I would appreciate, unless you have a perfect
memory, if you could jot down a few
notes.
I just sense in my heart there won't
be anything more important on a practical level,
on the bigger picture that I say this
year than what I'm going to say this
morning.
If you follow what's going on in these
teams the last couple of years, you know
that I actually speak less than I used
to.
I used to speak quite often, make tapes,
send them from here all over the globe.
I've cut way back on that, and you
hear many other speakers.
We want to try to find the balance.
That's not easy.
But the thrust this morning, and we're not
going to look at a set of notes
on various nuts and bolts of team life.
All of that is important.
But this morning is more the big picture.
What are the goals and aims and the
ministry of this team here in Forest Hill?
I don't know whether people in Carlisle will
listen to this or not.
One or two may.
I believe most of these goals and aims
fit Carlisle as well.
It's a tremendous difference in the two ways
of approaching the same goals and aims with
a phenomenal amount of overlap that only more,
I'm afraid, discerning or people who don't know
what goes on, especially on the telephone, might
be able to understand.
I wanted to read this amazing favorite scripture
from 1 Corinthians 9, where Paul says in
verse 19, Though I am free, I belong
to no man.
I make myself a slave to everyone.
In some ways, this is one of the
passions of this team.
We're not just serving very gifted and committed
area leaders, which is a part of our
mandate, but we're wanting to serve very ordinary
people who sometimes walk in off the street.
It demands a lot of balance, a lot
of discernment, and a realization that we have
severe limitations.
And also that unless we function as a
team, it can't be done.
I know ever since we started having more
mission events here, that's added another 5 or
10 percent to my own workload, which was
already beyond comprehension.
One of the persons who came here on
Tuesday really pressed me to take meeting as
church.
I thought this might be a large strategic
meeting.
I found out that it's a very tiny,
struggling church.
I can't even figure out exactly what he's
doing.
And I had the grace when he phoned
me yesterday to say some other time.
I only could give him a Saturday.
People don't always show up on a Saturday.
He only gets 30 or 40 on a
Sunday.
I go to plenty, plenty of small meetings,
so it's not the size of the meeting.
The next day I have major meetings in
Christ Church in Bromley, and I'm just trying
to find balance in that area.
But if it wasn't for all of you
committed to this mission center concept, especially the
mission mobilization department in Chaco, I'm out of
it.
I just say thank you.
I can't do that because I'm on overload.
But that's a tangent, so let me get
back to the scripture.
I make myself a slave to everyone to
win as many as possible.
Boy, that's a great goal, isn't it?
Get that into your purpose statement this year,
to win as many as possible.
To the Jews, I became like a Jew.
Wow, talk about cultural sensitivity.
Of course, he was a Jew.
That helped.
To win the Jews, to those under the
law, I became like one under the law,
though I myself am not under the law.
Wow, what a message.
So as to win those under the law,
to those not having the law, I became
like one not having the law, though I
am not free from God's law, but I
am under Christ's law.
I tell you, you've got about four paradoxes
already.
I've only read a couple of lines.
So as to win those not having the
law, to the weak I became as weak.
To win the weak, I become all things
to all men.
Inclusive language, all people.
So that by all possible means, I might
save some.
I do all this for the sake of
the gospel, that I may share in its
blessings.
Do you not know that in a race,
all the runners run?
We're in the ICT Marathon, just in case
you don't know that.
It's part of the OM Marathon, which is
part of the Body of Christ Marathon, which
is the Jesus Marathon.
But only one gets the prize.
I had a little struggle with that one.
Run in such a way as to get
the prize.
Everyone who competes in the games goes into
strict training.
Not just new recruits who need training.
We all are in God's ongoing Holy Spirit
-directed training program.
They do it to get a crown that
will not last.
But we do it to get a crown
that will last forever.
Therefore, I do not run like a man
running aimlessly.
I do not fight like a person beating
the air.
No, I beat my body.
I make it my slave, so that after
I preach to others, I myself will not
be disqualified for the prize.
What a phenomenal scripture.
I'm sure you've heard messages on that scripture.
I think when we think of our overall
goals and aims, one of the best ways
to summarize it is in the goals of
the 82,000 movement.
Even though that movement is going into closure
the end of next year, the vision will
go on.
The vision will go on.
There's been confession of sin, and confession of
exaggeration, and folly.
There is many, many messy situations.
It will never all get sorted out, but
God's work will continue.
The vision of 82,000, the gospel for
every person, the church for every people will
continue.
I hope that can continue to be our
goal and our aim and our passion.
It's important for some people more than others,
so be patient this morning, to at times
just stop and look at the bigger picture.
We're involved in a fellowship of 2,800
full-time workers, plus our older kids, with
more ideals than you can list in a
policy manual.
We're involved with our own graduates, a number
of 100,000.
Maybe we're involved in 10% of them,
20%, 25%.
It would be great if we could come
up with that statistic.
We're involved, of course, with thousands of churches,
even excluding what the ships get into.
We're involved with hundreds of other agencies.
We're involved with thousands of Christian leaders.
But the ultimate goal, and we don't want
to get bogged down with just attempting to
maintain too many relationships, become hyper-generalist.
I'm already a generalist in some ways.
So we have to sometimes just stop and
make it really simple.
We're attempting to give the gospel to every
person in the world.
In the past months here, and that's gone
out on the Internet, other people are now
quoting it.
I actually believe I'm the one that started
this 25%.
I've never heard, to see how you can
get these things going.
Now it's being accepted as fact.
I've always said it's just an estimate.
It's just an estimate.
And I said it because some people were
saying 50%.
And from all I could gather in my
monitoring, the Billy Graham Association, the Every Home
Campaign, other mass evangelistic agencies, radio, television, I
would be very strong and willing to debate
that probably 75% of the people on
planet Earth have at least heard or read
the gospel.
We're not saying that's enough.
We're not saying they're evangelized.
So quickly correct yourself or a missiologist will
be all over you and it may not
be pleasant.
But I haven't found many people disagreeing.
You've heard me remind people of the fact
that 25% of the world's population today
is very close in terms of numbers of
people to 50% of the world's population
in the 50s when some of us got
started.
Isn't that scary?
Therefore I believe the goal that we're trying
to maintain here and in our fellowship of
giving the gospel to as many people as
possible is still strategic.
And what a thrill to see without much
pushing on my part people like Joseph D'Souza
and our brothers and sisters in India working
with other agencies and other churches in a
united effort called the Millennium Project which is
going to be the largest literature project we've
ever been involved in.
10 million, 15, 20 million, I don't know,
I don't want to say.
We've already had one of the largest gifts
in the entire history of O.M. two
months ago to help pay for these tremendous,
powerful, it's like a book, a lot of
pictorial book presenting the life of Jesus with
testimonies of Indians.
The responses we're getting from the churches across
India at this time, just been on the
phone with India again this morning, is very,
very encouraging.
So with all the other visions and burdens
we have, we can't touch on those this
morning.
We are still having this goal of reaching
as many people as possible.
That means I will still be battling to
say no to a lot of things going
on in O.M. I lose many of
those battles but I'll still fight because if
we just get so diverse especially in our
effort to be holistic then we will not
be able to reach.
Just this morning I made a decision that
cost us $25,000 Praise God that we
have that money in special projects because the
two main pieces of literature they give at
the gangway of the ship, Lagos and Dulos,
they don't have, they haven't had it for
quite some time.
There's no money designated.
I've just been monitoring, waiting, waiting, waiting.
Finally it's getting too late for West Africa.
I'm sure they have some material but they
want $250,000 of one item, $100,000
of another item.
There's no money designated to that.
This morning we pushed the button or Vera
will later in the day when she reads
my scribble to go ahead with that $350
,000 piece of literature to give away at
the gangways of the ship.
All the money we spend on the ships,
all the money to line up a country
and then somebody goes to the ship and
walks away without a single piece of literature.
Now the children, by the way, they got
this gold nugget.
We have big gifts for this children's booklet
so the children are way ahead but we
want also every other ordinary person, can't neglect
the older people, to get something when they
walk off the ship.
And then that second major goal, the church
for every peoples.
We realize in both of these goals compared
to the total task, our part in OM
is still small.
Our influence, however, in the whole body of
Christ concerning these things may be larger than
we are able to measure.
So in a movement like OM you always
have those two things that are happening.
You have what you're actually doing and then
you have what you are influencing.
What we did on Tuesday is small compared
to the influence that will come from what
we did on Tuesday.
They overlap.
They're not easy to measure.
Moving on from this because we could consume
all our time just talking about those two
great things and you've already heard, I'm sure,
quite a lot about those two things.
I've written down just some basic words in
my outline to show how we here in
ICT Forrest Hill and Carlisle we fit into
this.
How are we going to make this happen?
There's a tape floating around a little hard
to find called Little Visions.
I only think I gave the message once
or twice.
I think it's a very important message for
the average person.
He's probably not going to launch some major
new vision in his lifetime and that's not
there particularly gifting but it's showing how without
a lot of people having little visions like
every department on this team has to have
its little vision.
It might be quite big and only as
every department and every individual on the team
has their little vision.
For example, how many of you would make
any effort in the next month to learn
how to redeem the time a little more?
Now I know it's very hard for me
to speak on this because I'm considered a
complete fanatic and so when people are complete
fanatics they open their mouth people immediately say
I've had it said to me so many
times well I'm not George Ferber.
Beware of overreacting to what you hear George
Ferber does.
People won't wear a global jacket because you
know George Ferber wears a global jacket.
I had a guy come to me the
other day and I had this global tie
and I said I'm glad I didn't wear
my I had a tie just like that
I thought I would steal your thunder.
You mean to tell me if one other
guy in the audience has a global tie
it's going to steal my thunder?
If so, my thunder needs overhauling.
But it is complex and my heart goes
out to any of you that have to
work with me.
My heart goes out to those that have
to work with Bill Drake too.
In fact, leaders in general who are getting
things accomplished are not always so easy to
work with and somebody may come along and
say to you oh what are you just
another yes-perf?
You know, are you just another ver-ver
yes-person?
Boy, that will really charge some of your
batteries.
But you, in reacting to that could end
up in very foolish situations.
No matter who is leading the team and
no matter where we are there are always
those kinds of hassles.
What if Madonna was leading the team?
She gets saved and she comes in to
lead the team.
Are you going to have any hang-ups?
I surely would.
I think I'd have to go to another
team.
By the way, she did profess faith knowing
the way she operates I think it lasted
for several days.
But the words I've written down that I
hope can help us focus on the goals
and aims for the new OM year.
In my mind this is always the beginning
of the OM year.
The new recruits are here or they're getting
out there.
A lot of things happen.
Financially we do not begin now.
The new year financially is I think is
the January 1st.
Or calendar year financially I believe.
But we're speaking about ministry, we're speaking about
recruits, we're speaking about more general things.
The first word I have, you probably guessed
it, is ministry.
Ministry.
We could easily change the name of our
team in far as still to International Ministry
Team.
We're not going to do that as long
as I'm still the international leader of the
movement because that's my biggest job and the
thing I'm committed to the most at least
the next four years.
By the way, if you're elected President of
the United States you only get four years.
So I tell you, I am out to
make these the four best.
By the grace of God, if he leaves
me around I want to make these the
four best and I've got great people like
you to help make it happen.
It's quite uncanny what God has done to
prepare us for where we are right now.
But we on this team do have a
worldwide ministry that is often unnoticed, that is
strategic in itself, even if it was totally
separated from OM, which it will not be,
but even if it was it would be
strategic in itself.
We saw this at the meeting of the
Americans when it was coming out through some
discussion that OMUSA didn't really have a ministry
in the USA because someone was talking about
are we going to start teams to work
among Muslims?
Of course we don't have that ministry.
But I think there was a consensus, I
wish we had time to discuss it, that
OMUSA has a major ministry in the USA.
It's not just recruiting.
It's not just sending workers, raising money, that's
bottom line.
But when we go out to minister, I
don't know how many thousands of meetings I've
taken in the United States, some of which
are almost detached from OM because they ask
you not to speak about OM.
That is ministry.
People are converted.
More people have recommitted their lives in our
meetings and joined other groups than have joined
OM.
Some feel uptight about that.
I know many a church where after we
got them all excited, Campus Crusade came in,
especially years ago, and got all the money
out of the deal because one group builds
upon the other.
And the same, of course, is true in
Britain even more so because Britain, we've declared
officially we have a ministry in Great Britain.
And...
It's off.
We have a ministry in Great Britain.
I'm convinced with all my heart God wants
to continue to give us anointing for that
ministry.
I believe we will fall into a ditch
if we constantly try to separate what's international
from what's national.
We live in Great Britain.
We live in London.
Some of us have been crying out to
God for this city for 38 years.
We've given millions of pieces of literature out
in London in the early days.
We continue to speak in London churches as
I do tomorrow.
And if we have to constantly pick up
changing hats, international hat, national hat, I believe
it's counterproductive.
And I praise God that more than ever
I've seen other leaders here in the UK
acknowledge that important part of our ministry in
Forest Hill it is to impact Great Britain
with the Word of God with our lives.
If all the emphasis in Scripture about our
lives being even more important than the Word
then where we live is important.
And where we live and the churches we
go to, the tracts we give out locally,
that is a vital part of our ministry.
You cannot easily separate it.
You want to forsake it when you walk
in the door at 9 o'clock on
Monday morning.
But in the middle of the morning some
needy soul that you've just witnessed to on
the weekend may phone you.
You say, I'm sorry, I cannot take this
call because during the daylight hours we're only
involved in international activities.
Oh, by the way, if you're an Indian
I can talk to you but if you're
British I would not be able to.
Every movement, especially as it gets bigger, has
a tendency to more easily slip into following
because there are more voices, we're reading more
books, we've got more baggage and we're attempting,
of course, somehow to do so much.
So our ministry in the UK is a
vital part of what God has called us
to.
Of course that involves, number one, this is
my second word if you're only writing a
few words, mobilization.
I've written three sub-points under the word
mobilization.
The first is prayer.
We're committed to mobilize prayer worldwide.
I believe it is a vital part of
our ministry whether we're speaking to 10 or
giving prayer requests on the phone or sending
prayer requests out through an email.
B, of course, we're trying to mobilize finance.
I think it's time that here on our
team we acknowledge that we are in fundraising
in a major way.
And it's not just me.
And if you haven't listened to that message,
fundraising is teamwork, one of the most important
messages I think I've ever given on this
subject and I still see people behaving certainly
as if they've never listened to that.
And sometimes giving honor to a certain person,
saying certain things that give the idea that
the fundraising is because of this person or
that person.
I urge you to understand fundraising is teamwork.
If that person typing that receipt doesn't do
that properly, the next gift may never come.
And no great entrepreneur in the world can
make up for some of these complexities.
So prayer is teamwork plus personal prayer.
Finance and fundraising is teamwork plus personal finance
raising whether it's for your own support.
I believe we want to have more teamwork.
We'd like to help one another more.
Dale Roton, he didn't find it too humbling
to ask me personally if I could write
a third party letter for him to help
him get his support which was in the
doldrums for years.
Ever since that third party letter, Dale told
me he's never had a shortfall on support.
It doesn't always work that way and that
was definitely teamwork.
If I can't sell the ministry of Dale
Roton then I just can't sell and I
should go back to perhaps collecting something.
I do collect things by the way.
C, the third thing under this mobilization title
of course is recruits.
We have to engage in more creative thinking.
We have to brainstorm.
Some people are but certainly of all the
teams in the world we are one of
the teams that has the greatest potential for
recruiting, for helping others recruit, for inspiring more
recruitings.
The Act 13 vision mobilizing 200,000.
There's so many things tied into that and
it's exciting.
Wherever we go to meet people that somehow
have been recruited in our meetings not near
the numbers we dream.
And I could get into major discouragement about
this with my ideals if I wanted to.
But again, recruiting is teamwork.
And when people join other missions as a
result of our ministry, I think we should
praise the Lord for that.
We are not in competition with these other
groups.
Feedback I had both by phone and email
from one of the special visitors to DuBron
was the thing that warmed his heart the
most is when I stood up and said
I want you to just know OM is
not my big thing.
It's not even my second thing.
Jesus is my big thing.
And the whole body of Christ and other
organizations that's my second thing.
I don't know where I put OM, I
guess the third or fourth thing.
That just so touched this man's heart.
He said that's why I'm committed to OM
and he is very extremely committed to OM.
We're part of one body and it's exciting
the synergy we're seeing from greater cooperation.
Though it is messy, it is complex and
there are the discouragements.
The third main word I wrote down here
is the word encouragement.
I think those of you who know me
well know that that is really one of
my favorite words.
I'm gifted at times at miscommunicating.
I think I phone someone and they think
I got some major agenda.
They think I'm recruiting them or all I'm
doing is trying to encourage them just to
see how are you doing.
Is there no place for non-agenda activities?
Can't we phone someone and say how are
you doing?
Do you feel okay today?
Is there any prayer requests?
I believe people are intimidated.
They're intimidated in some of the basic friend
raising and prayer partner winning because they put
it on too high a level.
They're afraid to make this phone call.
What will they think?
Will they think I'm after their money?
You can be so intimidated if you go
around always thinking and they're after my money.
I could go right out of my mind.
When they invite me to speak, do you
think they're actually inviting me because I'm George
Burwer?
They know me?
They love me?
They are inviting me to speak because they've
heard by some source that I can get
results.
They've got goals and they've got aims.
I'm flying all the way to Australia again
next August.
I'm trying to get off the hook on
it.
It's not working.
They want me to get the air ticket
book now because of the Olympics.
I'm not in the Olympic just in case
you didn't know that.
Unless they open up a whole new thing
for people who speak loud.
But the fact is they've acknowledged they don't
know me.
They're afraid that no one's going to come
or it's not going to help more people
come because I'm a semi-unknown speaker.
So they want to have a big flurry
of my tapes right now.
So what if I get hung up?
Do people really want me as I am
this ragamuffin who forgets to zip his fly
at a university meeting and they still love
me?
Or do they just want a preaching machine?
We cannot get into that.
We're dealing with human beings and people are
just getting to know us.
We've got to give them the benefit of
the doubt.
Therefore we must deal with all kinds of
intimidation.
Whether people love us or don't love us.
Some are still non-functioning in their Christian
life.
They're not even sure whether God loves them.
Which is a denial of the entire Bible
though I understand how that can happen with
emotional struggles and punches in the nose.
I'm not being hard on those people but
I believe sometimes it's good if you've been
a Christian for many years and you're still
struggling with that just to somehow stand more
firmly on the word and say I know
with all my heart God loves me and
I stand against the doubt, the intimidation, the
fiery darts from Satan because I think they
are fiery darts.
When it comes on your mind that God
doesn't love you that is a fiery dart
straight out of hell.
That is even to almost deny his omniscience,
his very attributes.
We need to move on.
As I wanted you to say a further
word about the ministry of encouragement.
I think we realize how many people have
been encouraged by our ministries.
We know there are always some who have
been discouraged.
When we hear that we try to go
the extra mile to try to get that
sorted out.
And as the movement gets larger and the
number of relationships we have gets bigger you
have to live, you have to live with
things that have gone through the cracks if
you know that expression.
You cannot go back and resolve it all.
Now by delegation you can accomplish a lot.
The biggest method that a person like me
has to use is delegation.
My main thing is not what I do.
My main thing is what everybody else and
all the leaders in OM that I am
in contact with what they are doing.
Our ministry in one sense is the sum
total of everything that is happening today anywhere
in OM.
Because we are serving the whole body and
we are serving one another.
Yesterday morning it was a major encouragement phone
call with Pedro Arbolet in Spain.
This morning it was Alfie Franks.
Tomorrow it may be somebody else.
And it is not just me that is
doing this.
I know sometimes you must have to listen.
Most of the things you hear about me
I never hear so you can relax.
But people do talk and I pick up
some and we make so many phone calls
and he writes so many letters.
People have even said polite things about that.
But we need to understand this has only
happened because of the team.
In fact if I fill up all these
tapes I think I did ten, ten tapes
this weekend and I don't have the team
to type them, send them, put them in
a box.
Tell me how many of those letters are
going to go out?
They will just sit on the tape.
It's dead.
I might as well never I should have
just gone swimming.
The ocean was a little cold but it
is still filled with small things.
So the ministry of encouragement the ministry of
encouragement that God has given us in so
many ways is for all of us.
Now here is the punchline.
We are all fairly relaxed up to now
so get ready for this.
Therefore I believe to be on this team
everybody has to be committed to go the
extra mile.
I don't believe we can have a two
-tier team.
Those who are busting their knuckles working extra
hard, weird hours all kinds of pressure weeping
over people staying up sometimes just so that
we can meet these obligations.
Do you know how many people that we
are linked with have died just in the
past few weeks?
Which one of those are we going to
just forget about?
We can't forget about any of them.
When you are in leadership I'll tell you
many things are not optional.
If you don't get it done it will
haunt you.
And other problems will come that are greater.
Now this is where of course we need
a lot of wisdom.
And I have never asked people to work
the hours that I work.
In fact I have told people clearly I
can work longer hours because I do have
a greater variety of work.
And things that non-Christians or let's say
Christians working in marketplace ministry things that they
would have to do in what they call
their free time with me there's a blur
between what is ministry and what is you
know diversion for my free time.
Reading a book to prepare for sermon that's
considered by pastors as part of their work.
But a man living next door who works
for Lloyd's Bank that's just his pleasure to
read a book.
So it gets complex and that's why I've
never liked an overemphasis on just you know
comparing people and comparing ministries.
Many people don't have the energy to work
such strange hours.
All the time now I'm having to put
the record straight that I generally sleep 7
hours.
Sometimes 8, sometimes 6 but 7 in the
middle.
I have to fellowship with people who boast
to me that they only sleep 5.
Boy do I feel inferior.
Forget it.
I esteem people that only sleep 5.
But I cannot pretend that I'm going to
function properly the next day on 5 hours.
Some of you need 8 hours.
Some of you like my wife never get
really proper sleep.
And so we're all different.
Therefore only you in one way will know
whether you're going the extra mile.
In the light of your energy what you're
battling what you're handling at home you may
be putting just 7 or 8 hours into
the more official kind of work and yet
you're going the extra mile.
So this is the beautiful thing about the
grace awakening.
We're not into judgmentalism.
We realize the problem of workaholism and yet
at the same time we don't want to
completely lose this other aspect that is a
core value of the movement the willingness to
go the extra mile.
The extra little bit of work the extra
phone call the extra letter the extra witness
to a man who's on the road to
hell the extra track given out when you
didn't even bring your tracks with you that's
especially difficult.
And all kinds of other things that at
the end of the day the Holy Spirit
has to lead you in that.
Though we don't want to ever get to
the place where we because we believe the
Holy Spirit is doing all the leading we
never challenge anybody about anything.
We never urge people.
If you were working for a secular company
you would probably in this day and age
get talks like this.
Have you seen the video captions of Wal
-Mart's invasion of Germany?
I mean it's almost humorous.
I can't believe the Germans are going into
this.
And it's a big controversy everything is controversy
by the way especially Wal-Mart.
But they got the Germans committed to the
Wal-Mart slogans and they're giving cheers in
the morning.
When have I ever come in here made
you stand up and give a cheer for
OM?
Never.
We're here cheering for Jesus.
But I think sometimes because of our desire
for humility because of our desire for reality
in its many forms because we have a
natural tendency to be introspective sometimes we lack
a little bit of just go for it.
Let's go for it.
Let's go that extra mile.
Let's demonstrate a little more zeal.
In this team we are we are overloaded
with work.
And that workload has to be shared around
naturally.
Sometimes it's more difficult to share the workload
than just try to do it yourself.
But we're at the stage where there's no
way we can do it yourself.
That passed years ago.
And I just want to take this moment
to thank every one of you who again
and again has gone the extra mile.
You may have been tired.
You may have really wanted to do something
else.
You've gone the extra mile in whatever way
even spiritually in prayer.
Maybe nobody ever noticed it except King Jesus.
I still want to thank you because in
what we're attempting to do globally if those
of us who are in this kind of
ministry I don't like to say at the
center but you know what I mean.
If we don't somehow stay in tune with
the Holy Spirit and are be willing for
the kind of things we just read about
in this passage the Apostle Paul then I
believe it's going to negatively, negatively impact the
whole work.
Because you and I know OM is a
very needy movement.
You and I know we have more people
going through than we can follow up.
We've got all these grandeur thoughts about re
-entry re-entry conferences.
How many of those do you think actually
happen?
It all takes time.
It all takes money.
People are already feeling overworked then somebody comes
along and says we're going to have a
re-entry conference.
Are you going to cook?
Are you going to pick all the people
up at the airport?
Where are we going to house them?
And so there are not many re-entry
conferences.
Other people coming back from the field they're
too tired.
They don't want to fly off to this
headquarters for two days of re-entry.
Some of them just want to forget the
whole thing.
Plus some of them are battling just to
find a job.
Just to find a job or another ministry.
So as we attempt the impossible and we
need to reaffirm that.
O.M. in 1999 is attempting the impossible
just as we watched as much as 59
or 69.
And yet it's more complex today because you
have all the existing people all the existing
organization that's already there.
It's amazing.
So the Ministry of Encouragement will continue to
be together with Basic Ministry mobilization a vital
part of what we do.
And then the fourth word is the word
serving.
One of my main jobs is to serve
the area and field leaders.
They must be a priority together with my
co-director Peter Maiden.
When I get one day's notice that Joseph
Sousa's due in town the day after tomorrow
that goes automatically the head of everything except
maybe Frank Seeley.
But I'm sure many of you are agonizing
with priorities because your life is of course
beyond the O.M. fellowship.
You've got your church.
You've got your family.
You have relatives.
We understand that.
We appreciate when you're patient with those of
us who are older whose lives are 20
times more complex than we were single at
20.
Can you imagine me single at 20?
Most of you don't want to.
Imagine that.
Therefore letting love cover being patient with one
another is so basic.
Being able to switch priorities quickly often on
consultation with others rather than just off the
top of your head.
We're trying to serve our field leaders and
area leaders who in turn are serving the
whole movement.
We have some of that as well.
We're trying to serve the churches.
Our first line in our main function as
international coordinating team our first line of serving
the churches is through those field leaders through
the existing structure.
But we also have the part that we're
directly involved in.
A team that takes 1,000 meetings a
year plus is certainly involved with churches.
The follow-up aspect is just so crucial.
I just want to throw this in.
I know some of you have still not
seen any kind of real breakthrough in using
the telephone in ministry.
I would just urge you to reconsider that.
This is 1999.
Maybe yours is all email now.
You'll never get the same bonding with certain
kinds of people and millions are not into
email that you can on a phone call.
Let's not have the either-or camp.
I'm an email person or a phone person.
We all also need personal time face-to
-face.
There's part of me that at times says
for now I'm going to call telephone and
email.
My more pragmatic moments.
Ridiculous.
My emails and my phone calls are meaningful
to people because I spent hours with them
in their home.
They've walked with me.
They've talked with me.
They've wept with me.
They know that Verwer is not just back
there pushing a computer or playing a record
on the telephone.
A phone, of course, a man called to
apologize to me this morning for a small
thing.
I said, you don't need to apologize for
me.
He began to weep on the telephone.
Tell me, are you going to pick that
up on email?
A little difficult, but you could try.
You could put an email.
I'm now crying.
Praise God.
I tell you, he and I got a
linking and I just shared.
I appreciate his emotion.
I sometimes cry over the smallest thing myself.
And I'd urge you to be willing to
change your habits.
It always bothered me when a main leader
of the movement said, more or less, we're
not telephone people.
That's not our method.
Wow, what if I had said years ago
when they tried to bring computers into O
.M., hello, computer organization, I could get a
big speech how great we did before we
ever had computers.
This is narrow-mindedness.
This is stuck in a rut.
This is why young people start praying, Lord,
send them out to the pastors because we
want to get on with the work.
We need to be flexible.
We need to grow.
We can be old and young at heart.
Mr. Dalley set the pace on email at
80 years of age.
Even the Scottish television wanted to make a
film of it.
So we're serving those churches.
Third point under this serving section, we're serving
our prayer partners and probably we're as involved
with prayer partners across the world as much
as any combination of teams anywhere on planet
Earth.
And that should excite us.
It should motivate us.
And then, fourthly, under this serving section, we're
trying to serve the world partners.
Former O.M.ers. I believe as a
team, we're in touch with more former O
.M.ers than any other team in the
world.
It's phenomenal.
And we're seeing results.
And we praise God that this is an
exciting part of our ministry.
The next main word I wrote here is
just these two words, foundation and backup.
A lot of what we do here, keeping
the basic goals and aims ahead of us,
it is foundation building, it is backup.
Our India Department is laying a foundation.
We together are trying to provide a foundation
for the little India Department to function, which
we've done for a quarter of a century.
But we're also trying to backup, backup the
work in India.
Often I only make a phone call to
India because Rosie gets me on the line
and says, hey, phone so-and-so right
now.
And I just believe we want to be
able to continue to keep India as a
priority on this team, even though there's only
a tiny group in the India Department.
We, in one way, should all be in
the India Department.
We should feel with them, pray with them.
We're dealing with O.M.'s biggest field.
Even the ship ministry was born out of
the India Vision Ministry.
And it was only my going to India,
traveling to India on an old ship, not
ours, that led to the birth of the
ship ministry.
Where did the ship go to when we
first got it and lived on it?
It went to India.
Now, India doesn't need the ship perhaps as
much as it did in those days.
But I feel we want to keep India
as a major thrust.
We're providing backup and foundation for the Muslim
world.
Crescent Consultants maybe has struggled along.
It was new.
And with people away taking meetings so often,
not easy to just make it all happen.
But it still has an influence beyond what
we've ever measured.
It still makes a statement to the movement
that here at the international offices, Crescent Consultants,
and the challenge for the Muslim world is
part of the heart.
It is not the periphery.
It's easy to be critical of O.M.
More people are critical of us today than
perhaps you realize because we have a whole
army of people who are so positive.
But the fact is, I would have thought
just what we are doing among Muslims alone,
so many hundreds and hundreds out working, that
somehow, when people are talking about the negatives,
that that would come alongside and that we
would be esteemed just for this tremendous work
that's being done among the Muslim world.
You need to understand there's many a people,
many people will not support this work financially
because they've heard negatives.
They've heard there's not enough pastoral care.
They've heard that someone went on a campaign
and they got hurt.
They've heard we don't take care of the
health enough.
They've heard George Ferber is a fanatic that
makes people work weird hours.
All kinds of negative things.
Not just about O.M., missions in general.
I cannot walk in the United States or
preach in the United States without picking negative
overtones about missions in general.
So the road ahead is not an easy
road and therefore, again, that puts the pressure
on us to go that extra mile in
keeping together.
Often, the negative thing someone says about their
own team in a moment of weakness is
grabbed by someone else who uses it to
attack this team.
I had someone specifically tell me they really
were thinking of coming to this team but
they didn't come and then they told me
the reason.
It just blew my circuit.
Such folly.
Such folly that someone would believe a sheer
generalization about family life on ICT Carlisle.
Believe me, those rumors go fast and furious.
You and I are responsible for what comes
out of our mouths and sometimes the greatest
harm has come right out of this mouth
because things I said in a defensive moment
or trying to drive a point, it wasn't
accurate and then later on, someone else picked
up and ran with it.
Well, we're almost out of time.
I wanted to mention the foundation and the
backup in connection with the South Asia Department
with Wakely, with Gary Dean, with ACT.
Each one of these is important and each
one needs commitment on the part of the
whole team.
The next word I have is the word
training.
We're in the Holy Spirit's training program.
We can't boast of a systematic, well-organized
training program here.
We don't even have global action here but
we believe through our lives, through the prayer
meetings, through the speakers, through doing things together,
through carrying these goals and aims and what
I've shared about this morning, we can be
in one of the most phenomenal training experiences
that anyone could ever get into.
We know of our commitment on the team,
especially with Viv, to leadership development.
This, however, is not something new simply because
we now have a better name but if
you study the history of OM, you know
that one of our greatest giftings is to
give people their first chance in leadership and
there are a few tens of thousands of
leaders that are now out serving because somehow
they got in this movement and they got
with these people who were so committed to
these basic goals and aims and the core
values that I'm sure you know about.
I wanted to give this example that there's
a danger of trying at times to separate
the spiritual from the practical.
We want people to be spiritual.
We want true spirituality but we also want
people to develop practical skills from what they
do on the computer to driving a vehicle
to understanding basics about communication, setting up a
book table, handling tough counseling situations and that,
I believe, has to continue to be one
of our goals here on our own team.
We then have the literature ministry.
That's one of the areas where we still
very much are in coordination through Jerry Davey,
through Vera and Special Projects, through Clark Kennedy.
There's not time to speak about it but
it is our desire at literature ministry not
just the coordination of projects but distribution through
our meetings, through our giveaway programs.
We could write a book about it that
this will continue and I think it's an
area where most people on the team are
getting involved a bit and exciting.
The privilege of having a professional writer on
our team like Debbie and her phenomenal books.
If O.M. got proactive about the books
the number of titles could quadruple in terms
of distribution.
We need to understand today that a large
part of O.M. is not proactive about
literature.
Now I've seen it actually picking up again
in the last few years.
Why do you think that's picking up?
Do you think it just fell out of
a cloud?
Because there are people stomping their feet and
there are people who are setting the example
and there are people who are exhorting and
there are people who have the gift of
asking hard questions.
My greatest method of communication often is just
asking questions.
Now it's a risk because sometimes people get
the wrong idea.
But when you ask people like I did
with a field leader who I know has
an atrocious literature program.
How's your literature program going?
As we went for a walk in DuBron.
A lot came out of that and we'll
be in touch as I visit that field
this year.
So literature continues to be at the heart
of the ICT vision.
And then the music ministry.
The most exciting department we have to acknowledge
on our team.
We esteem Bill and his crowd.
They always seem to get more recruits.
They take more meetings.
They cause more fuss per square millimeter than
most departments and we are thrilled.
And it would be my prayer that we
could always have a dynamic international music ministry
based in Britain or in Europe that could
continue to have this kind of impact.
I've written down here we cannot reach our
goals without hard work, creativity, taking the initiative.
I wrote extra mile but I've already touched
on that.
Hard work, creativity, and initiative.
And I would write around the whole thing.
Grace.
It cannot be somehow us trying to prove
ourselves.
It cannot be some false motivation though false
motivation always comes in and we have to
learn how to deal with it.
It has to be that we do have
this big picture.
That has to be there.
We actually want to win people for Jesus.
And even though what we're doing right now
doesn't seem to be related to that, what
we're doing right now will lead to people
coming to Jesus Christ.
And I tell you when you catch that
big picture you are going to be more
motivated and you're going to be able to
battle through some of the stuff that the
enemy may be throwing at you even times
of ill health which is always so difficult.
And some of you have not seen me
in my moments of ill health but I
have had ill health.
I have been operated on three or four
times and a few other things as well.
In fact, you may remember that I had
a serious tropical disease that they thought might
explode behind my eyes and that would not
be too good and I've been on display
in two tropical disease hospitals.
They wanted to give me a new medicine
that only monkeys had received.
The board of directors overruled that and the
disease went away.
That's 15.
That came from Nepal.
Eating uncooked pork.
We'll not go into more details.
And then I've written the word hospitality because
we believe that is part of our ministry.
In fact, hospitality is directly linked with every
other aspect of this ministry.
And everybody on the team on your personal
level or in Manor House or Westwatch we're
all tied in to the ministry of hospitality.
We know our limitations and one of the
miracles on our team is that sometimes when
we're not able to do it in our
own homes God has provided funds that we
could do it some other way.
We're not going to evangelize the world brothers
and sisters without spending money.
And it is very hard to decide when
to save and when to spend.
Some of you think I'm probably the last
of the big spenders.
You should have been with me this morning
as I was testing my batteries.
I take time I'm sure I'm going to
be rebuked in heaven to test my batteries
whether there's enough power in there to continue
to use them.
There's not enough power I put them in
a special bag for recycling.
I don't know what to do with that
bag it's getting bigger and bigger.
I will not put a new battery in
until I've tested the old battery to see
because I feel that would be a waste
of money and whatever.
When I'm doing this I'm sometimes wondering what
is wrong.
We are still committed to cutting corners and
saving when we can but time is also
money.
We have a gigantic budget we're involved in
a huge number of multiple things happening all
the time and sometimes a failure to spend
can even cause the death of a person.
So that's going to be an ongoing struggle.
Then I've written the word pastoral care because
we're involved in that through many many people
linked with us and trying to improve on
that.
I've written the word evangelism because I believe
that's also a silver lining that comes down
through all these things and I've written the
word local church because I believe we must
continue to have this strong commitment to the
local church on this team being involved in
a local church in an active way is
not optional.
It is not optional in the work of
the kingdom.
So please work on that.
I know people now can say well local
church is where we belong.
I don't think people should use that as
an excuse.
If that's a failure in my situation our
family did belong to Bromley Baptist for many
years it's all a long story but as
I'm ministering in local churches almost every single
Sunday 52 weeks a year sometimes twice and
I'm involved in local churches including many locally
until the Lord hits me on the head
that is the way I'm going to continue.
But I don't think people should use that
to justify the fact that they're constantly sleeping
in on Sunday as the great rest day
and not being bothered with church.
Among other things that is a stumbling block
to local people.
You can say well where does grace and
the law come together?
We'll probably be wrestling with that to heaven.
But I'll tell you a lot of things
I do I do it because I believe
it is common sense to just do it.
Whether I feel like it or not.
That includes sometimes going to the team meeting,
right?
Our first goal each day in fact should
simply be to walk with God.
At the end of the day in my
own evaluation sessions my main question is often
about people's walk with God.
I don't have a stereotype view of that
though I believe there are some basics.
So it's my prayer that we'll continue to
have these overall basics.
All this has to be worked out in
your different departments and lives.
I'm willing at any time to discuss these
things including in future team meetings.
My final words on this piece of paper
is simply that we need harmony and partnership
in a very deep way with ICT Carlisle
if we are to carry on our goals
and aims.
And we need that with all of our
other fields within the UK.
We also as much as possible need it
with the whole body of Christ.
So I think we got a lot cut
out for us in the next year and
years to come.
And it's my prayer that each one of
us will understand a little more about our
ministry here where we're going how we're getting
there.
A lot of this needs constant constant redefining
but we don't have time for that this
morning.
Let's pray.
Father we thank you for this opportunity to
be together.
Lord I've heard of some heads of state
that gave their State of the Union message
that went for several hours.
So really I've been very short here this
morning.
And I just pray that we may contextualize
this into our own situation our own health
our own family our own energy level but
not throw it aside and say it's not
for us.
And that Lord you'd enable us to function
as one body even though we have a
lot of diversity even though we have people
probably who just have a maybe a general
unhappiness about ICT for some reason that somehow
we let love cover somehow we continue to
practice Matthew 18 that if we have something
against a brother on our team especially we'd
be willing to go with him privately and
talk that through before we just sort of
mumble about it and start a little more
gossip going on around the team.
We're aware Father that we are attempting too
much.
I have to take part of that blame.
Help me to say no.
Lord I have people saying now that I'm
saying no too much.
What will happen if George Verber gets known
as being reactive instead of proactive?
Lord how do we win in these areas?
But I pray that we may somehow be
able to pray through and talk through the
various steps we take forward that we can
move together of one heart and of one
mind.
Lord you've kept this team going for 25
or more years here in South East London
but we're not leaning on past history or
traditions.
It's a new day.
It's a new way ahead.
We have just four more years in this
particular structure and we're going to go for
it in the power of your Holy Spirit.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.