Miracle Offering | Priority One | Dr. Rob Hoskins

those in Lakeville, Elk River, Maple Grove, Spring Lake Park, and in your tree stand. It's opening honey weekend, isn't it? We have no idea who's watching us or where they're joining us from on a given weekend. Today, we are continuing in our series priority one. Lastly, there's a great word and a compelling message about leaving the 99 to go after one. How many of you know the priority is after that one that left? And for us as a church, that should always be the case that we should care about those away from Christ, whether they be locally or around the world. And then today, we're going to continue in part two with that. And I want to encourage you that in this moment, as we gather together, we only do this once a year as a church family where we pause and we pray for God, what do you want to do through us for the world around us? This isn't about us, this isn't about building your brand, this isn't about building our own stuff, but the kingdom of God and the Church of Jesus historically was all about connecting and caring for the needs around us. Can I get any man to that? And so as we come into miracle offering kind of moment, just want to lay the facts before you and then allow God to speak to us and it won't be about any one person, although if you would like to write a $2 million check today, I will receive it in Jesus' name. But all of us together saying we hear you God and stepping into it. And so we have a goal, go ahead and put that up. Our goal for the overall church family, all four locations for the year is 1.85 million. And so with that, praise the Lord, year to date, we've already seen 1.2 million come in for kingdom builders and come through the church to God be the glory. And we're believing for the miracle here in the next couple of weeks that we'll be able to fulfill all of the projects that are laid out at the beginning of the year. If you pull out your manual M&A, you'll notice there you might have to refresh it at the top as a kidney-builder miracle offering, but there's also all of our projects that are laid out from the beginning of the year. We just want to help the gospel get out, we want to feed hungry kids, we want to take

care of people locally and around the world. And so all of those if you want to look through, where's the money go? It doesn't stay at a manual, it goes out to touch the world around us, I encourage you to do that. One of our partners that's in our list is One Hope. And today's speaker, President of One Hope is Dr. Rob Hoskins. And he's been with us for many years he and his family partners with us as a church family. Back when we were a friendly assembly of God, we began to partner with One Hope and then we became a manual and over the years we've had the opportunity and the privilege to partner with him. And the thing I love about Rob, go ahead and come up here, bro. One of the things I love about him is that he is consistently thinking about the next generation, investment in the next generation and how God's word can change the next generation. And if you want to cut his skin and my skin, the blood that comes out is the same, we really are all about the next generation. Would you give it up to Dr. Rob Hoskins as he brings the word today? All right, thanks, Pastor Nate, what a joy to be here. I just love Pastor Nate, I just love this guy so much. You've got an amazing pastor and just this long history with this church. So it's so fun for me to be back here, especially for a Sunday like this where the church lifts up his eyes and looks at those that are still waiting to hear the good news of Jesus and we get to be a part of that today. But we've been a part of it together now for more than 40 years now we've been partnering together and so I kind of consider Sundays like this, like almost a shareholders meeting. You know, like when you invest in stocks and then they have this annual meeting and people come together and sometimes you don't even know what the company's been doing but you've been faithfully investing and hoping for a good return. I want to tell you friends, if you invest in the kingdom, there's a promise from Jesus. Your return is 10, 20, 30 and he says in Mark chapter 400 fold what you get, I mean that's a pretty good return on investment and then he says it's just beyond your wildest dreams

so I get to come in and share with you beyond your wildest dreams kind of stories today about how we've been working together for these many, many decades now, I can't believe it and so I'm just so excited to be here. Turn with me if you would, I'll make it really easy, let's jump right into the word. Last chapter in the Bible, I think everybody can find that. Revelation chapter 22 or flip there into your phone, Revelation 22 and we're going to begin in verse number 12 today, Revelation 22, 12. [BLANK_AUDIO] "and my reward is with me, "and I will give to each person, "to everyone according to what they have done. "I am the Alpha and the Omega, "the first and the last, the beginning and the end. "Blessed are they that wash their robes. "That's those of us that can remain righteous "and holy before the Lord, "that they may have the right to the tree of life, "and that they may go through the gates into the city. "I want us to see what Jesus is showing us here. "He's showing us a walled, a gated city, "and inside the gates of that city are all of those of us "who have accepted him as Lord and Savior. "If you've accepted Jesus this morning, "or throughout your life, "whenever you found him as your Lord and Savior, "you're not waiting for some future dispensation "to enter the kingdom of God. "If you've accepted Jesus, "you are in the kingdom right now, amen? "We are in the kingdom of God.

"And so Jesus wants us to see that. "We're inside the kingdom. "We're in safe. "We've all experienced what it is to know Jesus, "to be a part of his church, "to be a part of his kingdom. "But then he goes on in this next verse, "and this is really important for this Sunday. "He said outside, picture that with me. "Outside the gates of the kingdom are the dogs, "those who practice magic arts, "the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters, "and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. "I want you to see that with me this morning. "On the outside of this gates of this city, "outside the kingdom of God, "are all of those people who have rejected Jesus "as Lord and Savior. "But if we believe the Scriptures this morning, "it's also all of those people who have never once "had a chance to know who Jesus is. "They are on the outside. "They have not received him. "They haven't tasted what you and I just tasted "in that beautiful worship, "where we're just gonna lift our voices "and feel God's grace and his peace and his mercy "and his joy. "Aren't you glad that Jesus found you "and that you're in the kingdom this morning?

"But he says, I want you to look outside. "I want you to look outside of the walls. "To those that are still waiting, "who have never had a chance to know who Jesus is, "but I love how he goes on." And he even says it this way, his own words. He said, "I, Jesus, I, Jesus, have sent my angels "to give you this testimony for the churches. "I am the root and the offspring of David "and the bright and the morning star, "and the spirit and the bride." Who's the bride this morning? We are, that's right, the church. And what do we say? We say, come, let him who is thirsty, let them come. And whoever wishes, let them take the free gift of the water of life. And I'm here today to declare that this planet, this generation is hungrier and thirstier than anyone's ever been before. They wanna know this living water that Jesus has provided to us as kingdom citizens. And for us, you and I, and that's what this is about today, to lift up our voices and say, come, who's ever thirsty, we have something to give you. When you eat of it, you'll never be hungry again. When you drink of it, you'll never be thirsty again. I grew up as a missionaries kid. I grew up in the country of Beirut, Lebanon, where my parents were church planners

among Muslim people in the Middle East. I met my wife along the way, and she was a missionaries kid from South Central America, where her parents were church planners. And Kim and I, from our various time of dating and everything, the only thing we ever desired was to do what our parents had done and serve Jesus on the mission field. And so over these last now 40 plus years of marriage, Kim and I have had the opportunity to minister in over 180 different countries around the world. And then those countries that we have visited and the backgrounds that we come from, Kim and I find that everywhere we go that people are exactly the same. Now, at first, it might not seem that way. You go into a new country. This thing called culture shock just sort of hits you full on. You go in and, you know, they're wearing different clothes. They're speaking different languages. They're eating different food. I remember I was in Madagascar, which is called the land that Time For God. I think Pastor Nate's headed over there. I'm going to tell this story for you, Pastor Nate, so you know what to eat when you go there. And we were doing a one-hope celebration, which we'll talk about in a little while. And after one of these meetings,

I was out in the bush, out in the middle of nowhere. And the pastor came to me and he says, "Brother Hoskins, would you come to my house for dinner tonight?" I said, "Yes, I'd love to." And so I made my way over to his house and his wife had prepared this big meal. And I sat down and I began to eat what was on my plate. And as I was eating this one particular dish, I was thinking in the back of my mind, "This is the worst chicken I have ever had in my life." It was hard, it was tough, it was sinewy. I was biting through nerves to try and get it down. So I started analyzing a little bit closer, that I didn't recognize. These were not parts I'd ever seen on a chicken before. So I said, "Pastor," I said, "Is this a chicken "or is this rabbit that we're eating tonight?" He said, "Oh, no, my brother." He said, "You'll be eating baked cat." And I thought, "I'd be losing it "all over your dining room table right now." I mean, it wasn't that bad. It just tasted sort of frisky, you know? I mean, the furball sort of get caught in your throat sometimes and, you know, it's hard to get down. Some of you travel, you know what I'm talking about. I mean, your head's spinning around, your stomach's churning around, you're wondering if you're even gonna survive. Have fun in Madagascar.

(audience laughs) But after you've been there for a while, and after you begin to build relationships with people, and after you minister to people at an altar like this, you realize they are exactly as we are. They have the same needs, they have the same hopes, they have the same ambitions, they have the same hunger, they have the same thirst. And what Kim and I find is everywhere we go that particularly young people are becoming more and more alike. As our world grows smaller and smaller because of technology and communication and globalization, our world is growing smaller. And as it does, there is a youth culture that is exploding around the world where young people are everywhere are becoming more and more alike. I don't care where I go on the planet. And I wanna testify to you today that this is the most spiritually hungry generation in the world has ever seen. With all we've been given, with the global materialism and economic development and literacy and all these wonderful things and prosperity in some regards, this is the loneliest generation that we've ever researched, the highest suicidal ideation. Why, I mean, the three countries that are the wealthiest, three of the wealthiest countries in the world

have the highest rates of suicide. Korea, Japan and the United States, I'm telling you, because whatever this world has to offer does not satisfy, there is only one thing on this planet that satisfies and that is the good news of Jesus Christ. And that's why we're here today, and that's why we're talking about this. My dad was actually praying these scripture verses when he had this vision. And God showed him, I mean, I grew up in a missionary home and my dad would pray these passage often about looking over the walls of the city and he was praying the great commission, he was praying for the lost on the outside of the city. But that particularly day, the Lord allowed him to see something he had never seen before. He saw those, I'd seen the loss before, as far as I could see, he saw people from every nation of the world and his heart was already stirred as he was interceding over them. But that day he saw something, he saw Satan forming his weapons of warfare against the next generation. He saw him filling the world with lies. And he saw that the enemy was going to use things that you and I have began to see over these last several decades.

And the Lord began to reveal to them that Satan is not omniscient, he does not know the future, but he can read the scriptures. And he knows what it says in Matthew 24, 14, when this gospel of the kingdom has been preached in all the world to a witness to all people, then the end shall come. And he knows what the end means for him. So to prolong his rule and reign on this earth, he targets the next generation and he tries and fills their hearts and minds with his lies like never before. And as my dad saw this, he saw things he'd never seen. He saw in that prophetic dream, he saw Satan attacking, he saw child soldiers. He saw little girls being stolen into sex trafficking. He saw the proliferation of drugs and alcohol. He saw things that he couldn't even explain to me. He called me right after he had had this vision, he was broken, he was weeping, he said, Robert can't explain it, he just began to talk about it. He said, I'm watching little boys watching pornography on the palm of their hand. This is before there were mobile devices. He says, I don't know what I'm seeing, but I just cried out to the Lord. I said, Lord, what am I seeing and what do you want me to do? And the Lord said, the only thing that will overcome these lies is truth. My word is truth.

Take my word and give it to every child in the world. And that's the way one hope was born on that day, on that day, and we as a family begin to pray. And we said, Lord, how in the world can we reach every child and young person in the world with your word? How many of you know that's a pretty big ask from the Lord? And so we just as a family begin to say, Lord, what should we do? How could we ever do this? And the Lord spoke to us so clearly. He said, you will reach the children and youth of the world and you'll do it through leaders. So we begin to pray about that. At the time, our family had the largest foreign language Christian publishing house in the world in French, Spanish, and Portuguese languages. We had just translated a new Bible into the Spanish language. And so we decided with this Bible coming out that we would give 50 copies to the top 50 leaders of every country in Latin America, presidents, vice presidents, heads of state, leading military people, leading business those countries and do presentations and say, "This is the first 50 of this Bible in your nation." And we put a letter inside. We said, "This Bible is coming to you from friends in America. We're concerned about you. We're concerned about your nation. We believe this is the Word of God, and we believe it is the only hope for your country. And if there's any way we could ever serve you, we are here to do that." And I remember calling Pastor Deneus the first time I ever talked to him, and he said, "We'll take a country and we'll supply 50 Bibles." So right at the beginning of our vision, your church said, "Yes." And those world leaders began to respond to us. We had President Pinochet and Chile contacted us, thanking us for sending the Bible. We said, "I want to give a Bible

to every member of my cabinet." President Daniel Ortega and Nicaragua wrote, and he said, "Thank you for sending me this Bible." He said, "Would you come down and meet with me?" You say, "Pinochet and Chile, wasn't that guy a fascist dictator?" And Ortega and Nicaragua, wasn't he a Marxist? You know, would you go meet with fascists and Marxists? Yeah, we'll meet with fascists. We'll meet with Marxists. We'd even go meet with the members of the Supreme Court if we thought it would help get the Bible in our schools here in America. And suddenly these doors began to open in places we never could have dreamed. We had a letter one day from the Minister of Education from the country of El Salvador. He wrote, he said, "Thank you for sending me this Bible." He said, "I began to read it. I now believe that it is the Word of God." He said, "I am responsible for the children of my nation. We're in the midst of a horrible civil war, and it's the children that are suffering the most." And then he asked us a question. He said, "Would it be possible for you to provide a Bible for every child in the public schools of our country?" I don't know about you, we got excited about that. I mean, you know, my dad, he's a very excitable guy. He took the letter and he was literally running around the office. He was jumping up and down because God was beginning to fulfill that vision he'd put in his heart. And he got so excited. He turned to his assistant. He said, "Man, send that guy a cable and tell him we'll send a Bible to every child in El Salvador." And he continued to dance around and get excited. And a little while later his assistant came back and she said, "Brother Bob, how many kids are there in El Salvador?" He said, "I have no idea." She said, "You better find out. We just promised them all a Bible." We found out there were 986,000 kids in that country. Yeah, we weren't laughing. We were like, "What in the world? How are we ever going to reach a million kids?" I mean, and then when are we going to send them? You know, I mean, you send a kid, a big black leather book. I mean, it's pretty good at the beginning. There's creation story and some great story. But then all of a sudden there's some really weird stuff happening in Adam's family. You ever read some of them? And then it's like, "Go in the village. Kill them all. Men, women, boys." I mean, this is tough stuff for theologians to understand much, but it's a little kid. We were like, you know, and then God just began to reveal to us like, "What do we want them to know? We want them to know the good news. We want them to know the gospel. We want them to

know the story of Jesus, the most exciting story that's ever been told. What's more exciting than the story of Jesus? You know, sometimes we've heard it so much. We've grown callous to it. It is still the most exciting story there's ever been. A heavenly Father who loved his creation so much that he sent his own son to come here to live with us, a manual to die and to give his life so that we can have freedom, his teachings, his stories all together. And so we said, "Man." And so God, we took the gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, we harmonized them, put them in chronological order, took out the chapter and verse so that it read straight through like a story. The most exciting story there's ever been. We called it in Spanish, "El libro de vida," what became the book of hope. And it's an incredible story, how God began to move, how people's hearts were touched, people began to respond and we printed our first one million copies. I mean, I want you to imagine with me what one million, I mean, it was nine 40-foot sea containers. Those big ones you see on the train, 256 tons of God's Word. How many of you know there's a little bit of power in 256 tons of God's Word? You know there is. And so we shipped them down to Guatemala. They went over land in El Salvador, where the church was, you know, the minister of education said, "We'll send the books and we'll do the distribution." And my dad intuitively says, "No, no, no, no, we'll do the distribution." Now what he meant was that we, that the church would do it. And I want you to get this, like we at One Hope, as a evangelist in the scripture engagement ministry, God only has one plan for building his church and it's through the local church. And so everything we do is through the local church. And thankfully by God's providence, my wife's uncle, John Bueno, past through the largest church in the country of El Salvador, he had 22 schools scattered all over the nation. They shut their schools down for six weeks and those children and young people went out from the churches into the public schools. And as they, in the middle of a war and as they begin to go into those schools, something incredible happened. They had a letter from President Duarte giving them permission to go in and when they went and the principals and teachers begin to act. is just give the book to the kids? Can't you tell them what's inside the book? And our brothers and sisters had the chance

to stand up in El Salvador, proclaim the good news of Jesus, give their testimonies, and the church is so magnificent. I mean, after a couple days, they were like, man, let's do dramas, let's do puppets, let's do songs, let's do testimonies. And I mean, all of a sudden, we were having these crusades in every public school in the nation. And it was like a spiritual bomb went off in that country. Kids, most of them in that poor country, this was the first book they ever owned, that they could actually, parents were reading it to their children, grandparents were reading it, and the entire nation was infected with the word of God. Now, what happens when a nation receives the word of God? You know what's gonna happen, don't you? That's right, it's gonna be transformational. God is faithful to his word. He says, this word will never return unto him void. It will always, always, always accomplish the task for which it was sent. And that's what we saw in El Salvador. Such a response to the gospel. (audience applauding) And we said, man, if we could do this in El Salvador, why not in Guatemala? Why not in Argentina? Why not in Colombia? Even Spanish? Why not in French? Why not in Portuguese?

Why not in Tamil? Why not in Hindi? Why can we do what God said? Why can we take God's word and give it to every single child and young person in the world? And suddenly, we began to realize, one thing we realized was that within our lifetimes, there has been a reversal of the Tower of Babel. More and more people are speaking fewer and fewer languages. Now, we could take all morning to talk about why that's happening. Linguistically, educationally, technologically, economically, globalized. I'll make it real easy for everyone. It's happening for one reason. It's because King Jesus is working everything in this world system. So the message of his good news can be proclaimed to an entire world within our lifetimes. And we said, Lord, as you help us, we wanna take your word, we wanna put it in this form where kids can understand it. And wherever you open the door, we wanna go. And so, you know, Pastor Nate, we thought we were really good messiologists. So we had made the list of these 20 languages, these 10 languages. We found that, you know, we could just reach entire nations. 10 languages, over 60%. 20 languages, nearly 90% of the children of the world.

We just said, man, so we were running off that school. How many of you know, we make our list and God makes his list? We had put all the easy languages up at the top of the list. All those hard, impossible languages, they were down there at the bottom. Because what we were really saying is, we really don't believe that we could go into some of those places and give out his, you know, God blew our list out of the water. Isn't he still saying to his church, oh, ye of little faith? I mean, suddenly these doors began to open and places we couldn't even imagine. My dad was in a prayer meeting in Washington, D.C. And some guy gave a prophetic word and he said, I want you to put the book of hope into the Russian language. Now, this is when there was the evil empire, the Soviet empire. Like, have you even known a copy of the word of God in Russia you were thrown in prison? And this guy said, I have a prophecy that you're gonna give out this book in the schools of Russia. And my dad got so excited again. He was so fired up. And then he came back to our offices in Florida. And he was driving to work on that Monday morning. And he began to think about the word that guy gave him. And he thought, wait a second, this is crazy. Like, we can't even take Bibles to schools here.

And this guy's talking about Soviet Union. We're gonna take, and he goes, you know what? I didn't even really know that guy. Like, that guy might be some charismatic cook, you know? I mean, like, you know, he says, this is, no, you know. And by the time he said he got to the office, he had totally dismissed it. He shows up at the office and he's assistant meets him at the front and she goes, brother Bob. She goes, there's some men here to meet you. And she goes, I told him your schedule is full. You don't have any time, but she goes, they won't leave. They're foreigners, they're very rude. And they won't go anywhere. And he said, well, who are they? He said, well, they're a group of Swedish businessmen. And they've come here to talk to you about putting the book of hope into the Russian language. They were those spiritual goosebumps just kind of go off on you and he says, what? I gotta talk. Long story short, this was a group of Swedish philanthropists that had begun to take humanitarian aid into the former Soviet Union, containers of food and mess. The Soviet Empire was falling apart. They needed everything. And so these guys, the Russian government couldn't believe it. They were like, and then they asked them. They said, why are you doing this? And they said, well, we follow the teachings of Jesus.

And Jesus told us to love our neighbors. And Russia is Sweden's neighbor, so we're just doing what Jesus told us to do. And they said, this is incredible. We've never heard of it. And then they asked a question, what can we do for you? And they said, well, this story that transformed our lives, we think this checks generation of Russian children need to know this story. And they had arrived at our office with a letter of permission. It was the first letter of importation to bring in 50,000 copies of the world. And they said, "We've seen your book of hope. We love your book of hope. Would you bring it?" And again, I remember Emmanuel was one of the first churches that said, "We want to be a part of that." You see, you've been a part of this story all along. I remember being in that meeting with the Minister of Education, that first meeting. And he said, you know, he said, "Everything is changing in this country." He said, and our children and young people have believed in something that no longer exists. For 70 years, we've taught this. And now everybody knows it's not true. He says, "We have the highest alcoholism rate in the world. The average Russian marriage will last two and a half years. The average Russian woman will have three abortions in her lifetime."

He says, "This is the moral condition of our country right now." But he said, "We know that everything is coming from the West. All of your movies, all of your music, all of your drugs, all of your pornography." He says, "We really believe we're looking at the greatest moral catastrophe the world has ever seen, and the words of that man begin to become prophecy in the nation of Russia." He said, "If what you're telling me is true, if this book can bring some hope and some answers to our children, we welcome it into our country." I walked out of his office with a letter of permission to give the book of hope to every school child in the former Soviet Union, 62 million kids. Does God know how to open a door? You see, friends, God can open any door. What does he say? His Holy Spirit will go where it will, when he will, and nothing, not even the gates of hell, shall prevail against him. The problem with our world being reached this morning is not open doors. You say, "Well, Brother Rob, what's the problem? The doors are open. Could it be that those that are on the outside of the kingdom this morning? Could it be that even if we were able to reach them, that they would reject him any way?" I'll never forget being in that first school,

and one of the first schools in Russia, and we were there, and I was in the school with a classroom full of 12-year-olds, and their teacher was translating for me. And I found out later she was a consumable leader, which means she'd been centered in doctrineate these kids in atheism. And I was just trying to explain the story of Jesus in the most simple way I could to those kids, who'd never heard the story, and at first she was translating so boldly what I was saying, but after several moments, her interpreting kept getting slower and slower. And so I was thinking, oh, man, she's angry. She's having to interpret these things that she doesn't believe. And so I turned to look at her, and there were just tears flowing down her cheeks as she heard the story of Jesus for the first time in her life. She took her hand, and she put it on my arm. She said, sir, she says, I'm sorry, I can't continue. I need to know right now, when school is over, what church do I go to? What man do I speak with so that I can accept this Jesus in my life? I said, ma'am, you don't need to go to a church. You don't need to speak to a man. I said, if you want to, right here, right now, you can accept Jesus in your life. And a smile broke across that young Russian teacher's face, and she began to speak to her kids in Russian. They were talking back to her.

She turned to me. She said, the children want to know, can they accept Jesus, or are they too young? I said, no, if they want to accept Jesus, they have them stand to their feet. And 32 out of 32, 12-year-olds stood to their feet, and bowed their hearts, and gave themselves to their Savior Jesus. (congregation applauds) You know, brothers and sisters, they are hungry on the outside of the kingdom this morning. They are thirsty for that living water that you and I possess. The problem with our world being reached is not hunger or thirst. What does it say? Does it say they perish for a lack of hunger? If there's no, they perish for a lack of knowledge. They're lost because, not because they don't want to know. They're lost because they've never once. Most of them have been given a chance to know who Jesus is. And we have seen God open doors that no man could open. I have experienced the hunger and thirst of children and young people all over the world. And since that original vision, we have seen God just do exceedingly abundantly above all we could ever dream or imagine. I remember we were, we were, we were wondering like, "Hey, if the problem's not open doors "and the problem's not hunger, what is the problem?" Maybe some of you are sitting here even saying, "Well, that's probably why we're here on a mission Sunday, "where we're taking an offering today."

Like, maybe it's a resource problem. Maybe if we just had more money than we would be able to, to a comp, maybe the church is some economic crossroads that we can't quite get through. I know that's the way I've, I've felt for so much of my ministry, like, Lord, if we only had more money than we could do more, we were in Brazil and we were meeting with President Colard DeMello, in the slum suburbs of Sao Paulo, about a million street kids in that city alone. And we were sharing the vision, and as we were, there were some other men there with the president, and one of them raised his hand, he says, "Excuse me, I'm sorry," he said, "I must tell you, I am not from Sao Paulo," he said, "I'm the senator from Rio de Janeiro," and he said, "I must insist if you bring this book to Sao Paulo, you must also bring it to my city." And another man stood up and he said, "I'm not from Rio or Sao Paulo," he said, "I'm the governor from Belo Rezante," he said, "If you bring this book to Brazil, you know, I need it for my region, for every child, and every one of my cities in the region." And the president said, "Well, you know they're right, we have freedom, we have equal access in this country." So he said, "If you bring the book of hope to Brazil, you must bring it for all of our children and all of our schools." I might have to say, "Well, how many kids do you have in your schools?" He'd learned to ask that question since El Salvador. The president said, "We have 32 million." We flew back to Florida and I'll never forget my dad went in and he was praying. I love the way my dad prays, he's 90 years old, he's been in hospice for 16 months. But I just love, I've seen him my whole life. I love how honest he is with Jesus, I mean, when he's praying, he's crying with Jesus, he's laughing with Jesus, he's arguing with Jesus, I mean. And he was just like, "Lord," he said, "You know, when it was a couple thousand copies

here and a couple thousand copies there," he said, "You know, I can handle it." And he said, "As soon as he said, I can handle it, the Holy Spirit fell on him." He said, "You can handle it?" He said, "Let me tell you something, buddy, you couldn't handle it when it was a couple thousand copies." This is my vision, this is my burden, this is my work. I am the master of the harvest. He says, "Who do you think I am? Do you think I'm staggered by a thousand, a million, 32 million, a hundred million? Where exactly do you think my stagger point is? I'm God. I created this. It's all mine. And he said, "Bob Hoskins, listen to me. I demand one thing of your life. And Emmanuel, if you don't hear anything else this morning, hear this." He said, "I demand a pure heart and pure motives." He said, "If you can keep yourself pure, I'll keep using you." Have we seen the devastation of impure motives in this country and in the church? From that day, we started praying a different prayer. I remember the prayers I'd used to pray. I'd go to a country and meet with the minister of education and we'd need 1.2 million. You know, I'd come back, "Lord, we need $400,000." You know, and then I'd pray somewhere and I'd go, "Just in case you forgot, we need $400,000." We stopped praying that way. Now every time an opportunity comes, every time a door opens, we do the same thing. I come before the Lord and I say, "Lord Jesus, keep me pure. Keep my heart pure. Keep my motives pure. Keep my mind pure.

Keep my marriage pure." And since that day, we've seen God do exceedingly abundantly above all we ever could have dreamed or imagined. He has been our supply. He has been our source. And now on this journey that we have been on, Emmanuel, One Hope and so many others, partners that we have, we've now seen over 2.3 billion children around the world receive the Word of God, all things are possible with Jesus. There is nothing impossible. The problem with our world being reached, it's not money and it's not resources this morning. We don't need to beg for God. God is waiting. Our problem is not resource. Our problem is not hunger. Our problem is not open doors. Friends our problem is the same as it's been for 2,000 years. Our problem is obedience. It's about coming before the Lord with all of us this morning with a pure heart and a pure motive in saying, "Lord Jesus, I realize I am nothing and I have nothing without you, Lord. Everything I have is from your hand, Jesus. Come Lord Jesus, touch me, use me, Lord, I'm available, I'm yours." And taking steps of obedience like we've never taken before. I remember our team was brokenhearted for Southeast Asia and it was one of those places where we just couldn't get in because we couldn't get into the schools, such strong Buddhism, Marxism in that part of the world, countries that we've been praying for. And the Lord said, "As for the nations and I will give them to you." And so with faith renewed in our hearts, I remember being in a prayer meeting and there was one of our young leaders in that meeting and God gave them a revelation. In Southeast Asia it's been incredible what we've seen over the last several decades because

of media and everything else like Christmas has become just so... I mean, it's Vietnam, and Laos, and Cambodia, and Thailand, and Japan, like, if you go into a mall and those-- like, there is Christmas carols playing in December everywhere. There's Christmas trees that are put up everywhere. I mean, they have the strangest expression. Santa Claus is walking around all over these Buddhist countries, you know? It's so-- and in Japan, the way they celebrate, no lie, the way they celebrate Christmas is with Kentucky Fried Chicken. Because, yeah, the boxes are red and white, and so they give Kentucky Fried Chicken to each other at Christmas time. And we were like, what-- you know, none of them know the story of Christmas. And this, you know, said, what an opportunity for us to do Christmas in Asia, and let them know that Christmas is not about Colonel Sanders or Santa Claus, but it's about God who sent his son to be born for them and for salvation and the living water to flow to them. And we were just like, oh, man, that's it. Let's just start-- so several years ago, we started our Christmas in Asia program. And when Nate and Pastor Darren heard about this, and they're burdened for Southeast Asia, they said, again, Emmanuel stepped up and said, we want to be a part of that. So our goal is Christmas. So these churches have Christmas parties where they invite everyone to come and celebrate Christmas. So if it's a Buddhist country or a marks--

like, everybody's allowed to have their own festival and have their own party, right? And they invite them, and we create this beautiful Christmas story comic book. And our vision is to give out 1.9 million of those in Thailand and in Vietnam this Christmas. And our brothers and sisters are waiting to be able to throw these parties in town after town, city after city, and invite young people to hear the real story of Christmas, the real story of Emmanuel, the one who's come to set them free and give them an abundant life and an eternal life. We've been talking about billions. We've been talking about hundreds of millions. Millions of the gods opened the door. And we've seen lives transform. But how many of you know with Jesus is all about the one? It's all about the one that Jesus knows their name. He knows exactly where they are. He knows exactly what they need. And I just want you to hear the story of one, a young woman in the country of Thailand. Her name is Ming. And because of someone like you being an obedient on a Sunday like this, you allow stories like this to happen. And I know you're going to allow millions more to experience what we're going to watch right now. Open up your hearts. [ Music ]

[ Foreign Language ] [ Foreign Language ] [ Foreign Language ] [ Foreign Language ] [ Foreign Language ] [ Foreign Language ] (audience applauding) - Wow, huh? Do you think about the power of God's word, the power of the gospel? And just move today to think of the opportunity we have to see more changed lives. You know, when I grew up, I heard different missionaries share their stories in church, and I would hear the stories of people being transformed around the world. But I really don't want those to be memories. I want them to be present tense in my life. That in my life from this point to the day Jesus calls us home, may we all be people that have ongoing stories of transformation in our world, amen? That the church is not done, that our best days are still ahead of us. In the Twin Cities, Minnesota, United States, and around the world. In particular, this project that we have, I think it's like 270,000 books. - 225, 20,000 kids. - I need the truth teller next to me

on this one. You'll take 270. - We'll take 270, yes. - This is like an auction. Do I have a 280? And all it takes for us to do the 225 is $75,000. So you might be able to take on a part of that project for this Christmas, and it will make a difference in the next 45 days as it gets in the hands of children on the other side of the world. Then on top of that, we have all of our other kingdom builder projects, and I'm just believing for God to do amazing things, specifically here in Springly Park. - Amen. Love the message. Thank you, Dr. Rob, for sharing your hearts and giving us an update on the return on investments. Love that. Emmanuel has been part of the story for decades. And Emmanuel, today we wanna renew that commitment to continue to be part of that story. Amen. Wanna continue to make an impact, as we share truth with kids and youth around the world. There's a list of the projects that we had earlier on in the service, like Pastor Nate was just saying, the one at the top, one Hope Christmas Outreach, $75,000 will help us close that gap so that 225,000 youth and kids in Thailand and Vietnam

and different countries in Asia will be able to hear and receive the greatest gifts this Christmas. Amen. And then we have other projects that are also included that would be part of that larger goal and that larger target. And again, if we can throw up that number that we had, that we started this year with, believing God with God's help, our faith is that God could use the generosity of our church family to be able to address the needs around us. And by the end of the year, if we're able to see the 445,430 command, we'll be able to address each of those different projects. Today, if you pull out the app, make sure you refresh it. You'll see that at the top, there is a button that says Mira Loughring makes it super simple to be able to participate today. You can also use the envelopes you received as you walked in, we got one right here. And, or you can use the website, whatever the means, the main thing is that pure heart clean hands like we talked about. God, we get to be a part of a people that says yes to you. It's not a problem of closed doors. It's not a problem of people not being hungry or thirsty. Oftentimes, it's us just listening and following God's guidance and his instruction. How many of you have had a moment

where God stirred you to give before? You've been somewhere, could have been sharing or the neighbor, could have been in a church service it could be. And when you were obedient and you just did it, something changed in you, didn't it? There's something about just simply obeying God and doing what he's saying. In the last couple years, even on our miracle offering week, I've heard stories back from people that were sitting in a service and it just flew over their head. It didn't hit their heart. But then God began to talk to them during the week. And there are a few that they went and they turned it and some of their stock portfolio gains for the year and they used that to the glory of God. And God took the gains. It was, they didn't lose anything in that sense. And I just, when I hear the stories of how God works in individuals, it really is special. And if we all just say yes to Jesus, how many of you know, He takes care of us too. And of course, it's all based on, this is one offering today. Our regular tithe is in this as well. We have two buckets, if you will. We have tithe, which is our offering to the Lord. It helps fund all that happens in our church.

And then Kingdom Builders, which is over and beyond in the end of the future of what God's gonna do. What's pause and pray today? And just say, Lord, what do you wanna say, our hosts are coming forward. They'll be receiving the offering in a moment. But can you just pause with me, Lord, we thank you. We thank you that you see us. We thank you, Lord, that you know us. First of all, we just wanna say thank you for the gospel reaching us. Thank you that it's transformed our lives. And thank you that you, Arjohova Jaira, you've provided for everything that we need. And because of that, we're able to partner with you so others may know. And as we hear from you right now and we act in faith, we pray for a miracle. Much like when Jesus fed the 5,000 and they were just the bread and the fish, a little boy brought his sack lunch. But yet you took that to feed thousands. I pray God, you do that through our lives. And that we would see the miracle. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen, amen, amen. God bless you as you give. How do they do you? How many of that's your song? You're crying.

Lord, here I am. Let me see your hands if that's you. I'm just like, how many of that's you? Aren't you saying it like for real? The same, just talk, it's like if a bucket goes by, if you could, you'd jump in the bucket yourself and say, Lord, here I am. Use me, do what you can do. Do it all that you can do. That has to be the heartbeat of the people of God. And before we go today, we'll have a final prayer at this missile. But you know, Jesus cares about the one. And if you're here today and you need to give your life to Christ, this is your moment. And we don't want you to miss out on an opportunity what we're sending money and prayers for around the world while you're in this service and you need Jesus. We want you to come all the way home as a church family. We want you to not be stuck. We want the light to shine in your heart. And if you would, just close your eyes all across the room and you're here today. There is no one insignificant. Jesus sees the balcony, the main floor he sees. People that join online, he knows the walk we take. He even hears what we've been crying about at night. He understands the tension underneath the surface. Yet he draws us. And if you came to church today,

you've been observing everything going on, but you really need a transformation in your own life. You need Jesus. Nobody's looking around, but if that's you, you need to give your life to Christ today. Surrender to him or perhaps come back to him 'cause you've wandered a long ways from home. I wanna pray with you. And if that's you, just put your hand up. So that's me. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Seven, eight, nine. Literally, I don't always see all the hands, but I see a 10. I'm not, see the gospel gets preached and people hear the gospel, 11. Come on, somebody, yes, 12. Up in the, yes. He sees your hand and you are important. And I wanna pray, I wanna lead you in a prayer. I'm gonna give you words to pray. You pray these words out loud. It's not a magic potion of some sort. It's actually an invitation to open up your own heart to the kingdom of God to come in and transform you. And no matter what your vantage point has been, but you're coming back and you're surrendering to Jesus, you can be made new right now. So I'll give you words to pray, but you gotta meet it from your own heart.

So just pray this prayer out loud after me and everybody else, you can join right in and say, Jesus, thank you for loving me so much that you came to the earth. You lived a sinless life. You died on the cross for my sin and that you rose from the dead. And I know that you're alive. Today, I surrender to you. I gave it to you, I gave it to you. Please forgive me of my sin and make me new. I choose to turn and follow you for the rest of my life. In Jesus' name, amen, amen, amen. Somebody give the Lord some praise in the house, come on, amen. I'd like to ask our prayer teams to come forward, both in the front of the room and the back of the balcony. Jodie's coming right now, and we want to pray a prayer, a blessing over you. If you gave your life to Jesus, our prayer teams will be available. We've got free Bibles available. And if you need prayer after the service of any type, anybody here, we would be honored to pray for you, the people that have these land years on, come prepare, they're ready to pray, the prayer of faith over your life. Before we go, Jodie, what was your thought you were thinking about? As we were in the service and he was talking about the project, I thought about Pastor Nate who went to Thailand about a year ago, and he was so moved when he came back about the spiritual darkness and how people don't know anything about Jesus. And I feel like today is an answer to your prayer when you've been praying for people there. And just thinking about us being able to bring Christ back into Christmas into a place that you saw so much darkness.

So I do think that since you said it, I think we need to up it and fill in the gap, even if it's us personally doing that, you know, we need to reach those people. So let's pray. Lord, I just thank you, Father God, that you care, Lord, you care about everyone in the world, Lord, you sent your son for the whole world that each one would be saved. Lord, we pray God for the projects, the projects in Asia, the Christmas project, we ask God that you would bring Christ into Christmas. Lord, all these young kids, there's so much spiritual darkness, Lord, that the light would come in, Lord, and that Emmanuel would play a significant role in Lord, that you would use us to answer the prayers that even we have prayed, Lord, for a dark place. In Lord, for all the other projects, God, I pray, Lord, that you would fulfill all the needs, Lord, that it would be exceedingly abundantly above all we could ask or think or imagine because you're the one who owns it already and we just submit our lives to you. Lord, I pray for every person here today, God, that you would meet every person's needs, Lord, that no one would go hungry here, Lord, that no one would leave broken today, but God, that you would put lives back together again. Lord, you are the God of the impossible, Lord, and when you are here, which you are, anything can happen. So I pray God that you would move, Lord, that you would keep our congregation safe, Lord, that you would provide, Lord, that you would heal, Lord, that you would guide, and Lord, that each and every person would know that they are partnering with you. Have your way in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen to God be the glory. Thank you for joining us.

We pray that you are encouraged and blessed by today's message. Check out immanuelcc.org for faith resources, how to get plugged into the community, or to join us live on Sundays at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Central Standard Time. We are so excited to see what God is going to do. The best is yet to come. [BLANK_AUDIO]