Go ahead and get started. I'm recording this
for posterity's sake, because we're going to
talk about some things that people might forget.
So we're going to do it so we don't forget. But
before we do that, we're going to look at some
scripture. You ready? All right. We're going
to pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for this
day. Even the rain, the work, even the tiredness,
even the troubles, we realize, Lord, that they
are all part of the plan. And you're a master
planner, much better than we are, for sure. And
we're grateful that you take care of us. We confess
to you our weakness. We don't always understand
the plan. When we don't understand the plan,
sometimes we go off plan. And so we ask your
forgiveness for when we do that. Thank you for
each person that's here. We thank you for the
workers in the kingdom and what's being done.
We especially pray right now, Lord, for Chris.
He's in a terrible amount of pain. We pray that
you'd heal us. his hip and his knee and getting
back on his feet strength pray for those who
are traveling pray for others who are sick pray
for rachel but we ask you to bless rachel heal
her heart help her make all the right choices
and then to experience your healing firsthand
i should bless our time together we're just going
to look a little bit of scripture and then talk
about some things that have happened so we don't
forget them and we pray that eventually the news
of what you've done here will go all over the
world. We pray all that in Jesus' name. Amen.
Okay, so the scripture we're going to look at,
there's no worksheet. So the scripture we're
going to look at is Matthew 16. So if you want
to grab a Bible and follow along, you can. Otherwise,
I am going to read it. So this is a pretty classic
passage of scripture. Jesus is with the disciples.
It is during Jesus' public ministry, and it is...
really headed into the time of when he'll be
crucified. And it's sort of like people are beginning
to realize what's going on. So we're going to
start reading in verse 8. Okay, this is Matthew
16, verse 8. Matthew 16, verse 8. It says, So
basically they were talking about why he was
upset with them, why he had said they had little
faith. And Jesus being aware of it, he said to
them, O you of little faith, why do you reason
among yourselves because you have bought no bread?
Because that's what they thought they had done
wrong. Do you not yet understand or remember
the five loaves of the 5 ,000, how many baskets
you took up, nor the seven loaves of the 4 ,000
and how many large baskets you took up? How is
it you do not understand that I did not speak
to you concerning bread, but to be aware of the
leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees? Then they
understood that he did not tell them to beware
of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of
the Pharisees and the Sadducees. That's the teaching
of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. When Jesus
came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, he
asked his disciples, saying, Who do men say that
I, the Son of Man, am? So they said, Some say
John the Baptist, some Elijah, others Jeremiah,
or one of the prophets. He said to them, But
who do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered
and said, You are the Christ, the Son of the
living God. Jesus answered and said to him, Blessed
are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has
not revealed this to you, but my Father who is
in heaven. And I also say to you that you are
Peter, and on this rock I shall build my church,
and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against
it. And I will give you the keys of the kingdom,
and whatever you bind on earth will be bound
on heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will
be loosed in heaven. Okay, so real quick before
I get into it, there's a couple things I want
to clarify. So when he says you are Peter, the
word Peter meant stone, small stone, generally
like a pebble, right? And so people do get off
in a confusion and thinking like that God would
build the church specifically on Peter. And that
is where the doctrine of the Pope comes from.
There's some stuff happens in between there.
But the bottom line is, I think there is a guy
who has the descendant authority all the way
back to Peter. All right. And that's not true.
That's not right. That's not what was intended.
But he was Jesus was giving a poetic way to remember
what he was saying. So the rock that he's talking
about there is the revelation or the understanding
of who Jesus is. Okay, so it's the gospel essentially,
right? The truth about Jesus. So we understand
that that is what God will build the church on.
And then he says, the gates of Hades or hell
shall not prevail against it. So when you see
that phrase, one thing prevailing against another,
you think like two wrestlers or two armies or
two football teams, right? Although they're not
really, they're prevailing in the sense that
they score, but not actually in the sense that
they're destroying the other team, right? So
he's saying the gates of hell. will not prevail
against us. The gates of hell would be symbolic
of the things that would hold back the church,
that would attack the church, the persecutions,
evil in the world, right? Okay, so if Jesus built
his church, if he's the one building the church,
then the evils of the world, the evils of hell,
demons, evil spirits, everything that's evil,
right? None of that is going to prevail or overcome
the church. So really what we have to just ask
ourselves is... Two things. One, what do we have
to do? And the answer is we just need to ensure
that our faith rests on Christ, not on something
else, not on like even an idea of who Jesus is
or even like just on the Bible, for example.
You say, well, I only believe, you know, what
the Bible says. Well, the Bible says a lot of
things, but it is not. Conclusive of all things.
It doesn't necessarily include everything you
might have to do. So the Bible doesn't talk about,
for example, cell phones at all. What about cell
phones? I don't know about cell phones. What
do we do with cell phones? Well, I don't believe
there's anything we should do with them, positive
or negative, because it doesn't say so in the
Bible. Well, you might have to read the Bible
and extrapolate what it means for today's world,
right? Ultimately, we have to build our lives
and especially the life of the church as a people,
as a person in the church, as the people that
is the church, and then the church growing, reaching
out on Jesus, on the revelation, understanding
of who Jesus is. So when people are like going
like, I believe in Jesus, but then they're living
kind of like however they want to live or they're
going after certain things that they want. They're
not building their lives on the church. They're
not building their lives as the church on Christ,
right? So it's nice to be able to go to church.
It's nice to be able to sing worship. It's nice
to be able to give and feel good about it or
serve and feel good about it or, you know, whatever.
But the key is building it on the revelation
of who Jesus Christ is. Basically, you say it
this way. If two or three people get together
and their relationships are founded on Jesus
Christ and they begin to live in community like
the church, then you could say, no matter how
many people are in the church, Jesus is there
with them and he's going to make it work because
the gates of hell will not prevail against them.
And then the second piece was we have to realize
that when he says the gates of hell shall not
prevail, that can take a lot of forms, right?
So that can take a lot of forms such as... temptation,
persecution, trials, poverty, hunger, disease,
famine, pestilence. Pestilence is like bugs and
rats and things that invade, disease. So all
of those things can be part of the gates of hell.
So for example, if death should take my body,
death cannot prevail against me because i'll
go straight to heaven right as soon as i'm dead
i'll go to heaven so even death can't overcome
me and that's why elsewhere it says it's death
has lost its sting okay so what we set out to
do quite some time ago now was to build a church
to make a church that was uh founded on the lord
jesus christ that was the whole goal i lost my
notes oh they're right here okay All right, so
what I've done on these pieces of paper here
is I have written or printed, some are printed,
some are written, examples of crazy things, miraculous
things sometimes, or sometimes they were hard
things that we had to overcome, whatever like
that. that we taught, learned, experienced while
planting or up to fairly recently even at new
heights. Okay. So what I'm going to do, I'm going
to randomly draw one and then I'm going to explain
it. So maybe it could be anything. Even I don't
know. There's about 30 of them here. All right.
I got to look at them. Hi Natalie. Nice to see
you. Okay. All right. So the first one that's
on the top. All right. And again, these are,
this is completely random. So one of the things
that about the church, right, is that the church
is led by what's called the priesthood of believers.
So everybody that's here who loves the Lord,
everybody that's here who believes in God is
supposed to be focused on Jesus. Right. So we're
not looking at each other. We're not looking
at the structures of the church or where the
money. coming from or going to, right? Who's
tithing, who's not, who's giving, who's not,
who's serving, who's not, all that. The priesthood
of a believer means your eyes are on Jesus, and
then when your eyes are on Jesus, you can lead.
You can do various things and serve, right? So
our church is led by our membership meeting.
So those who are members of the church since
the very beginning have set all of the ideas
and directions for the church. So you're supposed
to be praying, you're supposed to be studying,
you're supposed to be... serving in the teams
and knowing what is going on, right? And so they
come to the membership meeting and they would
say, I think we think we'd like to have a block
party. And the church says, yeah, we want to
have a block party. So then who throws the block
party? The church does, right? He's not hurt
anything. As long as he doesn't fall down with
that in his mouth. Okay, so we keep the membership
meeting orderly, which means we use it kind of
like Robert's Rules of Order. We use motions
and we take votes. The whole idea is that everybody
there is listening to Jesus. If we get there,
there's another one in here that's a very specific
time in which that really became huge. So that
was one example. You may go to another church.
There are churches that are called elder -led
churches. So sometimes you could visit one or
maybe down the road, the Lord leads you to be
in one. There are elder -led churches. And that
means that the oldest people, people who have
been around the longest or recognize being around
the longest, they make all the decisions. That's
not necessarily biblical, right? It's not a bad
thing. Elders should be respected, but it's not
necessarily biblical that a small, select group
of people make all the decisions. Even the disciples
didn't do that. When they wanted to call another
disciple, they did it with the whole big group
there. When they wanted to call another deacon,
they had them put forth examples of who would
be a good deacon, and they gave them criteria.
When they wanted to commission missionaries,
they all gathered around and prayed for them.
So there's not just a few people making the decision.
It's the whole church. So I've shuffled the pile.
I don't want to do that one next. I'll do this
one next. Okay. So we do, in our church, we do
a thing called the inspirational moment. So we
don't do it every Sunday anymore. Okay. But we
do it once in a while. And it's basically saying,
how has God spoken to you? Right? Are you able
to do that and multitask? Okay. As long as everybody
else is as well. Okay. So we all ask people to
read their Bibles and then come tell us what
they read. Ask people to pray, listen to what
God says, and come tell us. And the idea is that
it encourages everybody. So when one person speaks
up, then somebody else hears what they're saying,
and they say, hey, you know that. that speaks
to me too, right? Or I can read my Bible and
hear from God and that kind of thing, right?
And then we also have what's called a spiritual
discipline emphasis. And we do them basically
at the same time in the service. And that is
every six months, we pick a new spiritual discipline
to look at. That was something that along the
way, the Lord led us to start doing that. Now
we've done it for 10 years. So for 10 years,
which means 20 different times, we switched from
one spiritual discipline to another. Well, it'll
be 20 from May 22nd, okay? And then we explain
it, we practice it, we talk about it, we do it
together. Okay. I'm going to stop looking, because
if I look, I'm going to pick and choose. I told
myself I wasn't going to do that. Some of them
I like to talk about, some of them I don't like.
Okay, now this is it. All right, so along the
way, we started what's called Fog and Moon Books.
Okay, so Foggy Moon Books publishes books. Other
people have written as well, not just me, but
I do most of the writing. We promote the writing
online, and now those books have been read all
over the world. People can donate their writings.
You can write and donate. We've had a guy do
that with a couple of stories. Or people can
financially support, like give money to support
it. People can buy the books, and all that money
then goes to help fuel the ministry. Now, this
late date, we have the Prince Albert series.
We have the Low Moon Rising Saga. We have One
Last Soul series, Think Again series, and the
most recent book was called Another Reason to
Stand Up. Okay. And so those things are going
all over the world, having an impact. Okay. Next.
So New Heights partners with the Life Station.
Okay. The Life Station is a food and clothing
pantry. It gives food to the entire city when
they need it. We deliver food. We didn't used
to do that. We started that in 2020 during COVID,
when people couldn't get out, right about the
same time we started delivering. And it went
crazy right away because a lot of people wouldn't
come out of their house because they were scared.
And the governor said, you can still go to food
pantries, but a lot of people didn't want to
do it. They were afraid to. So we started delivering
and taking them the food. And we've been doing
that since then. Now we're at the point where
every month the Life Station helps between 1
,500 and 2 ,000 families with emergency food.
Several of our members work at the Life Station.
And if you count volunteers, like almost half
the adult and teenager population in the church
works there at some point in time. It's a very
active way of serving God. What most people don't
know is that when I... I first started the Life
Station. I've been there about two years. Northwest
Ohio Food Bank, which is the largest food bank
in this region. And they serve like nine counties.
And it's downtown. And they have a $120 million
budget or something. It's a lot of money. Big
money budget. And they appealed to the Life Station.
So we come use the Life Station. Or come use
Northwest Ohio Food Bank. There we go. I'll get
around. And we said, we'd love to. We want to
get more free food to give away to people. That
would be great. But they had a rule that you
can't talk about Jesus. But more than that, not
only can you not talk about Jesus or any faith
at all, but you're required to train every volunteer
and every worker not to talk about faith. But
a lot of other religions can do that. Right.
So they can say, well, we're just not going to
talk about it while we're here. That's fine.
But Christianity has built in the commands. Right.
So go ye therefore and you should be my witnesses
and and so on. And so we I am not ashamed of
the gospel. Right. So we are kind of like commanded
and required to share. So we can't train our
workers. That makes that policy directed right
at Christianity because we're the only ones that
have it built into our faith that says that we
must share. Not the only ones, but primary ones.
And so we went and toured the Life Station. One
of the guys that was working there at that time
and myself went and toured Northwest Ohio Food
Bank. And at the end, they said, OK, just sign
here and you can start using our food bank. I
read down the list, and sure it was. They were
right there, number 17. It says you have to train
all your people not to talk about faith. I said,
we can't do that. I said, if you'll mark that
off, we'll sign right now. We'll start using
it right now. And she said, no, we can't do that.
So then the director called me, the CEO. Actually,
he's the CEO. He makes hundreds of thousands
of dollars a year. He called me and said, we
really want you to use the food bank. And I said,
well. We wouldn't mind, but you'd have to take
this policy. So I'm going to task one of my vice
presidents with, or whatever she was, with getting
rid of that rule. And she called me two weeks
later. I called her several times. She was on
vacation and she called me back and she said,
well, we can't do that. So the bottom line was,
if you will not talk about Jesus. Here's a whole
bunch of resources you can have. You can get
cheaper product, cheaper food, get free food
to give away. You have all these resources. You
just have to agree to not talk about Jesus. So
we didn't do that. We refused. We would not do
that. So we said, no, we're going to keep talking
about Jesus. It means we're going to go out of
business. Well, about a year later, I got a letter
in the mail from the state saying that there
were funds for people who were not using Northwest
Ohio Food Bank. So if you're a food pantry and
you're not using Northwest Ohio Food Bank, you
can get funds. So I applied. Put in an application
and I asked for the funds and they approved like
$40 ,000 the first year, $50 ,000 the second
year. So right there, I'm $90 ,000 ahead of where
I would have been if I had just said, okay, we'll
stop talking about Jesus. And then in the middle
of that, COVID hit while that was going on. And
they called me and they said, can you take more
money? And so I wrote it again for like $100
,000 and like $115 ,000 the next year. And they
approved it. And then in the middle of that,
they called again and said, can you take more
money? And we said, yeah, we'll take whatever
you got. So then it went to, the first year was
almost over. So it went to like, I think it stayed
115 or something like that. And the next year
went to $250 ,000. So now I've gotten $365 ,000
from the state that I would not have gotten if
we had just agreed not to talk about Jesus and
been able to use that other food bank. I would
have got a lot of food and stuff, but we wouldn't
have got all that money. During 2020, actually
20. fiscal year 2021 because they switch over
in june right so the second half of 2020 was
fiscal year 21. they called me and they said
well they still have money on the table can we
take more and i said yes and then still later
with only like three months left in that fiscal
year they called me again and asked and the end
result was in fiscal year 21 we got 750 000 from
the state and we would not have gotten a penny
had we agreed not to talk about jesus and so
this church Any ministry that I'm a part of,
I hope I can always say, we will never accept
the ultimatum to not talk about Jesus. We will
always talk about Jesus. And so if we ever start
saying, well, we're just not going to talk about
Jesus here because it's uncomfortable or something
like that, you can be the one who says, no. That's
not us. That's not what we do. We're going to
talk about Jesus. I almost got arrested. I don't
remember for sure who was with me, but it was
Northwood and the Woodville Mall. We were talking
with a guy with a couple of evangelists and one
other person from our church was there. We were
talking and he was on the verge of accepting
Jesus Christ. And the security called the police
on us because they had asked us to not talk about
Jesus in the mall. And so we were edging toward
the door but still talking about it. And they
said, you got to go, you got to go. We went out
by his car. He said, well, come on. He still
had questions. He was going to accept Jesus.
And we went out by his car. And they followed
us all the way out to the car. And the police
were turning in the parking lot with their lights
on. And he didn't want to get in trouble with
the law. So he got in his car and went across
the street or whatever. And then he didn't stay.
So we didn't get a chance to finally finish talking
with him or get his information or anything.
But the point is, they said, you can't talk about
Jesus here. Might have gotten arrested for that.
And then I talked to the owner of the mall about
two weeks later while I was out bowling and ball
things. And I told him, I said, that's the way
it's going to be. Just be aware. God's going
to do something. God's not going to take that
lightly. And I said, and he said, I don't believe
in God. It's kind of fine, whatever. About two
years later, the mall closed. They went out of
business. He said, we are, they said, we understand
our business to be people come directly to the
mall. They buy what they want to buy and they
leave. They don't want to talk to anybody while
they're at the mall. So if you go try to talk
to them, you're going to chase them off. So we
don't want to allow that. I said, that's not
even true. That's not what malls were. Malls
have always been about. community so you'd be
a shopping center so you're talking about a shopping
center not a mall malls have huge indoor spaces
where all kinds of things go on that's how they
stay alive and he just wouldn't listen so anyway
so then it went out of business A more recent
thing in 2014, we started podcasting New Heights
services. So in 2020, we started putting them
on Facebook, but we started podcasting before
that. And then our podcasting provider went out
of business and it all went away, lost 300 episodes.
And I have some of those recordings that could
eventually be edited and put up on there, but
they haven't. Most of them have not been. And
then we got a new podcast provider and it went
pretty well. So we've been still doing it. And
now I, so the new. podcast provider just changed
their policy that you can't go back and see how
many people have listened to your podcast back
to the beginning anymore, unless you pay money.
So it's behind a paywall, basically. If you want
to know all the way back to the beginning, you've
got to pay money, more money. We already actually
paid out of the podcast. It's not very expensive.
But they pay more money if you want to go see
all of that. So I thought, well, I'm not going
to do that. I'm going to pay the money. So how
far back can you see? So I went back and looked
at 180 days. This is from today. 180 days back.
The New Heights podcast. which is just the sermon
from Sunday, and then usually it'll be like one
or two songs or excerpts of songs. I usually
want to do whole songs because you get into copyright
issues with that. In the last 180 days, the New
Heights podcast was listened to in 378 cities
worldwide. 378 different cities in 87 countries.
Is that not nuts? So we come in here, we preach,
we hear like 30 people in the room. And then
we take that audio and we edit it, put it up
on the podcast. And in the last 180 days, which
is just less than right around six months, right?
It was listened to in 378 cities in 87 different
countries. That's crazy. The live station doesn't
do quite as well, but it's the same way. That's
just the encouragement call. So each episode
is like a minute and a half, two minutes long,
and it's just the encouragement call. All it
is is we edit it, put it up, same as what it
went out to everybody in Toledo or wherever they're
at. So we've got a lot of people getting it all
over the U .S. now. And it was listened to in
the last 180 days in 172 cities in 57 countries.
And that one has an extra interesting statistic
in that because they're so short, each one's
less than two minutes long, there was 152 different
computers or different devices. So people listen
to more than one episode. So there's 154 different
devices. So that's why we're recording this right
now. So then this will become a podcast, and
then who knows how many times it will be heard
all over the world. I'm kind of ready to do that
one. All right. So here's a tough one. Along
the way, we realized that New Heights, this church,
is not going to be a church for everybody. And
that was a hard realization. So we don't tell
anybody, unless they're causing a problem or
something, we don't tell anybody they can't come.
Everybody's welcome. Every walk of life, every
social class, every skin color, pretty much every
age, we pretty much don't tell people they can't
be here. Now, if they come in, they're disrupting
the service, or they're not properly dressed.
come and smell so bad of weed that it's making
people sick or things like that, then we would
probably ask them to leave and come back when
they're more able to do so. But this is New Heights
Fellowship Baptist Church. So the New Heights
is about reaching new heights in Jesus. It's
about growing. So the people that are here are
supposed to be people that want to grow in their
relationship with Jesus, grow in what they know
about the Bible, and grow. So the theme of the
church is I'm growing and Cary's growing. Now,
the next step for me is not the same as the next
step for Cary. But Cary can help me get to my
next step just the same as I can help him get
to his next step. We can work together. And it's
not like the step that he's on is higher or lower
than my step because it's in his journey. It's
not even on my staircase. It's a whole different
staircase or a whole different. hike or trail
or road, whatever you want to say. And so the
step that I'm on, it's not the same step he's
on, but we can work together so that we can both
get to our next steps. And that's what Reaching
New Heights of Jesus is all about. But some people
don't want that. There's people that want anonymity.
That means that nobody knows your name. There
are people that don't want to be convicted. I've
had a lot of times where people come in and we're
preaching and then... At the end, someone will
be very polite or whatever, but then when you
follow up with them, you find out, well, they
had a funny feeling while you were preaching.
Something wasn't, I didn't feel right. When you
were preaching, I didn't feel right. I said,
well, not right, like what? Like you did something
wrong? Like I did something wrong? Did I say
something wrong? No, what was it? He said, well,
you made me feel like I should do something or
I should be something. I'm like, okay, let's
talk about the gospel. Let's talk about Jesus,
right? So all we really call to is to be a follower
of Jesus and, you know, like that. And we're
talking about conviction of sin. That's present.
I'm not saying it's not present in other churches.
It's present wherever the gospel is preached.
But that means that some people are not going
to be interested in growing. Right. They want
to just be able to go sit in the back, drink,
drink free Mountain Dew or have coffee or have
doughnuts or get prizes. Right. And and not there's
a problem with any of those things, but they're
not what this is all about. But this is all about
Jesus, right? And so we decided to do that. And
what that has resulted in, a couple of things.
One, we have a lot of men. If you look around
the room right now, there's more men than women
by no small margin. And it's like that on Sundays
too. Because men don't mind being told like it
is. And I'm not saying that women are the other
way. I think a lot of women don't mind being
told like it is either. But men need that. I've
been to churches where the message was kind of
pretty gentle. And I just felt... you know kind
of like it really wasn't the gospel you know
and that and so it's a different thing um and
so why why it's exactly like that i don't know
for sure but this is what i know i know we've
attracted with men uh and then we've tracked
a lot of young people we have a lot of teenagers
we have a lot of young people who want they're
smart for their generation they're smart they
understand this is the place to grow this is
the place i'm going to get what i need right
but also because they're young people a lot of
times they make bad decisions they go in a direction
that they should not go they do something they
should not do But they can recover from it. That's
another thing about young people. Older people,
when they make a bad decision, a lot of times
they get stuck in it for a long time. Like, why
did I do that? If that's true, then we think,
and I'm including myself in this, I think simply,
I make a mistake. And man, I own it. And I'm
feeling bad. I feel guilty. And then, okay, give
up the guilt because God doesn't do that. Okay,
now I'm feeling convicted. Okay, I repent. I
turn to God. I still have to figure out why did
I let that happen? Why did I do that? Whereas
young people are ready to go, that was stupid.
I shouldn't have done that. I'm done. I'm over
that now. I'm not going to do it again. I'm moving
on. And that's good. But it's also about personality
types. So you do, you know, because you're going
to have young people that are the other way too.
Young people get beat themselves up. And older
people can be quick to let it go. Anyway, the
bottom line is, in this church, you can't get
by for long. As a member of the church, pretty
soon, if you're not holding up your weight, people
know it right away. If you don't show up three
Sundays in a row, of course everybody knows.
If you join a ministry team and you're serving
and you don't show up to your meetings or you
don't show up to serve, then people know. Because
you're not in a meeting of 40 people. You're
in a meeting of like four people. And you're
one quarter of the people are missing. Everybody
sees it. And so that's different. So it's not
going to be a church for everybody. OK, this
is another one very early on. So and Karina can
attest to this one, even though she has struggles
with it a little bit, too. And that is we don't
go to church. We do go to church, but we don't
go to church. Right. So the church is the people.
So when we're not here, the church is wherever
we are out there, right? So New Heights Fellowship,
we tell people when they get voted in as a member,
you can now call yourself New Heights Fellowship
Baptist Church. You become the church and you
become a member. And it's not a member like a
name on a list. I probably shouldn't even say
this. It might be controversial to somebody,
but I'm registered to vote Republican. Not because
I'm primarily Republican, but because I want
to vote in the primaries, right? And if I'm going
to vote in the primaries, the people I feel like
I want to be able to have a say, that's the parties,
that's the one I'm registered to. It is what
it is. Like it or not, I'm not political. But
anyway, the point is, so because I'm on that
list, they consider me a member of that party.
That is not how this works, right? I go to Glass
City Federal Credit Union for my bank. And if
you're a member of Glass City Federal Credit
Union, every dollar you have in your bank account
counts as a share in their credit union. That's
a membership. This is not a member like that.
This is a member like a lung, a liver, or a leg,
right? And so when you join the church, you become
that important. And if you suffer, the church
suffers. If somebody's missing, and somebody
says, well, I'll do this, yeah, I'll take care
of that, and then they don't show up, then everybody
else is suffering, right? So, what, two weeks
ago on Monday, Josh was sick, right? I can't
remember what stopped him, but anyway, he was
sick, so he wasn't going to be able to do arts
and crafts night. Well, that same night, Most
of his team was having struggles, right? And
so nobody could pick up his load. And so we didn't
have arts and crafts. Josh is the one that God
has called to lead that ministry in our church.
He's the one. And so when the one who's called
to lead is out, if there isn't somebody else
to pick up, then everybody suffers, right? And
that's the way it works. We have people who want
to come and take part in ministries, and that's
good, or they help out, and that's good. But
it's when you say, I'll be there. You know you
can count on me. I'm a member of the church like
a lung or a liver. You're going to be able to
depend on me from now until I die or until God
calls me to another church, right? Yeah, I'm
dependable. If you ever have to have your entire
liver taken out, you'll never be the same. If
you ever have to have an arm taken off, you'll
never be the same. He was in his shirt. Okay.
All right. So we don't go to church. The church
is the people. I know this is another one that
we do fall into sometimes. The pastor doesn't
preach the sermon. I preach and I deliver the
sermon that God has given us, but the idea is
God is writing that sermon into all of us. So
if I preach something and nothing I said in it
resonates with you, it doesn't connect with you,
that doesn't matter to me. He talked about something
that was pretty hyper -focused today and it really
doesn't apply to me at all. Then you have to
ask yourself, well, why is that? There's one
possibility because you're not in the right church.
Another possibility is because God was preparing
me for something that's coming down the road.
And so maybe this is preparation you're learning
today because next week you're going to need
it. Maybe it's something that happened in your
past years ago and you haven't dealt with it.
So whatever. The bottom line is God is writing
the sermon, not in one person, but in the whole
church. And then we own everything. The church
owns everything. So we have 40 -ish, 45 members.
This building is appraised at $2 million. Last
time it was appraised. And so every member owns
1 45th of this building. That's how that works.
We all own everything. All the money we have
in the bank, we all own it, right? Now we all
together decide what to do with it. So that's
why in the church building, we all use the church
building. I'll take care of the church building.
You're supposed to. Sometimes we don't, but we're
supposed to. I'll take care of it because it's
ours. It's really God's, right? It's God's. And
so... That's another one. Every person has a
responsibility to grow. So if you're here and
you don't want to grow, you're in the wrong place
because every person has a responsibility to
grow. Every person is empowered. We want to bring
along people and let them serve. We have some
people who are not members, for example, and
they want to serve. We want to let them serve.
We want to let them participate. At the same
time, there is a difference. And not to be rude,
but there's a difference between being a lung
or a liver and being like a piece of clothing.
Clothing is valuable. It's necessary, right?
But your lung or liver is more than just valuable
or necessary. Okay, and then... So we've worked
throughout our history to kind of limit. So my
household, for example, we don't say we go to
church. We say we're going to the church building,
right? Or we're going to worship service. Or
we're going to Bible study. Or we're going to
Tuesday nights. Or we're going to Faith Force.
Because all of those things are true. But we
don't say we're going to church. Or if we slip
into it, we're constantly correcting ourselves.
Because remember, this is the church. Those that
are here that are committed and have become members.
Okay. Funny thing happened early on. We got this
building. We were still renovating it. When we
first got the building, there was a ton of leaks.
And there was a lot of water damage. And we took
the walls out. So we had a mission team come
in from Mississippi. This used to be three rooms.
Some of you probably don't know that. You see
this line right here behind the piano? There's
one line right there. That was a wall that went
all the way across the room. So that was one
room. And this was a bigger room. And then there
was another one of those lines right here at
the edge. It's behind that wall where the bathroom
was. So that was the third room. Those rooms
were 14 inches thick. block. So blocks, you know
what I'm saying? Like cement blocks, 14 inches
thick. And they busted them up and carried them
out. And back, it was two 15 -year -old girls
with buckets that carried out all that weight,
which turned out in the end to be 7 ,000 pounds
of stone. And they busted it up, and they put
it in the buckets, and they carried the buckets
like this, and they took them out, and they put
it down in a plastic tunnel that was trying to
keep the dust down. It went from this door to
the mortal perfection door, and they carried
them out there to a dumpster waiting by the dock,
and they dumped it in. And the reason why we
know how much weight it was was because after
they dumped it all in there, it went over the
weight, and then they had to pay more money.
And so they said, you are right. It fits, but
it's way too heavy. Anyway, and so while all
that was going on, we were getting ready to be
in this building one night. We never did find
out who. Somebody came up and went up on the
roof of this building. And if you look at it,
it looks kind of like a kind of castle edge around
the outside. But there used to be big, huge,
huge stone blocks that sat on each one of those.
They were like caps. They sat on each one of
those pieces. And they just sat there. And underneath
of them was copper plating. So you have this
big, long, eight foot long thing that weighs
about probably 400, 500 pounds easy. And then
under it was copper sheeting. Somebody went up
there on the roof and they pushed those pieces
off. onto the roof bed to get the copper out.
And they stole about $900 worth of copper was
what the police estimated it was worth. $900
worth of copper. When they did that, they pierced
the roof bed in 14 places. So there were holes
in the roof. And then it rained. And water came
in everywhere. And so we had insurance. So insurance
came and they looked at it and said, well, this
is vandalism. So then the insurance paid for
us to get a new roof. Now, we had some minor
leaks before. And I was up there several times
trying to make the water stop leaking in, right?
They put a whole new roof. And some of us, I
think, Karina, you were in Vacation Bible School,
right? This is way back. Like, she's tiny and
snotty. Anyway, so they pierced the roof in 14
places. Water's raining in. Like, right over
there in that door where that exit sign is, there
was a waterfall this big around. pouring into
the room. And Kuzhno's disaster came in and they
had heat blowers and they blew all the water
out and tried to keep it from doing too much
damage. Anyway, in the end, it was $880 ,000
that they paid to replace the roof on this building.
And the insurance paid it all. And it didn't
cost us a cent. And all the leaks were gone.
See? So there's a verse in the book of Genesis
talking about Joseph. And he says, what you meant
for my hurt, God used for mine and a lot of other
people's good. And so we're able to meet in this
building today without a leaking roof and probably
for another 30, 40 years without any major repairs
on that roof because somebody stole $900 worth
of copper from the church. Also, Ariana was a
baby at the time, and they put me on the news
talking about it. I was holding Ariana while
I was talking on the news, talking about the
vandalism. And so the church got a lot of free
publicity out of it too. Okay. From the very
beginning, it was the Southern Baptist Convention
that helped us plant this church. Okay. Here's
a couple things about Southern Baptist. Number
one, this is huge. You might get this because
someone's going to ask you. I guarantee it. Number
one, this is huge. Southern Baptist is not a
denomination. People go, what denomination church
do you go to? So we are a Southern Baptist church.
That's true. They planted us. We follow the Baptist
faith and message. We give the cooperative program.
I'll talk about those things in just a second.
We are Southern Baptist through and through.
Being Southern Baptist is not a denomination.
So I was talking with a guy today who asked me
what denomination we are, and I said, well, we're
Southern Baptist, but actually being Southern
Baptist is not a denomination. It's a missions
organization. It's a convention. We all participate.
Yes, sir? Okay, I'll explain that. One second.
Okay? And so it's not like being Lutheran or
Methodist or Presbyterian because we choose to
be involved. There's nobody above us. So in our
church, guess who's the boss? Easy. Jesus, right?
That's what matters to Jesus. And then after
Jesus, it's the opposite of no one. It's everyone.
Like I talked about with the membership meetings,
the members come together and make the decisions.
So it's kind of like no one, because no one of
us is in charge, but we together decide. So we
have a team that gets together to write the budget.
They bring the budget to the membership meeting.
The members vote. If the members don't like the
budget, they say, write a new budget. Say, you
want to get rid of me as the pastor. You want
to hire a new pastor. The members say, we think
we should get rid of Pastor Dan. And as long
as you get enough people to vote. I'm out. Then
you're going to call a new pastor. Well, let's
make a team. Let's get a team together and call
a new pastor. Or say I got killed in a car accident
or something, right? We're going to get a new
pastor. Who's it going to be? Bring a team of
people together, review candidates, bring it
to the members. The members are going to decide
who that's going to be, right? So in denominational
churches, it's not like that. Denominational
churches have a pattern of leadership. So for
example, in Catholic churches, Presbyterian churches,
and most Lutheran churches, you don't decide
who your pastor is. They make a circuit out of
it. So they're there for whatever length of period
of time. And then the leadership, that's outside
the church says, okay, they've been there long
enough. We're going to move them to Arkansas
and we're going to bring this guy from California
and he's going to be your new pastor. Even though
you like the guy you had, you liked his teaching,
you liked his preaching, everything worked for
you, it was working great, everything's, no,
you don't have to have him anymore. There's somebody
outside you telling you what you have to do.
In the Southern Baptist Convention, it's not
like that. So anyway, so I told him, I said,
we're non -denominational, but we're Southern
Baptists. All right, so now to answer your question
about denominations. So denominations, to denominate
something, is basically like to separate it down
into parts. So Christianity, those who believe
in Jesus, are separated. Maybe they shouldn't
be. Like maybe we shouldn't be separated at all.
Jesus, before he was crucified, he prayed, let
them be unified. So maybe there shouldn't be
any separations. But we're largely separated
by two things. So one of them is doctrine. So,
for example, we believe. that people are saved
only by faith in Jesus, by God's grace and faith
in Jesus. They're baptized by immersion because
that's a picture, that's what Jesus did, and
it's a picture of the death, burial, and resurrection
of Christ. So that's why we do that. We believe
in the Lord's Supper and taking the Lord's Supper
as a body. Some church denominations might say,
well, it's okay to be sprinkled. Splash the water
on you. Don't you. The problem with that is the
word baptism comes from the word baptismo in
the Greek, which means to be dumped or to be
immersed. That's a problem. So we try to have
the best biblical understanding that we can and
go by that. And that separates us from certain
denominations who have certain rules. One of
the examples of Presbyterians, for example, they
have higher level leadership. They have somebody
telling the Pope, for example, is the highest
person in the Catholic Church. So he's telling
everybody below him. He tells all the bishops
what they have to do. And then all the bishops
tell all the priests what they have to do. And
all the priests tell all the... under priest
what they have to do and then the under priest
and the priests all tell the people what they
have to do so it's all handed down from the tops
sort of kind of sort of isn't too but um that's
what they say so we don't do that we don't have
those other rules we follow the bible so if you
if you read your bible and you think you see
something we have not seen and you come in here
you say i see this and we talk about it yeah
that's right that is there and we realize that
we'll all adjust according to the what we found
in the bible but we will confirm it right so
you can't just go oh i think oh the bible says
you don't have to tithe anymore so i'm just not
going to do that because this says you don't
have to do that anymore and you don't talk to
anybody about it you just don't do it anymore
right you can't do that Because the church teaches
what the Bible actually says, which is that the
tithe continues. In fact, so just touch on that
for a second. The Old Testament standard was
a tithe, but it wasn't a tithe, right? They actually
did two and a third tithes. So they get 23 and
a third percent of their income every year. Yeah,
so they didn't get 10%. They gave two 10 %s,
and then they give another 10 % every third year.
So that's 23 and a third percent, right, in the
Old Testament. In the New Testament, Jesus said
that essentially the standard now is sacrificial
giving. So you're supposed to give what hurts,
give what's hard, right? But then when they questioned,
he said to the Pharisees, you know, you tithe
on the mint and the cumin, but then you don't
do the greater works of compassion and mercy
and kindness and whatever the actual words there
are. And he said, the one you should have done
and still done the other. So he said, you should
still tithe. But the truth is we should be more
than tiny because that might not be sacrificial
giving for some of us. For some of us, 10 % is
a real sacrifice. to really be able to get 10
% of your income, that's a real sacrifice. But
for some of it, it's not. And that depends a
lot about where you're on your journey and how
God has set things up. So to answer your question
is, Mike, are you ready? Answer your question.
Denomination means they have a certain set of
beliefs or doctrines that they follow that they
think distinguishes them from everybody else,
and they've named it. So they say, this is Presbyterian
doctrine. We go this way. We're Presbyterians.
This is Catholic doctrine. We go this way. We're
Catholics. we're Catholics. This is Lutheran
doctrine. We go this way, we're Lutheran. So
we go, we believe in Southern Baptist doctrine
in that sense. But even in that sense, in a given
church, it might not be followed the exact same
way. That make sense? So for example, in our
church, we are fully members -led. I have a friend
of mine who's a pastor of a Southern Baptist
church locally. And they only have a business
meeting twice a year. And they don't make any
significant decisions in that meeting. So the
members do not have any control over the direction
of the church because they don't get to vote.
They just, in the meeting, which they have twice
a year, they tell them what's going to happen.
The church that we went up to up in Holt, Michigan,
when we were in, we lived in Mason, it was in
Holt, was called Pastor Led. And so he made it.
All the decisions. He made all the decisions
about all the money. And the only committee that
they had in the church was the personnel committee.
And that was just formed whenever they needed
to hire staff. That's it. Otherwise, he made
every decision in the church. And he was a good
guy. He was very godly. And he made good decisions.
Don't get me wrong. But that's not biblical because...
then what happens is something happens to him.
Or if he turns in a direction that's ungodly.
There was a church in Georgia at one point in
time, this is 25 years ago, 19 years ago. We
thought God might be calling us to Atlanta, Georgia,
Sherry and I and the kids. And I had a job offer.
And Sherry had a job offer. And so when we went
down there, she was visiting the properties that
she would have been governing. She was going
to be a regional manager. And one of the properties,
this lady, she got witness into her, which I
encourage her to witness every opportunity that
she can get while she's at work. And I think
God encourages her to do that, too. And this
lady was just crushed. She was having a hard
time working because she was in a really bad
emotional state. And she was like, what is going
on? What had happened was they had joined a church.
And it was a big, beautiful, wonderful church.
They loved being there and everything like that.
And it was a pastor -led church. The pastor made
all the decisions, had all the control of all
the money, hired all the staff, everything. And
it had grown a lot. It had thousands of people
attending this church over the whole week. And
he got up one Sunday morning after preaching
for 20 years about the sexual... appropriateness
of heterosexuality only, right? So he didn't,
that homosexuality is not biblical. And after
20 years of doing that, he got up in one morning,
informed the congregation that he was becoming
a homosexual and that he was involved in an active
homosexual relationship and that he was not going
to resign. And overnight, the church went from
like 2 ,000 people to like 600 people. The 1
,400 people didn't come the next Sunday. And
then, so there were 600 people. That made like
all the Sunday, they come in on Sunday and all
of a sudden, teachers didn't show up you know
all the mature christians in the church or whatever
there's tons and tons of people not there and
they knew they had no avenue there's nothing
that they could do about it and so then they
they couldn't change it so then the next week
it was down to 400 and then she had just gone
the chair was there on a monday she had just
gone the day before on sunday there were 300
people it's like i don't know what we're gonna
do we can't even we're not even gonna afford
to pay for our building or anything and he was
he was just refusing to resign And so if the
pastor takes a doctrinal position that is wrong,
there's nothing anyone can do about it unless
the body has that vote, unless the body has that
control. So we've been represented in the Southern
Baptist Convention since the very beginning.
We had a vote from the beginning. I served as
a moderator for four years and a vice moderator
for two years or vice versa. RJ served as a moderator
for two years in the association. We've always
had messengers. We've always had responsible
people who go to those meetings and then come
back and they know what's going on. And all that
kind of thing. All right. I think we're about
done. Okay. This is the most important. Okay.
This will be the last one. So team structure
is the other one. So in our church, Natalie,
do you know what the word team stands for? It's
really good. So for us, it's an acronym. It's
Together Empowering a Ministry. Okay? Together
Empowering a Ministry. That's what TEAM stands
for. We don't always often say it, but you'll
notice that on most of the paperwork, if you
look on here, the letters are in all caps. T
-E -A -M is in all caps. It's because each letter
represents a word. Together Empowering a Ministry.
So we don't do committees. The other thing about
committees is if you have a committee, then in
Robertsville's order, when they bring a motion,
then they don't have to have a second. It comes
to the floor automatically, and you have to decide
on it or table it, one or the other. And so we
don't do committees, which means if one of our
teams makes a decision and somebody comes in
and is going to make a motion, then they have
to bring a second person. That way, if Josh is
the only person in the arts and crafts team,
then he doesn't have the power to automatically
get any motion that he wants. Everybody has to
listen, right? But the other thing about teams
then is we have people who are called to lead
or serve in those teams. I think God wants me
to serve this way. And then they marshal the
other people in the church who want to serve
in that same way. Right. So, for example, Josh,
our team leader, he's got 10 or 11 members of
his team now. And he has to organize them, serve
them, keep them kind of going in the right direction.
He has to unlock the door, lock the door, you
know, all those kinds of things for that team.
And then Brother Tim has, for the longest time,
Brother Tim was the team leader for the largest
team in the church, which is the music team.
And you've got a bass player, you've got a drummer,
and you've got three vocalists who can also play
instruments. And so he's been anywhere from like
seven to ten team members most of the time. And
some of those people, he brought them from not
knowing how to do music at all up to being able
to help them, assist them to be able to do music.
And so he was called to do that. And their team
does that together. They're together empowering
a ministry. The crossover line is when a team
wants to do something and another team is going
to be affected. So, for example, let's say we're
going to have a concert on a Tuesday night. So
we're going to cancel Faith Force and we're all
going to get together and do music. Well, Aaron
is the God's Kids team leader and Sherry is the
Little Wonders team leader. You would have to
get clearance from them. in order to be able
to cancel their club, right? You can't just go
canceling it. Same thing if somebody wants to
do something on Monday night between 6 and 8.
If it needs to be in the multi -purpose room,
we use the multi -purpose room now for arts and
crafts because we don't fit anywhere else really,
right? I mean, not comfortably. We might have
just fit. It would be tight. But some nights
we would not have fit. And it's probably going
to be like that again. So we're in the big room.
So if somebody wants to use the big room between
6 and 8 p .m. on a Monday night, they've got
to get permission from Josh because he has an
ongoing thing, and he would have to move it to
somewhere else. So that's one of the values of
teams. If you want to adjust something in a team,
you know who to go to, who to talk to. Or you've
got a great idea. Oh, I think it would be great
to do this with the kids. So you go to Aaron.
Or I think it'd be great to do this with the
toddlers. So you go to Sherry. You have somebody
in the church that can do that. In our church,
a team leader does not have to be an adult. There's
nothing that says a team leader has to be 18
years old or older. So we've had a couple of
times where kids, older kids, usually in the
15, 16 range, were close that they were feeling
called to a ministry. And they were close to
taking over and leading a ministry. It's never
actually happened. But a couple of times it's
been close. It could happen. Which means that
you could have a 16 -year -old. leading a group
of four -year -olds to do something. That's entirely
possible, right? And the church is not against
that. We don't age discriminate. If you went
in a lot of churches, there's no way. There's
no way that anybody under the age of 18 would
even get a vote or would be allowed to serve
or be allowed to decide how money is spent, right?
It's mostly all kind of like sit over there and
be quiet, behave yourself, come to this fun event,
invite your friends. I mean, that's pretty much
what goes on. The last piece of that then is
that every team leader who has an active ministry
that's actually doing things has a discretionary
fund, a budget, an amount of money that they
can use every month to fuel their ministry. It
isn't much, usually, but it's something. It's
something that will keep them all rolling. And
if they don't spend it, then at a certain time
it caps, and then the rest of that extra money
that would have gone into their budget goes back
into the general fund and the church's savings.
The reason that is is because somebody steps
out of that role, that money doesn't stop accumulating.
So, for example, for a while we didn't have a
preschool nursery team leader. um and so then
the pastor steps in and fills that role temporarily
or a deacon fills that role until they can find
somebody new um and if it was arts and crafts
for example if nobody stepped up if something
happened to josh nobody stepped up and took his
place that team after a period of time nobody's
taken a place would just cease to exist because
he has a calling by god to do that And if nobody
else has that calling by God, then that ministry
is not supposed to be here. And it's the same
way with almost everything. Now, some of the
age -based ministries, they never really cease
to exist. They just sort of combine or fall under
something else. You're always going to have,
hopefully, always going to have young kids. And
so when we didn't have the preschool and nursery
team leader, I let it go out, and then it just
kind of got lumped in under all the kids. And
the youth is the same way. You're always going
to have teenagers. You're going to have something
going on. So if you don't have a youth team leader,
then we're going to have youth activities, but
we don't have somebody. who's really leading
it and but like to talk about a lot of it for
example we do not have we know we have two very
avid workers cleaning the building we do not
have a cleaning and maintenance team leader i'm
filling that role but that's not me we don't
have one we don't have a uh let's see what's
the other one that we're missing tech yeah although
we have one in the queue so keep praying because
there's a family right now that is probably going
to come to join the church in june and that's
what he does at his current church So God may
be providing. That would be really great. But
the point is, there are areas where, and then
it could be something different. I'm talking
with a guy who's looking to join the church.
He's a veteran, and he feels like God is calling
him to do a ministry specifically with veterans.
Not just veterans in the church, but with the
veterans of foreign wars, connected to the VSC,
veterans all over. You know, and then he said,
we'll have events, appreciation events, Bible
studies and things. Which is a great idea. And
he feels like God's calling to do it. I'm all
for it. So, you know, don't put the cart before
the horse. Let's not figure out what we're going
to do first. Let's figure out who we're going
to be the church first and how to be the church
and then do it. So that's how that could work.
You could be like, I think we should have a ministry
giving out flowers to ladies. They're trying
to get in. Okay, anyway, so whatever it might
be, if it's flowers to ladies, for example, and
you feel like that's a thing, you could come
and be the team leader of flowers to ladies,
right? That kind of thing. And then sometimes
we'll segment the teams down with lead team members,
like Holly McCrory is a lead team member in Little
Wonders right now. And also... Hold on, who's
the other one that I know of? At least she's
a lead team member. Do you have a lead team member?
Ariana's? She's your lead? Okay. You want to
decide whether you want to formalize that or
not, and if so, get her some parameters so she
knows what she's up against. I think there's
at least one more that I'm missing. Ricky's the
lead team member of Active Sports and Christian
Games. So I like that. So the lead team members
that are not called to separate off from their
team, they just take over a certain aspect of
what's going on. All right. Well, I did most
of them. Is there one that you can think of that
we do that's different or an event or something
that has affected our church that you think we
should add in this before we cut off the recording?
I didn't make one, but COVID was huge for us.
I don't know if you know this or not, but Deacon
Tony and I in a prayer meeting felt maybe informed
by God that COVID was coming to the United States
and that we would have to decide what to do about
it almost three months before COVID came to the
United States. So we had that advanced warning
and we already had plans to sanitize everything
in between services, to shut down things that
were more like just like fellowship and recreation
and not. really a god like bible study and worship
and stuff like that to keep worship probably
open although we were going to let the church
make that decision those kinds of things before
it ever came to the us and then when it came
to the us we had a conversation about whether
to stop having public worship and they lots and
lots of churches did right a lot of people stopped
meeting on sundays talking about study put everything
online or not at all um and then we It was a
unanimous decision in the team leader meeting,
and then also there was a couple of very strong
proponents for it that we would remain open and
continue to have Sunday worship, and we did.
And we took a lot of heat for it. The health
department was calling me, bugging me about it,
and eventually I just told them I'd stop answering
the phone, and then when I did that, they stopped
calling. So the point is, we were legal. Everything
was legal. You're allowed to keep worshiping.
It was nothing that required church to stop in
Ohio. But we were one of very few that did. I
think maybe we weren't quite. We probably should
have been a little bit more public about it.
Let everybody know that we weren't stopping because
that might have been a good thing. But it also
probably would have drummed up a lot more trouble.
So what else? Anybody else think of anything
recent or not even recent? Yeah. So I don't know
if you know or not, but in the early days, the
church was in Northwood High School. So we started
in Perrysburg Heights across from Levis Commons,
which was just getting started at that time.
And when I would stand up and preach, right out
the window behind me was the mosque. You could
see it framed perfectly when I was up there preaching
the gospel. And we got persecuted out of there.
A powerful church in the community came after,
didn't want us there. got us kicked out of the
building, and then they were supposed to be allowed
to go back in the building in the fall, and then
they came and just told us we were allowed to
go back. So then we came, so we met in my house,
and it was hot. I didn't have air conditioning
until this last year's first time I've ever had
air conditioning in my whole life. Never had
air conditioning in my house. Still don't have
air conditioning in my vehicle again. But anyway,
so... We didn't have air conditioning, and we
crammed a lot of people in our house and stuff.
So we started meeting outside. And then my neighbor,
who was Jehovah's Witness, I remember this or
not, Tim, you probably remember, he would come,
and during our worship every Sunday, he would
mow his lawn while we were trying to worship.
Remember that? I don't remember that at all.
And eventually, I did give him what for about
it, and he did stop. And then from there, we
went to Northwood High School for about a year
and a half. Had an Awana club there, or kids
club. It was basically even Awana material. So
Jehovah's Witnesses, basically, they would say
that they are Christian, right? But their doctrine
is not Christian. It's a cult, is what it is.
What's that? Yeah. So they don't believe in heaven.
They don't believe in hell. The Catholic believes
in Mother Mary, if I'm not mistaken, because
my mom was Catholic. And we believe in Jesus.
Yeah, in Jesus alone. He was talking about how
to build a house. And I was about 13 years old.
And not because my mother was. I got into some
problems in school. And they wanted to rehabilitate
me. I went up to this family I didn't know. They
took me to Finley, and I was in an airplane.
And then they took me in a boxer, and I was there.
Well, their families would be too tough. And
they said, come on in, we'll take you down there.
At the time, I didn't know the weather was bad.
I really didn't know. from God, things from God,
to do what he wants you to do. We get down here,
and before you know it, these people had their
chairs all out, and they went to church every
day, second to second, and they worshipped the
Lord, and they did the Bibles. And everybody
had to do it. The next thing you know, we built
these metal things that come across with these
handles and go over the top. And then all of
this got together. And one thing I like about
the barn people, for the armors, they all get
together and they help each other. You don't
see them getting, I don't know how much armors
they get or this or that. They do what God wants
them to do. They all work together. So we got
there, man. The next thing you know, we had this
big old plant we worked on. I don't know what
that's called. And they had that preacher guy
down there. He preached to everybody and everybody.
We got their Bibles and stuff. The next thing
you know, we built this small chapter bar thing
that was really huge and it was really jerky.
And, you know, one thing, I would love to go
back there, and I would love to see it, because
it's always got together. My grades got better.
I was able to go home after that. I didn't have
to wait until I was 18. I got home when I was
16. So, you know, I got early, but my grades
started to get good, and I started to do good.
And that's one thing I will carry with me as
long as that church we build. Sometimes it just
takes putting somebody in a different environment,
and it's like that with the church. If people
will come in here. that people will come with
an open heart, they'll be exposed to the Bible,
exposed to the Word of God, see the community
that's here, that people care about each other,
then it will help them. It's different than the
world, and it helps them realize there is something
different. All right. Anything else? We are done.
We're going to pray together.