministry, great teaching, great teacher headquartered in the Pacific Northwest? They're all in Nashville. They're all in Tennessee. Right? They're all in Southern California. When I was in Southern California, growing up there, you had J. Vernon McGee. You've heard of him. You had John McArthur. You had doctor Dobson. You had Chuck Swindoll based there. You had Hal Lindsey based there. You had every ministry, big ministry based in Southern California. Today, we call them pockets. There's pockets of places in America where you have conservative Christian evangelicals wanting the word of God and supporting churches that teach the word of God. So Jeff, when he goes down to San Diego, he goes to doctor David Jeremiah's church in La Mesa, California, you know. Enormous amount of Calvary Chapels there, Jack Hibbs and Raul Rees and so many good bible teachers on the radio, just a saturation of the word of God. And if Franklin Graham comes here, he has a hard time getting people to show up. If Greg Laurie come up here and he's come twice, the first time only 7,000 people showed up. I asked him, Greg, you're gonna come back to the Northwest? Yeah. I got some unfinished business to do. And he did. He came back and did a much much better job with help from the radio station and such. But this is a place that's very very difficult to penetrate. But God has you and I here, and he has us here for a reason. And we know what we're supposed to do. There's no ambiguity about it. We are to study God's word, to teach God's word, to preach and teach, to go and make disciples. And Jesus said, lo, I'm with you always even to the end of the age. If you and I weren't here, then who's going to bring forth the word of God in our community? Praise the Lord. There are a few handful of churches in our community that still teach God's word. A handful, less than a handful. And so we we understand if we're gonna justify the reason for our existence, why are you still there? What are you doing? We're teaching the word of God. We're standing upon the word of God. We're investing in the kingdom of God through the teaching of God's word. What are you sowing? Are you using GMO seed? You're a farmer. What are you sowing? You sowing psychology? Is that what you're sowing into the lives of the kids and the families who are hurting? Are you sowing humanism? Is that the seed? The existential humanistic philosophy of man at the center? Everything's about me, I want feel good messages, the isms, or are you bringing forth a pure word of God that has the power to transform and change lives? Paul said he wasn't ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes. To Jew first, and also to the Greek, for therein is the righteous God revealed from faith to faith as is written, the just shall live by faith. We're not ashamed of the gospel. We have no other methodology to make a person whole than to preach Christ and him crucified for the remission of sins. Mixed with faith is they receive Christ in their heart and lives. We know by the power of the holy spirit, a person goes from body and soul to body, soul, and spirit. And that transformation, that sanctification, that making that person holy, God begins to change you from glory to glory into the image of his son. And husbands, you're to love your wives with the washing of water of the word. You're to wash her with God's word. Washing the filth of the world away. What if your wife or your husbands, maybe the husband. Wives, what if your husband likes soap operas? What if he'd like to sit on his rear and watch soap operas, you know? He's he's gonna get a real strange view of the world and relationships and marriage and all these things. And so you're gonna have to come home, wives, and you're gonna have to pour the word of God into him. You're gonna have to get him away from the channel changer and watching all those commercials, the sports he's watching. His mind's getting corrupted. How are you gonna deal with that corruption of the world? It's the word of God. You sow the word of God in. Hey, there's there's poison in the pot. There's poison in the pot. Pour the meal in. Pour the meal of God's word in. Wash it. If you still send your kids to public school or in the workplace, when you come home, gotta debrief them. You gotta make sure that that that you're they're biblically minded, that they're able to wash away the filth of the way the their friends and people are thinking. Reestablish the authority of God's word. God is not mocked, whatsoever man sows that shall he also reap. To ensure a good harvest, we must sow the word. Secondly, we must sow with wisdom. Notice verse seven. Be not deceived. God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption, but he that soweth to the spirit shall have the spirit reap everlasting life. Or excuse me, to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. So death or life? Who's your broker? Where do you get your investment advice from? Do you get it from Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway? Are you selling everything right now and building a treasure chest of cash to get ready to buy things pennies on the dollar when the stock market crashes in 2026? How are you handling your money? Are you gonna go with the Trump family and invest in the crypto? Getting all the crypto as the Trump family has different types of crypto to sell and present to people. Can you imagine that? President telling you, our present economic system is antiquated. It's time for a revamp. It's time for a reset. And oh, by the way, it's gonna be digitized. It's gonna be a digital blockchain and we're gonna take America's $3,740,000,000,000,000 dollars of debt and we're gonna hide that debt. And even the Russians are explaining to people what what's up. We're gonna hide that debt. We're gonna transfer that debt into crypto. It's gonna be absorbed by crypto, and we're gonna make more and more crypto out there. The control grid. You know, I was thinking, I've been trying to warn us warn myself about this digital ID. Do you know we already have a digital ID? When you go to the when you go to the airport to fly, and I flew last year to Arizona, they have a biometric picture of you, dude. That's you. That's it. That's the biometric digital ID right there. And it ties in with your credit cards. It ties in look at your phone. You open your phone. It's your mug. It's your face. They've got your picture. Everywhere you go, your bank's got your picture on your card. They just have to connect it to your bank account now. That's it. That's where we're going. But they're gonna collapse the present system. And then if the music stops and we got nothing, we worked our whole life and we got nothing, I can look up and say, Lord, I invested in heaven. And Moth and Rust can't corrupt, these can't break through and steal that. It's secure there, Lord. We we poured our lives into getting the word of God out. And Lord, what a great opportunity to get the word of God out now as you give us an open door. The fastest growing church in the world is in Iran. They're looking up. The mosques are empty. And yet, Islam is trying to invade America and and Europe. But over in Iran, a stronghold of Islam, the people, the jig's up. They know Christianity is the way, the holy spirit's moving and working, and people are getting visions and dreams and stuff. And they're being led to Christ through dreams and visions, and people on the street sharing Christ. What a great season to be a Christian. Who are you listening to? Who's your influencer? How are you to be influenced? Do you wanna be a pseudo Christian? Do you wanna be a wimpy carnal Christian, a fleshly Christian, a worldly Christian? Or do you wanna be on fire spirit filled Christian? I personally think that the mistake that we're making in the Calvary Chapels is we're living in the past. We're talking about our glory days too much, and we're afraid. We're afraid to be persecuted. We're afraid to lose what we have. I'd venture to say if the pastors, all of the big name pastors especially, would lead the way in standing up. And according to Ephesians five eleven, have no fellowship with them fruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. Be more like John the Baptist and expose them. They would invite persecution against the church. And then the assets may be in jeopardy as the state builds its, you know, this whenever the church becomes the friend of the world, the friend of the state, that leads to the dark ages, leads to compromise, leads to lukewarmness where Jesus said you're neither hot or cold. But if you stand for the truth and you're not gonna compromise at all, and you let everybody know they're not playing four g or five d chess, it's all corruption, then you're gonna be targeted. And when you're targeted, you come under persecution, that's where the Holy Spirit's poured out. That's where you'll see God do some great things in these last days. Not by way of compromising and loving the world and try to join up with the world. So afraid the things you say might might jeopardize your kingdom, you know. Take some risks. Take some risks. Step out in faith like you did when you're first a believer. You didn't fear anybody. You had nothing to lose. Now you got so much. You're gotta be so calculating what you say or don't say. You gotta rub elbows with certain groups of people to stay on point, you know, to be popular. Connect the dots. In Psalm one, blessed oh, how happy is a man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law does he meditate day night. And he shall be like a tree that's planted by the rivers of water that brings forth its fruit in its season. His leaf shall not wither. And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper, but the ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind drives away. Job said he esteemed God's word. He desired God's word more than his necessary food. Think you can go without a meal and set your phone down and have an appetite of craving for God's word? Maybe read through the Psalms during one meal time. How long does it take to make that food? How long does it take to eat it? How long does it take to clean up after it? Just just negate one meal and go for a spiritual meal. Do you steam the word of God more than your necessary food? Do we crave God's word? If you think you can neglect sowing to the spirit and still reap a good harvest, you're deceived. He says, be not deceived. God is not mocked for whatsoever man sows, that shall he also reap. In James one twenty one, the brother of our Lord, half brother of our Lord, he says, lay apart all filthiness and super fluidity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word. So you approach church, you come to church, you approach your bible, you pray, Lord, please teach me. Meekness, you're you're asking the Lord to strengthen you. And then the engrafted word, to come within, to be rooted and grounded in the faith. The engrafted word, which is able to save your souls, But be doers of the word and not hearers only. So we're learning this morning. We're hearing. Are we gonna apply anything when we leave here? So in Matthew seven, Jesus used the same picture as a wise and a foolish builder. The wise builder builds his house as a doer of the word upon the rock. And in 2026, when things crash, the wise builder, the one that been the doer of the word, his faith doesn't shipwreck. He's able to navigate day by day, trusting the Lord. He's maybe been a little bit like Joseph preparing ahead of time too. But the hearer of the word that doesn't do, that doesn't apply what the Holy Spirit speak into your heart, He's a foolish builder. His house looks just as good from the outside. His marriage from the outside looks good until the time of testing, until the time when the storms come, begin to beat against that house, and then we find out that you didn't spend time building upon the rock. Your life is not built upon Jesus Christ. Your life's built upon sand. You built it upon yourself. And now, the whole edifice, the whole construction of it's being compromised and exposed, and now your marriage is falling apart. You can't deal with adversity. You're running to the psychiatrist. You're running for the pharmaceuticals. You're looking for a way to cope because you don't have the faith because you didn't practice the faith. You were here and not a doer of God's word. What's God's will for my life? Just do what he showed you to do today. A progressive revelation. Do what you know to do today. You're here at church. The Lord imprompted your heart to show up at church. Well, what do I do after church? I don't know. What's the Lord showing you? What's next? Take your mom out to brunch. I don't know. Take me out. No. I'm just kidding. For he beholds his face, it's like looking into a mirror, James says. You're looking into a mirror of God's word, and he's showing you, you can see you, and then you walk out there and you forget what manner of person you are. He just showed you. He said, Rick, you're a liar. Rick, you're mean yesterday. Rick, you're mean this morning. Rick, you're always mean. Confess. Humble yourself. Oh no. I'm gonna double down. I'm gonna double down, man. I'm the king of my castle. For he beholds himself and goes his way and straightway forgets what manner he was. But who so looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues. So in John eight, if you continue in my word, then you are you are my disciples indeed, and you'll know the truth. Truth will set you free. There's a continuing in the word. Not just hearing one time, but application, being a doer, applying thee. Be wise, apply these truths to your life. If you fall down, get back up. Get going again. Confess your fall, and the Lord will restore you. Continues there, and he being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the word, this man shall be blessed of his deed. It takes time. If you wanna be blessed, be wise, so do the spirit, not the flesh. And we would say, man up. Man up. With the culture that we're in, I don't know what what's going on, but the guys I run into, a big big part of them, the young guys, they have a very difficult time doing the little things. They wanna do big things. And they're enamored in thinking that they're characters in the comic books they grew up reading. They're superheroes. They're being influenced along those lines, very egotistical and way up there. Do you know a real man, a real woman, a real husband, real father? It's just a simple person that puts a light on and opens their bible and reads the word consistently, and then applies what they're learning. And you might do it a lifetime unnoticed, in obscurity, but your life's built upon Jesus. He's the rock. Sow to the spirit. No shortcuts. Be a man of God. Given into the flesh, sowing to the flesh will lead to a harvest of destruction. Take your thoughts captive. Don't allow the devil to place these sexual, naughty, ugly, bad things in your head. Take those thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ. Get in God's word. Wash your heart and mind. Don't allow it to fester. Don't allow it to grow further. Be wise. Learn from others' mistakes. Learn from Abraham, his lapse of faith. Learn of Isaac. Learn of Jacob, of Samson, of David, when they yielded to the flesh, how destructive it was. We see him in Hebrews 11, the Holy Spirit's edited out all their mistakes, but I don't want my family to suffer the consequences of me yielding to the flesh. Even though God will forgive me, restore me, and we'll move forward. I I I don't I don't wanna go there. I don't want that sort of hurt in the lives of my family, nor do I wanna hurt the heart of God. So I wanna learn. I wanna learn from past mistakes that I read about in the Bible. Of men, giants of the faith, but they still succumb. They still fell somehow. In a time when kings go out to battle, David was idle, and you know the story. You know, Abraham, he was he's a father of faith. When he was tested, he went down into Egypt, a type of the world. His faith fainted simply because of a stock market reversal, simply because of a famine. God providing for him all this time, but now he sees it like, hey, we gotta go into Egypt now to get some food. And oh Sarah, by the way, tell them you're my sister. Now you're lying. Then you leave Egypt with what? You leave Egypt with an Egyptian woman named Hagar. And then a little way down the road when Sarah can't get pregnant to fulfill the promise that God's preparing you for, you help God out. You yield to the flesh and you bring forth an Ishmael. That's what happens when we take our eyes off the Lord. And in the small little things day by day, we begin to compromise being hearers only. Hosea eight seven says, if you sow to the wind, you're gonna reap the whirlwind. Our sin will find us out, Moses said. May not happen immediately, but remember, God is not mocked. Whatsoever man sows, that shall also reap. The Lord, as we read in the book of Revelation, he gives space for repentance. I love that. I love that. Even though I may have sown to the flesh, the results haven't come forth yet. But God's not mocked. Whatsoever man sows, that shall he also reap. But God gives me space to repent. And if I repent, then I don't have to reap those terrible consequences of my flesh. I'm forgiven. And he takes the sin and he sends it away from me. And he understands my frame. He understands that he made me from the dust of the ground. He does he he doesn't expect as much from me as I expect from myself. It was no surprise to him, my propensity to fail and to fall. But he's there if I'll simply humble myself to get me going again, get me back up, and to protect me and my family and help us to reach the finish line one day. Many starts and stops, many failures along the way, but it gives us space to repent. I love that the Lord's mercies are new every morning in Lamentations. I love in the book of Jonah that where we're told that they that observe lying vanities forsake his mercy, his mercies. So what's that mean? You fall into idolatry. You fall into lying vanities. You're you're falling along with the influencer that's leaving you in such a way that's a huge lie, but you can't see the lie. You're almost in a cult with a cult like fervent ferventness, you know. But you forsake your own mercy. Later when you find out, it's like, uh-oh, we were betrayed. We were deceived. Why didn't you keep your eyes on the Lord? Why didn't you follow him? Why did you succumb to following men again? You're being played by the devil. Don't put your trust in men. Trust in the Lord and hold one another accountable to the word of God. Our sin will find us out, but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. The abundant life of the spirit that Jesus promised. The life of the spirit is stimulated and experienced as we sow the seeds of prayer. As we sow the seeds of God's word, as we sow the seeds of fellowship, of communion, of worship, and of service, doing good deeds, ministering to one another. These all are works of the spirit. Sowing to the spirit and you're gonna reap life. We must be wise farmers and sow the right seed if we want a good harvest. Sow a thought, reap an action. Sow an action, reap a habit. Sow a habit, reap a character. Sow a character, reap a destiny. Nip it in the bud. Catch it in the thought process. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. Catch it in the thought process. Take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. Evaluate it. Prove all things. Hold fast to that which is good. Test the spirits. Allow the word of God to illumine your heart and mind, and to let you know when you're being deceived. God is not mocked, whatsoever a man sows that shall he also reap. To ensure a good harvest, we must sow the word, sow with wisdom. Thirdly, we must sow and wait. We're microwave Christians. We want it now. We don't wanna wait. Think how long are my grandparents waited. My grandparents came out of the Great Depression. And man, they didn't just get instant everything. They had to work hard, save, and then buy that which they, you know, the furniture, whatever they wanted. Nowadays, it's instant, and we just we're a throwaway society. You just throw it away. And some of you, you know, you you buy a sofa and your and your kids just beat it. Kathy and I had our sofa for like thirty years. I mean, what woman wants a sofa for thirty years, you know? But I clean upholstery too, so I kept it good. And I didn't let the kids jump on and break the supports and all that sort of stuff. Right? So nowadays, you go buy a real nice leather sofa set at Costco and you can let the kids go crazy on it. And if you have no shame, you can pull up to Costco and offload that thing and they'll take it back from you. Yeah. And you can just keep bringing that throwaway lifestyle. All that stuff you're throwing away, you just keep bringing it to Costco, and pretty soon, like the post office, they got a picture of you there. You're gonna cut your card off. Well, some people have no shame. It's kinda funny, you know. I mean, I'm saying it tongue in cheek because I know someone that does that, you know. But I I'd be so embarrassed, you know. God. But you know, I mean, you buy something and it doesn't live up to its warranty and stuff like that, that's one thing. But you gotta wait. And people are in such a hurry. I don't know if it's because prophetically, we as Christians, the young families, they sense that what we're saying is true, that Jesus is coming again, and they wanna hurry up and get all the things and live and experience all the things that their parents did and all their dreams of being married and family and all. They wanna get it done quick because it's almost over. That might be part of it. I don't know. But we must wait. And let us not be weary in well doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint not. We must wait. James says in James five seven, be patient therefore, brethren, under the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman, the farmer, waits for the precious fruit of the earth and has long patience for it until he receives the early and the latter rain. So in an agricultural society, you're gonna have to prepare the soil. You're gonna have to make sure that the weeds and everything that would mitigate and that would cause the the harvest to suffer, you gotta remove it. You're gonna have to fertilize. You're gonna have to turn the soil. You're gonna have to you're gonna have to get the ground, the clods out of it and all that. And you're gonna have to get it to where it where it where it where it can produce the ground itself. And then you put the seed, you cast the seed out, then now you gotta pray that it doesn't the wind doesn't blow so hard that it blows the seed away. You gotta pray that the rain, but not rain so much that it floods everything away. And you gotta pray that enough sunshine and enough everything is coming. And you gotta wait, and you gotta wait, and wait. All of your investment, everything you have, your seed is in the ground, and you gotta wait now for the seed to produce. And then if you're smart, apparently, you gotta take some of that seed and store it so that you have something to plant for the next year, and then you take some of it as grain and and you can sell it as food. But the farmer has to wait and wait and wait and pray and pray and pray that he's got the early and the latter rain. Israel is getting the early and the latter rain now, and they're prolific in producing fruits and vegetables and flowers and such. The desert is blossoming and growing. In Revelation twenty two twelve, Jesus said, behold, I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according to his work shall be. So don't quit. One of the things that happens when you have Hal Lindsey in the eighties writing, late great planet earth, and you have Tim LaHaye doing the Left Behind series, There's a whole lot of people come out twenty, thirty years later, they're tired of waiting. Now they're gonna attack the doctrine of the rapture and say, there's no pre trib rapture. Well, now you've become prophetic because now you're a scoffer that Peter warned of. You're fulfilling prophecy by scoffing, by saying, where is the promise of this coming? I remember, I heard that Darby, I heard that this witch named McDonald in the eighteen hundreds came up with this pre trib rapture, and it's not true. And we're gonna go through the tribulation period. Now, can't present your case biblically because you can't prove that. You can't prove a mid or a post toasty. You can't do it. But you can use a straw man's argument that McDonald and Darby and maybe even the Schofield bible put that out there toward the end of the eighteen hundreds. And then it and then it became this huge growth, this pre trib rapture. But what you fail to in your research is know that Irenaeus in the first century and other early church fathers believed in a pre trib rapture. Not only that, how about the apostle Paul? How about Jesus himself? How do you disprove I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again, receive you unto myself, that where I am, there you may be also. How do you how do you prove that we're subject to God's wrath? That we're gonna go through that place? So you gotta wait. You gotta wait. So you put your heart there and you say, well, why is God waiting so long? Because Ricky wanted to save you and he wanted to save your children. He's long suffering, not willing that any would perish, but that all would come to repentance. This church age, the Lord is long suffering because he's calling a bride unto himself. That's why. So be patient. Don't quit. Remember the good seed you planted. God is not mocked. Be faithful in the season of small things. In Hebrews six ten, for God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labor of love, which you have showed toward his name, and that you have ministered to the saints and do minister. Wait. Don't quit. That word of God that you sowed into your children, it's gonna come back. It may not come back till they're on their deathbed, but God has sown that word. God has watered that word. God is working. He's still working. Wait. Don't give up. Keep praying. Keep interceding. Keep modeling the Christian life. Don't let your faith fail. Be steadfast and movable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for you know your labor's not in vain. I know my labor for thirty years here is not in vain. I just gotta wait for the harvest. I don't get to harvest much in Kitsap County over thirty years, but there's a harvest waiting in heaven. There's countless people that have heard the gospel and people have come to Christ that aren't here anymore, but over a thirty year period of time throwing that seat out there and the word of God out there may not see it all now. May see some. You know, for me, all it takes is just every once in a while, somebody getting saved, and I'm ready to go another thirty years. I just need a I just need a crumb, Lord. Just throw me throw me a bone. Throw me a bone once in a while, and I get so excited. Hey, it's worth it. It's worth it. There's rejoicing in heaven among the angels when just one sinner repents. It's significant. It's important to God. There's rejoicing in the presence of the angels. You know what that means? Jesus is rejoicing when just one sinner repents. And what if that one sinner that repents is your husband, your son, your daughter, was it worth it? Would you want your pastor to hang in there for thirty years? Would you want would you Do you want your kids? Do you want a family to hear the real gospel and to be taught God's word? For real? Be steadfast. Be like a lighthouse where the waves are crashing and you don't give up. You never quit. It's always too soon to quit. We're gonna reap if we faint not. Farmers gotta wait. Matthew nineteen twenty nine, Jesus said, everyone that has forsaken houses or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands for my name's sake shall receive a hundredfold and shall inherit everlasting life. You can't out give God. Take that verse as a missionary. A missionary leaves everything he knows, everything she knows, everything you know. Your house, your career, your family, everyone. And you're going out there for what? To share the gospel, to go and make disciples. Most people don't wanna do that. And Jesus said, nobody that's done that is gonna miss out on the harvest. They shall receive hundredfold and shall inherit everlasting life. You cannot give God. God will never be your debtor. Ecclesiastes eleven one says, cast thy bread upon the waters, for thou shall find it after many days. Remember Jochebed? Remember in the book of Exodus, where there came a pharaoh, a king that knew not Joseph? And then you have got Jochebed and Amram, and Jochebed gets pregnant, and the pharaoh had made an edict that, hey, these Jews these these Jews are proliferating. They're growing. They're popping out like crazy. They're gonna overwhelm us. We're being overwhelmed by these foreigners. And so he told, Shifra and Fuwa, the two midwives told him, hey, when when they're sitting on the stool, when that baby comes out, make sure that that you kill that baby. Abortion. State demanded. One child policy like like China. If it's a girl, you can keep it. But if it's a boy, you gotta execute it. They're afraid militarily that someday they're gonna be, you know, outnumbered and all. So let's let's let's use euthanasia. Let's get rid of these these kids and all. And so Jochebed, she couldn't do it. And Shifra and Pua, they they lied and they told the king, hey, these these Jewish women, these Hebrew women, man, they their babies just squirt right out. You know, as a midwife, we can't even catch them in time. Know, they just pop right out. They're lively. So Jochebed, Moses' mother, she says he's a goodly child, a good looking child, and and so must have had a certain look. What mother wouldn't look in that way? And so she prepared an ark like Noah did. She took some bulrushes, and then she took slime or pitch, some tar, and put it around it so that it'd be watertight. And she put little Moe in there, and I saw the 10 commandments. I saw it. And she's got the little lid on it, and she she had Miriam take it down to the Nile because you're supposed to throw the kids in the Nile, and she let it float, and it came to the daughter of pharaoh. And then little Miriam went over there, do you need someone to nurse that little baby and get paid for it? So mama Jacobed, she got to wean little Moe for about four years. Then he becomes the son of Pharaoh's daughter. She just cast him upon the waters. She just cast him upon the waters. Lord, your will be done. And then later, Moses, he esteemed the reproach of Christ as greater riches than all the splendor of Egypt, and he waited upon the Lord for God to bring forth the fruit. He's 80 years old and the Lord meets him in a burning bush. In the next forty years, he's gonna be delivered, delivering the children of Israel, but he had to wait. Psalm one twenty six five says, they that sow in tears shall reap in joy. The many nights that you've been up sowing in tears, praying, pleading with God. Lord, save my marriage. Lord, save my mom. Save my dad. They're sick. I don't want them to go to hell. You're sowing in tears. Lord, keep that hedge of protection around my children. Don't let them be hurt. Don't let them be deceived. Don't let them be violated. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. He that goeth forth and weepeth bearing precious seed shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him. You waited for the harvest. You waited for the day they came to know the Lord. How exciting. You didn't give up. Don't be weary in well doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not. Isaiah 40 verse 31, they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount it with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. God is not mocked. Whatsoever man sows, that shall he also reap. To ensure a good harvest, we must sow the word, sow with wisdom, sow in weight, and fourthly and finally, we must sow to win. To win people to Christ. Verse 10, as we have therefore opportunity to let us do good unto all men, especially unto them which are of the household of faith. One man sows, another waters, and God brings the increase. You're at work, you're at school, you're out in the community, you're a missionary on one of the navy ships, you're going to Japan, you're going everywhere, you're sowing the word that you've been taught. Another one comes along and waters that word. You invite that person to church, and then I have the privilege of sharing the gospel, and then God brings the increase, and we're all rejoicing. We're all rejoicing with the new birth, how God did that. We keep sowing. We keep sowing. More seed we get out there, more people we share with, more we get it out there. God's counting on you. In the tribulation period, he's gonna have a 144,000 Jews, 12,000 from each tribe, bringing the everlasting gospel. He's an angel overhead sharing the gospel. But God in this dispensation is counting on you. He said, go and make disciples. Preach and teach. Preach and teach, and along with you always, even the end of the age. The great commission, or is it the great omission? It's not a suggestion, it's a command. God is counting on you. He's counting on me. Are we a bible believing evangelical church? We're heralding the good news. Or are we afraid we're gonna offend somebody, so we gotta kinda water it down and develop a different methodology to grow the church. He didn't tell you to grow the church. He told you to go and make disciples. He's the only one that can convert somebody. A true church is a church of believers, not a church made up of unbelievers that you gotta appease and placate and feed them little baby food, know. So to win. So we one man sows another waters, but God brings the increase. In Proverbs eleven thirty, the fruit of righteous is a tree of life, and he that wins souls is wise. Are you wise? Are you a soul winner? Seize every opportunity to win the lost. In John four thirty five, Jesus said, say not ye, there are yet four months. Oh, there's plenty of time. And then come with harvest. Behold, I say unto you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields for they're white already to harvest. You excited about the Christians in Iran coming to Christ? Do you think there's gonna be revival in our day here in America? I don't. I see an apostasy. I see a falling away from the faith. I see where it's gonna be the numbers wise. Numbers, I think are gonna be small, although there may be colleges and places professing that, hey, we baptized all these people. How are they walking when they come back down? They still sleeping with each other, still drugging, still drinking, still doing all the things of the world? Is it popular to be a Christian right now? What happens when the pendulum swings the other way? I believe the next revival's gonna be in the tribulation period through persecution of the tribulation saints. An innumerable multitude of people in Revelation six and seven beneath the throne of God because they refused, according to Revelation 20 verse four, the mark of the beast. Now, I hope I'm wrong. I hope there's a great revival in Kitsap County. Hope there's a great revival in America, people coming back to Christ. But I see the ecumenical church moving in a direction of a golden age. An age where we're gonna take over and we're gonna get rid of all those bad Democrats and we're gonna seize the country back for Jesus. That's not revival. That's a work of the flesh. Huge worship of work of the flesh. And he that reaps receive wages and gathers fruit unto life eternal, that both he that sows and they that reap may rejoice together. Jesus said in Matthew nine thirty seven, the harvest truly is plenteous, but the labors are few. So to win souls, invest in heaven. When the stock market and the dollar crashes, what will your harvest be? Jesus said, lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust does corrupt, where thieves break through and steal. But lay up for your treasure in heaven, where neither moth nor rust does corrupt, where thieves do not break through and steal. For where your treasure is, there where your heart, and there it is. Where your treasure is, there where your heart be also. What do you treasure? What's deep within your heart that you treasure? Do you treasure the kingdom of God? Do you treasure winning souls? Do you treasure people coming to know Jesus? In a time of apostasy, Elijah deceived himself and said he was the only one left. Everybody else has given over to Baalism and Ashtoreth. And God says, no, I've I've got 7,000 that haven't bowed their knee to the prophet Baal. No matter how bad it gets out there, God always has his people. He always has a remnant of believers to represent him in a time of apostasy, of falling away. What would be your harvest? Are you sowing the word? And and that would be one of the ways that I could gauge a church that's a biblical church is such a church of God's word. That's how I'd evaluate. Where does God's word fit in that group of people? Does a pastor do a two minute sermonette for Christianettes? Or does he give great place to the word of God to fulfill what God's called him to do, to feed his sheep? Are you sowing the word? Are you sowing wisdom? Are you sowing and waiting? Are you sowing to win souls? Be not deceived, God does not mock. Whatsoever man sows, that shall he also reap. I hope you don't wake up one day and have regret that you wasted your life. Everything we do for ourself is gonna pass. Only what we do for Jesus Christ is gonna last. In the short run, it may look like you got the bad deal dedicating yourself to the things of the Lord, teaching his word, dealing with indifference, and all the things that Jesus and all the all those who went before you the way they were treated. But when you get to heaven, you're not gonna have any regrets. You're gonna be so thankful, so thankful that you didn't quit in the season of small things. That you recognize the Lord's preparing you to rule and reign with him for a thousand years, and all of this is preparatory. All this is schooling us and getting us ready for King Jesus to rule and reign from Jerusalem. And we serve alongside him in a kingdom of priests, representing him to a world that's repopulating during that thousand years. Be faithful. Be not weary in well doing. For in due season, you shall reap if you faint not. Jesus said it this way, what would it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what would a man give in exchange for his life? The world wants you to think that it has something missing in your life. And once you get that, oh, you'll be fulfilled. Well, you already have the unsearchable riches of Christ. Godliness with contentment is great gain. We brought nothing into the world certain we're gonna carry nothing out. But you know what? There's gonna be people in heaven that are there as a result of your sowing to the spirit. Investing in the kingdom of God, getting the gospel out, getting the word of God out. That's a prize. That's exciting to think that we can be a part of God's work in these last days, that he wants to use us. He could use a donkey like he did with Balaam, but he chooses to use you and I. Ain't that exciting? He says, you'll do. Really, Lord? I've been rejected so much. No. You'll do. I can fill and use you. Just yield. Just yield to the spirit. I'm gonna use your life for my kingdom and my glory. Really, Lord? Yeah. How could that be? How can that possibly be? Trust me. Let's pray. Father, thank you. Thank you, Lord, for the demonstration of your son's humility. As he left the free exercise of his deity and as he came as the babe of Bethlehem, as he he yielded unto you, As he emptied himself with the free exercise of his deity, he became the son of man. He took on the form of a man. And even to the point of humbling himself unto death, and not just any death, but even the death of the cross. The cursedness of the cross. He that knew no sin became sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. So father, we rejoice. We thank you for the example of Jesus, that he came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. And Lord, we desire to take our cross up and follow him daily. We desire, Lord, to keep our hand to the plow and not looking back, no regret, but our hand to the plow and sowing seed, watering, watching, looking for your soon return, proclaiming your return, testifying of what we know to be fact. The prophetic fulfillment of your word all around us in real time, Lord. Lord, send us people. Give us open doors. Give us people this week that we can share the good news of your coming kingdom. Those who are losing hope, help us, Lord. Help us to be doers of your word, not hearers only. Bring in a great harvest, Lord. Lord, I pray I'm wrong. I pray that there will be revival in America, in Kitsap County. I pray I'm wrong, Lord. O me of little faith. I know you can, Lord. But will you? I hope you will. There's many that need to be saved. While your head is bowed and your eyes are closed as you continue to pray, there's anybody here this morning, this may be your moment. This is your time. This is where the Holy Spirit is identifying you as one whom God loves. One whom God sent his son to die for, for you. Jesus died individually for you. Personal. This is personal. And the Holy Spirit's letting it be known, speaking to your heart that he loves you, that he's paid for your sins, he died for your sins, the wrath of his father was poured out upon him that you might have eternal life. The bible says, as many as received him, to them gave he the power to become the sons of God, even to them who believe on his name. Do you believe on his name? What must I do to be saved? The Philippian jailer asked. And Paul and Barnabas said, believe, Paul and Silas, believe. Not just you, but your whole household. Do you believe? Are you depositing your trust upon Jesus, dependent upon him of his righteousness? Not your works, not your goodness, supposed goodness? Do you see yourself as a wretched sinner in need of a savior? You're crying out to God, God be merciful to me. If that's the cry of your heart. If you're believing, just lift your hand up. We wanna lead you in prayer. We wanna help you as you receive Christ. Anyone here this morning? Father, thank you. Thank you for the many times, Lord, we've seen you save. Thank you for those who you've drawn here to encourage and strengthen. Thank you, Lord, for the times you've lifted us back up and helped us keep going and gave us a measure of faith to fight, to continue in the fight, to fight the good fight, to not succumb to discouragement or despair or or the methodologies of the world and compromise, but to stay the course, Lord. To stay on that straight and narrow path and knowing, that it's the only way. There's nothing else we can do. Woe is me if I don't preach the gospel. So Lord help us, the love of Christ constraining us. Help us Lord. Help us to be faithful. Help us to bear much fruit for your kingdom and glory. And bless now as we partake of communion Lord. Bless this time in Jesus' name. Amen.