1 Corinthians 15. What do you think about when you think about 1 Corinthians 15? The resurrection. The resurrection. And we could read that part, and let's start. Would you stand with me? And let's read starting in verse 1, and we'll go down to verse 11, the first paragraph of the chapter. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand, by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day, according to the Scriptures, and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the 12, after that he was seen of above 500 brethren, at once of whom the greater part remain under this present, but some are fallen asleep. After that, he was seen of James, then of all the apostles. And last of all, he was seen of me also as one born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. but by the grace of God, I am what I am, and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God, which was with me. Therefore, whether it be, I'm sorry, whether it were I or they, so we preach and so ye believe. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We just pray that you would speak to our hearts, maybe even out of this congregation, you might lift up people that could come down and help us. We just pray in a special way, Lord, that you would help us tonight to understand your word and to be challenged by it, and that we might be obedient hearers and not forgetful hearers of your word. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. You may be seated. Susan and I, while we're down in Brazil, in particular, we have a custom every morning, we read a chapter out of the word of God. It wasn't too long ago, we were reading through 1 Corinthians, and we came upon chapter 15. And as we were reading, we go through the resurrection, you know, and those special, you know, the special things according to the scripture, according to the scripture, and to believe in vain. And then we came to verse 10, where it says, by the grace of God, I am what I am, and his grace was bestowed upon me, was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God, which was with me. That hit me right in the face. I thought, wow. Lord, has your grace been bestowed upon me in vain? How many of you ever made financial investments? I made them and lost money every time. Never got any money out of it. But when you make a financial investment, you want a what? A return. You want a small return or a big return? Big, the bigger the better, right? Yeah, well, I never had that, but I want a return on my investment. When I read this verse, I thought, wow, God has invested in my life, he's invested in your life, and what does he want? A return! A return! But you know, Paul says, "...but by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain." Paul was saying, God got His return out of my life. He says, after He had listed all those people that saw the resurrected Lord, how many people was that, do you suppose? He listed a few, 500. Plus James, that's 501. I'm pretty good at math, okay? And then all the apostles, well, it doesn't say that includes the apostle that they elected and all, so that's 513, more than 513. And what does Paul say about that? He said, but I labored more than they all. Well, Paul, you labored more than 513 people? That's what Paul said. And I don't know about you, but I'm just not too eager to call Paul a liar. He said, I labored more than they all. You might say, well, Brother Bill, wait a minute. You don't understand. I'm timid. My friend, I used to be timid. You say, no, that's crazy. No, I was. When I got saved in 1963, I was taught that, well, if you have the gift of gab and you just enjoy talking to people, then the Lord has put on you to be a witness for Him. But if you don't, if you're kind of timid at all, well, You know, the Lord understands that. You know what you call that? That's a lie out of the pit of hell. It's not true. God has sent all of us in the world to preach the gospel, and not just a few. They're more boisterous, shall we say. You say, Bill, you say you're timid. I was timid. When I moved to Greenville, South Carolina, I had that attitude that, okay, I'm just kind of backward and also I don't have to talk to anybody, and I started learning. that we're all commanded to be missionaries. Every one of us. I want everybody right now to put your hand on your nose. Now, young people, don't put it in your nose. It's on your nose. Okay, now everybody turn your head towards the organ side of the building. Okay, now turn towards the piano side and the orchestra side. By the way, that's very nice music. Okay, now look towards me. What happened? Well, number one, your nose moved, right? Along with your face. My nose itched. But it moved. Just beyond that nose is your mission field. I don't care if it's East Flat Rock, Henderson, or Shelby, or Greenville, or L.A., California. Wherever you go, wherever that little nose of yours goes, you're to be a missionary. Go show me. Okay, go to every missionary uses it. Anyway, go to Matthew 28 Verse 19. What's that first word? What does go mean? Means you get out of where you are and go where you ain't that's what it means. Okay, but in this case it means as you're going and Ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the... Okay, who is the Lord with always, even unto the end of the world? Those of us that have Jesus Christ our personal Savior. So that same group of people that He says, I'm with you until the end of the world, what is He a command to them to do? As you are going, therefore, preach and baptize, discipling them and the rest of the obligation. It is not just the Kieffers or the phrase I notice on your board. They're heroes of mine. God used them to call us to Brazil. Or the down K-washers or the many other people that have gone to the mission field or to be missionaries. You're to be a missionary as much as I'm to be a missionary. It's just the location is different. and I get paid for it. That's the only difference. We're to win souls to the Lord Jesus Christ. I don't care where we are in this world. During furlough, I've witnessed the people. I've even tried, I stopped doing it, but I even tried in toll booths to give out tracts like I do down in Brazil, and this one lady up in New Hampshire, she refused it. Said, no thank you. So I thought, well, maybe it's against their rules or something. So I stopped doing that. But gas stations, I remember one gas station I was at, there was a guy pumping his gas. I was pumping my gas. I go over there and I say, how are you doing today? And then I gave him a track. Every place we go, we're to be missionaries. But you say, well, Brother Bill, I'm just timid. Yeah, I was too. I was taught then when we moved to Greenville to get, well, if you can't talk, then at least give out tracts. So that's a prayer card, wrong thing. So I started giving out tracts. Now the normal place to give out a tract is where? You got a victim, I mean a candidate coming. And instead of giving them the track, you give them the track here. Say, hey, how you doing? I'd like you to have this track. It talks about the word of God and how you can know Jesus Christ your Savior. Right? That's the normal way. I didn't do it that way at the beginning. I'd wait till the person passed me, and I'd say, here's the track. And I'd keep going. I was scared to death. You say, you weren't. I'm telling you the truth. I wouldn't tell you a lie anyway. I might play around a little bit, but I don't lie. And that's the truth. But as I discovered, they're not going to chase me. And I discovered it's not so hard. I used to go into bathrooms, you know, the men's bathroom, and certain physiological necessities and all. And I'd make sure there's nobody in the stalls, and I'd put a track in each one of the stalls. You say, you used to do it that way? Yeah, I did. I was embarrassed. I'm not embarrassed anymore. I talk to people about the Lord. But that's where it starts. You say, I'm just timid. Well, Brother Bill, I just could never learn a foreign language. You're talking to the wrong person. I didn't know a language was, I didn't know a verb was conjugated until I got to Brazil. You know, I go, you go, he goes, they go, and all the other things you go. I didn't know that. When they talked about personal articles, I thought those are the things you put in the underwear drawer. Really, I'm not teasing. It's true. Is it not true? It is true without a doubt you say well Why Brazil listen? I'm a third-generation mechanic my grandfather and my great uncle were mechanics My dad and my uncle were mechanics. My brother was a mechanic. I was a B-52 mechanic when I was in the Air Force. I worked on my own cars until they started putting all this computer stuff in, and I can't do it anymore. But I was a mechanic. Mechanics are brilliant people, but they're just not linguists. A mechanic has to know why. Okay, it's not working. So you trace it back to the source, and you find out why, and you fix the why, and it runs again. That's a mechanic. When I was trying to learn Portuguese, every time they would say, they would say like, for instance, a verb ends in a, no. That's why I'm saying they're wrong. A noun ends in a, see, I'm telling you. It ends in a, then it's feminine. If it ends in o, it's masculine. And then they'd have all these exceptions, like cinema. Your cinema here, your show or theater or whatever, cinema, it ends in a, right? Should be feminine. It's not, it's masculine. Problema. Problem. It ends in a, right? Should be feminine, right? It's not. It's o problema. And I kept asking why. And one day I was sitting on our bed and I was just distraught. I was actually crying. I was so afraid I wasn't going to be able to learn the language. And my tender wife with her big brown eyes came up to me and she says, just memorize, will you? Will you quit asking questions? I stopped asking questions, started memorizing. Today, we have a doctor in our church. Well, he's going for his doctorate in chemistry. He's not one of these guys who are going to tell you what you want to hear. A lot of Brazilians are. They'll say, oh, you speak so good Portuguese, and they're lying through their teeth. But he doesn't. He doesn't do that. But he told me one day, he said, Pastor Bill, he says, I know that you're preoccupied about your Portuguese. But he says, your Portuguese is very good. He says, I could hardly hear an accent. That's from a mechanic, by the way. So don't tell me I could never. Paul said, I am what I am. Well, you're from a great Christian family, Bill. You know, I'm not from that. No, I'm not. We're still praying for my brother to come to know the Lord as his Savior. You'll say, well, you have this advantage. No, I'm not. You're from a rich family. No, I'm not. I started mowing lawns for 25 cents an hour when I was eight years old. Well, you're this. No, stop hiding behind excuses. Paul said, I am what I am. By the grace of God, I am what I am. And His grace, which was bestowed upon me, was not in vain. Now the question comes, If you know the Lord Jesus Christ your Savior, that means He's paid a price for your salvation. Has His investment in your life been in vain or not? Is He getting His return? Verse 11 says, Therefore, whether it be I or they, so we preach, and so you believe. The second part of that is, you can't give out what you don't have. If you don't have Jesus Christ your Savior, there's no way that you're going to be able to. faithfully witnessed for the Lord. Now, I'm sure there are a lot of unsaved people that have given out tracts over the years and even talked about the Lord. But you've got to have it first to give it out. Okay, you say, Brother Bill, why the shoes? A missionary that has gone home to be with the Lord, Don Harris, missionary to Argentina, he was on his deathbed in the hospital. He had some shoes on the floor beside his bed. And one of the men that he had led to the Lord came into his room, said, Brother Harris, why are the shoes on the floor? And Brother Harris said, well, I can't use them. And I'm wondering just who's going to fill my shoes to carry the gospel to the people of Argentina. And he looked kind of funny, and then Brother Harris said, you could be that one. I am 73. I only plan on staying on the field for another 30 years. That means we don't plan on leaving ever. I've had people ask me, well, are you going to retire on the field? No, I don't plan on retiring. We plan on working for the Lord until He calls us home, either one way or the other. I'd really rather have the uptaker rather than the undertaker, but the Lord's going to decide that. We plan on staying on the field the rest of our lives, but we need help. You saw that on the video, we stay pretty busy, and we need people to come down and help. We need people that have the kind of standards to show a Christian character. We need people that come and work hard, that have a real work ethic. We need people that stay faithful until the Lord should call them home. And I don't mean home to the states. I mean home to heaven. We need laborers. Now, tonight, if you already have put your trust in Jesus Christ, that means you're saved and God has made an investment in your life. And I would just ask you, Are you the one to come to Brazil and help us and fill the shoes that we need to have filled if we're going to continue to reach souls for the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you the one? Let's pray. Dearly Father, we thank you for the message. Wasn't a structured necessarily message, but it's a message that we all have to take seriously. if we're going to see the lost come to know Jesus Christ, their Savior. But Lord, it's just not in Brazil. We need to see the lost one here in East Flat Rock. We need to see the lost one in North Carolina, South Carolina, the United States in general. God, we need soul winners. I remember so many years ago in 1970s that the emphasis was on winning souls and our churches grew. Today, They're not growing so much because we're not winning souls so much. We pray, number one, Lord, You'd challenge us to win souls, but number two, that You'd give us fruit for our labor, that we'd see the loss, come to know Thee as personal Savior. And I also pray, Lord, in closing, that You would raise up laborers for the field of Brazil. Help us to see those three families come. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Amen, pastor.