Guidelines for Selecting Missionaries, Part 1

Introduction and Review of Missions Policy

0:00 This adult Sunday school class was held on August 27th, 1989 at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:10 Needless to say, it is a great joy for me to be back after being absent from you for three Lord's Days. And we were very conscious of your prayers and at no time were you not in our hearts and in our prayers. And God willing, since Mr. Dixon and I both took a number of photographs, both during our time in Australia and in the Philippines, once we get those all developed, we want to plan a presentation that will be a joint report using those slides that hopefully will add faces to names and places and thereby etch more firmly and clearly upon your minds and hearts these areas of the world where God has given us a particular purpose for our lives. A particular stewardship of ministry and opportunity. I called the Dixons this morning, I'm sorry, the Hoffmeyers this morning and just to assure them that Dad Dixon got home safely on Friday and that I arrived home safely on Thursday to inquire about their Lord's Day, which is already passed. And it was a new experience this morning as I was praying earlier in the morning around the world to set my globe by the chair where I pray.

1:28 And so often we think in terms of them having already met and having been there and thinking on the Lord's Day as we met that it was still your Saturday, to reverse the whole process was both an interesting and an unusual experience. And my ordinary psalm this morning was that psalm, I think it's 113, that from the rising of the sun to the going down of the same, the Lord's name is to be praised. And I just looked at that part of my globe that marks the international date line by the Fiji Islands and prayed for our brethren as from the rising of the sun there, the international date line to the going down of the same up in Alaska and out into Honolulu, that the name of the Lord would be praised on this, his special day. And we look forward to giving a report to you concerning that part of God's life. And I hope that you will join us in that work that we were privileged to witness in these recent days. Now, some months ago, as most of you know, it was decided by the elders that I should lead the adult class after Pastor Nichols concluded his series on the covenants and spell out the missions policy of Trinity Baptist Church,

2:48 that policy that was formally articulated at an elders retreat in the month of February in 1980. And when we speak of the missions policy of Trinity Baptist Church, the working definition of missions with which we are working is our part in fulfilling the commission to take the gospel to the ends of the earth according to the commission of our Lord in Matthew 28, 18 to 20, with special concern, not exclusive, but special concern, for this task as it relates to crossing cultural and linguistic barriers at a considerable distance from the sending church. Now, that's very general language and it's purposely general. When we speak of missions and our missions policy, we are speaking for the most part of what we are doing according to the light God has presently given us from the scriptures to fulfill the commission of our Lord, according to the light God has presently given us from the scriptures, to fulfill the commission of our Lord, according to the light God has presently given us from the scriptures to fulfill the commission of our Lord, And thus far we have covered three major categories of that policy.

4:10 First of all, we sought to identify the And, thus far we have covered three major categories of that policy. And, thus far we have covered three major categories of that policy. We first of all, we sought to identify the where the mission was being fulfilled. the major tasks of missions and will someone tell me please if you were limited to but one text in scripture which more comprehensively and succinctly than any other gives us the major tasks of missions what text would you give that bears the weight of such a description anyone raise your hand please all right jerry no i don't think that's the one that we would say we would use as our major text because though it says make disciples it doesn't tell us how to make them do we go in with machine guns and say confess christ while i count to three or else uh that would be the second rank text but the first rank text is all right alan yes acts 14 21 to 23 remember that text that's the pivotal text it speaks of the apostles making disciples by preaching

5:32 strengthening the disciples by teaching an exhortation organizing them into churches and then securing permanent qualified leadership in the form of elders then the second major area we covered was the authorization and warrant for our undertaking the work of missions who in the world are we you you a church stuck here in montville new jersey who are we to think that we have a warrant to take on this massive undertaking of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth making disciples through preaching strengthening them and then securing for them competent biblical leadership in the form of elders and here if you were limited to two key texts which text would you use

6:26 or this and other texts if you were unable to do so you couldl in a current church and we discuss them accordingly. All right? One of them's already been mentioned. Matthew 28, 18 to 20.

7:08 The risen Lord saying, make disciples, baptize, teach unto the end of the age and now that the apostles are no longer on the scene, what is the agent through which God accomplishes all of his concerns relative to the support and the propagation of the truth? Now, I almost gave it away by using that terminology. You're in the right book, Cliff, but you're a chapter away and about seven verses away.

7:40 Now, with a little addition, I think you should come up with it. 1 Timothy 3, verses 14 and 15. These things I write unto you, hoping to come unto you shortly, but if I tarry long that men may know how to behave themselves in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and the ground, of the truth. God has instituted only one organization for the carrying on of his work in conjunction with the truth.

8:13 And therein lies our authorization to do this work. For God has sovereignly, by his grace, constituted us a church. And then we spent several weeks in our third major area of missions policy, namely the practice of inter-church cooperation in the work of missions.

8:37 And under this subject, we looked at seven major groupings of various scriptures. And we don't have time to go back over all of those. But then at the end of looking at all seven of those groupings of scripture, we then came to two main conclusions and observations, and they were these. Number one, that the main areas of cooperation were communication, counsel, financial and material support, and prayer.

9:12 Communication,

The Fourth Category: Selection of Missionaries

9:14 counsel, financial and material support, and prayer. And then secondly, we saw that Paul's example, coupled with other lesser examples, indicate that financial support is legitimate, but may be voluntarily relinquished or temporarily relinquished for the maintenance of the integrity of the servant of God or of the message that he bears. Now this morning, we take up the fourth major category of concern, and it is this concern, the selection of those to serve as missionaries. And I hope you see the progression of these values, various dimensions of our mission's policy. Having identified the major tasks, having established that we have a warrant to accomplish the task, having demonstrated that though we have a warrant as a local church to accomplish the task, we do not act independently of the church universal, therefore the practice of inter-church cooperation. Now the moment of truth comes. We're committed to do the task.

10:30 We are praying. The Lord of the harvest to send forth laborers. On what basis do we select men and commission them to accomplish this task? And I gave a homework assignment.

10:43 I don't know if any of you were able to spend any time in it to study the book of Acts and in particular the pastoral epistles with this question in mind. Who should be recognized as called by God to the work of missions? And therefore set apart and sent by the church to give himself to this task. Obviously sent with the authority, the guidance, and the support of the church.

11:15 Now that is our concern. And once again going back to my glasses imagery and analogy, I want us to put on the glasses this morning that will filter out of all the texts that we study everything but the light, which those texts shed upon the question of the selection of those who should serve as missionaries. Now let me say at the outset that while confusion and indifference to biblical norms abound in almost all aspects of the work of missions in our day. Perhaps nowhere, perhaps nowhere is there more confusion, subjectiveness, and blatant indifference to biblical norms than on this point of what constitutes a legitimate call to the work of missions. It was very interesting. Somewhere, and I can't remember where, these last three and a half weeks are one indistinct blur. I heard that already people have termed our missions policy the Trinity modality.

12:31 But there are other modalities that are just as legitimate. Isn't that lovely? Give it a name and then you can dismiss it out of hand. There is the Trinity modality, but there are other equally valid modalities of recognizing and sending and supporting and accomplishing the work of missions.

12:53 Well, it's at least good to know that what we're doing has to be reckoned with even though they've got to give it a fancy name. But this area, I say, is one where biblical norms are perhaps more than in any other area of missions ignored, blatantly overlooked, and regarded with great indifference. And I do not say that hastily. I say it as one who was subjected to some of the most unbiblical patterns of thought as a sensitive, earnest, young Christian of 18 years of age.

Examining Biblical Texts on Missionary Selection (Paul)

13:31 And periodically throughout my life until probably into my early or mid-thirties still had areas of deep spiritual trauma because of the grave cloths of this unbiblical thinking that had been ingrained into me as a young Christian. So with this category, as with every other category, we shall examine the various groups, the groupings of texts seeking to discover the common denominator in those texts, what I call the spiritual, the exegetical, the biblical umbilical cord that holds them together, the cohesive principles found in each grouping of the texts. So now I'm going to read our first grouping of texts and I want you to try to discover the common denominator with reference to one question alone, namely, who was selected and sent forth to do the work of missions. Turn please to Acts chapter 9 and the first four groupings or first four texts in this first group all relate to the Apostle Paul, the great missionary to the Gentile world.

14:57 Acts chapter 9, we begin. Now don't...

15:02 don't get lost in details. Remember, we're looking for broad principles that bind these passages together. Acts chapter 9, and we read in verses 1 through 5, but Saul, yet breathing out, threatening and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked of him letters to Damascus unto the synagogues, that if he found any that were of the way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Notice the absence of children.

15:41 Apparently, there were not children who were members of the churches. And as he journeyed, it came to pass that he drew nigh unto Damascus, and suddenly there shone round about him a light out of heaven, and he fell upon the earth and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And he said, I am Jesus, whom thou persecutest.

16:17 But rise, and enter into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. And then he obeyed the Lord and shortly thereafter a man by the name of Ananias entered the room where Paul was praying, fasting, and he said to him, in a state of temporary blindness. And then we read in verse 15 what Ananias said to Paul. But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way, for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel, for I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name's sake.

17:02 So here is Saul of Tarsus converted by a direct revelation of the risen Lord out of heaven, commissioned to his task to bear the name of Christ to the Gentiles and even before the great ones of the earth and also to the children of Israel. And then we read in verses 19 through 22 these words. And he was certain days with the disciples that were at Damascus and straightway in the synagogues he proclaimed Jesus that he is the Son of God. And all that heard him were amazed and said, Is not this he that in Jerusalem made havoc of them that called on this name and he had come hither for this intent that he might bring them bound before the chief priests? But Saul increased the more in strength and confounded the Jews that dwelt at Damascus proving that this is the Christ. Now verses 26 and 27. And when he was come to Jerusalem he assayed an old English word for he made an effort to join himself to the disciples.

18:26 First thing he did when he came to Jerusalem was to attempt to become a church member in the place where he was now found. That's an apostle. First thing he did. He didn't go out in the street corner and preach.

18:40 He sought to become a church member. And they were all afraid of him not believing that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in the way and that he had spoken to him and how at Damascus he had preached boldly in the name of Jesus. And he was with them that is the people of God at Jerusalem and the apostles going in and going out at Jerusalem preaching boldly in the name of the Lord and he spake and disputed against the Grecian Jews but they were seeking to kill him.

19:20 Now we turn over to chapter 13 of Acts verse 1. Now there were at Antioch in the church that was there prophets and teachers Barnabas and Simeon that was called Niger and Lucius of Cyrene and Manan the foster brother of Herod the Tetrarch and Saul. And as they ministered to the Lord and fasted the Holy Spirit said separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work where unto I have called them. Then when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on him they sent them away. Now all of those texts have reference to this great missionary Saul of Tarsus who became the beloved apostle Paul. Now a passage that speaks concerning Peter the great apostle to the Jews and when God was going to push back a new missionary frontier among the Gentiles. He makes selection of a certain individual to do it.

Examining Biblical Texts on Missionary Selection (Peter & Timothy)

20:34 And we read of that in Acts chapter 15. The details of it are found in Acts chapter 10. But here is a wonderful summary statement inspired by the Holy Spirit. Acts chapter 15 verses 6 through 8.

20:50 And the apostles and elders were gathered together to consider of this matter and when there had been much questioning Peter rose up and said unto them brethren you know that a good while ago God made choice among you that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God who knows the heart bare them witness giving them the Holy Spirit even as he did unto us and he made no distinction between us and them cleansing their hearts by faith. So here we have this one passage concerning what God did when he would bring the gospel for the first time in a formal way to a group of gathered Gentiles. He chooses Peter the leading apostle there in the church at Jerusalem. And then in chapter 16 several verses concerning a man who becomes very prominent in further missionary endeavors. Later on in Paul's missionary journeys as a companion and then as his as it were alter ego in the young churches at Ephesus.

22:10 And he came also to Derbe and to Lystra Acts 16.1 and behold a certain disciple there named Timothy the son of a Jewish that believed but his father was a Greek. The same was well reported of by the brethren that were at Lystra and Iconium. Him would Paul have to go forth with him and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews that were in those parts for they all knew that his father was a Greek.

Common Denominators in Biblical Missionary Selection

22:45 Now with reference to these passages looking at them with our special spectacles that filter out everything else that they teach except what they teach about the question who was set apart and sent to do the work of missions what is the clear principle embedded in these passages with respect to the question who should be recognized set apart and sent. If you've seen the umbilical cord the common principles raise your hand and declare yourself. All right. Pete. All right. So in the case of both Paul and Peter and of Timothy you are saying these are men who had provenness of usefulness as preachers who had seals to their ministry before they were sent forth to do the work of missions. All right.

24:04 Someone else see the principle and perhaps a little bit differently. All right. Wayne. All right.

24:23 So you would say the emphasis in all of these passages is that the individual himself did not take the initiative nor did the church take the initiative but the initiative falls upon the activity of God himself. Acts 15 with regard to Peter God made choice among us with regard to Acts 13 the Holy Ghost said separate Paul and Barnabas. Good. All right.

24:49 What's another common denominator in all of these passages? Someone else had his hand raised. All right. Tim.

24:59 Pardon. Repeat that a little louder.

25:05 They're all males. Isn't that amazing? God didn't call a woman to the task. Women were suffering for Christ.

25:17 Paul showed no difference in persecuting men and women. But the Holy Ghost made a distinction when he's ready to call someone he called males. He didn't call women. I hadn't even thought of that in this connection but it's so obvious the minute you said it I said to myself you dummy you see that yourself.

25:39 All right. Any other common denominator? This is one of the reasons I ask you because you always see more things than I've seen and then my answer gets bigger as you speak. All right.

25:50 George. All right. They were well reported of. Men knew them.

25:58 Men knew that they were faithful. When it became known that Peter was sent to Cornelius' house or Paul was set apart for the work of missions or Timothy you didn't have people all getting in little huddles saying, the Lord called that guy? The Lord called that guy? You're kidding.

26:20 You see there was no one that had a look of incredulity when God laid hold of them and he did. It seemed quite natural and normal and fully expected that the ones who were called were the ones that were very likely to be called. All right. Any other observation?

26:37 Yes. Norman. Every case where anyone was set apart they were set apart out of the context of being embedded in the life of a local church. Now isn't that interesting?

27:13 They weren't out at the Urbana Missionary Conference under the tremendous pressure of 17,000 peers and multimedia presentations of hunger and world need and then herded to the front to sign a card, I'm ready to be a missionary. Now that's what's done at Urbana under the auspices of the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship every three or four years. I was at such a meeting when only 7,000 were there. I understand at the last one 17,000.

27:49 In every case the call came in the context of someone embedded in the life and ministry of a local church. Now what we want to prove from that is another question but that it is a fact that the text of Scripture is without question. All right? Any other principles or common denominators in the passages?

28:12 Yes, Elmer? Teachers or farmers or...

28:22 All right. All of them were men who had a proven gift of utterance of the word of the living God. Now why so significant in the light of the first pillar of our missions policy? What is the great task of missions?

28:42 Making disciples by how? Preaching. Not making disciples by teaching. Not making disciples by giving them shots of penicillin.

28:53 Not making disciples by any other way but by the proclamation of the word of God. Now if that's God's purpose and the primary function in missions then surely when He's going to call men He's going to call men who can preach. Just the opposite of the mentality in our day. If a guy can't preach out of a paper bag and couldn't hold down a church even out in some little rural community with 17 people then make him apply to the mission board and maybe he'll make it there.

29:22 What a horrible state of affairs we've come to. All right. Any other common denominator that you see in the passages? All right.

29:31 Now I'm going to have to guess. All right, Rich? The point that Rich has made is that not only was the church the crucible in which the call came from God but it was the church then that validated its recognition of the call of God by sending them forth. So what I had written down and this is what I took from our missions policy as we articulated it and my fellow elders it looks like the congregation by their input has helped us so we're going to have to expand this a little bit. We had this that men of proven character gift and a modicum of experience in the work of the ministry in one form or another that's what I have in one form or another prior to being sent out the way it is set out in our actual missions policy as we have it printed experienced men called and separated by God notice men called and separated by God the divine initiative for the work servants of Christ qualified and recognized as pastors and shepherds separated from the church

Critique of the Standard Missionary Scenario

30:59 for their existing ministry for a special task and to this we could add some of these other side lights that sort of expand on what is implicit in our definition. Now this raises some very important questions and precipitates some crucial observations. The first question it raises is this what does this data from the word of God say about the standard scenario which has existed and dominated for years in the English speaking world? Now many of you don't know what the standard scenario is.

31:41 Let me tell you because I was a product of it for a while and I lived and studied in the midst of hundreds who were the product of it and to this day I have to counsel and write letters and deal with people who are the products of it because the scenario has changed very little in the 38 years since I was converted. God is pleased to save someone relatively young someone in his or her late teens and in the flush of their new found faith in Christ and under the passion of their first love they love to read the Bible. Some like myself wore out a Thompson Chain reference Bible in two years. I literally wore out that Bible till the pages were all gooey with the oil from my hands and there were more passages marked than unmarked. The unmarked passages began to have more significance than the marked ones. All different colored pencils and there was this desire to share Christ with others who passed out tracks to anything that had legs and made a general pestilence of yourself wherever you went and you had a hunger to pray and to witness and people said my oh my you must be called to the ministry.

33:04 I must be? Oh yes. You love to study the Bible you love the Lord you love to speak about Christ you love to pass out tracks you love souls. Well if I'm called to the ministry what do I do?

33:15 You gotta go to Bible school. Oh you do? Oh yes. Okay so off to Bible school you go.

33:19 That's a real scenario that's not caricature describing me. Alright? So you're there in Bible school and then in chapel at least once a week sometimes twice a week according to which Bible school it is. Some emphasize more going into the ministry at home others have more of a missions emphasis.

33:39 You have missionaries come through and if there's two, three texts you learn if none other during the years of your Bible school pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth laborers the harvest is white the laborers are few and then you may find this guilt manipulation this kind of statement the burden of proof rests upon you that God wants you to stay at home you don't need any special call to go abroad you need a special call to stay at home and if you can't prove that God means to keep you home you must go to a mission field and some of us took it seriously the people were old enough to be our fathers and that was in the day when you respected people old enough to be your fathers. You did. You didn't say who you would talk to me where's your credentials? If someone was old enough to be your father you instinctively respected them and especially if they were speaking the Bible and my mother showed me the letter that I had forgotten I had even wrote that after had written after one of those chapel services I wrote home and told her how I was called to Africa as a missionary I've seen it with my own eyes I mean it's plain it's there right in my handwriting that I knew it was going to be hard be hard for them to take but I said mom and dad I know you've given me to the Lord and I believe God's made his will known he wants me to serve him as a missionary in Africa well when my wife and I were courting by mail for two years when we were apart

35:08 every night we had a certain mission field we prayed for at the same time in the midst of our mutual study she was way up in Rhode Island and I was in South Carolina but at seven o'clock every night we took twenty minutes to pray for a different major section of the world Lord is that where we should go is that where we should go and our whole lives were oriented to the fact if we're sold out we must get out to a mission field and that was still so much with us that we made positive steps to go until we would have been tempting God to have continued in that direction and that's the ordinary scenario you go off to Bible school now it's you got to get more than Bible school because you can't get a visa to get into a country unless you have a graduate degree so there now is more emphasis in many places Bible school or Bible school plus seminary then when you're done and you still have a desire to go to the mission field what do you do well you see if you're inclined to go to a certain field in a certain linguistic group then you find the mission board that works in that area and you get its literature you talk with its executives you find out whether you like the way they operate their policies and etc etc then you apply to the mission board then the mission board interviews you and if the mission board accepts you as a bona fide candidate they then bring you to their annual candidate school it may last four weeks, six weeks, eight weeks and there they spell out their missionary policy everything from their finances to their policies of evangelism

36:38 church planting etc and then if you are accepted as an approved missionary now follow closely in a faith mission board and there are two basic kinds of mission boards faith mission board and denominational mission board once you are accepted as a candidate in the faith mission board then you are told you must now go out and go into the process of holy begging called deputation and so you compose a letter and I don't mean this to be sarcastic this is the truth hundreds of them have passed over my desk the bottom line of the letter is my name is so and so never heard of the person under the sun I don't know how they got my name our address how they got the mailing list God has called me to such and such a field I am an approved candidate with such and such a mission board I would love to come and share with your people my vision, my burden for the work the bottom line is I still must raise $1347 per month of my support anything you or your church could do would be greatly appreciated because most faith mission boards say though we have approved you as a candidate to go to Ecuador until you come up with at least 95% or sometimes even more of your monthly support pledged

38:08 which includes what the mission board skims off for its overhead so they are out doing PR work for the mission board too by the way and some of it is up as high as 15-17% some of it is much lower than that and so here people have to go out and I call it a kind of ecclesiastical prostitution they must sell themselves on the churches I don't know what else to call it but ecclesiastical prostitution they must sell themselves to the churches then when they've got enough commitment they notify the mission board then the mission board sets a date for sending them and then if the home church has been involved at all in all of this then the home church will have a commissioning service and they are sent out to the mission board now with denominational mission boards it works differently and just today because I did not want to break the ninth commandment I checked with a man who was well along in this process who had already been accepted by his denomination to serve the Lord in Indonesia and in that particular denomination once you've presented yourself as a candidate you've gone to candidate school you've been approved then the denomination commits itself for your support you don't need to go out and raise the support what you do then is you then make your plans to pack your missionary barrels and get on your way now my question is this

39:34 in the light of the materials we've looked at together in these passages concerning Paul and Peter and young Timothy what does this biblical material say about this standard scenario which has existed and dominated for years in the English speaking world I'm talking the US Canada and Great Britain and Australia what does it say about that whole system hmm it's wrong it has precious little relationship to anything that we have read in these passages of the word of God now do you believe that those people by and large are insincere hypocrites I don't what lies behind then the great disparity between what we've read so clearly in the scriptures and you have so clearly seen and even more than we had in our original definition and this practice what is the fundamental issue that lies beneath the great gap between the Bible this chasm and this practice that obtains almost universally in the evangelical world

41:02 at least in the English speaking countries what lies at the root of it Doug alright zeal but not based upon knowledge and can you go a little deeper than that yes right so what David Perosi is saying is that one of the reasons or one of the major dimensions in this gap between the Bible and the existing practice is that the church has just not been doing its job and having relinquished it other people have come along and said the job must get done if the church won't do it we'll do it alright I would have to say I'm sure that that's true yes Cliff it appears that many men have raised up as their standard for missions pragmatism rather than the word of God alright there we are isn't that the root of it pragmatism what works rather than the word of God in other words many have never taken the time to even ask the question is there a Biblical modality

42:31 of recognizing and sending a missionary they do what they do because it's been done because it's been done now if you're a Roman Catholic that's alright because you claim to have two courts of authority the Bible plus the church tradition but we claim to be Evangelicals who say that no tradition is sacred if it stands condemned by the word or does not express positive obedience to the word of God and at the root of this and I speak again as one who attended for two years a Christian college where the strong emphasis was on the ministry at home and a call to preach at home and I spent another two years as a student and then one year on the staff and then was offered a fellowship a faculty position in a Bible college where the strong emphasis is upon missions but in both cases the whole scenario was one in which no one it seemed ever asked does the Bible tell us how does the Bible give us the materials to instruct us as to how a man may know if he's called to serve God as a missionary and if so does the Bible give us principles to teach us

The Problem of Guilt Manipulation and Carnal Haste

44:00 how he may make his way to the place of God's appointment now oh my our time's gone so quickly got three minutes left and I do want to complete this first grouping of passages the second question this raises what does this say about the guilt manipulation and the carnal haste which prevails in our day you see there is this guilt manipulation the world is perishing so many souls every minute and they give you the statistics and picture the people dropping into hell and in the light of that how can you sit how can you not get up and go and there's a guilt manipulation that appeals to the tender heart of a true and especially a young and inexperienced believer in the flush of his first love there is that guilt manipulation and what we have seen shows that this is not of God for if anyone was ready to go in a relatively short time it was Saul of Tarsus he was converted by direct revelation he had all the knowledge that he'd been taught at the feet of Gamaliel now to be baptized as it were with his Christian perspective and his Christian understanding Galatians 1 16 to 18

45:28 speaks of God taking him off into Arabia and all during those years if anyone was qualified to go quickly and get on with the job especially when he had been told at the very moment of his conversion he was going to be a missionary to the Gentiles it was Paul and yet God was in no hurry to get him out he gave him some preaching experience back in his own home town he gave him some more experience down in Jerusalem then he gave him enlarged experience for a while up in Antioch you remember that Barnabas sought him from Tarsus and he came and for a whole year the brethren were strengthened and much people was added to the Lord different circumstances working with different people and then God nests him into a multiple teaching ministry in Acts 13 he's learning how as a strong leader as a man of great independent judgment he's learning how to work along with other people not to be a one man band that's why through the rest of his missionary journeys he's never a loner he's always got a team of workers with him why? he had learned in that period of maturation and development now if the apostle Paul with all of his experience and all of his revelation direct from heaven

46:55 if he was not ready to be sent until there was a maturation of knowledge of experience of ministering in different situations with different people learning to work with others if he was not ready till he was proven who in the world do we think we are to lay our hands upon little boys and send them out to do this tremendous task no unproven, untested, inexperienced man was ever sent by the Lord now do you see why we're doing what we're doing with Jonathan do you see now why is Jonathan Walker on the church payroll laboring alongside our dear brother John Ruther Jonathan's no kid Jonathan's in his early thirties Jonathan's had a burden for overseas missionary work for years Jonathan's preached in a lot of situations oh but he hasn't had to work hard closely with a man close to his age different in personality he hasn't known what it is to be immersed in real ministry in a real life church with a real life co-laborer and already he has come to some areas of real self-discovery that had he come to on the field might have been devastating that's his own testimony

48:22 and we thank God for that that's why we're not antsy you say but oh all the people in the Philippines perishing God will take care of his own elect and though we don't take the attitude of passivity we don't take the path of hasty pragmatism for the scripture says in Proverbs 19 2 he that makes haste with his feet sins and in Isaiah 28 16 he that believeth shall not make haste and therefore we can afford the luxury and the grace of God of waiting upon God until he raises up men of proven character proven gift and a modicum of experience in the work of the ministry that we have reason to believe the seal of the Holy Ghost is upon them in utterance and in proclamation of the word of God well we got through the first grouping and some of the implications we must quickly and hastily bring the class to a close and now God willing next week we'll take up the second grouping and move through the rest of the groupings they are much briefer and in a sense they are but amplifications of this first and fundamental grouping of the word of God and may I remind you please after I pray that we all exit the auditorium unless you're just going to stay right on

Conclusion and Prayer

49:51 to meditate and prepare but don't fellowship here in the building but make your way completely out and down into the foyer so the upper foyer and the auditorium are quiet for those who come to prepare for worship let us pray our Father we are so thankful for the scriptures how we bless you that in them you have given us a deposit of all that we need for faith and for practice thank you for your people in this place who desire to think biblically and to act biblically and oh Lord we can't care not what names men may call it so long as in that day we can hear you say well done good and faithful servant give us wisdom Lord there's so much so much we need yet to know give us light and then grace to follow that light no matter what the cost may be help us to be charitable to those who do not have that light and while we've had to expose broad areas of the Christian church today Lord we thank you that we've been able to affirm that we believe that many of them are moved by genuine sincerity but oh God show them your way more perfectly be pleased by your grace to bless these efforts in these classes that there would be a great return

51:18 to biblical principles in the work of missions we ask in Jesus name Amen