BUC Stony Hill - Outreach Ministry - "Discipleship" - Sept 3, 2021 - Bishop Peter Edmund

foreign ahead and minister hamilton go ahead minister hamilton you're muted bless the lord everybody amen we will be continuing our night service tonight by singing from our pentecostal hymnal amen number 12 we have an anchor hallelujah i'm inviting us to all sing in our spaces tonight and clap our hands and worship the lord in the beauty of holiness amen will your anchor hold in the storms of light when the clouds unfold their wings of strife when the strong tides lift and the cables train will your anchor drift or firm remain we have an anchor that keeps our soul said fast and sure whether fast into the rock which cannot move grounded firm bend in our save your love it will firmly hold in the straits of fear when the breakers not an angry way shall our bark or flow we have an anchor that keeps our soul steadfast and sure grounded firm and in our savior look when our eyes behold through the gathering size the we shall anchor pass by the heavenly shore with our storms all past forever more we have an anchor that keeps our souls which cannot move which into the rock which cannot move grounded firm and deep in your safe your love fasting to the road which cannot move grounded fermented your love come on let's listen to our hands and worship the lord tonight hallelujah come on let us worship the lord tonight hallelujah hallelujah we have an anchor tonight that keeps our soul steadfast and sure while the pillows roll hallelujah while the pillows around us they roll tonight hallelujah let's ensure that we're anchor rolls hallelujah let's ensure that we are steadfast tonight hallelujah hallelujah amen or scripture portion tonight amen comes to us from the synoptic gospel of mark amen chapter 16 reading from verses 15 to 20 hallelujah and i will read in your airing hallelujah saint mark chapter 15 amen chapter 16 reading verses 15 to 20 and it reads and he said unto them go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved but he that believeth not shall be done and these signs shall follow them that believe in my name shall they cast out devils they shall speak with new tongues they shall take up serpents and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover so then after the lord had spoken unto them he was received up into heaven and sat on the right hand of god verse 20 and last and they went forth and preached everywhere the work the lord working with them and confirming the word with signs following hallelujah this is a portion of god's holy work he promised to bless the readers here uh hallelujah at this time i'm just going to ask amen to breed a word of her evangelist suzette dunbar in jesus name hallelujah start in the name of jesus christ of nazareth almighty god we give your praise we give your honor we give you glory almighty god because you are worthy there is none like you jesus and there is none to be compared unto you you are the only wise god the everlasting father the prince of peace mighty god we thank you for tonight almighty god we thank you for spearing our life mighty god thank you for your grace and your mercy that has brought us true lord god almighty lord we're asking you to wash us in your blood right now god forgive us for all our sins see known and sin unknown almighty god lord god as we are here tonight mighty god to spread your word mighty god to lift you up until magnify your name mighty god lord i pray in the name of jesus that everything that is to be said and the almighty god will be done to bring glory to your name jesus sit upon the moderator right now god sit upon our bishop sit upon the preach almighty god in the name of jesus i pray tonight god that you'll reach somebody's heart mighty god because you know our mission is to reach the lost jesus lord bring deliverance to somebody tonight mighty god oh god in the name of jesus heal and deliver somebody to your word tonight almighty god through the testimonies to the sons mighty god in the name of jesus christ of nazareth lord lord our prayer blessing upon the spiritual right now lord god almighty let your holy anointing rest upon us mighty god send anointing to break and to destroy your in the name of jesus lord we give you praise tonight lord we give your honor and we give your glory hallelujah in jesus name i pray and i say amen thank you jesus amen amen amen amen oh what a friend what a precious spring so complete and so divine and if you walk this whole world over there's no water you can fight what a friend what a precious friend so complete and so divine and if you walk this whole world over there's no water you can find oh what a friend what a precious friend so complete and so divine and if you want this old world there's and if you this whole world's over there's no water you can find and if you want this old world over there's no water you can find and if you want this old world over there's no water you can find let's worship the lord tonight let's worship the lord tonight hallelujah hallelujah what a precious friend we have in jesus hallelujah there's just no other that can be compared to this man called christ jesus hallelujah let me just take the time out tonight to be the holy spirit who is truly on this line with us amen to greet our bishop and pastor bishop brown first lady brown greetings to you in the precious name of jesus amen our guest speaker tonight bishop edmund greetings and salutations to sir amen outreach president evangelist latoya simba we greet you as well as we see elder mark online tonight blessings to you sir hallelujah at this time i t great privilege in handing over the rest of our night service into the capable hands of our bishop and pastor bishop devon brown receive him with a handclap tonight hallelujah god bless you minister blessed your father hamilton i extend welcome ingredients to you also to your wife and god has been good to us and we are so happy we are delighted to be back in his presence uh will be to our respective homes and different parishes and different countries but we thank god for his goodness to us and i honor and glorify his precious name god is good because of his goodness we have to worship and to magnify his name so i greet my dear wife minister brown in jesus name god bless you in the ground and your such pastors and their wives to all our officers and their families to all our members also your families i meet you in the wonderful exalted name of our lord and the savior jesus christ praise god special greetings tonight to our outreach ministry led by the families of the symbol god bless you may be a symbol and your hard-working team members we really appreciate you your vital work in the ministry serving the kingdom god bless you jesus name praise the lord let me also extend the greetings to those who've joined us and we thank god whether you are on facebook or youtuber are you in the room where the comment is in jesus name so happy to see that person pastor john campbell and history overseas god bless you and also join us from portland tonight praise the name of jesus christ we thank god again for his goodness and his mercies to us and we honor him tonight as we continue serving god in difficult times challenging times but the mission still stands and we're told by god in our convocation even to go forward amen go forward and get on with it we should not allow the pandemic amen to slow us down or to stop us because jesus said we will i said before in the open door and no man can shut it praise the name of our god praise the lord so we are here tonight to focus in a here of ministry that is a focus praise god for bethlehem church international bola territories whether it's germanic and western days or the us and africa or canada or the uk and europe we have one common focus this year and for the next few years and that is the matter of evangelism and discipleship and we are seized on this aspect of ministry so here in the in the west indies we have been focusing since convocation a lot and evangelism a lot of discipleship as prepare our members and prepare the kingdom of god amen to really praise that go forward utilize the giftings that god have given to the body of christ so we thank god for this meeting and we thank about what he's doing so we're happy to have back with us tonight to amen a friend of brother uh bishop bj edmund was last week and wow wow wow all i can say wow wow wow praise the lord is back with us tonight and of you thank god for him praise the lord bishop edmund is not stranger to us praise the lord as i said last week his father uh was the first he was assigned by bishop one to be the first pastor from bethel south kentucky when the church was opened back in the sixties so he meant he's not assuming to jamaica work in america and we thank god for him tonight bishop edmond even is a porter he's a publisher yes and he has done a number of books and he may want to say more about that later on but i know he either auto book work work with him managing your call to ministry also principles of effective leadership be positive praise god amen is also the founding president and senior pastor of timber church's international where he's got two locations over here in the u.s and he also currently serves and general secretary i mean for international bishops international churches and we thank god for him praise god you may also need to know that his grandparents his grandparents were the founders or women of the china churches in jamaica and worldwide worldwide and amen is from a very good absolute background when they watch the family his grandparents praise god and they have done tremendous work in jamaica and internationally even by starting a child representative one of the largest in germany and we thank god for this man of god so today i'm very happy to have you with us tonight and we want to release him praise god to share with us and god will share with him as we focus on the discipleship it's my delight to welcome bishop p.j edmund in the morning god bless you bishop heaven god bless you welcome sir good to see you again thank you presiding bishop devin c brown senior and to greet you in the victorious name of the lord jesus again we are here and we're delighted to be in fellowship together thank god for the technology and the wisdom the knowledge that allows us to connect together uh we're connected by spirit and it's just a wonderful thing to see everyone tonight i greet everyone in their respective places uh thanking god for uh the ministry team bishop brown those that you've assembled that i think play an important part in the mandate and the mission of the church and the the types of discussions that we've been having are vital even in this end time ministry and jesus gave us one charge and uh it is to this purpose while we're here tonight so thank you for the opportunity to come and share again i don't think i'll ever be able to say that i've been to jamaica twice in two weeks but thank god that we're able to do that tonight i'm excited to to be able to share with you uh uh concerning um the the the emphasis for tonight uh which is indeed discipleship uh we uh again i'm i'm blessed by the the connection of the two disciplines because you really cannot have true evangelism if there's not true discipleship there is a process and a formula that god has given us and that sometimes i think we have to abide by uh the uh the principles and the and the um and the formulas of god baptism in jesus name is a formula being filled with the holy ghost is a formula and if we follow the formula if we don't deviate don't change don't transform if we just follow the formula then we will begin to see the results uh in the earth this is not a church move tonight we're talking about a kingdom move and one of the things that i think we must begin to embrace uh is that we've made the church the beginning and the end of everything and yet jesus christ is very clear in teaching that the church is the beginning in fact the church is a portal is a door to the kingdom the kingdom is much greater and even though we live on the earth we are blessed to be able to live by kingdom principles and so tonight we're going to talk about kingdom principles the things that god wants us to be able to utilize in the earth uh we we don't use the the power of the earth the weapons of our for of our warfare are not carnal and not fleshly but they are mighty through god to the pulling down of strongholds tonight i want to just talk with you briefly tonight uh that i would say the cousin the twin of evangelism is discipleship and if you have strong evangelism without strong discipleship then you miss out on the opportunity to complete the case the discipleship closes the case of evangelism discipleship closes the case of evangelism and by that i mean that evangelism god uses evangelism to bring individuals into fellowship and then through discipleship god ensures and stabilizes and teaches and matures individuals into areas of their lives and so we can't just in fact the formerly is if you preach people in you have to teach to keep them in you preach to bring them in but there must be a strong discipleship ministry because it's through discipleship that we feed and we mature and we grow in the knowledge of god that the things of god is where god confirms the case of what he has called the students where god perfects us where god matures us and in fact if we get this right through the scriptures that god saved us to teach others to bring others to himself uh there's a there's a verse in first corinthians chapter 13 that i really really love and i think i just want to share that with you as we segue into this topic tonight that paul says when i was a child three things happened i spoke as a child i understood as a child and i thought as a child spoken these are the three things that must be transformed through discipleship the three things that must be transformed through discipleship my speech my understanding and my thinking my speech my understanding and my thinking and we're going to come back to that perhaps to close out our thinking but paul says that when i was a child i spake as a child i understood as a child and i thought as a child but when i became a man or when that really means a more correct exposition of that when i matured in god when i became a tour paul said i put away childish things and so now in in discipleship is where we grow believers where we grow the truth in believers where we grow in faith and where we grow to become what god has called us to be 10 17 romans teaches us this so then faith cometh by hearing right and hearing by the word of god it is a formula and i really could uh really could kind of encapsulate everything tonight just think about learn the formula and repeat the formula learn the formula and repeat the form no matter how life changes no matter what comes no matter what happens in our churches no matter what happens in our world if we learn the formula that god has given to us and repeat the formula just as jesus did because we're going to look at this a little bit tonight even as jesus did then we will begin to see that everything that god has set forth in the plan remember salvation is a plan the the comforter coming is a plan creation is a plan everything that god does is a plan so if we follow the plan i think you're understanding tonight if we follow the plan then we will get the results and so evangelism is followed by discipleship so that we can increase what god is doing in our lives tonight uh the teaching is going to really be about uh discipleship that there are several things that i i was praying about today and and i'm i couldn't settle on anyone and so i just decided i'm just going to give you them all tonight that you you decide which one you want to run with you decide which one you want to accept um in fact this is just a little note to preachers if you don't know what to preach preach everything and you take what you want and it will be fine i want to talk about the teaching about modeling and mentoring modeling and mentoring which is really the uh a king definition for uh discipleship thank you president bishop brown for your direction we want to talk about how to disciple how to get disciples and then how to disciple others how to disciple remember it's a plan it's a plan if there's anything that a ministry ought to be and i know i'm apostolic from my youth up but i understand the purpose of preaching but i've seen the transformation of teaching i've seen the transformation teaching and sometimes we have to forgive the way that we were brought into ministry because we seem to highlight preaching and really don't give us much credence and respect to teaching where teaching has its role but teaching is the thing that gives us substance and gives us the ability to move on so modeling and mentoring modeling and mentoring i want we're going to spend some time in the book of matthew tonight we're going to touch in uh on matthew chapter four uh touch on matthew chapter five and then finally it's a short flight tonight we're gonna land in matthew chapter 16 and i believe by then we will have picked up uh the kind of principles that will help us uh to my role tonight is to inspire you to you know to to to to to stir things up it's not that we don't know i don't believe we have to preach to people that are saved we simply remind ourselves paul says consider what i say have the lord give you understanding in all things and so we're praying for understanding tonight uh in terms of a definition so we can all be on the same theme tonight to make sure that we're on the same train this is why when you get on a plane when you can when we can get back to flying when you get on a plane in jamaica and uh your your destination is perhaps england uh the flight attendant would say this is flight jamaica flight 95 on the route to england if jamaica 95 is not your or england is not your intended destination you have an opportunity to get off the flight so i'm saying this is where we're going tonight if that's not what you're if you didn't buy a ticket for this flight this might not be what you want to do tonight discipleship discipleship so please get your pens your pencils your pad let's learn let's learn because it's only when we learn it's only when we can grasp new concepts new ideas not new information but new revelation god does not have to rewrite anything all god wants to do with us is for us to open our minds to receive more of him the word of god is not going to change obviously all of that jesus did is not could not be contained in the bible but we have enough this is what john 20 teaches but but these are written that he might believe that jesus is the christ the son of god and that believing you might have life through his name so we have enough we have enough in front of us now let's be disciplined to meditate to search the scriptures to ask god to open our understanding so that we might be better and improve our ability to do the formula as a definition tonight and i believe that it's important that we set the theme that to become a disciple means one thing is to become a lifelong learner a lifelong learner to become a disciple means first of all we have to commit and open ourselves to ever learn and to be open to everything that we will learn because what we found out is that people are very different and the way that we interact with individuals have to be different and if we if we don't have a variety of approaches and strategies to win a fisherman will tell you there are many strategies there are different types of bait to catch different types of fish and if the church if we as evangelists that work in evangelism and outreach do not acquaint ourselves with a variety of strategies there are many souls that we're going to miss simply because we did not have the understanding for how to engage and how to reach uh it follows this and this is not scripture but i often share this in our leadership training that if your only tool is a hammer you see everything as a nail and so someone may not understand the gospel but if the only tool you have is a hammer you tend to beat things into people now i was raised in a jamaican home and really that was i think that was part of the heritage they would beat things into you they you know i i i remember being whipped so much but it my question was either beat me or talk to me but don't do both of them right yeah as you as you get as you get a whipping you're being taught whip don't do this whip next time though right so we tend to we tend to have a strategy to want to beat things into people but god's called us to be more creative and more strategic because the world is changing and people are changing uh the church has to accommodate uh the gospel does not change cannot change but the way that we approach those that god has given to us must change i remember once my wife uh went on travel she was ministering somewhere and she left the the the girls with me and as as usual whenever she was gone that's when they decided to get sick they weren't sick when she was there but as soon as she leaves they decide to get sick erica my youngest daughter um got a got a fever and um so i went to the got some you know got the tablets and the pills and and i said come on take these this will make you feel better she what i didn't know mother would know this my wife knew this what i didn't know was that erica had an aversion to taking tablets she couldn't take it she didn't she didn't like it she always felt like she was you know she was choking when she took the tablets here becomes the challenge for us as the church as it relates to evangelism and discipleship i had in my hand what i thought was the answer for her she was sick i had the medication but the problem was erica couldn't swallow it now i would like to tell you that i was a very patient father this is when i was very young i cannot i must confess that i wasn't as patient as i could be and after about 10 or 15 minutes i was almost forcing the pills down her throat because my position was this will take care of the fever i have the answer she has a problem but then i have a problem administering or serving her in a way that she needed to receive that was the problem after many minutes of fighting and vexing and all the things we do when we get frustrated i decided to call um the chemist the pharmacy and i said well sir please you have to help me because my daughter's sick what can i do he said well the the the tablets that you have they're the right ones i said but erica can't swallow he said no problem we have the same medication in liquid form in nice flavors and immediately in that moment the lord spoke to me and helped me to understand here lies the problem with the church in that we have one method to deliver the gospel but when we run into individuals that don't receive the way we want them to receive then we we have to we run into it we run into a problem well long story short ran to the chemist pharmacy got the medication erica opened her mouth she received the medication she got better i had the answer but what i didn't have was the strategy i had the answer i'm talking to the evangelist now because i call our evangelists and disciples i call them street pastors you say i have some house pastors and they do very well but i need some street pastors that know how to engage people and how to develop people and how to nurture people and they don't get offended when the person doesn't receive it the way you understand that we receive it so our gospel the gospel does not it cannot change in terms of discipleship but our methods must be flexible our strategies must change in order to affect a dying world we have to find many different ways to be able to present jesus christ so that the man who just simply gives up his life to god we do well with that but for a person that's entangled and struggling with certain things we have to learn how to disciple others when it comes to god so to become a disciple means to become a lifelong learner in other words you never stop learning how to win the lost you never stop learning how to uh to reach individuals and know who they are you're a lifelong learner of jesus christ there are two things that i believe we ought to do we shouldn't just be readers of the you know uh we should just be readers of the word we have to be students of the word there is a difference between being a reader of the word and being a quota of the word and being a student of the word all of us can perhaps quote scripture but do we stut do we spend enough time with the word to understand how to disciple and how to walk and how to get individuals to where they need to be that's what we want to talk about for the few moments that i'm here tonight all right now let me go somewhere else because um i think this is going to be relevant first corinthians chapter three and verse number six now i can't hear anything but i just feel in my spirit someone is saying amen i just feel it i know i can't hear it but i just feel i just feel it amen amen first corinthians chapter number three are you receiving tonight amen first corinthians chapter number three and verse number six now we're talking about the process of discipling and those that disciple must have a different set of gifts than those who evangelize those who disciple must have a different set of skills than those who evangelize evangelists are charismatic evangelists are inspirational evangelists don't sleep evangelists not tambourine all night evangelists but disciplers must have a different temperament because one what while evangelism is to bring people in disciples are to sit with individuals and help them work through their differences here's what paul said my little children who i have travailed with till christ be formed in you disciples disciples know how to be patient now your evangelist is not so patient you know sorry for any evangelist is on the line we know the gospel we preach the gospel i'm gonna show this to you emphatically here in first corinthians chapter three but to disciple is a different ministry than to evangelize and if we don't put the right people in the right ministry you will either prevent people from coming into the church or you would drive out people that are in the church if the right people are not in the right teams i hope you're understanding what i'm saying it's not about holy ghost you have it it's not about speaking in tongues you have it it's about temperament what are what's the level of your patience my mother said take time with people that's that's discipling that's discipling now first corinthians chapter three and verse number six and here's what paul teaches and and then we're gonna jump into this i'm i'm i'm excited um paul said i have planted you see this apollos watered but god gave the increase paul said that you're paul said the apostle paul the greatest contributor to the new testament one of the greatest orators and preachers in the new testament paul says as much as i love to preach what i want to be known as is a planter paul said i can plant a church that's evidence corinth rome thessalonica ephesus galatia he planted churches so as much as paul was known as a preacher his real passion was as a church planter i i guess what i'm trying to to set up for you tonight is you have to know where your passion and your purpose is because if you're placed in the wrong element of the ministry even though you're sincere you might not be the right person to engage those who need patience now here's paul paul said i planned but then he says but apollos watered i i think you are you're getting this tonight i think you're getting this paul said as much as i love to preach and as much as i love to write and as much as i love to plan paul in a sense and this is my this is my concordance this is my exposition this is my commentary paul said i have no patience to pass the people apollos but apollos does though apollos knows how to water apollos knows how to sit with people and hear their concerns and walk with them and talk with them and and pray with them every time they come to the altar even though they come to the altar with the same need week after week after week i'm getting off course i'm sorry you see you have to have a particular patience discipling is about patience paul said i will plant a church and i'll leave the church and put an apollos in place because while i can preach up a church my patience isn't so good when it comes to nurturing the church why do you think paul had to write so many letters you know why because he wasn't at the church the reason why he wrote to the church at corinth because he wasn't there why do you think he wrote to ephesus because he wasn't there paul would put a pastor in place who could nurture and who could grow and who could groan and who could you see disciplers are waterers evangelists they are planters but disciplers are waterers disciples of people no matter what you do they don't they just they're on an even keel nothing upset them you think something's wrong with them because you you think that they don't go through the same things you go through life hit them and they just they just stay the same level not all of us have that testimony you don't have to raise your hand not all of us have that testimony things happen to us and we're quick to react but paul says i'll plant the church but as important as my job is i will step aside and let apollos raise the church because apollos has the kind of character he has the kind of patience apollos don't have a short fuse paul had a short fusion just read some of his writing paul was very skillful he would start out very very apostolic he would start out uh he would start out so what manner of love that the f hath the father bestowed upon us that we should be that's not what paul wants to talk about you know but he starts he starts nice that we should be called the sons of god love now will we the son of start very nice and then by the time you get into the middle of the chapter he's telling off the church and saying this is what you should do right he was very skillful but he didn't do that in the ministry he did that through writing i would dare say if paul had to stay in the church it would drive him crazy because when you're preaching you just want to preach if you're an evangel if you're an evangelist you just want to release your gift but there are those of us discipleship the case i'm making tonight is that when you appropriate when we appropriate our teams make sure this is not about calling gifting and holy ghost it's about temperament about temperament people that don't bark after people you can't you can't disciple a person that that annoys you i feel like i'm getting in trouble now you you can't win up you can't grow a person if every time they come to you for help you're running them away or telling them to go to someone else so a discipler is someone who knows how to manage people and they are the conduits of god's love because remember they're not our people you know they're god's people and if they're god's people then we we ought to minister to them in the way that god if according to second corinthians 5 god did not hold our sin against us then we can't hold people's sin against them to with that god was in christ are you with me church reconciling the world unto himself that's second corinthians 5 and 19 and and did not impute their trespasses to them but have given unto them the ministry of reconciliation two things that god has given us without oil or anything is the word of reconciliation and the ministry of reconciliation but a discipler must be paid do you see how patient jesus was with the 12 so patient was he all right i'm going too far paul said i i implanted apollos water but when god sees paul in the right place i'm tr i'm trying to show you biblically how we can grow church when god sees paul in the right place and apollos in the right place then he sends increase because the right gift is in the right place at the right time being led by god to do the will of god but anyhow you tie up an evangelist as a as a discipler or type a discipler as an evangelist you may not get the increase from god because even though they have good intentions sometimes the temperament is different and we have to be sure jesus called himself the shepherd why because there's a way you handle people i'm not sure if you're looking for something else tonight but this is this is what god has given you and so you pray now you pray for the ability to do that how do we disciple people we disciple them because we need them to grow we need them to grow that would be nice if that was what god wanted we need them to grow so that they can disciple others if you wanted church growth is seldom from without church growth is always from within that if you can disciple one one can reach another each one can reach one all right let's look then matthew chapter four matthew chapter 4 and verse number verse number 18 let's just further our case tonight as a student this is what this is what we call you have to do the book work you have to do the book work right matthew chapter 4 and verse number 18. yes in verse number 18. now discipleship and jesus walking by the sea of galilee saw two brethren simon called peter and andrew his brother casting a net into the sea for they were fishers now what can we learn and gain from this remember i said there's a difference between reading the word and studying the word apparently if we take the model and the formula of jesus jesus seemed to do more work with families than individuals jesus seemed to do more work with families than individuals jesus is strategic god wants to do a work in family so one of the ways that we increase our evangelism and increase our desire is to tell god that we what we want god send families to the ministry families this is this is this is really what i call holy ghost arithmetic because you can grow a church one one but you can grow a church quicker if you begin to have a family approach what's happening in the family and when you begin to engage one person they are your entrance into the family jesus approached these brothers he approached them because could it be that the answer to um evangelism and discipleship is to begin to have a focused strategy on families now we have to pray for that things don't happen because we want them or because we desire them matthew 7 7 teaches us ask and you shall receive seek and you shall find knock on the door shall be open i know this is what you're doing already i'm just reminding you that there should be a strategy to win families and disciple families remember the first church started in homes you know it started in the family home this is where the power of the gospel was released in the power of the whole so jesus called peter andrew simon call peter and andrew his brother casting a net into the sea for they were fishers listen to 19 and he said unto them he declared he spoke a word unto them now there is this there is this part that gets us into the gospel follow me and i will make you fishers of men now i could probably spend all night on follow me and i'll make you fishes of men um but i don't i don't think that would be a good idea tonight for some reason jesus said follow me it wasn't that he was just declaring follow me but in his statement to follow and again the casey's relationship jesus identified their gifting and gave them a reason to look beyond themselves and find what they were looking for at their next level in jesus himself could it be that part of what part of why sometimes our effectiveness or our strategies don't work is because we're trying to employ a strategy that has no relationship to the people that we're trying to win the people that we're trying to deal with are you getting this follow me and i will make you fishers of men why is that key because jesus speaks to them about fishing because that's what they were the key to engaging people is to understand what people have a passion for and so this this is a little bit off the mark but but let me be sure tonight what one of the things i know we do and and i'm seeing it more expansive in the kingdom you see there's some things we do in the church that don't happen in the kingdom and that's why sometimes you have to travel throughout the kingdom to see what god is doing in the kingdom and then you can assess whether or not it's working in church here's one one of the things that i'm that we're doing now with our young adults they're not all going to be ushers they're not all going to be on the choir they're not all they they run from those things one of the approaches to to engaging people is to find out where their passion is and perhaps now of course they've got to be saved sanctified for the whole group but i'm not talking about those that are just on the outside i'm talking about those who are invested in the ministry and have desire to serve discover where their passion is and build ministry around their passion as opposed to placing individuals in areas of ministry where we have need the question should be what do they have need of what is their passion how can we get them to see that that whatever they have a passion for can be part of the ministry what jesus did here was to show peter and andrew that they could continue their passion if they followed him that their fulfillment was in him they understood fishing so jesus talked to them about bishop which is why jesus spoke so often in parables because he spoke about those things that related to people in order to get them to where they need to be find out where people hurt discover what challenges people and if you if you don't want to talk to people just think about the things that challenged you before you came to christ and you probably end up in the same place the concerns you had the the the stresses you had the struggles you had the misunderstanding you had the confusion you had if you begin to talk to people about where they are if you show them you can fish in their lives then they'll follow you but we want people to follow us and they don't know us and we have not yet explained to them how we can how they can benefit from following us because we have not determined how we can understand their lives jesus immediately understood what would how do you catch fishermen but by talking about fish and as soon as they jesus began to talk about fishing they followed him now listen to what verse number 20 and they straightway no decision because immediately they knew there was something in jesus worth following jesus had an answer that they needed and straightway they left their nets and they followed him all because jesus could identify with a passion and because he included them in his conversation sometimes it's not because people don't want to come sometimes because i believe we have not yet learned how to engage them meet them where they are we can't be so safe that we can't have difficult conversations which is why i think that and the pandemic i think has borne this out that that mental health has become such a high priority even in the ministry people are struggling in their mental health and if we're afraid to talk about it we are missing on an opportunity to have people follow us because if that's where their need is that's where the power is pray for fat engage families it's holy ghost arithmetic you can grow church quicker if you deal with families than dealing with one one one when when jesus went after families which is why crowds followed him not crowds of individuals but mother father daughter and son found a reason to engage him and this is the part of the issue now so we're learning right discipleship is is learning how do we how to disciple how how do we do that how can we understand that let's begin to understand that now for the time i have left so to disciple really means to to learn how do i help someone to learn how do i help someone to learn remember i mentioned erica erico needed medication but she couldn't swallow pills and if that's the only way that i couldn't teach then sometimes i'm going to miss an opportunity to to to help someone to learn and it's not that the information isn't good it's not that the gospel is not being preached it's not that you don't know your bible but i believe we have to spend time understanding what jesus understood and that is how to minister to a person's humanity we want to get them to divinity but before you can get them to divinity you have to you have to minister to their humanity and many times we want to go forgive me we want to go to holy ghost too quick and yet there's certain sins in people's lives that must be conquered before we can even lead them to the road where they might be filled and receive the holy ghost and become a vibrant part of the ministry how do we how do we learn how did jesus how did jesus do that he did it in several ways number one jesus walked among them jesus walked among his disciples we're not talking about leadership yet we're talking about relationship jesus dealt with his disciples in such a way that not only did he mentor them he modeled them there's a wonderful passage in matthew 14 where jesus goes out on a ship and leaves his disciples and what our night he comes walking on the water and you remember the account peter in the boat sees jesus walking and said lord if thou if it be thou bid me to come what i love about jesus christ is this that before he asked peter to walk he showed peter it was possible to walk in other words he did not just walk on the water he did not just stay in the in the boat and say peter you walk jesus walked before them this is the point i'm making we if you're going to disciple people you have to walk amongst them you have to walk with them you have to you have to hurt with them now the time for leadership is coming but discipleship and evangelist evangelism is about relationship sometimes you want to rush to leadership and there's no relationship if there's what will cause a person to follow you is because there is a relationship there will come a time that you can then move uh reposition yourself but jesus lived amongst his disciples he's he slept where they slept he ate what they ate he spent time with them and of course he heard all kinds of foolishness with his disciples arguments and and confusion and friction but jesus stayed in the middle of them to be able to mentor them and was able to model in front of them let me choose one example jesus is about to go to the cross and he does the the greatest thing that you could have ever think he he serves all the way to the end he served first of all this was a three we thought the ministry was for jesus the ministry was not for jesus the ministry was to train his disciples it was a three-year training program we often talk about jesus ministry only lasted three years it lasted three years because that's the amount of time he had to deposit in his disciples what they would have to do once he had left so it was a three-year training program jesus was about to go to the cross and serves the last supper i think this is an amazing example of being among them that jesus decided that not only was he going to serve them he was going to wash their feet he's going to serve them now i would remind you brethren and there are those of you that are far more scholarly than i am pastor adrian the lord bless you far more scholarly than i am but when he washed his disciples feet judas was at the table all right see some of us are challenged now because jesus knew what judas was going to do and yet he ministered to him there are some people that may or may not ever come to christ but it does not mean they're not entitled to receive ministry so we cannot be respectful we can't be selective about who we preach to the gospel everyone is entitled to hear the word of god jesus served his enemy which i think was one of the greatest one of the greatest acts ever done and so he he was among them you you can't influence people if you're not among them it doesn't mean you become them but you have to be among them you it you can't be afraid we're so busy trying to protect reputation that we forsake reputation we forsake relationship for reputation and yet and this is why jesus taught it i told you about the formula jesus spent so much time with people that they called him a they called him a wine bibber they called him a sinner because he spent so much time jesus said i don't have to i'm not concerned about my reputation i'm concerned about my relationship because you can only win someone through relationship this is why it's easier for a person that's in a home to evangelize that home and bring that home because of relationship so leadership has to find the balance we have to be strong enough to be among people but not become like people and so jesus exemplified this and so the first step of discipleship we're not even talking about information we're just talking about presence being accessible being touchable being relatable and uh let me tell you a little funny past the story that i do many weddings here and i have us my holy ghost know at the reception when is about to go a different way i know it is about to go a different way and so it doesn't mean i don't go you know because i can't lead people and not be among them so i'll go to the reception and when i when i feel sister edmund it's time for us to go and so we take our leave and as you walk through the door that's when your base and that's right i'm just talking about where i come from my point is though but i don't have to sit through the whole thing but your presence makes a difference because how are you going to re how are you going to win people and disciple people and there's no you don't dwell among people get to know people the heart of a pastor is to get to know the heart of a of a discipler is to get to know p the most the most powerful thing that god you could ask god to do is to is to give you people that know how to gather you have enough people that know how to scatter i'm getting in trouble tonight already you have enough people that know how to scat how to scatter but you have to have enough people that know how to gather if you know how to gather everything it's going to be all right so disciple means relationship mentorship cannot happen without discipleship and so uh and again evangelism is is more emotive but but discipling is remember i talked about and and this is a completely different class because i could teach on evangelism all day and um because because evangelism is inspirational but discipling is patience discipling is is creating relationship uh decide discipling is making sure that an environment is set where people can learn where people you can be received where you can be heard and you can be loved so it's about temperament it's not about holy ghost it's about temperament who then has patience because just like those of us who have parents that are parents and raise children sometimes it's difficult to see a child struggle in certain areas but you have to have patience because it's with patience that we're going to possess your souls so number one and i'm i'm i'm i'm finished really now number one you have to be among people and then number two you have to distinguish yourself from people even though you're among them jesus taught this in matthew chapter 5 that you are the salt of the earth and ye are the light of the world and discipling is it is the information it is knowing who jesus is it is knowing the word of god it is knowing the characters of the holy ghost it is knowing the talents of the faith it is knowing the doctrine it is all of those but those things can't happen where there's no relationship and so if there if there's a course that i would i would like to to teach all evangelists and disciples is how to create relationship how not to be offended by people how not to be offended by the people that you're trying to win because part of our role in this changing world and i found out uh even as it relates to this you know this this this vaccine issue how different people really think how different people believe even people that are saved sanctified filled with the holy all this has done is to show how divided we really are or at least to show where we're unified and where we're not but if we're going to disciple it means first of all living among people so that you can be trusted because when a person trusts you that we hear you my father taught me this lesson many years ago people will not people don't want to hear what you have to say until they can hear you and so when people can hear you they see the way that you operate they see that you're not judgmental they see that you don't criticize they see that you because there is a travailing that must happen in order for this to happen i've got two minutes to do this matthew 16. i pray that you're receiving tonight in jesus name matthew 16 discipling is hard work because before we can even get to we can go to information but how many times have you sat in the classroom and the teacher was not effective and no matter what they said you did not receive it because there was no connection to the teachers as a as a person and so here it is matthew chapter 16 and verse number three 13. when jesus came to the coast of caesarea philippi he asked the disciples saying whom do men say that i the son of man am they said some say that john the baptist some elijah others jeremiah or one of the prophets but he said unto them but whom say ye that i am and simon peter answered and said thou art the christ the son of the living god jesus answered and said unto him blessed art thou simon bar jones for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto you but my father which is in heaven the whole point of jesus choosing 12 men and spent every moment of three years with 12 men this is the plan of god and this is what the church has inherited he did choose 12 000 men 12 million men 12 billion men 12 men and poured himself into 12 men and then invested in them taught them trained them molded them mentored them and sent them into the world so everything that we're going through now in terms of ministry god is simply preparing us and molding us and and making us ready there is a greater harvest that's coming to the world there's a greater harvest that's gonna happen in the island of jamaica there the lord is setting up a greater harvest but in order for us to win individuals god's got to work on who we are because if there is no relationship by the way that's why when god saves you don't be so quick to forget where god saved you from because the very thing that god is saved you from is the area that you're going to have impact in the most so the gang man is gonna have more influence with the gang man even though god saved them because there's a there's a necessity is it this isn't this amazing and this is right close that god he calls in romans 12 he calls to renew your mind be not conformed to this world talk about discipleship be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind isn't it amazing can i pose this question to the theologians tonight isn't it amazing that god can renew your mind and not erase your memory god wants to keep our memory in place because you must remember where he brought you from so that when you see an individual that looks sometimes you can look around the church and you can say okay that would look like me i know what that one struggles with because that's what i struggled with and could it be the only reason why god delivered us from those areas is so that we might have what it takes to be able to relate and deliver other people from what they're going through david said in psalms 51 lord after everything i've gone through everything i've done bathsheba i'm sorry but here's what he said but lord if you restore unto me the joy my salvation if you renew the right spirit of within me he said then will i teach transgressors your ways god brings us out of things to give us the information to disciple others because people are not going to believe what you say until they believe you that's why your testimony is powerful don't leave your testimony out of discipleship i know we've got to go through the rules of the church and i know we've got to go through the ten commandments and i know we have to learn by heart acts 2 38 and i know we have to learn by heart the 27th psalm and psalm i know see that's discipling someone through information i'm talking about discipling someone through relationship and that person will stay when they understand who you are what god has done for you so that the method that god uses that jesus used first of all was to live among them but when it was time for important ministry he would separate himself so so leaders have to know when to lead and when not to lead and when you lead don't walk so far in front of people that they still can't relate to who you are never go so high in god that people can't relate to who you are because discipleship is going to be key how do you disciple you disciple through relationship how do you get discipled you get discipled through school jesus took them through school he took them to school every time at dinner he was teaching every time they were walking he was teaching every time that they got frustrated he was teaching how you how do you get disciple do you have to teach you have to become a lifelong learner and how do you expand the kingdom because i believe evangelism is not about the church evangelism is about enlarging the kingdom of god and then god will cause people to serve him at the local church so we don't win people to the church we win people to relationship with jesus christ and when and and because geographically you were the one that walked them to christ then the hope is that they will serve god in your local assembly but let's not win them to the church let's win them to jesus christ and as they as they as they are filled with the power of god and if you have relationship where you eat they'll eat where you worship their worship where you pray they'll pray because discipleship is about relationship i pray this has been a blessing to you tonight i i i knew this film was going to be a little bit more challenging because evangelism is more inspirational but discipleship is more patient i started let me end out as i started i pray that god will change the way that you speak i pray that god will change the way that you understand and i pray that god will change the way that you think because as the spirit of god is moving throughout the kingdom throughout the world there are souls that are coming that need to be understood they need to be touched but they need to be understood they need to be felt hebrews 5 we have not a high priest who cannot be touched with the feelings of our infirmities but was it all points tempted like as we are yet without sin we need to be touched discipleship is being touched by people so that you can touch them with the gospel of jesus christ can i pray father in jesus name tonight i thank you for the temperament and for the patience i thank you for the articulation i thank you for the inspiration to be amongst your people to be able to interact to have strategies and innovations and to treat people where they are to meet people where they live and to find a way to find a way to get find a way to lead them to god i pray in the name of the lord jesus i pray tonight that someone was inspired to to be led and to and to cleave a hold i pray that someone receives something from you i pray that you would find the right area of ministry that your temperament is better matched to so you can be more effective in the things that god has called you to be you pray these things in jesus name amen and amen the lord bless you bishop preside the bishop by turn this back to you in jesus name go ahead sister sammy last year bishop teacher was taking a thank you tonight for again come above us to share the process i've shared with you less inspired as we said through this profound teaching we're a big tonight bishop we're a big relationship big relationship vegan leadership but first relationship when we have a segment let me know ahead of system some of the right would be coming here it's time to to perhaps uh add comments not at all it's all okay you know we're here about the same thing that's all is wrong with that god bless you bishop brown bishop edmond really wonderful listening to you here this evening and we thank the lord for you imparting as you have to us uh on the matter of discipleship and i think it's very interesting that over the last couple of weeks um as we've been looking at evangelism that one of the key areas that have been brought out into our session is having relationship in order to evangelize so it's interesting that having now talking about discipleship we're hearing that relationship is one of those key elements for discipleship so uh interesting that we see some type of is that a crossover correlation i'm not so sure interesting uh so we thank you bishop edmond of course brethren if you have any questions please uh you can use the reaction icon to raise your hand if you don't want to do that you can also write it in the chat if you prefer that amen so bishop i i took down a couple of notes from what you were saying and and key key for me uh three things you must be transformed through discipleship is your speech your understanding and your thinking i think that for me is one of the major takeaways from the this discussion your speech your understanding and your thinking are key errors for transformation i know you went in and you did a little bit of a comparison between evangelism and discipleship and you mentioned that you know our disciples have to be patient disciples know how to manage people uh and and they have to be focused on strategy and so when i hear this then it comes to mind this question uh is it that not all persons are called to discipleship and and if that is so is it really a calling i i had a feeling that a profound question would come from you sister samantha for some reason i knew as soon as you began to speak um um i i here's what i truly believe i think that we all should be able to give an answer to to the gospel we should all be able to articulate whatever don't have to be a preacher uh uh 2nd corinthians 5 teaches us that god's given us a ministry of reconciliation how to reach people but i think that what we should be focused on as we as we grow in god and growing in in the demands of the world is is is effectiveness where are we effective and in order to be effective we have to have effective people effectiveness cannot happen uh when people are assigned to areas of ministry where they don't have a passion for it and that's why i mentioned earlier that we're dealing with the younger generation now that don't see themselves as ushers don't see themselves as quiet let's find out where their passion is i believe that um that with uh there are two things that indicate the holy spirit and we one we uh we spend a lot of time talking about and we should is the infilling of the holy spirit the infilling of the holy ghost with the speaking of tongues that uh as as god gives utterance i believe that there has to be a sign and a continual sign you know you know when a baby cries once you know that when they're born you know they're alive but if they don't cry again it's a problem so there must be a continual i believe uh evidence of of the holy spirit but the but the the second indicated the holy spirit that we don't spend a lot of time teaching is really galatians chapter 5 22 the fruit of the spirit what and and patience and love and joy and actually this this surprised me samantha that faith is a fruit of the spirit faith that if you have the holy ghost you should believe god without any quivering so i think uh to answer your question directly i just think sometimes in those two key if those two areas this is why i think there is that there are those that are called to those um to those ministries and i believe that god gives the personality and the character and the virtue and the values that help individuals um and we we know that because there are some people that are most effective so i think i look for it just in our church those people that already flow in that effectiveness and uh because it's difficult my father would say it's difficult to give a man ambitions you just right so it's difficult to give someone effectiveness but i think the more that we we look and see how god is working in individuals so everyone ought to be able to entreat someone to the lord but there are those that i think god gives to to to evangelize because they're effective with people they are connected to people they're they're relevant to people um they have a way to articulate the gospel uh that that's not as churchy as some you know we can get church when they when they when they're church but if they're not church it's it's almost a different language i i was at a service not so long ago and i just stopped the holy ghost dropped in the room people were speaking in tongues running and i said to myself if if a complete stranger walked in this church what in the world would they think because they don't understand the things of the spirit so i think temperament temperament i think has a lot to do with ministry this is why pastors uh jeremiah 3 15 i will give you passes after my own heart patience and understanding and long suffering and yet not everyone has those virtues so i believe when you look at these two important ministries evangelism and discipleship if we're trying to help people to transform their speech their understanding and their thinking it takes time and if if an individual does not have patience then it becomes a challenge and sometimes i think that it's not that a person's not gifted the real question is what are they really gifted in and let's appropriately place them in the area and that goes for all the five-fold ministry goes for everything in the ministry i think we need to ask the question of temperament what what is your temperament towards this ministry because we've all seen vex ushers that's that's that's all a lot more tonight does that answer your question doctor not to write thank you so much uh bishop admiralty you are troubling the room wow so private area of passion and how can we utilize that passion in ministry i think very critical even in our event in um thrust um evangelism if i can call you out and that one and the discussions that we had in the area yes all right so i i don't know if we have any other question in the chat as yet but there is one other thing i wanted um to know is discipleship just a straight thing across the board or are there various levels of this discipleship i i think yes i would say yes i think uh and i'm a proponent and i associate myself with with there are levels to everything there are levels to god there's levels to revelation there's levels to faith there are there are levels to passion there are levels to everything and that's why i think that as we uh as we assign ministry um you know where's that you know there are levels to people's walk with god yeah some people are strong in the faith some people are not at a certain level and i think that um passion is very is is very natural i think it comes with the gift the evangelists give actually the gift of charisma energio just comes naturally to a person who's been gifted with evangelism because it takes the kind of energy and inspiration and personality and gift to be effective to preach someone or to engage someone um jesus was effective i think we read this in matthew 4 that he he connected to peter and and to andrew and they followed him so how we how do we connect to people and sometimes um you know we don't give enough thought to that how many more people could we have won to the ministry had the approach been different or had the right person with the right temperament uh i've been there this is why um when you know you work in retail and you get an irate customer uh the portal cashier knows when to call the manager because you get to a point where you need someone who's more skilled to handle that individual uh and so um so passion and temperament i think i think are key um and and i think we just need to pay attention to who we are naturally um accompanied with with our spiritual gifts to make sure that we're placed appropriately in the right ministry and some people are on the forefront some people in the background it depends we have to really pay a lot of attention uh to do that jude uh israel sent judah first they're the worship leaders right so sometimes we have to identify those who need to be to to go first who who are going to be the forefront and other ministries play a supporting role but just to have that kind of arrangement i think it is going to be key did i answer your question i'm not sure all right so the question was is the discipleship the same across the board or are they levels to discipleship us think they're levels you indicate that as there are levels of spirituality discipleship so it depends on where you are on that journey with christ exactly and and the more that you receive christ the more that you grow as a individual is the more you have to share yeah and that's why when i used first corinthians 13 it's very much about um paul identifies this is where you were as a child but we we must grow and we must we must be developed and gain confidence in those areas so that that's key i think also okay wonderful as i as i heard you talking about you know how um the mixture of the the giftings the calling and the personality brings me back to a message i heard some time ago that the lord is waiting on you and your own personality in order to bring forth the word to somebody else so even in discipleship that is also a critical um handle right uh i think we have two questions missionary glenda donkly and then evangelist simba in that order missionary glenda you can unmute and go ahead praise the light sense praise the lord tonight in the mighty name of jesus i greet bishop brown and also pastor edmund um bishop edmund praise god thank you for this wonderful teaching and bishop keep reminding me the zoom room is open but i had textman said they had asked me to moderate youth service dinner but he said um don't worry we are all ahead our behind so as soon as i finish it's over and i'm so excited to be here tonight about the topic with discipleship because as a child of god we really need all this teaching to know how to go about being a disciple for jesus and bishop edmund makes some very very important key points bless the name of jesus and i i wrote down on a piece of paper and said sometimes the leader know that i'm gonna use myself and as an example my pastor know that i am not fit for this position but yet still why he give it to me because i'm his friend because i can buy him something or you know because of so many reasons and as you said if you are not in the right ministry you can mess up the plan of god and you also mentioned that paul what paul plant an apostle apollos water you said a pearl he planted the church he's an evangelist but apollos is more a disciple because as i said and that's the scripture that we read a scripture tonight in titus chapter 2 about the same thing paul had wrote to titus how to tell the younger are the older men and women how to teach us as the younger one how to adorn ourself and when i came out and i and i hear the teaching i said my god this is something that i really need to feast on and to be a disciple you have to be humble and as you said jesus said to the disciples when he called them i called you to make you fishers of men he as you said he's gonna teach them not to took natural peace but how to minister to human or to minister to people and that is something that i always hear this phrase lord of mercy we don't scale the fish before we catch it when people come into the church visitors we're ready to condemn them bishop not knowing and as you said we have to look from where god has brought us from but where we are today we never just see it all the time because i'm telling you all those who are hearing the sound of my voice if you ever had known where i was what i used to do if you ever hear my testimony you wouldn't even have said no if god has done it for her he can do the same and that's why sometimes anywhere i go and i stand up and give my testimony sometimes people look at me and say even my own regime that knows me would say why you always give the testimony you're not afraid people use the testimony and put you down i said let me tell you something where god has brought me from and where i am i already let go my heavy lord so if they want to pick up my lord they can go ahead and carry my lord and tonight this discipleship it it is so powerful and i'm so i'm so overwhelmed knowing that sometimes you know that you are being taught something but when someone else teach it this other way then you realize how much of an important this is and one more thing i'm keeping i'm gonna say and i'm gonna leave the floors jesus when he went to the well to meet the woman like well when he went and met the woman at the well jesus knew he was going to meet that woman at the world but the disciples and didn't know said jesus sent them away and bishop what did they do when they come back they start to curse i said like it's like a just a paraphrase why is jesus talking to this horror heart what is this right jesus talking to this woman who has so much man as you said they called jesus a junker than everything because of the people that he mix up with so you are teaching me tonight that no matter the state that a person is in don't condemn them because jesus the lord had saved the harlot and his whole soul and the others have died and tonight i really really interest to have an interest in the discipleship on her to be a true disciple for christ may god bless you all in jesus name amen god bless you sister uh missionary glenda for again crowning the teaching tonight i mean bishop edmond did say you must live among the people so you can be trusted and distinguishes are from people even though you are among them so jesus's time in ministry though he was among the people he was able to distinguish himself so when he met that woman of samaria praise the lord i would not go any further because we all know the scripture amen but he was able to win that woman of samaria through discipleship as well amen amen god bless you missionary dunkley for that uh bishop edward not sure if you had something you wanted to to comment on there well i i did just to say thank you for the comment and the feedback i think that we this is a healthy exchange and i think we need to talk we need to talk more about about this um and basing our thinking on the word of god and that's why i tried to draw all those parallels uh that if jesus could serve his enemy and bless his enemy and and and and even know knowing what people might do but our responsibility is still to minister to find a way uh to reach a bishop presiding bishop mentioned something and i just want to take a moment before uh i'm sure that you you transition um one of the the one of the latest books that i've written and i want to be able to share that with you tonight it's called your greatness your greatness is in your weakness and what this book teaches us is just about the fact that how god will use us even in our weakness there is greatness in each in each one of us and um paul said when i'm weak then am i strong and it's it's it's it's a very i'm very proud of of the ministry that we do here but i'm going to put that in the chat and also some information about our bible college i'll put that in the chat but i just wanted to share that with you tonight to know that much of the teaching and much of the things that i share uh are either found in some of the publications or even through the through what we teach through the uh through the bible college and i pray i pray that event evangelism and and discipleship very very distinct the very different takes different personalities but i think that uh but discipleship i think adds to retention you know if when i understand and when i know and when i'm informed and when i'm enthusiastic then i from myself then i think that most people then will stay longer they've run some correlations to two surveys and it will show that the attrition from ministries are because people uh may be confused or are unclear uh are unclear about the strategy of the church the vision the church the mid what the what the purpose is they feel the call of salvation and they feel god but discipleship then must come in and be able to teach and secure people into the truth of who they are and for them to know who they are in god as a way to disciple others so thank you again for the opportunity amen god bless i think we have one final question this evening i think we are a whole ah one hour behind at this point for the folks who are joining us from the usa and canada so we have one final question uh from evangelist thimble uh who's also gonna close out so evangelistic if you could move from the quest and then into the close then i think that could do very well for us this evening so we allow um the time for those persons who are one or ahead of us sure thank you so much sister sammy for doing such a fantastic job um she argues with me all the time whether or not you know um she's she's she's the right person for certain ministry and i mean that's the the reason why she could have had that banter earlier because i want to convince her that she's definitely right where the lord wants her wouldn't you agree with me um bishop edmond and pastor brown yes yes bless you bless you i i have been really really blessed um bishop edmond um last week when you spoke i was really moved um you you you you spoke with such clarity about the woman at the well and you know it the the thought of conversation driving conversion has remained with me and i have been thinking over it over it over it and so my questions are more geared towards a portion of what you addressed last week and maybe one or two things that you said tonight so bear with me i have a three-part question the first one being what approach because you know we spoke you spoke a lot about you know um the right persons being in the right ministry to really affect god's kingdom what approach would you say you would suggest to leaders that they should take to ensure that more of the functions the ministries that persons are assigned to are indeed aligned to the purpose of god and to also have individuals understand the the the the necessity of their purpose in the ministries that they've been assigned to and i asked because you still have a lot of persons in the churches today struggling as to whether or not they've been placed in the right areas and how do they affect the call and purpose of god on their lives that's the first one i think the short answer thank you um um dr simba the the i think in all ministries whatever they are i think the most important virtue that we show people is is the thing that will draw people and that's the love of god and many times um we get caught up in what ministry should be or or how you know how we ought to perform or how we ought to be effective i think love draws i think the love of god is one of the greatest tools that we can have um and so that that's that's really the short answer to that i think that uh that we we need to pray uh james 1 5 teaches us that if a man lacked wisdom let him pray and i think we oftentimes don't pray enough about our ministries and and for god to show us what it is that we can improve on or where we need to be or sometimes and and this is a whole different subject sometimes the the the assignment shifts it can shift and and um i i know for for me as a young pastor um just to to have people in certain positions i knew they weren't we were young church i knew they weren't the right people but they were able to people are able to serve out of their talent i want people to serve out of their gift and that's that's the that's the peace but i think the love of god is the love of god is what brings everything together so the approach that you're talking about i feel is really the heart of god if we can teach people just to love and that means no judgment uh that means no no criticism um and meeting people where they are because what the it started in love 3 16 for god so loved the world and that's what moved him and love should move our ministries and love should move our church and that's the key i think once people feel and sense that they are received whatever state they're in and the love of god is is present uh it leads to all of the other gifts that are in the ministry that people can can be um exposed to so i hope that answers i i i think you did so minister uh bishop if if i get you right as long as you're at a place where the heart of god is pushing you and you have a love and passion for ministry you're basically saying whatever is assigned the love of god will propel you to function and god and we have to be open for god to to use us and for many years i've served in positions that i didn't feel that i was i was you know adequately suited for but because i love to serve yeah and because you know because i had excellence in my heart i served it to the best of my ability until greater assignment came or until um i i felt that until i felt that i'd served sufficiently or until i identified where i really belonged but i think every every person should find an area to serve and where we serve sometimes may not be where we think we ought to serve nothing but i think we ought to serve in excellence and serve with the passion of god and wait for god to bring elevation and direction but to serve fantastic i i absolutely love that add-on that's a fantastic add-on thank you for that uh the second piece would be uh you spoke a lot about conversation that drives conversion and as the evangelist um as the the head of outreach when we go into the communities we minister to a wide demographic of people socio-demographic middle class upper class lower class um i i i would i would for you to just explain to us tonight um and i asked because a few of my pers a few persons on the team they've also been asking when you go and you do outreach ministry what does the right conversation look like how do you open these conversations across the different demographic groups how do you move when you leave that conversation knowing that you created the conversion that will lead people to christ so you know what does the conversation look like how do you ensure that you're improving to ensure it becomes more and more effective and to really bring um home persons to christ excellent question um here's my terrible answer um i think that we ought not to remove the power of god and the power of preparation um and prayer in terms of what we do when jesus sent out the disciples they had the same concerns what did we say what jesus said if in that same hour if there's if there's relationship with god uh then i believe god's not going to leave you hanging but uh two things i'll say one is if you if you follow the example of matthew 4 jesus was very skilled at connecting to people which means that he knew a lot about a lot of things right i think church i think church becomes less attractive when we when those that we're trying to reach feel as though all we can identify with this church yeah and i'll say i said that to say that one of the things that i teach in evangelism is this um i have a team that um i don't i don't want them quoting scripture because they they don't know enough bible i don't want them preaching because they're not preachers i don't want them getting into into exegetical expositional discussions about the word i don't want them doing that that's not where they're skilled to do what i've taught them to do is to in 60 seconds be able to say 10 years ago this is what my life was but this is who i am right now i mean just testify find a way to do one of the things i teach our team is what i call the the open door an open door vandalism open door evangelism basically is what jesus exhibited in matthew chapter 4 had a conversation with these men but found he found a connection so sometimes you know is what the is what the saints used to do i used to love talking to the to my mother because the word of god was never absent from their conversation and i start to use it now one of my one of the things i do to relax is that i play golf we have a in fact we have a men's fellowship we have a golf fellowship so the deacons we got we're pretty good and um you know so they asked me at the end of the game how did you do i said well you know this is what the old saints they incorporate bible and everything i say well i finished the course i kept the thing you know in something simple they find a way to introduce don't ask me what my score was but i finished the course whenever i would talk to the mother church well how you doing well you know i'm not doing too bad you know but god is my helper right they would insert they'd find a way to do open door uh i passion in probably one of the most affluent counties in maryland uh there are there are pockets of poverty here but for the most part it's a very affluent community and so your conversation has to be different i have to be able to relate on educational levels on political levels to have a conversation i can't be so i can't be so heavy in scripture that i can't talk about uh you know the forecast or i can't talk about how your children doing in school and what i tend to do is to just have an open conversation and wait for the spirit to reveal an open door and if you talk with people long enough uh i was speaking to a guy the day just talking and said you know but i've been i've been having such a hard time sleeping would you like okay open door you you listen for the things that god is opening for you to insert connection uh but the reverse of that is you go out saying jesus saves jesus that's that's not that's going to drive people away have a comment jesus related he was so cool this is what jesus did the kingdom of heaven is like let me talk about what you know so i can introduce you to what you don't know which is to come into a relationship with jesus christ so in terms of um you know the demographics and in terms of just um you know the kinds of conversations you have i think that you need different different levels to on your team there's some people that can uh there's i know youth ministers that can immediately connect to younger people yeah that's that's who needs to minister this that's who you want on your team but uh if there's someone that you know because you're always going to have some einsteins that you meet and they want to debate bible one then you have someone who you know come you need to talk to him because you can you can hang with him but my my purpose is is to make a relationship with jesus christ regular and normal sometimes i think we get so super spiritual that people often misunderstand that we're just we're regular people we just but we walk by faith though we walk by faith and i think that's so key um that you that you assess your environment every preacher every teacher knows that you have to know your audience and you have to know the people that you're dealing with and be able to discern very quickly how to be effective compliment people talk about everything but and wait for the open door well said bishop i could listen to you all night and i saw where uh pastor campbell typed in the chat to just support your point every day value people every day believe in people every day just spread that unconditional love because everybody's teachable everybody is reachable and everybody is redeemable powerful powerful i love it last last last question because i know we must go uh it's the point bishop aron the strategy to get families uh the question to that is how do you suggest we target and disciple families in in a pandemic and i.e home bible study etc i i think that in my experience the key to families are children children's ministry children's outreach things to engage the children because if the children become excited so this is why we utilize our children to connect to other children because the thinking then is if if families if children are involved it pulls parents in it pulls arms in it pulls other people in heavy children fight figure out pray to god get strategies to do things with kids and and um and see the psychologists kids can't drive so somebody has to drive them right so if you if you win children if you and and so this is this is a little bit this is a little bit more suggestive but to find creative things for kids to do to learn to engage uh whether it be recreational whether it be educational um different things that that the church can get involved in that don't look like necessarily ministry but it is ministry i think that if the key to families are children if you win children you get at least access to the home um and while you know if it's uh if it's a recreational event while the children do what they do then you have an opportunity to do this one of the strategies that that we've done when we've done outreach and we have a very have a very vibrant food ministry that i strategically place evangelists we have people that serve but i have people that um have street pastors that are in the lines that are strategically placed to talk to people while they're waiting right so the purpose is not just to serve them but it's also to connect with individuals that might need ministry in a different way um making them aware of what we offer not through the church i think the church has got to be the church we not sure how they do in jamaica but our non-profit is just about ministry the church is the church but everything else in terms of ministry comes under the heading of the nonprofit all of our programs all of our outreach all of our food drives whatever we do bible college um um there there's there's a ministry we have which i which i'll share with you is very effective it's called life-changing seminars it's called life-changing seminars and um pick those topics and issues that really impact individuals let's talk about let's say let's talk about cancer prevention let's get a professional in to talk about that it's a free seminar things that people need to learn what people need to hear um and again it's life-changing seminars if we if something comes on the news there's something to do with with high blood pressure let's get someone to talk about that invite the community it's not even a church event but it's it's hosted through ministry but what that does is everyone who leaves that event gets a flyer about the church gets implemented this is also what else we do so it's almost as if um you are you're kind of packaging your ministry by the activities at your church just does that help fantastic i think those were some awesome suggestions uh i'm sure bishop he's a man that you know is into continuous learning evolution and i'm sure that these are some of the things that he has already started and i'm sure will expand to really target our families um they will definitely i believe our sister sami say minister to the needs of a broader group so i think those are some great suggestions bishop um i i think this was just a superb session your your your timeliness your your level of just uh going through things systematically you know brought a lot more clarity and i believe the body of christ is better for it and i think we're well edified tonight i don't know i know time is far spent if there's not a burning burning question or comment bishop brown no um then we're going to bring this segment to a close bishop edmund it's a sacrifice he's six hours ahead of us so we wanted to start one just one i'm in state one i'm so sorry i'm i'm i'm mixing you up for your brother who's six hours ahead but if it was six i'd still be here for bishop brown look at that thank you we bless the lord for you sir we really bless the lord for you for taking the time out you know to be with us two consecutive weeks and i'm sure sure sure i've been seeing the messages coming that persons have been so richly blessed and we're grateful that you made the time to be with us thank you bishop brown he was quick on the finger to ensure that we got you back we called for you and sir honored the call so bless you bishop brown for always being so open we bless the lord for your leadership uh before you add obviously to closing prayer just highlight uh information written chat regardless book up to get the book launched the college amen amen so sir has highlighted let us go look for the book it's in the chat i'm sure sir will always will also send it in our whatsapp group so if anybody on this chat misses it i'm sure sir will also um distribute uh biowhatsapp so we can ensure that we we learn more from you sir god bless you god bless you um outreach department let me use this opportunity to publicly say thank you thank you you know yourselves every single one of you on the team you've been working so hard and your labor will not be in vain and you are appreciated i love you and i know bishop loves you more so thank you for all your hard work yes sammy keep giving me that smile thank you sister dunbar brother geo sister and sister arlene i'm gonna get myself in trouble minister green and his wife and all you lovely saints that are part of the ministry heaven bless you over to you i would sing a song but time is fire spent so i'm gonna hand over the rest of the service to pastor everton campbell to close us out the love of god be with you i bless you in the name of the lord thank you god bless you to our bishop and to bishop edmund and to officers tonight from the bethel church estonia and all over and i'm going to borrow from bishop tonight the diaspora greetings to everybody thank you for a i saw i keep seeing all these meetings and i said tonight i'm very tired we're working ten to six this week but i wanted to share because i bought two books from bishop edmund and i he also shared my passion and leadership and and so um i i i just get excited and i said well um somewhere between i'm gonna fall asleep but guess what i'm gonna be there because i know that you can't lead people until you love people and so sir i i'm so happy that you were able to share with us tonight and i was able to join so i'm supposed to pray nothing else so i just wanted to put my two cents in god bless you let us pray father we thank you tonight for your love for your mercy and your goodness indeed god in these times god while it's a challenging time it's also a great opportunity for us to learn and grow in these pandemic and these difficult times because god you told us when you created us that we will have the meaning over all things and so tonight though we thank you god that even in this time evangelism is alive and well discipleship oh god love the way it was put the cost to us paul he planted a policy watered but the increase come from you and so god tonight sure different mediums and different teachers and different ministries we god recognize that this is a great time for the church to grow god somebody says that the only guarantee that tomorrow is going to be better than today we have to keep on growing and learning and so but i thank you oh god for bishop and the team in stone who continue to make all of this great teaching available and those guys who come on this platform to share we thank you for them lord god tonight we ask you god as we move forward as we move forward and go forward we will continue to be steadfast and movable always abounding in your work bless us now oh god we say thanks in jesus name amen god bless you obviously and god bless you my friend uh mr pj i'm gonna miss i won't miss you next week you know i'm going to miss you and carol is not supposed to ever attend the convocation and the launch of the ministry in new york but things happen here and i couldn't leave at the moment to stay put but i'll please support the ministry god bless you very much sir god bless you god bless you to samantha and this is samantha right right it's nothing new i've been pushing you that way also god bless every one of you tonight thank you those of new york amen god bless you your second person canada bless you across the caribbean we appreciate you very much god bless you stay strong be safe and see you on sunday morning back online hopefully the center will be online and what is happening across jamaica lord bless you and keep you the lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you the light of his countenance peace shalom peace be unto you god bless you on jesus christ and those my

Channel: Bethel United Church of Jesus Christ Stony Hill

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Length: 126min 14sec (7574 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 03 2021