One Thing Missing: Awakening the Church for Evangelism

``The same God who is doing this in the Middle East, the same God who is starting revivals all across the world, the same God who parted the sea, the same God who literally stopped the sun from moving so that his army could win, the same God who does miracles, the same God who does wonders, the same God who does the impossible every single day is the God which we serve and it's the God which you serve every single day and that we the church finally get back to a place where we start believing that we serve the God who could do the impossible. [01:15:14] (29 seconds)  #GodOfTheImpossible

We're in Acts chapter 11 and now the church is finally beginning to understand and realize, hold on, God is actually moving outside of our community. Hold on, God is actually calling all people, not just us, not just me. So in verse 19 now we catch a glimpse here of what God is trying to do and so it says now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phineanica, Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except who? The Jews. [01:16:45] (32 seconds)  #GodIsMovingEverywhere

Many people often tell me it's easier to preach in other countries like Zambia, Ghana, Nigeria, it's easier to preach in Brazil, in Chile and Nicaragua, it's easier to preach in places maybe even that are persecuted like countries within the Middle East or China or Russia and people hearing the word and soaking it up and receiving it. It's so much easier to preach here. Jeff, you don't understand, in Canada, in Ontario, nobody wants to hear the gospel and yet at the same time we live in the most multicultural province in almost the entire world. [01:22:14] (34 seconds)  #MissionFieldCanada

Believe it or not, Canada has now become a mission field. We have become a mission field and that often times we are in the process of thinking that, well, I live in an area that which is predominantly Christian and so I'm going to assume that my neighbor is Christian and yet all the meanwhile your neighbor is struggling through what might be a divorce, your neighbor is currently struggling with mental illness and they don't know how to deal with it so they're self medicating and so they're diving deep into alcohol every single day into marijuana into other narcotics. [01:23:10] (35 seconds)  #PickUpYourCross

This is why Jesus told if you want to follow me you got to pick up your cross and follow me, you got to pick up your cross. If you want to follow me then you got to pick that up and that means being uncomfortable. I hate being uncomfortable. I seriously hate being uncomfortable. I keep telling Shareware Global can you please just send me to Hawaii, can, can like, you know, the Maldives, they need to hear the gospel too. Why, like, they, they, they send me to Brazil and I was like thank you Jesus. [01:25:47] (37 seconds)  #GospelForTheBroken

We were there and we were trying to share the gospel message to her and she said, you know, I can't go to church and we asked her why and she said because if I go they told me that God will strike me down and kill me. And so my buddy of mine and myself were sharing the gospel with her and it was a sunny day and we had one of our hope magazines with us and we were just trying to read it through to her and to show her how much God loves her and that that's not the case and that he died specifically on the cross for your sins so that you could have a personal relationship with him. [01:28:13] (34 seconds)  #RevivalStartsWithMe

I had to tell my leadership, I said let me pose it to you this way for a moment, I needed to get them into the right mindset about what it means for the great commission. I said if God were even only to send 300 people our way next month, okay, let's not talk about thousands, 300 people, I will be dead in two months, I will be dead in two months because you're all going to look at me to disciple all 300, I can't do it, I can't do it. [01:29:50] (34 seconds)  #ComfortZoneChallenge

Notice that the fact that this church now at this point was in a place where they decided that rather than simply just pouring into ourselves, we're now going to pour out into a new people group and that's the Hellenists and they found success in doing it. The Bible talks about water that which stays still, what happens when water stays still? Stagnant water that's moving, you know, the Bible references us as vessels to be poured into but then what? To be poured out. [01:33:27] (31 seconds)  #LiveTheFiveActs

If we're being poured into every Sunday but we're not pouring out—individuals pouring out into the needy, pouring out into the helpless, to the fatherless, to the widow, to the homeless or even just into our own family or our neighbors or our friends—if we're not pouring out and we're just constantly being poured in, I hate to say it, we're becoming stagnant. That's just the reality of Christian life that we could get to a place where we're God, I'm reading your word every single day, Father, I'm praying to you every single day. [01:33:59] (43 seconds)  #FromLearningToLiving

The minute they decided we're going to step out of our comfort zone, we're not going to do the same old same old, we're going to speak to a people who we usually don't speak to and the result was that the lord was with them. Many of us, we often feel like, you know, why am I not experiencing the growth, why am I often finding myself, you know, trying to push and trying to get excited about god or church, sometimes we kind of fall into these ruts and we forget that we're meant to be poured out. [01:36:41] (31 seconds)  #ShareOnePerson