Well, good evening to you here in England, and good morning to you in Australia, Ian, and others. Bernadette, welcome, and Reading for 4 Plus, welcome to you. Thank you for joining us for this live broadcast of the Bible Believers podcast. This is a Christian podcast. It's predicated on the gospel of Jesus Christ. We believe that Jesus Christ is the savior of the world. We believe he's the only one, the only name, the only person who can take away our sins and give us everlasting life. And if you know Jesus Christ, your sins are forgiven. If not, then there is a judgment and a wrath to come. And therefore we're very serious about this gospel. Having found life ourselves, having found the joy and the peace of the forgiveness of our sins, we commend the Lord Jesus Christ to all. This is what we're about. We're about the Lord Jesus. We belong to him. He purchased us with his own blood and we long to be used by him for his glory. Micah, welcome. Stacey, welcome. Hannah in Germany, welcome. And Margaret in Scotland are welcome to you as well. So, usual format. First of all, some notes on things that are going on in the world. First of all, the floods in Wales and in England. Now, again, as with so many things these days, I find myself saying I've never seen anything like this in my lifetime. Certainly, there have been floods and heavy rain in England over the years. But the pictures and the floods that we saw yesterday and the video footage of that, I don't think I can recall seeing anything like that in the United Kingdom in my lifetime. There was supposed to be snow in many parts of England. Here, we had very heavy rain. I don't think there's any immediate floods where I live, but the flooding elsewhere is extraordinary. The flooding in Wales, for example, is extraordinary. I believe that we should say, I believe it's right for us to say that God is speaking to us as a nation. I've often said when preaching the gospel in the open air that God is just beginning to deal with us as a nation. His judgments are coming upon the nation, and these floods should make us look up and should make The people think very carefully about who is truly sovereign over the world in which we live. It is almighty God. But we are obviously very concerned for the welfare of people in Wales. I tried to phone up the owner of the Welsh chapels today, but I wasn't able to get through to him. I assume that he's all right and hopefully the chapels are all right too. Some of you know that there's a chapels project in Wales whereby there's 15 empty chapels and a desire that they would be used for the glory of God. So the floods in England, there were similar floods in Spain, but we should look up, we should say, what is God doing? What is going on in our days? So many other things are going on. Also, I should mention that in the news yesterday, Islam is now the largest religion in the United Kingdom. While there's no surprises about that, it is a cause of concern because we've forgotten God, because we've forsaken the Lord Jesus Christ. Then the next thing is this. I've put a link in the community section on my channel here to an article that came up in The Telegraph yesterday. And this is about Donald Trump and Elon Musk. And the picture that they're using is absolute antichrist symbolism, referring to Donald Trump and Elon Musk as though Donald Trump was the antichrist and Elon Musk was the false prophet. not long since preached a whole message on that, which again you can find in the videos or the live section of this channel, is Donald Trump, the Antichrist. The symbolism shows Donald Trump with his right eye missing, and that is definitely a symbol that the occultists particularly use with some biblical justification to describe the Antichrist. but you can see that picture for yourself and I'll probably do a separate treatment of this subject and post it on the Edified Ear in the Christian Coffee Shop section, which is about to be opened on the Edified Ear collection. So then I need to mention about why I must preach the gospel, because some of you'll be aware I had a bit of trouble last week in Kidderminster here, where I'm sitting, preaching the gospel in the open air and many people made one suggestion and some people made another. Many of you said thank you for preaching and encouraged me to keep going and I think that's my duty before God but others were concerned and I think that from pure motives they were concerned for one reason and another but I just want to read this from Acts 21 verse 13. This is the apostle Paul who was going up to Jerusalem and it was prophesied that when he went to Jerusalem he would be bound and imprisoned by the Jews. So Acts 21 verse 13, Paul says, Acts 21 verse 13, Then Paul answered, What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart? For I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. What I want to say about this is that one of the things I really myself want to communicate in this day is that we cannot preach the gospel faithfully without facing persecution, without facing opposition, and this is something which we're seeing. If I'm an ambassador for a great king and I turn back because the outer guards on the city gates tell me to get lost, then I'm not much of an ambassador. But if I stand my ground and say, no, I'm on the king's business, I must proceed, then maybe I'll be in trouble. But the thing is this, that I must serve the Lord Jesus Christ. I must preach the gospel. I don't expect people to to always respond favorably but at the same time I must be faithful to the Lord Jesus. Paul was ready to go to Jerusalem even though people tried to dissuade him and he was ready to die there because that was his duty to obey the Lord Jesus Christ and to do what God called him to do. He didn't die in Jerusalem but he was willing to if that was necessary. And then again before we come to our Bible reading I just want to mention again the Edified Ear Collection. This is a slowly growing collection of Christian audiobooks. We're going to start adding our own original material to the Edified Ear Collection and in addition to that we're hoping to do various interviews and broadcasts live and things like that. This is the way it's developing along with the library that we've got new postings include another chapter by Anne Pratt who is the authoress in the book The Excellent Woman read very capably by Sonia Wiebeck from Toronto and that's on the Edified Ear podcast which you can find at the Edified Ear collection and in case you're wondering where you're going to find that there's a link below as I've put there, where you can find the Edified Year Collection. I'd also like to recommend The Religious Tradesman by Richard Steele, who was writing in the 17th century. A very, very good book indeed. Very good for any Christian who's in employment or any Christian who has employees. Well, let's turn to the reading of God's word. And I previously did a talk on nonconformity or the catastrophe in nonconformity. So I'm going to take that theme up again and develop it just a little bit. And I want to read numbers 13 verses one and two. So if we turn to numbers, we read this last time, but I just want to expand on this. I think it's important. And I'll explain why I think this is a helpful passage to us. Dove, welcome. Duncan, very warm welcome to you. Maria, welcome. Amanda, a very warm welcome to you, sister. And it's good to see you. No Drama, welcome. Kerry, welcome in Italy. And Eddie, welcome in Ohio. So we are, as ever, an international bunch. And it's very, very nice to be an international bunch. So numbers 13, verses 1 and 2 to start with. This is the story of the 12 spies that were sent into the land of Canaan and came back and 10 gave a bad report and two gave a good report, Joshua and Caleb. And God's anger was aroused by their unbelief. Joe, welcome to you in Peterborough. I'm going to just stop welcoming people for a bit because I need to focus on the word of God and this is what I'll do. It's not because of any antisocial tendencies on my part, I hope. that because I need to focus on this but welcome to everybody a warm welcome to everybody who's here and God be with each one of us and may we benefit from this study this evening. Numbers 13 verses 1 and 2 and the Lord spake unto Moses saying send our men that they may search the land of Canaan which I give unto the children of Israel of every tribe of their fathers shall you send a man everyone a ruler among them and then we're going to all the way to verse 32 of chapter 13 of Numbers, and this is speaking of the ten men, not Joshua, not Caleb, the ten men, and they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the children of Israel, saying, The land through which we have gone to search it is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof, and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature, And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which were come of giants. And we were in our own sight as grasshoppers. And so we were in their sight. We'll keep reading through verse four of chapter 14. And all the congregation lifted up their voice and cried, and the people wept that night. All the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron. And the whole congregation said unto them, would God that we had died in the land of Egypt, or would God we had died in this wilderness, Wherefore hath the Lord brought us unto this land, to fall by the sword, that our wives and our children should be a prey? Were it not better for us to return into Egypt? And they said one to another, let us make a captain and let us return into Egypt. So they were of course going to reject Moses' authority now and return to Egypt. Now, this angered the Lord because of his goodness to them and his promises to them that through unbelief, they wavered. Chapter 14, verses 26 to 29, because we have skipped a bit here, but we haven't got time, I'm afraid, sadly, regrettably, to read all of it. And the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, How long shall I bear with this evil congregation, verse 27, which murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against me. Say unto them, As truly as I live, saith the Lord, as ye have spoken in my ear, so will I do to you. Your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness, and all that were numbered of you according to your whole number, from twenty years old and upward, which have murmured against me. Doubtless, that's this verse, then finally, sorry, 14 verse four, I'm gonna go back and read that because I think I missed it out. No, I didn't miss it out, that's all right. So, okay, yeah, I think that's good, we're where we should be. Chapter 14, verses 35 to 45. I, the Lord, have said, I will surely do it until all this evil congregation that are gathered together against me in this wilderness. They shall be consumed, and there they shall die. And the men which Moses sent to search the land, who returned and made all the congregation to murmur against him by bringing up a slander upon the land. Woe to unbelieving ministers who lead the people astray. Verse 37, even those men that did bring up the evil report upon the land died by the plague before the Lord. Ten of them died by the plague. Verse 38, but Joshua, the son of Nun, and Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, which were of the men that went to search the land, lived still. And Moses told these sayings unto all children of Israel. And the people mourned greatly. They rose up early in the morning and gathered them up into the top of the mountain, saying, Lo, we be here, and we'll go up unto the place which the Lord hath promised, for we have sinned. And Moses said, Wherefore now do you transgress the commandment of the Lord? But it shall not prosper. Go not up, for the Lord is not among you, that ye be not smitten before your enemies. No point going up if the Lord isn't among us. The Amalekites and the Canaanites are there before you, and ye shall fall by the sword, because ye are turned away from the Lord. Therefore the Lord will not be with you. But they presumed to go up unto the hilltop. Nevertheless, the ark of the covenant of the Lord and Moses departed not out of the camp, Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites, which dwelt in that hill, and smote them, and discomforted them, even unto Hormer." Father, we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you for this gospel. Oh, that it might be shouted from the rooftops. Oh, that it might be spread out, and through the lands, and through the nations, and to the ends of the earth. Oh, that it might be heard in our own nations, in our own cities and towns and villages. Father, oh, that you'd revive your people, revive your churches, revive your cause in the midst of these years. Oh, Father, that you'd have mercy upon the Western world, which has become absolutely corrupt in your eyes, which has become utterly wicked and utterly just idolatrous, Father, and utterly godless. And Father, we pray for the things that remain, that you would strengthen the things that remain, that you would have mercy upon your people, that you would return to your churches, that the people once again would be full of rejoicing in the Lord Jesus Christ, strong faith and confidence in our God and in the power of your Word and your work in our days and in our midst. We pray that you pour out your Holy Spirit upon us, Father, in convicting power, that we would put away our sins, And oh, Father, we pray and ask that you would cleanse us in Jesus' blood. Thank you that if we have faith in Jesus, we are saved, but we long to love him more. We long to love you more, Lord Jesus. We long to be closer to you. We long to walk with you. We long to fellowship with you. We long to obey you and faithfully serve you in these days in which we live. But we need your help, we need your presence, we need your power, and we pray and ask, Father, that you'd help us in these days. Father, have mercy upon your people in South Wales. Bless the chapels project there, Lord. It's not that the buildings matter, it's the people that matter, Lord, but the buildings can be used to bless the people. I pray, Father, that you pour out your Spirit on the Welsh Valleys and that you would turn the tide there and awaken sinners there, Lord. May the people wake up, may they be woken up by these floods, Lord, to see that you're speaking and calling them to repentance. Father, help us in these dark days to walk wisely. Have mercy upon your people in Israel, in Iran, in Gaza, and in Lebanon, Lord. Mercy upon your people in Russia and in Ukraine, Lord. Bless our nations, Australia Lord, Germany is represented here, Italy Lord, Canada and the United States, Scotland and Wales and England Lord, and Ireland Lord, and other countries Lord, have mercy Lord, and help us to be lights set upon a hill or on a candlestick Lord, that people would see our light, that our light would shine before the world, Father, we ask that you be with us this evening and bless the ministry of your Word. At this we ask and pray in Jesus' precious name. Amen. Amen. So we must pray for revival in these days. We really must. It's not something that should be tagged on. It's something that really should be there at the very centre of our Christian living in these days. Praying for the return of God's presence in power into our churches. You know how I previously spoke that the greatest failing of the non-conformist churches is a failing to preach the gospel, and I speak as a non-conformist. Baptists, Congregationalists, Independent Evangelicals, the Methodist denomination has lost it totally. The Church of England, which of course isn't non-conformist, is, I think, beyond repair. Particularly, as I say, the bishops and archbishops have have completely corrupted the church in the face of the word of God. This was certainly presumptuous sin. We had the presumptuous sin here of the children of Israel. There in, I think it's verse 43, is it? No, it's verse 44 of Numbers 14, but they presumed to go up to the hilltop. Well, presumptuous sin is a terrible sin. It's to sin and break a sin against God, knowing what his law says. And this is what's happened in the Church of England. And she has crossed lines, which I believe there is no coming back from. I think that's the clear teaching of Scripture. And those who love the Lord, and there are a lot of those who love the Lord who have been in that denomination, really, really need to get out of the denomination, I believe, before God's wrath finally falls on her. We're already seeing the beginnings of God's judgments. Look here in this passage in Numbers, we see how the ten spies, they died in the plague. God judged them. Now, woe to unbelieving ministers, woe to corrupt ministers, woe to unfaithful ministers, woe to ministers who discourage the flock and scatter the flock. You see what happened, these ten spies, they discouraged the flock. My purpose tonight is not to lash the Church of England, it's to lash the non-conformists. and I'm a non-conformist, and really from many years experience I have seen how even in our gospel and bible-believing churches we have not preached the gospel. We haven't begun to preach the gospel as we should. We've tagged the gospel onto things. We've tagged parts of the gospel. We haven't preached the whole counsel of God. We have been so concerned that people will be comfortable or happy or enjoy the situation or not leave us that we've become soft and we have failed to faithfully declare the whole counsel of God. You might think it's not nice to stand in the open air and preach to a bunch of hostile people who are shouting and bawling at me. It isn't nice, it's absolutely right. But what about the pastor who faithfully preaches the gospel and gets frozen out by his congregation murmuring and gossiping behind his back? He doesn't have people standing in his face shouting at him, but he is stabbed in the back because he's faithful. It happens in churches as well. Generally speaking, my experience has been that in the evangelical non-conformist churches, the ones that haven't died yet, there has been a failure to preach the gospel fervently, powerfully, fully and faithfully. This has led to an attitude of hopelessness in many congregations. God doesn't work anymore, God isn't going to bless us anymore. All we can do is just wait until we grow old and die, and then the church will cease. Well, this is the kind of situation we're in. We may have an attitude of hopelessness in our congregation, some it's the case, or satisfaction. We think we're doing everything we should be doing, there's nothing more to do, and all that needs to happen now is that God will bless us, not realizing that we're blind and pitiful and naked, that we need eye salve and gold refined in fire, or indifference. We don't care. We're very happy with the way things are. After all, it doesn't require anything of us. We can sit in the pew. Going to church, being a Christian is a spectator sport. We get comfy chairs now. And everybody else's job it is to do the work. Well, in Numbers 1, God calls 12 spies to go into the land of Canaan and to go out and get fruit of the land. And he shows them a very good land. He shows them a wonderful land, which is full of flowing with milk and honey. so to speak. And then God shows them this beautiful land. Then the ten spies, they come back, and instead of thinking, well, it was God that sent us there, and therefore it's God that will take us into the land, and that we're well able to go up and take the land. Let me just read what Joshua said. Caleb and Joshua, this is what Caleb said. Caleb says in verse 30 of Numbers 13, and Caleb, still the people before Moses said, let us go up at once and possess it for we are well able to overcome it. There's a man that knows his God. People that do know that God will be strong and do exploits, but the rest prevailed and the people became discouraged. And Joshua says something very similar. And Joshua was just determined to honour the Lord in this. The others were looking at the giants, but these men were looking at God. That's the difference. Ten of them were faithless, two of them had faith. So the ten spies had an evil rapport and the people became discouraged. If we don't have faithful, fervent, powerful, continuous, excellent preaching of the gospel in our pulpits, if we make excuses for not doing that, or we think we've got everything we need, or we think that the gospel is just something to be tagged on rather than fundamental to the church. I mean, how many church services have I been to where the name Jesus is not even mentioned in the service? And that's shameful. We are all meeting in the name of Jesus Christ. We are all there because of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're there because he purchased us with his own precious blood. But the people are distressed because instead of looking at God, they've listened to the spies. How easy it is, a little leave and leaving it the whole lump, a little bit of coldness. I've seen this again and again, a little bit of coldness can, if you pardon me, Mixing a metaphors but a little bit of coldness can spread like wildfire through a congregation. What's the congregation becomes cold months they believe they got an excuse to be cold and they don't realize that they're cold it's almost impossible to warm that congregation up again. God's wrath came upon them once the people were distressed. Once they spoke about going back into Egypt, getting another captain, forgetting about God's goodness, God's wrath came upon them. And he said that they would die. Verse 29 of chapter 14, your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness. There are many of our churches where our carcasses will fall and the churches will die when our carcasses fall. And I'm sorry to put it that bluntly, but that's what we are. We're frail human beings and we will die. And if the church dies with us, that's a disaster, that's tragic. That's how it is with so many of our churches. Some churches, you hardly have anybody in the congregation below the age of 60. Increasingly, you have hardly anybody who's over the age of 60 either. It's partly because people die. But the thing about it is this, that somehow and in some way, we seem to be going through this. We forget God. We are faithless. We stop trusting in God. We become discouraged. We stop believing that God is in his church and that the christian life is a supernatural life and that that if great things are going to be accomplished the weapons of our warfare are not carnal it'll be accomplished by the lord in his way using his people but god's wrath came upon them now i need to say this that I'm very convinced that there's been a failure to fully preach the gospel in non-conformist evangelical churches. The most important thing, of course, is that we get that gospel back. We need faithful, fervent preaching of the gospel. We need ministers who preach the gospel. Let me just check the comments. Duff says if only the Church of England would stand true to the Bible, it's too late. She's basically committed spiritual harry-carry by doing what she's done, and she can't come back from there. God won't bring her back from there, because God is under no obligation to bless the Church of England, because it's the Church of England. He has his church. Jesus Christ has his church. But I think we can look for terrible judgments coming upon the Church of England. Don't become a partaker of her plagues. But in the non-conformity, we also have been judged. We've been judged with our churches dying out, dying out, dying out. There was some hope recently because there were articles saying that some of the evangelical churches in some of our towns here in England were growing in numbers. I think this was in Evangelical Times that somebody did some research of that and said that in reality the growth in numbers was because other churches were closing and it's only explainable in terms of people having less choice and therefore going to these churches. Now I believe that. It's a sign that this is a day of small things. It's a sign that things are falling apart, that the people of God are being taken away. It's a sign, but there is a problem. We are not preaching the gospel in our pulpits, nevermind in the streets. In London this evening, there was a book launch done by Christian Concern and the Wilberforce publication. So this is a book, third in a four-part series by Jeremy Thomas. who is writing on church history, particularly in England. And I was very encouraged because I opened this book and began reading it. And it said in book two, which I've got, this is book three that was launched this evening. He said, I'm going to focus particularly on Kidderminster because God's worked there in the past. And I thought, how thrilling is that? Especially as we face going back into the open air here and continuing to preach Christ in a difficult situation. But he points out there that before World War II, there was a great emphasis in the churches on open air work, on going out, on taking the gospel out. And my experience now is that the churches are saying, what's that you're doing? That's not necessary. Why are you doing that? There's no need to do that. It's potentially troubling or damaging or harmful. We don't go out. Somehow, somehow, Something changed and no longer are we going out, but yet it was taken for granted. That was what we had to do with the gospel. But if we're not taking the gospel out, the very least we must do is preach the gospel in our pulpits. And soon I'll do a talk on this, on what I think the components of the gospel should be that we must preach, because some of them are definitely listing. You hear very little preaching on repentance, you hear very little preaching on sin, and you hear very little preaching on hell, and these things are absolutely necessary. Microphone is quite scratchy. Yeah, I wonder why it's like that. That's a difficult question to answer. It should be all right. I'm just checking the settings on the microphone. Yeah, no, it's got the right settings. I'll just turn it down a tad and see if that helps. Sorry about that. Thanks for telling me and thank you for telling me and that's very helpful. Scratchy, scratchy. Thank you, Britannia. Thank you. By the way, I'm going to start calling people by the names that they put on YouTube just for better security for people. So some of you, I know your personal names, but I'm going to not use that because I don't want to put anybody at risk. Because frankly, 8 billion people could be watching. I wish they were. I really wish they were. Brian, welcome. Okay, so Brian says, I would like to request prayer. Thank you. Please pray for Brian, people. He's asked for prayer. I'll just pray for you just now, actually, Brian. Father, I pray for Brian. I pray that you draw very close to him. I pray that you'd help him. I pray, Lord, that you'd have mercy upon him. I pray that the things of the Lord Jesus Christ would be very real to him and to each and every one of us. In Jesus' name, Amen. Thank you, Brian. No, I do like to pray for people often at the end, but that's fine. And thank you, Brian. You've been an encouragement to this channel, and by God's grace, I'm sure you'll continue to be. And we are praying people. People here love to pray for one another. That's great. That's really wonderful. So the thing is, these were destroyed, weren't they, in the wilderness? They were destroyed because they were presumptuous, and God having told them that they were under his judgments, they then decided that they were going to Canaan in their own strength. God having forsaken them in that matter, they decided to press on. That's presumptuous sin. And this is the sin of our churches in this day, this presumptuous sin, presuming to carry on without God's presence. Now, if you read church history, you find about churches that the people met together, and the reason they delighted in meeting together, they loved to be together in the presence of God. It wasn't the buildings. It was the meeting together of the people of God, and God's presence was with them. You almost never, ever feel that these days. It's still scratchy. What if I try moving it a bit further away? We'll have to see. It's all set up correctly. It's all set up as usual, so it should work, the microphone. You know what it is? I almost think it's this jumper. That's the only difference. It's a wool jumper. If you rub a wool jumper, you get static. And maybe not, but I'll have to not wear it in future. It's just as cold, that's all. The thing is, we need the presence of God. We should hunger and thirst for God and for his presence, and yet we are content without that. So first of all, the church has a commission to preach the gospel, don't we? And we're not to be carnal Christians. There's no such thing as a carnal Christian. If you're a Christian, the Holy Spirit has changed you from within, and knowing Jesus Christ has changed your life. The idea that you could say a little prayer and be a carnal Christian and your life is exactly the same and unchanged. It's just that you've accepted Jesus as your savior, but not as your Lord is not true because it's a tremendous work of grace when God takes any person from the world and changes them from within and brings them into a living, saving relationship with Jesus Christ. All things have passed away. All things have become new. I greatly hope and I greatly desire that some of those who were being obnoxious in the open air last Thursday will find the Lord Jesus Christ. Those who came to mock stayed to pray and so on. We are to be, in this world, we're to be a militant church, aren't we? That doesn't mean militant in the sense that we're physically violent or anything like that. We're not, but we stand up. We say, I serve the Lord Jesus Christ. I refuse to budge because Jesus is my savior. Would it be a city set on a hill? What's the point of being a light under a lampstand? Let your light shine. How can they see our light if we only keep it in buildings? And we're only Christians on Sunday. Would it be a city set on a hill? A lamp set on a lampstand? And the church has known Jesus Christ, hasn't it? We know Jesus Christ. We know him as our savior. Toiled, did I write toiled? I can't remember in writing. Good things we've tasted. It's not toiled. We have tasted of the good things of the world to come. Well, thank you for that, Geraldine. Sorry for reading for 4+. Yes, the jumper, it could be. So I'm not going to take it off just now, but I apologize for that. If I move the microphone further away, if I move back slightly, perhaps that will lessen it. I don't know if I can earth myself, but there we go. In fact, what might help is if I unplug the headphones. So I'll just unplug those and I'll manage without them. But please, I do want this message to be heard. Right, Ian says churches should pray to Jesus but never to foreign gods like Cop and Gaia, which some do. Ian, you're absolutely right, we should never pray to Cop or Gaia. Cop 29 is going on and it's about worshipping the planet, essentially. Too many Christians easily get into that. This planet is going to be destroyed soon. It's not that we should take pleasure in trashing the environment, that's not our job, but our duty is to live for Jesus Christ and to preach the gospel. The church has lost heart in these days. We say, there's a lion in the streets. There is a lion in the streets, but David was able, by God's help, to fight with a bear and a lion, wasn't he? We see a lion in the streets, and we think that's an excuse for not serving God. And gradually, what happens to us is that coldness of heart sets in. When we become introverted, inward-looking, when we, see, nonconformists, in my experience, we will talk forever about the importance of evangelism. We will talk and talk and talk and talk and talk about evangelism. We'll talk about how it should be done. We'll talk about where it should be done. We'll talk about why it can't be done in certain ways. We'll criticize those who are doing evangelism, but not in the ways in which we approve. We'll talk forever about it, but we will never do any evangelism. Which is why, with the things I'm saying, I'm trying to get people beyond that, because I know people will talk about what I'm saying, and I know they'll talk forever about it, but will anything change? This message, incidentally, is not about, you must do evangelism. It's about, you must return to the Lord first. If we're in a wilderness, and we've been in the wilderness for generations, then we must return to the Lord. That's the first thing. Return to close fellowship with the Lord, love for the Lord. and a determination to serve and follow the Lord. If we carry on in our own strength, we have great problems. And I think there is coldness of heart. We have replaced that coldness of heart with a forced exuberance with our music, with our songs, and with the way that we do things to hide our coldness of heart towards God, our true coldness of heart, that we should be fervently concerned to walk with the Lord Jesus Christ And I think we can grow coal and churches have grown coal without even knowing it. Josie Rose says, what is COP? Ian, could you just give us a potted definition of COP for Josie, please? It's an international, global sort of environmental thing, which probably is going to ruin all our lives. but Ian, if you could just mention that, I'd be grateful, thank you. But those churches that survived grew cold, great coldness in evangelical churches, but covered by exuberance. Evangelism, instead of being a matter of the heart, instead of a matter of me delightfully going forth, compelled and constrained by the love of Christ, became an exercise where I did certain things. And one of those things is, if you take something like the Billy Graham crusades in the 1950s, these were a new thing. And Graham would make an altar call, which isn't biblical, and people would come forward, and many, many, many of them were not truly converted. And the thing about this is that this was a new method, this was a new way of doing things. Now, you can never compare Billy Graham and, for example, Charles G. Finney, who made altercals, you can never compare those men and their evangelistic methods with men like Charles Spurgeon and John Wesley who preached Christ Jesus and him crucified. Different approach, different methods. These men preached the gospel. Graham and Finney used methods as well. And altercals and sinners prayers and so on. And evangelism became sort of an act or an event We had to, our job, the job of the Christian was to bring people along. So all our effort went into bringing people along. Our minister was gonna preach the gospel on Sunday, so we had to bring people to church. I'm not saying it's wrong to do that. We love it when they do. But when they came, the question was always, did you enjoy that? Not looking for conviction of sin. And again, One of the worst things I saw was my own mother when she was dying of cancer, this is some time ago now, the minister knowing, being an evangelical minister, the minister knowing that sitting right in front of him was a woman dying of cancer who did not know the Lord Jesus Christ preached on the importance of keeping the law of God. And I was heartbroken. She'd gone to church, she'd gone to hear a man preach and he preached on the importance of keeping the word of God. We have this idea that evangelism is bringing people to the specialist and we need the specialist. So we have superstars, we have the Billy Grahams of this world and so on, and we have auditoriums and stadiums. And this is a complete departure from the whole people of God being filled with the Holy Spirit, compelled and constrained by the love of God to go to sinners, to tell them the gospel where they are, to share the gospel. And again, the result of that is we became armchair Christians. We became spectators. We went to the stadiums. Whatever we did, we became spectators because it was somebody else's job and somebody else's thing. We have this armchair Christianity. We're all spectators. Now, quite a few people have written criticizing my evangelism on the recording of last week's Open Air, and that's fine. I'd rather people said what they think. But the question is, how many have any experience themselves of doing this work? How many of them could? Some of them have offered to come and stand with me. I believe there will be a pastor with me this Thursday, and that's very good news, and I thank the Lord for that. But what about the armchair critics, the ones who know how evangelism should be done, but have never done it? There's too many of these. Because we can't all be preachers. That's a calling from God. But we must do what God has called us to do. So we have evangelism as an event, perhaps with some musical features or some drama or something. I mean, in a certain city I lived in, in Scotland, for some years, there was great darkness, still is sadly, but one of the churches there said, we've decided to address this, so we're putting on a musical. Now, how can you address darkness, spiritual darkness, with a musical? The thing here is this. We have the event. We become spectators. Christianity becomes a spectator sport. Evangelism becomes a spectator sport. And we become cold. We lose our burden. Kerry says, Derek Prince, I don't like Derek Prince at all. I think he has a wrong view of the gospel. And I think that he is greatly overhyped. um so i'm afraid i don't have i don't actually have personally any time for derrick prince um a lot of people follow him um sally says the problem got worse when churches closed their doors in lockdown in contravention of hebrews 10 25 a church in london which refused to lock down didn't stop street preaching to great effect praise the lord the thing is this that that we must preach the whole counsel of God, we must preach the gospel. And it's something, again, you can have structured, programmed evangelism, or you can have Holy Spirit compulsion. And this is the thing, the 10 spies persuaded the people to reject God. When they rejected God, they quenched the Holy Spirit and God was no longer with them. F.M. says, 1 Corinthians 3, 4 is denominationalism in miniature. I'm of apostle, I'm a Paul. Today's quote is I am Baptist, I am Presbyterian, and so on. This party spirit is not God's will. Although that's the case, it's something that we can't clear up. For example, I am a Baptist because I believe in believers' baptism. I can't help saying that, but I'm more than prepared to have fellowship with others. So the problem is quite complicated. But whatever we are, we must be focused on Jesus Christ. I say I'm a Baptist first. No, I'm a Christian. I love Jesus Christ. That's what I am. I am a Christian. Doss says, I found one of the comments very inappropriate after such a difficult preach that day. Sorry, Dave, but I thought it was completely off. Some of them were, Dov, that's true. I had to remove some comments because they were extraordinarily derogatory towards God's people, but not many. But I still prefer it to people are honest and disagree. So we quench the Holy Spirit. The thing about the church is that we've carried on. God departed from us, it seems, maybe around the time of the Second World War or something, but God departed from us. He withdrew his presence from us. I believe that's because we weren't preaching the gospel. We persuaded ourselves that we were preaching the gospel. We were preaching parts of the gospel. We were preaching a gospel light. We were preaching a soft gospel. We were preaching an easy gospel. And God departed from us, just as he departed from the Israelites. before we were totally dependent on him. And we said, I can go and preach to a hostile crowd because God is with me. I can stand there. I can overcome a troop. Like Jonathan saying, let's go up and fight the Philistines because we're well able to overcome them. But when we quenched the Holy Spirit, we said, well, we need to be nice and we can carry on in our own strength. It's as though we believe we've got it all. God left us, we didn't even notice that he'd gone and he withdrew his spirit from us. we didn't even notice, so that we believe that we've got it all. And that is too prevalent. Lloyd-Jones used to say to people, you know, come now you that say you've got it all, where is it? Show it to us. But we think nothing more is needed. We can do everything without God. But when it comes to real challenges and things like, yes, there were giants in the land of Canaan. Yes, there were. Yes, they're big, scary giants. And they were like grasshoppers in the eyes of these giants. Boy, we better head back to Egypt. We better realize what a crazy venture this was to get out of Egypt and cross the Red Sea. But no, not at all. This was with God. Without God, it's impossible to defeat the giants. With God, it's very much possible. That's why Joshua and Caleb were men of such faith, extraordinary faith, who said, you know, we're well able to overcome them. They weren't looking with the eye of flesh. They were looking with the eye of faith in God, the God that they served. It depends on him, not on us. But the God departed from us. Our churches carried on, and we got nicer. We got comfy chairs. We said we no longer believe in pews, must get rid of those. All those lovely pews got burned or whatever, or sent off to antique shops. Now, I'm not going to waste time arguing about pews or soft, comfy cushions. That's not an argument for this discourse. But the thing was that God left us. That's the thing. And we didn't miss him. And if we didn't miss God, it was a sign that we were already in serious trouble. Just like the Israelites here wanted to go back into Egypt, because we weren't faithful in our gospel preaching, because we sought to win men by means, and we sought to win men with being pleasant and nice, and we decided that we weren't going to go to the hard places, and God wasn't sending us to the difficult places, and that the world could be won by us being nice, and in many cases by us being just like the world. We found that we could carry on as though nothing had happened. So the greatest need we have in our non-conformist churches, the ones that are left, the ones which says strengthen the things that remain, the things that are about to die, because the way things are looking in England, it looks as though there won't be a church in less than a generation, especially with this important news that Islam is now the largest religion in England, unstoppable humanly speaking. The greatest need for us is for God to return to us We need to remember, we need to go back instead of trying to go on as they went on into Canaan in their own strength and they were slaughtered by the Amalekites. God wasn't with them. They were presumptuous in their sin. They could not fight the Lord's battles without the Lord. They could not do it. We need to return to God, and we need him to return to us. Well, Jason, don't despair. The whole reason I'm saying this is because rather than despairing, we should get back to God. We should have the faith of Joshua and Caleb, and not the faith of the spies. Joshua and Caleb said, be strong. We have good courage. We can do it. God is able to. That's the reason for this discourse, to say, let's return to the Lord. Let's have strong confidence in our God in these days. Now, just as they went into the land presumptuously and they died there, so if we continue without God's presence, we are also being presumptuous, presuming that we are capable on our own of doing the work of God. We're not. And we died just like the people in Numbers 14. You say, how did we die? Well, our churches died out. I was told, I think, previously about the chapels in Wales and the story about how people got old, and as they died, eventually the chapels closed. Same thing with these in the wilderness for 40 years, and they all died out. This is what's happening. So many churches with very few people under the age of 60, Christians get older, the younger generation fall away. We've seen that. You and I have seen that with our own eyes. The younger generation, we brought them up, we taught them the gospel, and then we saw them fall away. We can't understand it. Then we realize it's because God isn't in our midst, and the world is a great, great draw to them. Even if they've been homeschooled, the world is a great, great draw to them, which they easily fall into, and the church seems to be lifeless to them. We need God's presence in our midst. And I say this to people, I say, if in your local church, your local evangelical church, God was to pour his presence into that church, then everybody would hear about it and people would come to find out what was going on. In the Welsh revival, there was the man who asked the station master, I'd like a ticket on the train to the place where the revival is. He said, that's very easy. He said, stay on the train until you feel the presence of God and then get off at the next stop. if you've ever experienced anything like that, you'll know that it's actually very correct, true. The most important thing is, you see, if I say we need evangelism, I'm going to keep saying that because we need evangelism. Evangelism, we need faithful, powerful, fervent preaching of the gospel. And we very especially need men like Wesley and like Spurgeon raised up to preach the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. But we need to be in this process ourselves. But the thing is this, that before we can do that, before we can do that, we must return to God. So I'm going to say we must have evangelism and we must go into the hard places and the difficult places. Like Paul, we must be prepared to go to Jerusalem. The Lord Jesus set his face to go to Jerusalem. And if Paul, because somebody said to me, you know, you prove that either Jesus or the apostles ever preached to people who didn't want to hear. Well, I've only ever preached to people that didn't want to hear. How are we going to find the people that want to hear? Nobody wants to hear. There's none that seeketh after God. So like the, Like the Israelites we are, we're trying to get into the Canaan in our own strength. The one thing we should do is drop everything and seek God. We have a revival prayer meeting once a month or once a week. It's a short prayer meeting and it's an extra prayer meeting, but it's not the whole of our prayer meeting. Revival is the only answer. Everybody says that. It's the only answer. Why are we not doing everything we can? Nobody can command revival. Nobody can force God to send revival, but we can behave and we can seek to persuade God that we're serious about seeking him. We long for revival. That was what the Israelites should have done. I mean, they should have submitted. They should have repented. They did not repent. Rather, they just took things into their own hands and they sought to accomplish God's work by their own strength and they died. The most important thing in our church is that God returns to us. We must have ministers who preach the whole counsel of God, who preach the whole of the gospel fearlessly and boldly and faithfully. We must have that. and saying that if a pastor preaches the gospel in the open air, it gives a cutting edge to his ministry because he's in the firing line, because he's in the hostile place. It's very often, I think, when ministers only preach in the building that they become blunted because they're preaching to the same people every week and they're afraid to offend people. But put them in the firing line, put them in the difficult place. Somebody put a comment up and I think that was very telling. I'd put up that message about the, Speaker's Corner in London and I went there and those who are Christians I felt were being abrasive and I'm quite capable of being abrasive myself but I thought it was important to say so. Somebody put a comment up saying that sometimes, perhaps often, the Muslims who weren't being aggressive that day can be very aggressive, even violent, even murderous in their actions. Now it's important that I acknowledge that because I didn't see that but I only went there once on a Sunday. But let's get As I was saying, if you think you can be a witness in a male voice choir, get the choir down to sing Christian songs at the speaker's corner. That will have an impact. Go and fight your battles in the firing line. I said, you know, if a king said to you, only go and fight those who don't want to fight you, sorry, who won't fight you, if anybody comes at you with a sword, run away. What kind of a king would that be? What kind of an army would that be? If I'm an ambassador for Christ, I can't just run away at the first sign of opposition, even if it takes grace and grace alone for me to go back and fight again. Of course, the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. I preach Christ Jesus and him crucified. But the most important thing, the first thing is, we stopped believing in the supernatural power of God's presence, and yet Christian life is a supernatural life. To establish the churches, to maintain the churches, and to further the cause of Christ, it cannot be done without the power of God. I believe that Billy Graham said, without denying that some good was done, and some people were truly and powerfully saved, without denying that, I believe they quenched the Holy Spirit and changed the direction of the people of God from Bible evangelism to man-centered evangelism. But we stopped believing in the supernatural power of God's presence and our hearts became cold. We didn't preach Christ as we should. And you hardly hear the gospel preached in the churches. You hear Jesus mentioned, sometimes you hear the cross mentioned, but we don't, Sorry David, I'm just saying whilst it goes to free to ask questions like that, my advice to people would be don't give away personal details or locations unless you really feel sure that you want to because as I say eight billion people can see this and So, we lost God's blessing. The non-conformist churches might not be in the state of the Church of England, many of them are worse than the Church of England, but many of them remain, many of them have closed, but we lost God's blessing and we lost his presence. If that isn't the thing that's breaking our hearts, compelling us to pray, causing us to seek God, then what is? We can't carry on as if there is no God. We are satisfied, we are comfortable, we are just doing everything we say because our constitution is doctrinally sound, because we have elders and deacons, and because we have a Bible teacher in the pulpit. That's all it takes, that's all we need, and yet we are blind and pitiful and naked. We need to pray for our pastors, that they would be reviled, that they'd be not just expositors of God's Word. There's a movement that says all we need is expository preaching, that's all. Expository preaching that tells you what the Bible says, but doesn't tell you how it impacts your life. The preacher must motivate the people of God. He must exhort the people of God. He must rebuke the people of God. He must preach for conviction. He must lift up the Lord Jesus and he must preach in such a way that the people desire to follow Jesus Christ and see the majesty of the Lord Jesus Christ and long for fellowship with him. Preaching is far more than just the impartation of information. Preaching, which is from God, is anointed by the Holy Spirit and goes to the heart. that our preaching has become methodical and perhaps it seldom stirs us. Now, I have to say these things because the non-conformist churches are in bad way. We failed to preach the gospel. We failed to do that very thing that we claim was our core teaching, to preach Christ, to preach the law, not to preach the law that we should obey it, but to preach the law by way of conviction and leading people as a schoolmaster to the Lord Jesus Christ. And we lost God's blessing and we don't have his presence. and Islam is taking over. Now third, we have little insight into our condition. I know because I've spoken to many people, we have little insight. We think the only reason we're not blessed is not because we're not doing everything we should do, but because God isn't blessing us. So that breeds the same kind of discouragement in the people of God that the people in Israel had when the spies came and said to them, they were as giants and we're not, it's a terrible land, it devours the inhabitants thereof and so on. People become discouraged because we are a militant church. We are a contending church. How can we earnestly contend for the faith if we only contend with nice people who don't upset us or don't oppose us? We have to stand up for the truth. We are to stand up for the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to do so because our hearts are burning with love for Jesus Christ. We try and do it without it. This is the whole problem. The church is trying to do all of these things without the presence of God. We must start by getting back to Jesus Christ by fellowshipping with him, by walking with him, by seeking him. That takes time and effort. We must return to the Lord. If we are going to preach the gospel, I could have just said we must preach the gospel and call upon the pulpits of the non-conformist churches to preach the gospel, but The first call is for us to return to God, to overcome the discouragement. Where is God in these days? He's given up on us. Well, yes, but if we return to him, he'll return to us. How can we preach in these days? Because it's too difficult. We're like grasshoppers in the sight of these Muslims or in the sight of all of these other problems in the country. But no, if we return to God, he will return to us. God is, we're well able to overcome. We're well able to preach the gospel in these days. We're well able to do all of these things if God is with us. And we must, if we don't return, if this message isn't heeded, I know very few people perhaps will hear it, I wish everybody would hear it, but if it's not heeded, the problem is going to be that our churches will continue to die, nothing will be done, nothing will change. People keep saying to me, when you go out in the open air, take some other people with you. Which people were you referring to? Would you come with me? Would you stand with me? Do you think you could stand with me? Do you think you could go there and stand right next to me, shoulder to shoulder? In a situation like that, I've seen many who thought they could and ran away almost. We need God's presence. We need the outpouring of his spirit. him, first of all, to draw us back to himself. We need to walk with Jesus. It's when our hearts are aflame with love for Jesus Christ, then we can do these works, these exploits. If we don't, we'll carry on doing things and hoping and calling in experts and having a special event and hoping that somebody else will do it and we'll continue to die out. We are dying out. The church in England is dying out. It's dying out in Scotland as well. We must preach the gospel, but we cannot preach the gospel until our hearts are aflame with love for Jesus and until God restores his presence to us. So by God's grace, my prayer is that we would return to the Lord. This is the message. If we don't, we're just doing what the Israelites did. We're going into Canaan in our own strength. We must stop doing that. We must stop in our tracks and we must say, unless the Lord comes with us, we cannot do this. But of course, if God is with us, we can, and we will, and we shall. Good evening, Amy, and bless you, and thank you for being with us this evening, and Josie as well, and Josh, thank you. Josh, you'd be very, very welcome. I wouldn't say it was worth coming a long way, because I will have a pastor with me this week, but at 4 p.m., God willing, this Thursday, I hope, 4 p.m. UK time, I hope to be preaching outside the town hall in Kidderminster. And by God's grace, it is better to go in twos and threes. It would be better if the whole church were there, if whole churches went to the speaker's corner, evangelize the muslims there that would make them think if whole churches showed up again before world war ii everybody said this is what we must do we must get out there we must go to the people we must take the gospel out and now it's all oh we couldn't do that you might upset somebody or it's too difficult or the muslims will be nasty to you or it wasn't you know or people in the street or nobody will listen to you anyway and it doesn't work and what does work if gospel preaching to sinners doesn't work then what does work If this isn't faithful preaching of God's Word, then what is? Sorry, I'm getting onto my... I believe in the preaching of the gospel, that's it. I believe in it, it worked for me, it brought me to the Lord Jesus Christ, and it's brought multitudes of others, and that's what we need. We need boldness, holy boldness, love for God, fear of God, causes us to call others to flee from the wrath to come. Do you know Jesus Christ? Have you found the Lord Jesus Christ? He died for sinners. He died for hell-deserving, hell-bound sinners, and his blood was shed as he became a sacrifice for us. Those who put their trust in Jesus Christ have everlasting life. Those who do not know the Lord Jesus Christ cannot be saved from their sins. And I would encourage you and I'd exhort you to find the Lord Jesus as your savior, as many of us have, because he is a wonderful savior to those who put their trust in him, and there is no other name under heaven whereby we must be saved. Father, I pray that you'd revive the non-conformist churches, the churches where the gospel is still held to, Lord. where people are clinging on by their fingernails, where they're wondering what happened to the younger generation, where they believe that everything is as it should be, Lord, but your presence is absence, when nobody knows what to do, where the people are discouraged, Father, where the people are thinking that you've forsaken us forever, when the things that are about to die need strengthening because these are the things that remain, and Father, have mercy, pour out your Spirit on our countries and our nations, this week Lord, God willing I hope to preach Father on Thursday and everybody's saying I shouldn't go back and not everybody's somehow Lord and we're all wondering what's going to happen and I know Lord it's not possible humanly speaking there isn't the courage or the strength there's just bravado but Father I pray that this town this town which you've blessed so often in the past I pray that you pour out your spirit here Lord pray for those who mocked the gospel, who hate Jesus Christ, who opposed the preacher, who would have done far more if they thought they could get away with it, Lord. I pray, Father, that the Holy Spirit would come down in superabundant power. I pray that powers of darkness would be put to flight. I pray that they would be absolutely convicted. Even now on their beds, Lord, in their homes, they'd be convicted of their sins against the Lord Jesus Christ, against the Lord and against his anointed. I pray, Father, that there would be salvation visited upon this town and many other towns upon Melbourne and Toronto and towns in the United States, Lord, and Belfast, Lord, and Glasgow and other towns in Scotland, Lord, and just a multitude, Lord. I pray, Father, that you would have mercy. We need your presence, Father. We need you to come and return to us. So anoint your people in prayer. Call your people to prayer, Father. Call us to pray for the outpouring and the effusions of your Spirit, the floodgates to be opened from heaven. Strengthen the things that remain, Father. Quicken the ministries that are, but raise up mighty, powerful preachers of your Word in our day and in our generation. Help us to be a militant people, standing up for the Lord Jesus Christ in the face of opposition. Help us to love the Lord Jesus so that we, like Paul and like Jesus himself, would set our faces to go to Jerusalem as it were, even when we know that trouble and trials and tribulation await us there. So Father, we commend ourselves to you and pray that you'd make us the Christians we should be, but we pray, Lord, that we would be drawn more and more into fellowship with our beloved Saviour. Thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh Lord Jesus, I pray that you would reign in my heart, in our hearts, and in our lives. Have mercy upon our loved ones, Father, and help us, those of us who are ill and in pain, Lord, those of us who are even dying, Lord, from cancer and other medical problems. Use us for your glory, and so long as we have life and breath, may we be the Lord's. May we recognize that we've been bought at a price. May we love you and serve you, Lord Jesus, all the days of our lives. Father, forgive us. Forgive us for our waywardness and for our backslidings and for our coldness of heart. And revive us, we ask and pray, Father, in Jesus' precious name. Amen. Amen. Well, thank you for joining us tonight. I'm just going to check some of the comments. Reading for 4 Plus says, if God, by the way, Reading for 4 Plus, the reason that's there is because if you go to the channel, you'll find there's resources there for teaching children to read. So I'd encourage you to go and look at some of those. If God is for us, who can be against us? Kerry says, we who are all distant or overseas should cover you in prayer and fasting on Thursday at 4 p.m. That would be very welcome, Kerry. That means that when the fruit comes, you'll be a partaker of that. You'll be part of that and you can say, because those that pray are also very much part of the work. Josh, you're currently in Cambridge. I wouldn't expect you to come all that way for one open air, Josh, but maybe we could meet up at the Speaker's Corner. Maybe next time I go there, you could come and join with us there, and we can put a team together at Speaker's Corner in London. Gary says, some people are too ignorant. Gary, we don't know who they are. I was ignorant before somebody told me the gospel. I didn't instantly understand it. The most ignorant people have come to know Christ. It's not about knowledge. It's about conviction and about the Holy Spirit's work. Go and preach the gospel to every creature, Gary. It's not for us to decide who to choose and who to leave. And Ian says, also note that even one extra person with you changes the street dynamics. It does. It does, Ian, and that's a biblical principle. But I was never going to wait until somebody came and joined me before I preached Christ. The churches aren't interested. That's the problem. The churches aren't interested. They don't look upon what I'm doing as having any great relevance or bearing on the situation. They consider it to be a waste of time or indifference or of no significance. I consider it to be absolutely essential in these days. I consider it to be totally biblical, both biblical in practice and biblical preaching, proper preaching. I don't consider it to be the only form of preaching. We need preaching in our churches too, but that's where I found the unbelievers. I didn't find them in the church, I found them in the street, and that's why I preach in the street. I'll put out a short broadcast on YouTube before I preach, so if those of you have notifications, click the notification icon. Sometimes it works, you'll get a notification, but I am saying that I intend to preach in the open air on Thursday at 4pm. I may preach tomorrow in the open air as well. I would like to, possibly in Droitwich and Worcester, because the time is so short. We must sow and sow and sow, and God will give the increase. but good suggestions of thank you um josh says um good um okay so i will i will try and put a notice on that uh it'll be it'll be a sunday where i've not think not thinking yet i can do it this sunday but I might be able to, but I'll put out a notice on YouTube on the comments section to tell people when I hope to be at Speaker's Corner so that people can attend as well if they choose to. We've got a nice little group of people who are standing there and preaching. But if it was up to me, I would go every week. And we'd just like to see whole churches there. And as I said, even a male voice, Christian choir, boldly preaching, singing Christian hymns to the Muslims, that would be good. Mobilize your Christian choir and send it into battle. Thank you Andy for your comment and Stacey. Carol says, David do you have an email we could sign up to where you could send us your program and prayer requests? I do have an email, sorry I haven't put it on this channel, but if you go to sermonaudio.com you type my name in that means Makrith has to be spelt correctly. If you type my name in you'll find my web page on sermon audio so it's David Makrith at sermon audio and you'll find a contact button there and people can email me via that and usually I try to reply within one to two days so My email load is increasing but that's fine, that's part of the work, so I thank the Lord for that. So Gary says you're correct Dr David, I'm trying to Gary, thank you for your comment, brother. Warm-hearted greetings to you, Gary, from myself. But it's the people who say to me, it's now time for me not to cast my pearls before swine and wipe the dust off my feet. I'm just nowhere near that, because I know it takes more than just preaching once to people usually to awaken them. And we love these people, and we just want it. We want them to be saved, just as we were saved. They're no worse than we are. Are they worse than us? I hope we don't think they are worse than us, because they certainly aren't worse than I was. Malcolm, enjoy. Thank you. I preach in Stornoway, Malcolm. I love Stornoway. I'm praying for Stornoway. I'm looking forward to the day when I can return to Stornoway and perhaps the west coast of Lewes and preach the gospel. I've done open air preaching in Stornoway on a number of occasions. I worked as a junior doctor in Stornoway and lived there for a while in the old Lewes hospital. It's a very, very precious place to me and I'm very glad that you're there and you're trying to do evangelistic work there, Malcolm, and may the Lord bless you in that. That's very, very precious. I know that islands have seen a lot of challenges to their Christian ethos in recent times and I'm very sad about that. Sad to hear of Tesco's opening on a Sunday, but there will still be people praying to God about that. Well, Josh, if your singing isn't up to par, maybe you'll frighten Islamists away. I don't know. Yes, Carol says thank you. Yes, Carol and Brian. Brian, would you like me to answer a question? David P., forgive me for being contentious, I might say, you don't know you're lost until you are found, but then at the same time, you don't know you need to be found unless you know that you are lost. But it's the Holy Spirit who shows us and brings us. If he brings us to that point, he also brings us through to saving faith in Jesus Christ, I guess. Dynamics, spiritual dynamics, I suppose, of salvation. So, we're out of time, Brian. There's time for your question, Brian, if you want to ask it. I'll leave that with you. Right, Brian says, I've committed sins even after salvation. Can I lose my salvation? Right, hands up everybody here who's a Christian who's committed sins after your salvation. Well, of course, I can't see you, you can see me, but every hand went up, in my mind it did anyway. Brian, we're still sinners. We're still sinners even after we're saved. We've talked about presumptuous sin. Christians even commit presumptuous sins. If you've been a Christian for a long time, you'll be aware that you've committed presumptuous sins. Sometimes, very often, we are still fallen creatures. And sometimes we feel hard-hearted and sometimes we should increasingly mourn over our sins and sigh because we're not perfect in this world. But we still have the Lord Jesus Christ and we still have the promise of God's forgiveness. God knows what we're like. We are still sinners. And if we are living in open and flagrant sin, which is shameful for a Christian, we must repent and put it away and God will have us. But no, Brian, every Christian is a sinner. Every Christian is a sinner. And we mourn the very fact that we're concerned about our sins is one of the evidences that we're a Christian. But no, Brian, just commit yourself to the Lord. Look to the cross. Don't look to yourself, look to Jesus Christ and see that He died for presumptuous, rebellious, wicked sinners such as ourselves. Trust him alone. And God, if you belong to Jesus Christ, God won't cast you away. He may chasten you for your sins. But all of us who've been Christians for some time know that that is God's faithfulness to us. When God chastens us, it really does hurt. God doesn't spare his rod when we need it. So Brian, no, you won't lose your salvation because you sin. And you will sin, but the Lord Jesus will have mercy on you. But again, that's not an excuse to live in sins. And as Christians, we don't teach that people can live in sins when they're Christians. That would be utterly shameful. Sorry, it's an important topic. It's an important topic. It was a good question as well. Thank you, Brian. If you're a Christian, Brian, if you're trusting Jesus Christ alone, you have nothing to fear from hell. Again, look at Jesus. Don't look at yourself. If you look at yourself, you'll find abundant grounds for despair. If you look at Jesus, you'll find abundant grounds for confidence. However bad you are, I am. I am a great sinner. I mourn over my sins. I mourn over my failings. I mourn over my backsliding. I can look back over nearly 43 years of being a Christian and see many times when I was cold-hearted as a Christian. Not so very bad thing, but God has been faithful to me and had mercy on me, but it's Jesus Christ alone I'm trusting, and it's Jesus Christ alone I'm looking to. Now, fearing that I would go to hell is probably not a bad thing because it causes me to examine myself. As long as I can say if I am in Jesus Christ, I will never go to hell. Now I must ask, am I in Jesus Christ? And I'm in Jesus Christ if I'm trusting him alone for my salvation. Brian, I think we should talk more about this in future broadcasts or by email if you contact me. But yes, it's just that once we're Christians, we can never lose our salvation. God does such a powerful work in us, but we may feel as though we could because of the wretchedness of our hearts. but more to be said about that. But Brian, there are other Christians who feel the same way as you, who ask similar questions, but all Christians sin. Where sin did abound, the Bible tells me, grace did also much more abound. So thank you, everybody. Brian, the Lord bless you, Brian. So people, please pray for Brian and anyone else here who's discouraged or in the same situation. Somebody said, you know, a guilty conscience makes cowards of us all, and we've all got guilty consciences. But the Lord Jesus cleanses us from all sin. His blood does that. Okay, so Carol says, Brian is lacking assurance and good teaching will help. It took me a long time to get there. Carol, that is the duty of pastors and I would love to do that. But yes, I think you are right, but I think most of us will probably struggle with assurance at times. Again, Britannia, we're moving into a whole new topic, which is really important. Britannia, we should repent of known sin, and we should trust that our sins are washed away in the blood of Christ. How much we must repent, how deep that goes, how long it lasts, is in God's hands. But there's a sense in which a Christian always has an attitude of repentance, because we're always aware of our sins, and even now we don't love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. So there is an attitude of repentance always in the Christian's heart, but at the same time there's a joyfulness at knowing what Jesus has done for us. I am going to end the broadcast now. Thank you. These are really important topics and questions, which I'm really happy to talk on. And we can do that. And we can look at this topic and the topic of assurance. This is a topic that the Puritans were very, very concerned about and wrote a lot on, I believe, and others. Brian, so yes, again, if you go to sermonaudio.com and type my name, David Macareth, into the search on Sermon Audio, you'll find my page. On that page, you will find an email button, and you can contact me via that. Thank you. So I'm going to end the broadcast now, but thank you to everybody for being here. I will say subscribe, like and click the notification icon because it does help the channel, it really does help the channel. If anybody wants to help support the channel financially, you could do so also via this same page at sermonaudio.com, but thank you to those who have helped the channel financially, who are helping the ministry, and the Lord be with you, and thank you so much for your giving for this The Lord bless you Brian and everybody else here. Thank you for being with us tonight. Amen.