And I'm just so thankful for what the Lord's continuing to do through this church and what the Lord is going to do throughout this year. Let's keep our eyes on him. Amen. And I want to take a few moments tonight before we get into the video. The video will be after this challenge, if you will. I want to take a few moments. I want to go over some things that the Lord had helped us with throughout this past year. and some things that the Lord allowed us to see, some things that were blessings, and just be able to look back and see how God has blessed us and how God's been good over this past year. And there was a lot of things accomplished in 2024. And then I also want to give us a challenge towards the end of this as well, based on our theme from last year, just a few statements on that. In 2024, uh, this past year, it's hard to believe we, it's hard for me to say last year, this is what happened is only a few days ago. Amen. It feels like this year still. But, uh, today I had, I was writing something down and I had to write 2025 and it just felt weird. My mind wanted to write a four there at the end of it. But, uh, the reality is we are in a new year. But the Lord blessed us last year and the Lord is so good to us each and every one of us. And as I was looking over all that the Lord had done in this past year it's humbling to see how the Lord worked in different lives and I can't get into everything tonight on everything that the Lord has done over this past year. But what I can guarantee you is that in addition to these statistics and things that I'm going to give you and names mentioned and added to the church and baptisms and all of that. What I can guarantee you is this, that the Lord has been working in families in the midst of our church throughout this year. I've met with different individuals. I've met with different families. I've met with our young men just about every week, different young men on different days. throughout the year, and just seeing how the Lord has worked in their lives, and there have been husbands and wives that I've met with, there's been many different ones, and just to see the Lord work in people's lives is humbling. And it's humbling because I know that that same God that's worked in their life has worked in my life as well, and desires to work in every one of our lives. And for all of us, what I'd like to challenge us to do is in this next year, keep your eyes on God. Don't take your eyes off of God. Just keep your eyes on Him no matter what we go through. Know that He is there for you. His strength and His grace are sufficient for us. And there are many things to praise God for. And the Bible says, let the redeemed of the Lord say so. Amen? And let's continue to praise God for what He's done in our lives as well. But in 2024, what we have seen, we saw over 100 first-time guests in 2024. And when you look at that, I've got a envelope in my office and it's got all of the first-time guest cards. And we take that, that goes into a database. And also, so Brother Delaney puts that into a database for us. And Miss Erica sends out a letter to each and every one of them thanking them for coming. And I'm so thankful for the help that I have In that and especially when we get as many first time guests as we receive, we average over two guests a week. That's over two or two, if not more of those letters that went out per week. Some were four letters, some was one letter, some weeks was no letter, but it was an average of two first time guests per week. And that does not include the ones who were here under the preaching during funerals and things like that. It didn't include those first-time guests. And we had two funerals this year, and through those we had over 600 people, between the two funerals, over 600 people come through this building. Some came only for the viewing, some stayed for the service. Each time we had well over 100 here for the services. hundred heard a clear presentation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And I was just thrilled at that to be able to just hear the Gospel go forth through those things. Multiple professions of faith, hands going up all over the room with ones that had trusted Christ during those things. Different funerals that I had the opportunity to preach. outside of this place, even in funeral homes and in other facilities and things like that and people trusting Christ as their Savior. As I look back over this year and I see the ones that the Lord brought into this place and the amount of people that heard the Gospel and then also the way that He was able to to use me as an instrument, if you will, of this place to go out and preach the gospel as well. It's humbling to think of how many people heard the gospel of Jesus Christ, many of them probably for the first time in their life. The Lord is using this place and let's continue to serve him. Just to name a few throughout this year, professions of faith in our immediate church family. We had Emma Torres, she trusted Christ as her Savior. Brother Jerry Coleman as well, Brother Robert Adelman, many more that we could see trusted Christ as their Savior throughout this year. Families and individuals added to the church, of course the Torres family, and I know I'm going to forget one or maybe two, but I'll go down this list, the Torres family, The Campbells at the beginning of the year, the England family at the very beginning of the year, or the last year, or the last week of 2023. It's debatable on which week they joined there, but I believe it was this year. Ryan and Robin Freeze, Miss Vera as well, and just many individuals and families. added to the church through this year. And God has blessed us with some great people, ones that are growing in the Lord, ones at many different stages as far as a spiritual growth is concerned. And you know I've mentioned before that If you have a church in which everybody is on the exact same page and everybody is at the same place spiritually speaking you do not have a biblical church because we are to be reaching people. People are at different stages if you will, different growth as they learn the Word of God and as they grow in the Word of God. People are all over the map if you will spiritually speaking. It's our job to teach them and the Lord has given us the opportunity to do that. And one of the ways in which we're able to teach outside of regular services is of course regular Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night is our Sunday school. And our Sunday school attendance has been consistently increasing and our high Sunday school attendance in 2024 was 63 in Sunday school. It was a great day, and we've been averaging in the mid-50s is where we're averaging right now in Sunday school. But we have, of course, the auditorium class here for the adults. We have the teen class with some young adults there as well. We have the first through fifth class. Ms. Kristen teaches that, and then also the fours and fives, which Ms. Kim teaches. And we've just got a lot of people coming to Sunday school And that is just a great thing. And just to put it into perspective for your high of 63 averaging of course in the mid 50s in the years leading up to this at least in the last four years in 2021 our average and Sunday school was somewhere between 15 and 20. Our average in 2022 was just under 30. Our average in 2023, we had a high day in the high 30s of 39, but then in 2024, of course, our high day of 63. So we saw a large increase in Sunday school last year, and I'm just praising the Lord for that. Our church welcomed a baby last year. Amen, Miss Melody. And she is doing well, praise the Lord for that. She's down in the nursery. I believe, I don't see her back there, so she's down there in the nursery. And Lord willing, welcoming a baby this year, of course, with Ryan and Robin Fries. And Robin, of course, expecting there and coming right up. Let's be in prayer for the Fries family. They are planning on inducing her at the beginning of February. And I heard, of course, that's a few weeks out now and the baby is already measuring over six pounds. So if she makes it to February, I said, that baby's going to be a bruiser. Amen. But let's pray for a healthy delivery there. As far as attendance goes, last year our highest Sunday morning on a non-promotional Sunday, so a promotional Sunday would have been something that we're handing out invitations for, such as Easter Sunday, First Responders Day, those types of things. But the highest Sunday morning last year on a non-promotional Sunday was 94, and this place was full. I was glad that we had chairs in the back. on that day. Our highest Sunday night, I believe, was 47. Our highest Wednesday night was 44. And every one of those was higher than the highest in the years leading up to this, at least in the last four years. We've had a lot of growth in those areas as well. And we had several promotional Sundays and promotional services that were hovering right around 100 in attendance and many even over that. And praise the Lord for that. You know, as we go through the year, we have a tracker or we have some things in the sound booth and the men take a count of the attendance. And of course, for Sunday school, we take a count of attendance as well. And it is not so that we can stand up somewhere in some council and say, well this is how many we're running. We count attendance because we can see where the Lord's brought us from, where the Lord's taking us, and it helps us to plan as well for the future. It's just amazing just watching the Lord work through these things. And just on the way of statistics or in the way of statistics there are sermon audio. We have of course sermon audio. That's what our live streaming goes through. People can get that whether they go to sermonaudio.com and look up our church. They can have our church app and get it that way. They can go on to our website and click on live stream and they can watch it directly from our website. Many different ways people can get to our sermon audio. And just in 2024 our sermon audio had 12,621 plays and since 2022 we have had 33,955 plays on our sermon audio. That includes people listening to the service live and then also people listening to sermons and the special music that gets posted after that. Um, as well of those 12,000 plays there, 8,824 were videos. The remaining, uh, 3,797, uh, were only audio. Uh, in 2024, our sermon audio reached all 50 States. And in last year alone, we reached 54 different countries just in 2024. And those countries range all over the map. It's amazing when you look at that map, there is a lot more that's blue means that someone there in that country has listened to our sermon audio, and there was a lot more blue than there is gray. Since 2022, the sermon audio from this pulpit, these sermons have reached 102 different countries all around this world. And you may say, well, how are those people hearing about us? I have no idea. I don't know. But what I do know is that God is allowing the gospel to go out from this pulpit and it's going all around this world. And I'm so thankful for that. We completed over 70,000 Romans booklets in 2024. We were able to support, of course, all of our missionaries on the back wall there, 19 missionaries able to support every single month. Last year, we purchased the folding machine early in the year. We were able to use it throughout the year. to produce, of course, Romans booklets for Beacon of Truth. Many of those that we took care of, if not all of them, went to Venezuela with Beacon of Truth. And looking forward to just seeing much fruit for our labor there in those countries. We were able to add 25 white chairs to the chairs that we already have downstairs. That took us to a hundred of those. And there were multiple events where we had to have all of those chairs out. And that's a blessing as well. We added the chairs of the auditorium this year. That was a blessing. And of course, being able to have them here. on the platform as well. And these chairs for the auditorium, we added 60 of them, used them throughout the year, able to start the choir this year that was kicked off on Easter Sunday. And that was a blessing. And of course, being able to sing that song Beyond the Cross there on Easter Sunday, what a blessing that was. I truthfully believe, and I know I've heard many people talk about it as well in a great way. I think the choir adds such a great element to our morning service just being able to hear a group of people just sing praises unto God. And if I could just encourage each and every one of us if you are not in the choir and you want to be join the choir, amen. But if you are sitting out there and you are listening to the choir don't just listen to people sing, listen to the words of the songs. The same way when it goes with the hymns, let's not just sing these things that are familiar. Let's know exactly what it's talking about. Why do we sing the hymns that we sing is because they teach doctrine. It's not just some foolish song. No, it's teaching us the truths of God's word. The choir gives yet another place for individuals to serve the Lord. Our first responders day. That was a great day. We had multiple departments represented, one all the way from Hokuson. That was here. You'll see pictures of that in the video here in just a little while. And we're still seeing the fruits of our labors for the first responder day. I've been in the community. I was in the community at a certain place not too long ago and this lady asked me as I was getting ready to purchase this item there. She asked me, she said, are you the pastor of the church that hosts the first responders day every year? And I said, yes, I am. And she thanked me for the church here and for caring for the first responders. And I'm so thankful for that. And you may say, well, how did she hear about it? I don't know. Cause she wasn't here that day. But she heard about it, and maybe a family member or a friend that was a first responder. And I say all that to say this, these things that we're doing, understand in the community, it makes a difference. These things resonate with people. And we don't just do these so that we can fill a calendar. How many in your personal life you are busy? Every one of us, we're a busy people. We're not doing these things just so our calendar can be filled here at the church. We're doing these things so that we can reach more people with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And the First Responders Day is a great way to do that. Vacation Bible School, Brother Colton Peck was here, did a great job. We had over a hundred different kids come through the doors. We had over a hundred here on family night, multiple professions of faith. It was a great week and the Lord blessed during that week there. We were able to get the flooring replaced over in the parsonage and due to the other one dying, Brother Gary installed a new hot water heater in the parsonage, amen. And it was one of those situations, but the hot water heater didn't seem to warn us. It just decided I'm not working anymore, but I appreciate Brother Gary and putting that in for us. If you remember last year, I say if you remember like it was a long time ago, Remember our theme, okay, so we're digging back in time, I drilled this into our minds this morning, but last year our theme was so bountifully, rebountively. Who can tell me what passage that theme was from? Anybody tell me? Sammy's got it, it's on the tip of his tongue, I know it is. Anybody know? You don't have to raise your hand. I'm turning there, I'm giving you time. I'll give you a hint. It's in the New Testament. That means it's not in the Old Testament, Bailey, just in case you needed to know that. Nope. Nope. Second Corinthians? Nope. You give enough guesses, you'll get it. Amen? Chapter 9, verse what? I don't know whose son you are. 2 Corinthians 9 and verse 6, turn there if you will, 2 Corinthians 9, 6. Sow bountifully, reap bountifully. Here in 2 Corinthians chapter 9 and verse 6, and you may look at this and say, wait a second, this has a lot more words here than just sow bountifully, reap bountifully. Yeah, there is, but the truth is there. And this is what we of course looked at last year And with our theme there, sow bountifully, reap bountifully, it says this, but this I say, he which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly, and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also sparingly. Everything that I've mentioned thus far, all of the statistics, all of the ones that have came through these doors, all the times the Gospel was preached, and over 200 messages were preached in this building. If you give all of Sunday School and everything, close to 300 messages or lessons were given under this roof last year. And every single one of those things represent seed that was sown from this place. Every one of those first-time guests that came in here, you know what we did when they came? We sowed seed into their life. I wish I could say that everyone in my life throughout this year I sowed bountifully into their life. But I can't say that and neither can you. Why? Because there are some that we should have given the gospel to that we didn't. There were some that we should have encouraged in a certain way and we didn't. Oh, at the time we had great excuses on why and all of those types of things. But what I want to do tonight is just take just a couple of moments here and we'll get into the video here. But I want us to see how much the Lord has blessed us and how much the Lord completed through this place last year and how many people were able to hear the gospel and how many tracks we were able to hand out. Over 30,000 tracks went out from this building in 2024. Over 30,000. It's a wonderful thing. It's a lot of seed going forward. But let me ask you this, if over 30,000 tracts left this place, we could all look at that and say, wow, that's a lot of tracts. Let me ask you this. How many did you hand out? Of that 30,000, how many can I say I handed out? If everyone handed out the exact same amount of tracts as I handed out in 2024, how many would this church have handed out? Can I help you here tonight? It would have been less than 30,000. It would have been. Why? Because there are times in our life, though we know we are to sow bountifully in good things, we sow sparingly. And there are things in our life that are important to us physically speaking or or emotionally speaking, physically speaking, whatever it may be. There are things in our life that are important to us. And all throughout the year, we sow bountifully to those things. When many times we're sowing sparingly with the things of God as we watch the video here in just a moment it's great to reflect on what God has done but let's understand that even though we've reaped many blessings we must continue to sow good seed throughout this year there there will be new ministry opportunities there's going to be new areas of service the Holy Spirit is going to continue to speak to our hearts as as he allows us to and as we allow him to and with these new areas of service you know what they're going to need they're going to need workers they're going to need people who are willing to to be used let's be involved and let's strive to to get others involved as well if you know of someone that is coming to the church no matter what service it is and you don't know if they're saved ask them some people will say well so-and-so well well they're not even saved When's the last time you gave them the gospel? You see, people are coming into this place, as I mentioned this morning, looking for hope, looking for help, looking for something to fill that void. There are people that come and they may have heard the gospel over and over and over again. And you know what they're waiting for? Someone to take an interest in them and say, have you ever trusted Christ as your personal savior? And anything short of, yes, I've trusted Christ as my personal Savior. If it's a, well, I think so, or I hope so, or whatever it may be, do not leave them there. Allow the Lord to work in your life, to give them the gospel, to present that to them. If they're saved and they're not baptized, encourage them to follow the Lord in that way. If they're not members of the church, encourage them to join the Grace Baptist Church family. Let's serve God together. What did the Lord say? He said, pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth laborers into his harvest. We're to pray for that, are we not? You know all throughout the scriptures we are told as well in verse and also in principle that we're not only to pray for things but we are to be working to that end. Lord help me to lead someone to you. I'm not going to talk to anybody but Lord help me lead someone to you. It's not gonna work. No, Lord, help me to lead someone to you, and as I yield to you, and as I'm willing to give someone the gospel, put people in my path, and we have to take advantage of those times. Reality is this as well, many times we just go throughout our life and we just go throughout our weeks and months and years and as we come to church, week in and week out, we're here Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night and we're here with one another and we have no idea many times where someone is spiritually speaking. Why? Because we haven't talked to them about it. Ask them. I have yet have someone, that is, that has been attending church for some time now, I've yet to have someone get upset with me when I ask, when did you trust Christ as your Savior? Or, have you ever trusted Christ as your Savior? And it's amazing how many times the Lord has allowed that to open a door, and I may not be able to lead them to the Lord then, but it gets the wheels turning in their mind. Take interest in people. As we go throughout this year, yes, let's be praying for laborers for the harvest, but let's put our feet to the prayers and make disciples. Let's encourage one another to take that next step. You know something every one of us can do as we come into this place on Sunday morning at 9.30? Look around your Sunday school class. Just look around. As we mentioned a little bit ago, our high in Sunday school was in the 60s, our average was in the 50s, but we average in the high 70s and 80s in Sunday morning. That means there's somewhere between 20 and 30 people that are coming to Sunday morning that are not coming to Sunday school. Who can you encourage to come to Sunday school this year? Do you know God's word is true for you? Then it's true for them as well. I'm not saying browbeat people. What I'm saying is this. Let them know how the Lord has been speaking to your heart through the Sunday school lesson. From the youngest to the oldest. Let's be excited about what God is teaching us and be excited about what we're learning and let's share it with them. This is all part of sowing bountifully. Yeah, in 2025, we've moved on to this theme. Thy word is truth. but let's not lose sight of the fact that we are to still sow bountifully. Sow bountifully, reap bountifully. Sow sparingly, reap sparingly. I had different pastors that I would talk to throughout the year and they would ask different things and they would ask what kind of things are going on in the church and what events are coming up and different things that they would ask about the ministry here. And I would have many of them and they would say this, they said, do you ever sleep? And I'd say, well, I do eventually, amen? My body just conks out, amen? I said, we're a busy church. I said, that's a good thing. We are to be busy because time is running out. And in talking to these preachers, you know what I found out when I started asking them about the church that the Lord has placed them over as well? I found out that I would be asking them, do you ever sleep? Because they're busy as well. When God is working in a place, you know what God's going to do? He's going to have people that are involved and He's going to allow the church to start new ministries and reach more people. And more people, yes, it's great to see this place packed. It's great to be able to preach the gospel to as many people as possible. It's great to hear the singing when this place is full. But people mean God. work. It means work. As I mentioned, every first-time guest that comes to the door, they get a letter. Most of the time, it's the exact same week. Within a few days of being here, they have a letter in their mailbox thanking them for being here. Then they get visited and they come back or meet with them. They want to meet about different things. There's a lot of work that goes into that, but you know what we're trying to do? We're trying to sow bountifully. into people's lives so that we can reap bountifully. And we've seen people being helped by the gospel of Jesus Christ, being helped by the Bible, being helped by all of these things. And if I could encourage us to do one thing tonight, it's this, keep on keeping on. Just stay busy. Don't give up. Keep sowing bountifully so that you can reap bountifully. We can all look at areas of our life and we can say, you know what? And in this past year, there were there were things in my life, spiritually speaking, that I didn't so bountifully in. And because I didn't so bountifully, boy, I'm reaping sparingly. It doesn't have to be that way in 2025. Make the change now. Lord, I failed in the past. Help me. Remember last year I said, reflect on, but do not dwell on the failures of last year. Lord, I failed in the past, but I know you can and you desire to help me in the future. Let's allow the Lord to do a great work in our lives throughout