I appreciate all the good singing this evening. Praising the Lord in song. And we should all have a desire to do that. Some of us are much better than others. But to the Lord, He's not listening for that, what do you call it, perfect pitch? He's just listening. He just wants to hear us, whoever we are. And He give us the the knowledge of music and to sing. He'd give people words to write down and we may not be any good at it at all. But the Lord just wants to hear us praise him and I appreciate I appreciate that well this morning we preached on John 3 16 and what we were trying to do was give a very concise complete message of the gospel on how to be saved now That's good But now if we do go by, I ask at the end of the service, is anybody in here lost? Okay, and I didn't get a hand, that doesn't mean none were, but nobody raised their hand. So if that were to be true, and we left that message here, it's about useless. Now it went out over the air, I guess it's on, it'll be on YouTube too, somebody might hear it there, but that's not the reason for it. Now what I wanna try to do this evening is basically take the same message and encourage you to take that message out those doors because that's what we need to do preaching is proclaiming the gospel now you do have men that are called to preach And that's preaching from a pulpit, preaching from a street corner, or you know what I'm saying there, preaching. But the word preaching simply means to proclaim the gospel. And that is what all God's children should do, is proclaim the gospel. So I've titled the message tonight simply Soul Winning 101. Now if you're in Sunday School class in the auditorium you've heard most of what I'm going to say but I'm sure I will deliver it different. I didn't memorize what I said then. I'm sure I'll deliver it different. It'll be good to hear again. But we should all have a desire to win souls through Christ. And it doesn't come from aptitude, being a genius, being smarter, knowing how to talk better. It comes from knowing the word of God. You cannot proclaim the gospel if you do not know the gospel. So we should make it a concentrated effort, concentrated and consecrated effort to know the word of God that we may proclaim it when we go outside these doors. We're going to be back in John 3.16, John chapter 3, we'll start in John verse 1 and we'll read the first three verses again of John 3. There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. The same came by came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God, for no man can do these miracles thou doest except God be with him. Jesus answered and said to him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. These verses are good to introduce the gospel to somebody and when you're trying to lead them to the Lord. You don't have to use these verses. There are many verses in the Word of God you can use. But we have to get them to see their need of a Savior. And that's what Jesus is doing here with Nicodemus. They're good verses to lead somebody to Christ. But if you use these three verses, You need to learn and understand and know these three verses. You shouldn't, as a child of God, if you've been saved for a length of time, you shouldn't read them once every eight years. You should know these verses. Be familiar with these verses. I'm not saying that you have to quote the verses. It would be good if you could. It might be better if you could. But you don't have to quote them. God can use his word whether you read it or quote it. Some people get nervous when they try to quote anything. Try to quote Mary had a little lamb and get nervous. You can read and have a little lamb and get the message across, right? But we need to be familiar with the verses. It's okay to be nervous when you're doing it. Of course, the more you do anything, the less nervous you get. But we need to learn to understand these three verses and the next 15 verses and more, verses 4 through 15. And you might not use all the verses verbally. As a matter of fact, I would suggest that you don't try to tell somebody the whole Bible when you're trying to lead them to the Lord. So that's another reason to rehearse. What part of the Word of God does he want you to use with that person? But you need to know and understand those verses. All those verses I went over this morning, you need to know and understand those verses because you may need to explain something out of those verses to someone that is lost. We've got to remember they're lost. So you may need to explain, you may need to explain even verse three, as I said this morning, you must be born again. A lost person may not understand those words at all. It may sound absolutely as it did with Nicodemus, like an impossibility. So we need to be familiar with those and be able to explain them. And it's very simple to explain. Why you must be born again, or exactly what that means, being born again. You just have to say something like, well, you're a child of your parents through a physical birth. You become a child of God through a spiritual birth. That's being born again. Now that's pretty simple, but most people could get a grasp of that. They understand a physical body and a spiritual body. They may deny it, but they understand it. They understand what you're talking about. So you explain to them that they must have a spiritual birth as well. By receiving God's gift of salvation, we are born again into the family of God. You have a family that you were born into. Every one of you in here is the same. You have a family that you were born into. And to go to heaven, you must be born into the family of God. Each of us that's saved on our way to heaven, we were born again into the family of God. once you can get them to understand that they need to be saved. Then we can go on to John 3.16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believed in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Now as you are using the scriptures this is really very important for you to understand and you've heard this before and you know this but you need to realize that when you're giving scriptures God is working in their heart. It's not you that the Holy Spirit uses to convict somebody. It's the Word of God that the Holy Spirit uses to convict somebody. You cannot give the Scriptures to somebody without the Holy Spirit doing something with it. You can't say, well, I'm going to go talk to Brother Shane. I believe he's lost. I'm going to talk to him. I'm going to read John chapter 3 to him. And Holy Spirit, you wait now. When I tell you to, you start to know. He hears it the Holy Spirit's gonna start working on him. You don't have to worry about it You don't have to think about when it's going to happen then God will do it in God's time now when my wife was at a young age and she heard the gospel when she understood the gospel she had heard it before through preaching and so forth but when she was at home and she heard the gospel and she understood that she was lost well she got saved almost immediately as a matter of fact she called out her mom was actually giving the gospel to her older brothers and she called out to her mother and said I'm the one that's lost Yes. You need to talk to me. Yes. Glory to God. Now with me, I heard the gospel on a Saturday. And then I knew what I needed to do. I was a little older. I was still barely a teenager. I knew what I needed to do. But I waited until Sunday to go to church and to get saved. And that's when God really impressed upon my heart. I needed to do something. Brother RJ, I hope you don't mind, I re-read your testimony just a while ago. Brother RJ heard the gospel on a Wednesday, understood the gospel on a Wednesday as a young child, and he waited until Friday. He told his mom, he said, I need to get saved, I need to get saved. You might have heard the gospel one day, I know a man that was presenting the gospel over and over and over and over and one day on the way to work after he had heard the gospel years before pulled over on the side of the road and asked the Lord to save him. You can't give the gospel and the Holy Spirit not work. I'm not going to say they're going to get saved every time or sometime down the road. They might not. But the Holy Spirit will work with His word if you will give it to people. Depending on the person, you may need to explain part of verse 13 of John chapter 3. As I did this morning, I tried to break even that verse down. As Christians, we hear that verse and we know exactly what it means, right? When you went to school, especially in English class, and you were given words, and okay, now what's the meaning of that word? And you knew exactly what it was. It means what we go and then and you're trying to explain and give the meaning of the word without using the word, right? And so sort of hard to do sometimes but we have to be able to explain John 3 16. So it says for God, well who's God? Somebody was telling me, a friend of mine was telling me, he went to the doctor and she was Hindu. And she said, he was having some bad health. And she said, well, you come and you're always happy. And I'm giving you bad news. And he said, well, I'm at peace. And she said, well, how do you have that peace? He said, because of God. And we would never say this. You know what she said? Who's God? If she was raised a Hindu, she was taught millions of gods. It's completely foreign and crazy to our minds, our ears. Millions of gods, what are you talking about? You know what's completely foreign and crazy to her ears? One God. Couldn't comprehend that. But what she was seeing was this God, the God that he prayed to, the God that he believed in, give him peace. She probably heard about millions of gods, but she didn't have that peace in her heart. So we have to explain who God is. God is the creator of the world. One God. Well, God so loved. The world means God loves everyone. He doesn't love the earth. He loves the people. He gave. That means he sent. He sent, He gave, He sent His only begotten Son. Now begotten Son is different than Son. Begotten Son means that they are of the Father. And Jesus is God's only begotten Son. He is part of the Father, part of the Godhead. Then it first says, whosoever believeth. In the context that God loves everyone in the world, anyone can be saved if there was one he didn't love or one he didn't love as much they might not be able to be saved but God loves everyone enough to bestow salvation upon them if they will ask and then it says should not perish so remember you're dealing with somebody that also should not perish well they may just be thinking Well, if I live long enough, I'm going to die. They know that. You don't have to go up to somebody 35 years old and say, do you know? Now, I'm going to tell you something you've probably never heard before, but in 150 years from now, sometime between now and then, you're going to die. They're going to think you're crazy. They knew that. They knew they was going to die. No doubt in their mind, they're going to die. There's been a couple of men who thought they weren't, but they did. But perish here means eternal punishment. So you may have to explain that verse, Mark 9, 45. And if I foot offend thee, cut it off, it is better for thee to enter halt into life than having two feet to be cast into hell into the fire that never shall be quenched. That's perishing, eternity. Not perishing and gone, but perishing and perishing and perishing and perishing. So if we can get them to understand what it means, what's going to happen to them, they know this body is going to die. If we can explain to them that they have a spirit and one day, if they don't get their sin forgiven, it's going to die and it's going to perish. It's going to have eternal punishment. And then everlasting life. Everlasting life is in total contrast to eternal punishment. Eternal to perish. It means to be with God in heaven for all eternity. Luke 23, 43 And God said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise. Now, I may say this again in a little bit, but we need to understand and know and study the crucifixion. We need to know what happened on the day of the crucifixion. We need to know what happened the next three days and especially what happened the third day. The cross rose again. But there were two thieves on Mount Calvary, one on each side of Christ. They both condemned Christ, but one of them later said, Remember me when thou comest into paradise. Remember me. And he said, Today thou shalt be with me in paradise. To be born again, one must understand the following. All of us are sinners and are condemned before God. It's just like, If you don't know you're sick, you're not going to go to the doctor probably. You may go for a checkup and he may not find nothing. But if you don't know, if you go out into the woods and you don't know where you're at, you're probably lost before you knew you were lost. You realize, wait a minute, how do I get back? You won't find your way back until you realize you're lost and start looking for it. And you won't get saved until you realize you were lost. What need is there of salvation if I'm not lost? They're lost, but they just don't know it. So again, there's some other scriptures in the Bible that we need to be familiar with. And again, you don't have to use the scriptures that I'm using. There's hundreds of scriptures in the Bible to talk to somebody about salvation, but these I'm giving you are good to use. So when you meet somebody, they're lost, and you know that if they're not having been saved, they're lost. They don't know what being saved is, and they don't know they're lost. So you can use Romans 3.23. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And then Romans 3.10, you could use 3.10 and then 3.23 either way. As is written, there is none righteous, no not one. Well, you might explain those verses a little bit. We need to understand these verses. So for all have sinned, well what's sin? If you're lost, you might not know what sin is. You've been raised in church all your life, you know what sin was when you were two years old. That don't mean the person you're talking to does. And that is a problem in the independent fundamental Baptist churches. We grew up thinking, we live thinking, even through part of our adult life, The whole world is the same. Everybody's heard the gospel. Everybody knows how to be saved. Some people just won't know. Some people never heard it. And when I was growing up, most of the people around me, they had heard the gospel. They did know they needed to be saved. And those who were lost probably did know they were lost. But you can't say that today around here. I didn't realize, but you couldn't say it about In the western part of the United States, in the northern part of the United States, you couldn't say it when I was growing up about there. They hadn't heard the gospel. When you, you think about it, and I know some of you are spiritual and you've never seen a television program of a western with a saloon on it. So the rest of you is who I'm talking to. You know those scenes you see in a saloon? That's how they grew up. A lot of people out west, that was life. In Connersville, where we live, and I'm sure the Chamber of Commerce, boy, they're just thrilled with this, Main Street, bar, bar, bar, bar, bar. You know how many was there 20 years ago? Zero. Maybe even 10 years ago. There's one, the newest one that I know of anyway, maybe some of those are newer, I don't know. Social habit. Oh, that's a great name. That's exactly what it is. And you think, but why would anybody want to go in a bar? They don't know nothing about church. They look at us, why do they want to go to church? That's what they grow up knowing. That's the social life that they grow up knowing. You say, well, so and so went to a bar and found so and so, and they got married, and it's all cool. And you say, well, they should know better. Well, they didn't know better. That's where they go to meet people. We come to church, we meet people at church. I'll give you a recommendation right now. If you're not married, good place to find a wife or a husband in church. If they're not in church, where'd you find them? If they're not in the habit of going to church when you find them, they're not going to be in the habit of going to church when you marry them. As written, there's none righteous, no not one. Then Romans 5 and 12, so what is sin? Romans 5 and 12 says, wherefore as by one man, sin entered into the world. Now when we say that, I could say, who is that? And probably everybody in here would say, Adam. You say that to the majority of the world, who is that? Who did that? I don't know who that is. One man sent into the world in death by sin. Boy, that must have been a bad sin. Wasn't the world he knew. It wasn't Hitler. No, it was Adam. You mean he did something worse than Hitler? And so death passed upon all men. You mean he's going to hell and I'm going to hell because of what he did? That's how it all started. It must have really been bad. So death passed upon all men that all have sinned. So we're all sinners. And you can see where somebody that doesn't know that verse may have trouble understanding that. In Genesis 3, 17, you told them it was Adam. I know this sounds odd. They know Adam West. They know Adam 12. What Adam are you talking about? One God created. Who? And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it. Cursed is the ground for thy sake, and sorrow shall thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat herb of the field, and the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground. For out of it was thou taken, for thus thou art, and unto thus thou shalt return. Why don't it seem so bad? They say you've got to go back. But I commanded you, don't do that. And you did it. It's not how big sin is, it's just sin. He's sinned. No sin in heaven. Now, returning unto dust, that's the first death. That's the death they understand. When you say, they understand dust to dust, ashes to ashes. That's pretty simple. They can understand that. They understand that once they die, their body is going to decay back into the ground or, you know, in the coffin, whatever. They understand that. Revelation 2.11, He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. He that overcomes shall not be hurt of the second death. I don't know what second death is. I have no idea. Revelation 20.14, And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. So the only way to escape the second death It's through Jesus Christ's forgiveness of your sins. You're still going to get the first death, but it's the second death you need to escape. So how do we do that? Now here you have, you've told them that, you know, Adam just, really, you think about it, Adam only messed up that much. Have you ever done anything worse than God telling you not to do something and you're doing it? Of course you have, I have, you have. But it was sin. Yes. No sin. And I know it ain't no big sin, no little sins in God's eyes. And when it comes to salvation, that's true. That's true. Amen. Any sin. There is no sin in heaven and no sin can go by undealt with. You cannot get into heaven without dealing with sin. That's right. So how do we do that? So Romans 3 and 23 says, For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And then Romans 6, 23 says, For the wages of sin is death. And again, that's the second death. Sin or no sin, you're going to die the first death. But you have sin, so unless you do something about it, there's a second death. But Romans 6, 23 also says, But the gift of God is eternal life. through Jesus Christ our Lord. So Romans chapter 6 verse 23 has got two parts to it. A lot of times you'll see it listed on a track. You'll see Romans 6 23 A and Romans 6 23 B. A is bad, B is good. You need to know B, you need to understand part B. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Through sin, the wages in his death, we have earned death. That's a pretty good analogy for people to understand. We were at Sheetz today and if you are a manager at Sheetz, from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. you can make $18.50 an hour. Man, I never made But $20 an hour, you know, rebuilding engines on big trucks. And that seems like a lot of money. But you work and you earn the wage. Your sin is a work that you have done and you earn a wage and that wage is death. But God is at all times ready to give us eternal life if we will put our faith in Him. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Again, John 3, 16, for God so loved. Well, why would He do that? Because He loves us. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. And then Romans 5, 12 again. Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned, and then verse 17 of chapter five, for if by one man's offense death reigned by one, much more they which receive abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ didn't just pay for Adam's sin, He didn't just pay for your sin. He paid for all sins. He paid for Hitler's sin. I don't believe Hitler ever repented. But the sin was paid for. But each one must go to him and ask him to forgive their sin. Recognize who he is. Christ died for all our sins. You've never committed a sin that He didn't pay for. Romans 5, 8, but God committed His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. When He died on the cross, He knew about me, He knew about you. God knows all things. God doesn't deal in time. You say, well that was 2000 years ago. Yeah it was. But He doesn't deal in time. He knows all things. He died for us while we were yet sinners. He didn't wait for us to ask Him to forgive us and then appropriate the payment. He appropriated the payment on Calvary and paid for our sins then. Much more than being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. We are saved because Christ paid our sin debt if we trust in him and ask him to forgive us of our sins. Again, you need to be very well acquainted with the crucifixion. That is the gospel, the death, burial, and resurrection. that is what gets people saved is understanding what Jesus did for them accepting what he did and asking Jesus to forgive them so we need to be very familiar with the crucifixion we must trust Christ for salvation now we need to learn this as Christians we all have this same responsibility And I'm going to say this and don't take it in the wrong way. Brother RJ, he went to school to learn the Bible, preaching and theology. I didn't. Okay? So you can't say, and RJ, I'll be honest with you, RJ can tell you about scriptures that I don't know about. He knows things I don't know. Because I didn't have that training. I have some experience on him, but I don't have any training on R.J. He knows the Bible. But you can take theology and learn the Bible, but we're all responsible for learning the Bible whether we take theology or not. We are responsible to proclaim the gospel to those that are lost. And in Romans 10, 9 and 10 and 13, So we've tried to explain the gospel to them, right? And we've tried to get them to understand that they are lost and Jesus paid for their sin. So then we need to tell them what to do with that information. Verse 9, Romans 10. that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. So you explain that gospel to them, it says that thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, in other words they believe that Jesus did die on the cross, he did shed his blood, he did pay for our sins, he was buried and he rose again, they believe that. Believe in that heart that God has raised from the dead, thou shalt be saved. You confess that. For with the heart, verse 10, man believeth into righteousness. So you believe it, right? You know it. In your heart, you know that's true. And with the mouth, confession is made into salvation. That's right. Yes, sir. You cannot believe in the heart and not confess it with the mouth. That's right. If you believe it in the heart, It'll come out of the mouth. If it don't come out of the mouth, it's because you don't believe it in the heart. And I've had people tell me this. I believe all about the gospel. I believe the death, burial, and resurrection. I believe it, but I'm not ready to get saved. In other words, I'm not ready to confess Christ. They don't believe it. I don't know what part they don't believe, but they don't believe it. They don't believe they're going to go to hell in the next five minutes. If they did, they'd get saved. With the heart, man believes in righteousness, and with the mouth, confession is made in salvation. Now you don't have to audibly confess to Christ. He can hear our prayers through thought. He knows what we're thinking. You don't have to be able to speak the words, but you're talking to Christ, remember? He knows your heart. For whosoever, verse 13, shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. That's right. Whosoever, for whosoever believeth and whosoever calleth. That's right, brother. You gotta believe and you gotta call. Yes. Shall be saved. In verse 9, to confess the Lord means you believe everything God's word says about Christ. Yes. Not part of it, all of it. Now, you don't have to memorize the Bible and say, yeah, I know. There's no part of the gospel. You can say, I believe this part, but I don't believe that part. I believe he died on the cross, but his blood didn't have anything to do with it. No, you're not safe. I believe he died on the cross. He shed his blood. But I don't believe Rose is going to know. You got to believe it and then confess it. You must believe it with all your heart. Verse 10, true belief will bring about a confession. It will happen every time when you believe. Verse 13, the confession and the belief puts us in right standing with God. And anyone in right standing with God will have the request for salvation granted. Whosoever believeth, and whosoever calleth. If we believe, we'll call. If we call, it's because we have believed. But we must believe. Now, I know this is a little, you don't want to probably take this long when you're explaining the gospel. I've taken longer. Sometimes it takes longer. But generally, you won't have this much time. But you need to know these scriptures. You need to know these scriptures. As I said, you don't have to memorize them. You've got your Bible. Now, I suggest if you don't have one, I've got three or four of them, the Bible about this size, the New Testament. I suggest that if you're going to use this track right here, that we give out. You can call it a track. You can call it an invitation card. You can call it a ticket. to heaven. Now on the back of most of our invitation cards, tracts, are identical or very close to the same thing. And of course what we want them to do is to read the back of that and through the reading of the Word of God the Holy Spirit can work on their heart. But we need to know what's on there and I appreciate all the tracts you hand out But I hope you've read it and I hope you know what's on there. You might hand me a track and I might turn it over. What's this right here mean? There's not a lot of scripture on here. But we all know what's on here. I may be prepared to tell somebody what's on here. If you have to say, maybe you don't read that well, you don't remember that well, listen, if you're saved and you read Number one, recognize your condition. That's right. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Yes, sir. You know that means that you're a sinner and they're a sinner. That's right. I love it when somebody says, you're a sinner. If you don't get saved, you're going to die and go to hell. They're probably going to die and go to hell. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, that means I'm a sinner. That's right. No shame, that means you're a sinner. Yes, sir. Always include yourself because you're just as much a sinner as they are. safe center and lost center. So each one of those verses you need to understand what they mean and need to be prepared. 99% of the time or more than that actually. You're never going to have, they're never going to ask you. But boy, we're God's children. We need to be ready, prepared to tell them the gospel. And like I said, we're not, it's not to those that's been taught a certain way We're saved. We have the word of God. We should know how to present the gospel to somebody and be prepared to do so. And not only that, make an effort to do so. We need to know how to lead somebody to the Lord. At all times we should be prepared. Can we stand to our feet? Ms. Susan comes.