I'm feeling very much more at home today
and it's this, and it's because really, I'm
feeling at home because the weather reminds me
of home.
The prolonged absence of the sun one August
in England promoted this letter from a certain
Mr. Peter Chapman to the London Times.
It may interest your readers to know that
on the morning of August 2nd I saw
a small area of blue sky which became
visible for a few moments over the metropolitan
tabernacle in that part of London known as
the Elephant and Castle.
Several of my acquaintances were witnesses to this
phenomenon and I should be interested to know
whether similar sightings were made in other parts
of the metropolis.
And three days later a certain P.
H.
Moore replied in the same newspaper, the Times.
The small area of blue sky that Mr.
Peter Chapman saw last Friday over London is
known as English Summer.
It is a curious meteorological phenomenon, there is
however no cause for alarm as it rarely
lasts for more than a few minutes.
We haven't seen much sunshine today and I'm
feeling very much at home.
Well now, we are to read the Word
of God together this evening and talk about
the Word of God together because we've got
as far as Mark 4.
Of course we haven't been able to deal
with every subject in the previous chapters but
we'll read this evening a few verses from
Mark chapter 4.
Verse 2.
And he, the Lord Jesus, taught them many
things by parables and said unto them in
his doctrine, hearken, behold there went out a
sower to sow.
Verse 11.
And he said unto them, to his own,
unto you it is given to know the
mystery of the kingdom of God but unto
them who are without all these things are
done in parables.
That seeing they may see and not perceive
and hearing they may hear and not understand
lest at any time they should be converted
and their sin should be forgiven them.
And he said unto them, know ye not
this parable and how then will you know
all parables?
The sower soweth the word.
And these are they by the wayside where
the word is sown but when they have
heard Satan cometh immediately and taketh away the
word that was sown in their hearts.
These are they likewise which are sown on
stony ground who when they have heard the
word immediately receive it with gladness and have
no root in themselves and so endure but
for a time.
Afterward when affliction or persecution arises for the
word's sake immediately they are offended.
And these are they which are sown among
thorns such as hear the word and the
cares of this world and the deceitfulness of
riches and the lusts of other things entering
in choke the word and it becometh unfruitful.
And these are they which are sown on
good ground such as hear the word and
receive it and bring forth fruit some thirtyfold
some sixty and some a hundred.
So may the Lord bless to us his
precious word.
The Apostle Paul said I am getter to
everybody I am ready to preach the to
you who are at Rome also.
Talking about I am getter may I remind
you that your debts to the internal revenue
must be paid by the fifteenth of this
month.
And an American was talking with a Dutchman
and he said to him what are the
stripes in your flag for?
What are the colours for?
Well he said they are really related to
our taxes in Holland.
We get red when we talk about them,
white when the bill comes in and we
pay and pay till we are blue in
the face.
Well the American said to the Dutchman that's
just how it is with us except that
with us we see stars also.
Just to remind you that you may be
a getter too in another way but if
you are a child of God you are
certainly a getter to all men to give
them what has been given you the word
of God.
The Lord Jesus himself was our first and
greatest example in this when in his high
priestly prayer he prayed and said I have
given them thy word.
Now freely ye have received, freely give.
So right at the outset this evening we
see that ours is a tremendous responsibility as
children of God with the word, the living
word of the living God in our hands.
And the Lord God said in the forty,
no the fifty-fifth of Isaiah as the
rain cometh down and the snow from heaven
and returneth not thither but watereth the earth
and maketh it bring forth and bud that
it might give seed to the sower and
bread to the eater so shall my word
be that goeth forth out of my mouth.
It shall not return unto me void but
it shall accomplish that which I please and
it shall prosper in the thing where to
I sent it.
God is still sending forth his word.
Thank God for the sowing of the good
seed of the word of God in these
days all around the world in a greater
way perhaps than has ever been known before.
I'm very glad to hear in your prayer
meetings and in the general public prayers there
are intercessions for those who are taking the
word of God around the world.
So tonight with the Lord's help we're going
to talk about sowing and reaping.
Not particularly you'll reap what you sow but
that is certainly true as well.
And God has just said that he expects
to reap what he sows.
My word that goes forth out of my
mouth shall not return unto me void and
I shall have a reaping time by and
by.
Somebody visited Bottomley, the John Bull of England
some years ago when he was in prison
for an embezzlement I think it was, and
his friend noticed first of all that he
was sitting down there with a mail bag
on his lap.
He was making mail bags, that's what some
of the prisoners used to have to do
in Britain.
So his friend said to him, hello Bottomley,
sowing?
He said no, reaping.
And of course this is a law in
the world in respect to everything.
We sow what we reap and if we
sow to the flesh we shall reap corruption.
If we sow to the spirit we shall
reap life eternal and we shall reap eternal
life and the blessing of others and the
lives of others if we sow the good
seed of the living word of God.
So the Lord Jesus here in Mark 4
commences his ministry by parables and this is
the first one recorded in this gospel.
And a parable of course is an illustration
generally, a kind of explanation in homely, down
to earth terms of the divine truth that
the Saviour was seeking to get over.
We sometimes say that in a sermon the
foundation is the text and the divisions, or
rather the pillars are the divisions and the
illustrations are the windows and the windows are
needed to let the light in.
And the Lord Jesus of course was the
expert in illustration.
A friend of mine in Britain some years
ago he was boasting in the fact that
he only used scriptural illustrations.
He would never condescend to use one out
of his own experience or a story he'd
heard or make up a parable like the
Saviour did.
No he said I only use scriptural illustrations.
He was very proud of it but he
was professing to be wiser and cleverer than
the Saviour himself.
Because the Saviour used Old Testament scriptures it's
quite true to illustrate himself and his work
but he used all sorts of things as
well to illustrate.
He spoke of lilies, vines and corn, the
sparrow and the raven and words so noble,
so simple yet so wise were in men's
minds engraven.
And a parable is an invented illustration.
It is imaginary, it is invented in the
mind.
The Saviour made these things up while he
went along and the greatest preachers that I've
ever heard are those who invent illustrations to
absolutely perfectly fit the doctrine or the word
that they're getting over.
And H.
P.
Barker, whom some of you might have known,
one of the greatest preachers the Brethren ever
had was a master in the art of
invented illustration.
That's just what a parable is.
He said to them once, now you see
he wanted to explain something.
He was praying and they said Lord teach
us to pray like that.
He said alright.
Now listen, when you pray don't forget to
start by worshipping God.
Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be
thy name.
Pray for his will to be done on
earth, his kingdom to come and pray for
your own needs as well.
Give us this day our daily bread, intercede
for others and so on.
And when you finish it Edna Harper that's
not quite the end.
One more thing please in this pattern of
prayer.
And he says now which of you my
friend, which of you have a friend, shall
have a friend.
And shall go to him at midnight and
say to him friend lend me three loaves
or give me three loaves because another friend
of mine who was lost come to my
house and I had nothing to set before
him.
Give me something to meet his need.
This is the story of the three friends
and the three loaves made up on the
spur of the moment to illustrate the extra
point that they needed for their intercessory prayers
in the pattern prayer.
Now he says when you pray don't only
pray for yourselves but pray for others and
ask God for what you need for others
who come across your way.
So he said in the text immediately afterwards
ask and it shall be given you.
Meaning according to the context never take a
text out of its context.
You never get the right meaning.
He said therefore according to the story the
illustration in the context ask for others and
it shall be given you for them.
Now you know the text is ask and
it shall be given you.
But the meaning is according to the context
ask for others and it shall be given
you for them.
This middle friend who goes to the friend
who has everything for the sake of the
friend who has nothing and is lost.
This middle friend is you.
The believer in between a bountiful heavenly father
who has all that he needs not so
much for himself but for the man who
is lost and out of the way.
So in a marvellous way the Lord Jesus
invented an illustration in his mind, in his
imagination at the moment a parable about the
three loaves and the three friends to say
now when you ask don't only say Lord
bless me but say Lord give me something
for somebody else who is in me.
Let this mind be in you which was
also in Christ Jesus and mine for others.
And that was his meaning in Luke 11.
But this parable here is a little different.
This needed an explanation.
Apparently the light did not dawn upon them
when they heard this parable.
The people generally know and his disciples they
didn't understand it either.
And so he put in the application point
by point himself when he had the disciples
on his own.
Well now he explains to them why he
did it while they were on their own.
That is give the explanation.
Verse 11.
He said unto them unto you it is
given to know the mystery of the kingdom
of God.
But unto them that are without all these
things are done in parables lest they might
see.
Now this was a serious word and it
was about the nation who at this point
were rejecting him.
No message here to any particular individual but
the nation having rejected his testimony was now
deserted of God and left outside and exposed
to judgment.
Sometimes in giving an illustration we need to
give a little application at the end as
the Saviour did here.
But the best illustrations sometimes not always need
no special application because they let the light
in and the truth dawns.
Well now in the message here we find
that there is a sower, there is the
seed and there is the soil.
And the sower is God and the seed
is the word and the soil is the
heart of men.
The sower is God and he wants fruit,
that's what he sows for.
The seed is the word and the seed
is living and the soil is the heart
of men.
And his response as we see in the
parable is varied.
Now God ploughs and God sows and God
prunes.
The whole purpose of God working upon his
creation is that he might get a harvest.
We read in the parable of the vineyard
in Matthew 21 that the householder planted a
vineyard and what did the farmer want?
He wanted fruit and wine from the fruit
as it were to gladden his heart.
I used to have on my desk in
my study in England years ago a little
notice which says, let him plough he purposeth
a harvest and let him prune he wants
more fruit.
And this is why God sows the good
seed and gives his word to men that
they might be blessed and that he might
be glorified through the blessing coming into their
lives through his living truth.
So shall my word be that goeth forth
out of my mouth the sower is God.
In this gospel anyway it's pretty definite here.
God sows the seed of his living word.
Now of course he does it through his
agents and through his servants and has done
it all down the ages.
Of course in wanting fruit through his sowing
the seed God seeks fruit not from men
himself but from the word of God, his
own word which he puts into the heart
of men through his servants and through the
scriptures of truth.
Nor was a preacher of righteousness and the
righteous standards of God were proclaimed by nor.
But unfortunately the seed mostly fell on stony
ground.
Then the prophets came and they said first
saith the Lord and they gave the people
a message from God.
You see an Old Testament prophet quite different
from the New Testament prophet we were speaking
about this morning.
An Old Testament prophet had to have heard
something from God so that he could pass
on God's word to the people.
In some cases he's called a seer.
Not that he sees something in the future
particularly but he has seen something.
He had a vision of God and he's
heard something, he's heard the word of the
Lord and it's God's word that he gives
to the people and God's word is always
powerful.
So the prophets came and they said three
thousand times in the scriptures it is recorded
first saith the Lord.
These men were not liars.
These men had seen the Lord and heard
the Lord and knew that they were speaking
as from God.
God chose to speak through his servants the
prophets and then later through his son.
He could have chosen other ways to declare
his will to the world.
He could have done writing in the sky.
Far better that you can do it with
your aeroplanes.
But he sent his servants and gave them
his word and they said advisedly they said
thus saith the Lord.
And then the Saviour came and in his
high priestly prayer he said Father I have
given them thy word.
It is God who is the sower through
his son and through his prophets down the
years.
And the apostles were special sent messengers.
That's the meaning of the name.
And the message was a message from God.
A living message from the courts of heaven
to the people to whom they proclaimed Jesus
and the resurrection.
And the gifts in the church are teachers
and preachers and evangelists are those who know
the word of God and declare his truth
to those who need it so badly.
So God's word finds an entrance into the
heart of man.
God uses his servants to sow his seed
but in the final analysis he is the
sower.
And some sow in tears but the promise
is that they will reap in joy.
He that goeth forth weeping bearing precious seed
shall doubtless come again with rejoicing bringing his
sheaves with him.
Now he doesn't say when.
Some are seeing great blessings these days and
others are waiting till they get to the
judgement seat of Christ to see the results
of their labours.
And one of our coloured evangelists in the
Bahamas was invited through one of my graduates
Zacharias Zachariasen to go to his country the
Faroe Islands, that's near Iceland.
And preach the gospel.
And he went in January and he was
there February and he continued his stay for
another two weeks till about the 15th of
last month.
And there was tremendous blessing.
All that Tom does, this coloured evangelist, is
preach the word.
A simple straightforward gospel.
And after four or five evenings, ordinary congregations,
a few more than usual because they'd never
seen a coloured preacher up there before.
There was good interest, no results.
And then after five days a couple came
to see Zach and they said Zach we
feel we really want to know the law.
So they told Tom and Tom said very
good, get them tonight to come out in
the meeting.
And that was the beginning of a tremendous
break when they stepped forward to own Christ
and confess him publicly as their own personal
saviour.
And before Tom left, which was only the
other day, there were nearly 300 baptised and
in fellowship.
And there were two or three more baptisms
to be had in the last two weeks.
And I understand that hundreds and hundreds and
hundreds were led to Christ.
Thank God that his word is still as
powerful as ever.
I don't know whether I ever told you
about the Faroe Islands, but the first missionary
that went there from Scotland was a Mr
Sloan.
And it's his son, William Sloan, who is
the leading brother there in the islands now
and one of the greatest men of God
the Brethren have ever known.
I tried to persuade him to come to
New York when I was there the other
day, the other month, to meet the Brethren.
They ought to know Mr Sloan is the
greatest man in the assembly that I know.
What a mighty word.
What there were twelve and a half percent
of the people in the Faroe Islands are
born again Christians in the assembly.
And my first weekend there, there were 450
in this one assembly to the breaking of
bread.
There were 800 for the gospel meeting and
500 for the prayer meeting on Monday night.
And when Mr Sloan's father first went he
didn't know a word of the language.
Faroese is the language, something similar to Norwegian.
So all that he did was go round
the streets and put his hand of blessing
on the children's heads.
Then after some months he learned a word
or two, God bless you he'd say.
Then he'd say, Jesus said, come unto me.
And that sort of thing.
And the thing developed and now there are
26 assemblies there.
And two of them have 600 in fellowship.
That was before Tom went.
And now one of those that I know
of now has about 750 in fellowship.
Because 150 there have been recently baptised.
That's a clacksvick.
So thank God he is still through his
servants sowing his seed and it is bringing
forth that which he pleases.
Thank God for teachers and preachers and evangelists
of his living truth.
The sower is God and he wants fruit.
And the seed is the word and his
seed is living.
This is good seed, tested seed.
It is living seed.
The life is in the seed and not
in the soil.
Please note that.
Now some of our neo-evangelicals, and there
is a certain amount of this in the
assemblies today by the way and there should
be a bit of a warning about it
from time to time.
Neo-evangelism is alright in part
but there seems to be shades of modernist
theology in it and it begins with a
misunderstanding in my opinion of the word of
God, the Bible.
And it is said that the Bible itself,
the book itself isn't living.
The Bible is living but it becomes living
seed when it is received into the heart
of man and responded to.
But that isn't true.
We are born again of the incorruptible seed
of the word of God.
Incorruptible.
The life is in the seed and not
in the soil.
It is a living word of God.
When I was in Seacliff in Long Island
I bought some seeds.
I'd never bought seeds in America before so
I had a look at a packet and
I found they were supposed to be good
seeds, tested seeds and I chose the best
I could find and they were beet seeds.
I think in England we call them beetroot.
Beet seeds and indeed they were fruitful.
At least to some extent.
I put a nice row of them, two
rows actually and about five came up and
one of those grew into a beetroot or
a beet about as big as a pea.
But you know God's seed is not like
that.
God is behind it.
It is his word, it is the living
seed when it gets into responsive good ground,
there's blessing and glory to his name.
I think we must make quite sure that
we appreciate the word of God and that
we fence off certain hours each week to
read the living word.
Blessed is he that readeth and they that
understand.
We must keep reading to understand it.
Now we thank God for all the Bible
societies that are around the world, for the
Gideon's movement and the distribution of scriptures in
the hotels and the hospitals and schools and
so on.
For the scripture gift mission and New Testament
Pocket Testament League and organisations like this and
I think they're just marvellous.
Thank God for all those who give so
that the word of God can get round
the world to those who need it.
But you know in some of our countries
the problem is to get people to read
the living word of God.
They've got it, they have the Bible, they
possess the scripture, there it is on the
shelf but to read it?
No, they read the paper, they read some
fiction or other but they'll never get down
to read the word of God.
I was with one of my students in
Eritrea I think it was, or Ethiopia, Eritrea
and on one occasion John Hanley and I
went out with him and he said I
want you to come out with me today
and he put a satchel over his arm
and he put a lot of Gospels and
New Testaments in this satchel and he went
to a certain shop and the man said
to him what have you got there and
he said I've got some New Testaments and
Gospels.
Oh he said let me see them and
he immediately bought two or three.
Somebody looked over his shoulder and he bought
some and before three minutes had gone by
the shop was absolutely crowded with people wanting
the word but they came out reading it
and they sat in the gutter reading it.
Today in America we get the word of
God but we don't read it and it's
wonderful to see how they're clamouring in some
countries for the living word of truth and
how they're devouring it and thy word, no
God's word, giveth light wherever it goes and
how shall a young man cleanse his way
but by taking heed thereto according to thy
word.
I think we've lost the art of meditation
in the word of God don't you?
Are you going to confess that?
When was the last time you sat down
just for half an hour on your own
without the television on or the radio on
or any noise at all and you were
on your own and you read the scriptures
and you re-read them and you meditated
in them and you communed with the Lord
over his word and that became a really
living piece of the word to you.
When was that?
In Psalm 119 in those 176 verses there,
David shows how his delight was in the
word of God, he just adored it and
you know he'd only got a little bit
of it.
He had the Pentateuch, the first five books
in the Bible and he probably had Job
and Joshua, maybe Judges, but he had very
little of the living word of God but
the bit he had he went through it
and through it and he rejoiced in it,
delighted in it day and night, when he
woke up in the middle of the night
he didn't start moaning, he read the word
of God.
Psalm 119 and see what the word of
God did for him and what it can
do for you and me as we develop
again, gradually maybe, the lost art of meditation
in the living sacred scriptures.
Very glad to see you all here this
evening, delighting to listen to the preaching of
the word.
Let us also have concern for those who
rarely hear the word.
A few days ago my wife and I
were in Hopetown, Abaco, that's a little island
off the mainland of Abaco, which is an
island off the mainland of Bahamas, which is
an island off the mainland of Florida.
And Hopetown, a very nice little place is
Hopetown for a quiet holiday but the assembly
has closed down.
There are only two sisters there now who
are in fellowship with the assemblies and they
rarely get any fellowship at all.
And how this dear sister we visited rejoiced
in the bit of fellowship that we were
able to give her on that occasion.
And there are lonely souls who don't hear
much of the word these days and thank
God for the radio ministry and those who
preach the word of God over the air.
And regarding this I often say to myself,
Clifford, you must preach the word.
Not so much stories, interesting little bits and
pieces, but give the people the living word
of God.
Now don't get sidetracked, Clifford, into politics.
Give them the living word of God.
Our politics is in heaven from whence also
we look for the saviour.
The people are dying for need of the
living word.
And I say, Clifford, don't start philosophising in
the pulpit.
Such a lot of this these days, the
reasoning of men's minds apart from the revelation
of God, and you get nowhere but the
living word of God will reach the heart
and very often bring forth a response to
the glory of God and the individual blessing.
So the soul is God and he wants
fruit, and the seed is the word, and
the word, the seed is living seed, but
the soil is the heart of man, and
his response as we saw in the parable
told by the saviour is varied.
There was shallow ground and stony ground and
spoiled ground through thorns and suitable, solid, suitable
ground, and these denote the four types of
responses to the word of God in the
heart of man.
In the shallow ground the seed does not
sink in far enough.
In the stony ground the seed does not
last long enough.
In the spoiled ground the seed does not
have room enough.
But in the suitable, solid ground the seed
is enough to bring the fruit.
Of course the Lord Jesus in speaking like
this was talking about our three enemies, Satan,
the flesh, and the world.
There are always these enemies around seeking to
ruin the fruitfulness of the word of God
in our lives.
In the shallow ground type there is the
picture of Satan.
The seed falls at the wayside and Satan
comes immediately and snatches it away.
The seed does not sink in far enough.
There is a lot of shallow evangelism in
the world today, and if I may say
so, especially in some of these parts and
in Britain, a lot of shallow evangelism.
And one writer published a book on Hollywood
evangelism some years ago, and I always used
to give a lecture on this to my
students, to give them a balance, because most
of them had been brought up with a
kind of shallow type of evangelism only, and
they'd never had much of the solid stuff.
And this was really a condemnation of shallow
evangelism.
Shallow ground.
Satan is ready always when there is not
the solid, abiding word of God to snatch
away the good seed.
We are not ignorant of the devil's devices,
and thank God we have the sufficiency of
the indwelling spirit to overcome the strong one,
Satan.
And then of course there was the stony
ground, and the Lord Jesus was talking about
the old nature, the flesh here, the self
-life.
The seed doesn't last long enough because it
has no root in itself.
It's stony ground.
He's talking about people who receive the word
just temporarily, a little bit of it for
a short time.
They endure for a little while.
They never go on and enjoy the living
word of God and the salvation in its
fullness that it can bring.
They endure for a little time, and then
when a bit of affliction or a bit
of persecution comes for Christ's sake, they've gone.
The flesh comes in, and the self-life
wins, and they are lost.
The heart, in this case, understood the story
of love, maybe, but the mind did not
understand the cost.
The entrance see into God's kingdom they understood
to be nothing, and they stepped right inside.
But they didn't understand that the annual subscription
was everything.
For you it is given in the behalf
of Christ, not only to believe on him,
but to suffer for his sake.
It's made quite sure we understand the bargain.
It is the way the master went, shall
not the servant tread that way still.
And when affliction comes, or a little persecution
for Christ's sake comes, let us make quite
sure the word, the living word of God
is deep down in our hearts, and will
abide the test.
And then there was the spoiled ground he
was talking about.
Spoiled because the seed didn't have room enough,
and it was choked by thorns and thistles,
and things like that.
This is the type of person who is
interested to a degree in the living word
of God and the gospel of truth.
But there's so much room in their lives
for other things, the word of God does
not really find an abiding place.
Room for pleasure, room for business.
We sing, but for Christ the crucified, not
a place that he can enter in the
heart for which he died.
Room for pleasure, room for business, but for
God's own living word, not a place the
seed can enter in the life that's made
for God.
Demas was like this, you know, he only
believed for a while, and then faded out
of the picture.
In sending greetings at the end of the
Colossian epistle, Paul writing to these Christians at
Colossae said, Now Titicus, a faithful minister of
Christ, the beloved brother, he sends his greetings
to you.
And then there's Archippus, you know him, he's
one of your city, he's a faithful servant
of the Lord, labouring for you in prayer,
he sends his greetings to you.
Dr. Luke is here, the beloved physician, he
sends his greetings to you.
And so he went on, and then he
said, and Demas.
Now he didn't say, and beloved Demas, or
dear Demas, or faithful Demas.
He couldn't say anything like that because Demas
was beginning at this time to show his
real character.
And all he could say, Demas greets you.
Because soon after, he had to say, Demas
has loved this present evil world and has
gone back.
And all those who love this evil, wicked
world that crucified our Lord and Saviour, will
sooner or later go back, and the living
seed will not have its desired effect in
their hearts and in their lives.
But then thank God for the solid ground,
and I hope this ground is a picture
of your heart and your life, receiving the
beautiful, living, incorruptible seed of the Word of
God.
You and your heart and life, meditating on
the Word, making God's Word your very own
by grim determination, careful, prayerful study and meditation,
suitable, solid ground, bringing forth fruit in the
light by the seed of the living Word
of God in the heart continually.
Thy Word have I hid in my heart
that I might not sin against thee.
Thank God the living seed is enough to
meet our spiritual need day by day.
God's Word is sufficient.
Receive it and devour it and make God's
Word your own, and be fruitful by it
in your own life, in the lives of
others through you to whom you preach it,
and to the glory of God's name.
Has your life produced a good harvest through
the living Word of God in and through
your heart and life?
Have you been able to multiply yourself?
Some brought forth thirtyfold, some brought forth sixtyfold,
and some brought forth a hundredfold.
Some of you haven't got a lot of
time left to serve the Lord.
I heard a very interesting prayer by one
of the Brethren this morning.
He was facing the fact that he wasn't
going to live down here another forty or
fifty years, and he wanted to put his
life at the Lord's disposal, that the Word
of God should have free course and be
glorified through his life in a special way
in his later years.
And I said, I'll mentor that prayer.
I'm getting on myself.
I'm emasculating.
I haven't got long to live now.
He spent in the service of Christ preaching
the living Word of God, which only is
effective in Christian ministry.
Philosophizing would bring no blessing to anybody.
After all's said and done, this is your
idea, and if I philosophize, that's my idea,
and together they're no good at all.
The living Word of God is the incorruptible
seed which shall abide forever.
After a year or two of running the
Bible College in England, we bought a trek
cart for the students to go a safe
trek for six or eight weeks.
It was a little cart, about twice as
big as this desk.
It had two wheels on it, and a
pull bar at the front, and some ropes,
two ropes at the back, four ropes at
the front.
There were eight men to pull this cart.
They were dressed in shorts, and they were
to walk twenty to twenty-five miles a
day pulling this thing in which was their
sleeping equipment.
And every town and village they went through,
they had to preach the Gospel.
I didn't tell them to, just gave them
a rough idea, and they just longed to
do it.
And when they started out, I said, now
I'm going to, I must examine your equipment.
And they had to put everything out on
the floor before they put it in the
old trek cart, you see.
And I said, okay, oh, you've got two
pairs of trousers there.
You just put one of those back in.
And I went through, and I said, now,
and what have you got in your pockets?
And they turned out everything they'd got in
their pockets, and one brother had a ten
shilling note.
I said, now this is a faith trek,
you've got to start with the Lord and
nothing.
So they handed it over, you see.
And so it was, and some days they
starved, they just had nothing to eat.
But my, what a valuable experience it was
for them.
I remember when they were marching through Cornwall
on one occasion, they hadn't had anything to
eat for two days, and they were pulling
this trek cart up a hill, you know.
And they were praying to the Lord to
send them something to eat.
And lo and behold, a lorry came along,
a truck you would call it, and dropped
a great big swede.
And they cut it up into eight, and
had an eighth of the swede each.
The Lord just dropped it for them.
My, and they were thankful for that.
Then of course on other occasions the Lord
gave them a ten pound note.
A friend of mine in a certain town
which shall be nameless gave them a ten
pound note.
Just, well as a matter of fact, what
happened was this, he forgot to give them
something, you know, and they'd been preaching there
over the weekend.
And they marched on, you know, and one
brother said, oh he said, oh I've left
my mac back at the chapel in so
and so.
The town shall be nameless.
And he said, I have to go back.
So he thunder left back, you see, and
when he got back this fellow said, oh
he said, I forgot to give you a
gift to your work.
And he gave them ten pounds in an
envelope.
So that's how the Lord provided, but I
wasn't going to talk about the provision.
This is what I was going to say.
The first trek we ever had, the leader
of the trek was Peter Wheeler.
He'd never preached when he first came to
us, hadn't preached at all.
And at Moorland he learned to preach the
gospel.
He was a farmer by profession, but a
very charming and very well educated young man.
He was about 23, 24 years of age,
and he led the trek.
And my brother-in-law said to me,
he said, they'll be coming back in a
week or two.
He said, shall we drive up to Llandudno
in North Wales and see how they're getting
on.
I said, yes, we'll go up and get
there in the afternoon and then come back
tonight after the open air meeting.
And this is what we did, and we
had a cup of tea with them in
the school room.
And I said to the leader, Peter Wheeler,
who was a missionary in France now, I
said, no, you just carry on as though
we're not here, just ignore us.
Anyway, they did give us a cup of
tea and a piece of cake, and I'm
very glad they didn't take me too literally
and ignore us altogether.
And then they had their prayer meeting in
the chapel, which was their headquarters, for that
weekend.
And Peter Wheeler, he sat at the front
and gave them a little word from the
scriptures and then encouraged them all to pray.
Of course, we took part in prayer as
well.
Then they got the old treck cart out
and they walked down the middle of the
town.
We didn't walk with them, we just left
it to them.
We weren't dressed right for the occasion.
Then they walked down to the beach, you
see, to the front, to the promenade of
Llandudno.
They had permission already to stand there, and
they just stood down the steps there on
the sands.
And Peter, or rather, no, there was another
boy named Ray from Coventry, he'd never preached
before he came to us.
And he got up to preach, first of
all, and he preached for half an hour.
And he gathered a big crowd.
And then Peter preached after him.
Now, there was another one who gave his
testimony for a quarter of an hour, and
the crowd increased.
And then Peter Wheeler preached for half an
hour himself, and then he made an appeal.
There was a big crowd of people there.
And we, Jim and I, stood right back
out of the way, and we were praising
the Lord for their ministry.
And Peter Wheeler said, Now, here's a gospel
according to St John, the living Word of
God.
If any of you want to be born
again of the incorruptible seed of the Word
of God, take a piece of it today
and read it.
If you want to trust Christ, come forward.
And they kept coming down these steps for
these Gospels of John till they ran out
of them.
And then he closed the meeting in prayer.
And after a few minutes, Jim said to
me, he said, I think we ought to
go home.
We've got a long way to go, you
know.
I said, all right, well, just say goodnight
to the boys, to the students, and then
I'll come home with you.
But you know, we didn't say goodnight to
any of them.
You know why?
Every one of these young men were down
the steps or along the promenade or in
the pavilion there, sitting with somebody, standing with
somebody, leading them to Christ from this John's
Gospel.
And as soon as they got in the
car and started driving home, Jim said to
me, he said, David, what would you rather
be, an evangelist or a teacher of evangelism
in a Bible school?
Well, I said, now you know what I
would rather be.
I was seeing myself by the grace of
God.
And I say to His glory, I saw
Him multiply myself.
I taught them evangelism.
I taught them homiletics.
I taught them the Word of God, and
so did the other teachers as well.
And here we were able to multiply ourselves.
Now you know why it is I do
Bible school work.
And this is very, very, very scriptural.
Some thirtyfold, some sixtyfold, and some hundredfold multiply
themselves, are thus fruitful unto God.
Listen, the things that thou hast heard of
me, says Paul in 2 Timothy 2.2,
amongst many witnesses, the same commit thou to
faithful men, who shall be able to teach
others also.
Brethren, you've got to find some young men
who are able and who are faithful, who
are spiritual and who have a certain amount
of ability to be developed in the preaching
of the living Word of God, the living
seed, the Word of the Lord from heaven.
And if you can teach them what you've
been taught, they'll be able to teach others.
Now you know what we're doing in the
Bahamas and the Bermuda.
In these countries, while we can, we are
doing what we can to give to these
young men the Word of God and develop
their gift in preaching the truth so that
if anything, if a crisis occurs and the
doors are closed, they're already there, they are
the nationals, they can preach the Word to
their own people.
Thank God, somebody with a bit of foresight
in China a few years ago started giving
Bible school work in Christian organisations, top priority,
and there were thousands of young Chinese men
who learned to preach the Gospel.
And that's why the Church of God has
been flourishing during the communist occupation.
Let me give you the Scripture again.
The Word of God, the living truth of
God, the incorruptible seed of the Word of
God, which you have received, the same commit
thou to faithful young men who shall be
able to teach others also.
And above all things, may we as servants
of the living God preach the living Word
of God.
And to preach the Word of God, we
must know the Word of God, we must
know how to preach it, and we must
be filled with God's Holy Spirit.
Let us pray.
Oh, how we thank thee for thy living
truth, Heavenly Father, for the inspiration of the
Scriptures, for their preservation through the years, for
their interpretation into our own mother tongue, and
for illumination by the Spirit on the sacred
page from time to time.
Make the Book live to us and live
to others through us, for Christ's sake and
His glory.
Amen.