Elements of Effective Evangelism, Part 4

[0:00] If you have your Bibles, turn to Acts chapter 10. We've been in this chapter for a while. We'll still be in this chapter for a little while after tonight even. We're up to verse 44. We won't cover all of this. We'll pretty much focus on verse 44 tonight.

[0:26] As you know, we've been going through the conversion of Cornelius. The gospel has reached the Gentiles, and the Holy Spirit is going to fall upon them for the very first time.

[0:41] So in verse 44, I'm going to begin reading if you want to follow along with me, and I'll read through verse 48. While Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word, and the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles.

[1:02] For they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter declared, Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?

[1:12] And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days. Most of us, I'd imagine, are perturbed when we are interrupted, whatever the case may be.

[1:30] Say you sit down in your family room or your living room with a snack. You're about to watch your favorite TV show or game that's on TV, whatever the case may be, or read. And then the doorbell rings.

[1:42] And you think, well, I just got here. I'm comfortable, right? And, you know, I don't want to go answer the door. Maybe you do. Maybe that's you. Or maybe it could be when you're talking to somebody and you're in the middle of a sentence and they interrupt you with a question.

[1:59] Or it almost seems as if they haven't been paying attention to the first part of what you had to say. And that can be frustrating as well. Or perhaps someone as important is speaking or has been invited someplace as a guest speaker, but someone either jumps up on the stage with them uninvited and interrupts what they have to say, or they cause some kind of disturbance or ruckus in the audience.

[2:24] I know we've seen that a lot, especially these days when it comes to politicians giving their speeches in different places. Or it could be, again, you're watching sports or you're at a sporting event and someone gets the idea that they're going to jump over the fence, they're going to hop onto the field, and they're going to run around and be chased by the security guards for a while.

[2:46] That, too, can be an annoying distraction. And no doubt, 2020 has been the year of interruptions, hasn't it? We could spend all night listing all the ways in which COVID-19 has interrupted our normal routines and even the plans that we had for this year.

[3:10] But not all interruptions are bad interruptions. Sometimes we're interrupted with good news that brings great joy to us.

[3:23] I know, and Willard can testify, too, and I appreciate Willard for preaching on Sunday. It was a good message. Thank you, Willard. I appreciate that. I know it was a blessing to those who heard it. But, you know, we can say, and you all who have been to church for a while, you know that part of preaching is eventually there are going to be interruptions, whether that's crying children or people who are upset with what you had to say, and they get up and they leave.

[3:47] I mean, there's just a lot of different things that can happen, but sometimes good things happen. I remember a couple years into my first church as I was pastoring, that as I was in the middle of beginning my introduction to the sermon I was preaching, in our sanctuary, the main entrance was right in front of where I stood.

[4:06] And so I saw the door open and in walked my preaching professor with his wife, who I hadn't seen in a couple of years. And automatically I kind of, you know, gulped, had a pit in my stomach, and thinking, okay, am I still following the way that he taught us to do it in seminary?

[4:22] I don't want to disappoint him or upset him. But anyhow, that was a joy to see him, and also because it was that Sunday, that was the first Sunday after Hazel had been born, and Hazel had been born a month early.

[4:35] She came on her own, and so she was in the NICU and would be for a month, and Danny was there, so I was there with Jack. And so to see him was an encouragement. And then as I shared that with my congregation about what was going on at the end, my professor met me at the door, and he greeted me, had some encouraging words to say, and then he handed me a slip of paper, which was a check for $300.

[4:56] And I thought, wow, that was quite a blessing. You can come and interrupt me anytime, right? Amen, yeah. So if you are going to interrupt, you know the price.

[5:07] It's $300. Yeah, and that was a while ago, right, inflation. We've got to adjust that. So again, interruptions happen, and they are frustrating when they do happen, but sometimes they are great when they do happen.

[5:23] And there are some interruptions in church that are excellent, and we give glory to God for them. And so that's what's happening here. Peter is preaching, and he's interrupted, and he's interrupted by somebody very important.

[5:35] He's interrupted by the Holy Spirit. So as Peter is preaching, he's interrupted. The Holy Spirit interrupts his preaching. Who wouldn't want to be interrupted by the Holy Spirit?

[5:46] And so his audience is Cornelius and those in his house who have gathered there. The Holy Spirit, after Peter has preached and declared the gospel to them, interrupts wherever he was in his place.

[6:01] He had already done enough. And the Spirit comes, and those who are gathered there receive the Spirit because of the fact that they had been saved. And so our main idea for this study continues to be the same, and it's this.

[6:16] The Lord desires that his disciples make more disciples. To make more disciples, we must be willing to go, share, and teach those whom God brings to faith in Jesus Christ.

[6:30] And so I'll again go over sort of where we've been as we've been talking about these elements of effective evangelism, and we see these elements in Peter as he is called by God to go to Cornelius and those gathered and to share the gospel with him.

[6:50] The first thing we saw was that to be effective in evangelism is we need to have a submissive will. And so remember Peter was on the housetop of Simon the Tanner's house, and he was praying.

[7:03] He received this vision from God, and it told him, and God told him in that vision that he was going to have some visitors and that he would go with them. That was what God commanded. And so Peter was submissive to that.

[7:14] He dropped whatever he had planned for that evening or planned for that week, and he did exactly as the Lord told him to do. He didn't ignore what God said. He didn't disobey, though certainly he had some questions about what all that would entail.

[7:29] He still was willing to go and willing to make himself available. So to be effective in evangelism, we need to also be submissive. It's God's will that we go and make disciples.

[7:39] That's the great commission that is for all believers. And so we must be submissive to our Lord's desire to use us to go and to make more disciples.

[7:51] Secondly, obviously a salvation presentation is important. And so when Peter finally does arrive at Cornelius' house, he establishes first a rapport with him and those who have gathered.

[8:02] He asks Cornelius about why he had asked for him. He learns from Cornelius that God had directed him to do that. And so the questions that Peter had in his mind were becoming clear to him now, that God had something going on here that was going to result with the salvation of the Gentiles.

[8:22] It was an amazing thing for Peter and for the Jews to see happen and to understand that that was what God was going to do, that God wanted to save these people, these people whom the Jews had long rejected and despised, whom they looked down upon.

[8:36] He's realizing these people are going to be a part of the church of Jesus Christ. These people are going to be his brothers and his sisters in Christ. Third, we saw the third element for effective evangelism from Peter is to examine your audience.

[8:53] And so as we saw with Peter, he's asked some questions, he's established that rapport, and he's found out some information about them. And so likewise, when we do the same, we want to know who it is that we're speaking to.

[9:05] We want to know what they believe about God. Do they believe in God? Have they been to church? What do they know about Jesus Christ? And in finding out that information, we're better able to know where to start with them.

[9:19] Fourth was to explain God's truth. So again, Peter isn't interested in converting these Gentiles to Judaism. He's not concerned with converting them over to his culture.

[9:31] He's not concerned with expressing to them how oppressive the Roman government has been towards his people, towards the Jewish nation. He's concerned only and primarily with simply explaining the truth of Christ with them, that truth that, again, is embodied in Christ, who is the source of all truth.

[9:51] And then fifth, the fifth essential element is to point them to Jesus. At all things, we point them to Jesus. Jesus is the way. Jesus is the truth.

[10:02] Jesus is the life. Jesus is how we are forgiven through his life, through his death, through his resurrection. So we're always, when we are evangelizing, pointing people to Jesus, pointing people to Jesus.

[10:14] Which brings us to the sixth element, which is to expect results. Expect results. When you share the gospel, you should expect results.

[10:30] Isaiah 55, 10 through 11 says this, For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there, but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.

[10:52] It shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish what I purpose and shall succeed in the things for which I sent it.

[11:03] So Peter's preaching, as well as the other sermons that we have recorded in the book of Acts, recorded in Scripture even, we see that they always produced a result.

[11:15] There was always a result that was produced. But again, since Peter is the preacher here in Acts chapter 10, we'll focus primarily on the results of his preaching ministry.

[11:27] Typically, the results of Peter's preaching and others produced either one of two results. One of two results. Either his listeners were convicted and they came to faith in Christ, or his listeners would hear and they get very angry and agitated with what he had to say.

[11:47] So for example, in Acts chapter 2, Peter is the one, if you remember, who's preaching on the day of Pentecost. And Scripture records that on that day, 3,000 people came to saving knowledge of Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.

[12:04] Pretty great and awesome day. The day that the church was born. Why was that the case? Well, because we see when we read there that the Spirit of God had done the preparation work of the hearts on those who were hearing, who were there when Peter was preaching.

[12:24] They were convicted. They were cut to the heart. They saw their sin and realized their need for a Savior. The next sermon that Peter is recorded as having preached in Acts was delivered to the Sanhedrin.

[12:38] What was the result of that? Well, they were furious at him. They were angry with what he had to say. Why? Because there was no work of the Spirit prior to that within their hearts.

[12:51] Why was that? Well, because they had already willfully rejected Jesus Christ again and again and again. Peter presented the gospel to them, even offered them an invitation in chapter 4 when he said in verses 11 through 12, this Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone.

[13:11] And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men with which we must be saved. So he laid it all out there for them, but instead of being convicted and seeing their sin and their need for Christ to save them from God's judgment against their sin, they instead were indignant, they were bitter, and they were hateful.

[13:34] So there's two things that make the difference in that, right? Why was one group so responsive and was saved and the other so non-responsive and, in fact, indignant with Peter?

[13:49] Why is that? Well, plainly, simply, it's to do with sovereign call and submissive will. Where they are present, salvation occurs. Where they are not present, salvation does not occur.

[14:03] Here, though, in Acts chapter 10, God has done the work, as we've seen. And we've seen that through the first 33 verses of this chapter.

[14:13] They reveal what God has been doing before Peter goes to meet Cornelius. We've seen what God's been doing in Cornelius' life. We've seen what God has been doing in Peter's life to lead them to this divine appointment when salvation would come to the Gentiles, beginning with Cornelius and his family.

[14:34] And so Peter stands before them and he says, in effect, to summarize his sermon, he says salvation's available. It's in Christ and it's by faith.

[14:47] And before he knows it, God's grace just explodes right there in that place. And that whole group of them is saved. That's what we see in verse 44.

[14:58] It says, while Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word. And we see that they believed. Notice again how it happens, how their salvation happens.

[15:10] Or maybe I should say notice how it doesn't happen. No one asked in that group permission for Christ to come into their lives. No one repeated a prayer that Peter led them into repeating.

[15:25] No one walked forward or down an aisle. And to this point, none of them had yet to undergo water baptism. We know that they were saved by what resulted from the moment of their salvation.

[15:40] It wasn't what they did to be saved, but what they did once they were saved, that verified the authenticity of the salvation that they had received.

[15:51] And really, the only way that we can really see that a person has been saved is by what happens in their life from that moment onward. After all, doesn't Scripture say you will know them by their fruits?

[16:03] And so we will know those who have genuinely, truly been saved to have received the Spirit of God by seeing the fruit of the Spirit evident in their life.

[16:14] Prior to their salvation, God again was at work revealing his sovereign call in salvation. Cornelius, we've seen prior to this time, was devoted, that he was a religious man.

[16:27] But again, though he was devoted and though he was a religious man, he was not saved. And so God orchestrated the events that brought him into his body.

[16:43] If you share the gospel clearly and accurately with unbelievers, you have been effective in what God has called you to do.

[16:53] Whether or not that person has been saved, I need to say that before we continue on. So these are elements of effective evangelism. And so what I don't want you to go away from this thinking is that, well, I can't be effective in evangelism if whatever I said didn't result with that person's salvation.

[17:11] That's not what we see from Scripture. We are to go and to make disciples, but we see from Scripture with our Lord, with the disciples, the apostles, that when they preached, either people were saved or they weren't.

[17:25] But ultimately, whether they are saved or not is God's doing, not our own. So I don't want you to think that in order to be an effective evangelist, you have to be batting 1,000.

[17:36] You know, I witnessed with 10 and all 10 were saved. It'd be great. Maybe that could happen, right? It's possible. But if it doesn't, don't beat yourself up thinking that you have been ineffective for the Lord.

[17:49] If you open your mouth, you share and declare the good news of Jesus Christ. You have been effective in what the Lord has called you to do. But when a person is saved as a result of God's sovereign work, using, again, us as his instruments to communicate the gospel, typically there are three more elements that will result in the life of the believer.

[18:13] So now we're going to kind of turn. We see, well, this is what we need to do to be effective in evangelism. Now we're kind of looking at, well, what is the results when we have been effective, when the Lord has saved that person?

[18:25] What should we see as a result of that? And so in number seven there, the seventh element is receiving the Holy Spirit. Receiving the Holy Spirit.

[18:38] So again, the Holy Spirit interrupts Peter while he's preaching, and as a result, everyone listening is saved. And again, who wouldn't want to experience those same results when they share the gospel?

[18:53] But jump forward a little bit to Acts 11.15, where there Peter gives a report of what had happened, where we're going, where we're at in verse 44 of chapter 10.

[19:04] He says, he gives a report back to the believers in Jerusalem, as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them just as on us at the beginning. So again, he was willing to go, Peter, he was willing to share, and the Spirit came.

[19:19] And the moment Peter said salvation is available, it's in Christ, it's by faith, in that moment, those who heard believed. That's all they needed to hear.

[19:30] And immediately, when someone believes, we see from Scripture that God grants that someone or someone's His Holy Spirit.

[19:41] It was as if God was saying to Peter, you know, okay, okay, Peter, that's good. That will do. They've got the message. Now I'm giving them my Spirit.

[19:56] And so we must understand this. You cannot be saved and not have the Holy Spirit. You cannot be saved and not have the Holy Spirit.

[20:09] And so this was the Pentecost of the Gentiles. God gave them the Holy Spirit when they believed. And that is the norm for every believer from that point onward.

[20:23] Should be the case for you as well. When a person believes, God gives them the Holy Spirit who dwells within them from that point on.

[20:34] And His presence in their life is as eternal as their salvation is eternal. This is the immediate result of saving faith. The Spirit takes up residence in the believer instantly and permanently.

[20:49] You don't wait for it. You don't go on some kind of quest to acquire the Spirit. He comes to you the moment of your salvation.

[20:59] When you believe, the moment that you believe, the moment you put your faith in Christ, you are at that instant receiving the presence of God's Spirit within you.

[21:11] And again, this to me is the clear teaching of Scripture. Let's listen to what God's Word says about this very thing. Back in the Old Testament to Ezekiel. Listen to what the Lord said there.

[21:23] This promise that He gave in Ezekiel 36, 26. And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

[21:39] So here we understand that man needs a new heart because the old one is deceitful. It's deceitful. Jeremiah said, above all things, it's desperately wicked. So we need a new heart which speaks to our need of salvation.

[21:51] And that then is connected, this new heart, with the new spirit. That, to me, it looks like come in the very same moment. The new heart and the new spirit come in the same moment.

[22:02] Again, Ezekiel 36 and verse 27. The Lord says there, I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes, to be careful to obey my rules.

[22:15] So here we see that receiving the spirit is essential in our salvation, for our salvation. And it is also essential for us so that we are able to be obedient to what God's word asks for us to do or commands us to do.

[22:31] In other words, if you don't have the spirit residing within you, you won't obey God. You won't want to obey God. You lack the capacity to do that, see the importance of that.

[22:43] You may do good things that seem to be in alignment with God's word, but the motivation for your doing those things will be not for the glory of God.

[22:55] Not for the glory of God. Again, God does not say, if you can demonstrate that you are a Christian, I'll give you my spirit. You wouldn't have the power to do that. You first need the spirit in order to have the power to do anything stipulated in God's word.

[23:11] And so again, we've got to understand that Christianity is not some kind of a trial run. You don't give Jesus a try. You don't give the spirit a test run.

[23:21] You either have received him in salvation or you haven't. And there's no trial for you to perform to get him because you wouldn't give the effort, if that was the case, in the first place.

[23:33] In Zechariah 4.6, God informs the Israelites that his people have been repeatedly told that they are not to depend upon military power or foreign alliances or any other power on their part to accomplish what God has called them to do.

[23:51] Zechariah 4.6, it says there, So Cornelius is told in Acts chapter 10, verse 4, that his prayers, that his alms have ascended as a memorial before God.

[24:13] So God seems to be, in some sense, pleased with his devotion. But again, the most important thing for us to remember about that is that Cornelius was not saved.

[24:29] So if God was fully pleased with that, then why would he need to have Cornelius send for Peter? Why send Peter on that errand?

[24:39] If Cornelius, you know, hey, he believes in God, he seems very devout in his religion, he gives to the temple and is generous, if that was necessary and all that was required for salvation, then there would be no need for God to interrupt Peter and to inform Peter that he was going to go to Cornelius because, again, in order for Cornelius to be saved, he had to hear the gospel.

[25:07] He had to hear the gospel. That was the message that saved him through which, as we've seen, he received the Holy Spirit. Again, not a result of his works, but only because of his faith in Jesus Christ.

[25:23] Jesus revealed in John 14, verses 16 through 17, There he says to them, So the promise of God is the giving of the Spirit, And that giving of the Spirit will result with him being within us.

[26:03] And here, as we see, as Jesus talks to his disciples, there are no other qualifications that he mentions to them for this to happen. Again, he does not say to them, Pray in this way and you'll receive the Spirit, or anything like that, or you'll be saved, or perform this act and you'll be saved, you'll be mine, or do this deed.

[26:25] He doesn't do any of those kinds of things because there are no prior qualifications for this. Now let's look at John 7. John 7 introduces us to the Spirit of God in a unique way.

[26:39] This, to me, really seals the deal that unequivocally, with no contradiction, that we absolutely, at the moment of salvation, receive the Spirit. In John 7, 37, Jesus is at the Feast of Tabernacles.

[26:53] At the climax of the Feast, Jesus dramatically repeats the message that he gave to the Samaritan woman back in chapter 4, verse 10, making it clear that coming to him means believing in him.

[27:06] The Feast of Tabernacles concluded with a ceremonial procession in which vessels of water would be carried to be poured out in the temple courts, commemorating God's quenching Israel's thirst in the wilderness with water from the rock.

[27:24] And so at that moment, as this is happening, when everybody is looking at these vessels full of water, Jesus stands up and I think interrupts what's going on, and he can do that.

[27:35] And he says, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. In other words, Jesus takes that entire ceremony that's going on and he turns it back to himself to communicate to them a great and important truth.

[27:50] He's saying that if you're thirsty, you can drink. Salvation could come to those who were there that day, is I think what he's saying. Remember that he said to the woman at the well, he said, If you believe in me, I will give you water and you'll never thirst again.

[28:06] And so there was this promise that they could have spiritual water, spiritual refreshment, a spring of pure cleansing water of life inside of them. And then in verse 38 of that same passage, he takes it to the next step.

[28:22] He says in verse 38, Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of him will flow rivers, rivers of living water.

[28:32] And so there we have a two-fold promise from our Lord. First, that those who believe in him will receive this water.

[28:44] And second, it won't be a trickle of water. It won't be like when we're going through a freeze and we've got to keep the faucets on just a little for that tap, tap, tap.

[28:56] No, this is rivers. This is gushing, flowing water. And then in verse 39, he says, again, same passage. Now this, he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

[29:22] So what is being communicated here is that they can now believe and drink from the water of life, but someday they would believe receiving the Spirit and from that would gush out of them living waters always and forever, but not until the Spirit comes.

[29:40] In Acts chapter 1, Jesus said to his disciples, I have told you everything that there is to know. I've spent time with you post-resurrection. I've informed you. I've talked to you about the kingdom.

[29:52] Now he says, basically, don't do anything. Don't do anything. You stay here and wait. Wait for what?

[30:04] Well, wait for the coming of the Spirit of God. Until then, his instruction was, don't do anything. Just wait. And they waited.

[30:15] Because they won't have the power until that moment comes. The power which, when it comes to open their mouths, these men from all kinds of different backgrounds, in the world's eyes were not much of anything.

[30:30] And yet, the Lord used them in a mighty way to bring spiritual transformation to so many and used them in ways that continue to reverberate to this very day.

[30:42] And that's what they did. In Acts 2, the Spirit comes. The water starts to gush. It flows throughout the book of Acts as we've been through it, as we'll go through it. They drowned all of Jerusalem in a matter of weeks.

[30:55] And then that water continued to flow and to fill the Gentiles now in Acts chapter 10. They had the energy. They had the ability to reproduce. And you, as a believer, if you are here and you believe and you have received the Holy Spirit, you should know that the same Spirit that indwells you is the same Spirit that indwelt them.

[31:18] And the question really is, I think, about obedience. Are we as obedient? Are we as eager as they were to share the good news of Jesus Christ?

[31:31] So now let's look at some application here. What should we do with this passage? First, I think, we need to understand that to receive the Spirit, faith in Jesus as Lord and Savior is required, is necessary, is absolutely essential.

[31:53] However you want to put it, I put required, you can fill in whatever, but the point is it's absolutely, necessarily required for anyone to be truly saved, to receive the Spirit.

[32:06] So again, no amount of good deeds, no amount of religious devotion, no amount of perfect church attendance can do it. Only faith in Jesus Christ can.

[32:18] Second, those who have truly been saved will demonstrate the fruits of the Spirit in their lives in increasing measure. And so, if you've been saved, not only you, but those around you should notice the fruits of the Spirit in your life.

[32:39] And I would think that from the moment of your salvation, and for some of you, I know it's, you know, for I can go back, I would think I was five when I was saved, and now I'm 37.

[32:53] And so, I should be more spiritually mature now at 37 than I was at five, right? You'd hope so. And so, I would say it's the same case for every believer. We grow in Christ.

[33:04] We mature from drinking milk to being able to eat solid food to really being able to chew on those big, thick pieces of steak, that theology, that doctrine, right?

[33:16] We're able to continue to mature. We're continuing to grow. We're increasing in our knowledge of God's Word, in our devotion to Him. So, those spirits should be evident within, or those fruits, excuse me, should be evident within you, and I think as well as in increasing measure.

[33:34] And so, the question would be to think about, you know, do I exhibit in my life? Now, we know that the sin nature still remains, and that we are not perfect. We're not there yet, right?

[33:47] One day when the Lord returns, when it's all done, we receive that new glorified body. We will be. But until that time, we continue to wrestle with the flesh. So, I know that, you know, am I always going to be patient? No. And I already told you about the week that I've had today, right?

[34:00] But, it should be visible. It should be visible. People shouldn't have to hear me talk about how I'm a Christian and think, well, I don't know if I believe that, right?

[34:13] It shouldn't be something like that. So, we should have those fruits clearly demonstrated in our lives. And then finally, prayer and altar calls are not essential for true saving faith to take place.

[34:25] Now, I want to be careful with what I say here because I've talked to people who were saved. But then, as a result of hearing the gospel, they were saved.

[34:37] But then, you know, the next part in the gospel presentation they heard was to repeat a prayer. And for them to understand what saved them was God, was them hearing the gospel, them putting their faith in Jesus Christ.

[34:49] That prayer that came afterward was just, you know, some words. That prayer wasn't what did it. It was what God did in them the moment they believed and put their faith in Jesus Christ.

[35:01] Likewise, I've met a lot of people who came forward during an altar call. And, you know, they share their testimony and they talk about that very thing. Again, to me, you were saved in the pew or wherever you were sitting when God convicted you of your sin and showed you your need for Jesus Christ and you received His grace, His gift of grace by faith and you put that faith in Christ.

[35:25] You were saved. Though you walk forward, you were saved when you were sitting down or when you were standing up or when you were kneeling and praying. Okay? So, you know, if we have somebody tell us, well, you know, I was here on Sunday, I was an unbeliever, I heard the gospel and I believed.

[35:44] You know, we wouldn't say, well, did you pray, you know, this certain prayer or we didn't see you come down the aisle. So until that happens or even we didn't see you baptized and we'll get there soon with Cornelius as well.

[35:58] We didn't see you get baptized yet so we don't know that you really were saved. No, that's not, that's not something that we will say because we know from Cornelius and from Scripture those things aren't essential for salvation.

[36:11] Now, like I said, I think the last time, I think that every sermon given in Scripture and every sermon that is given in the church should have some kind of an invitation.

[36:23] You've heard God's word and God wants you to respond to his word in some way. And so, you know, whatever the sermon may be, if you want to come forward to pray, pray for somebody else, I think that that's a good thing, that there's always an invitation and we need to give people that opportunity on a Sunday morning or whenever we meet to have that time to respond in that moment to whatever the Holy Spirit is doing and working in their heart.

[36:53] And so, I encourage you when you see people come forward, come forward with them. That was one of the things from being in Latvia that I'll never forget that Sunday that I was there to be able to worship with them, how people were coming forward and other people just came and wrapped their arms around them and prayed.

[37:12] I didn't know what was going on. I just knew that, you know, the Lord was at work. And I asked Edgar's after about that and he said, yeah, that's pretty common. Whenever one of our people comes up to pray, somebody else is there to just put an arm around them and to just be there with them and to let them know that, you know, they're loved and they're a part of that church.

[37:33] So, I encourage you to do that as well. Most importantly, we understand that in salvation we've received the Spirit. You cannot be saved unless that is the case and thank God that when we receive the Spirit, He doesn't take it away, that it's with us forever and ever and we ought to praise the Lord every day for that.

[37:52]