Thank you for downloading this sermon brought to you by the Preaching Ministry of Liberty Baptist Church of Las Vegas, Nevada, Dr. David Tice. For more sermons in both audio and video format, we encourage you to visit experienceliberty.com. Also, for a word of encouragement, insight, and biblical inspiration, follow Pastor David Tice's blog at davidtice.com. So without further ado, let's open our hearts to the Word of God. tonight has been a tremendous, tremendous friend of this ministry. He's been a personal friend, a personal encouragement to me since I met him on a train one day. And we'll tell you about that some other time. He is a man that really loves the Lord, loves his wife, loves his children, has raised his family for the glory of God. I like to hear a man preach well, but I think it's better to see a man live well. Can you say amen to that? And he has lived well. He has lived a life. When I say lived well, I'm not saying a man of means or rich. I'm just saying he's a man who has lived the Word of God and he's been faithful to it and God has used him. He's used him all over this world in many different ways. He is the chairman of the board for a a mission board, he's a World Baptist Mission, Baptist World Mission, he is the chairman of the board for Maranatha Baptist College, he is, is that Maranatha University now, or Maranatha, it's something, he has just been used in so many different ways, he's the chairman of the board for Camp Kobiak, where I'll be preaching in a few weeks, just has been used mightily, but better than being the chairman of anything, He's a pastor of a local church. He's a great family man. And he's a soul winner. Loves the Lord Jesus Christ and tells people about Jesus. And that's what it's all about. Can you say amen to that? Please welcome Doug Jackson. Thanks, brother. Thank you. Well, I woke up this morning at 5 a.m. in Saginaw, Michigan. And where's Andy at? Andy, when I went to Saginaw 39 years ago, it was 135,000 people. This morning when I woke up, it was 47,500 people. They've all moved to Phoenix. Do a job there if you would, yeah. It's 47 degrees and I woke up at 5 a.m. 5 a.m. would be like 2 a.m. here. And so, yeah, it won't be a long message tonight. Somebody will have to probably wake me up in the middle of my message. But, and I tell you what, we've been having some beautiful weather there. Then I stepped off the plane and went, oh. Oh, oh. My wife says, oh, isn't this heat nice? Oh, come on, honey, this heat is not nice. But yeah, my family, I've got twin daughters, and one works at our Christian school and is a blessing, and the other one's at Camp Kobiak. Here they are right there with my wife. Some special pictures. Everybody, you need to know the guy before you can really, can you see those beautiful daughters of mine? My twin daughters, and they're married to a couple guys. I don't have any pictures of them. This is Clint, my son Clint. How many remember Clint? Clint was born with Down syndrome. He's 33 years old. He's doing a great job. He knows about 100 scripture verses. He ushers every week at Community Baptist Church, ushers on the east wing. People come in, they'll say, isn't that nice, that Down syndrome boy over there ushering. He likes to dress in a suit. And he takes up the offering, and little do they realize, as he's taking up the offering, he's able then afterwards to tell me what everybody gave in that section, and I'm able to, help them with their stewardship. There's Clint right there. His NRA membership. And here's my grandkids. I've got five grandkids, ages 10 through five. There they are right there. Oh, here's a picture of Matt and Brianna and their kids right here. No, I didn't have a picture of Pastor. And then I get kind of choked up with this picture. This is a 37 pound salmon I caught in Lake Michigan. I'm wearing glasses because it looks more distinguished. Your pastor's worn them all these years, and so I thought, well, to be more like him, I'll wear glasses. No, actually, I have a branch vein occlusion in my left eye. It just happened a while back, and they told me that I was gonna have to get shots in my eye, and so I had everybody that I knew that would have successful prayer life pray for me, and I haven't had to have that shot in the eye. They can't believe that my eye is getting better. But what has happened is everything in my left eye is crooked. So everybody in this section, you're all crooked. And everyone over here, you're in good shape. But I have to use these to read the Bible. I was reading the Bible and one of my men said, Pastor, since you put the glasses on, we're reading out of the same version now. But anyway. It was great commentary, it just wasn't the Bible. But it is good to be here with you. Let's all stand, I'm gonna read a few verses out of Philippians chapter one. Philippians chapter one. Philippians chapter one. Start with verse number three. I'm so glad to be here, I love your pastor. I love him, we have a great time together. We were on a board together one time and they separated us. They wouldn't let us sit next to each other. Philippians chapter one, verse number three. I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making requests with joy. For your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this very thing that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Even as it is meet for me to thank this of you all, because I have you in my heart, and as much as both in my bonds and in the defense of the confirmation of the gospel, ye all are partakers of my grace. For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ. And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment, that ye may approve things that are excellent, that ye may be sincere without offense till the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ and the glory and praise of God. But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel, so that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace, "'and in all other places. "'And many of the brethren in the Lord, "'waxing confident by my bonds, "'are much more bold to speak the word without fear. "'Some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife, "'and some also of goodwill. "'The one preach Christ of contention, "'not sincerely supporting to add affliction to my bonds, "'but the other of love, "'knowing that I am set for the defense of the gospel. "'What then, notwithstanding, every way whether in pretense of in truth Christ is preached and therein do rejoice yea and will rejoice for I know that this shall turn to my salvation through the your through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ Heavenly Father, I thank you for this time you've given us tonight. Pray, Father, this will be a profitable time that you'll use your word to challenge our hearts tonight. I thank you, Father, for these missionaries and for the vision you've placed upon their hearts. And I pray, Father, you'd bless them and raise the support that they need. Again, Father, we thank you for this church and what you're doing here. In Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. Praise the Lord for missionaries, amen? I pray for them, I try to do everything I can do for them. I give weekly to keep them on the field. Why? Because I've received a great commission. Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel. I'm the ye, you're the ye. Matter of fact, point to somebody and say ye. Go ahead, do it. Ye. Go ahead, somebody else, do another one. Ye. You like that, don't you? These girls here are poking each other in the nose. Ye. So they, the missionaries, helped me in the Great Commission. They helped me carry out the Great Commission. Someone has said we should either go to the foreign fields ourselves or help someone else go so that we can fulfill the Great Commission. I remember an old missionary who helped start our church some 59 years ago. His name was Howard Berger. He told me about a church he went to after he got through preaching at the missions conference. He said there was a man that walked up to him. He had a big bandage wrapped around his hand. He said, hey, listen, do you need gas for your vehicle? and Howard Berger said, yeah, I could use some gas. He said, well, follow me, I own a gas station. So they went to the gas station, and they jumped out of his car, and the man had his key, and he turned on the pump, and he said, hey, listen, my hand's been hurt, I've had some surgery, so you pump, and I'll pay. You pump, and I'll pay. That's exactly what these missionaries are saying tonight. They're saying, you pump, We need to tell them, you pump and we'll pay, amen? You do the job and we'll pay. We'll get you on the field. You can depend upon us. In the book of Philippians, Paul is writing by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and he thanks these Christians for their help in the ministry, for their involvement in supporting the ministry. Their involvement was a blessing and a necessity. Their involvement brought joy to his heart. Matter of fact, they were joy because of their involvement. Verses 5 through 17. In this missionary conference, truth of the matter is, we're not after your money. Brother Tyson called me and said, hey, listen, Brother Jackson, I want you to just preach. I mean, just preach, get money out of those people. He never said one thing about money. We're not talking about money, we're talking about your heart. See, if God has your heart, he'll have your wallet too. How many believe that, amen? If God has your heart, he will have your wallet too. My goal is for you to get the vision of what God can do in your life, what God can do through you. what God can do with you if you'll give your heart over to God, completely give it over to God. Just recently, I found this saying, your standard of living should determine your standard of, your standard of giving should determine your standard of living instead of letting your standard of living determine your standard of giving. My goal is for you to get a vision of what God can do and help you look beyond Friday's check to eternity, to what's really important, what really is valuable. Problem today is many Christians are deep in debt. Huh? I remember Tennessee Ernie Ford, 16 tons and what do you get? You know that one. Deeper in debt. You know, my grandkids were walking through a store at Christmas time and they heard Little Drummer Boy. Johnny Cash was singing the Little Drummer Boy. And my grandson said, Mama, that sounds just like Grandpa. And so when they walked in our house on Christmas Eve, I had Johnny Cash singing the Little Drummer Boy. And they said, Grandpa, did you tape that? But anyway. Problem today is many Christians are deep in debt. They're paying Visa, MasterCard, American Express, JCPenney, Kohl's, Macy's, Discover, as much as 20 cents or 20% a month on a balance. And you know, I read the other day, it's a sad commentary, read the other day in one of those big Barna polls, the recent national poll was that most Christians, most people who say they're Christians give between only two and 4% of their income back to God. Here's what we've done, Kathy and I, my beautiful wife, Kathy's right down here in front, 46 years, can you believe that? I can't believe it, 46 years. It's just amazing, we look at each other and we just start laughing. Can it be, we've 46 years. 46 years, we can't believe we're this old, but we're old. Not as old as him, but we're old. We decided a long time ago, 39 years ago, when we went to a community in Saginaw, that we weren't going to be burdened with interest. So we decided that we were going to do everything we could do to get ourselves out of debt so that we didn't have to pay interest on any charge card. So for 39 years, we haven't paid a cent of interest on charge cards. 39 years, we've only paid interest on a car or a house. For the last 20 something years, we've not paid interest on a car. We've saved our money and then bought the car. And so you say, well, what does that do for you? Freedom! You got it? Yeah, freedom. You're able to give. You're able, when God tugs at your heart, to do something for somebody. You're able to be generous. You're able to go beyond what you think you could do because you've got now some money you can do it with. I was just talking to a man the other day, and we were talking about a couple things that he could do so he could be a better giver. And I said, what you need to do is you need to go over the bills that you pay. You need to go over your phone bills. A lot of people spend a lot of money on cell phone bills. Cable. You can cut the cable and you won't even miss the cable. You can find TV, internet, phone deals. Matter of fact, after I told him that, he saved almost $600 on his insurances. He went back and checked on it. The debt vacations. A lot of Christians take debt vacations. They take cruises. Remember the Titanic? Well, it can sink your budget. It can sink your budget. Entertainment. A lot of folks go, well, you know, I just gotta see this. Well, listen, if you're paying for it for six months afterwards, was it really that good? Think about it just for a second. Before Dave Ramsey, by the way, was Doug Jackson. I just wanted to tell you. We've played a lot of games over the years. We've not let Hollywood have much influence in our home at all. Matter of fact, we like home spun things rather than Hollywood spun things. I love the reality of who I am. I don't have to pretend to be anybody but Doug Jackson. I don't have to watch movies so that I can be somebody else. I think big purchases, save and then buy. Take a long look before you pay for a long time. That make sense? Let's say that together, ready? That's good, I forgot what I was gonna say, but anyway. People, I'm tired. People, God has saved us to be saints, not just so we'll be free from eternal condemnation, and have a home in heaven, but to see other people saved. Amen? We had three people saved last Sunday. It was great to see them saved. Two weeks before that, we had a young couple, Kathy and I led the Lord, 34-year-old couple, and they got baptized. It wasn't long ago that we saw a couple in their 70s. We led them to Christ. It was so great. Oh, brother, you'll like this, Brother Reid. They said, they went to another church their whole life, and they went back to that church, and they told people that they had gotten saved, and they said, we're gonna go to the Baptist church, and the people at that church said, well, you know what that means, you go to that Baptist church, they're gonna submerge you. They're gonna submerge you. And so, when we baptized them, we said, we're submerging them today, in the name of the Father. Yeah, it's wonderful to see people say, All right, let's look at a couple things, and we're going to just look at a couple things tonight. First, verses 3 and 4, there must be a participation in this ministry program. Participation, the state of being related to a greater whole. participating in the local church, participating in the cause of Christ. In verse number five, he participated in their lives because of their participation in his life and in his ministry. Verse five, Paul was especially thankful for their fellowship. I know, as a pastor, how thrilled I am to see people get involved in soul winning, get involved in faith promise, get involved in praying, get involved in giving the services. The word fellowship has been defined two fellows in one ship, but greater than that, the word talks about a common sharing, a participation, a partnership, a partnership with the Apostle Paul. This was great. So we need this participation in the ministry. You're on this team, so let's get involved in this team. Let's go forward with this team. Let's see things take place for the glory of God on this team. Let's become partners for the cause of Christ. This participation, that's why you need to get involved in faith promise giving. Besides, people are getting saved. We give a lot of money to Camp Kobiak. It's our camp up in Michigan. Your pastor's going to speak there. Matt spoke there before and will speak there again. Well, we look at Camp Kobiak and we saw last year in the summertime only 186 young people received Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. 186 young people, we had a part in each of their lives because we gave to that ministry. 186 young people are gonna go back to local churches that preach the Bible and learn about baptism and learn about church membership and learn about serving the Lord Jesus Christ, 186. We had a part in each and every one of those souls. And not only do we see Their participation, as the Apostle Paul has commended them, says, you're my joy with this, but also their continuation. Notice the continuation in verse number six, being confident in this very thing that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. We see God's continuation in their life. This is one of the biggest and greatest promises in the Bible. Stop, look at what we have. It costs us nothing. It costs Jesus his blood on Calvary's tree. 2 Corinthians 8, take your Bibles and turn there. 2 Corinthians 8, verse number nine. 2 Corinthians 8, nine. Paul is, again, right by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. He's writing to the Corinthians and he says, for ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich. Paul gives us good reason to participate, recognizing what we have in Jesus Christ, a secure salvation, an eternal salvation. A promise from God, John 3, 16, for God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten Son, that whoso believed in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. If you're here tonight and you don't know Jesus Christ, your personal Savior, please let us show you out of the Bible how you can know Jesus Christ as your Savior. I still remember when Clint, my son Clint, received Christ as his Savior. Every Sunday he'd come forward and I'd say, son, what are you coming forward for? Remember, he was born with Down syndrome. And he'd say, Father, I want to get saved. I said, Son, you want to get saved? Well, who's a sinner? And he'd point over his twin sisters. And finally one Sunday he came and he had tears coming down his cheeks. I said, Son, what are you coming for? He said, Father, I want to get saved. I said, Son, who's a sinner? And he started crying. He said, Father, I'm a sinner. And I need Jesus to come into my heart and forgive me of my sin. With that simple prayer, Clint's on his way to heaven. With that simple prayer, Clint knows Jesus Christ is his savior. Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I would come again and receive to myself that where I am, there you may be also. I've got heaven to look forward to, too. How about you? And you know, brother, I love this verse, it says, being confident of this very thing, that he which has begun a good work in you, huh, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. There's nothing we have to do to keep our salvation. Huh? I remember visiting, actually it was Bob Eastman's, Bob Eastman's mother, I'm gonna just sit down here for a minute, I'm a little tired. Bob Eastman's mother, her name is Nettie Eastman, and she was in a rest home, and Bob said, you know, Pastor, Bob Eastman was the first man that ever got saved at our church in 1978, in September of 78. And he said, would you go see my mother? So I went to this rest home and they had two bleeding teeth Doberman pincers. How many know what I'm talking about? Guarding the door. So I knocked at the door, man came to the door, pulled the dogs down. I was very uncomfortable with those dogs there. And I went down this hallway and there I met his mom. His mom gave me a testimony, she had received Christ. But then there was a lady that came up behind me and I was kind of watching her because she had some kind of brain injury or something. And she started screaming behind me and she said, Jesus, save me! Jesus, save me! Well, of course, I was sitting in a chair like that and soon as she did that the first time, I jumped up, you know. And then the dogs came and so. But she came around and she kept on saying, Jesus, save me! I don't think I'll ever forget it. I remember getting in my car and driving back down 46. It was about a 40-minute drive home. And I remember thinking to myself, that person, that lady knew Jesus Christ, her Savior. Something happened. She's not lost her salvation and will not lose her salvation. I started crying on my way home saying, thank you, dear God. I don't have to do anything to keep my salvation. What you begun in me will stay in me. Thank you, dear God, for the wonderful salvation I have. Thank you for what you've done for me. Well, as we get back to the idea here that is before us about partaking, being partakers in this ministry, participating in this ministry, recognizing what God has done for us, I thought back of William Carey, He was considered to be the father of modern missions. It was the beginning of a new missionary movement. He spent 40 years in India proclaiming Christ to the Indians and pioneering many of the methods missionaries use today. None of Cary's accomplishments would have been possible without dedicated Christians back in America who had prayed for him and gave so that he could stay in the field. Andrew Fuller was one of those men who gave and prayed for William Curry. And he recalled Kerry's request for help when he volunteered to go to the mission field of India. And I know I went to India in 1982 and India changed my heart. When he came to missions for three weeks, I was nearly there for three weeks. But he said, Fuller said, we saw that there was a gold mine in India, a gold mine of souls, but it was as deep as the center of the earth. He said, I ask who will venture to explore it? He said, Cary raised his hand, replied, I will venture to go down, but remember that you must hold the ropes as I go down. We need rope holders today. We need people that will hold the rope. What a great picture of Kerry going down into India and those Christians up there holding the rope, the ropes of prayer, the ropes of finance, the ropes of love, the ropes of care. Through the years, supporters firmly held the lifeline that sustained Kerry. And Kerry did a wonderful job through difficult times, through lonely times, troublesome times, trials. The example of those faithful senders challenges us to consider how well we are at doing holding the ropes today. We must all be willing to make sacrifices to reach the lost. When our people are led to participate in missions, when a young man in our church who went to New Zealand He went to Bible college and then after Bible college, he got a master's so he could start a institute or a college. And then he was on the deputation trail for nearly four years by the time he got to the mission field. And then he left his family, all his friends. He's out on his own. We're holding the ropes. When our people are led to participate in missions, we need to hold the ropes of prayer, hold the ropes of finances, hold the ropes of love. Will you participate to see the cause of Christ go forward? Will you participate? Will you recognize that maybe there's some things you could do in your life to work yourself out of a financial debt problem so that you could give, so you could do more for your God? You know, we are so blessed in America, aren't we? Let me try that again. We are so blessed in America, aren't we? Will you ask God to help you organize and restructure your finances? Will you ask God to help you have a greater part in the missions program of Liberty Baptist Church? God can use you for eternity, if you will, but organize and say, dear God, use me to the praise of your glory. Father, I thank you for this time you've given us tonight. I thank you for your word and the power of it. Thank you, dear God, for the opportunity we have to have conferences like this to stir our hearts, help us recognize there's a program bigger than our program. It's your program. Dear God, I pray that you'd help us see that we need to, as Christians, become greater participants, take a greater role further in the cause of Christ. Father, bless these missionaries. I thank you for them. Father, I thank you for these new church plants, what you're doing in the lives of these missionaries. What you're doing here at Liberty Baptist Church. Father, help us see we can have a greater part in this great program. In Jesus' name.