Well, Wilson's been a good friend for several years now, and we certainly appreciate him. All right. Thank you. Good to be here. I'm getting to the age where you're just glad to be anywhere. It's good to be in the house of the Lord. Amen. All you gave testimony about what went on before you got saved, and I got my share of my own. But I don't really want to talk about my old life. There's so much that God has done for me in this life that, you know what, that old life just don't mean anything no more. Thank God for the new life he's given us. I'm glad I'm saved. And I'm glad I can say that without no hesitation because it's been almost 41 years that God saved me out of a drunkard's life. And the only service that I've ever had at a place I live called Ojo Amarillo, It was the only church service that preacher ever had. I was the only man that got saved in that service. That Sunday night, he carried me down 22 miles to his local church. And there, I just sat and listened and took in what he had. And then the following week, I found myself going to jail with him. He told me, he says, I just found out in the week knowing you that your navel has got a big mouth. So we're going to put that to use. Let's go to the jail. Went down to the jail, and half of those guys there were all my buddy, drinking buddies. And I froze. I didn't want to say nothing. And he went over in front of me, and he rubbed his hand on that bar. He said, see this right here, son? He said, that's to keep them from you. So now preach, he said. I started preaching there. And the reason why he did it was because He asked me to interpret for him. You know, there was a lot of non-English speaking Navajos in the church, and he had a sound system in the back where you put earmuffs on, and then you plug it in, and then you repeat what he said, translate whatever, what he said to the folks that couldn't understand English. So, he had me do that. And then he had to wait after I caught up here and started translating. He'd say something and then I'd go to translate that, but I would go to preaching. Then he'd look at me and he'd say, did I say all that? And I'd say, you sure did. And then that's how he found out, you know, that I could get a hold of something. And so it's been 40 and some months, wonderful years, that I've known Christ as my savior. That's eight churches ago. Every time we seem like we get comfortable at work and we got a preacher raised up, we ordain him. One lady in church said something that was really interesting during the last few days of work at Tlaqueto. I've been at Tlaqueto the longest because we had men surrender to preach there and then we just go out on an outreach and start another work. And then I'd pastor two churches until God raised up a preacher over there and ordained him. And then we'd let that work go. And then we'd come back to Tlaquito and then another guy would get up. And one lady said that during that last, I think it was in October, was our last Time we were in Calcutta and we had just ordained brother Gary Ozzie and be pastor there that spring camp meeting and He wouldn't working with me during that spring through the summer and then through the fall and I was getting ready to move back to New Mexico and And they had that in October, of course, is, you know, pastors honored, you know, honoring pastors month. So they had a pastor honoring month. And we were there. And it was also the last time to say goodbye to those folks and leave. And it's kind of like a bittersweet moment, you know. You just hate leaving. You made so many friends. And people was already crying. But you knew you had to go, you know, because the man of God had to take over. And I never really believed in a practice that, you know, when you start a work and God raised up a preacher for that purpose and you turn that work over and become local church, that you don't ever go back in there. Because I'm a missionary, I'm no longer over that work, but I'm out of that work now. I'm going to start another one. So that's what we were doing, getting ready to do that. People were asked to give testimony, like you all did a while ago. And one lady got up, and she said, you know, I've been, she said, a member here 18 years. And she said, it was about 19 years that we got here, and I became a member. And she said, I go around churches, you know, like she said. She named some of the churches there. Then even out here, some of the churches. And she said, they're always talking about revival. So they bring in evangelists, and he preaches, and you know, a one-week revival, and he said, that's over. Everybody's going back to their own business. That's just what the revival is about, he said. But we've never, Pastor Calvin has never asked for a revival. He's always had camp meeting every year, but never a revival. And I always wondered why, and then I realized, he said, 18 years, I counted back and counted how many men surrendered to preach. 15 men surrendered to preach and Churches were planted. He said we were in 18 years of revival He said there was never a dull time when we when we had church service, you know, sometimes I get up here and I'll have One of the ladies while she's back with us now. She's married to Jeremiah. That's miss Leo. I'll call her miss Leo Liz Leo grew up with us and Her daddy's a preacher now. He passes different church, but miss Leo came back to us and she's our piano player right now But anyway, I remember I just asked her Leo won't you go up there and just sing something that you get up there and and God will move in I'm in Sunday morning service, man. We we don't get out till about 132 o'clock. Nobody cared. I I mean, seven miles of unpaved road out in dirt road, middle of nowhere, and you just go out there. And you know what? You don't have no plans to leave once you go in, especially when it's the winter, when the roads are bad. You're not looking forward to go back out that bad road. So they just stay there. And a lot of them pack their lunch. And then Sunday night, we have service again. And well, I'm telling you, pretty soon, people from 50, 60 miles away started driving to church. And then one day I had this church split, and Harry Nix was there during the camp meeting, and he said, Brother Nix said, I heard you had a church split. I said, yes, I did. And he said, I want to hear about it. I said, everybody that lives on Highway 87 on the west side towards Winslow and Holbrook, y'all need to go to Jonathan's church. And all of you ones that live on 87 on this side, you come to our church. That's 40 miles. The other way, over 87, that's about 50, 60 miles. You guys are coming a long way. If you go to Winslow, it'd be 30 miles. And so we had that. And then Brother Harry said, well, praise the Lord. I hear that white folks have a church split. People don't talk to each other no more. He said, you have what you could probably call a good church split. He said there was such a thing, you know, and that was crazy that brother Nick's coined that, you know, and but Jonathan's still pretty. I think he came here, but Jonathan's still passing that church in Winslow. And it's a good church. A lot of these churches have been started by that, you know, so I want to read you verse and then I'm not going to preach right now, but I'll just give you verse. John 4, I guess the John chapter 4. I want you to notice that in verse 35, this is the Lord Jesus speaking. He says, Say not ye, there are yet four months, and then cometh harvest. Behold, I say unto you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for they are white already to harvest. My preacher told me when I surrendered to the mission field, he was dying of cancer. And he said this, I want you to take this verse. I want you to pray over it. I want you to read it. I want you to study it. And I want you to know everything you can, that you can know about this verse. And it's become one of my verses in doing mission work. And the Lord Jesus spoke these words. And to me, what he was saying is there's an urgency for a present emergency. That's what he was saying. Emergency is people are dying all around us And there's an urgency to get out there and you know make a difference and you know, the harvest is quickly passing away According to what the Lord said God appeals to us, you know And that that day when the preacher talked to me it applied to me Applied to me as being the one that responsible to get the gospel to loss and dying the world right now I think our populations over eight billion And it's growing every day, you know, and I'll tell you, the harvest is ready. It says it's white already. My dad used to harvest a lot of wheat for our neighboring you know, people that were our neighbors. A lot of them were white folks, and we live over there in the southern part of Gallup where there's a mixture of people that live there, not just Indians, but that's not the reservation. They call it the checkerboard area. There's some Indian land there, but the land we live on is private land. And then I bought my uncle's land there, 12 acres where we're building a church, and that's all private land. But some of the land around us are what they call Navajo trust land. That's where Navajo would apply for a home site lease, and he would go through the government system to get that. And it takes quite a while, about four or five years, to get that land so you can build on it. And then, you know, then there's what we call Indian allotted land. And then there's BLM land. And then there's all kinds of private land. But one of the guys that planted wheat there, his name was, Rico mini pace and he owned a car dealership in Gallup called Rico Motors But Rico was already an elderly man and he couldn't redo the field work but he plant wheat and beans and hire my dad to go out there and do that and He always come over right before the fall rain season and he would tell my dad he says Herman I wonder if you can come out this week and cut my wheat and He says, rain is a prediction next week, and if rain hits it, he said, it'll get white. It'd be no good. That wheat will turn white, and you can't harvest it. So I want it golden brown. I want it in my barn. And my dad would take us out there, and we'd help. And we'd bring in the wheat golden brown. Then take it to market and make bread or whatever they needed. Back in the old days, that's how men did that. And my dad was always the one that had to do that. And it was very interesting how he would tell us that, you know, that it's going to get white if you don't bring it in. And here the Lord said that the harvest was already white already. I mean, it's past, bring it in. And that's something that, you know, you need to understand. And that's probably what hit hard in my heart when I started. And my heart broke. Well, my mom and my dad, they live 150 miles from where I got saved. So I went back, and I sat them down, and I talked to them just the best way I know how about how to get saved. And my mom got up, and she said, son, you need to go back to where you came from. What you're talking about, we ain't got nothing to do with. And then my dad just said, huh. Then he got up, and that was it. And it really, you know. I guess it hurt my heart because I thought, man, just like that, they're gonna get saved, they're gonna get right with God. Here they are, they're in their 70s, and I'm thinking, you know, they're gonna get saved, but they didn't. And then for 10 years, I decided, because they did that, that I'm gonna start a work there, and I started a work there. And for 10 years, I preached. One day, my mama walked in, and she sat about right over here, but there was a window there, and she just sat towards the window and looked out all the time I was preaching. And after the service, I asked mom. I went to her house. And my dad, him and I always had coffee. So I told him, I said, mom, what do you think about the service? She said, I don't know. She said, I didn't pay attention. I just went there to see who was all there in the community. And then another time, she came again. And then I asked her, what do you think about the service? She said, I don't know. I didn't pay attention. This is my friend Mary. She invited me. So I just decided to come. I didn't want to offend her. And then that went on for a while. But then one day, mom was not looking out the window. She was looking at me. I was preaching about the Lord dying on the cross as a sacrifice for the whole world, including Navajos. I said, you Navajos need to know that there's a God in heaven that loves you. And my mom started crying. And then she got up and she came up here and she stood there for a while. And then I stopped and I said, what'd you come for, mom? She said, I think I'm ready to be saved. And she got saved. And my dad got saved. And my son got called to preach there. And so he took that work and then we went to Arizona. And my mom and dad were pastored by Terrence, my son. And so many things happened in that time. that God just stirred up, you know, my sisters got saved. I got two sisters that are faithful to church. And then I got two brothers now that come off and on. And now that we're back in that same place where we started years ago, we thought we had land, the fence line was right about where this parking lot is, and we'd build a church here. And my aunt over here came over and said that they resurveyed, and now there are new boundaries down here. So that church property is only our property. And you all need to disassemble. So we did that. I didn't want to fight nobody. We disassembled the church. And then here, 2019, my uncle called me. And he said, I've been trying to sell my property. And that's the one that our church was on before. And there was 12 acres. He said, I've been trying to sell it to my siblings. Nobody's got enough money. And I want $24,000 for it. So during camp meeting, Brother Chandler got up and he raised $17,000. You were there. They raised $17,000. And then I told my church, I said, well, we got 30 days. We'll buy the land. So what we're going to do is we're going to do what we call this offering that we're going to do. And what I'm going to do is I took $1,000 of my own money. And I put it in the envelopes, increments of four $100 bills, and then $10, $50 bills, and on down, all the way to $1 bills. And then I put it in the basket. I preached that message there, where Jesus gave one man five talents, another one two, another one one. And I preached on that. And then I said, OK, at the end of the service, I said, we're all going to take an envelope. And we're going to do, our goal is to get $7,000 in 30 days. and we'll combine it with the money we got and we'll go ahead and buy the land. And so everybody got it. And then I went and reached down. I was the first one. I said, just to let you know that I'm participating in this, I went and took an envelope out. And right standing there, I opened it. Here, a $100 bill came up. That meant that if I take that in 30 days, I'll multiply it seven times. It'd be $700. So whatever you had. We had a lady that didn't even have a job. And she took one, and it was a $100 bill. My wife felt so sorry for her, because she didn't have a job and had five daughters. And the husband was a loser. He didn't want nothing to do with church. And here she was. And then my wife said, Deidre, why don't we trade envelopes? I'll take that. And she said, no. She said, I'm going to do it. She said, I'm going to do it. And you know what? A woman not working like that, she ended up doing all kinds of stuff, selling fried bread and all everything. She raised that money. And she brought it in a week before it was deadline and she raised in a thousand eleven hundred dollars what she raised gave it all to church Things like that happened and we were able to get the money and I took it to my brother My uncle and I gave him that cashier's check and he bought fell over He said how the world are now who raised that much money in such a short time I said I can't but I said my god is able My God can do anything. The Bible says nothing shall be impossible with our God, and He's the God we serve. And my uncle saw stuff like that, and he was lost when he sold me the land. Today, when he comes out to visit his family, kinfolks where we live, he comes to our church. And one time he came and he said, I want to look at the building. We drove up there and we were going through the fence where the gate was, and we're going through. And then he said, how did you say you got saved? And I got to talking to him. By the time we got up to the church door, he got saved. Boy, I'm telling you, things changed with him. And now he's an ally. He's a blessing. And, you know, you can lead people to the Lord just about anywhere if you're willing, you know. And I think that's important, you know, and that's been made. My wife and I, we were writing down names of people that have gotten saved, and I think we're at 2,900 people since we started that we personally led to the Lord. And there's people out of that group that are still in church. They're still serving God. They're still doing things for the Lord. And then one of the ladies, her name's Leanne, she came with a list. She said, you guys forgot these people. And she had two full pages of names. And then I got to look at those names. I said, that's right. I remember them. And you didn't remember until you see the names. And so they're still counting. You know, not to know exactly how many people got saved, but I'm telling you what, that's a lot of people. Navajo Nation has, I guess right now, about close to 400,000 Navajos on the reservation. But you know what, 2,900 is just a drop in the bucket. You could do a whole lot more. Recently, a man called me from a place called Kenyatta, Arizona. Never been able to go there. We tried to go there and we've never been able to start a work That's in the how many ever heard of Monument Valley those big mammoth rocks come right there. There's a town there, right at the foot of that Historical site is pounds called Kayenta and we've never been able to start a church. There's no independent Baptist Church there. There's not even a church there that's going that you can go to and And recently, a man called me. His name was Harjo. He was from Oklahoma, but he moved to Wickenburg, Arizona, a member of a church called Faith Baptist Church. And the preacher, Jeff Hall, was his pastor. And Jeff Hall, I knew him. He's a good friend of mine. And Brother Hall found out that Brother Harjo wanted to go to the reservation to try to start a work. And he went to Kayenta and he found a church building. During COVID had been closed and nobody wanted to do anything with it, but he found that preacher that was last, the last one there. And he talked to him. The guy said, here's the keys, gave it to him. And Brother Jorge started to work. When we get back, I'll be preaching for him. He's Choctaw Indian, but he loves people just about everywhere. And he's looking forward to getting that work started. He said, I've never really started to work, Brother Calvin, so I need your help. I need you to come and help me. I said, as long as it's such a help, I'm going to be able to do it. But if you want me to go over there and do everything, I can't. Can't do that no more. Now, there's several times in our ministry that I pastored three churches at one time. And two churches, when I went to Klageto for the first time, a lady kept calling, kept calling. And finally, I told her, I said, I can't go. I'm in Nausetiti, and then I'm in Vanderwagen, and now you got to go to Klageto. I can't go. And then she said, if you ever get your heart right, you'll come. That was the first time a woman ever spoke to me like that. And you know what? I got mad. I got upset. I'm being a Baptist preacher, you know. Nobody talks to me like that. So I told her, I told you I can't come. So I turned around, I snapped at her, and I turned around. And before I could hit my vehicle, the Holy Spirit smoked me. And he said, you said, you remember, you said, you go anywhere I tell you to go. And you don't want to go. So what's wrong? So I turned right around and I told that lady, I said, we'll be there Sunday. And that Sunday, it rained, and man, we got stuck three or four times on the way on that seven miles of dirt road. It turned out to be one of the best churches on the reservation. Today, it's still a real good church. I go there, but I try not to go there too often. People will start crying. Calvin we're so glad you're back. We miss you and all this stuff, you know, but you know, that's what the harvest is about That's what the Lord said here and I'll tell you You know what the final wrap-up on this thing is over there and Luke where he said I say unto you that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner to repent More than 99 just persons which need no repentance Most one of these days this would be over and there's going to be joy in the presence of the angels. You realize how loud heaven is right now? Some of you don't like noise, you're not going to enjoy heaven. All the shouting and carrying on, man, I'll tell you what, this is just an inkling of what it's like in heaven. It's going to be so loud. I mean, you read about it, was it in Revelation? I don't have the verse, but in Revelation it says there's literally thousands, hundreds of thousands of people around the throne. Where do you think that came from? They didn't come from Calvary Baptist alone. They come from mission fields all over the world. That's where those people come from. And there's a mission field out here, even in America. right now that, you know, people are getting saved. It's a blessing. My wife and I are spending time in Birmingham. I went to church on Sunday, and at the pastor's church, they had me preach, and I got up, and I said, we came here to Alabama. We heard that there were some saved people here. I made a joke about it, you know, because, you know, when they come out to our area, they can't believe that Indians get saved. When an Indian gets saved, man, he gets rid of everything. Back in 2000, remember when the Y2K came up? Everybody was scared to death of Y2K. My son got up and he said, all that means, y'all going to have to live like us Indians. Have a trail to the back to the outhouse and carry water in, you know, and get oil lanterns again. You know, that's what it's all, that's all that means. I said, we're doing that back home, he said. I thought that was very humorous, you know. But anyway, I want to say before I get the message that I really appreciate this church for supporting us, being behind us. Your money goes to good use. I can stand here and tell you without even being nervous, without even, you know, hesitation, that the money you sent built some works out there. And today we have a big, our church building, the sanctuary is 42 by 47. The building itself is 82 by 48, and it's a big, good-sized building. It's probably the largest sanctuary we've built, and by the grace of God, you know, we're gonna fill it up. We got about 50 folks that come, and we thank the Lord for them, you know. When we had that little house down by our place we built, me and my granddaughter built a little building. It was 16 by 20, and we were meeting there, and we had standing room only. And we couldn't wait to move up to the church. And October 8th was when we had our dedication and we went up there and we opened up the building. What a blessing to spend. Now it seems like our church is empty because there's so much room. And I told the folks, I said, don't be discouraged. I said, that's just a lot of room for us to grow. We got a lot of folks to reach. So every week we got new people come by. They'll come by and we're just not too far off the highway. So they'll come by and visit. And some of them, they stick. I've had a couple come, a guy named Jeremy Hosteen and his wife started coming. And I'll tell you, they just love the church. And their mama said, where have I been all these years? I've never heard stuff you teach. It's just so new to me. You know, some things we take for granted. Some people don't even know they're sitting in churches all these years. One lady, 1973, she got saved. She's 82 years old. She said, I cannot believe the stuff I'm learning to hear at this church, she said. And to think that I went to a church down here, and I never heard none of this, never even talked. some of these things. And she said, where'd you learn all this stuff? I said, from the Bible. Just study the Bible. Amen. Amen. So you have any questions or something, just want to let you know, you can ask me afterwards. I do want to encourage all of you to stay with it, just be faithful, because it does make a difference when the church backs you out there that, you know, sometimes you don't hear from missionaries too much. But when they do, I want you to know that we pray for you all. We pray for all the churches that we can remember, friends of ours. On Wednesday night, we went to a church where they said, we're going to have a prayer meeting. At least they called it a prayer meeting, and everybody took their request, and then the preacher got up, and he just prayed, and that was it. Our prayer meetings are like that. Our prayer meetings will last as long as the last person still praying will be out. Indians don't care about time. That's why they call it ending time. They come in when they feel like it, and they leave when it's done. They're not going to leave. And I mean, Wednesday night service, we have prayer requests, and then we have prayer time. And man, in prayer time, we just find a place where we can pray. People lay out, or people just get to the altar, and they pray and pray. And man, it'd be about an hour sometimes. hour and 15 minutes to get through praying. Then I get up here and I open up the book and I'll preach to them. Sometimes we leave, we start at 6.30, we probably don't leave till about nine sometimes. But that's just the way it is. And we tried here, man, a bunch of you would strip your gears. Man, it's too long of a service, you know. But we're not like that, you know. We believe that it's serious business when you talk to the Lord and pray. And so we put a lot of emphasis. So a lot of churches call midweek service prayer meeting, but they don't pray. And we're one of the exceptions. When we say prayer meeting, you're going to come through prayer meeting. We had a couple out of Ravenden, Arkansas. They were on their way to Hawaii. And after they went to Hawaiian trip, they come back and they stop on Wednesday night at our church service. And that lady, we asked her to sing. I know her, she sung before at a different place, so I asked her to sing. She sung, and she's always going to preaching, but we went and had prayer, and she could not believe that. She said, our church don't even last that long with prayer. She said, that's a blessing. She said, people, and I told her, I said, we've always done that. You know, on Sunday morning, Sunday morning, I kid you not, You come to church and people are already there at 9.30 and they're at the altar praying, praying for the church. They don't say, we're going to call for a men's prayer meeting. No, that'd be men and women at the altars praying. It's no wonder we had 18 years of revival. People were just stirred up about the Lord. And you know what? It's a blessing to see that. And that's more of an exception than the rule these days. You don't see too much of that anymore. But I'll tell you what, out there in the southwest desert, dry as could be, God moved in on us, and then he stayed with us all those many years. And tell you, we want to see that again at Two Wells Baptist in New Mexico side. We want to see God do that again. We had one preacher already said, Brother Calvin, I don't see why you can't have camp meeting here. This is a great place. I told him there's things that still need to be done, but I said, we certainly pray in that direction. If the Lord tarries, that's probably what we're going to do, and your preacher's going to have to come out and be one of the preachers over there, you know? So that's a blessing to be able to see that, you know, among our people. For many, many years, the pastor, the Baptist preachers, both Southern Baptists and Independent Baptists, ostracized me because I'm a King James only preacher. There was no King James only preacher on the reservation. When I showed up, They started attacking me. And now most of the churches that we started have grew and most of those men are all King James only. And people say that, you know, I like to hear him preach because he preaches and he knows what he's preaching about. And we have these end of the month meeting every month. One of the churches takes a fellowship meeting on Sunday night. We all go over there and then we all have a great time. Sometimes we don't come home until one, two o'clock, depending on how far it is. And I enjoy that, man. I get in there and I get to hear these preachers preach, you know. And they go back and forth, Navajo and English, Navajo and English. That's what they do. You could do that. See, I can talk in tongues because she can interpret that for you right there. That's what tongues is, is language. You know, and so, you know, my wife can interpret that for you, what I just said. I said, they preach in Navajo, and they preach in English, they preach in... I said, they preach in Navajo, and they preach in white man's tongue, Navajo tongue, and back and forth, you know. That's what I do. A lot of times, I do that, you know, with my people, because a lot of time, my people are... My age or older They're comfortable with their language. So you have to go to the language and a lot of times you do that But this morning is not going to take too long a matter of fact what I said already probably take longer than what we're going to preach psalm 11 psalm 11 is where I want to go Preach to you a little thought here that been on my heart and uh I tell people out here, I said, I'm gonna try this on a white church. When I come home, works real good, I'll try, I'll preach at home to my folks. In the Lord put I my trust. How say ye to my soul? Flee as a bird to your mountain. For lo, the wicked bend their bow, they make ready their arrow, the pawn, the string, that they may privilege shoot at the upright in heart. If the foundation be destroyed, what can the righteous do? The Lord is in his holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven. His eyes behold, his eyelids try the children of men. The Lord tries the righteous, but the wicked in him that loveth violence, his soul hateth. Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and a horrible tempest. This shall be the portion of their cup. For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness. His countenance doth behold the upright. You know, there in verse number three, it says, if the foundation be destroyed, what can the righteous do? You know, that verse there, alone by itself, you know, it sounds hopeless. If the foundation of anything is destroyed, you know, I'm a construction worker, so I know, you know, the whole structure that's built upon it will come down, it'll collapse. And you get the sense that if the foundations are destroyed, you must just give up. That's what it sounds like. Just give up. There's nothing else you can do. However, this morning, I want to encourage you to let you know there's still some things that we can do despite the foundation being destroyed. And there's some things that you and I can do. For example, verse number one, we can trust the Lord. Amen, don't don't run beloved. Don't run. Don't take off trust the Lord instead Bible says his foundations are sure Isaiah 28 16 therefore thus said the Lord God behold I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone a trite stone I says a precious stone Cornerstone is sure foundation. See he that believeth shall not make haste I like that. God encourages us that what our life is built upon is a sure foundation. Now, I like that because, you know, being in construction, you know, that building that we built, the one I just mentioned, the church building, the footing is four feet deep and two and a half feet wide of thick concrete. I could not believe that's how much shame poured in there. Our foundations are not normally that big, but he built it. And I was wondering, why did he build like that? And here, when Mike Ellis from Florida brought the material to put the bill on, it was a huge building. And I said, that's why. The bigger the building, the more it needs a bigger foundation. And folks, the Bible says other foundation can no man lay than which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. Amen. So we have a foundation that's been laid, and we can certainly trust it. We can believe in it, you know. You know, remember Nehemiah, over there in the book of Nehemiah, he was building that wall back. And of course all these, you know, people that were opposing it showed up, the Arabian and Shemaiah, and you know, they started ridiculing him. And Shemaiah tried to get Nehemiah to flee, remember? But Nehemiah's words were, should such a man as I flee, In other words, hey, I got a bigger job to do and I ain't got no reason to be running. I'm going to stay put and get this job done. And many times we're tempted to do that. I know some men who ran when they should have stayed. Then I know some men who stood when every instinct in their life told them to run. You think about that man that stand in that field with his sword. And when everybody else fled, he just went ahead and fought the enemy and killed many, many enemies. And then after it was all over, all the guys that ran off came back and took the spoil. That's about how it goes sometimes. But you know what? You need a man to stand. I appreciate a man that will stand. You know, the Bible says, be strong in the Lord and the power of his might. You know, it's one thing that you learn early in your Christian life is that you learn how to be strong in the Lord. You learn how to, you know, trust Him and believe in Him and lean on Him and trust Him. You know, like John, the apostle, he stood where no man stood. Did you ever notice that? He stood by the cross. Then he saw what no man saw because the Bible says several times that it's the disciple whom the Lord loved. You know why he loved him? He stood where no man would stand. He saw what no man would saw. You know, he did a lot of things that other men would not do. And he was always referred to as the disciple whom the Lord loved. The Lord has a special love. I know the Lord loves all of us, but every once in a while, the Lord will have a special love for one of his servants that does something extraordinary. And you know what? That's what God is more expected of today, to trust him more. And I'll tell you, some of these men that have stood, they trusted the Lord and got through their difficulties. And you know, the wicked will try to take you out. You know, that's what it says in verse two. Therefore, though the wicked bend the bow, they make ready their arrow upon the string that they may privileged shoot at upright in heart. They'll do everything they can to make you quit. Amen. One preacher said you will either rust out, fall out, or burn out. But the point is, you're going to be out. Amen. And when I was in the military, You know Every bone in your body would ache at the end of the day Begging you to quit and I've seen people quit They just think excuse to quit One day as drill sergeant said how many don't believe in bearing arms, of course a Jehovah Witness and seven-day disadvantage all them raise their hand I And he said, you guys get over here. And he separated them. Then he said, they will. He said, down there, the processing state, they will process you out as what they call a discharge, undesirable, get you out. But he said, the rest of you, you claim to bear arms. So let's see. You're going to fight for your country. But the people that raised their hands said, we're not going to fight our country. What were they doing in the army? What were they doing? They were there to get a college education. They were there for other reasons than to fight for their country. And you know what? The Lord's army is that way. You entered a battle when you got saved. There are enemies, there are real enemies. And they'll rise up like here, and I'll tell you, they want to take you out. And the devil's in the business of doing that. We're seeing some things in this country that we've never seen before. Our country has turned for the worse. But I'm not downplaying my country. I love my country. I still love America. And I appreciate it. If I didn't, I wouldn't have fought for it. But there's threats against the Christian today. We just had a street preacher's head shot down in Phoenix. Just preaching the street. Somebody just came by and shot him in the head. And he's still in critical condition right now. His wife is pleading with people to give money so that he can have his hospital bill paid. And you know, a preacher, you know, he don't have insurance. And this man, all he was doing was doing what God told him to do. And some idiot came by and shot him in the head. And I'll tell you, folks, our country's turning for the worse. But that's not going to stop us from street preaching. We're still going to go out in the street. Amen. You think about Paul, you know, the apostle Paul. You know, he didn't flee. He didn't flee because of reproach or ridicule. He just stood. That's what we ought to do. We ought to just stand. Amen. Father, we ask you to help us, and we pray your blessing upon this, and we ask that everything said and done would just be said in a way that would be pleasing to you. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. Did you know that the war in Ukraine has caused a big turmoil? But you know what happened? A majority of the missionaries in Ukraine are still there. They didn't flee. When everybody else was fleeing, they stayed there. And you know what's happening? Hundreds and hundreds of Ukrainians are getting saved. Hard time has hit Ukraine. And these people that, you know, ridicule and run down the church and run down the Lord and run down Christians, you know, pretty soon their foundation collapsed. So they turned to the One Sure Foundation. So there's a bunch of them getting saved. Our brother Green, I saw you had his prayer letter up there. Brother Brian Green went to Ukraine. He told us about how just everywhere he'd take about 100 tracks and he'd walk down one street and he'd be gone. Then he had to go get some more. He said, only in Ukraine it happened. It don't happen anywhere else. He said, people are just taking it, saying, you know, what you got? And tell them about how this tells you how to get saved and go to heaven. And they're grabbing it. And this is, folks, this is a communist country. And God is stirring up in there all because missionaries said, I'm going to stay. Come hell or high water, I'm going to stick with it. I'm not going to run. Should such a man as I flee? You know? We need Baptists, you know. We got too many Baptist beanies, beanie babies, you know. And we need them to get some old-fashioned guts, get out there and fight the good fight. Folks, I've been sick now for the last six years off and on, but it's not stopped me. But you know what? I can show you. If I took you home today, I can show you the folks that got saved during the time of my hardest time battling sickness. And people got saved. And God does that. And that's my next point. Notice what it says there. It says, if the foundation be destroyed, What can the righteous do? In the next verse, the Lord is in his temple, the Lord's throne is in heaven, his eyes behold, his eyes try the children of men. The Lord tryeth the righteous. God's gonna try you and I. Because we're his children, God tries his own. But you know what? We need to learn how to rejoice in trials. Did you know that trials is a teacher? It'll teach you. How do we act and how to deal with things? Not only is it a teacher, but you know, it's also a trial helps you to get tough. It toughens you. Amen. And then also it tenders you. So it's a teacher. Trials are good for us. Here's Paul, he's going on a ship to Rome. And he told the men there, he said, I told you we shouldn't have gone. But since you guys went ahead and took that boat out there, we're facing trials. But he said, let me just tell you, be of good cheer. You're not being so low. He's rejoicing. He said, man, I get to go to Rome and stand before Caesar. Nothing's going to hinder that. God promised me that. You see what I'm saying? Trials are good for us. Sometimes trials does come and we don't like it. But you know what? over there in the 22nd chapter of Genesis. We're reminded of Abraham, who the Bible says he was a friend of God. That means that God tries his friend. Are you a friend of God? Well, he gonna try you. He tried Abraham. Abraham knew that, you know what? My God, he decides to kill my son. He'll raise him up because he's a God of resurrection. That's okay. Let it happen. So he trusted the Lord. He stayed, he stuck it out, he went through the trials. Just like Paul did. Went through the trials and at the end he said, be of good cheer. I don't know about you, but sometimes trouble hits us and we don't wanna be happy, we don't wanna rejoice. But you know what the Bible says? Look over there in the book of 1 Peter for a minute. I'll give you a verse. You think I'm just rattling along, but I'll tell you, I'll give you a verse here. Right here in the book of, yeah, 1 Peter chapter 4. Look there with me, 1 Peter chapter 4. The Bible says this in verse number 11. Well, I'll do verse 12 for a second time. It says this, for the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his eyes are open unto their prayers. But the face of the Lord is against them that do evil. And who, excuse me, I'm reading verses 13 in chapter three, but it says there that Lord is against the people that are evil. That's what I wanted to bring out. And then in chapter four, it says, if any man speak, verse 11, let him speak as the oracles of God. If any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God gives him. God in all things may be glorified through Christ Jesus, to whom be praise and dominion forever and ever. Verse 12, Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trials which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you. But notice this is crazy, but rejoice. So here you are, you're going through a hard time, you're getting hit with everything from every direction. God just said, just rejoice. That's hard to do when you're in bed sick, you know, with a fever. Oh, thank God I got a fever, Lord. You know, it's hard to do that. But God said, rejoice so much as you are partaker of Christ's suffering, that when his glory shall be revealed, you will be glad also with exceeding joy. Remember the Bible said he was facing the cross in Hebrews chapter number 12. And Bible said that joy that was set before him. He was looking at that. He wasn't looking for the suffering that he was going through, the cross. He's looking beyond that. He's looking at the time he's gonna rejoice. And when he brings many sons unto him, Hebrew says, and you included, and me included. We got in on that stuff. Because we have a God that could take the trial. He took it, folks. You can take it. You and I can take it. You and I can face these things. And Bible says that, yea, all them that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. It's like in Timothy chapter 3 verse 12. Right now, most of you probably can't really identify with the trials that do come. I mean, America is so spoiled. See, in Navajos, we still have to haul our water. We still have, like I said a while ago, we still have outhouses that we have to visit. three or four times a day. We still have no electricity. A lot of them still burn coal oil lamps. But to them, that's normal. To them, that's accepted. The government has forgotten the American Indian. He came and he took his land and never gave anything back. And a lot of Indian tribes are holding grudges. South Dakota is full of Indians that do not want nothing to do with white man religion. I go up there and preach to them. They say, you traitor. You went and forsook your tradition. You pick up the white man's religion. I tell them, my religion ain't white. Navajo say that all the time at our reservation, too. We got this new religion called peyote religion. They call it traditional Navajo religion. It's not Navajo traditional. It came in 1943, 44, somewhere in there. Somebody went to Texas to the Comanche tribe and brought that, you know, that evil worship back to the reservation, and the majority of Navajos had that. One day I was out visiting, I'm knocking on doors, I met this guy, and he was a peyote priest. That's what he was. He held peyote meetings. I told him, I said, what's with the deal with this peyote? He said, we harvest it and right now it's illegal to carry it unless you got a card that says you can harvest that. We get it from Texas and Mexico, we bring it, and that's what we use. Just like you, he told me, he said, just like you Christians. Take the bread and the wine for Lord's Supper. We take the peyote button and water for our supper. And then he was comparing it that way. Then he said, but the only thing, he said, the only thing different is, see, your religion's white man religion, and mine is Indian, he said. Then I said, I beg to differ. Then he said, what do you mean? Then I told him this. I said, you probably don't know this, and I'll just educate you right here. I told you, I said, back in the 1800s, there was a chief by the name of Quanah Parker. Quanta Parker was part white, part Indian. He's the one that got wounded by the U.S. Calvary and he fled to Mexico. And supposedly some witch over there healed him and that bullet wound got healed with that medicine. He brought it back and he started using that medicine as a worship tool. And that's where peyote began. So I said, so if anything, that peyote religion was started by a white man. So mine was started by a Jewish man named Jesus Christ. And he didn't know what to say. I told him, you need to educate yourself. You couldn't run in your mouth without knowing the facts. The Bible, you need to get in the Word of God and let him teach you that. But you know, a lot of people are like that. While the trials are taking down a lot of these people that are anti-God and anti-Bible, that same trial is making us stronger. Amen. We started our church, Two Wells Baptist, Right at the beginning of COVID, the police came, the authorities came, the neighborhood government came and said, you can't do that. You can't do that. It's impossible to do it. Nobody would come. I stood on a platform about six inches wide. I put a platform, I put a pulpit, and I stood out in open air. And I put a sign up by the road that says, church meeting here, come. And people drove up. I said, stay in your vehicle. Let me just preach to you. And one of the men would get out and take a basket, and he would pass it for offering. They never asked for offering, but they would watch me, and I did that. And that's where the church got started. Right at the same time, COVID was really coming in, and everybody was afraid of it. We was having church. They said I couldn't do it. I told them, I said, you watch. I said, the last time I read in the Bible, Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. He's the one who started the church, not the government. You government officials, I respect you, but I'm not going to follow your laws, because you've got man-made laws. And I've got a book that tells me I'm going to have church. And I've got every right to do that. And I'm telling you, folks, out in Clackito, the policeman came and blocked the road. And the preacher couldn't go in. He called me. Gary called me. He said, they're not letting me in. I said, I'll tell you what. I said, take a couple tracks and witness to them. At least you get two people this morning. You don't have church service. At least you got the people. He went over there and he gave a track to one of the police officers. That police officer just broke down. He backed his vehicle up. And he said, preacher, you can't let your people in. I'm a Christian, too. I'm going to go back to Winter Rock and tell my boss, you go out there and stop them, not me. He defied the law that he was to uphold because he had conviction and was stronger than what man brings. That's what this book does to you. Amen. The truth will find its root in you. Then you learn to handle the trials that come in. Trials after trials can come, but you can get stronger and stronger. So rejoice. Amen. And don't let trials crumble your life. Don't let it destroy your foundation. Then number three, I want to say that verse number six and seven challenges us to walk in righteousness. Trust the Lord, rejoice in your trials, and then walk in righteousness. The Lord loves righteousness. That's what the Bible says. So when everyone and everything else around you goes down to apostasy, don't descend with it. Man, we got Churches that supposed to be good independent fundamentalist churches got songs that they sing. They're not like our songs this morning We sung every one of them songs. He sung this morning. We sing in our church And man, it stirs us up It stirred me up a while ago Amen, I felt like running the aisle but this church might be a little more dignified. I just said my wife said don't run. Hey there I Amen. He said, oh, I want to see him. The moment I walk out that door, he might meet me. Amen. I'll tell you, those songs are real. But we got churches today, so-called independent families. They got people up here, you know, that got half their hair purple. They got yellow shoes. And they're not dressed to worship the Lord. And I'm telling you, they're a mess. And they got these lights, strobe lights, you know. Coming to church is not an entertainment. It's a worship service. It's a time that we get close to our God. We spend a whole week listening to that crowd out there running down our God, running down our Bible, running down everything. But this is our time when we come and rejoice. And the louder we do it and the longer we do it, the better off we're going to be. Walking in righteousness, it's not that hard. You just have to make up your mind that you're going to do right. I tell people back home, you know what, if you're not right, get right. And then just be right and stay right. And then I said, when you die, everything will be all right. That's the best way to live. Amen. But keep doing right. You know, a lot of people are weakening their services, Christians. Weakening their walk and you know what it appears that they're getting away with Some stuff and you're getting away with this and that but you know what don't go along with it You stick with your guns. I Love this in this church Because it's old-fashioned. I like that. Amen. I Told folks in my church. I said they don't a lot of people don't know old-fashioned. So I Most of you that are as old as me or older, let's just stick in here so people know that it's an old-fashioned church. And we've been doing this a long time. My uncle that just got saved, you know, he's older than me, quite a bit older than me, about 10, 15 years. And he got saved, and that's what he told me. He said, from the time that you gave me that money, I watched you. Every time I came out here, I watched you. He said, one thing I noticed about you is that you got boldness. I said, my sisters, they told you, you can't build here. And then you told them, show me where it says it. Here's the deed to the land. This is my land. Matter of fact, you're trespassing. You need to get out of my land. And you're not coming to worship, and you need to take a few steps back out of my land. And you know what? It shut up my aunt. And he said that you're the first person that I know that actually caused her to shut up. And he said, she walks over everybody. And now she shut up, he said, and I was really surprised, he said, and that impressed me. And I said, what is it that he has that I don't have? And that day he witnessed to me, I said, that's it. I'm not saved. I'm going to church, I'm acting like a Christian, but I'm not saved. And I need to get saved. So he stopped me and said, how can I get saved? Well, that was a tender moment leading your Uncle to the Lord, you know what a blessing be able to tell him you know a Folks you don't want the wicked to come and get involved and stuff. That is you know Bad and bringing into the church, you know There's plenty of righteousness in church and there's plenty of things that we can do to help maintain the foundation of this church This church the reason why I like coming here. It's got it's got a good foundation But if the foundation be destroyed, what can you do? Just keep trusting the Lord. Hey, just rejoice in your trial. And then just keep walking in righteousness. Walking in righteousness is something that we need to really emphasize. 2 Timothy 2, verse 19. Nevertheless, the foundation of God standeth sure. Having this seal, the Lord knoweth them that are his, and let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity. In other words, walk right, talk right, do right. When I got saved, I'll give you a little bit of testimony and I'm done. You know, when I got saved, I got saved in a place called Ojo Amarillo and there was over 200 homes. And that preacher would come every Thursday night at 6.30 and knock on my door. He aggravated me. I said, why is he always knocking on my door? How come he can't knock on these other doors? There's over 200 other homes, you know, but he'd come to my house, make a beeline every Thursday night. I come back from work at the power plant, which was about five minutes away, and I would come back with my Carhartt overalls before I even take it off. There he is. So finally, I told my wife, I said, you can't beat him, join him. Put on some coffee. And we started putting coffee on at 6.30, and sure enough, he'd show up, and we'd have coffee together. But the moment he started talking about the Bible or Jesus, I tell him, it's time for you to leave. Then one day, he didn't show up on Thursday. And I thought, what happened to him? I was really concerned. Man, he's usually on time, and he's here Thursday night. I said, what happened? Then he showed up on Saturday, and he said, tomorrow, I'm having church service down here at the school, at the gymnasium. I'd like for you to come. Then we got there, and he had a big tarp on that gymnasium floor, and about 25, 30 chairs. A lady came in with her kids. Another lady came with their kids. That was it. Then it was us, my wife, me, and Terrence, and Terrence's sister, Vinnie. Christina, my third daughter, my third child, was not born yet. We're all sitting there. And he said, who don't have a Bible? I raised my hand, and he reached in a box and took out a King James Bible. He opened to Luke 16. He said, son, you don't need to turn. I'm going to be preaching out of there. And he preached hell hot. Man, I got to work thinking, man, this guy is after me. I'm going to leave. I started to leave, and his two boys, David and Timothy, were standing over there. And they were standing like this with their head behind them, like a military person at a parade rest. They're daring me to leave. And I thought, both of them were taller and bigger than me. I thought, well, I'll just stick it out. And I turned around. Preacher was crying. He was no longer preaching on hell. He was preaching on Calvary. He said, there's only one time in the Bible the word Calvary shows up. Because it only took one person one time to pay for our sin. And his name is Jesus. Do you know him? Jesus loved you with an everlasting love. He started crying. For some reason, I was crying. So I got up and came on this side of the bleachers. I can show you within one foot of the place where I got saved. I went home. I forgot I drove. I walked home. It was only a few blocks, but I walked home. My wife was right behind me. It was snowing like crazy. I could have sworn the birds were singing. I could have sworn the sun was shining. Got back to the church. I mean, got back to the house. We walked in, and there's my dog. Every time I go in the house, that dog will go in the bedroom. He knows I'm going to kick him. I don't want dogs in the house. I'm going to go somewhere. My wife puts a dog in the house, and I'll tell her, When we come back, you guys clean up his mess. I didn't want the dog in the house. I always kick him. And he was looking for a kick, and he ran in the back room. I went back there, and I told him, I said, Daisy, come here. And he come crawling up, and then he went and licked my hand. And she's like, man, he actually let me lick his hand. He didn't kick me. Even the dog knew I got saved. We took all the beer. I'd usually take my son, and I'd tell him, son, open me up a can of beer. And after work, he'd always grab a can of beer, and he'd open it up. And that day, I told him, we're going to open it all up. And I set him on the sink. Here's the sink. I set him on the counter. And he opened it up. And my wife started singing Amazing Grace, and we poured that stuff down. Amen. And after we got done, then I said, OK, no more drinking. And then my son said, Dad, I know where there's some more. You know how when you're drunk, you know that you can hide anything from your kids, but they know anyway? Dad says, I saw a Seagram 7 behind the washing machine. We went back there, and there was a Seagram 7. I took it out, and I dumped it out. They said, Dad, how about that one under your pillow back there? And I took that Cutty Sarc out to dump it. Man, we had revival. One man revival. I'm talking about, folks, that booze went out that window. The Bible came in from this window. Everything about me changed. Man, I never got over that. That's why I'm talking about walking right. All these years, I have never had no taste to do that. Matter of fact, when I see somebody drunk, I know right away that they're drinking. They may not only took a little bit, but I know. Because I used to live that life. But it's been over 40 years that I don't even remember what it tastes like. I'm glad I didn't take out cigarettes. That would have been harder to handle, you know? Some Christians, they still smoke. You may not go to hell with smoking, but you smell like you've been there. If I was you, I'd throw it away, amen? Did you ever notice that two's a number of rebellion? You ever notice that when a person goes in the bar, he says, how much you want to drink? You put a glass down, a shot glass, it says, jigger, two fingers. You ever notice that the pope says, two fingers, curse you? You ever notice that a man smokes two fingers? He's saying, I'm a rebellion. I don't care what you say, I'm going to smoke. You see that? Your actions speak louder than words. I could stand here all day and tell you all this stuff, but man, I tell you, what I preach already is enough. Number one, trust the Lord. Number two, what did I say? Rejoice in your trial. And number three, just walk, right? Walk righteously. God loves righteousness. And if you're walking right, God ain't going to have no problem with you. Just keep doing right. Amen. And you know, there's a saying. I got it written in my Bible. Probably an unsaved man said this, but this is what I wrote. You said you have enemies. Good. That means you're standing for something right. I write down all these thoughts, you know. They're not original with me, I just write them down to say it. But that makes a lot of sense. You're standing for a right, you're gonna have an enemy. Amen. You go out to the reservation, you visit any Navajo and say, you know Brother Calvin, he's a real good man. They'll say, huh? They got people out there that don't like preachers that preach the word of God. Jonathan was talking about that not too long ago about people in Winslow You know, I think tears is responsible for that tire stirred up. That's that town Before he left became evangelist. He pastored that church and He stirred up a lot of people for good And a lot of them did get saved doesn't get right, but a lot of them got mad. They're still mad We were out there one day and he said dad how did I? There's a first town, when you cross the state line in Arizona, the first town is Holbrook, and then Winslow, until you get to that beautiful town of Flagstaff. You got to go through these two towns. Son said, Dad, how did these towns get started? I said, a bunch of people. He said, I'm going to go west, because horse screaming. He said, go west, young man. So I said, they started out, but they ran out of money out of the middle of nowhere. And they said, I guess we'll just settle here. And then I found out that that wasn't true, that all those people are Mormons. Those all Mormon towns, Snowflake, Flagstaff, I mean, Winslow, all those are Mormons built those towns. And that's why they don't like this, folks. They got nothing to do with it. But you know what? God stuck us right in the middle of those towns and made us preach to them. And I counted the joy, amen. Kind of a blessing to be able to talk to these people. Because they need the Lord. But you know something? One thing they can never say about Terrence is that he wasn't doing right. He wasn't walking right. Every one of those people that I talked to, even the ones that didn't like him, said, you know what? That preacher did something right that stuck. And it always reminds me that when he's here, that that's what we're going to hear. I may not agree with it, but I'm glad somebody's right. Folks, it pays to live right and do right. That's the message I'll leave with you this morning. Because we know the Lord, we can do right. We can live right. We can talk right. What was it Joe Coley says? Talk right, be right, and spit white. That's about how we need to be. Amen. Well, let's have our heads bowed, eyes closed.