Missionary Marc Buxton

What's a blessing? I last month got to connect with Pastor Mark Buxton. He is out of Florence Baptist Temple, I believe it is Florence Baptist Church in North Carolina and they've got a great church there, a great church planning missionary church, and Brother Bill Monroe, pastors there, been pastoring I think 40, 50 years or something like that, 53 years and so started that church and that church has grown up to well over a thousand people and Brother Mark has been missionary now for several years and they've got a church there, his dear wife Jessie's here, they've got three children, Reece, Levi and Nicole and the two younger ones are in Iwanis and they've got to spin the wheel tonight so they were excited, you know, we give gifts to the kids and glad for that but I'm so thankful Mark's come tonight to share a little bit about the ministry there, he's going to preach to us and so thank you Brother Mark for your welcome as he comes tonight to bring the word. Well thank you Pastor Josh, good evening, good to see everybody, it's our first time here and I'm excited, I've heard great things about this church and how much you love missionaries, I was looking at the missionary hallway there earlier and you support some of our good friends, one of my good friends is Shawn Evans, the Evans family in Sierra Leone, some of you would know them and Shawn and I are great friends and he's just told me wonderful things about this church here and I love the opportunity that I get to share what God's doing in the Philippines so that's what I'm going to do tonight and I pray and I hope that you'll be blessed and encouraged tonight and I hope that God will use me because I love this opportunity, I love the chance to get up and just share with you what God's doing but I know not everybody enjoys that sort of opportunity to get up in front of people and that's just the truth.

Now I like to take a little survey whenever I speak anywhere, have a chance to preach, I like to find out who's here, so I'm going to take a little survey and I want you to be honest with me, okay, now we're in church, they need to be honest tonight, okay, how many of you would raise your hand and you would say if I had to get up tonight and speak or I had to say something, I would be terrified, I'd be scared out of my mind, I do not like to speak in public, it scares me when I have to do that, would you raise your hand and be honest with me, I don't like public speaking, okay, Pastor Josh I'm glad you didn't raise your hand, that's good but that was about 80, maybe that was about 90% of you, okay, that is exactly what I see every time I ask that question, I've asked that question dozens of times since we've been here in the States, if you raise your hand don't feel bad, okay, don't be ashamed, they did a survey a few years ago, they actually found out that the number one fear of the average person is speaking in front of a group of people, number one fear, number two was death, number two, do you know what that means to the average person, that means to the average person if you had to be at a funeral, you would rather be in the casket than doing the eulogy, that's what that means, I don't understand that because I love getting to share what the Lord's doing, all right, some of you are awake tonight, I know some of you have been working all day and it's, you're tired but you're here in the Lord's house, amen and we're gonna have a good evening, before I forget a couple of housekeeping things, I always forget to say this, we've got some prayer cards out here on the table, you can pick up one of those and stick it in your Bible or stick it on your fridge and remember our family, remember to pray for us, there's some contact information on the back, if you wanna visit our website, that sort of thing and keep up to date with what we're doing, I've also got a book out there on the table if you're interested in that and we don't have a price on it, we just ask for a donation, whatever you wanna give and you can take a copy, this book is all about the minor profit, so if you're interested in Bible study, interested in studying the minor profits, I wrote this a few years ago, came out of a sermon series that we did in the Philippines and it's called Big Things, major lessons from the minor profits and there's so much good information and just spiritual food in the minor profits, so if you're interested in Bible study, take a look, flip through that book back there at the back tonight, well we're gonna look at a topic that I think is very important for us and I hope that we'll encourage you tonight and we're gonna look at the fact that God is on a mission in our world, let's pray again before we open God's word, Father thank you for this opportunity, thank you for this evening, thank you for everyone who has gathered here and Lord I pray that you would strengthen me and speak through me tonight through your word, Lord I pray that your ministry in the Philippines would come alive that we could see what you're doing there and how you love the people Philippines and in Southeast Asia, you are on a mission, I pray that you would bless our time, in Christ's name, well if you're like me, you like to watch the news, I like to keep up with what's going on in the world, I like to kind of have my finger on the pulse of you know what's going on and if you're like that, you'll know that things can be pretty depressing if you're paying attention to the news right, doesn't seem to be a lot of good information on the news and I know that's just kind of how it is, I know that's just kind of you know bad news sales and that kind of thing but the truth is it doesn't matter what side of the political aisle you're on, I'm not talking about politics tonight, doesn't matter to me how you vote but it just doesn't seem to be that our country is going in the right direction regardless of where you vote or how you vote, it just doesn't seem to be going in the right place, in fact the world doesn't seem to be going in the direction that maybe we would want it to go in if we had our choice, it just seems like some things are coming off the rails, some things are a little bit chaotic but what I want to focus on tonight is the good news that our God is on a mission in this world, God is on a mission, God is not asleep, you know there was that movie a few years ago, God's not dead right, God is not asleep, he's active, he's actively involved in reaching this world with the gospel and that's what I want to focus on tonight. If you have your Bible you can turn to 1 John chapter 4, if you don't have it it'll be on the screen for you there and this is a very simple message tonight, just a couple of places in your Bible that we're going to look, one of them is 1 John chapter 4 and verse number 14, this verse says, and we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world, let me read that one more time, and we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world, you may be seated. What this verse tells me, what it reminds me of is a very simple but a very powerful truth and that is the fact that the gospel is God's mission, the gospel is the Father's mission, the gospel is not the creation of a certain church or a certain group of people, the idea that the world needs a Savior, needs salvation from our sin is not the creation of some denomination and it's not the creation even of the disciples or the apostles who are in the Bible, this verse very clearly reminds us that the gospel originates from the heart of God the Father, it's God who sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. Now that may seem very elementary to you and it is, that's an elementary type understanding, doctrinal understanding, but it's important to understand because when we understand that the gospel is the mission of God, then we understand that we don't need to create our own mission, we don't need to create our own idea of what we need to be doing with our time and with our life and with our resources and with our ability. In fact, what we see all throughout the scripture and what we see through the New Testament is because God is on this mission, He calls us to join Him on His mission and what you've got to think about tonight, what you've got to consider tonight, this Wednesday night is how are you joining God on His mission. God doesn't need us to create a new mission, He needs us to get involved with what He's doing and how He is moving in the world.

Now we can be creative in how we serve God, we should be creative in how we serve God and some of the things that I'll talk about tonight and what God's doing in the Philippines, we're trying to be creative, but we are on mission with God. So my question for you tonight is how are you on mission with God? Are you actively praying for and supporting the mission, the work of this church? Your pastor talked about outreach ministries and things that you're doing, are you actively on mission with God as He is moving here in your church and in this community?

Are you actively praying for missionaries, giving and supporting what God's doing around the world? You see, for a Christian, it's really not optional for us if we will be on mission with God. He invites us to join Him and He doesn't force us to, yes, but it's really not optional. I really like how Hudson Taylor put it, some of you, most of you would know the name of Hudson Taylor, the great missionary to China and Hudson Taylor said the great commission is not an option to be considered, it's a command to be obeyed.

That's a powerful statement when you understand that. It's not something that we can sit and understand the great commission, understand that God has called us to take the gospel to every nation, to take the good news of Jesus Christ to every person on earth. It's not our option just to sit there and say, hmm, I wonder if I should be a part of that.

I wonder if I could get on board with that. No, it's not something that we need to consider. It is a commission, it's a command that we need to obey. So if you're a Christian here tonight, I just want to remind you the very simple truth that God is on a mission. God's on a mission. The Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world and if you're a believer here tonight, you need to be on mission with God.

You need to decide, you need to renew, you need to be re-energized that you're going to be on mission with Him and you're going to join Him and you can join Him on mission every single day. Now if you're here tonight and you are not a Christian, you're not a believer in Jesus Christ or you have questions about your faith, I want to encourage you tonight and the benefit I have is I don't know 95% of you. I've shaken some of your hands, I've talked to some of you, but I don't know, I don't know all of you. And so I want to encourage you, if you're here tonight and you're a guest tonight, I want to encourage you to seek God's purpose for your life. You want me to switch to that, there we go. Turn this off. Okay. Can you hear me now?

All right, we're good. If you're a guest here tonight, I want you to seek God's purpose for your life. Let me read a verse for you.

This is not on my PowerPoint, okay, it's not on this slide. Let me read this verse for you. You know what God's purpose for every single person is? First Timothy chapter two, verse four tells us, says God who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. That's God's purpose, that's God's desire for you. So if you're here tonight and you don't have that knowledge of the truth of Jesus Christ, you can find that in this church here tonight.

I want to encourage you with that. But as Christians, if you're a Christian here, we've got to remember that God's on a mission and he's given us a commandment and we need to be involved in what he's doing. We are to take the gospel globally. Now the great news is there's so much opportunity around the world. There are so many places that are open to the gospel as we sit here tonight and we just have an incredible harvest field before us.

Jesus said, look at the fields, they are white, ready to harvest and that is true right now in 2022. There are so many people that need Jesus Christ. There's so many people in your community here and there's billions of people around the world that need the gospel and it's refreshing for me to be in a church that loves missions because you get that, you understand that. You understand that there are people outside of your world here, outside of your church here, outside of your community here that need the gospel.

There's so many places that are opening to the gospel even tonight. One place that I want to focus on is the continent of Asia. If you read the news, again you follow the news like me, you will see and you'll read the term Asian Century. You'll see journalists talk about the Asian Century. If you Google that term Asian Century, you'll see all kinds of articles about the fact that Asian countries are growing economically. In fact, some of the fastest growing economies in the world, especially pre-COVID, are in Asia.

The Philippine economy itself has grown 6-7% every single year for the last decade. China's economy, of course, is very strong. Other countries in Asia are growing. People talk about the Asian Century. A lot of countries are growing just in their political power, their military power in Asia. It's becoming a very significant place, a very strong place.

But I'm not an economist and I'm not a historian or a political scientist. So I don't know if all that is valid or true or I don't know, but I do know this. I'm a missionary who's been in the Philippines for over a decade and I can tell you that the Asian Century for the Gospel is here. The Asian Century for the Gospel is here. God is doing incredible things in Southeast Asia and I'm going to share some of those with you tonight. We believe that the Philippines is really the new center of Gospel missions and what God's doing around the world and we have to be a part of that as believers. I use the illustration when I talk about this of a springboard like you would see in the Olympics.

There's a picture of a springboard right there. How many of you like to watch the Olympics? Come on. You ever watch it? I like to watch it. I don't watch, you know, I don't sit there and watch them.

Ben, you watch the Olympics all day, but I like to watch it and it's really interesting when you watch the gymnast, watch the gymnast do their different, you know, stunts, all the things that they do and it's pretty amazing. You'll watch them and they get a running start across the platform there. I'm not going to demonstrate this with you, okay? Some of you are looking at me like you're ready for me to run across the thing, I'm not going to do that, but they get a running start across the platform, right? And then you'll see them kind of jump up in the air and they land on both feet and then if you watch closely a lot of these moments, the floor kind of compresses for a second. You'll kind of hear it and then they'll shoot up into the air, right, and do all these twists and go around the bars and everything. What is that happening? What's happening in the floor there?

What is that? It's called a springboard and sometimes they jump right on it, sometimes it's actually two or three underneath the floor and the springboard is the catalyst, gives that gymnast the energy to jump up in the air. It gives them the energy to do what they need to do and what I like to say is that the Philippines is the springboard of the gospel, that God is using the Philippines to take the gospel not only through the Philippine islands where there is over 100 million people, 110 million people now, but God is using the Philippines to springboard, to catapult the gospel throughout Southeast Asia and throughout the world as we send missionaries out from the Philippines. God is doing some amazing things as we look to train and send out missionaries. As I mentioned, we've been there for over a decade now and the things that I've learned about the Philippines convinces me that God is going to use this country in a significant way. I want to show you a picture of Southeast Asia and the country in purple, I kind of hit the middle there, that's the Philippines and every country around it is what we call the Southeast Asian region.

If you look at that region of the map, there's something very interesting about it. The Philippines is the only country in Southeast Asia that is not Hindu, Muslim or Buddhist. All of those other countries are one of those three major religions, Hindu, Muslim or Buddhist. The Philippines, if you know anything about the Philippines, it is predominantly Roman Catholic. Over 80% of our population would claim to be Catholic. That's because the Philippines is the only country in Southeast Asia that was conquered by Spain and was a Spanish colony for over 400 years and Spain brought Roman Catholicism with them. Why is that important?

Why am I giving you that history lesson tonight? Well, we believe that the Lord works in mysterious ways and even though most majority of Filipinos are not born again, believe me, but a majority of Filipinos are very religious and they would claim to be Catholic. In fact, it says Catholic on their birth certificate when they're born, their religion. What does that mean? If you talk to a person in any of these other countries, Cambodia, for example, I've been to Phnom Penh, Cambodia many times, and if you stop a Cambodian on the street and you talk to them about Jesus, you know what they say to us when we do that?

We'll say, we are Christians, we are followers of Jesus Christ. You know what they say? What's that? Tell me more about that, never heard about that.

I'm serious. I know that you never had anybody tell them anything about Jesus, 98% Buddhist in Cambodian. That's true in all of these other Southeast Asian countries, but it's not true in the Philippines. Philippines, we take a Bible, which they already have some understanding of the Bible. They already understand that this claims to be the word of God. They already have some understanding about Jesus. We can take their Catholic Bible, their family Bible, and we can open it and show them the Romans Road and say, let me tell you what Jesus has done for you. We can share the gospel with them. Because of that, we are seeing thousands and thousands and thousands of people get saved in the Philippines. I know you've heard other missionaries talk about that.

I know the Zis family that you guys support, and they're reaching many, many people. The Philippines is a fruitful place because of that history, because the Spanish conquered the Philippines 400 years ago. I don't think that was an accident.

I don't think it was an accident. I think the Philippines are ready for the gospel. Not only that, in Manila, we speak two primary languages. We speak a language called Tagalog or Filipino, and the other language we speak is called English. We speak English in Manila, and English is everywhere. It's the language of business.

It's the language of education. Most Filipinos speak English very, very fluently. As evidence of that, the Philippines just recently passed India as the largest provider of call center workers in all of the world. So if you call your bank tonight to check on something, or you call your computer crashes and you call HP or Dell or whatever, there is a high, high probability that you're going to talk to somebody in Manila.

Why? Because everybody there speaks English, and they're able to provide that service for companies around the world. Why is that important that Filipinos speak English?

Why am I telling you that? Because if you speak English, you can go just about anywhere in the world. English has become the global language of business.

You can travel just about anywhere on the planet. Even if they don't speak English there, there's people there that can help you, that they speak English. So a Filipino can travel the world because of their English language. Not only do they speak English, but the average Filipino person speaks three to four languages. They speak Tagalog, they speak English, and then they'll speak one or two other tribal languages. There are hundreds of tribal languages in the Philippines, and they'll speak that. That's where their family came from, or their mother was from a certain provincial area, and they'll speak that language as well. So literally, I'll be in a meeting, maybe this size, and if I was in a meeting this size in Manila with a room full of Filipino people, and I said, how many of you speak three languages, 95% of the hands would go up, some of them would speak four or five languages.

Why am I telling you this, why am I giving you these facts? Well, it's just a truth, linguistically, that if you speak multiple languages, your brain is already working, it's already wired to learn other languages. So guess what, when a Filipino moves to another country, very quickly they can learn to speak that language. I have a friend who says Filipino, he was saved in our ministry, grew up in our ministry, and was actually sent out of our church, the church that I pastor, he's a missionary in Bangkok, Thailand, and he was there about six months, and he was speaking the language fluently in Thailand.

Why? Because he already knew three languages before he went, and his brain was wired to do that. I was so jealous of him, jealous in the Lord, right, of him that he could do that, but I'm telling you the truth, Filipinos pick up language very, very quickly.

Now, the fourth thing that I want to tell you, then we'll put all this together. There are Filipinos that are working just about every country on the face of the planet. There are millions of Filipinos that work abroad, that work in another country. The Philippine government calls them OFWs, Overseas Philippine Workers. Millions of them leave the Philippines to go work in Asia or Africa or the Middle East or in America. Now, if you go to a hospital here in the United States, there's a good chance that a Filipino nurse might be taking care of you at some point during your stay. Filipinos are everywhere.

Why is that important? Because it's a part of the culture that Filipinos leave the country and go abroad. It's a part of their culture that one member of the family will go somewhere else to make more money, to send that back, to help their family.

It's a part of their culture. So do you know what happens when we have a young person get saved in one of our churches and we start talking to them about missions? We start talking to them about the need in Cambodia.

Do you know what they say? I'll go. Pastor Mark, I'll do that. Sign me up.

When can I go? And we are seeing God call hundreds and hundreds of people to missions. It's incredible. God has prepared the Philippines. All of these things I'm talking to you about, the fact that Catholicism is there, the fact that they speak English because they were an American colony for about a hundred years, the fact that they speak multiple languages because of the tribalness of the Philippines, and the fact that, frankly, the Philippines has been a very poor country for a long time, so people leave the Philippines to make more money.

All of those things are not an accident. God has prepared the Philippines to be a mission-sending country. There's no country that's more ready to take the gospel around the world than the Philippines. And I firmly believe that that's why our family is there. Our family is there to help plant churches and to raise up the next generation of missionaries. I want to tell you about where we live in the Philippines.

I don't live in a grass hut with a dirt floor. I live in Metro Manila, one of the largest cities on the planet. There are 22 million people that live with me in Metro Manila. It's the fourth largest city in the world, larger than Shanghai, larger than Tokyo, larger than New York. Just to put it in a little perspective for you, Manila is also the most densely populated city in the world.

There are almost 92,000 people per square mile in Metro Manila. It is crazy. In fact, when I come back to the United States for a trip or a visit, one of the first things that I think when I get off the plane here is where are all the human beings? What happened to all the people?

Because they're not here. If you come with me to Manila, it is wall to wall people all the time. I would love to have you guys come on a missions trip. We will welcome you.

I want you to come, but don't come if you're claustrophobic, okay? Because there are people everywhere, and you will lose your personal bubble that we all have, huh? There's people everywhere in Metro Manila. And that gives us a great opportunity to reach them. If we're going to reach this city, we have to have an urban mission mindset. We've got to do things that will reach these people where they are in the city so that from Manila, we can reach the world.

And that's what we're trying to do. I want to tell you a little bit about our ministry tonight and give you an idea of what we're doing to reach this city. The graphic that you can see there on the screen is what we call our ministry pipeline. We work with a ministry called Global Surge.

Global Surge has been in existence since 1994. It was founded by a group of missionaries, including my father-in-law. And we serve and work alongside a great group of missionaries there in the Philippines. We have a strategy and a vision that we call our ministry pipeline.

And if you see on one end of the pipeline, there's the words Lost World. And on that end of the pipeline, we envision people who need a relationship with Jesus Christ. They are not believers. They have not been saved. And they need to be saved.

They are lost in their sin. On the other end of the pipeline, you'll see the words Church Planter. That is our vision for our ministry. That's our goal. We want to train and send out church planters in the Philippines and around the world to start new churches.

So how does that happen? How do you get to send out church planters when you start with the Lost World? Well, there's four words across the top of that pipeline. And it describes our ministry and what we do. The words are Reach. We want to reach people with the gospel.

Renew. We want to see them renewed in their life as they grow spiritually. We want to raise them up to be servant leaders. And then we want to release them out into ministry. And by the way, that's really just the book of Acts.

If you read the book of Acts, that's really just what they were doing, reaching people and discipling them and sending them out to be church planters and missionaries. To date, our ministry has planted over 60 churches throughout Metro Manila and even in other countries now. And the Lord continues to bless our efforts and bless our ministry. I'll show you a couple of pictures here, or maybe one.

I can't remember how many I have. But there's a picture or two of the church that I planted nine years ago. It's called Midpoint Baptist Fellowship.

There's a picture of some of our members. And God continues to bless that church. We've planted over 60 churches, just like this one, throughout Manila and surrounding areas and throughout Southeast Asia. And the reason that we're excited about church planting is not only to reach the people in the Philippines, that's primary.

We want to reach them with the gospel. But the other thing we're excited about is who God is calling out of those churches to be church planters and to be missionaries. In our church alone, just in this group that you're looking at on the screen, we've already sent out two missionaries, one I mentioned to Thailand, another lady we sent out to Cambodia. We have three or four other missionaries that are training right now to go out. We've already planted a church out of this church in another area of the Philippines. And I have in our church six young men that we're training who feel called to be pastors and church planters. God is doing an incredible work and we're seeing multiple, multiple people called into ministry. We want to reach people with the gospel, see them renewed in their life. In this picture, I'd say 95 percent of those people are first generation Christians. They did not come from a Christian family. They didn't get saved because their parents brought them to church and they were saved in our church and our ministry. And they've been renewed in their life as they've learned to follow the Lord, as they've been discipled, and we've been raising them up to be leaders.

Now, how do we do that effectively? If we want to release leaders, if we want to send people out to serve God, we've got to effectively train them and raise them up. So we have a Bible school. We call it Global Life University. And such a wonderful story, I won't even take all the time to tell you everything about it, but God is just doing incredible things through our school.

Our school was started over 20 years ago, 1999. It was before my time as a missionary there. And the story is that our Bible school started with six students studying the Bible and they met in a McDonald's. They had no building, no facility, they met in a McDonald's.

They met in a McDonald's because the McDonald's had free coffee refills as long as you were there. And so our missionaries would buy, you know, seven coffees and they would sit there and teach these six guys how to preach the Word of God and how to lead a church and how to be a pastor. And out of those six men, there are several of them that are still in our ministry today that are still pastoring.

That was over 20 years ago. From six students meeting in a McDonald's, God has blessed Global Life University. And now today our school has over 2,000 students that are enrolled. We have multiple campuses all over Metro Manila.

This year we're opening our first campus in Cambodia and we're going to be opening in other countries very soon. And God just continues to bring us more and more students to train. We are training pastors, we're training missionaries, we're training church team members, we're training school teachers, we're training literally an army of believers in Manila. Global Life University, and we say this with all humility, it's the largest Bible school in Southeast Asia.

And what that is enabling us to do is to train a group of people that are going to go out throughout Southeast Asia, those other countries that I showed you, and take the gospel around the world. I'm going to show you a picture of one of our graduates. His name is Jarek. Yeah, and that's a picture there of Jarek and his wife, Angelou, their daughter. And let me tell you about Jarek. Jarek was one of those teenagers that was in the lost world.

He was not from a Christian family and he was not interested in God. And Jarek got invited to come to one of our youth camps. We have a youth camp that reaches tens of thousands of young people every year with the gospel. And Jarek got invited to come to our youth camp. And he came and he had a great time at the camp and he heard the gospel. And Jarek got saved at youth camp. And he got on the bus.

The camp is about five hours outside of Manila. He got back on the bus, went back home to an area of Manila where he lives. And he got invited to come and visit the church that had invited him to camp. So Jarek started going to that church and he started growing in the Lord. He started reading his Bible. He started attending a Bible study, a small group, and he began to grow. Then Jarek actually began to serve and volunteer and was helping to lead that group. And then he started to lead a small group and started to grow.

And if you talked to Jarek, he would tell you, as I was growing, I realized I wanted to know more. I wanted to do more for God. So he talked to his pastor and he said, I want to enroll at Global Life University. I want to study the Bible.

I want to give my life to that. So he enrolled in our school. And just this past June, we had our graduation for Global Life University. Just before I left the Philippines to come here, we had our graduation and we had over 800 graduates, 881 graduates of our Bible school.

Now if you think you've been to a long event at some point in your life, try shaking hands with 881 college graduates as they walk across the stage. It was a long morning and Jarek was one of those graduates that I shook hands with. And Jarek graduated with his bachelor's in biblical studies. And I'm telling you that because I'm telling you today, as of about eight weeks ago, Jarek and his family moved to Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

And they've given their life to be church planters in Phnom Penh, where again, 98% of the people are Buddhists and need the Lord. Jarek is doing a wonderful job. One of our Global Surge team members is there helping Jarek. And this other missionary said to one of our team members, he said, if I had a hundred Jarek Garcias, we would reach Cambodia for Christ because he is just on fire and he's got energy and he wants to serve God.

I think I've got another picture of him. He is meeting with some Cambodian school kids after school and he's doing a lesson with them and a kind of a Bible study with them after school and they're reaching people and planting churches there. God is doing incredible things. We really believe that in the coming decade that we're going to send out hundreds of Jareks. I'm going to show you a map that kind of gives you an idea of what the Lord is doing. This is a map showing all of the countries where Global Surge has sent out missionaries from the Philippines to these countries. We've sent out over a hundred and thirty missionaries now, a hundred and thirty-one I think is the exact number that have come out of the Philippines and are serving God in other countries.

And Jarek is one of those and we believe that's just the tip of the iceberg. The next time I come back here, I think that number is going to be three or four hundred people because our Bible college is continuing to grow, we're continuing to plant churches, God is continuing to call people out and we're continuing to send people out to other countries. Now is the time to join God on his mission. Now is the time to get involved with what the Lord is doing around the world. We have got to be involved with what God's doing in the Philippines. We have to pray, we have to send more missionaries, we have to do everything we can to join God on his mission. I'm going to close by reading you a verse from the book of Esther.

You don't have to turn there if you want to, you can and I won't ask you to stand. The verse is on your screen there. I think most of you would know the story of Esther, but if you don't I'll give you just a cliff note summary. Esther was the queen at this time and there had been a lot of political things going on and there were some people who didn't like the Jewish people and they had kind of circumvented and passed some laws and the king had signed some things that basically were going to lead to the Jewish people being expelled and being killed and so the Jewish people were in a very bad situation. They were literally going to be exterminated and Esther was the queen and some people didn't even know this, but Esther was actually a Jewish lineage and there was a very powerful man that worked in the king's palace and it was Esther's uncle, does anybody remember his name?

Mordecai. It was Esther's uncle Mordecai and he was a very influential man, a very powerful man and he knew what was happening. He had seen the handwriting on the wall so to speak and he knew that Esther had the power, had the political power to put a stop to this and so as the story goes Mordecai approaches Esther and says Esther you have to do something about this. You have to go into the king and talk to the king and if you read the story at first Esther's reaction was I can't do that, I'm not doing that, there's no way I'm walking in there. You got to find another solution and then Mordecai challenges her, one of the most famous passages in the Bible. Mordecai her uncle says this to Esther, Esther if you remain completely silent at this time relief and deliverance will arise from the Jews from another place but you and your father's house will perish yet who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this. Esther maybe God has put you in this place at this time for this specific reason.

Have you ever thought about that? You know what I firmly believe is that God has put the Philippines where the Philippines is at this moment in history for a specific purpose for such a time as this. It's not an accident the things that I have shared with you tonight, it's not an accident. God is on the move, he's on a mission and he's going to get the gospel to people who need to hear it and you know what I believe, I believe our family, the Buxton family is God has put us there in Manila for such a time as this. I grew up in South Carolina and if you had told me when I was a teenager, when I was in college that I was going to be a missionary, I would have said you're crazy, not happening but God had plans to call me into the ministry. God began to work on my heart as I went on mission trips and I spent time in his word and my life's verses, Psalm 37, four, delight yourself also in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. As we delight ourselves in God, as we spend time with him, he gives us new desires in our heart.

He plants new desires inside of us and that's what God did in my life and my family's life. God has called us for a specific purpose and I believe that this church is here for a specific purpose. You are here to reach this community that you're in. This church is not here by accident. This church is here for a specific reason to get the gospel to people who walk through those doors and for you when you walk out of those doors to take the gospel to people who need to hear it. And this church is here because that hallway is lined with missionaries over there and all of them are doing a wonderful job getting the gospel and being on mission with God. And this church is here to enable that, to support that. Missionaries cannot go unless people send them.

We cannot go unless churches like this one send us. So maybe you're here tonight for a specific purpose. Maybe you need to be encouraged by what God's doing in the world. Maybe you need to be inspired by something God wants you to do.

And I don't know everybody here. I don't know your story but maybe there's somebody here and you've been thinking about doing something for God. Maybe you've been thinking and praying about missions. I would encourage you to pursue that, to follow that. Maybe you've been thinking about how you could serve in this church and be on mission with God more.

I would encourage you to pursue that. Esther maybe you're here for such a time as this. Did you ever think about that? Maybe God wants you to do something right here in this church. Maybe there's somebody here tonight and you walked in the door because you needed to hear that God loves you. You needed to hear the gospel that Jesus died for you to pay for your sins and that he came back to life. The Bible says if you will believe in him, you'll have eternal life, you'll be saved.

Maybe you needed to hear that. If you're here tonight and you needed to be saved, Pastor Josh or anyone here at the church can help you with that. Here's what I believe and then we'll close. I believe the best days for this church can be in the future as you continue to stay on mission with God, as you continue to stay close to the Lord and what he's doing. Because remember, it's his mission.

We don't have to invent anything, guys. We just gotta stay close to him and what he's doing and he's gonna lead us to do it. So the great days for this church, the best days are in the future as you follow God. And the same is true for each of you personally. Your best days, no matter whether you've had great days in the past or you've had a lot of struggles in your life in the past, the best days for you in the future will be as you join together with God and you walk with God and you say, God, I'm gonna live my life on mission with you.

That's what I'm gonna do. Your best days will be ahead. As you bow your heads and close your eyes, and I'm just gonna give a very simple brief invitation and then I'll turn it back over to your pastor and he can close. With your heads bowed, your eyes closed, I'm curious who's here tonight and who God is speaking to tonight. Some of you are already coming to the front to pray. If you feel that you wanna come and pray, if God has touched your heart tonight, I want you to come to the front.

I want you to pray, I want you to give that to God. With your heads bowed, no one's looking around. Is there any person here in the room tonight?

Is there anybody here tonight? And you say, you know, I'm not sure about my salvation. I'm not sure that I have eternal life.

Mark, I don't know what would happen to me if I died. I'm not sure that my sins are forgiven, but I want to be sure. I want to be saved. Is there anybody here tonight?

I'm not gonna embarrass you. I want to pray for you and I wanna give you a chance. Is there anybody here tonight you would raise your hand and say, pray for me, I'm not sure about my salvation.

I'm not sure I have eternal life. Would you lift your hand up so that I can pray for you? Pray for me, I want to know Jesus. I want to have a relationship with God. Pray for me.

Is there anybody here like that? I'm gonna lift your hand. I'm gonna pray for you in just a moment, those of you that are thinking about that.

How many of you are here tonight and you might say, I didn't come down and that's okay. But God spoke to me tonight. Pray for me.

God touched my heart about being on mission with him. Would you lift your hand so that I can pray for you? I see your hand, thank you. I see your hand, amen.

I see your hands, yes. Pray for me tonight. God touched my heart tonight about being on mission with anybody else. I'm gonna pray and then I'll turn it back over to your pastor.

God thank you for this wonderful church. Thank you for the opportunity that we've had to open your word, to hear from you and just a simple message, just a few verses, but it reminds us of your power that you are on mission and that you invite us to join you and that you've put us here for a purpose. God you've saved us for a purpose and I pray for all of those who lifted their hands tonight that you've spoken to them about aligning their lives with you and being on mission with you and what you're doing. I pray that you would continue to guide them. I pray that you would continue to answer the questions that they have, that you would continue to make the path straight for them and clear for them, that they could follow you on mission. Lord I pray for this church and the many things that it's doing to reach out to people. Lord I pray that as everyone in this church joins together and is on mission with you, I pray that you would continue to grow this church and bring people into this flock, Lord, for your glory. And then God I pray for anyone here tonight who is not saved, I pray that they would get saved tonight. I pray that they would be sure about that tonight before they leave. God thank you for meeting with us tonight, thank you for this wonderful church, in Christ's name, amen.