Kingdom | East Wind Blow | Ps Ben Fitzgerald

I'm going to get into a bit more of a deep, serious topic this morning. Are you okay if I go a little longer? Are you okay if the Spirit of the Lord falls on you again at the end of the service? Are you okay with that? Put your hand up if you give me five minutes extra, anybody. Okay, five, ten, fifteen, twenty. Alright, such a joy to be here. Would you open your Bible to Matthew 4? We really enjoyed the Neuma Conference this year. It was really great. It sounds like an AI enjoyed it as well. Someone's AI is like, "I love the Numa Conference." Whoever that is, tell them we love them. A lot of demons came out at this conference. I preach in a lot of places around the world. Sometimes I preach in deacon-possessed churches. I mean demon-possessed churches. I'm just kidding. In the book of Timothy talks about ordaining deacons. I'm just joking. I get to travel around the world and I preach from Baptist to charismatic Catholic. I actually spoke in the Heiligenkreuz. They said, "You are the first evangelical speaker we've ever had here in the Heiligenkreuz Austrian monastery outside of Vienna." They're the ones where those monks, they dance and twirl. They all wear that big black and white garb, you know. We have a friend there. His name is Pater Franciscus, like Father Franciscus. They allowed me to preach. You are the first person we have here. I dressed up really nice. I made sure I honored the pl... I didn't try and go in there and shake too many things immediately. I knew that would happen when I started to pray. I came in there with a suit and I stood behind the lecturn. I said, "Hello Catholic brothers and sisters." They were very reverent. They had all these priests lined up in a row and everything. It looked like a mix between heaven and old Jerusalem or something. It was sort of a wild feeling in there. I was preaching and there was no response at all. That's a lovely time when you're preaching and you just continue with the Bible. You have to trust the Bible more than you trust yourself. So just continue reading the word. I talked about freedom. I talked about deliverance from sin and breaking the captives free and all that stuff. I got into it. At the very end I said, "Okay, would you close your eyes?" That was easy. Everyone was like, "Mm-hmm." I said, "I'll put your hand up if you're living in sin." There were so many hands that came up. Then the priest said, "In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti." They let me go for it. I said, "I'm just going to enter out of here." I had a suit thing on it. I entered out and I prayed for two of the priests. They got baptized in the spirit. They fell out in the ground. They fell out in the Holy Ghost. That was powerful. That was cool. Then I started praying for people one by one. If you think's happened, demons came out. People started repenting of sin. The glory of God fell. It was really cool. The service went way long. The same two priests came out later. Again, can you pray for us? Three of them, actually. The head of the monastery came out. The young head. There's an old one. He's like the training one. He's like the training bishop. He came out and he said, "Pray for me as well." I prayed for him. He fell out on the ground with the white and black garb in the concrete. It was really powerful. They're like, "Under the glory of God." I took a picture. I was just like, "Underneath the Lord." I was just like, "This is amazing. My friends aren't going to believe me, so I'm just going to take a photo." I took a picture of him. I get the honor of doing this for the Lord. I never take it lightly. I get to go to all these different places around the world. Sometimes I talk to really powerful people in government position. Other times, homeless people. They're all the same. Everybody's the same, no matter what they're wearing. You have many people in our city of Melbourne. We have many people who are homeless millionaires. You know what I mean by that? In here. They are homeless inside. They're broken inside. The Lord loves this city and he loves people. So, Father, I pray this morning that the love of God would grip our hearts for people. Father, I pray that the stigma of, "I've heard about evangelism." The stigma of messages of, "I know what that is. I know, yeah, yeah, yeah." I pray that thing of coldness of heart will come off us, and this morning we will see the heart of the Lord for the lost. God, grip us, please. Let your word grip us. Let us see the heart of Jesus clearly this morning. Amen. Put your hand up if you've been saved in the last 10 years. Okay, good. What about last five? Okay. One, two, three, four, five. About five people? Good. Last one. One year? Okay. No. Okay. One. Awesome. Praise God. That's you. That's good. Don't worry. Don't feel bad if you're the leadership team. Like, "Oh, we're in trouble." No, you're in trouble. Oh, good. I want to start with a couple of statistics before we read this verse. The Bana Institute in the United States has studied Western Christianity very deeply and intently. And what they found out is that it takes 85 Christians to save one new believer. That's a lot. When we say you join TikTok or whatever, and it doesn't take 85 friends to get one on TikTok, there's this kind of multiplication that happens because there's a joy. There's something that feeds you in it. There's some kind of interaction. And I felt like the enemy worked very, very hard in the Western church to take the joy out of evangelism. Wow. And I've seen this happen with the word discipleship as well. There's some cool buzzwords like apostolic. I feel the apostolic. That's kind of cool and that's kind of spiritual. I see the prophetic. Everybody wants a prophetic word. Sometimes we want a prophetic word when we do it, then we more than we want this. And we're looking for a word in season, but this is full of words in season. God wants to talk every second of every day to us right here. And prophetic words are also good, but there's kind of Christian buzzwords. You know what I'm saying by that? Like, "Bury, you know, it's wild. We love worship." You know, I love like there was a buzzword 10, 15 years ago, and the buzzword was about worship. A friend of mine was used as a catalyst. Have you ever heard of a lady called Kim Walker-Smith? She did this album and she did this song, "Your Love Never Fails" with Chris Quilala and she would dance in the song and she'd go, "Ha ha!" and she'd do this thing. And they called it spontaneous worship. And it became a thing. And now it's no longer a thing. Everybody has spontaneous worship. Every church. We did it today. Even the Catholic churches do it. Even the Anglicans. Like there's a freedom that has entered the global body of Christ. But where I still see the fingers of the enemy and the fingers in our lives and the laziness upon the body and almost this hardness is around the two concepts. Main concepts are prayer. Sorry, main three concepts are prayer, discipleship and evangelism. Prayer meetings and evangelistic meetings are the least attended in the church. In the early church they were the most attended. People prayed together. You remember Acts chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. You see a constant theme of they prayed together, were shaken and God saved souls. You see all of these movements of God birthed in prayer and people thought that was an honor to pray. And they thought evangelism was the same as worship. They saw these two concurrent pillars running that are the worship of God, the adoring of God together, the communion. He's so precious, he shared today, so he roman today about the communion today. It brings peace, it brings fellowship, the coin and ear. And then you have the second part of that which was the gospel, the witness of the gospel. And they traveled everywhere to do it even under persecution. They're like, "This is getting worse. Let's just go tell the next village." They were very given to the gospel and they loved the gospel. And so we entered this modern age with a lot more options, let's say. And then we had this kind of thing that happened some years ago, I guess, where evangelism and evangelist God highlighted them. So God highlighted them and typically they were very bold people because when you're in your own sort of field, you have to be bold, don't you? When you're a pioneer, you've got to be a bit bold. Even if your personality is a bit drawn back, when evangelistic fire comes on you and you feel that love for souls, there was just a couple of people that sort of stood out to us and were like, "Evangelists are very bold." Well, we could say the same with worship leaders. Worship leaders are very sensitive. But not all of them are. Not all of them are quiet. Not all of them are sort of, "Oh Lord, how beautiful thou art." Not all of them are like that. Some of them are wild too. And every person that does evangelism isn't necessarily an extrovert. In fact, my personality, whatever I did, a test, my assistant told me, and she studied me. She said, "You're a 60 to 70% introvert because I love being alone. Typically when we go to conferences around the world, I stay in the hotel room most of the day. If I'm not having to do 50 sessions, they work you like a horse here at Numa." [laughter] But typically, I love to stay in a hotel. I'll take Vincent with me and he's one of our pastors. And he loves to go and explore in coffee and he loves fashion and things. And so they go out and do stuff. And I sit in my hotel room and I'm trying to catch up on Bible reading and stuff. And I feel like the older I'm getting, the more weird I'm getting. I'm only 42 this year, this month. I turned 42. I'm already becoming like an old man in some areas. I'm like, "God, you need to help me. I'm becoming a bit strange." And I'm like, "No, I don't want to go out now. It's too cold. It's past 4pm." It's weird stuff I'm saying. And I'm like, "God, help me to renew my youth." But a lot of evangelists were typically like these fiery people. And so others were like, "Oh, that's that kind of a person." And the devil loved that. He loves to segregate what God holds treasure and what God calls important. And he loves to minimalize it and make it very difficult for the body. So it's not easy for you. It's going to be a tough part of your life. Nothing could be further from the truth. Joy and evangelism are the two most connected. Apart from worship, they're the two most connected elements of my life. When I see someone get saved, this joy erupts in me. Why would it erupt in me? Because in heaven, all of heaven celebrates over one sinner, repenting. All of heaven. So it doesn't say the angels go, "Oh, bless the joy is released to the evangelists here." No, no. It's all of heaven. I'm like, "Yes, because this is the reason he bled." And if you really think about it, you're the reason he bled. So somebody, God himself, perhaps evangelized you. Someone got you. Whether it was your praying mama like I had. My mom was like a pit bull with a bone. She would not stop praying. Her and my sister said, "God's going to haunt you." My sister got involved as well. She recruited people. And they're like, "God's going to haunt you." I said, "I don't want God to haunt me." And they'd pray against things that I was doing. I'd try and be sinful and they'd pray against my sin. They would make it hard for me to do a line of cocaine because I'd feel gods around. And you know, God's trying to get me saved. I always felt like I was guilty and stuff because of my mom's prayer. But my mom wasn't a five-fold evangelist. She had a heartbeat that was in line with the heartbeat of the load. This morning, God wants to align you again to his heart. It shouldn't take 85 people to see one saved. They also studied who are the main people inside the house of God that see people saved. Guess who they are? Christian saved less than one year. Do you know why? Because you've received the greatest gift and you're like, "Yes, of course." Right now in Germany where we live, we're seeing five to ten people turn to the Lord in our church a week. One girl and her sister, they were saved about seven weeks ago. They've already led six people to the Lord. I've met them every week. I meet them. They get past the bed, past the bed. Meet this girl. And I'm like, "Hello, girl." You know? And I hug her and she's like, "They've just bought me here." I'm like, "Welcome to church." You know? But they just, every week, bring someone. Next week they brought their mom. Then they bought, then they told me that my dad doesn't live here, but we saved him as well on the phone. And they're just getting people saved. One after the other, nobody told them to. We never preach this to them. Taste and see. God is good. When you've been sick with something, how many of you know fever is terrible, right? We've all had fevers. You're in bed, you're shaking, you're sick. And just the touch of maybe your wife or your mom or someone praying for your friend touching you. And then once you come out of the bed after three or four days, you're like, "Oh, my goodness." And you feel this overwhelming compassion for sick people, don't you? You're like, "Man, that was so bad." And then you want to pray for them for about a week. And so you're busy again. And when you forget again, and then you're sick again, six months, "Oh, sickness is from the devil. I'm going to be God, heal me, and I'll heal everyone." You start making big promises. And then we forget. The heart can easily forget. And there's a Christian sin that we have in the body of Christ that we almost bless when we hear it from people's mouth. It's an acceptable Christian sin, and it's called busyness. You're like, "Oh, you're so busy with the ministry. You're so busy with your family. You're doing so much. Yes, sometimes we're doing so much, and it has nothing to do with God." And it's so far from what God calls a priority. So I want to start here with, we're going to read a lot of Scripture, and then we're going to get into seeing the heartbeat of Jesus. And I want to again make it clear, the Lord did not start His ministry by saying, "I'm going out there to find evangelists." He didn't do it. Matthew 4. Let's read this together. Are you there still? Yeah. Do you remember when Jesus was in the wilderness? This is right after He came out of the fast, and... Yeah. Okay. Let's start from verse 17. Jesus began His ministry with a very soft saying and wanted everybody to feel good by saying, "Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." No, He didn't. That's probably what Benjamin Solomon would have said. But He started with, Jesus began the ministry with repent. He started with repent. That's a full-on message, right? First sermon, repent. I've been studying the sermons of Jesus, and I call them reductive messages because it's three, five thousand, ten thousand people, and He starts after the ten thousand crowd come and goes, "Hello, welcome to this stadium event, unless you hate your mother and father, even your own life. You're not worthy of me." He starts by reducing false Christianity. He cuts it all to the bone. He says, "You can't live a middle life with me. It's going to be all in or nothing." He's really great at this. And so, He starts with repent. And then all these people are hearing this at the seashore. Let's look at verse 18. Jesus walking by the sea of Galilee, saw two brothers, Simon called Peter, and Andrew, his brother, casting their net into the sea, and they were fishermen. The Lord knew that these people understood something about seeking and searching for something. And then Jesus says to them, using their own language in verse 19, He says, "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men." Turn to your neighbor and say, "You're a fisher of men." Some of you single girls got too excited when you said that there. Turn them again, say, "You're a fisher of men." Tell them, "You're going to find men for Jesus." Or women, whatever you want to say. Jesus began the genesis of his calling of Christians. He didn't begin it with, like, "Hey guys, you're intercessors. You're worshipers. Yes, those gifts all exist." But he began the Genesis with, "Follow me, and here's how it begins. We are going on a search for human beings." Okay? That's the Genesis. Who's ministry are you made after? Common, current, modern churchality? Or Jesus, which one? Jesus, right? Okay. Because we want revival. Like, "God, give us a revival." Like, "God, would you move?" And God's like, "Would you move?" Oh, Lord, move. God's like, it's tough for me to move you, though. You know, I just, I would love to move you at 7-11 on Monday. Oh, Lord, extend me to the nations. Yeah, how about your next to the neighbor? So, the nations, how about your boss you don't like at the accounting firm? Oh, no, no, I meant popping you guinea. Send me where they'll see me as a super apostle. Then I'll come home so bold, and say, "Now we're going to change Australia." Then I'll fall straight back down into my apathy. I've done this myself, guys. When I moved to Germany, we saw a stadium the biggest event in Germany in 50 years. When we did Marvel Stadium, 2018, one of the biggest events in Christianity in the last 20 years here in Melbourne. It was amazing, but even in my own hometown, Melbourne, where I come from, I grew up in Geelong, here it was a challenge for me to go on the streets, because everyone's like, "Nah, mate, nah, you're good, mate, yeah, alright, yeah." Like, it's stronger. Ozies are stronger. They're like, "Nah, mate, nah, Jesus stuff, mate, keep it yourself." And they might even use a few choice words. We are clearer as Australians. When I moved to America, everyone's like, "God bless you, brother." Of course, I remember sharing Jesus with Methodics. One guy was a meth dealer, and he goes, "Bro, I love God, too." I was like, "You're a meth dealer!" "I feel so much for praying for me, bro." I'm like, "How can you say that? You're a meth dealer!" In Australia, they'd just be like, "Nah, mate, and they'd be beep, beep, beep, beep away." It's more clear and more real, but I was challenged to the bone. I'm like, "It's easier for me to go somewhere else. It is easier, guys, to go on a mission trip than live a mission in life." But if you let your heart sink into the heart of the Father, you realize, "Oh, God is not asking me to do big, challenging things. He's not asking me to save all of Melbourne. He's asking me to be obedient to what he places in front of me. Ooh, he brings into my life." And here's what I want to show you from this verse. Number one, Jesus is the one who calls you. It's not the church. Jesus is the one who says, "Come and be a fisher of men." It's not to fill the pews of the church. It's to fill heaven. Number two, Jesus says, "Follow me." You're going to do it with God. You're not alone. If people reject you on the street or they reject you at work, don't take it personal. They're not rejecting you. They're rejecting the message of the gospel. And a lot of Aussie Christians don't think the gospel is the real gospel. They think it's a church and steeple on the corner of Collins Street in Melbourne that hates everybody. They don't understand Jesus properly. They think it's a dead religion. Don't take it personal that they don't like you. Just turn that love on real deep. Turn on really strong, okay? "Fisher of men." Turn to Acts, chapter 20. Am I speaking to anyone this morning? Are you awake this morning? If you're not, I can send Vincent out with a water pistol. We have these comfortable chairs at our church back home. We have a very big church and we have these comfortable movie chairs. They literally have movie cups. You could chuck a popcorn and a big coke thing in them. I'm like, "I can't stand these chairs. I want to get rid of them." Because half the time when on Sunday, even when I'm not preaching, at first I thought it was my preaching, it was boring. But then I realized people fall asleep all the time in our church. I'm like, "It's not the peace of God. It's the fact that these chairs are like cinema chairs." And one time I was seeing this one guy sits right up there, right where you guys are. And I'm like, "I need a water pistol. I cannot... I want to go right up there every Sunday and shoot it in his mouth. Baptize his mouth." I'll go, "Would you like me to work on your teeth as well? I want to do some dentures work on the guy." So this morning I want you to be awake to this. Don't let the devil lull your brain and your thoughts out of the gospel, okay? Sometimes we love the message like, "God's going to turn your pain into a promise. We love these stupid messages." Why do I call them stupid? Because people make up these aneurysm and allegory things with two letters. Like, "God's going to take your broken to a blessing." It's just like you can make up any of that nonsense. We need the anointing. We don't need nonsense. I don't mind the things. I don't mind if you preach that way. I'm not knocking you. Sometimes I say to people, "God's going to take your... I don't know... your apathy and make it just Jesus' anarchy or something." You know, whatever. I don't mind doing the A-A-C-C, whatever. But I have a problem in church when we come to be entertained. I have an issue when we come to be entertained instead of come to the throne of the feet of the Lord, saying, "Teach me, mature me, disciple me, let me have ears to hear. Jesus himself even had to tell the church the one... the alpha, the omega, whose words appear like a sword. He even had to tell the church. He who has ears to hear. Let him hear what the word of the Lord says. There's many dull people in the body of Christ. Let's not be that. Let's not be dull. Let's be alive. Amen? Otherwise we're going to get water pistols. All right. Acts chapter 20. God loves you so deeply. Acts 20, are you there? Awesome. It's right before 21. All right. This is Paul the Apostle speaking about what Jesus gave him to do. Look at verse 20. "I kept back nothing that was helpful but proclaimed it to you. I taught publicly from house to house, testifying to the Jews and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. And see now I go bound to Jerusalem, not knowing the things that will happen to me there, except the Holy Spirit testifies in every city, saying, "chains and tribulations await you." This is him describing his ministry. Verse 24, I love this, but none of these things move me. Nothing. Nothing should move us away from our bold conviction about God. If our friend at work starts at Jesus, bro, don't tell us about all this God stuff. Just go, "Brahm, so sorry. I'm passionate about God. I hear you talk about basketball every Monday, all day. When you talk about the clippers, whatever, the Detroit pissing. You talk about it all Monday. So I'm going to tell you God loves you too, bro. I'm shooting hoops in the spirit over your forehead. Like everybody else is allowed to talk about what they're passionate about in the world, except Jesus, why it's the message that offends the spirit. But don't lose the boldness. Don't let anything move you. He says that I may finish my race with joy. And here it is, and the ministry that I receive from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of his grace. And indeed now, I know that all of you, among whom I've gone, preaching the kingdom of God will see my face no more. What a powerful statement. He's like, "I know I'm going to be killed." Therefore I testify to you that I am innocent this day of the blood of all men, for I have not shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God. Paul the Apostles' ministry he received from the Lord Jesus was to be an ambassador. He didn't receive to be a teacher. He received to be a preacher of righteousness. He received to be the cross has paid the price. Every person can be washed in the blood. So everywhere he went, he preached the gospel. Paul didn't preach the apostolic mandate. He didn't have a five-fold ministry card that said, "Come meet me in my office." Paul the Apostle preached Jesus. He preached repentance from sin. So God's mandate here even flowed so far down another 20 years down to another apostle and then more apostles who spread through all of Rome, Asia, mine, and Greece. And then eventually they got on boats and they came to this little land called Australia, Van Diemansland. No longer Diemans here, are they? It's a great South land of the Holy Ghost. But the Dutch man, Van Diemann, he came here. The Dutch guys came and brought the gospel here. They loved the fact that there was other lands, other places, uncharted territory, nations that didn't know God, people like you and I. See, if my mum didn't get saved, if my grandma hadn't got saved, if my grandma's sister or whoever it was before her didn't get saved, I wouldn't be saved because I wouldn't know the good news. This church is full this morning, numerous full because somebody shared it. And somebody paid a price and said, "My ministry is not according to me, it's according to I received it from the Lord Jesus, fisher of men." So all of us had called to be a worshipper and a witness, both at the same time. Not everyone is called to go on the street corner preaching, but all of you are called to be a witness. Now let me give you some tips about the streets though. I just want to share this. I used to really struggle in Melbourne big time. I had a guy once pull a knife on me, that also didn't help. It doesn't happen now. We're in harvest season in Melbourne, I'm telling you. In Australia, something has shifted, it's probably your prayers. I want to say thank you to all the older intercessors who pray for revival in Australia. Something has full on changed. The harvest is ripe guys. You could start working and just with God alone and praying for your one friend, and you watch, they'll be saved within a few months. Trust me, there is a difference. I can tell you that from experience because I was on the street daily for 14 years. I can give you a little bit of 13 years or something. What I used to do is this, I would walk past people and God would say, "Stop that girl." My heart, like you sometimes, you feel that? I'll be like, "Okay, which girl? Which girl? And he's like, "That girl?" And you go, "Which one?" And he's like, "That one? You guys too late now, God." You know? She's right there. You're like four meters away. Oh, Lord, it's too late. Or inside your thoughts go, "That can't be the Lord I have a meeting." Like the God of the universe, the Holy Spirit who ordains the universe to hang in gravity and balance is telling you and saying, "Please stop this person and doesn't know you have a meeting." God knows. See, here's what I started to do. I started to disobey my fear. Literally. I was like, "I'm just going to not obey fear." So I started to make myself disobey it. So if I felt fear, I generally would go like, "Okay, I feel fear, but I'm just going to go against it. Didn't feel good to go against it." But what I noticed is, progressively after some months, my fears started going like that. Just down. So then, next time in God said, "Stop that person. I'll just like straight in." Hey. And what I do is when I stop them, I don't go, "Hello, the Lord Jesus died for your repent. I don't do that." What I learned to do is not be weird. Number one, that's a great tip for you. You might think that's very like, "No, no, I'm not weird. Yeah, you are. Some of you are really weird. Some of you want to take a show for him, blow it over non-Christian's head." That's not the best idea. Just be normal. Some of you see a metallic t-shirt they're wearing, like, "That's demonic." Like, they're like, "What do you mean demonic?" They're like, "Yeah, I love it. I love demonic." They don't understand our Christian-y's language. So here's what I encourage you to start with. Number one, start with the love of God. Start with just being joyful. Like, let them see a smiling Christian and a gentle Christian, a loving Christian. And so sometimes when I walk up to the door, "Hey, excuse me, bro. Can I ask you a quick question?" "Yeah, yeah, if you want." And I ask God all the time, give me words and knowledge. Because the gift of words of knowledge, according to the Scriptures, is given so that we can reach people, right? So God is the one. The Bible says in 1 John, "If we ask according to His will, we know He hears us. If we know He hears us, we shall have the petition. We asked of from God." And what is God trying to do in the earth? Save more people. What is heaven wanting up there? Do they just want to sing songs up there? Heaven wishes more people would come to heaven. Every one of you, if you died, you'd be in heaven going, "Why didn't I tell my sister?" You would be thinking of that. We know this because there's been people raised from the dead. In fact, there's a man from New Zealand who got stung by a jellyfish. Do you remember him? Ian McCormick. He got stung from a jellyfish. He was in heaven. And then the Lord showed him his mother. She would never know that he died. He should think he went to hell, showed him his mum, and a multitude of people standing behind him that weren't saved. And said to him, "Do you want to stay?" He still gave him an option. He said, "Do you want to stay or do you want to go back for them?" He came back to the earth, and he was dead, clinically dead. It's proven they have the documents of it. He was clinically dead, and he came back to life because of Jesus, and he came back to testify to the grace of the Lord Jesus. Well, guess who else was dead and came back to life? You. Yeah. Try this side. Put your hand up if you were dead in sin. Don't forget it. Don't forget. You were dead. Do you remember the porn addiction that destroyed your thoughts? You were resurrected. Don't keep it to yourself. You can't. You can't keep it to yourself. So Paul said he testified. So what I do is I go, "Hey, bro, can I ask you a quick question? "Yeah, mate, I'm cutting the hurry. No worries, man. I'll be really quick." Don't go, "No, you're not. You need to hear this. Just be always, just be easy." Go, "Bro, do you have problems with your back?" And you go, "Uh, actually, yeah, I do, mate. Yeah, why are you a chiro? "Yeah, yeah. Go, "I'm not a chiro." But this is going to, and I say this to my go, "Bro, this is going to sound weird to you. "You've never heard this before, but God actually loves you. "And I felt to stop you. Can I pray for you?" Just a short, like that 10 second prayer. I've had people stop and go, "Oh, mate. Yeah, if you want. Yeah." And inside I'm like, "I want." And I put my hand on their back, literally, here in Oz, put my hand on their back, and next minute moves. And then like, they're like, "Ah, I'm... "Next minute, they don't have to go to work. They don't know where they were." And they're like, "What has happened? Mate, my back is on fire." Then they go, and then I've had this happen a bunch of times with groups of people too at a shopping mall, where there's a bunch of guys, like two, three guys, they're teasing you a bit of me, "Oh, yeah, okay, mate. "You're telling me the Jesus stuff, mate, yeah, yeah." Like, tough and funny. Pray for one of them and go, "No joke, bro. "No, my knee is fully better." And then they're preaching for you. Then you just say to them, "Guys, value has me in taking up and offering." You know? This is where the gospel begins to multiply. So you don't approach people with awkwardness, approach them as you are. If you're getting your haircut and you're not a very outgoing person, hairdressers always ask you questions. How about you ask one back? As they're doing your hair, and it's hard when they're doing that thing. They're actually, yeah, soak that in. It's tough when they're doing the massage thing. Everyone loves that, huh? Who loves that? Put your hand below there. I love that thing. I was like, when I get married in the future, I'm getting that for my wife, for my head. So when you're doing that, okay, but when they're cutting your hair and stuff, they go, "Oh, so what are you doing?" And we always tell them, "I do this. "Yeah, I'm doing this. I've got this coming up and everything." Ask them back, say, "What about you? How's your life? "Do you enjoy being a hairdresser?" And just sit there with them. I have many friends who've led hairdressers to the Lord. Women, girls, moms who are single moms and stuff. Ladies who are not evangelists, who just by chatting to this hairdresser, and then going, "Hey, is there anything I can pray for you today?" Just after they're about to pay. Like, "Oh, it's funny. I asked that." You know, me and my boyfriend, we were fighting and stuff. Okay, can I just come over here real quick and gentle, quiet. Father, I just pray that you would show your love, help her to have a heart of peace, and then thank you. Then they go back in the next time, lead them to the Lord. Salvation. This is not hard. It's very, very easy. We make it hard in here. First new believers under the age of one in the Lord aren't hard because they've tasted immediately God is good. And so they're like, "God, do that for me. Surely he wants to do it for somebody else." But when we get older in the Lord, we forget what it feels like to be redeemed. We lose touch with that dead sin, that darkness, because we're so used to kind of being inside the goodness of God. But we can't forget. We cannot let that happen to us. Turn to 1 Timothy. We'll go with two more scriptures, and I'm going to pray for you. And I want to give you a couple of advices on how to see people saved in the easy way. Does that make sense? This morning's a little bit more practical. I could have gone really to the jugular of like having you weep your guts out, because I kind of know, no, no, it sounds wrong, but I know in a way how to share some of the testimonies where God really gripped me, especially about my brother's salvation. My mom's here in the service of my dad. They can tell you, my brother ended up walking from God from being a musician, in church, a worship leader, to renouncing God quickly, to shooting up speed, to being in the Melbourne crankcase, every night till 6 a.m., to prostitute, all sorts of craziness. He became very, very dark. But the Lord saved him. And the testimony of how he saved him, even I go nuts and I weep. Everywhere I share it around the world, people bow their eyes out when I share what happened to him, how God saved him. And I could have shared that with you this morning, but I really feel this church, you kind of already, to me, you feel like you have a love for people. I sense that in here, you have a love for people. Perhaps you just haven't known how to get it out of you. Or what to do with it. All right? So I'm just going to give you a few more practical things, but then we're going to pray the Lord will change you, your boldness, put on you the spirit of boldness, and help you to do it as you. The very big problem I see with people is when they share the gospel, they try and share it as evangelists. Share it as a witness of what the Lord did in your life. And share it as an evangelist. He told the fisher of men, fisher of fish, sorry, to be a fisher of men. He didn't tell him, "Now I'm going to make you an evangelist." He's like, "You know how to fish? You're going to do that with people now." All right. First Timothy chapter 2, you there. Okay. The beginning of this chapter, Peter starts to really tell us what intercession means, to pray for everybody. That's another thing that's difficult for us sometimes. He tells us to pray even for government leaders. I've had the honor of being able to mentor. I don't know how this has happened, but mentor, a government world leader right now. She leads a whole country, and she's a Christian, and she's in a real dark spot, very hard spot, because it's very political up there. You know, it's very twisted and manipulative in the top politics of the world, and she's a European, and she's a Christian. She was praying. She said, "God, if I do this, how am I going to do this? Who will be a spiritual leader in my life?" I didn't even know her. She said, "Benfitt's Gerald." She reached out to me. It's been pretty crazy when I go to her and pray for her. I don't put on Instagram, and I'm boast of it, because she's a person. She's just in a position of authority. It's no different to anybody else. Do you realize that, right? I was telling the guys last night, I had a wonderful time with my friend Pastor Cory. I had a good dinner with him, and he's wife last night. A little bit of dessert and stuff, and the kids, Zach, and all the kids from Numa. I had some great dinner with him to catch up with him. It was wonderful to see him, and he was talking about how God has broken his heart and repentance. It was really beautiful. It was so great to hang out with him. I really enjoyed it. He was like, "Bro, God is doing so much, and he shared it with me." I was like, "Wow, it felt so deep what God's doing, and he's really growing closer to the Lord." It's just so precious. As we were talking, I was talking to Zach and stuff, and I was like, "Oh, yeah, you know, Ronaldo." They were talking about football players. I said, "I preached to Ronaldo's agent." They were like, "What?" They named him. I was like, "I don't even know who he was." My friend told me, Vince and I were at Wembley Stadium at the Champions League. The biggest final in all of us, the state, 90,000 people. I'm sitting there, I don't know who these people are. I tell him, "Hey, bro, I feel like you have a problem with purity. You need to get free." I don't know who they are. I told Ronaldo's rich guy out of all these bodyguards with him. I preached the gospel to him. You know what he said to me? At the end of it, I said, "Jesus loves you, bro." I said, "You got all these people with you?" "What you do? You signed up, Ronaldo and all that?" I heard the guy told me. I said, "I respect what you do." I said, "But you need Jesus Christ in your life. It's hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." I said, "You need God in your life." And he stopped like this. All the people stopped to listen. And he goes, "You had a beautiful suit. You stretched his hand." He goes, "Thank you." He goes, "Thank you for telling me this." Really cut him. It went in. I was like, "It's so good. It's so easy to actually bring Jesus to people." If we stop looking at everything as, "This is hard and this is whatever." It's not hard. So Paul here begins this with, "Let's pray for everybody. For government officials." He says, "Pray for all men, intercession, giving of thanks for kings, all who are in authority." That's verse two. Now look at verse three. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God, our Savior, who desires all men. Men to come to the knowledge of the truth. Some verses will say repentance. Wow. Do you know God desires your arrogant boss? Your constantly swearing cousin. God desires him. Your brother, who's an atheist, who fights your Christianity. God desires him. God wants to touch him. The issue for the Lord is this. When we say we're friends of God, we have to determine what does this really mean. We have to look at ourselves clearly and go, "Are we true friends of God?" Maybe we're partial friends in some areas. Perhaps some of you are really good at locking in the secret place an hour a day and just seeking God and saying, "I love your Father." And you're a friend of the Lord in the way you love on him. But there's a second part of friendship with God. I love meeting brand new married couples. They are the least embarrassed people of their love. They're kissing each other everywhere they go. They don't care who you are or how embarrassing it is for you. They want to show affection to each other. Newly married to Christ's Christians are the same. They don't hide. They're not holding God back. And we actually, would you believe this statement? Some of you theologically will disagree with me, but it's actually written in Psalms. They held God back. Sorry, it's in the book of Job. They held God back because of their own disobedience. They held him back from the nation. They were like, "God can do all things." It says, "They limited God." What if God wants to pour out a revival in the East that is so significant in this region, in your family, that you've been hoping, hoping that something happens? And the Lord says, "Today I equip you. I put boldness in you to start praying for that one person." So I want you to see the connection here with Paul saying, "You should start praying for all men." And then he says, "God desires." I mentored Vincent many years. Still do. It's a huge honor for me. And I also learned from him. He loves the Lord, "Man of God." He's younger than me, but man of God. Amazing young man. I tell him sometimes, "You're going to end up being the German Bill Johnson." And because he's just really deep with the Lord. And it's been such an honor to do that. But when I mentor somebody, you get to know the deeper workings of how they think, and you get to know what they like. You get to know even the communication they like. And with God, he has the same thing. Now if I find out that Vincent loves shoes, loves sneakers, there's also a pastor sitting here in the front row who has an obsession with Michael Jordan sneakers. In fact, I see that two of them are here. And I looked at your pastor and I was like, "Okay, the kids have been a great influence." But let's say it's his birthday. Let's say it's his past birthday. And we are true friendship. We have true friends. We're truly friends. And then I come to him and say, "Hey, brother, it's your birthday." And I just want to give you this gift. And I saved up for it for months. And I bring it to him and I say, "Open it up. I'm handing him a big box." And he opens it up and it's a cat. And I'm like, "You like it?" And I tell him, "I like it. I like this cat. I think this is good." And he's looking at it like, "Thank you. Thanks for your offering of this cat. Thanks for the gift." But it's not what I desire. Father, how can I bless you on your birthday? I desire all men to come to the repentance, to come to the knowledge of the blood of Jesus. My desire in this friendship is that you administer to me what I actually want. It's not just praise he wants. It's people. And where's the proof of that? Where's the proof that he wants people? You are the proof. Every time I preach about God's love for the lost, I don't think of the lost. I think of you because you were lost. I think you are the proof. I look at your eyes, I'm like, "You are the redeeming proof of the blood. You're the passion of the blood. It's you. But it doesn't stop with us." And that's the sad part is a lot of the modern church stops the will of God with us. And we reduce it to church-yanity. But we are called to win people. So here's what I want to encourage you to start doing. We are distracted. Life gets busy and I'm busy too. So what I began to do is I began to put on my phone because I knew my heart had gone numb. I had stopped feeling a little bit. I knew that if I said, "God, use me, it wouldn't be enough." I knew I had to adjust. I had to align myself. So I put a picture of my brother on my phone. Every time I get a text or after I get a text, I'd see it and all of a sudden just start praying for him, 30 seconds. And this is what I used to pray. The Bible says whatever we bind on earth in Matthew 18 will be bound in heaven. It says we have authority to ask with God. So I said, "God, I ask you and I bind him to the cross." I was literally about to ask you to come on the keys. I said, "I bind him to the cross of Calvary. Get him, Jesus. Get my brother, Jesus." So what would happen to me is as I'd pray that I'd feel some kind of equity with God. Then the next day or the next three hours later, another text or I'd look at Facebook and after I'd finish it, I'd go to close my phone and guess who I see again, my brother. And I'd go, "Oh, Jesus." I'd put him before your throne. Get him, God. Save him. Save him, people into his life. Go after him, Jesus. Then me and my mom and dad came into agreement with him. I started to really feel the heart of the lamb toward his lost, prodigal sheep, not just those who fell away, but those who are away, those who are headed to hell. We do not have enough sermons about hell. Statistically they've proven this. There's one sermon or something that some guy did a study of a megachurch in America. It was like one sermon mentioned hell in three years. It was mentioned hell more than heaven in his three years of ministry. We are not conscious of eternity because it doesn't feed us, but it's not in this case about us. It's what do you desire? How do I love you back? So I said, "God, I bind into the cross." Some of you tonight, the best thing you could do even this afternoon, go to your bathroom mirror, place two names on there. It could be your boss, whoever God shows you this morning. It could be your best friend. Put their name right with a Sharpie pen or something. You can raise it, just put it on there and say, "God, get them." Every time you brush your teeth, you check your head. Just take 20 seconds. People are like, "I don't have the time." Check your screen time. You have the time. When I check the screen time on my phone, I'm very convicted to never again say to God, "I don't have the time." You just start to seek the Lord over that person, then you put faith in it. So this is what I do with my brother. This is what me and my mom and my family did with my brother. My brother, at the end of this nine month period, it was like a birthing period, by this time the Holy Spirit had given me such revelation over his salvation that I knew even how to speak to him. I knew how to address him. So I didn't preach down his throat when I saw him. He had bags under his eyes. He was shooting up speed. He was full of demons and this guy was a worship leader. Can you imagine looking at him when you see demons living inside of a guy, you used to see Jesus inside of him worshiping. In fact, he had a physical angel appear in his room at seven in the morning or something. He physically saw it and that morning he walked across one of the highways, Power Road, Heather and Road in Endeavour Hills and something pushed him behind his back and a car went right past. The angel pushed him, saved his life. My brother's had so many supernatural experiences that made me jealous how many he had, but he went away from God even after that. So what I do is, Father, I bind him to the cross, get him. Three things happen. Number one, my heart expanded like crazy. I fell in love with my brother even before he was saved. Second thing happened, I grew an authority. I felt like me and the Lord had equity over that soul, that I felt like I'm with you in this God. I felt like I was blessing the heart of the Lord. The third thing that happened is God began to invade my brother's life with circumstances that were far beyond what you and me could control. What about your unsaved sister? What about your atheist father? What about the numbness and the coldness that entered your life where you're like, "I hope it works out?" I can solemnly tell you as a pastor and as a man of God, and I don't mean to sound wrong or harsh, but it will not work out sovereignly. He will go to hell if he's not saved. She will go to hell if they're not saved. So right before my brother came back to God, he had a motorbike accident here in Melbourne, and the first person he decided to call was not all of his gambling friends. Duffy knows my brother very well. The first person my brother called was me at one or something in the morning when he flipped the bike and went backwards through a tree, and the first person he rang was me. He said, "Help me." He was on the ground, the bike was smashed ripped the tree out of the ground. He's back. He said he couldn't move. We took him to hospital. In that hospital who's in there for two and a half hours, the Lord healed him. He really healed him because they said he's spine is swollen. God healed him completely. And then he said this to me, he said, "Ben, pray and ask God for help. Ask God for help." I said, "I will." And he even asked God, "I heard him in the hospital room." He said, "Help me." God, he said, "I'm sorry for the life I live." Okay? So I was like, inside I'm like, "Yeah, heal him, but inside I'm also like..." Praise the Lord. I wasn't saying praise the Lord for the accident. I was like, "Yes, God saved him." Mum, Dad and I were all excited. About three, four days it lasted his salvation. He went back and he went further back into sin. He went way away. Once he's back got better, he went way back. So what did we do? Do we get discouraged? What does the Bible say to do? The Bible says to have faith. The Bible says, "If you ask God, we'll answer." So we kept praying and this is how it happened. Mum and I were in the kitchen of the house and my brother walks in randomly. One day we were going to stay away church that Sunday and my brother randomly walked into the kitchen. I remember chatting to Mum. I was leaning up against the back of the kitchen there and she was talking to me and he walked in and he sort of walked in weirdly. He said, "Look to this." And he said, "Hey Benny." He said, "Hey, and this you have to understand, this is a person who is entrenched in darkness." And this was after only about nine months of prayer. And God told me, "God gave me wisdom." He said, "Don't preach to him right now. Just hug him. Just say hi to him." And every time I hug him I feel devils in. I was like, I was like, I was like, I wanted to go repent. One time I did make one mistake. I was so angry that he was in the casino. I drove to the casino and I sat at the Crown Casino table for an hour right next to him. And I started pulling out of my wallet, all my money. I said, "I'm going to gamble my life away in front of you to show you how bad this is." I said, "Do you think this look good when you see me doing this?" I tried to prove a point to him. I tried him own flesh to save him. And the Lord said, "Don't do that." He said, "It's just going to mess with him even more." "Don't try and make him feel guilty. Let me work on him." And you do the work of the spirit. You pray and you so seed. So you preach, pray, so seed. So I didn't do that ever again. I felt really bad after that. I was like, "Man, what? I do that because I was trying to snap him out of his own brokenness, you know, but it doesn't work that way." So Mum and I, nine months later, he walks in and he just says to us, he goes, "Hey, Benny." And this is at the height of his sin, the height of his sin. Are you going to church on Sunday? And I went like this. I went, "I tried to act really cool." I was like, "Okay." "Yeah, looked at Mum." "Yeah, I guess. Yeah, I guess we'll go. And inside I'm like, my heart is just like thumping." I go, "Yeah, I guess." And he goes, "Okay, can I come with you?" And I'm like, "Yeah." You know, like if you want to. And then, you know, we were so trying to play it cool. And he goes, I said, "I'll leave at 9.30." And he goes, "Okay, cool. Thanks, thanks." And he walked back in his room and I ran. I literally ran into my bedroom. I got on my knees and like this because the rooms are next to each other. [Music] Back out, went back out to my mum and Sammy, Sammy, Sammy, we'll leave 9.30. Yeah, let's leave on time. You know, that Sunday he came to church. The only thing I wanted to stay away church, I was like, "God, keep him away from every weird oil anointing flag, the shofar blowing Christian. I'm not against you. If you blow the shofar in here, we love it. Now I have one at my church. I can't get rid of him. The Lord gave him to me. You sow your reap." But I was like, "At church, I was like, 'Keep him away from any weird Christian. Please, God.'" And then I was a bit like trying to worship. But the whole time I'm worship, I'm looking at him. Like that, I'm just sort of like, "I will get you home." Get saved. You know? And I was watching and nothing. He just sat there. Remember that mum? Dad? He just sat there the whole time. Then this lady at the end of the service comes up, she's like, "Whoa!" Well, I feel the Lord. She goes, "You're bed's brother." And I was looking at her, I was like, "Get away from her. From this guy woman. Get away woman. You're going to wreck his salvation." And she's like, "Well, I feel the Lord." He's just like this. She's looking at her. And then she goes, "I feel God telling me to give you a drum kit. A drum kit. One of them." And in my head, I'm like, "He doesn't even play drums." And then I said to her, "I later I go, 'You better give him the kit.'" We've been working on it for nine months. Give him the dang kit, you know? Buy that kit today. And she's like, "Yeah, I feel the Lord telling me." She bought it over two days. Remember that? She bought the drum kit over two days later. This lady named Lisa. Precious lady. Remember Lisa? Tall girl. But full of the Holy Ghost, she's like, "Well!" She bought the kit around. I watched my brother. He sat on his bed. He's still on drugs. He's still broke and he's in sin. He sat on the bed and stared at the drum kit. He just stared at it. And I was like, "What is going on God? This is so weird." He did not get saved that day. But we had a Friday night Holy Ghost party. And my mom's a smart mama. She knew what to do. She said, "Sam, it just so happens that the worship leader for Friday night can't lead. We don't have a guitarist. Can you play?" And Sam's like, "Mom, I'm not a Christian yet." "Yeah, I know. But look, you have a drum kit now." She's like, "Come and please lead." And my brother, he led. And all of us as a whole home group are like this. We're sitting there on the chairs watching him like this. As he's leading, all of us knew what was going on in the background. They're all against him in prayer kind of a deal. And all of us were watching him. And I think he sung about what can wash away my sin. Nothing but the blood of Jesus. And he was singing that. What can we make? And we're just like this. Yeah, whole again. And then he literally, remember this dad, he fell over. And I remember, I jumped like that. Right on top of him. And we're like, "Get out devil! Every devil of hell! Get out of him! Every day, we jumped on him." Remember that, Mom? All of us we jumped on him. We stayed on Father in Jesus. They deliver him. You witchcraft, that way. He was probably like, "Ah, underneath." He stayed in the ground two hours. Every demon came out of him. Every addiction came out of him. My brother got up off the ground, saved spirit, soul and body. Completely delivered. My brother, in a couple of months, met his wife. He went back to worship leading. And him and his wife now lead together. They're still in their way. Worship together. They're full of Jesus. But it started in me by making sure I wasn't living Sundays or pulpits. I was ministering to the heart of the Lord from the Scriptures. And I took seriously prayer. And today the Lord would like to reveal to you who you can begin to pray for, who it is you can actually put on your bathroom mirror or a picture of them. If they come over and go, "Why is a picture of me in your bathroom?" So every time I throw a brush on my teeth before I go to bed, I think of you and I bless you. They'll go, "Ah, it's really kind of you." They're not going to go, "That's weird. You're awkward freak." They're not going to say that to you. They're going to actually be thankful. Just go, "Bry, bless your life." I think of you and I actually pray goodness over your life. They're going, "What? Super kind of you, bro." No one will say no to that. But what you and me have to say yes to is the heart of the Lord. We have to let that challenge us out of this place of complacency, okay? So it's so easy. If God says, "Stop there person." Just go, "What's the big deal?" "Hey, bro. How are you?" "Good day, mate." Just have a chat. Learn to speak on your feet. And then if God puts a person today on your heart, just make a commitment. Okay, God? I'm just going to pray a few minutes a day. I'm just going to start with you asking Jesus to save their life. You watch what the Lord does. Would you stand?