Missions Report (Trip to Grace Baptist in Edinburgh Scotland)

All right, let me share with you what we're gonna do tonight. I'm gonna do something a little bit different I'm gonna give us a missions report. I thought about the different times I could do this Part of me would like to do this on a Sunday morning, but I'm gonna be out this Sunday for vacation So it would put this type of a of a service a little further out and I wanted to go ahead and Speak about these things.

So I'm gonna give us a missions report about our mission strip to Scotland and To Grace Baptist Church there in Edinburgh and before I get into what I want to share I want you to turn or mark several places of Scripture If you're not comfortable flipping around you can write them down and go look at them later These are portions of Scripture that you do know, but I'm gonna ask us to look at Philippians 1 starting in verse 3 Matthew 18 starting in verse 16 Acts 13 starting in verse 1 and then John 3 starting in verse 16.

I'll say those again Philippians 1 starting in verse 3 Matthew 28 starting in verse 16 Acts 16, excuse me acts 13 starting in verse 1 and then John 3 starting in verse 16 Now first of all before I get into anything that I want to share I have to offer a thank you Multiple thank yous. I'm thankful for you. I'm thankful for our church I'm thankful that you sent us and what I mean by sending us I mean we came out of the work of the church here.

I didn't share anything That came out of me and what I mean is everything that I shared and everything that we were Came out of what God has been doing here in all of us and I'm thankful for your prayer I'm thankful for the text messages. I'm thankful for how you supported us in every particular way Every now and then I get a text message from some of you and I would try to respond Although although I was a little hindered for some reason my international plan did not work on my phone My wife tried to straighten that out.

But at night I did have Wi-Fi and I could catch up with a few But I do want to say thank you for everything for all of your support But we went to Scotland the minister to and the minister alongside Grace Baptist Church there in the capital city of Edinburgh Now Grace Baptist Church is an anchored in truth church I think most of you know that of course, we are a part of the anchored in truth network of churches I have stated this before kind of a purpose statement, but it needs to be stated again anchored in truth was founded for the purpose of strengthening and planning Bible saturated Christ honoring churches for the glory of God and the ministry of anchored in truth has turned into a network I like to use the term family a network of family of partner churches church plants and missionaries in many parts of the world and Grace Baptist Church there in Edinburgh is a part of that network our network of Churches and missionaries and I think most of you know that that came out of the work that God has been doing at Grace Life Church in Muscle Shoals Alabama and I do try to explain to folks it is their missions arm of their church But it is a separate entity anchored in truth is a 501c3 It is a nonprofit Organization with the board of directors and I'm going to come back to that the board of directors here in a minute But I want us to see that everything that I saw Everything that we participated in is what we see taught in Philippians chapter 1 You know these verses you probably anticipated me mentioning these verses Everything that we saw everything that we participated in we see here in Philippians 1 verses 3 to 5 I love these verses Paul says to the Philippian church verse 3 I thank my God and all of my remembrance of you.

This would be the Philippian church Always in every prayer of mine for you for you all making my prayer with joy because of your partnership Some translations say participation the King James says fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now Because of our study through the book of Philippians We know the relationship that Paul had with the church Paul didn't have any relationship like this the Philippians did not relate to to Paul like they did anybody else and What I'm saying is they had a unique one-of-a-kind relationship and they were true partners and participants in Paul's Ministry and he was a partner and a participant in their ministry and that's just what I saw churches partnering together fellowshiping together participating together in the work of the gospel in the work of the church in the work of Producing and helping produce a healthy church now You might say I've never met them many of them have never met us You know a lot of those believers a lot of those brothers and sisters I've met over there.

They want to know all about us They wanted to know all about you They wanted to know all about what God was doing here in his doing here And we got to see what God is doing there and that is a part of that fellowship that participation That partnership and you know today I thought about there were those in the Philippian church That never could travel to see Paul There were some newcomers that maybe didn't know Paul like some of the older ones in the church But yet they were all participants in the work of the church and what I'm showing you is this all that I have studied and Taught you here in Philippians.

I really got to see that firsthand there in the church grace Baptist Now let me tell you a little bit about grace Baptist Church Grace Baptist Church is a church plant. It's about 10 years old. I do know that I don't know the specific time But I did know I did hear some of them say that it was about 10 years old They were sent out from another particular church They did not just go out kind of like Americans do you know Americans like to be lone Rangers? But they were sent out now the pastor's name is Ali mcclacklin. He is Scottish. He was born in In London raised in London and his wife Caroline is British their children's names are Elspeth.

She's the oldest It's interesting about Elspeth. She was born and raised as a missionary daughter Her parents were in a ministry, but she married a young man from Grace Life Church of Muscle Shoals, Alabama So she lives in Alabama and she works for anchored in truth as a matter of fact. She is the mission's pastor's Administrative assistant so she was there It's interesting to see how God worked out in her life And then they have another son named Jonah another same son named Micah He is a deacon in the church and they have another daughter named Miriam She was about my Annie's age and a ten-year-old daughter named Martha and I'll be honest with you I tried real hard to spoil Martha.

I didn't have jolly ranchers But I would have given some to her But it's interesting they have their building. They have a building of their own now They did rent in another part of the city and they were able to buy a church That was a part of a brethren fellowship that ended up closing They're really proud of the building that God had given them now doctrinally. They're very much like we are on a sunny morning They run about 55 to 60 65 on a sunny morning worship. I don't know how many they have as far as Members are concerned.

I do know that they have Bible studies throughout the week and I know that right now They have people who are going through the membership process. So that indicates growth They have recently had conversions because they were talking about the baptism services that they were having so that indicates growth and Health and they have even planted other churches Now think about that. They're only 10 years old They are a part of a church plant in Poland.

God sent them a gentleman from Poland Max Markowski many of you met him at the true true church conference and they helped plant him back in Poland and they have another church plant right outside of Edinburgh in a little town called Alawa We went there and did some evangelism there now. I will say this they've had a very very difficult Past year they've had divisions in the life of the church They've had prop people create problems in the life of the church People that the pastor had poured into in a great way ended up making a lot of false Accusations against the pastor and the work of the church It's been a very very difficult year and I bring that out to you to show you that they're just like us They're people and what I mean is Although they are growing and they're doing well.

They do have difficulties just like we do I met their two elders besides the pastor one of the elders names is his name is kev Wong They've had a difficult year Kev and his wife his wife's had cancer if you think about it pray for them They've been really having a hard time and then the other elder who was a newer elder his name was Christman Ayuma and his wife Sophie and I will tell you that I spent as much time as I could with those elders Just to encourage them.

I brought up the fact that I knew that they had had a hard year and I let them talk and share and then I looked at them and said we've been through some of the same things and just to Share hey, we've been through some of the same things encourage them greatly Because when you're in the life of a church and you're going through difficulty sometimes you can think that you know We're the only ones or something's wrong with us But I was able to minister to them and encourage them from some of our Experiences now, let me tell you about my first impressions and the impressions Throughout the week when I walked in the door of the church and when I was among them now Monday when we got there We were very tired dealing with jet lag and we went to the hotel got cleaned up went right to the church They fed us and so I was working against a lot of just exhaustion But the first thing that gripped me when I walked in the door was joy The kitchen was full of ladies and they were full of joy serving food They were full of joy.

They were full of excitement They were joyful to be there and they were full of joy about all of the work And the next thing I noticed was it was a lot of young people in their 20s and early 30s Young married couples and they were busy About the work of the church and the work of evangelism that was right in front of them one of the young men I'm gonna speak about in a minute every time we got ready to go out and evangelize He would just say I'm just so excited. I Found out his testimony.

He came to Christ and kind of a charismatic Situation and he he kind of you know, it was doctrine got a little better and I told him I said hold on to some of that excitement But they were full of joy those young people were and I noticed this about them. They were very spiritual There were times when they had opportunities to share their testimony and they would stand right up and share how they came to faith in Christ and how God was working in their life and then I noticed that every now and then one would come to me and they'd want To know my spiritual story.

I remember we got into a car coming back from doing some evangelism and Micah's the young deacon his his wife She asked me she wanted to know how I came to Christ and what God was doing in my life And look see that's a mark of being spiritual when you want to know how people came to Christ and you want to share with People you're eager to share what God's doing in your life But also they had a very great zeal and excitement for evangelism now I'm gonna get to what we did They were excited to get out of the four walls of the church and go into a very sin field Cold culture and share the gospel.

They were excited And see this immediately reminded me of the passage of Scripture that we do know Don't we know the Great Commission do we not know what the Great Commission says? Should we not be familiar with that portion of Scripture? Of course So if you would turn to Matthew 28 starting in verse 16 We know this portion of Scripture Now the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.

We know what's happening Jesus about is about to ascend back to the father and he's about to leave the work of the church to them And when they saw him they worshipped him but some doubted Remember this is between the resurrection and the ascension and Jesus came and said to them all Authority and heaven and on earth has been given to me and notice. Here's the Commission the Great Commission He says go therefore and make disciples of all the nations Baptizing them in the name of the Father the Son of the Holy Spirit teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you and Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age now.

Let me share with you real quickly how this related to them They had to go part down They were ready to go and they were ready to go out into evangelize No one comes to be a disciple unless they come to faith in Christ first and they did not just go out to evangelize They wanted to evangelize and bring them into the life of the church and you know, they were going into their city But in many ways they were going to the nations Because it is a multicultural city They didn't care what color they were.

They didn't care if they were from Southeast Asia or from somewhere in Africa They didn't care if they weren't truly Scottish All they cared about was taking the gospel to those who were behind the door when they knocked on that door So they were zealous. They had the go part down They were ready to go and they were ready to evangelize and they were Desirous to see them come to faith in Christ and come into the church and be baptized and then to be Disciplined and they were zealous to teach them all that the Lord had been teaching them and then we saw and we experienced something that reminded me of Acts chapter 13 the church in Antioch This is one of my favorite portions of Scripture for various reasons But acts chapter 13 Some of you know this portion of Scripture.

This is the beginning of Paul's Great missionary journeys. This is when he started off with his first one He was sent out by the church at Antioch and he came back to the church at Antioch But I love this portion of Scripture verses 1 to 3 now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers Barnabas Simeon who was called Niger Lucius of Sarin Manin a lifelong friend of Herod the Tetris art and Saul We know who Saul was Paul and while they that was the church Were worshiping the Lord and fasting the Holy Spirit said set apart for me Barnabas and Saul That's Paul for the work to which I have called them This would have been the first missionary journey Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and they sent them off And the reason that portion of Scripture came to my mind is they were ascending out church They are only ten years old But there are they are already sending people out Rather than keeping Max Mark Kowski there.

They sent him back home and I saw that they had some young ministers there in training One young man's name was Cameron the other one's name was GV Parents are from the Philippines and they were in ministerial training and they're not training them up to keep them They're training them up to send them out and they were ascending church And I also saw that this church had lots of potential now We could look at them and say I don't see it. They're building a smaller their congregation is smaller They've gone through a hard time.

No, there was lots of potential to multiply to reach others in the start of the churches through them And then I also saw that the church had some that were on the peripheral Pastor Ali did confide in me that there are some that are just not as committed as he wanted them to be or thought that They should be I Saw that there's the core group usually then there's some kind of on the peripheral and then some sometimes further out And I hope and pray that us being there was an encouragement To them and I tried to minister to all that the Lord put in my path Now let me tell you what our missions team actually went to do what the trip was about First of all our team from our church was obviously any and me both of us And then we had one individual one man from an anchored and truth partner church in Tennessee And then we had four that were from Grace Life Church of the shoals now one of these men is a board member on anchored in truth Mr.

Tommy Singleton And I was gripped by mr. Tommy for several reasons. First of all, he's past the age of 70 Most men over the age of 70 even if they're active in the life of the church are not going on foreign mission trips He goes to Scotland every year He goes to Austria multiple times a year in two weeks. He's going to Africa and mr. Tommy's Testimony was wonderful.

First of all, he could tell you how he came to faith in Christ He also told me how in his younger years He thought maybe he needed to be into the ministry and then he realized he was not called But he said as God had placed him on the board of anchored in truth He said I realize that God has blessed me where I can go around the world and minister to churches and Teach in the life of the church and be used He even explained how he's worked hard to try to stay healthy and become healthier so he can continue to do that He's not looking to spiritually retire now that spiritual health You know as we're connected with anchored in truth It blesses me to know that they're board members that are not just making decisions.

They're on the mission field They're on the mission field But we went to participate in a week of evangelism and outreach from Monday night to Sunday night We had worship services that dealt with a particular theme life without The first night pastor Ali preached on life without fear Then we dealt with life without hope One of the young ministers in training he preached on life without guilt There was a time for the ladies to deal with life without anxiety Then one of the elders taught on life without regret.

I had the privilege to teach on life without end I had the privilege of preaching on Sunday morning and then mr Tommy taught on life without loss on Sunday night and what I'm showing you is this each night We had worship services that dealt with a particular theme and their desire was to invite people in their work visitors who did come a Part of the week of evangelism outreach was this getting out into the city.

We went door to door They had the immediate city mapped out They had maps printed out and highlighted sections and we've already gone here and we want you to go there And we would choose up in teams and cars and we'd spread out usually two by two And we'd go door to door witnessing knocking on doors You never know what kind of a response you got lots of times. It was very cold Lots of times it was just utter rejection But we did have some good ones I'm gonna mention a couple of those here in a minute.

We did Street evangelism Someone go out into the streets and evangelize and this was when they were having pride celebrations lots of sexual deviance out there So it was every day in the morning and in the afternoon of going out door to door witnessing Going out in the streets witnessing sharing the gospel sharing our faith A couple of things here before I move on I want to mention three divine appointments that I had Now when I say this this is going to sound extremely experiential and I believe in this Throughout the years when I've done this type of evangelism Usually there are one or two people that you know God sent you to talk to The first one was a man named Malcolm.

I Was going door to door. We was four of us myself in a little 21 22 year old young lady we were going door to door and the other ones were on the other side of The street and we made the corner there and there was a gentleman in the second house sitting there in his garage Painting and he was watching us and I told the little girl Hanya I said now we're gonna go to this door, but I'm gonna talk to this gentleman. I knew he was my Appointment so we went to that door and we went around and I began to talk to mr.

Malcolm He wanted to know all about what we were doing and he was thinking about death He was dealing with sickness his wife was sick He was thinking about his bad health. It was deteriorating and he was contemplating death and eternity and he was sick He told me later. He said I never sit out here like this. I never sit out here like this But I did today I got to share the gospel I shared about hide come to faith in Christ I shared about his need about his sin about how he was facing eternity. He said he had a Bible I said, would you please read the book of John?

He said I will I got him to say it back again So I knew that he had remembered I Asked him if he was open to someone from the church coming to minister to him and he said yes So I had a wonderful divine appointment with mr. Malcolm, would you please pray for mr. Malcolm that he'll come to faith in Christ? Pastor Ali's going back to see him It just could be that one day one day When I get to heaven I look up and mr. Malcolm's there Then later little later on in the week. I was Going door to door again.

It was four of us We'd split up and and brother Ali's daughter was was with me Mary him and we went to the door and it was a young man named Craig and He professed to be kind of an agnostic, but he knew of Christianity because of his grandfather He said he would go sit with his grandfather and read him the Bible And I'll begin to share with him about life and eternity and he was extremely open and I begin to deal with him about his sin He knew that he sinned see look folks if people will will not subject themselves to the scriptures You have to understand that God's given us three tools. Number one.

He's put eternity within the heart of a man Ecclesiastes three Man knows that they're an eternal being and then also he's put the law of God on man's heart Man knows it's wrong to steal and to kill to lie Of course man sinful nature warps that so with that young man I went right to the fact that he knew he was a sinner He knew that he had committed sins and he was open. I shared how I'd come to Christ I shared the gospel again. I asked him if he was open to someone coming back and he said he was But I shared with him for quite a long time just like mr.

Malcolm and I took those conversations as far as I could go and I had another particular divine appointment someone that was a part of the church a man in the part of the church that was under conviction that he was lost and I spent quite a bit of time counseling him just like I would someone here, but let me explain to you what? church life in Evangelism and all that looks like for them in Edinburgh It's not that Edinburgh doesn't have churches.

They have more churches than we do Around every corner are large old churches now to understand that you've got to know your church history prior to the Protestant Reformation Edinburgh was Catholic and It was the state church So in that day you had to be Catholic It was against the law to be anything but Catholic well Through the Protestant Reformation and the Protestant Reformation was led in Scotland by John Knox Well, the state church became Presbyterianism and it was top-down.

That was the state church It was against the law to be anything but Presbyterian And it stayed like that for a long time Of course, they did break off and have the free church and then you had the state church But the point I'm trying to make is it was against the law to be anything but quote-unquote Christian for a long time I think even up to the mid 1800s But see the problem with that is it's top-down.

It's external You could still go to churches and see the torture devices out in front of the church Where if you were a habitual Sabbath breaker, they would put you in a metal collar out in front of the church I'm serious And what pastor Ali explained is this The Scottish people hate religion. They hate church. They don't want to have anything to do with it Because for centuries they were forced to be Christian from the top Daniel and that never works You never can legislate the human heart and He explained all that to us.

He said you're gonna be rejected and this is the reason why but there are churches everywhere They're just a few people there and most of them are closed So the Scottish people are jaded by religion. They're anti religion They don't want to have anything to do with it and it's deeply bred in them and it comes out of Some faults that came out of really the Protestant Reformation. So for them, it's hard They're dealing with hard ground. They're dealing with cold hearts, but you know what the gospel it can penetrate any heart It can penetrate any now.

Why do I tell you that because you need to understand Where they're ministering and what that's like and they would ask me what it's like here and I would explain to them Well, it's kind of the opposite here, but much the same here They're Baptist churches everywhere and everybody professes Christ. Everybody's joined the church. Everybody's been baptized. Of course, I'm Painting with a broad brush when I say everybody But most people would say I'm a Christian. I've been baptized.

I'm a member of the church and I would explain to them It's produced cultural Christianity and that can be even hard And so when you go into these situations, sometimes you realize it's not like what we have Now, let me speak real quickly about the ministry success kind of the the results First of all, I want you to know that we were a very big encouragement to the church and the believers there We really were an encouragement to them.

I heard that and I saw that and I experienced that we helped them spread the gospel to many in the city, I don't know how many doors we knocked on but I Mean, I don't know it was a lot We shared the gospel to many people in their city and we also continue to help the work of anchored in truth now anchored in truth is about churches and In the health of the churches and evangelizing and starting other churches.

So we just participated and they participated With us Bob ministering to us Now as far as success on our end, I think it was a spiritual blessing for Annie She can speak to that ask her I heard her earlier sharing with Megan Quite a lot that she had learned she had never done anything like that before She'd never been on an airplane before and when that airplane took off It was too late But I saw any be used of the Lord. I saw her witness I saw her get to know people in the life of the church.

I saw her serve she knew she wasn't going for a vacation and So I saw her be used and I think that that was a tremendous blessing for her and for me It was an encouragement in many different ways. I'm going to speak to some of those in a minute But for me, I really felt the need to encourage them especially the young people You know, I'd rather hang out with a bunch of young people than old people who are sticking the mud But I enjoyed being with those young Christians who were so energetic They had a lot of questions.

I shared with them as much as I could I spent a lot of time with them and one of the ladies in the church when we were leaving She said thank you for spending so much time with our young people. She was watching me and I looked at people who were 24 26 27 some were young married and I said When I came to faith in Christ and when I got married and when I was your age My wife and I poured our whole lives into the life of the church and we've been doing it ever since I said pour your life into the church You'll never regret it So for me, it was a great encouragement for me for me I'll speak to some of that here in a minute, but I was an encouragement I was an encouragement to them and I tried to be for pastor Ally now I want to share how challenging the ministry was for me Not the travel.

I don't mind any of that not the food of a culture I didn't mind any of that any of the travel any of that is fine with me. I enjoy that I don't mind sleeping in unfamiliar circumstances or eating strange food But let me share with you the challenge Their desire for evangelism their excitement and their efforts in evangelism challenged me To make sure that we are purposefully evangelizing like we should And it challenged my apathy it challenged how I can become comfortable It challenged me in the fact that we can come and we can meet and we can have church And we can go back home We can come become comfortable in our community We can become comfortable in where we live how we send our kids to school just in our life Again, let me read to you the Great Commission Matthew 28 16 to 20 now the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain of which Jesus had directed them and when they saw Him they worshiped him but some doubted remember they were still kind of confused and Jesus came and he said to them all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me go therefore and make disciples of all nations and That was a challenge for me they were being good at going and evangelizing And you know, what should that look like for us?

We cannot get apathetic and too comfortable in this environment we've got to go When you go to the feed store when you go to Walmart when you go to the grocery store When you go to the farmers market when you talk with your neighbor? in your own family We all must be going to make disciples Evangelizing and making disciples we should be doing that individually This was a conversation that Tommy and I had yesterday It might be that we need to make sure we train you properly because some people need Some training and we're looking at some of those things But yet as a church, what should look that look like?

It showed me that as a church I should purposely work harder to provide avenues where we can evangelize I give you a tip on one I've been working on for a while We're working on a men's weekend a men's retreat weekend in the fall it'll be Encouraging for us as men, but it will purposely be evangelistic We need avenues like that where we can reach out into the community and try to be evangelistic I also want to share the passage of scripture that I preached from the last Last Sunday morning when I was at Grace Baptist there at Edinburgh.

This was the passage It was on my heart for weeks before the trip I was given a particular topic to preach and that was dealing with life without end and I immediately went to One scripture and that would be John Chapter 3 verse 16 as a matter of fact, I told pastor Ali I said when I got the email that I was to deal with life without end.

I immediately thought about John 3 16 He said well, you couldn't have picked a better text Well, I dealt with three verses verse 16 17 and 18 Now they posted the message and now I saw that it got shared so some of you've already listened But let me read the portion of scripture and I want to make a few comments For God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life We know that For God did not send his son into the world and condemned the world but in order that the world might be saved through him Whoever believes in him is not condemned But whoever does not believe is condemned already because he is not believed in the name of the only son of God And what we see here is this We see a lot about who God is God is love He did not choose to love God never chooses to love to say that God chooses to love would seem to indicate that he could choose not to love God is love and out of his love he gave his son It's not that he gave his son so as to love he is love and he gave his son He gave that which cost him the most and he gave his son to the world Now that does not teach some kind of universalism.

No You have to understand the context of this verse Jesus had been dealing with Nicodemus and this was up against the Jewish context The Jews thought that the Messiah would come and save them and judge all of the Gentiles What we're seeing here is that God sent his son to all of the peoples of the world Not that he's going to save all of the world and he did not send his son into the world He condemned the world but to save the world But inevitably when men and women choose not to believe they are judged It seems rather contradictory But why did God send his son into the world?

So that Men would not be judged that they might be saved and he says whoever believes in him is not condemned But whoever does not believe is condemned already and What I tried to emphasize in teaching the message here is this The love of God is within us as born-again believers God's love is shed abroad that King James language in our hearts and I showed them that out of God's heart comes the Atonement Christ comes out of the heart of God the Atonement in the cross and in the Plan to save men and women comes out of the heart of God and so for us the love of God is in us In the Atonement should come out of us the gospel should come out of us Jesus should come out of us and That's how we should evangelize.

That's how we should witness When we go to Walmart, we should love that lady behind the counter even when she gets our order all messed up And when we love her we should automatically Think we should automatically plan we might not even should be planning. It should just come out Why because if the love of God is in us Christ comes out Say ma'am. I'm not mad that you messed up my order. Let me tell you why I'm not mad See Now I want to conclude by saying that a trip like this Will become more commonplace When I begin to announce that any and I were going to Scotland.

I had several of you come up to me with a chip on your shoulder Yeah, why can't we go? There are plenty of trips out there we'll talk about that more We're looking for other opportunities to go. So if that's on your heart and you want to go we'll make it happen We'll make it happen There are many different places we can go in the world with anchored in truth and they do those trips Well, they know what they're doing. They're safe and they're great opportunities to minister and I can promise you this you'll be Used of God and you'll be blessed by God.

I know I was So there's a lot more that I could say but those are some things that I definitely wanted to share