Alright. It's great to be back here. We
we... Elena and I get here
sporadically
every couple years or so about our history
with the church goes back a long ways,
particularly through friends. I russell and mimi me
we've have known a long time, and many,
many others and so it's a delight to
be back with you. And
the last couple years, it's been
good to meet
get to know, pastor Austin and
and to get get to know him a
little bit better
and
see if I could get my little papers
so I can say on here.
So
we've really appreciate then Pastor Austin had asked
me
via email if I if I would, share
a a sermon. And part of that will
be a elaine will share a little bit
later in that. But let me just say
first, we are so thankful for first present
here in
Griffin for the
role you've had with us prayer and partnership
for many, many years. And I'm I'm serious
when I say that, you know, we're we're...
We were 20 years in Turkey. Some will
you remember that. But we've been 3 and
a half years in Belgium. It's an
interesting story. I won't go into all that.
But
We really believe that we could not see
the things happening that we are without your
prayers
for us and and giving and partnership. Thank
you so much. And we...
Others, many other churches and individuals have a
part in that too. So, we wanna thank
you for that.
So
next week starts the
20, 24
a limp summer Olympics in Paris.
If you're like a elaine and, we'd love
to
enjoy different events, including the opening ceremony. Right?
And and so we're we're looking forward to
that next Friday,
and a hundred years before that,
there was also an Olympics in Paris,
and many great athletes
emerge from that
1 in particular,
years later achieving greater notoriety, and that was
a Scottish
runner for the country of of for Uk,
and named Eric Little. And his life was
immortal
through a,
a film
that was done,
like, 25 year in the early eighties.
How many of you have heard of or
seen that film? Chariot it's of fire. Okay?
The older folks are
waving their hand, but it was,
it's a tremendous film,
and I just
watch that, and I... It's I'm almost in
disbelief
that the
director and producers. As far as I know,
we're not evangelical Christians.
Just a guy that had a, the his
other works were not anything along that line,
and then this comes up. And I don't
know. I'm sorry, but I just see it
as
1
just, a gift of god,
of the the the idea of faith that
comes out of that and many other things.
But I
It's a little
little side note, but I was a
early, a young missionary in Turkey when it
came out in the early eighties,
And I'd come down with hepatitis
at that time and that we had a
conference scheduled out of the country.
So our entire team flies away
and I'm left there by myself in this
istanbul.
And but 1 good thing, we we had
a Beta Max machine. I don't know some
of you remember that. It was... The 1
we had it just come out of the
size of a small car, and we had
it in in our room and a little
beta cassette you put in but somebody had
given us this cassette of chariot of fire.
So, of course, I watched in our team
before they left watched it. But then
the missionary community was really tight, and they
heard I had this, and they came over
1 by 1, So I think I watched
the film. I remember I'm bedridden.
I think I watched it 25 times. But
it would be my favorite even if I
only saw it once,
and it just some great
great principles come out of that. And Pastor
Awesome it was so gracious. I wanna show
a couple clips real brief. And then from
there, I'll I'll tie that into the message.
I've decided
I'm going back to Chime.
The commissioner have accepted.
Moving.
I've got a lot of running to do
first.
Jenny.
Jane, you've got to understand.
I believe that God made me for a
purpose.
For China.
He also made me advice.
And when I run,
A seal pleasure
To get it up with you the hold
and of content.
You were right.
It's not just fun.
To win
is the honor of him.
Jenny.
So what does the power come from
To see the race to hanging
from within?
Jenny,
believe god for this.
He also made me fast.
I would run
Yeah thank you, austin. So
this was... It's a powerful scene about how
he's talking about that he loves to run
and he said God.
Made me fast
and to not use that gift would be
to dish honor god.
And I'm I'm I'm drawing out of 1
word out of that, and that's that word
fast and talking about how God had gifting
him and made him fast physically.
But I wanna talk
today a little bit more about how God
himself works fast, not just in individual lives,
but in in our society and in our
country,
and
you know, it's interesting when I think of
god moving working in our lives. I normally
think of slowness.
You know how a holy spirit work your
life at years, it he's producing the fruit
of the spirit, A wonderful thing. It and
it it continues our our whole life until
we die. He's always at work. Of course,
you can make a case that the lengthening
of that work is sometimes our own
you know,
stubborn or dis disobedience, but he will complete
what he has what has begun, what he
has begun. But
I wanna look, take another tact if you
will and look at
cases where
Gone moves fast.
And I think that's encouraging to just see
another attribute of Gone. And we look in
the old testament of Ne my,
he and his labor built that wall and
the whole wall around Jerusalem after the exile
in just over 50 days,
Even
secular sources I understand look at Neo My
as a study in leadership. How how he
did or hal God.
Excuse me, worked through him.
And then new testament,
Jesus says in John 04:35,
do not do not say there yet 4
months.
And then comes to harvest behold,
lift up your eyes and look on the
fields
that they are white for harvest.
Believe Jesus is saying there. That harvest that
mission field, that harvest is always there ray
ready to be
tapped into Ready,
God is ready, and he's using us,
and he can act fast in in situations
you never think to
see that happen.
And then I've been... Also new testament. I've
been re
recently reading in the book of acts. A
paul's missionary journeys. Okay? Read a many times,
but a second or third look at it
What I saw was, Paul on the first
second, third missionary journeys,
he went into a culture
that was radically different from Jerusalem in and
J.
He went to the G Roman world. Now
can you believe this? He went to Be
preceding Antioch, he went to icon then later
on to Cor and philip. And if you
look at it, by the time he left
2 weeks later in he city,
there there were churches established.
So the core of Jewish people believe, they
always had this
connection of,
gentile god fears, then and and by time
he left, all these cities had the beginning
of a church. I just kinda marvel. I
forgot that it really happened that quickly. So
that's a reminder of how
how God can move an amazing way. So
I I just wanna give a quick
scan
in our own history, United States.
Of of how god has moved fast.
And
I wanna look at the term
revival. Now it's not a just holding a
tent meeting or
someone come to speak for a couple days,
you know, it could be that. But
revive. I'm here's a kind of a definition
I thought of, a revival is
a sovereign decision on God's part.
To reach down to his world
and to create a spiritual renewal many times
are all times and answered to believer prayers.
And I wanna add another little part to
that
when it's a a really
great revival
the secular world can't miss it. It's so
huge
that they have to take notice.
And
this is not to say,
we're always we're we're evan analyzing. We're d
decipher. We're reaching out to others. That continues
all the time. But when God chooses to
do a revival, he can accomplish more
in that revival time than many years of
our work, But it's his sovereign choosing to
do so.
Our our part is in there as well.
So I wanted to
look at a couple,
3 great awakening in our society. The first
1
happened even before our country founded. The first
great awakening
was in 17
32 to 17 45
2 main proponents were Jonathan Edwards and George
Field, and so great was this impact that
I don't know about you, but it... When
I was an elementary school here in Georgia,
we we we read about him and went
both of them together.
Great thousands
came to faith from New England all the
way down to to our here, to Georgia,
in a great great impact in our lives.
And in fact,
you can make a case that the American
revolution
may have come out of that. Why?
Because believers many believers came to faith. Their
lives were emboldened. They had courage
and they may may have led
some of them to be
a force to in in the American
revolution.
So that was the first great awakening.
And with all revival,
it doesn't go on forever.
There's
little tri
out of that that continue,
thankfully. And then the forces of, disbelief
and and evil continue their way. So
so it was in the 17 hundreds by
the time we get to 1800,
people were saying that our country was heading
to a direction of, un unbelievable and secularism.
And then we have the second great awakening.
And this
awakening was
perhaps even greater than the first,
and 1 name in particular stands out. There
were many was evangelist char Charles Finn had
had a had a great impact there. What
what were some of the things that happened
out of that?
America's first pioneer
movement, foreign missions happened out of New England
during during that time.
Other things were the
the, the the denomination of methodist baptist press,
and they started reaching out to Appalachia and
kent Kentucky and Tennessee,
frontier camp meetings.
Many, many people came to faith. Can you
think about what our country would be like
if that had not happened? It it it
churches were formed on the front here. It
it was... It made a it made a
big difference.
And from there... Oh, and perhaps the...
Let me check my notes here. And perhaps
the biggest thing of all was
coming out of that. Now again, it lasts
in many years was the ab evolution of
slavery and with that, the the American Civil
war and more than a million lives were
lost total on both sides.
But we think about that
and God's subsequent working,
it's it's hard to believe there our country
it could have been splinter in a hundred
ways, and God somehow cape kept our country
together
and and
unified. And I I'm... I just just intrigued
by history. What what if we had been
splinter, What would have happened in War war
2
with these 2
empires that would that were not
were not good things, basically. But our country,
particularly Us played a an unbelievable role in
that So
that was an incredible thing.
And then,
from the second awakening, we moved forward,
okay, 2 tri tri.
God continues to work in a great way,
not quite like the initial revival, and then
you have the
of disbelief
and
just lack of faith secularism,
so that was continuing. And so you... We
we fast forward to
War war 1 and World war 2.
And world war 2, our our soldiers came
back
from War 2. And some of them
were, red dedicated their lives. Some were became
came to faith, and they had been in
the orient, and they had been in in
Europe, and they went back as missionaries, 1
of the greatest forces in missions that we
have seen
will happen right after War war or 2
and a... So in kind of a weird
way, that's what caused a lot of missionaries
to go out.
And and from there, and I'm really proud
of this, the Wick Bible translators.
I don't think there'd ever been an f
organized effort to go out to bible tribes
and to translate the Bible
into their language.
And and that happened in in 19 thirties,
19 forties,
Wick bible bible translators. So the Billy graham
movement,
as you know,
crusade around the world,
the a para church group called the navigators.
You might... Maybe you know them, maybe you
don't, But they... His Dawson T
contribution was
1 man in disciples 1 or woman, or
or 1 or 2. In other words, don't
let people
you know, really show attention in the disciple,
you know, And some people think that
that idea has become a little bit forgotten
today. But that was a contribution of a
the navigators. And my our group campus crusade,
we we would similar navigators. We would do
evangelist
disciples ship would go out to the to
the world. In in our campus crusade in
house terminology,
we call that win build send. Okay? When
people to Christ, build them in their faith
and then send them out to reach others.
So,
campus Crusade has had a unique role as
well. And then
passage that was right it mainly after war
too. Then time moves on. And then we
hit a period
in the late sixties and all of a...
A lot of us live through this. When
it seems like we were coming apart at
the seams. There was the Vietnam war, and
I remember as younger teenager
every night would watch the news and find
out how many Americans died in battle that
night. That'll be that day. And that was
every day seeing that and all of a
sudden protests broke out around the country. Some
of the young protesters were killed by by
the
you know, government
soldiers,
and it it was a it was a
crazy time. We had the hippie movement
mountain California,
and with that increasing in morality and
and and and drug use was happening at
the same time.
And
so it looked like... Oh, and then maybe
the the touchstone of everything
was a 19 6
Democratic to convention. Now I don't mean to
highlight whatever party it just happened that if
you were there and watch that then it
was unbelievable. You're thinking, where our society continue.
This is like crazy.
And
So that that was 19 68. And then
all of a sudden, all of a sudden,
God showed up.
And you can almost put it on the
year 19 70. God showed up. What happened.
Well, in the Hippie movement, out in California,
who would have thought? Many of them came
to faith in Christ you can make a
case for had they not
been a part of that. They wouldn't... Maybe
you could say they wouldn't have been open.
But
this is... It it made many of them
came to faith in Christ and a whole
denomination came out of that Calvary Chapel.
So that... And then what what else was...
When else was going on.
So from from that,
a revival revival started breaking out in our
colleges, as very seminary in Kentucky. They... Many
students came to faith. They canceled classes,
and the students went across the country to
tell what what had happened in them. My
remember some kids in my neighborhood and had
had come and in making Georgia tell him
telling about that.
And then in campus crusade that I'm familiar
with and,
it just said
evidence of what happened. In in 19 68,
19 69,
the young people joining our staff, it was
very encouraging it was about, 200
or 02:50, something like that, starting in 19
70, a thousand joined. For the next 3
years, a thousand a thousand a thousand. It
was just an indication of what God was
doing. And from what I call this, the
third grade away kidding. Because I believe it
is an awakening. It's a
revival
in the same way as the the other
2 I mentioned. Jimmy Carter and Chuck C,
made the terms born again,
vernacular language.
Everybody, that was be talking about that. What
it... About born again? A person can come
to have her a relation of Christ. We
have the beginning of contemporary Christian music.
Amy Grant, Michael W Smith, and and that
that has continued to today.
Any any branch of music you look at
you could have pop, rock,
country, of course,
and and even heavy metal
all of them have a little sidebar
with Christian contemporary Christian music in it. I
I don't know that we've ever seen anything
quite like that. And then you get to
sports.
And,
say you're watching a
a game with the Scc a local team
And
the the star and they won the star
of the game, they won the they they
won, and the reporter will come up to
them, that 1 individual
tell us tell us what happened How to...
How were you able to do so well.
And and you know I'm going with this,
the the the the the athlete will say,
well, first, I wanna give praise to my
Lord Jesus Christ for what he did. And
and and, of course, the the sports reporter
can say nothing, but just let him speak,
and it... It's a great testimony in it.
Some people think that was the case years
and years earlier.
I I don't see it. I I see
it was something incredible God... God was doing
here. And then Hollywood,
more, probably more believers in Hollywood than we've
seen it a long time. And you wanted
to point out might be Mel Gibson
producing the,
the film that passion of Christ. And then
and then I grew up and macon in
Georgia and I. It it was... It alone
had a revival love its own. I was
talking in in Houston last month with a
a person that's in his seventies,
and he was involved a little bit with
the high school ministry in Macon. And, you
know, I I watch this as a non
believer,
what God was doing in people's lives in
macon.
I I... They were in all the all
the school assemblies and churches. And so as
your... I I just knew, Wait a minute.
I was going to church, but
they're acting, like, I'm a second class and
not nothing toward me, but just they're so
vibrant and exciting. And I I was just
it caught my attention. And later had a
impact in college. My first freshman year. I
remembered what I was hearing and that had
an impact for me. And I just... And
1 1 little analogy I have to show
share was our student body president
at Stratford Academy in macon Georgia.
They allowed them to come to all the
schools and share this. Well, he was... He
had came to faith in Christ. And if
you go back that far, you might find
this interesting. He he was given his testimony
and he said he referred to a product
back then called Deputy Do, and he said,
deputy do a little gel. You put on
your air and he said yeah. And that's
me. Religion was like that. A little bit
was enough, but he was saying now in
Christ that, you know, that's not the case.
He was loving God. And so
so there we go. God did an incredible
work. And how how do we how do
we respond to this? We can't conjure up
revival. Oh, you know, I'm gonna make it
happen, but I think the first step is
is prayer,
obviously,
in second chronicles 07:14.
If my people
Her call by my name shall humble themselves
and pray and seek my face and turn
from their wicked ways.
I will hear from heaven
forgive their sin and heal their land. So
first thing is prayer, you probably could come
down with a list of 7 or 8
different things that you could do subsequently
to help revival take place. But I I
just wanna
simply have number 2 is take action
is to take out. You could be,
you could be taking action by going low
to the, I don't mean that to be
p
negative. But those that don't have the... That
are going through a rough patch in their
life in in and they need somebody's help.
Physically and even spiritually. It could be moving
out
in your neighborhood.
Those people you know and helping that maybe
sharing the faith
and helping them or even getting them in
a home group or a bible study. Now
it could be moving up, and that means
to the leaders of like here in your
town or,
the city counts are a school boards. It
could be trying by faith to make to
make a.
Impact in that in that area as well.
And then if you
if a person
absolutely can't find their spot.
To make a difference, and I'd encourage you
to follow a henry at Black bees advice
in that book experience Gone. He said, see
where god's at work and then just jump
in and have a part in it. So
that'd be another another thing we could do
to make an impact. But we feel like
god is moving fast in Belgium. We really
do. In Belgium this country of you draw
a line through it. The top part is
Dutch and fl
people. They're more dramatic. And the south part
is
French speaking. They're more Latin kind of people,
But it's it's 1 country.
We're not as... We're... Elena I live in
Ant in the Dutch part. And we all
what we know there is, they're very friendly
and they love Americans. And they're still appreciative
for what we did in war war 1
and 2. Which is really encouraging. And the
young people know English so well. Some have
no accent. I mean, the accent they have
is American accent because they're watching Netflix.
And things like that. And they pick it
up quick. And so anyway, so that's the...
That's the top part and the south part
is french part, where we'll get it there
eventually. But I ask a Elaine would come
up and wants to give you a short
kinda summary of what's going on in Belgium.
Yeah.
Thank you. And as Ra said, thank you
so much for your partnership in Belgium and
how you are making a difference in the
lives of the Belgian.
We have really 4
of our ministry there in Belgium.
We first went there just to start
with the leaders of the city, the
section of our ministry, called leader impact. And
it's helping the leaders of a community make
an impact in their community
for the gospel and for the health of
the community.
It as we went there, we didn't have
a lot of connections with the community. We
didn't know Ver many
individuals there either
And the couple that had invited us invited
us there. They were leaders in the community,
but they too did not have a lot
of Christian connections.
So begin to pray and for that reason
we did the dub of the Jesus film
an order that we would be able to
meet some of the leaders and also have
a tool for the communication of the message
at Christ.
In the course of that time, we god
brought to our across our path, some leaders
in the city.
1 of those was a young man who
had started a media company,
worked with,
in the finance area of a orbit of
a company. But on his spare time, he
He felt like
individuals in the city needed to hear the
gospel in their own language.
So many Christian films they would take it
upon themselves to dub those films
into fl.
And as Ralph mentioned, that's the language of
the upper part of Belgium,
but Fl is quite different from the Dutch
of the Netherlands.
It's like us listening to the
English of the Scottish
than the English of the Americans. If you've
ever listened to Scott, you can't quite figure
out exactly what they're saying
But there... But what was... What they saw
with that was that
the people needed to hear it in their
own language. So he helped us with the
Jesus film, but then as a leader in
his
organization, his company, he also said I really
wanna get involved with leader impact. I wanna
help
the people in my community know how they
can have a personal relationship with Christ. So
Frederick started a group there the second.
Groups that we had were in the city
of Ant. Fred is in the city of
Lu.
And we involved a lot of
individuals and 1 individual that
really love being involved and was so effective
in
administering to others was a young man named
Cad. Could do is actually Brazilian in background,
but is a member of our church and
has a real passion for the community that
he's a part of.
So Cad do has all started leading groups
as well in Belgium, The groups are
designed not just to bring Christians to begin
to grow and ask questions about their faith,
Ask more questions
about their faith, but also,
it's designed to bring in non believers.
And Frederick and Ka are both now
have ongoing groups. And 1 of the things
some of the non believers have said in
Frederick group is You know, I really appreciate
doing this because we're asking about what's important
in life. We're not just
dealing with normal things in life. We're asking
about what's really important.
Because 1 of the
foundations is 1 of the
series that will take them through and foundations,
deals with the questions of personal
professional and spiritual growth in life.
So please just continue to pray. We... When
we went there, 1 of our major prayers
was the prayer that was mentioned earlier,
We prayed the Lord to Harvest to raise
up laborers for the harvest field.
And we saw that here he has already
rated at that Cad do
and Frederick, and then there are 2 women.
1 was a former
consulate general... Assistant consulate general for the Caribbean.
And the second woman
is
works with the church and works with the
Eu writing articles,
on whether or not the laws, the new
laws that are passed within the Eu have
a compliance with Christianity.
But both individuals have a passion for the
European Union commission an area they both live
in Brussels and We're just asking God now,
what else do you wanna do that we
can help
the individuals in this community come to faith?
Just a few more
details about some of the other opportunities that
God has given.
As a result of coming there,
We had a group from Indiana contact us
and say, you know, we'd really like to
help reach out to campus students. Can we
come to Belgium? And help you. And since
we had been say, Lord, please write about
laborers for the harvest build, we couldn't say
no you can't call.
We, of course, we would love for you
to come. And over the past 2 years,
they have sent over 50 students
that came for week
times and 3 week times,
and we now have 2
individuals who are leading
the group in Lu and the group in
Ant. So we have 2 campus ministries that
have kind of spawned
from the upper opportunities that all of these
individuals have come and helped us with. And
during the past year or just the past
year, they had
conversations with over 200 students during their time.
And of those 200
conversations, they probably had conversations with another hundred
students where they were able to give a
clear presentation of the gospel.
So we're trusting that God will continue
to give us more students to interact with
the students in Belgium.
1 really special
example of God's... Concern for the Belgian people
was with 1 of our students
named Sherry Sherry...
Was Chinese background,
and been adopted by a family in America.
She was
on the campus looking for students and she
met a Chinese girl. Well, this Chinese girl
had been adopted by a family in Belgium.
And that girl started talking with Jerry as
she said you know?
I just always wanted to have someone
talk to me about this.
But as a result of her adoption talking
about her adoption she also was
talked with her about what it meant to
be adopted and to become a child of
god. So she we're trusting that this young
girl
understanding how concern god was for her. Sent
her somebody from America,
to help her understand what her adoption was
truly about.
And then the last sector that we are
seeing god open up is the sector among
the youth like the
young life, but it's called Shine ministry. And
in Cheyenne
ministry, we had a chance to train a
few students on using this
bracelet where they talk
very similar to our colored bracelets
has a heart a division across and a
question mark,
God loves you.
Were separated.
Jesus has the answer in. What will you
decide? Or what those represent. So if there's
any young people here that would like 1
of these to use with your friends,
come to me and I'll be happy to
give you 1. So thank you so much
for
the prayers for making a difference in Belgium
for
praying for labor as we've prayed for labor
and really for the future of the part
that you will play in this amazing country.
Yeah.
So just to wrap it up. Thank you
for your
listening and
what sharing. But for Belgium, you could pray
Matthew 09:36,
the 30 and I think Elaine mentioned, raise
up labor for the as the... 1 of
the challenges of Belgium Belgium is they... They're
making it really difficult
for it to get people in.
Take people from,
internationally, it's really, really, really hard.
And
so we wanna see Belgian raised Belgium raised
up. But you could pray to send people
in and then creative ways for them to
get accepted by the Belgium government.
So that's a major request. And then
then who knows in our countries
facing some challenges as well, societal,
politically in many areas and maybe maybe God
will be gracious and give us AAA
fourth great awakening perhaps. Right? So
may... I may I could just close in
prayer. Yeah. Have many father, thank you for
a chance to
share
about what you're doing, and
reminders of your great
power in our in our past history that
continues to today, and we look to you
and ask you for you. Be, your gracious
hand to be at work individually in our
lives, in our families,
and then our society our country. And to
the world, thank you that America's has been
such a beacon of hope to the whole
world and Thank you. Pre please continue to
send workers from here and other countries around
the world. Thank for this wonderful time. With
at first perez Griffin today. We praise you,
and thank you. And your name, we pray.
Amen.