Well, I want to read a scripture portion
from Romans, chapter 15, verse 20.
Romans 15, verse 20.
For missions, this is a very popular verse.
I like this so much because it really
expresses what I'm trying to share with you
tonight.
Yes, so have I strived to preach the
gospel, not where Christ was named, lest I
should build upon another man's foundation.
That's King James.
In simple English, that means, Paul said, I
looked around and saw a lot of people
that already heard the gospel of Christ.
Sin, repentance, Christ dying on the cross, hell,
heaven, and all these other things.
But then I looked away and saw a
group of people that never, never heard the
name Jesus even one time in their life.
So he said, I made a decision, that
is to go to those people that never
heard it and tell them about this good
news.
One more verse I want to read for
you in the Old Testament, you don't have
to turn to this.
Lamentations, chapter 1, verse 12, the first part
of the verse.
Is it nothing to you, all ye that
pass by?
Early part of this year, I was in
Bombay, India, waiting on the street to get
the light turned green so I can cross
the street.
As you know, you do it here.
And like other times, I had a group
of children around me begging for pennies or
whatever in the Indian language, Hindi.
I heard it and saw it so many
times, I didn't even care to look.
I just wanted to go.
But then I heard the sound of this
young girl, about 9 or 10 years old.
This is what she said, Sir, my father
died a few months ago, he had TB.
And my mother is very ill, she cannot
beg anymore.
I have a few younger children, they are
waiting for me to come with some bread.
Would you please give me a few pennies?
The light turned green, again it turned red.
But I stood there.
I watched these kids, particularly looking at this
girl.
I did not know if I have seen
a more beautiful face of a young girl
like that one.
Big black eyes, long hair, beautiful face.
Obviously she hasn't washed her hair for a
long time, dirt running through her hair or
dirt under her nails.
And wearing rags, holes in her clothes.
I gave her a few pennies and walked
across the streets.
I could not shake that off from my
mind.
I just asked, so the Lord began to
walk with me and began to talk to
me.
I thought about my daughter, Sarah.
I have two children, Daniel, 11 and Sarah,
8.
Very healthy, beautiful, intelligent, best in their school.
Every night she kneeled and prayed for the
missionaries, for her brother.
And that Lord called me to be a
missionary and all those things.
I mean, it's really wonderful.
Early morning I got up and took them
both in the car and to the school
and said goodbye.
And I said, I will see you in
three days.
And said, Daddy will wait for you and
all those things.
I said, please bring me a present.
Well, I thought about my daughter.
A question came up in my mind.
Asked, so the Lord asked me, What is
the value, the worth of this 9 year
old girl you just met on the streets
of Bombay?
Is her life less valuable than your own
daughter?
I came back to the United States.
I kept on thinking about it.
Her life represented to me again the masses
of Bombay and India and many of these
countries.
And Jesus loves them.
I want to ask you a question tonight.
What is the worth of your life?
I tell you how much.
You get a headache, you will find out
quickly.
In the night, you will be going all
over the place to find the medicine closet,
to find your pills.
Aspirin, Anastin, Bufferin or whatever you take.
If it won't go away, you call a
doctor.
Before you came tonight for the meeting, how
many of you stood before the mirror and
spent 15 minutes trying to figure out which
dress fit you?
You put some makeup on, you took it
off, because it's too much, then you put
more on.
You are saying, how do you know all
these things?
Well, you know, you are in America, you
learn all these things.
Well, how much you care about your children?
You try to find the best school for
them.
The private schools.
Even spiritual things.
Why you come to this church?
Why couldn't you go to some church close
to your home?
You are the best.
You really care about yourself.
Last year, one of our board members and
myself, Skip Heitzak, we traveled to Thailand.
From Bangkok, 8 hours ride in that old
beat up Datsun pickup.
It was so hot, you know, I want
to be humble, so I said, you guys
sit in the cab, I was in the
back.
Little did I realize what I was going
to get.
My back, the portholes and everything.
When we go to the other end, my
nose began to bleed, my ears began to
bleed, over 135 degree temperature.
It was so hot.
And I turned to Skip and said, Skip,
I do not know why people want to
go to hell.
I mean, you may laugh about it.
Have you ever driven in Texas without air
conditioning in your car, summertime?
It's bad, eh?
And he said, man, I want to get
out of Texas, it's really bad.
Well, Thailand was really bad for me.
The reason I said that to Skip was
this.
If this is so hard and unbearable, what
is going to be like in hell?
A few things we don't want to talk
about.
One is death.
Another one is hell.
H-E-L-L Yet Jesus talked about
it a lot.
If hell is not real, then Christ dying
on the cross, the Bible, redemption, revelation, forgiveness
of sin, this Bible, Dr. Stanley's preaching, this
church, you, what you profess to believe in,
it's all just fairy tales.
It has no foundation, nothing, zero.
Hell is real.
It is not a place to go for
vacation.
The man went to hell, Jesus said.
And he was in such agony, he began
to scream and cry out.
For what?
Give me a drop of water.
And I imagine after a billion years, he'll
be still crying out for a drop of
water.
And it is not for a short time,
for a long, long time, never to end,
eternity.
And I sat down, sometimes thought about it,
the state of people that go to hell.
I suppose, after they go there, they are
in such agony, pain.
Flames will never die, flames shooting out from
their ears, from their nose and their mouth.
And in such pain, I suppose, they will
be crying out for one thing.
I want to die, I want to die,
I want to die.
That's all I want.
But after long, long time, eternity never to
end.
The answer come back to them saying, you
will never die, you will never die, you
will never die.
My brothers and sisters, hell is a real
place.
It is called a bottomless pit.
One day I was thinking about that, I
said, how come?
It is called like that.
I did not know what the shape of
hell.
Maybe it is like a round ball.
The people in it, they love to land
somewhere.
Have you ever had a dream that you
are flying in your sleep, and all the
sudden, you lost control and zoom, you are
going down, your stomach comes out?
Well, actually, I have been in some airplane
flights, and I thought, it's it.
I said, Lord, here I am coming home.
Well, can you imagine for a million years,
somebody is falling, never able to land nowhere.
Jesus said, all the commandments is summed up
in this.
Love your God with all your heart, all
your mind, all those things, then what?
Loving others as?
As yourself.
I want to ask you a question as
a brother in Christ.
Do you care?
Do you love those that never have a
chance, do not know the Lord Jesus Christ?
They are dying and going to hell.
This week is missions.
As a matter of fact, a year about
60 to 80 cities are traveling and speaking
meetings and mission conferences.
And I learned a lot of interesting things
through this.
I want to make a statement.
Please listen close.
World missions is not you giving some of
your money.
No matter what amount it is.
It is not saying, God, our church will
send two missionaries somewhere.
And give them some dollars and pray for
them once in a while.
World mission ought to be your life so
totally, subjectively, emotionally involved with the pain.
For lost and dying daily.
Your individual life, your family must revolve around
every day.
For a lost world that is dying without
Christ.
At the age of 8, the Lord in
his mercy saved me.
At 16, I went to Bangalore to hear
a crazy man preach.
I never knew who he was until I
went there, George Worwer.
And there it was, he talked about North
India.
Having born in South India, never left my
village.
You want to know where I was born
and raised?
Go and watch an old Tarzan movie.
Is this good water to drink?
A doctor told me two weeks ago, you
better stop traveling and speaking.
I said, no, I cannot rest.
But here I heard him speak about North
India.
You see, AD 52, first century, Thomas, Jesus'
disciple came to my place, my village.
He planted seven churches in South India.
One of the churches only three kilometers away
from my home.
And in this community, in my village, you
know, the first time I wore shoes or
socks, anything on my feet, was when I
was 17, after I joined Operation Mobilization.
Didn't wear this kind of things, I had
wraparound.
And I'm sure this is a result of
man's fall.
I don't know why on earth man must
wear this thing.
I am wearing this for you.
Really, I am.
I hate this thing.
And I got two of this.
I like this one better.
The other one is in my hotel room.
Well, there I was.
That one night, God really spoke to my
heart.
I didn't have much to give up or
sacrifice, but all I had was a skinny
body of mine.
And I decided to go to North India
with Operation Mobilization teams.
It was interesting.
Didn't know the language, nothing.
They asked me what my name was.
All I could tell them was, in Hindi
language, 50 paisa, good book, please buy it.
They asked me where I come from.
I said the same thing over again.
They said, what are you doing here?
I said, the same thing.
Well, in the end, I said, OK, you'll
get it.
And you know, for months and months, literally,
with others, I traveled in the villages, in
the rural areas of Rajasthan, North India, never
to meet a Christian, never to see a
church.
And we would ask people, sir, have you
heard of Christ?
Normally, they would say, no, no one by
that name live in our community.
Why don't you try the next village, you
may find Him there.
And numerous times, as the years went by,
I remember, God began to break my heart
as I began to mature and learn from
the Lord for the lost souls.
I remember, a few times I went out
on the streets to give out tracts and
preach, and I could not do one thing
because I was so broken.
I wept and wept and sat on a
street corner.
In 1974, at the invitation of Dr. W
.A. Criswell to come to his school, spent
two years.
I mean, I'm looking at this crazy watch.
It takes about three hours to tell you
all the stories, I will not.
You'll read some of this in the book.
I came here, hoping to spend two years
and see what God does, maybe go back
to India and all those things.
You know, January 8th, 1974, I came to
New York and then to Dallas.
And, I can't believe this.
The first time in New York, I was
so hungry, I went to the restaurant, I
didn't know the names of your food, I
had eight dollars in my pocket.
And I said, lady, what is that?
She said, that is hot dog.
And took two steps back.
And it was a black lady.
I said, lady, you please tell me, in
America, people eat dog meat?
And she thought, I was not crazy.
I really thought it was something.
How would you interpret D-O-G?
Well, I was so glad to leave New
York for Dallas, Texas, thinking all my troubles
are behind me.
It was like jumping from the fire, you
know, what is that?
Frying pan into the fire.
For two weeks, nobody understood me.
I didn't understand anybody.
In the end, somebody said, KP, please don't
feel bad.
In Texas, they do not speak English.
They speak Texan.
I'm still learning.
Well, it didn't take me very long.
In six months time, I was called to
pastor church.
While I was in Bible college there.
And in two years time, I learned it
all.
Kind of became semi-American.
A three bedroom house.
Two cars, one was Impala.
The biggest car you can find.
Have you ever seen a mosquito sitting on
an elephant?
That's how he found me if he saw
me sitting in the car.
He can find me.
And I had 100,000 life insurance plan,
savings account, checking account, string of credit cards.
I was in debt.
Seven suits minimum, five pair of shoes, about
25 ties, 30 shirts.
Learned to eat hot dogs, hamburgers, chocolate shake.
Every junk food he can find.
And by then, of course, being a theological
student, I must have a library of 2
,000 books.
Greek, Hebrew and all those things.
I mean, it was okay.
I was not doing anything bad.
So, I got used to it.
Oh, believe it or not, even ladies bought
a book called Color Me Beautiful.
Winter, summer, autumn, spring.
I am winter.
Well, that tells you how far this skinny,
lost Indian, how far he has come.
Long way.
The end of 1976, it was like somebody
pulled the bottom out.
I went to the darkest night of my
soul.
I felt like a terrible hypocrite, standing like
this and preaching to Americans Sunday after Sunday.
And I said to myself, you know what?
I know now what happened to me.
I was deceived by demons.
I left my country and here I am
in America.
I look at my life.
My heart is completely empty.
I never felt like that before.
I told my church what has happened to
me.
I didn't tell all the details.
I said, look, I am in a real
dilemma.
I couldn't eat breakfast, lunch, couldn't sleep.
I was in turmoil.
If you ever believed in losing salvation, it
was then I could think so.
My wife said to me, well, I said,
look, I think the best thing to do
is go into real estate.
The other day, my wife and I talked
about it.
I began to get books and trying to
figure out how to make money again.
You know, she said to me, look, God
never calls anyone and forsake them.
It only takes for you to wait and
ask him, he will speak to you.
I said, yes.
With my, the same Bible, news card for
reference.
I went to my study, closed the door
and said, God, if you ever saw a
man who is desperate, want to hear you,
totally willing to do anything you ask him
to do, it is me, I am lost,
would you please talk to me.
God is gracious.
His grace is great.
And he came into the room, just as
he did when I was 16 years old,
all alone, in that room in Bangalore.
And he began to speak to my heart.
And anchored my soul.
And reassured me of his love.
And told me what I must do.
I came out of that room as a
crazy man.
And all of a sudden I realized, two
years went by in my life in America,
my eyes were dry.
Every Friday night I had all night prayer
meeting for seven years in India.
Not one night did I pray in America.
World map was completely, there was nothing about
a map in my home anymore.
I had the TV, the newspaper magazine, and
Dallas morning newspaper, which is about 5000 pages
every morning.
I lived for these things.
But you know I came out, for next
few days and weeks, people thought I was
kind of sick or something.
Because I had to continue wipe my eyes,
so I can talk to people.
I carried this Bible in the shower, driving
car with one hand.
I was dying, like a man without food.
Not trying to preach next sermon to my
people.
But I said, Lord please talk to me.
I want to obey you.
This became my life.
I remember, that following weeks, my devotional time,
reading from the Gospels, I began to read
the four Gospels to see what Jesus was
saying.
It was also so fresh once again.
The Lord spoke to me, if any man
want to come after me, let him deny
himself, then let him pick up his cross,
and daily then let him come after me.
All these words became so real to me.
If, you don't love me, more than your
father, your mother, your son, your wife, you
cannot be my disciple.
That same week, my wife was working at
Baylor Hospital as a nurse.
Somebody gave me a book.
I don't know who wrote it, nothing like
that.
And I was reading it.
The man who wrote that prayed a prayer.
He said, Oh God, would you please take
eternity and stamp into both of my eyes.
Never read a prayer like that.
And I went into my bedroom, and inside
my bed, I said, God, I don't know
what all this means, but please do this
for me.
The following weeks, I found my hair was
growing long, and I walked around asking God
for permission to get a haircut.
See if I can find me three dollars
here.
It cost three dollars during those old days
to get a haircut.
I would look at my three dollars, and
I say, these three dollars represent three thousand
tracts that can be printed in some language
for my brothers to distribute, for people to
hear at least one time about the name
of my Lord.
And the TV four legs walked out of
the house.
Newspapers stopped, magazines stopped, and I said to
my wife, I just want to keep two
suits, five shirts, and I said, either I
sell it, Salvation Army, whatever, I just want
to keep this much only.
And I said, why are you buying cookies,
cakes, and ice cream, and all these things?
The cleanest water people have in Bangladesh or
India, if you brush teeth within America, you
will get diarrhea.
How clean is our water here?
I said, we can drink clean water, use
all our money to get this.
I am not promoting legalism, work, or anything
like that.
You can do all what I did, and
more than what I did, it will not
make you any spiritual.
That is not what I am saying to
you.
I am just telling you the story of
this Indian.
Everything in my family as a little family
of husband, wife, and two children, we began
to look at the world once again as
lost with our Christ and our responsibility to
start a prayer meeting still goes on faithfully
praying for the world and world map came
back into my home.
Why am I saying it to you?
Do you care about those that are dying
without Christ?
That never heard the name Christ?
In a few weeks time, Christmas will be
here.
Can't believe.
I like Christmas, you know why?
Because I get presents.
But while we have the Christmas here, all
the things that goes on the buying and
the selling and the presents and the joy
and everything, you must remember still today, half
of the world is waiting to hear about
the first Christmas.
I was in Oklahoma City not too long
ago, visiting a church, one of the pastors
came to me privately and said, Brother KP,
I am disgusted.
I am tired.
He happened to read the book.
I said, how come?
He said, you see the church building?
I said, yeah.
He said, we are paying $52,000 a
week to the bank.
Mortgage or whatever you call it.
This week, I was reading couple of years
ago, I remember super churches they call it.
A church in Houston, the pastor boasted, boasting,
I am repeating some words so you will
not miss it.
After millions of dollars been spent on gymnasium,
you know for aerobics and jumping up and
down like monkeys and frogs, whatever they do.
He was saying, we have better things to
offer than the world can offer so our
people will come to our church.
Am I against church buildings and gymnasiums?
No.
But I am saying to you, if you
belong to Christ, to this church, to the
body of Christ in this country, when 2
.7 billion people are waiting to hear about
Christ and going to hell, you have no
right, I have no right to live our
life the way we live and handle God's
money and go on thinking nothing is wrong,
everything is wrong.
Revolution must start in our individual life.
After two years in North India, having lost
some weight, tired, weak, old clothes, I walked
back into my village to see my mother
travelling five days in a third class compartment
in the train.
As I walked into my village, I saw
my old mother slightly bent, short.
She came and she embraced me weeping and
this is what she said, My son, for
three and half years I prayed that one
of my son will become a missionary, a
preacher.
Brothers and sisters, recently I spoke to a
group of young people in an evangelical fundamental
church.
350 young people.
When I talked to them I found out
there was not one soul in that whole
group that had any thought about world missions.
Where are our children?
What are you praying for your children?
What they must become?
Over 20,000 Mormon people 18, 90, 20
march in the face of the earth conquering
people for their cult's sake.
Every 24 hours a 747 jet from Russia,
Moscow, lands in Delhi or Bombay loaded with
communist literature, magazines, books, selling all over India
on the streets.
In 1985 it was the Indian Express newspaper.
More American money came to India for Hinduism
than for missionary work.
Number 7 was for Christian missionary work.
I'm asking you, are we not playing games?
Do we really believe what we say we
believe?
How can we take it so calmly?
I was listening to a tape by Keith
Green this morning.
The church that is sleeping in the light.
And he said, all I hear anymore is
bless me God, bless me God.
No one ache, no one hurt, no one
weep.
When God began to break my heart.
I will not break that.
I went to my study and saw the
two thousand some books and half a dozen
leather bound expensive Bibles.
And I said to myself, I can't believe
I did this.
When hundreds of my brothers do not have
even a Bible with any notes in it
here, I have all these Bibles.
All the study books that I will never
read.
That reminded me one day I asked George
Woolworth, George, why don't you have a leather
bound Bible?
It was several years ago.
He replied to me, KP, how can I
spend money on a leather bound Bible when
half of the world today do not have
a Bible to their name.
Not our brothers on the mission field don't
have one book to their name.
I packed all our books by the way
and sent it by ship to anybody I
can find that could use it or read
it.
Even spiritual things you can become selfish.
The video tapes, the seminars, the trips we
make, the cruise on the ship, all this
is junk.
Why am I saying it to you?
There must come a time in our life
we will say, Dear God, I want someone
else to be holier than me.
I will give up.
My brothers and sisters, I grew up in
a home with five brothers.
My oldest brother was a communist before he
became a believer.
Now 52 years old.
I remember as a young boy he used
to tell us when he became a communist
he took his own blood from his hand
and signed his name over to communism.
I never could forget that statement.
I just want to ask a question.
How old are you?
In America nobody wants to tell their age.
But do you know your age?
Go ahead.
Add 100 years to your age.
Where are you now?
You see what I'm saying to you?
You can accumulate all the riches you want
all the reputation keeping the Jones next door
to you and all the clothes the fashions
the cars and everything all these things spend
time the way you want it everything.
But remember it doesn't matter what other people
think about you it will all be gone
before you know it just like that.
And all that you'll be doing is fooling
yourself Oh!
What I tell you brothers and sisters if
only if only the living God can for
a split second open your eyes to the
eternity and world that is waiting here about
Jesus it will change our life.
Other day in our prayer meeting we were
talking about Maldives a small island we are
praying so much for some 200,000 people
live on that island not one known Christian
among that many people no church no bible
no radio ministry no hymn nothing it is
said it is a capital crime to become
a Christian there 600,000 villages in India
without a church today and on and on
and on like that Oh!
by the way these people I'm talking about
are not monkeys and rats and snakes they
are human beings just like us and Jesus
is not an American Jesus heaven is not
just for us and he cares and he
weeps and he is concerned the question is
this do we care?
and our prayer is this that some of
you will say well as for me I'm
going to walk away from this mess this
plastic watered down superficial me mine pleasing Christianity
and with a one way ticket I will
go somewhere if need be never to come
back and give my life so completely over
to him and for others although you will
not make it to some other country you
will make an inventory of your life and
what you're living for what's the purpose then
say Lord I cannot go to China or
one of those countries but I'm going to
give my life to become a sender helping
missionaries to go half of the world countries
are closed to Americans and Europeans to come
and be missionaries anymore but God has raised
up tens of thousands of what I call
native missionaries they don't look like you but
they speak the language of the people live
like their people and paying a price and
with your praise and financial help they will
and they can and we can reach our
generation for the Lord Jesus Christ 1967 Bundi,
Rajasthan was the first place I was physically
beaten up for preaching the gospel I was
not the only one I had seven others
with me we all got enough beating our
Bibles and tracts and everything was burned right
before our eyes by the fanatic Hindus seven
times our teams went there all seven times
we were stoned and beaten up three years
ago now about three and a half 19
year old young brother named Sam went to
Bundi with the determination if need be he
will die there but never he will turn
back he will never turn from that place
the leader Emma Thomas said to him Sam
you are too young inexperienced it is too
risky and dangerous he said I can't I
must live in this place win this people
to Christ seven dollars rent for one room
start living there of course they came to
him and said hey what are you doing
here we are going to kill you we
are going to kill you you know what
we will do he said fine I have
come here to die he said what he
said Jesus loves you he is the only
savior I will not leave this place you
can kill me or do what you want
early part of this year brother Terry Jones
was there six hundred of the brothers we
support in north west of India gathered and
I met Sam and went to Boondi later
to see nearly hundred people that came to
the Lord baptized worshiping the Lord and he
said to me brother KP these are few
fellows that persecuted me when I first came
here Gospel for Asia is a mission we
have two thousand five hundred brothers on the
mission field the story of some of them
is incredible what God is doing a new
day our prayer is to support five thousand
brothers by the end of next year of
course I am crazy and I am a
dreamer and fifty thousand one of these days
you know what I am absolutely convinced in
our generation we can win these nations to
Christ I am so convinced I wish I
had a time to tell you the story
behind that I have never been so excited
like this that I said this generation in
my time we will turn this generation to
Jesus Christ it can be done it must
be done but it is going to take
you each one of us Johnson Barbara Tim
John Margaret each one not looking at from
far but getting involved as a radical maniac
soldier laying down our life may the
Lord speak to us he is seeking to
use you I know he will thank you
pastor as you have heard in this message
the Lord is moving mightily throughout Asia and
you can be a huge part of his
work by partnering with a native missionary who
has chosen to give his or her life
for the Lord's service for more information on
how you can sponsor a GFA missionary visit
gfa.org slash sponsorship that's gfa.org slash
sponsorship