Am I Called To Missions?

This is the Truth Network. This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Truth Talk Live. All right, let's talk the truth is. I can't hide.

Oh yeah. A daily program powered by the Truth Network. This is kind of a great thing, and I'll tell you what. Where pop culture, current events, and theology all come together. Speak your mind.

And now, here's today's Truth Talk Live host. Good day, Truth Talk Live listeners. I have a packed show for you today. We're going to be talking about a whole bunch of things. We have awesome guests.

We have one in the studio. We have people calling in. This is going to be a packed, great show.

So tell your friends, listen in on the app, listen in on truthnetwork.com. We have all kinds of ways of listening.

So find out how to listen in on different areas, different channels. This is going to be a great show. I say that because, first of all, we're going to be talking about a nationwide, I'm sorry, it's an international wide class about the Christian movement called Perspectives USA. And I will let our guests get into that a little bit more about the details behind that. Also, we're going to be talking about mission trips, local, foreign, the whole nine.

How we all benefit from mission trips. And this is going to be a serious subject, but it's going to be a very impactful and enlightening subject. Hopefully, this will be an empowering subject to get you out there in the mission field as well.

So, with that being said, Oh, also. Um Holy Spirit just reminded me. We're also going to be in prayer for a brother of ours, brother and wife, who has some trouble. and um they just need prayer, they need support. Um they know who they are.

And we can't get any into any details. We can't give out any names. And that's going to come up in the second segment about where we're going to pray for him specifically and probably have some people call in about him.

So that's another segment or another part to the show that's going to be pretty enlightening.

So with that being said, we have brother Tim Hanauer with us. He is a teacher in the Prospectives class. He is also a carpenter by trade. I'm not sure if that's the official title, but he's like your fix-a-guy, build-a-guy. If you want to build, he's your guy for that.

Tim, do you have an official name for your company? Yeah, my company, Earth Graphics, has been around actually landscape architecture. And so we do landscape design. And I've done that for a number of years, kind of as a business platform, but I've also been a missionary and used that particular trade when I am in the field. And I've helped a lot of missionaries through the years.

So some folks would call me bivocational, and that's fun. It really is. It gets me outside. But I also am a discipleship minister, and I've been that for a long time. for a while and written some curricula for that.

And I love to disciple people. That's my heart and my passion, the core of kind of who I am. But I started into that starting with missions. And my very first foray out into the world was with an unreached people group in the middle of Central Asia. And then when I came back to start working on a master's in AgiCon, then I got into the landscape trade.

And so those are kind of how I got in. And those are kind of, you can put those on the table. They'll be fun to talk about, maybe pick up as we get into the questions you had for me. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.

Most definitely. I would like to kind of start off on Who are you, first of all, just a little bit before we get into this? Because I think there's going to be something that the listeners might. Um my fine, um, kind of imported. How does a carpenter go from carpentry to the mission field and also Talk a little bit about what an Irish people group is.

Okay. For me, getting to the field was more at my conversion. When I came to Christ, I was at a kids' youth camp, 15 years old, and typical 15-year-old back in the 70s. And the camp had a lot of missionaries that would come in and speak into the lives of kids at that time. And when I came to Christ, I really felt like immediately I was going to somewhere out probably in Indonesia, maybe Iran Jaya.

And so I was real excited about that. My family background, my grandfather was always into plants.

So again, the landscape architecture. Is where I tend to land. I draw a lot of things. I tend to be very right-brained and creative. Nice.

And so those two things have always been on the same rail, as it were.

So when I ended up choosing the field, or the Lord chose the field for me that I was to get into, It wasn't unusual that it was in architecture and also farming system design and plants and things like that.

So when we started off, that's what we were doing. We were doing Yeah, just just project development, designing farms that would work in small islands. And uh that's when I took the perspectives course that you mentioned. And uh as we were getting ready to go on that that particular outing and I took the perspectives course from the people who actually wrote the book.

So that was 47 years ago. The course celebrated its 50th birthday this past year. Amazing.

So I took it when it was three years old and from the people who wrote the book and that was fun. That was really cool to meet the people who wrote it and experience that.

So that has been a fun ride to be able to watch that course develop. and watch God develop me all along the way. He's always doing that. It just seems like his M.O. And um One of the reasons why I asked that question was because I don't want people to say that You have to be retired to be a missionary, or you have to be a college student to be a missionary, or you just have to have nothing else to do at all with your time to be a missionary.

You can do both, and you can have a job, a career, and from what you're telling me, a pretty important and high-profile career, demanding career, and could still be on the mission trip.

So, guys, don't be intimidated. Don't be afraid. Don't be scared about going on the mission field. If you're called to be there, For weeks, months, years at a time. God bless you.

If you're called for a short-term mission trip, which we will get into, You know, you're just there for a few days. Do that and come back to work or come back to your life. This is not, or doesn't have to be, a life-altering thing. But we all are blessed by missionaries and by mission fields. And it's just good when the body of Christ goes out there and witnesses to people.

This is how this thing spreads. It doesn't spread by you being on the couch and just hoping and praying things happen. God said to go to all the world. And I think Paul said, pray without. Uh, faith without works is dead, so you have to pray, yes, but you have to also have to do on top of prayer as well.

So Just going to get into these questions since we got a little bit of background and kind of give people a little bit of intro into missions and how they can get into missions. And we can go a little bit further, but to go with these questions. I want to start with the churches. You know, from the churches, you know, it could be a top-down thing.

So if the churches are mission-based and kind of. Have a foundation or a good foothold in missions. That'll bleed out to the pastor, bleed out to the deacons, bleed out to the congregation, from the congregation to the families, from the families to the kids, and it'll be generational.

So let's start with the churches. Um so question one. Should churches be doing short-term mission trips. It's a great question, and it has become, in the mission world, it's become a controversial question, Jamal, because sometimes we do mission trips and we do a lot of harm. There's a fantastic book out there.

You and I have both looked at it. It's called When Helping Hurts. I can't recommend it enough. Brian Fickert. Steve Corbett developed this book, and it has been one of the greatest gifts to the church in the last 15, 20 years because it's shown very subtly and very humbly.

I appreciate their approach, but it's shown that sometimes when we go out and do mission trips, we might take a bunch of kids and go do a project. We might do a build project, we call it bricks and sticks, and we go out and we build something in some place. that we actually hurt the people that we're trying to help. And that's the premise of the book, When Helping Hurts. There are other good mission trips though, and I think what I saw, I was on one this past year and we were actually doing, it was a survey trip, it was a prayer trip, and we went and we went to pray over missionaries and we went to listen and look at a particular unreached people group in northern Ghana.

And when we got there, we were praying over this people group. It happens to be a Muslim people group. It happens to be very rural. And we spent a lot of time just listening to the Lord, praying, and then praying over the people there on the ground who are getting ready to start reaching these people. And uh It was so empowering.

And in fact, I think it is going to end up yielding a few folks who actually want to go into full-time Christian missions. And so that to me is a successful trip. Because it was a trip starting in humility. Gotcha, gotcha. Hate to jump in, but we've got to save that for a little bit later.

And I just want to tell folks: hey, stay tuned for more. We're talking about mission trips and the Christian movement. Stay tuned for more. Truth talk. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com.

All right guys, welcome back to Truth Talk Live. This is a call-in show, 866-348-7884. Again, real slow, eight, six, six. 348-7884. Call in.

If you have any experience on the mission field, if you know somebody that's been on the mission field, or you have any questions, statements about the mission field, any criticisms about the mission field, call us up. If you've ever been a part of the perspectives class and you have anything that you want to tell us about the prospectives class, call us up. Again, 866-348-7884. We have on the line a well, hold up. We're going to get to Matthew in one second.

So we see you, Pastor Matthew. Thank you for calling in. But we want to get to Dr. Date the word Carson, and we want to get him in. And we want to pray for our brother and do it in a more official capacity.

But unfortunately, Dr. Carson, I didn't get a chance to talk to you about this. I have been advised by some people close to the person that we're praying for to leave out any names, leave out any details. That may be difficult, but I know you can take care of that.

So if you could, just take over with the prayer, please.

Okay. Jamal, thanks for taking my call. We are praying for someone that's very special to us. Yes. And he.

And so to our listeners When the time is right, more information will be given. But um I know that our listeners, many of them, do you understand the power of prayer that God knows?

So join me right now in prayer. Father, we come to you on behalf of some friends.

Some things have happened in their lives that have brought about some concerns. uh they are going to need uh the type of help that Meet us. Filled hands. Can we pray for that right now? Uh we pray for their families, we pray for their friends, friends like us.

We just need your peace right now, and we're asking you, Father, to do in their lives. Uh what you do as the great physician. And father of We we're so thankful that we've had friends We have these friends in our lives. They have been such blessings to us and And though we can't give out their names right now, Do you know who they are? And um We're lifting them before you.

asking you to do what only you can do. Thank you for Truth Talk Live. Thank you for this ministry and the listeners. uh so many around the country, uh literally around the world. Thank you for our listeners, and we just again place this.

uh situation in your hands. Thank you for Jamal right now as he's leading this discussion on missions. Father Woody, it's your heartbeat. It's your heartbeat. You sent your son and then your son sent us.

He was faithful to come. May we now be faithful to go. And I pray that through this rest of this program, you will stir up people to say yes. to missions whether short-term mission Yeah. use this program.

We pray in Christ's name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Dr.

Carson. We got some other callers coming in, but if you could give us a little bit about Date the Word and what it's about and how they can get in contact with that ministry. Yeah, anytime just go to date the word.com. It's a website. They can download the app and get date the word.

And today's date, 331, is Judges 331 Shemgar. He took a hacks go and kicked. Yeah. Philistines is incredible. He started where he was, he used what he had, and he did what he could.

And that's what Date the Word is trying to do.

So, thank you for letting me say a quick word about that. We're just finished speaking up at Liberty University, and I had an opportunity to speak to a number of women's leadership classes, and they're part of Date the Word. Just want to be vessels in the hand of God to change the world.

So continue on with your show. Thank you for what you're doing today. Thank you, Dr. Carson. And we're going to move on to Jerry Mathis.

He's another guy from Pinedale. Pinedale is in the house tonight. Again, Pastor Matthew is the pastor at Pinedale Christian Church that is going to be off of Peters Creek Parkway. That's the church that I currently attend. But we will get to Pastor Matthew in one second.

Brother Mathis, if you could, you have a few minutes because I want to get to the pastor. Go ahead. Yes, absolutely. I'll make it quick. But the big thing is what Dwayne Carson, just the prayer and stuff.

Just lift that up. That's everybody just they don't need to know names or anything. Just somebody that's a dear brother to all of us. Him and his wife, we just want to just lift them up in prayer and just bathe it in. God's grace and God's healing power.

I'm going to get out of the way. And I love the subject of missions. And One thing about it, and I hear Tim in there with you, will tell you. The thing is, people go on a mission trip too many times, they think they're going to go and bring something. in which we are.

We're bringing the gospel of Jesus Christ to people that need to hear it. But also when you go to the just expect to be changed also. And I'm going to let you go and Y'all have a great show. Jamal, I appreciate you stepping in there and appreciate you all the way around. And seeing the man that you're growing into, man, God is good.

That's all I can say.

Well, thank you, Brother Matthews. And real quick, give the shout out to your company, Ray's Body Shopping Record Service, and what you all do, how they can get in contact with you real quick. Yep, Ray's Body Shopping Record Service in Winston, Salem on South Main Street. You can look us up. Uh Great business.

Try to the thing is, we try to make part of our our mission field is our shop because we have people who walk through those doors that need to know about Jesus and they're usually in a crisis.

So hopefully, we can bring some comfort to them and in a way point them to Christ and trying to point a lot of them to Pandal.

So I'm going to get out of the way. See y'all have a great show. And Tim, I'm going to be listening. Y'all have a blessed. And again, just continue to lift up in prayers for that unnamed.

Person and the silent request for that person. Just lift up that family. We'll do. Thank you, brother. And we're going to go to Pastor Matthew.

Hey, Pastor Matthew, we have only about a minute and 30 seconds, but I wanted people to get you before we lost our audience in some markets.

So if you could give us a little bit of background on who you are and what Pine Dale is all about. I hate you, Maul. Man, you got an all-star cast there. Tim Hannah, Jerry Mathis, Dr. Carson.

Good grief. And then we got Pastor Matt. He's bringing it home.

Well, that's not exactly the all-star. Hey, man, I love this topic about missions. And that is the heart of the church, brother. I mean, it's all about how we point people to Jesus. And Jesus didn't really give that to us as an option, right?

I mean, if the gospel is stagnant at your church, if it's just sitting there, then you're doing something wrong.

So Jesus said Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria to the ends of the earth. And we've got to start where we are and take it out, you know? That is so good. And that's a great time. And you must have done this kind of stuff before.

So, with that being said, we are going to lose some people.

Some people are going to go to, I think that's going to be Andrew Hopper with Mercy Hill Church. Other guys are going to still be with this program. But no matter where you are, stick with Truth Network. You can listen to it on the app. You can listen to it on the web, truthnetwork.com.

Find different ways that you can listen to the show. This will be a podcast later on. And also, one of the main things along with mission trips is to get people saved. If you're not saved, find somebody that you know that's a well-churched brother and sister and ask them how to get saved. Today is the day of salvation.

That's one of the most important things on top of mission trips to get saved. And if you are saved, find somebody who was lost and get them saved. We have another brother that goes to Pinedale Church by the name of Fred Hagen. He's written a book called Just Simply Give Him Jesus. I didn't know about evangelizing and mission trips.

He took me out to the bus station. Then, from the bus station, we went to Las Vegas.

So, this book is amazing. Again, the book is called Give Him Jesus. And that's one of the main things out there. Whether you go overseas to Africa, you go to China, if you stay right here, everywhere is a mission field. That book will help you to.

Be more equipped on sharing the gospel. And as Stu said when they were worth, just ask them: what do you think about Jesus? That opens up the door. If they say no, you can follow up. They say yes, good.

Well, go find somebody else and tell them about Jesus. This is going to be something that we all have to do: churches, pastors, people. It's about the mission trip, it's about the gospel. Truthnetwork.com. Hopefully, we'll see you on the other side.

And if we don't catch you, catch us on the podcast, truthnetwork.com. Uh You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com. All right, guys, welcome back to Truth Talk Live. And we were just talking off mic. I got my Facebook Live going on.

So, those that want to check it out on Facebook Live is there as well.

So, I'm just trying to do more things with it when it comes to this whole programming thing. Thank you for Stu Efferson for giving me the opportunity to host the show today. This is going to be the second part of what we're talking about. We are again talking about the Perspectives Class USA. It's basically basically about the Christian movement from beginning to current and also talking about future.

We're also talking about mission trips. But we left Pastor Matt on where he was talking about the church and what they did. We had to get him in before the last segment ended because different markets are going to different programming. And I didn't want anybody listening to Truth Talk Live to miss out on what Pastor was saying.

So, Pastor Matt, if you could pick up on Pondale. What they're doing and how they are a part of the mission trip perspectives. You talked a little bit about. what you guys are doing. Also, talk about what you are doing as far as mission trips and about the perspectives class, if you would please.

Still a new guy getting used to this. Um gotta give out the call-in number. 866-348-7884. I didn't forget to. 866-348-7884.

Call in anything you want to talk about regarding missions, regarding the church, perspectives class. Uh call us up. All right.

Sorry about that, Pastor. Uh go ahead, please. No problem at all.

Well, when it comes to perspectives for that class in particular, you've got the expert sitting with you because Kim is absolutely as much an expert as there probably is anywhere. But on the subject of missions, I don't know that Pinedale is different from most healthy churches in that we just we recognize the importance of being a church that's obedient to Christ. And the Great Commission is the word go. Several years ago, our elders really made a commitment to challenge the church. that everybody, every person at some point should spend a little time on a short-term trip.

And part of that, I mean, you know, Tim referenced earlier, there's projects that you can do that may have some good and some value to the places you go. But our commitment was really that when a person steps out on the mission field, when you get out of your comfort zone and you challenge yourself, it really broadens your view because you start to connect with the worldwide church and you realize, you know, the church of Jesus Christ, it's a lot bigger than what you see on your block or even what we see in our country. And so you start to see this bigger move of God that's everywhere. And also, frankly, it makes you thankful for what God has given us. Because as you travel and see the context in which believers live around the world, you start to realize, man, we really have a great opportunity here.

And God has given us that opportunity. We just need to leverage it.

So I think people are just energized for kingdom work after they get their hands dirty a little bit. And a lot of times that just means getting out of your comfort zone and actually. Giving it a shot, if that makes sense. Yeah, that does make sense. Let me ask you this: how long can you stay with us, Pastor?

Can you stay with us for the full length of the show? Brother, I'm here until you kick me off. Good deal. Good deal. Because I don't want to lose out on the wealth of knowledge that you have to bring to this show.

So you mentioned. getting dirty. You mentioned getting out of your comfort zone. You mentioned what we have to offer. That is so true.

That is amazing. Um So Yeah, this could be for. Pastor Madden's could be for you, Tim. Anybody that wants to take the ball and run with this. To somebody sitting at home who has never heard of a mission trip, never been on one, that is afraid to go on one, like I was afraid to go on one.

Who's afraid to be out there in the cold? Maybe you're rounded up by gangs. They don't want to be out there hungry, lost, something happened to them. Tell them about What the mission trip actually is, all the benefits, all the beauty, all the good fruit that comes from going on a mission trip. You're not going to be sitting there in squalor all the time.

Now, if you are called to be in those kind of areas, those are going to be for the more professional people, people that are trained more to be. They're not going to toss you out to the wolves like that. But Well, Jamal, Tim, I'm going to defer to him after I just say this one thing because I think the one thing I can add to that question is the first time that I went on one of these trips, it was way out of my comfort zone. And I can remember being, we were in a country that the predominant religion is voodoo. And I was in a voodoo temple, and you could, I mean, I don't want to be weird right now, but you could just feel the evil around it.

It was just dark. It was very dark. And there was a moment in that when I actually, like, I felt panicked. I'm not going to lie, I felt panicked. It was like, what have I done?

And where am I? And I think that's when I vividly remember it was just like the Holy Spirit reminded me, hey, he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.

Well, that happened 12 years ago. And still today, when I get in a situation where I'm panicked, I go back to that moment. And so it was kind of like, yeah, it was uncomfortable and it was scary, but God taught a lesson that day that stays with me. And I just think that's when God galvanizes your faith sometimes. You know, when you put yourself in a position where you say, you know what?

There's something happening that's bigger than me. It's spiritual warfare, but good grief. If we're walking with Jesus, what do we have to fear? Tim, you can add to that, but that just was making me chuckle, wasn't you, Mal says that? Absolutely.

And before Tim, you get into that one, just to add on to that a little bit. There are some tough situations, some tough areas that we're going to go to. But when you go to, and not go to, but when you hear about these areas that have been untouched, that have been difficult ground to to toil, and you come back and hear that that whole town has been saved and that they're living differently, they put away all their pagan ways, they put away the mutilation and whatnot, and they have turned to Jesus. That wouldn't have happened if we didn't get out of our comfort zone and go to those areas. But, Tim, go ahead and add on to that if you would, please.

Well, I think as Americans, we are very culturally myopic. We're incredibly short-sighted in our cultural context. Most people in the world can speak two to three languages. That's pretty average. And not Americans, we tend to be monolinguistic and monocultural, and we have a kind of a superiority about ourselves.

And Western people in general tend to do that. And there are some absolutely beautiful cultures out there that we have no idea even how to interact with them. And it's one of the most enjoyable things, especially if you train people who are getting ready to go on their very first mission trip. How to be still, quiet, humble, learn to read cultural cues, what things, especially not to do in a particular culture. What is the general worldview behind the culture?

And sometimes you end up with you're meeting a culture, for example, that's an honor-shame culture. And we in America are not. And if you understand honor shame, when you step into the culture, you suddenly see that people tend to be more group-oriented. We are the most individualistic people on the planet. There really are no cultures that I'm aware of that aren't more individualistic than ours.

And so we tend to just not really be good anthropologists, as it were, when we first step into the field. But it's great because as soon as those things are cut loose and you begin to process what God is doing in other places, you begin to realize. That the God of the Bible is pulling people from every nation and tribe and people and language. And He wants to get us ready. For that great celebration, the throne around the Lamb where we all are in worship together.

And he's getting us ready for that. And that's what's the beautiful thing about a mission trip: it tends to jar you culturally. And suddenly you realize, oh, that's not even a biblical thing, that's just a cultural thing that I've always accepted. Right, right. And that leads me to.

one of our I guess core beliefs or core principles is the Bible. Is that something that we can believe in? Is that something that is provable, evidence based?

So when we are going out there on a mission trip and we're telling them about Jesus, we're telling them to follow the Bible, And also, what I learned in perspectives: when you evangelize anybody, foreign or domestic, you got to get them plugged into a church. That's something else that Brother Fred Hagee said. He said, Hey, once you evangelize them, take them to church, take them to a small group, a Bible study. He walks around with a Pine Dale flyer in his pocket every day. And he says, Brother, once you evangelize them, bring them to church.

So that's something else that we have to do. But. Is the Bible something that we can believe in? Is it something provable? Pastor Matt, can you, and also Tim, can you talk about.

uh the validity of the Bible and how anybody can believe in it.

Well, first of all, let me just say the Bible is absolutely provable. I mean, there's no question about that, and people have tried to disprove it from the beginning. I mean, that doesn't work, and that's the reason you might have any number of textbooks that have changed 100 times over the last hundred years. The Bible has not, so that kind of speaks for itself. But one thing I would say is that when you're walking in on the mission field, your first step probably, and also probably when you walk across the street, Your first step probably isn't to get in a debate about the validity of the Bible.

I mean, your first step is to show people how. How Christ changes lives. And a lot of times that just starts with your own testimony, right? I mean, when a person walks on the mission field, they're an ambassador at that point. They're an ambassador of Jesus.

And so they're going in, trying to connect those people with someone they know. They're saying, I want to introduce you to Jesus. And then as people are interested, absolutely, what God has given us is His Word, which is reliable and has stood the test of time. And there's not a single attack somebody's launched that's ever really torn it apart. But we start at the place where, man, I'm an ambassador.

I want to introduce you to Jesus and let you know what I've experienced with him. Amen. And Tim, you got about 45 seconds before I come up. Jim Moll, the cool thing about the Bible, especially as it goes into other cultures, and there are over 7,000 languages on the earth. Many of them, a good majority of them now, have got at least portions of the Bible translated into them.

The Bible is incredibly transcultural. And in an age of relativism where people say, well, everything is relative, what's actually fascinating is that as the Bible is translated into different cultures, different cultures connect with God through the message of the gospel. Because of what's the truth that is in the Bible. The Bible is absolute truth, and that's what's fascinating. Amen to that.

Guys, as you see, we have plenty to talk about. If you want to call in about mission trips, about church, about mission trips foreign and domestic. Call in 866-348-7884. To talk about You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com. Welcome back to Truth Talk Live.

We are back with Tim Hannauer, Pastor Matt, and these guys are part of a great church in Pinedale, Winston-Salem, off of Peters Creek. Go check out that church. I happen to go to that church as well. I may be a little biased by shouting them out, but hey, you know, it is what it is. They are in the mission field.

They have schools at their church. The pastor, I was about to say the guy, I'll be more respectful. The pastor is a line-by-line Bible teacher. He has graphics and notes that you can take on screen. I'm taking notes there.

That's another reason why I go there because I'm an intellectual guy. I know we also are in the supernatural and we are involved in a spiritual battle, but it doesn't mean that our faith is not also based in evidence as well. This is the realm of apologetics. I'm all about apologetics. And what apologetics is, it's a defense of your field.

So if you say you are a scientific apologist, that means you defend science.

Well, we are here. We are Christian apologists. But I don't want to get more into that topic without getting into our sponsors. Because without the sponsors, we won't have microphones. We won't have lights.

We won't have none of this.

So we are having the show brought to you by our sponsors. And one of our sponsors is LeBlue Ultra Pure Bottled Water. And we have Brother Tim that's sipping our hair right now. I love it. I love it.

I'm glad I grabbed a bottle as I came in.

Well, that's good marketing that he approves and he likes it. Another one is Mighty Muscadine Juice. No sugar, no carbs, full of all kinds of antioxidants. We also have Mayflower in Rural Hall. Go see Gus.

I've been there before. They have great food. They have all kinds of food outside of seafood as well. They have great desserts. The Mayflower and Rural Hall.

Carolina wood floors, open your doors to Carolina wood floors. Also, limitless golf carts. I believe they're also off of Silas Creek over there across the street from Forsyth Tech. They are a new company, but they are branching out and they're great for this weather right here. I think Stu has also shopped there himself.

So, Limitless Golf Cart. And we just want to thank all of our sponsors. We want to thank all of our staff. St. Nick, who is awesome as a producer.

Car Bona came in here a little while ago, gave a little heads up. All the staff, Rebecca, out there in the front that handles all the business. The boss lady. We want to thank the Truth Network and everybody that's a part of it. It's a great radio station, and we want to thank all of our sponsors.

So, with that being said, we want to get back into the mission field and to To say how good and fruitful it is, and to knock some of the fear out of people. that are a little bit reluctant to to go on a mission trip. What can be some of the ways that we can knock the fear out of people, Tim?

Well, I think part of that is just your relationship with Christ. I was incredibly fearful my very first time going overseas, and the Lord actually took me through some harrowing situations. I think there's a problem in America with the way we raise our kids, Jamal. We are incredibly overprotective of kids. And I'm going to tell you what that creates: it creates fear.

When you're overprotective of your kids, if you don't let them try things, to do things, you create fear in them. And it's far better as a Christian man, a Christian woman, as you raise your children to put them in really uncomfortable situations. And I purposely took my kids into Central Asia, and I had them up on the Silk Road, and we were up on horseback. Wow. 10,000-foot altitude, way above Timberline.

Oh, my God. Eating stuff from yurts and from people that we didn't know, but they were hospitable, and we brought them in. And Jamal, my kids are now in their 40s. But when those kids experience that, we still, when we get together, we talk about it. And they love, they look, go back on those experiences.

In fact, there are some that as they go back on those experiences, they say, Dad, that's just some of the coolest things ever. And I'm thinking, because we took our hands off of them. And I found that God wants us to actually create bold warriors. And to do that, put them. Out of their comfort zone.

Don't try to keep them comfortable. Comfortable will kill them, and we don't need to be doing that. Pastors Matt Sink, what do you say to that?

Well, that made me laugh because I was just imagining what I probably wouldn't eat if I brought that with you, brother. I don't think I'm exactly like the least picky eater in the world. And, you know, the thing about fear is that courage doesn't mean you're not afraid. And I mean, it's okay to be afraid. It's okay to tremble on this side of it.

But the thing is that when you will step across that line and do what God's calling you to despite your fear, that's where courage lies. And that's where faith really is galvanized. I mean, I don't think when you look at Bible heroes, I don't think those guys were all that courageous all the time. I think it's just that while they were trembling and shaking in their boots, they stepped out and God showed up. And a small way to do that.

is to step on the mission field. And there are entry-level trips. I mean at Pinedale, we go to Jamaica every year and we call that kind of an entry-level trip because it's a place we've been so many times and we know the people and it's it's a place that you know young like teen students can go and and kind of get their feet under them. I mean there's entry level trips, but I think our our challenge is to constantly push ourselves To be obedient to Christ. And that's in this area and all areas.

Amen to that. I couldn't have said it better myself. You hit on so many points right there. Another thing I want to talk about when it comes to mission trips in the church. To a small church, because we know big churches can do pretty much anything that they set their heart to.

You know, they have budgets, of course, but the small church that says, well, we can't, and we have so many barriers. What would you say to the small church of only like a dozen people way out in the sticks somewhere? Or no matter where you are, just a small church of a dozen people. What would you say to them? Are they able to be a part of the mission field as well?

Well, I just think you have to see the mission field as something that's bigger than let's go across the pond. I mean, the mission field may be right in your neighborhood, right? I mean, the mission field is where you're stepping out and sharing the gospel, which is why Jesus said, hey, go to Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria. I mean, it's concentric circles out. And then the end of the earth.

My thing is I think ev Everyone is responsible for what God has given them. And so you just have to take the opportunity the Lord has given you and be faithful to that. And so to whom much is given, much is required to all of us who are Christians, to all of us who follow Jesus. We have a responsibility to go. And heck, that starts.

Right across the street, which sometimes is the scariest place to go. Amen to that, amen to that. And we only have about a few minutes. To close out the show, and the time has gotten away from us. There's so much to talk about.

We could talk about cross-cultural mission trips. We could talk about how the gospel has been spread under persecution as well.

So let's do that a little bit, real quick. A minute to each of you. Talk a little bit about cross-cultural mission fields. Tim, you can go first.

Well, that's how we typically define mission. When you cross a culture, then you're actually doing something that's a little different than just being a witness. A witness is someone who shares Jesus in their own culture. As soon as you say, that's a different person over there, I'm going to jump into, and I'm going to, first of all, be, I'm going to listen, I'm going to learn. Cultural superiority is deadly.

Pride is always deadly to the world Christian movement. The people that God uses are humble people. The Vikings were reached. By having that, by going into the British Isles, capturing Christians, bringing them back as servants. And that's how the Vikings came to Jesus.

Now that's unintentional missions. But it is missions all the same because they're crossing into a different language group, a different cultural norm and set of ideas. And so being good culturally is part of what it means to really become missional. And I think it's important for the church in general to begin to distinguish between what is the difference between missions. and just simple discipleship on your own cultural level.

And so that's when our church defines missions, we always look at it as being cross-cultural. Amen to that. And did you jump in real quick? Oh, yeah, I would say that. Powerful.

I'm glad he's on the show today. Real quick, before you also answer, Pastor, they say in the Perspectives class that I think in 2050 or in about 50 years, the black and brown around the world are going to outnumber the white Christians.

So, for those that say this is just an American thing, a Western thing, or a white thing, you have people in Latin America, you have people in China, you have people in Africa that are evangelizing their own area.

So, this is an organic worldwide thing.

So, in about 45 seconds, Pastor, add on to what Tim was talking about with the cross-cultural mission field.

Well, I can't add on to it, but what I'll say is something I said earlier, which is the word is ambassadors. And all of us, mean, we represent heaven. I mean, ultimately, more than anything else, God's brought us here and we belong to his kingdom. And so our job is to bring the values of God's culture, the kingdom of heaven, to earth. And that was the gospel, you know, the kingdom of God has come.

And we're missionaries. Wherever we go, we're called to be ambassadors who bring that message and represent. Arking. And say, hey, there is some good news for all of you. Amen to that.

So, guys, just to close out. We got to be about our Father's business. And we got to go out there and preach to all the world. That's that scripture. And I'll reiterate what I said in the earlier show, in one of the segments.

If you're not saved, find somebody that will lead you to salvation, that will lead you to that sinner's prayer. And actually, you don't even need anybody. You can say the prayer of salvation yourself: Father, forgive me, and I'm making my Lord and Savior. It's about being saved. Getting other folks saved and going out on mission trips.

This has been Truth Talk Live, Tim Hanauer, Pastor Matt Slick, Matt Slick, Matt Sink. Truth Talk Live, thanks for watching and listening. God bless you.