Bishop Marrell Cornwell - Bible Study Seminar 3

or did you stay up all night well i hope not because we want to be fresh i'm ready for some bible how about you and get some training and teaching and i see a few that are here that could not obviously make it through the week and so i want you to know that there are dvds available of the services and you're welcome to get one and get some and in fact it'd do you good to get the whole set so you could review it go over it again and again amen well praise god man has this been good are you ready to win some people to jesus i am ready to win some people to god amen let's worship once you stand let's worship god together let's invite his presence lord jesus we love you we want to give all glory and honor to you today my god we're expecting you to just minister in a special way help us lord speak into our lives what we need and give us your strength give us your grace lead us in the way we need to go almighty god we'll give you all the glory we'll give you all the praise we'll give you all the thanks you are worthy of high praise today jesus hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah i will praise the lord amen um you can be seated for just a moment you know uh we've got to we've got to get a burden for people and we've got to reach out brother nick here a while back he he sent me a letter that he wanted to send to the governor invite the governor out to service and uh i read his letter and and just uh if by the way if you're ever going to do something like that send it through me let me if you're going to represent the church don't represent the church on your own okay you don't represent this church unless you send it through me on on something like that so he did he he thought about that he sent it through me and and i just edited his letter and sent it back and i said go for it he sent the letter to the governor and uh i got a call from the governor's office or my wife did well did you know that my wife got a call from the governor's office and and they said do you know nick green cohen and she said yeah and uh they said is he uh a is he a leader in your church or in leadership in your church and she said she said well no not really he's just a a soul winner just a member of the church and uh they said well he has invited the governor and please let him know that the governor's schedule is very very busy we deeply appreciate the invitation but the governor is not going to be able to attend service well now now they're going to get a card i guarantee you they're going to say oh oh this is this is where nick goes to church amen amen you know if you don't talk to people you don't have opportunities and so we're just going to have to become people people and you're going to have to talk to people and give people an opportunity amen i don't care how much brother cornwell teaches you i don't care how much you know if you don't get out and try you're never going to do anything amen and if you're embarrassed and you're afraid of putting your foot in your mouth you need to get your foot in your mouth a whole lot more so you get over that amen brother cornwell come on just help us out today hallelujah so glad brother cornwell's with us aren't you thank you elder you have a great pastor uh and uh you have a great first lady i'm kind of glad that i don't get to come down here very often because if i came here very often and ate at their house every time i came i'd be bigger in this pulpit oh my goodness oh my goodness they have treated me i wanna i wanna thank you for the wonderful food i have a policy if anybody wants to feed me i let them also i do want to thank you for the the wonderful food uh the very gr the beautiful room that had been provided me at the sheraton hotel and they even upgraded me i'm up on the club level and i get all the budweiser i want free of charge oh how can i have an amen the lord is good the lord is good amen there is a kindred spirit between this church and our church and uh there's a kindred spirit between brother sharp and i and uh brother sharp son where's jason at where's jason this is a fine young man right here uh [Applause] him and his wife they have such a sweet spirit and of course right now she's wanting to kill him because she's about eight months pregnant and miserable but they are these are sweetest people and uh my son uh the one that i thought would never be called to preach i have an older son i have an older daughter and i have a younger son but my middle son two little over two years ago was elected a senior pastor of our church and he's a little bit older than jason maybe a couple of years but him and his wife and jason they they're so much alike it's almost scary and uh but we're we have a kindred spirit our church this past sunday adopted y'all's church for the next month and uh we have over 200 people that's going to be praying every day for this church and the program that you are putting on and uh that that being said i think that there ought to be some reciprocation and we'll take a couple hundred of y'all praying for us every day for the next month and uh i i'm very serious about uh the fact that this this the high plains of kansas and oklahoma iowa nebraska missouri uh and uh colorado i think that these cities are some of the cheap cities in america we think of denver as being a great metro area but it's no greater than oklahoma city oklahoma city is one of the most progressive cities in america and not only is a very progressive city it's a very beautiful city it is a very diverse city it is a very reachable city in america can i have it amen and uh so bearing that in mind i think that this church as well as ours should start praying that we could bring a coalition of men together from denver omaha des moines kansas city uh tulsa oklahoma city and this this circle of fire that can burn out from uh middle america to the rest of our nation and i'm a i'm a believer i'm a very strong believer that america may be in trouble but we got a god that can fix it you cannot separate religion from politics you cannot separate religion from the economy can i have what amen if my people which are called by my name shall humble themselves and pray can i have it amen and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then will i hear from heaven i will heal their land and forgive their sin and so i am praying and i am believing god for a great awakening and a great outpouring of the holy ghost in america praise god now this morning i don't know whether we'll have one two or three sessions or there'll all be just one giant session but i want to talk about soul winning as a lifestyle i want to talk about bible studies as a lifestyle can i have it amen our families we are all very busy people can i have it amen and the devil will make sure that we're so busy that we don't have time to develop a christian soul-winning lifestyle well the truth matter is there is no joy just in having money and there is no joy in just being uh filled with recreation and sports and that kind of thing the fulfillment of our soul comes from deep within and that part that god puts in us can i have it amen uh when you are involved only in sports we call that carnality when you're involved only in hunting or fishing that is called carnality it's not called recreation anymore it becomes a carnal lifestyle but when you put god first all these other things can be added to us and it will not destroy us can i have it amen now i'd like for you to uh help me for just a moment i'd like to turn the book of exodus and uh i'd like to just read just just a few verses as a token text this morning and my subject is soul winning and bible study as a lifestyle amen exodus chapter one and beginning at verse number eight there rose up a new king over egypt which knew not joseph and he said to his people behold the people of the children of israel are more and what mightier than we are isn't that a strange statement that the pharaoh would acknowledge that israel was more and mightier than egypt there's no other place in the bible that you'll find a scripture like this one that the king or the pharaoh of egypt could see what god's people could not see all right let us deal wisely with them lest they multiply and it come to pass when they fall without any war they join also into our enemies and fight against us and so get them up out of the land therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens and they built for tr pharaoh the treasure cities of python and remember this is what's happening in america the truth of the matter is that the christian community is more and mightier than the homosexuals we are more and mightier than the adulterers we are more and mightier than the muslims we are more and mightier than any other element in america and consequently we cannot see that of our own selves and so they have set over us taskmasters and they have bound us with burdens so that we cannot have the liberty in christ that we so richly deserve and have been given to us now let me let me give you just a little background before i get into my teaching uh of uh i read this passage probably 20 times and every time i would read the first chapter of the book of exodus my temperature would rise and and my spirit started getting angry and i would i would close the bible and i'd walk away and i'd come back and i'd open to that chapter again and i'd read it again and the same thing would happen there would be an anger come on me my temperature would rise and i told the lord i said lord what am i not seeing here because i mean why would the scripture just make you angry and so uh i i i of course i'll do a lot of reading anyway but i went to the book of numbers when it said they that that israel was more and mighty and three times it is reiterated in the first chapter of exodus that israel was more and mightier than we and one phrase or another it lets us know three different times that israel was greater than egypt and so i went to the book of numbers uh the first couple of chapters of the book of numbers when they left out of egypt that night and they got in the wilderness god told moses i want you to number the people and uh i want you to number those that are 20 years and older that was able to make war and so moses did that and he and it gave the number of men 20 years and older that was able to make war which means that if you had any malady in your heart or in your in your life then you was not numbered it was only the well-able-bodied from 20 years old and older and and so from 20 to 40 45 years old it gave the number of names of men in each tribe and if i'm not mistaken it comes out to be about like 715 000 men 20 years and older able to make war that's a lot that that's almost as big as the standing army of america is right now mean there's only like uh two and a half million uh men in uniform in all the services but just in the army alone that almost numbers the number of army in america and uh and and still it didn't i couldn't see what god was trying to show me and so i got on the internet and i typed in a google search for ancient egyptian armies and uh they brought up the history of all of the pharaohs in egypt and it also gave you the names and numbers of the of the soldiers that they had and and i scrolled down to ramses ii who was the pharaoh in the time of moses when they left out of egypt and and when i when i read the history of the armies of ramses ii i got so cotton picking mad i just got up and put the bible down and walked away and had to come back again and i thought how could this be when i found out that the standing army in egypt under ramses ii numbered 29 000 men 430 years israel was in bondage and they were under bondage to one of the smallest armies in antiquity and and not only that ramses had another 6 000 men in the mechanized artillery which means that he had a thousand chariots and he had six thousand men that was over the one thousand chariots that he had and i got to ask myself why does it take six thousand men to man one thousand cherries that's six men per chariot and then when i read that when moses crossed the red sea and the water's divided and here's here's there's three and a half or four million people walking across the red sea on dry ground i mean it wasn't just a narrow trail folks god rolled that sea back for hundreds of yards and and when pharaoh came to himself he took 600 chariots and came after them but i thought wait a minute they had a thousand chariots why was only 600 well i found out that the chariot stayed in such disrepair it took six men to keep up one chariot that was always falling apart in other words their their their mechanized artillery was in very poor condition because when they went down in the red sea the bible says god god rolled their wheels off took their wheels off god didn't do that they didn't have says enough to keep the chariots in good repair they fell apart and when i realized that that 35 000 men a thousand chariots kept israel in bondage for 430 years and israel numbered over 715 000 men able to make war it tells me that israel was blinded by the flesh pots of egypt can i have what amen do you know that we're blinded by our prosperity we're blinded by our automobile we're blinded by our home we're we're blinded by our our our recreational site all these things are blind us to how strong we really are now let me let me bring that down to where we live we're pentecostal we're apostolic folks we're not on the backside of the tracks anymore okay you didn't hear me i said the pentecostals the tongue talkers the shouters those that believe in the gifts of the spirit we're not on the backside of the tracks anymore of the top 100 churches in america 75 of them speak in tongues somebody shout amen and if we don't if we don't awaken and take our proper place in this thing we're going to be forgotten about we are more and mightier than they are we are well able to possess the land this is i'm sure this is on videotape and it's probably being broadcast on the internet so i'm saying this up front praise god the united pentecostal church has got to awaken our preachers have more liberty than any preacher in america our preachers are the let me tell you something the nominal world they're preaching not even worthy to pack our bibles i am the best preacher in the city of wichita y'all didn't sound too impressed with that praise god your pastor is the best preacher in oklahoma city i'm not i'm not seeing that for your applause i'm making a statement of fact the man can preach amen when people come to your congregation this month of october they're going to open their mouth and their tongue going to hang out oh my god where'd this man come from they're never going to hear anything like this the presence of god that's going to be with this man the presence of god that's going to be in your church is going to be so overwhelming that they they have never been in anything like it folks wake up god is in this place quit hanging your head and quit being ashamed of what goes on in your church everybody say it together we are more and mightier than they are that is a literal truth that we must receive if we're going to turn america around if we're going to turn our own city around and if we're going to turn our own church around praise god amen now in the book of ectless there are three things that happens in the book of exodus number one is deliverance the first 14 chapters of exodus is all about deliverance now just to make just not to preach it but just to give you some uh insight here uh the first 14 chapters talk about the fact that it took god and his strength to deliver them let me let me put it let me put it in our own vernacular it took god to make them open their eyes okay we're not we're not going to have the revival we're looking for until god in his strength opens our eyes okay i'm not quite getting this across god has got to force us to open our eyes we we are satisfied in our slavery we are prospering in our bondage if we are prospering in our bondage how much more can we prosper in our liberty if you're driving a chevrolet in your bondage you could drive a cadillac in your liberty can i have an amen we are oh my goodness i feel so much holy ghost it's very important for us to understand that that the only difference between you running 300 and you running a thousand is what you can see you don't believe in me say it again the only difference between you running 300 and run you running a thousand is what you can see can i have it amen once you break a thousand you'll never be held back again amen this property is not going to hold this church the 12 acres you've already bought is not going to hold your new church if the lord tarries long enough let me tell you god is going to open your heart he's going to open your eyes somebody said amen you say but i like old-time pentecost i hate old-time pentecost i hate swatting bugs and mosquitoes and brush arbors i like comfortable pews and air conditioning i like nice automobiles instead of a horse and a donkey can i have it amen i hate the old-time pentecostal attitude of that we're the off-sky of the world on the back side of the track we are not on the back side of the tracks anymore the only thing that i love about old time pentecost that's the same here is the power of god and we're going to let it be free praise god we're not going to keep it in four walls can i have an amen and so the first thing the first 14 chapters is all about the deliverance okay the second part of exodus is about the law the law of the lord is what is going to sustain you in dark hours it is the discipline and the lifestyle that you learn from the preaching of the law of the lord the law of the lord prevents you from going back to egypt all right i need three volunteers uh you three young men y'all come here well i'm sorry i lied let's say yeah you stand right here and you stand on the end down here you look more like god than this guy does all right this is god this is you and this is the devil did i get it right now now we are cursed because we preach the bible don't we we believe in the law of the lord i i don't make i don't make uh excuses for my preaching i preach the word i preach rules can i have an amen and i believe that some things that a child of god ought to do and should do i don't believe that you're saved by grace plus nothing minus nothing i believe that god has to put the law of the lord in your life i believe in the law i didn't say the old testament law i believe in the law of the lord amen uh there's over a thousand different rules in the new testament alone that i'm sure that god still wants us to keep right here so where does the law of the lord fit in this scenario does the law of the lord stand between you and god okay i want you to start towards god next step toward the lord said thou shall not have god make another step thou shall not have praise written thou shall not live for god is that where the law is is that the law of the lord we preach you can have as much as of god as you want praise god the law doesn't prevent you from having the holy ghost the law doesn't prevent you from having the gifts of the spirit the law doesn't prevent you from having joy and peace and righteousness the law of the lord has nothing all to do it does not stand between you and god and see the denominator world has made us feel like that the law keeps us from god but the law the law doesn't even affect the child of god if he's walking towards god but if he turns around and starts walking toward the devil thou shalt not commit adultery thou shall not love the world and so the law of the lord stand between you and hell as a buffer to keep you from backsliding y'all can be seated praise god and so the a good portion of the book of exodus is establishing the law in the people that have come out of egypt and when you come out of the world you better hope and pray that your preacher preaches enough law to keep you from turning around and going back everybody amen and then the third part of the book of exodus is in chapter 25 he gave them the order of the tabernacle make me a sanctuary that i may dwell among them and he gave them a form of worship praise god and and it is impossible to live for god unless you have a deliverance unless you have the law of the lord in your life but those two are not enough those two may make you a very dull person it makes you depressed and all that but if you can get the revelation of worship praise god worship will bring you through the wilderness can i have what amen i have trouble in my church with people that are not praisers they're constantly having to have counseling they're constantly in my office they're constantly bickering and squabbling praise god it's because they have no joy in their life and they think joy's going to come by a bigger paycheck or a nicer home or a bigger car that's not where joy comes from joy comes from the worship of his people towards god amen and and and so consequently you got to have all three and and you got to you got to learn to work and and worship is more than just praise worship is more than just shouting worship is your lifestyle can i have it amen when you take the word and you open this book and you start telling somebody about the word of god that is worship praise god and when you are teaching somebody the word there is a worship flowing out of you that'll bring a joy to you that is second to anything you've ever experienced because i have an amen and so when i when i go into a home and i start teaching a bible study now let me give you let me jump way ahead so you understand where i'm going uh when i when i start teaching a a couple a bible study i already know where that bible study is going amen and the first thing that has to happen in that bible study is that that family has to have a deliverance it doesn't matter whether it's the governor or the person on the street it doesn't matter whether they're a deacon in some church or an elder or or they go to church every sunday the one thing that we have an advantage is everybody that we teach that has not been baptized in jesus name that has not received the holy ghost we know there's a reason why they have not received it and that is there is a bondage in their life now there's more bondages besides alcohol drugs and tobacco i'm sure that if i sit down and taught each couple in this room a bible study i guarantee you within 10 to 12 weeks i would change at your life and god would reveal to you bondages that you have that you shouldn't have if that was to happen here what about the center i guarantee there's jealousies envies there's lust there's carnality there's pride stubbornness rebellion hidden down in our hearts come on i'm not preaching strange to you okay so i have a built-in advantage number one i know that this person has a bondage i do not try to guess what that bondage is now i i can tell some bondages if you're rebellious i can tell you that but that rebellion may not be the body that's holding you back and so when i start teaching this book i start where god starts in the beginning now this bible has been laid out in such a way as that we cannot improve on this bible you can't improve on this word and so why do we start with acts 2 38 or john 3 16 or whatever why don't we start where god starts is because we don't understand the process by which god wants to save you the reason that people come in and pray through and get baptized and they don't last is because they get the holy ghost without ever being delivered there's only one prerequisite for getting the holy ghost and that's repent and be baptized and you shall receive the gift of the holy ghost but you can repent of your sin without being delivered from your sin you can repent of your sin without being delivered from your bondage many of you have already repented but you kept your foul spirit many of you have repented but you keep your stubborn attitude many of you have repented but you're still rebellious many of you have repented but you're still cantankerous many of you have repented but you're still unfriendly many of you have repented okay and so when i start in the book of genesis i start the creation story and when i teach a couple i teach the word just like it's written it's just a matter of fact with me and i have no authority in that person's life i am totally dependent on the word converting them they may like me i may be interesting i may be funny i may have a good personality and that's all well and good i ought to have those things but i'm totally dependent on the word doing a work can i have it amen when i start teaching a couple i know they're lost amen if i don't win them they're still lost if i win them they have won i do not get my joy from their decision i get my joy from me doing the will of god okay y'all getting that okay let me say it again you know if you decide to go to heaven thank you good that's good that's great praise god i don't get my joy from you would decide to go to heaven i get my joy from doing what god wants me to do and i teach you the word if you make a decision to go to hell i'm not going to go cry my eyes out for three days because you decide to go to hell i'm gonna go in the closet and rejoice because i got to teach you you were going to hell let me make sure you understand what i'm saying here okay you got to get your joy from having this bible in your hands you're going to get your joy from expressing what god wants you to express he said for you to go and you to teach and you to baptize can i have it amen but the bible says the angels of heaven rejoice over one sinner that repent of it's the angel's job to rejoice over the sinner that repents not you your job is to praise god because you're walking in the will of god you're doing what god wants you to do can i have it amen when i go into a bible study i am addictive because first of all i'm going to go to your home with a smile on my face i'm not going to be burdened down with all kinds of problems and guilt praise god i'm not going to be affected by your sin i'm not going to be affected by your bondage i'm not going to be affected by your lifestyle i am affected by the holy spirit in my life can i have an amen let me give you an example i was teaching a a man and his wife a bible study and i'll tell you more about that in a few minutes and uh so one saturday night i walked out to get in my car and they followed behind me and uh i got my car and they knelt down on the driveway at my window and we were still talking they just followed me out and i got in my car and they hung on the door and said robo went down we get we kept on talking and finally bob said said brother cuomo said we don't understand it he said you are the most addictive person we have ever been around in our entire life and i had never been called a dicty before i've been called a lot of things but not addictive i said what do you mean he said he said when you leave here tonight my wife and i are going to go to bed we're going to hold hands and we're going to lay on our pillows and we're going to review everything that you have taught tonight we're going to we're going to review every little funny story you've told we're going to review the spirit that we felt and said we're not we won't sleep tonight because of the fact that you have been in our home and you are so addictive you got us keyed up so high and he said what is going on here it's because i go in their home with joy that has never been in that home before it's not me they're addicted to it's the joy of the lord that i example praise god it's the presence of god that walks with me the same thing is going to walk with you when you go in with the right attitude the holy spirit is with you it's not you going there it's god going there now if i went in in that hole with a negative attitude and a downcast they got enough sorrow in their life without you bringing more sorrow are you listening i said they got they got more problems in their life and they don't need you to bring more problems into their life they need somebody with a spirit of deliverance and i and so i cover the creation story and i cover the fall of man and why man failed and and i tell them about the only mistake god ever made is when he put man to sleep man didn't get married with his eyes open can i have an amen did he god had to put him to sleep and make him get married praise god it's like getting drunk in a bar waking up with an ugly woman amen you heard a story when god looked at man he said i can do better than that and so he made a woman i'll i'm getting in trouble here i'll tell you right now when you go through the fall of man and why they fail when you go through the story of cain and abel the k the story of cain and abel is the greatest evangelistic sermon in america that evans don't preach when i'm sitting 16 to 18 inches from their face and i talk about two boys cain and abel and i start describing cain and his attitude and his stubbornness and his rebellion towards god and his pride that when god refused his sacrifice it made him so cotton-picking man and god accepted abel's sacrifice and how his countenance puffed up i am describing those people to a t but i'm not i'm not preaching at them i'm talking about cain and when i get through i say something like this there's a little bit of cane in all of us in it and i just smile and uh and and she'll look at me and she'll say there sure is amen and i talk about abel and when i get off on knowing the flood don't get so caught up in knowing the flood that you forget that you're speaking to people and you're relating to that man and woman it's not about the flood it's not about the ark it's not about that it's about the people that's before you and you're making this bible relative to them why did god bring the flood because of violence and because of corruption are we living in a violent society are we living in a corrupt society and what did god do when he saw the corrupt and the bible says that man's heart was only on disobedience continually on evil continually ever thought of their imagination their heart was only on evil i said evil is all around us we can't go to work on our job i had a man quit working at cesta making 26 an hour because he had to work with a wicked woman that was constantly trying to rape him and and your friends are constantly trying to get you to cuss and they're offering you drugs and dope and and they their jokes are so filthy and vile and vulgar no wonder our families are so messed up is because we're not thinking right because the only thing we think about is sin and vulgarity can i have an amen and god finally said i will destroy a man whom i have created i fully understand why god destroyed that first world and when god pours out judgment and tries to destroy a world all he's doing is protecting the world from killing the christ child every time there is a judgment when god destroyed sodom and gomorrah it wasn't about sodom gomorrah but some way the sodom and gomorrah was going to destroy the birth of the christ child and god was only preventing the world from destroying that which he had prophesied was going to come to pass and then when i get to the tower of babel and nimrod building that tower to heaven and and and and i talk about the fact that we have become so idolatrous and so wicked that we're trying to find another god that we can serve that won't require anything of us and and i'm just every story from in the book of genesis is relating to a bondage that somebody has if i knew what bondage they had i'd go straight to that story that would deal with it but since i don't know i got to cover every story they are more than just stories every one of those stories is the greatest evangelistic tool in the world can you imagine sitting 18 inches from their face and you're teaching and preaching a greatest evangelist story in the bible now listen to this there's not a preacher in pentecost great enough to preach to the person 100 foot away on the back row because everything is going to distract him every crying baby every movement everything is going to distract him and and i'm just not good enough to preach conviction to a sinner that's never heard anything on a hundred foot on the back row but when you're 16 to 18 inches from their face and there's no distractions and they are receiving the full brunt of the word of god it is going to affect their spirit one way or the other can i have an amen and sooner or later the word is going to require that person to make a decision now the denominator world has it right we need to make a decision for christ can i have it amen i should have done this before but i didn't realize i had it on and i got to turn my telephone off or it's going to bother me all morning amen it's very important to understand that that word we get so much preaching we don't realize how much it affects us but a person that's never heard the word and and they're getting a full load of it folks it affects people and and and in that person there is bondages there's demons there is the world there is self there is greed there is selfishness there is pride all these bondages and all of a sudden they're faced with a decision of hanging on to them or releasing them every human being has a choice you have to decide i cannot make your choice for you and you cannot make your choice for me all the psychology and the psychiatrists in the courtrooms that try to explain why a person did what they did and and they tried to get them off because well uh they got beat up by their mother got wet by their mother when he was three and a half years old and it affected their personality so they come out with a nine millimeter and they shot 10 people and therefore we should let them go because mama spanked him when he's three and a half years old no that ain't go they don't they don't hold smoke with me you are responsible for your decisions i look i looked at our girls i looked at some girls are very intelligent and they make straight a's in high school and i said if you marry an ugly boy you ain't got nobody to blame but yourself i said if you marry an idiot that won't work and and and you have to buy food stamps or get food stamps when you've been married 10 years you don't blame nobody but yourself you're going to make a decision on who you're going to fall in love with well i can't help it who i fall in love with that's ridiculous even when i got married i wasn't going to fall in love with an ugly girl amen i had a choice of who i was going to marry praise god and and i tell senator coyle i said you had a choice you just had to make a great choice now when when in many cases when they're when you bring them and you teach the word and and they have to make a decision there is trauma involved because now the word has made them has forced them to make a decision to live for god or not live for god to release their bondages or to not release their bondages and many times this decision is very traumatic this is the reason that i only teach one couple at a time in the beginning never start with a group always start with a family unit for instance if i'm teaching a single mother i do not want her new boyfriend in the bible study because he will affect her decision if i'm teaching a single man or a divorced man i do not want his new girlfriend in that bible study because i'm trying to make him make a decision and sometimes people around you will affect the decision you make please listen i'm talking about evangelism as a lifestyle okay and i always start with one family unit husband wife okay single single mother mother father father it has to be a single family unit otherwise they could come to church and you can preach to everybody at one time but bible study is designed if personal evangelism is designed to bring a decision to a person okay and where there's a husband and wife you say well there's two people yes they're supposed to be one flesh okay in that in that decision it can be very traumatic now listen carefully if they make the right decision and and they release their bondages your bible study will take on a distinct flavor from there on if they make the wrong decision one of two things is going to happen number one they'll quit answering the door when you come they'll quit the bible study on their own or they make a decision to not live for god but they may want you to continue their bible study forever now in our church we have a number of people that teach bible study and and voice while i have to call in my main bible study teachers and i i have to go through where each one of them is and i have to stop many of their bible studies because that person has already made a decision but it was a wrong one but they enjoy the fellowship and the attention of the teacher even though they're not going to make any lifestyle changes in their own life they made a decision not to live for god now they're not going to say i'm not living for god but when they go through that trauma of having to make that decision you can usually tell what kind of decision they made okay when when i teach a person a couple a bible study and all of a sudden i realized that there's something going on here that god has making them make a decision if if they make the wrong decision they'll relax there's no more trauma but also they will not make any move to attend church they will not make any move to change lifestyle for a fact they may even become more obnoxious or more worldly than they were before and when i discerned that they made the wrong decision then i go into the finish mode i finish the bible study i teach one hour lessons 12 lessons and i'm out of there i quit the bible study i stopped the bible study i finished the bible study and i get the last lesson i said this is the end of our lessons oh they want you to continue and i said well let me see let me check my schedule and as soon as i can start another bible study with you i will but uh for now this is the last lesson because i'm not going to teach a whole year to somebody that has already made a decision to not live for god i'm going to find somebody that wants to make another decision now what is happening now is the people that made the wrong decisions 10 12 and 14 15 years ago they're coming back now asking for another bible study after their life has been wrecked and ruined and they realize that they're paying the price for the wrong decision and we are winning people now that we talked 15 years ago that made the wrong decision and they're picking up a bible today now but they're making sure they make the right decisions i cannot make the decision for that person i can present them the clear presentation of the gospel for them to make a decision but if they make the wrong decision i very quickly finish the bible study and i move on to the next person now let's suppose they make the right decision you can usually tell when they make the right decision because of a sudden they start asking questions and and they become more involved in the bible study and and they even start taking on characteristics that you have presented to them i call that moment of decision conversion they now believe what i'm preaching they're receiving what i'm preaching and they're accepting what i'm preaching at that point i say do you have anybody else that you'd like to bring into the bible study or can i bring another couple into this bible study and either they've got a couple or i've got a couple that i bring into that bible study now there are two couples in that bible study or two family units you say what are you doing instead of being one on one or one against one now it's two against one because the converted person has already made a lifestyle change he's already made a decision that what i'm teaching is right and so now it's two against one do i start the bible study over no what i do is i review every lesson in every bible study i open the chart and i flip the pages and i ask questions from each page until i get to new material and i catch the person up that started the bible study i get them caught up and we continue because there's more stories than genesis there's excellence leviticus numbers deuteronomy joshua judges and all of them do the same thing they are dress people's bondage and now there's two against one and the second couple will be easier to convert than the first couple because now they got pressure on them from the other person and when the second couple makes a decision if they make the right decision i ask again you all know if anybody else wants to be in this bible study and they say yes and so we bring in another couple now there's three against one and under normal circumstances i never have more than one couple in a bible study that's unconverted you heard me talk about uh jack last night and kathy uh and their brothers and all that kind of thing well when when they made the decision that that they were gonna change their lifestyle it was very traumatic and uh and she said can i bring somebody else in this bible study and we brought in another couple and then we got them converted they brought in the first thing you know i had eight couples in that bible study we had to move downstairs and put up chairs in a circle in their basement and i had eight couples in that bible by the way some of the greatest preachers in the united pentecostal church right now came out of that bible study and and and and when i finally got to the cross i knelt down to pray and and when i opened my eyes after i got through praying all eight couples that got out of their chair and they was kneeling down and i looked up when i got through praying they said they said would you teach us how to pray like you prayed i said are y'all wanting to repent oh yes we want to repent and so they all all eight families repented and the next sunday i baptized all eight of those families in the name of jesus and they all got the holy ghost and i think seven of the eight couples are still living for god and it appeared it appeared that they just eight couples developed out of nowhere but the truth matter is it took almost eight months to get them to where they were at and consequently that bible study lasted for quite some time but it became such a lifestyle and they kept bringing in more couples that why go out and try to find another couple when they're bringing couples to you now what i'm just trying to teach you is the formation of a group bible study that perpetuates itself let me give you another example let me give another example uh my wife told me one day she said go buy me a car and i believe that the best way to have a happy marriage is to obey them that have the rule over you i'm hand-packed i just happen to like the hand of doing the pecking and i might look strong and mean and all that my sister called a mean or a junkyard dog she keeps me in line amen she said go buy me a car and uh i said okay so i went to the the oatmeal bill dealer and we couldn't work out a deal so i went to pontiac dealer and uh and so when it comes to buying a car i become cornwell stein and uh was at the desk and was arguing over the price of the car and it got louder and louder and people got to gather around and the sales manager came out to help the salesman and and then all of a sudden the general manager came out to help the sales manager to help the salesman and there was quite a crowd gathered around the desk we were fighting back and forth and yelling and screaming and talking real loud and finally the owner came out walked up among us and he said what's going on here i looked at him i said they're trying to rob me blind and he said get this guy out of here give him what he wants and so i bought a car and uh he said what kind of work you do i said i'm a pastor he said i knew it i knew it i knew it i knew it and then he said you want to go to work so we want to hire you right now i said i i don't believe in working i'm a preacher and so i took the car home from my wife and she went to see her mother and we got back i went to see the car dealer and walked in his office and i said i want to thank you for helping me buy this car he said he said we've never had an experience like this in our life before well i thank you he said uh well i thank you for coming back i'll come back the next week and uh he said preacher come into my office we drank coffee i went back the next week and he called me pastor he said pastor come in here now when you call me pastor open your checkbook and write out your tithing that's right as long as i'm your preacher i don't collect time when i become your pastor i want you to write your tithing check and for two years i tried to get a bible study with him and little did i know that god was working because he got trapped in a snowstorm in a denver airport and went in the bookstore and bought a book called the late great planet earth by hal lindsey anybody ever read that late great planet earth sure you have it's a religious book and it scared him to death so when he got back to wichita he called me said come see me so i went to have lunch with him and his partner and they want to make their lunch while the uden asks questions then the other need is lunch the other nice question they both got to eat their lunch and ask questions and i never got to touch my plate and he finally said you still teach that bible study i said yes i do he said we want that bible study now for two years i asked him for a bible study he wouldn't take it now he's asking me for a bible study now i'm a busy pastor i teach 11 bible studies a week that means i ought to teach 11 couples a week but the bible says if you sow abundantly you reap abundantly and and i realized that there was a lot more people wanted me to teach them a bible study but i'd have no more time slots and so i started building groups out of each one of these bible studies so i started with steve and janet him him and his wife and uh one day uh was going to start bible study on tuesday night uh january the 14th 1980 he said brother cuomo he said uh i told my father-in-law or told my wife was gonna have bible study and she called her mom and dad i said really he said yeah said they want to know what kind of preacher you are i said i'll tell you what kind of preacher i am i said i'm a good one he didn't know what a pentecostal was so he called his dad in law and said he said he told me he was a good preacher he said no steve he said find out what denomination he is so he called me back and said brother corman he said what nomination are you i said i'm a pentecostal he's okay he calls the dad-in-law said uh he's some kind of pentecostal and his father-in-law and his mother-in-law screamed oh my god he said steve you got a holy roller coming to your house he knew what a holy rotor was but he didn't know what a pentecostal was so he called me back and he said uh brother corny set up my mother-in-law and father-in-law uh they're kind of religious and they want to come in this bible study with us and i thought oh my god i find a heathen sinner and i said he's bringing somebody into the bible study with him it's religious and i got to think he's this this or this and i thought oh man when i got the bible study his father-in-law his religiosity was he watched a tv preacher and sent an offering once a month to a tv preacher and he was the biggest heathen in wichita he was about five foot two one fourth apache indian he drank fire water and got meaner than a junkyard dog he was an alcoholic he he was such an alcoholic and when he would drink he'd get mean and in a hotel in dallas texas his wife said you cannot drink on this business trip well he was paying the waitress to spike his coffee and he got drunk drinking coffee and an ed two tall jones of the dallas cowboys came in that hotel and bumped his chair and he got up and took a swing and he had two tall jones now if you don't believe that's stupid ed to tell jones with 285 pounds and harold smith weighed about 140. and just before ed two charles jones killed him his friends repented for him that's who they brought in the bible study so i go to bible study the first night and and harold and chris came in to protect steve and janet from the holy roller preacher so i taught the first lesson in the beginning god created the heavenly earth and went through the flood when i got through harold stood up and said well if i'm going to have to make changes my friends are going to have to change with me you know what the first night there was a conversion sometimes it doesn't take much to convert sometimes it takes well now i did not say conversion was salvation did you understand that i said they had a mindset change and he said i want you to teach this first lesson again next week now steve and janet own the pontiac store carol and chris on the chevrolet store i got two heathen car dealers there's nothing that the only center that's greater than a car dealer is a lawyer and so they brought in their friend who owned the honda dealership when i got through they said we want you to teach this first lesson again and so the next week i came they brought the buick dealer in i got four heathen car dealers and then the next week i had to teach the same lesson the next week and they brought in the jaguar porsche audi dealer i got five car dealers now five heathens and they said we want to teach them one more time and they brought in their corporate lawyer i had sinners galore and and but the time the the bible study came to full fruition and each of these couples got converted we have 37 adults in one single bible study now i taught that bible study for 10 years 520 weeks every tuesday night you say well that's a long time to put in one couple i didn't put it in on one couple it became a lifestyle can i have an amen i found a home that was very hospitable and there's no use finding another bible study if you've got a home that is very hospitable and they'll welcome other sinners into that home i baptized 75 adults out of that single home in 10 years before you say that's not very much let me tell you something they provided over 40 percent of the income of our church out of that one bible study one night i was teaching a bible study and they said brother cohen do you have children i said yes well where are your children i said they're the babysitters and the chevrolet dealer said you hire a babysitter to teach us a bible study and i said yes i didn't think anything about it he said we can't have this he got up and went to the pantry got a three pound folger's coffee can open the lid poured all the coffee in the garbage compactor put the lid back on it took a butcher knife and jabbed a hole in the top of the lid went out in the bible they said now y'all annie up you have to understand we had 20 people in our church 20 people was paying a thousand dollars a month in tithe and that's all the money was coming into our church was a thousand dollars a month and we had we had uh uh uh over 280 dollars on one church payment 204 another church payment and something like 300 something dollars another church payment we had elected bill light bill insurance bill but there was only a thousand dollars a month tithe offering building fund mission and everything coming into the church and and i had a toyota with 170 000 miles with the paint peeling off and the quarter panels caved in and i'm teaching people i was driving jaguars porsche artists mercedes honda chevrolets and pontiacs and i just walked up right up amongst them like i owned them and so they passed that coffee can around and said here pay your babysitter and so i reverted back to my evangelistic days we got down the first street light and i said to my wife count it and i opened that can there was two thousand dollars in that bucket you know what i did i brought the bucket back gave it back to them the next week they filled it back up and they started filling that bucket up every night and i was bringing two thousand dollars a week home out of a single bible study and people was wondering why i would not go to work why work when you get it free the bible study became a lifestyle and and and the joy and the beauty of of that bible and it all started with one couple that it took me two years to get a bible study with can i have it amen now let me make some comments here number one you want to be very careful about teaching your best friends a bible study because if they make the wrong decision you will also lose a friend can i have an amen i'll give you an example i could not convert my own family as hard as i tried to get them to take a bible study for me they would not take a bible study from me and so i taught a seminar like i'm doing this one to a church about 30 miles away from my hometown and there was a young man there that had just gotten the holy ghost was in that bible study seminar he got turned on to bible studies and he decided that brother cuomo could come down 800 miles and teach them a bible study seminar that he could drive 30 miles and invite my family to teach a bible study i didn't know this was going on so at the end of the seminar on monday he drove to my mother's house knocked on her door and said my name is gary howington and said your son taught us how to teach bible study and he said i was just wondering if you and mr cornwell would like to have a bible study and my dad was a heathen god he cussed me so bad when i started preaching and got saved it was unbelievable my dad said i'll never give 15 cents to a church or a preacher as long as i live my dad hated preachers and hated churches and my dad said i'd like to have that bible study and my dad and my mother called me said i said morel said guess what i said what so we're in a bible study i said you're what i said with who said gary howington i said he don't know how to teach bible study i just taught him he just got saved and i just taught in a seminar on bible study he's well he's going to come teach us a bible study anyway and and gary howington baptized every member of my family you know you don't realize that when you reach out to somebody god is going to in turn bless you back and god's going to reach somebody in your family can i have it amen soul winning has got to become a lifestyle and so every tuesday night it it became a part of our schedule it became the highlight of our week on tuesday night to go to to all these people and you know what those people taught me how to preach i never will forget never will forget the first conversion i was teaching that bible study and it had become 37 strong and god was in that bible study because the glory cloud came down actually the glory cloud went up because 36 of the 37 smoked it was folks you wouldn't believe it every everybody smoked in bible study it was a large living the living room was almost as big as this auditorium i mean never mind it was almost as big as this auditorium and everybody smoked now you get 36 chained smokers in this auditorium and and then you put a preacher in and make them all nervous and they smoke twice as much as they're chained smoking and then more than half of them brought their own drinks to the bible study and believe me it was not coca-cola and they're sitting there with a bible in their lap cigarettes in their hand and a high ball in the other one in front of a holy preacher and they didn't even feel guilty and by halfway through the bible study they started asking ridiculous questions drunk people asked asked stupid questions and so i came to bible state on tuesday night and we had finally got to knowing the flood i don't even i thought i've been teaching for probably seven or eight weeks and i finally got to knowing the flood these were they didn't know about the bible most churches passed out so books and tambourines we had to pass out ashtrays i'd get there early and we'd put up a tv tray and an ashtray besides each sitting place it's a it's ridiculous a preacher a one god jesus name holy ghost holy preacher having to handle ashtrays and then on top of that have to handle tv trays we have to set the living room up for bible study every tuesday night and and and so i'm teaching on knowing the flood okay and and i'm 27 years old 28 years old i'm very young and i got a church running 20 people i got all these important people in the city i'm teaching bible study to i'm young and stupid and so i revert it back to my days of evangelism and i'm teaching on my knees okay because and i learned to teach on my knees is because it was the only place i could breathe i'm highly allergic to smoke and the glory cloud the blue glory cloud would fill the living room and i'd get as low as i could where there was fresh air on the floor and so i decided to teach online to flood and i remembered me preaching on though in the flood at a youth camp in california in which about 55 kids got the holy ghost that night and that's why i'm teaching on the you ain't never heard noah in the flood preached until i preach on it i got to talk about about noah saying it's going to rain 40 days and 40 nights and and he's building this ark and they're having a budweiser beer party around the ark and they're making fun of noah and uh and i said no what's rain what's a boat and noah tries to get on the stump and tries to preach to them and they reject him and and finally uh they got their ark finished the animals got on board and noah was walking up the gangplank and somebody said hey noah how many bathrooms are in the ark and i said oh my goodness i knew i was forgetting something i forgot to build a bathroom and just before god shut the door they heard noah say but i'd rather be in the stink than in the storm and for seven days they danced around the ark and drank their blood water smoked their marijuana and cussed and read their playboy magazines did i describe that crowd or what and then it started sprinkling and started raining and they crept up to the ark and they politely knocked the door and said uh noah it's raining can we come in and no one didn't say a word and finally the water got up their knees and they got to banging on the door and said noah uh it's getting wet out of here you better let us in and finally the the water guns about the armpits and they're screaming and they're clawing at that door and their fingernails come off and blood every time their heart beats it's pulsating out of every finger and the waters kept rising got on their nose they climbed up in the trees and the water kept rising they swam over the hills and the water kept rising and they swam over the mountains and finally there's one guy standing on top of mount everest with his nose barely out of the water and god puts his finger on his nose and shoves that sucker under it worked at youth camp 55 kids got the hole to go to youth camp when i got through there was cakes and pies and coffee and iced tea on the snack bar 37 people stood up it was quiet as a church house they stood up and like little toy soldiers they marched past the cake and passed the pie and pass the coffee and walk out the door nobody said a single word and steve and janet said brother you ran everybody off i said what did i do my wife was sitting there crying she said why did you pull that stupid stunt i said what did i do she said you had to get that melodramatic thing you just scared everybody to death that's what you've done you why can't you just teach a bible like everybody else it worked at youth camp but tuesday night the next tuesday night all 37 of them were back donna raises her hand brother carmel i said yes she said i want to give a testimonial i said what a testimonial i said where'd you learn a word like that she said last week you scared the hell out of me she said i went and got saved i said donna i've been teaching you all bible study for weeks and weeks why didn't you come to my church she said you scared the hell out of me so bad she said if you preach worse than what you just teach i i couldn't handle it we don't realize how much we scare people when come to the house of god i said give your testimonial she said i went got gloriously saved and baptized and seven others raised her head hopefully i will get my testimony i got saved this week too praise god i said why didn't y'all come to my church he said you scared us i come to your church and get scared again so they all gave the testimony i filled up half the churches in wichita i i wrote a letter to one of the pastors in which tom said dear sir i said i have converted half your congregation please send me some tithe when they all left that night steve said you know they didn't get saved i said steve i know that he gets saved and you know they didn't but they when don't gave the testimony of going and getting gloriously saved and baptized when i got through the guest training i picked up in the bible study where i left off and just started teaching i didn't confront them and say you didn't get saved blessed god you got to get baptized in jesus name hallelujah no they don't think about baptism in jesus name they don't really think about the holy ghost yet i'm still trying to get them converted and i told steve i said just trust me we'll get there it took almost nine months later before i got to the book of acts when i taught the book of acts donna raised her hand well the cornwall said yes ma'am she said we didn't do it right did we i said no ma'am she said we got to do it over don't we i said yes ma'am she said i'm just as scared now as i was back then that night at midnight i took every one of them 26 miles across town and baptized the elite of wichita in a horse trough they didn't quiver about getting baptized in a painted horse trough or wearing each other's wet robes to get baptized in when you convert somebody they don't care what the baptism looks like they don't care what your church looks like can i have an amen i never will forget they all got converted and one sunday morning they all showed up at church 37 of them showed up at church and i thought what in the world's going on here and about a half of them got the holy ghost that morning and harold and steve came and said said pastor you might be wondering why we do it at church i said yes sir he said we're on our way to las vegas to a convention i said yep so we'll be back next sunday morning i said what y'all going to las vegas for he said we're going to gamble i said my god you just got the holy ghost got baptized in jesus you're going to they went to vegas i didn't know that when they got on an airplane gary looked at all the crowd and said look here's what we're going to do we're going to give half our winnings to the church everybody agreed to give half their winnings to the church next sunday morning it came back the ocean had to hold the place with both hands they were 100 there were rows of 100 bills that being around rolled up in offering plates so i came the bible said on tuesday night and uh and uh uh vic vick said uh uh preacher he come and preach hey preach he said how was the loot sunday i said loot of course they noticed i had a new pair of cowboy boots on they noticed i had a 65 tile that's better than having a a goodwill town they noticed i was dressed a bit different had a smile on my face we we have yet to break that record of giving that sunday it was the biggest take i'd ever seen in my entire life there were there was something like 37 different rolls of hundred-dollar bills in a plate and they told me what they'd done that they had given half their winnings to the church and they won't know if i was doing any better i said well the tithing offered a pretty good sunday so you took the devil's money i said you better believe it i said he don't need it no more evangelism bible study if you'll make it a lifestyle and you'll work at it until you have a breakthrough can i have what amen that's just one group that i built one family at a time that that when when that group got converted we started bringing in other couples larry brown his family owns the the biggest restaurants in wichita came to that bible study after they all got converted and he got converted and his wife and they're still in our church uh fred schreff was a german chef uh cooked at one time at the saint louis club the white hall club here in oklahoma city by the way and uh and and has been in some of the biggest restaurants in america uh came in that bible study him and melanie received the baptism of the holy ghost got baptized and i just buried fred shreve just a few months ago and i contain others in our church that are still in our church that got baptized and got the holy ghost because of of the fact that we had bible study every week and it became a lifestyle to us and that was just one of 11 bible studies okay you have to understand i was the only soul winner in the church in those days in 1980 i won 106 adults to god in 1981 i 109 adults to god in 1982 i want a hundred uh i want to say 107 more people to god uh in in that three year period of time god blessed our efforts in those 11 bible studies i had a lady call me she said uh brother come on are you the pastor that teaches bible studies and i said yes ma'am she said i'd like to have one of those bible studies i said okay i've got people asking me from bible study because when your name gets out that you're a bible study teacher and that you are a kind person can i have an amen you're not going to get invited to take a a personal teaching bible if you're mean and cantankerous and ornery we don't we know what we believe i could i could have blasted donna in that group for not being baptized in jesus name but i'd rather be patient and wait till i get to the truth can i have an amen do i believe you have to be baptized in jesus name absolutely do i believe you have to have the holy ghost absolutely but i'm not going to condemn somebody to hell and back that doesn't know anything about the baptism or the holy ghost can i have it amen i have been accused of being a compromiser because of the way i teach i know what i believe i am not intimidated what others believe can i have what amen i believe in ministering to people let me give you an example in one of our bible studies i have one gift and it's called the gift of pregnancy i can pray for people and they'll get pregnant it's amazing gift i have on my phone right now a text message from a couple that came to our church from arkansas they heard i had this gift they came and got prayed for and they had been married seven years and could not have children and the doctor said they cannot have children and she just texts me they got pregnant and now they're having twins and that happens over and over again well this this lady came she said pastor she said my husband i've been married 11 years and we can't have children do you think your gift would work on somebody like me i said well we can try you have to understand they own in trust bank in wichita chuck and charlie chandler and i said i'll pray so her and her husband came up in front of the bible study i laid my hands on and prayed for them and the next week she called me she said oh pastor she said you won't believe it god's answered prayer i said you're pregnant she said no she said our lawyer has found us a baby in kansas city and we're going up tomorrow and we're going to sign the papers and bring our baby home i said that's not what we prayed for oh she said but i'm satisfied with this so the following monday they drove up to kansas city and her husband had to stop four or five times to let her throw up and they signed the papers and she had to throw up because she was pregnant at the same time she was adopting a baby now they've had four more babies you got to minister to people can i just take a moment tell you you got to love people i have taught the poorest of the poor i have taught the wealthiest of the wealthy and everybody in between and you know what everybody needs ministering to and as long as you have a ministering spirit you'll always be welcome back if you go in with an arrogant haughty know it all obnoxious attitude you're going to say bible study doesn't work this lady called me she said would you teach me a bible study i said i will she said there's a problem i said what is it she said i live 55 miles away i said no problem i drove every week to anthony kansas at noon because her husband would never have bible study at night and she'd get off work at noon come to her house five minutes later i met her at the house we taught her to five minutes to one she went back to work and she ate her lunch while we had bible study and i never will forget when she came face to face with her sins and she made a decision the right decision and about three months later i baptized her in jesus name she made so many changes her husband said you have changed what's happened and she said i took a bible study from the preacher and i've been converted he said that conversion changed you that much and she said yes he said have him come back i'd like to have the bible study and i went back and taught him a bible study and want him to god then they said we don't have a church in anthony can you start a church i said well let's just start bible study so on saturday night we started the bible study in anthony in their home again and they brought in another couple and i won them to god and then we had another bible study and they brought in another couple and i wanted them to god and the first thing you know we outgrew their living room we started using the bank hospitality room and we outgrew the bank hospitality room so we moved to the farmers co-op auditorium and now there is a autonomous church in anthony and i won 69 adults out of that single bible study saturday night became a lifestyle am i talking to anybody here the soul winning has got to become a life style it's got to become part of your life i understand that you're busy that you cannot teach 12 bible studies a week but if you'll teach a bible study and win a couple and bring another couple in and win that couple and bring another couple in the first thing you know you are entrenched in a lifestyle that is productive to god to the church and to yourself let me stop right here for just a moment does anybody have any questions that maybe i can help you with with your bible studies that you're teaching this morning yes ma'am okay she's asking a good question here um if y'all could get a microphone so that they can ask the questions on the tape she's asking do i definitely in my teaching between somebody that is a is a churchy person versus somebody that's a heathen i do not okay if if they are in a denomination or they are religious or maybe they even go to church i always start in the book of genesis for two reasons number one they have a bondage number two i want to build a relationship with them so that they will believe the truth when i teach it okay i do not confront notice carefully i am not a confrontational bible teacher i am a relationship bible teacher it is a rare exception where i will square off with a person and debate them for that to happen they got to really back me into a corner because i can win an argument and lose a soul but if i can build a consensual relationship with them it may take a little bit longer with a person that is religious versus a person that is a heathen okay do not back off of teaching bible studies to someone that is a denominational person because most of all you have to learn to build on what they know and what they have already experienced my grandfather was a denominal sunday school teacher and when the pentecostals first approached him they treated him like he was a heathen and that he did not have anything and that is not the truth the denominations have a lot and they have areas where they are much more progress than we are but they don't have the core truth of salvation because they've never been taught they've never been confronted with it so do your best to build a relationship with them and you teach the truth in bite-sized chunks and then when you get to the meteor matters of acts the book of acts then you can start bearing down a little bit greater does that answer your question okay other question yes sir okay this is a wonderful question because people are going to tell you i've been taught this this and this and and i simply answer that this way i said look i can't help what others have taught i just want to lay out a clear presentation of the bible and let's compare what the bible says to what you've been taught and then you can make a decision as to what you want to believe because and i say i am obligated only to teach the word okay like i had someone tell me that that jesus did not have any brothers and sisters and i said well is that what you've been taught he said yes i said well do you want me to teach tradition or do you want me to teach the word well i want to know what the word says so i said well turn over to the sixth chapter of the book of mark and i and i read where jesus had brothers and sisters and kin folks he said well i've been taught wrong haven't i i said according to scripture this is what the scripture teaches and i said the scripture is more authoritative than the teacher you've been listening to i try my best not to downgrade what they've taught what they've been taught nor downgrade the teacher but rather say look i'm only obligated to teach what the word says okay so i you have to be very careful that you're not offensive in your answer let me understand what i just said okay uh especially when you get in the areas of the godhead for instance when i when i'm teaching a denominal person i start teaching on the godhead in genesis chapter one for instance when adam and eve sinned and god slew the animal he ripped the skins off that animal wrapped their naked flesh with those bloody skins and the blood ran down and i turned over to john and said behold the lamb of god which taketh away the sin of the world speaking of jesus and i said in the old testament that lamb represented the one that was to come and john called him the lamb of god and then called him god in the flesh and so without even cursing the trinity i'm starting to preach on jesus as god and i also start preaching on holiness from day one like when when adam and eve sinned what did they put on fig leaves and they sewed them together didn't he but what happens to fig leaves when they dry when they dry up they split and since god does not like split skirts he clothed them with animal skins and very humorously i've started off on holiness without them knowing i'm preaching on holiness okay the key is number one learn to laugh at yourself and you won't be mad when others laugh at you learn to develop some humor in your life a lot of us could learn how to smile that would be a big improvement can i have an amen it's very important that you not downgrade what they have already learned because they are going to have learned some great truths not the truth but great truths i taught the the president of the of the kansas nebraska district of a certain denomination that you're very familiar with and i met the president of that denomination who used to pastor next door to you guys when y'all was at the other church and uh and i met him and he was on his way to kansas to preach and the reason he was going because we were outgrowing them and he was going to teach them how to outgrow the pentecostals which he never did and so the president of the kansas nebraska district came to me won't know what we were doing to grow and i told him about our bible study program he asked if him and his wife could attend one of my bible studies and when he attended then they started attending regularly and his wife told my wife she said we did not come to this bible study to enjoy we come to learn what y'all are doing he said she said this is the best thing we've ever been in in our life and she said when my husband dies i'm going to be a member of your church i defused the the long-standing battle in wichita between that denomination and the pentecostals and now that man's sons are both attending our church on wednesday night all because rather than being ugly and nasty can i have an amen i don't know why i'm emphasizing this so much learn to build a relationship with people learn to enjoy what you're doing learn to love the truth become contagious become addictive can i have an amen okay more questions any more questions yes ma'am okay if he wants to teach a bible study to that friend should he ask permission from the parents first uh i think he should let the parents know that he'd like to practice on their son and and practice teaching a bible study and uh i would i would uh i would most definitely let the parents know that the kids taking a bible study most parents want their kids to learn something about the bible they learn all about marijuana all about pre-marital sex and all about drugs why not learn a little bit about the word of god yep just like this 11 year old girl or 10 year old girl that taught the school of bible study and it was quite phenomenal but but young people can teach the word just like adults can but okay now i guarantee that jehovah witness will not ask you permission to teach your son a bible study okay but but we're not in the rebellion business we're in the teaching business okay yes sir on ebola study um how long should you teach the lesson okay that's a very good question anything beyond this is an exception i go into a home i teach 55 minutes i am usually in the home less than an hour and 15 minutes we have a time of fellowship we get into bible study i give them a chance to ask questions at the end and i leave i usually only teach 55 minutes now i review every lesson every bible study and by the time i get to the lesson 7-8 i'm reviewing all of the other six lessons i may only teach 25 or 30 minutes of new material okay people can only endure so much at one time the exceptions are the three-hour bible studies but 55 minutes most people struggle to teach one hour but if you'll keep it in bite-sized bits they'll want you to come back but they may love you at 11 o'clock at night when you're still teaching but at five o'clock in the morning they're gonna hate your guts okay 55 minutes as a general rule okay yes sir well i'm wondering like uh i have my son and stuff like that and i'll be wanting to teach a bible study i know i could do it like between classes now then but it's okay if you have to take a child with you oh listen uh i take all kinds of people with me to bible study i teach my i take my grandkids to my bible study with me especially if they got kids i take my grandkids so they can start fighting with deacon kids right off the bat uh let me give you a story okay uh i have a lot of preachers come to wichita that want to ride with me for three or four days so i i have a bible study on saturday night it was a very sticky sticky bible study i mean it was i was having to handle them with kid gloves and the preacher had been riding with me all week and preachers are so obnoxious they're know it all they are opinionated and and this guy was with the epitome and he'd take over i start teaching he'd get so excited he'd butt in and start teaching and i just sat there and let him finish teaching well we got this bible study and i said look this bible says very sticky you cannot open your mouth in this bible study you are to remain silent when i introduce you you hold out your hand and nod don't say anything okay okay now you know this preacher very well he is a household name in pentecost he's a very well-dressed very well-groomed preacher and carries himself very good so we went in to this house lots of antiques large home and i introduced him he held out his hand and nodded and didn't say a word i sit here he sat there bob and jan bob sit here jan across the table my bible study charts sitting up on the table and i'm teaching a bible study now now bob comes to bible study with a pair of cut off jeans that have been ripped up the side and a thread is hanging the first the front side to the backside on and it ripped up the other side and he has that's all he has on and he's bare-chested bare-legged and he's got a a high ball and a cigarette he got his bible laying there and jan sits across the table and i start teaching bible study and about that time my friend the preacher well-known name in pentecost very distinguished educated upright man of god he gets to jerking and bob gets looking at him jan looked at it and i look at it and i said be still and he's sitting there in his face he he's in agony i didn't know whether he had diarrhea or constipation his hair falls down in his face sweat is pouring off something he loosens his neck he doesn't say a word and about that time he relaxes he smiles he looks over he grins at us and about that time that cat grabbed my knee [Music] and when that cat grabbed my knee and put his claws on my knee i jumped and screamed bob poured his high ball out on his bible and swallowed his cigarette it was pandemonium we got outside and and the cat had ripped his pants leg ripped his leg his shoe had filled with blood his hair is hanging down he said i didn't say a word then i didn't say a [Applause] word i would love to tell you what the man's name is but he he made me i told myself i'm going to tell the story of where i go but he made me swear i'd never call his name but you know him i promise you you know him so i take a lot of people with me i take a couple with me sometime that's wanting to learn how to teach bible study men most of the time my wife goes with me or a grandchild to go with me or a couple from church are going and i always instruct them in a bible study to make sure they understand where i'm at okay but yes take your kids with you amen okay more questions yes ma'am when you're teaching a lesson and you have someone that maybe kind of want to kind of get off of what you're teaching oh that's a wonderful question what happens when people get you off the subject now everybody has a different style of teaching brother forsyth in our church has taught 31 000 bible studies he has averaged 18 bible studies a week for the last 30 years okay brother forsyth is a it's a different he's a different breed of cat altogether he's he's a three-piece suit man and he sets his bible study chart up on the easel he pulls out his pointer and he teaches and he doesn't he want you to breathe while he's teaching bible study me well brother scott osborne in our church he's taught probably 10 000 bible studies brother osborne has adhd squared he is hyper and he goes in takes a bundle of dynamite with a short fuse lights a fuse drops it in your lap and it goes off and he spends the next hour trying to put all the pieces back together again his bible studies are pandemonium he drives me absolutely berserk but he is also very effective as brother foresight is very effective okay so the style of teaching is different everybody has different i i dialogue in my bible stuff i'll ask little questions along the way i get people interacting with me and when you interact people are going to get you off the subject and i have learned how to say just hold that question for just a moment okay we'll get to that just a few moments i never do get to it but i put them off in genesis one what i'm seeing in the beginning god created earth that raised his head said what about baptism in the name of jesus because they've heard a little bit about us see or they won't know about do i believe in the trinity i said look if you'll just wait till i get there we'll teach all in due course and so i i try to i try to answer that question to the to satisfy them so i can get back on the subject okay you understand what i'm saying okay uh and like they'll ask me about something that they saw at church or maybe they have heard and if they're very insistent i'll say now next week i'll bring a lesson on that subject and i'll prepare a lesson and i'll bring it just on that subject but it gives me a chance also to think about the motive and what i'm going to be saying and every once in a while if i'm teaching someone that's phenomenal and they'll just say i don't want to talk about that i don't talk about this that i way lay them i i mean i'm like rush limbaugh i know enough about the bible one hand tied behind my back and they know with both hands so i'll debate with them debating is a last resort okay all right questions many believes that you can have a bible study as a lifestyle wouldn't it be nice to have a bible study that you could win family after family in a good hospitable home now let me make a recommendation here do not start a bible study in your home okay because when you start a bible study in your home you no longer can dictate what time you quit and what time people leave okay i i've taught something like 25 or 26 000 bible studies and i always teach in other people's houses that way i can leave at the proper time and and a lot of people come to your house and they won't stay all night okay more questions all right yes sir as a single person and you have a married couple how do you relate to the opposite sex well that's that's a good question uh we have a lot of singles in our church that teach families uh it's very important that if you're a single person you have to be very discreet uh you want to be very careful that you're not attracting the opposite sex that you're teaching a family okay and i think that that's where holiness on our part comes in uh we have to be discreet number one we never borrow money from people we're teaching you know we never make uh comments about uh sexual uh situations in a bible study okay we have to be very very discreet i have several uh singles in our church that are my best soul winners and they stay above board okay now uh we have a lot of single ladies that teach bible study uh as well as single men and as long as you keep the the the bible study scriptural and it's not a dating game or a courting game uh i never suggest that a woman teach a man alone or vice versa that is a no-no doesn't that just make common sense we're talking about the work of god and the work of god must always be above board can i have an amen okay yes sir wait a minute wait wait wait sir yes can he ask this one question okay switch the tape okay tell me when we're almost finished we're almost finished praise god hallelujah okay we're ready okay um i'm teaching uh we're teaching a bible study with about 20 or 25 people and uh none of them are married none of them are couples and they're all they're

Channel: ApostolicWitness

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Length: 119min 47sec (7187 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 21 2020