MyRon Edmonds - The Essence of the Message

come on say man how many know that the Lord is an excellent phrase yeah let's put our hands together give God praise for our music ministry you guys know how blessed you are I mean y'all get down like this every week really every week like this is not like a high day really I praise the Lord praise the Lord praise the Lord I don't know is it like a New York thing is all the churches in New York getting down like this is this a Connecticut thing is it a East Coast thing Connecticut oh I messed up right now saying does everybody get down like this no are y'all grateful for what you have I'm Lord you know funny things I travel a lot and but I like this guy he's even easy that he's even in rhythm with as I'm speaking like I'm I'm on I'm on the one right now Tuesday but uh man seriously I go a lot of places man and it is yeah don't take this for granted thanks for granite this dude right here is a beast the things that he is doing on that bass guitar are unlawful and then this young man right here so let's try it's good let's bless the Lord for now in the band but also where's where's uh where's Tasha Cobbs the evidence also conservation come on evidence past and on stand out so let's praise the Lord [Music] one more time its breath of life fellowship thankful for its music ministry right all right man y'all know y'all need to get around a little bit and see that this is this is a special special thing is this not normal this is not no this is four o'clock and y'all got this I was at a church not too long ago in the afternoon service man it was just acapella we sang father Abraham I mean I'm not against any of that but I'm just I mean that's my song but I'm just saying like it's four o'clock almost 5:00 and y'all got full band out here like wow this is amazing this is good stuff alright praise the Lord Amen yes yes yes yes yes alright we're gonna we're gonna get in this afternoon I'm not gonna preach I'm goin we gonna have a conversation is that Alright I realized that I start trouble when I go places only because people tell me seriously you know you know some of the things that I say honestly and I'm not saying this to be like facetious or anything I really do not I'm not I'm not viewing them as controversial honestly I just don't and a lot of it is because how it was raised so you know that was my my version of Adventism was a very out-of-the-box ministry minded reaching people bringing people into our home version so you know the culture shock for me was leaving home and then going to church and trying to figure out okay this is weird like wow most of our churches are dying what's what's the deal here most of our young people are leaving and so but we're seeing the opposite at home so I'm gonna I want to kind of have this conversation day with you guys you guys mind talking back to me this afternoon is that Alright could we have a conversation I mean did anything stir you up this morning that made you say we did let's explore this a little further one of them I don't know where the brother is one of the brothers came to me he he was like like made you said some things man he's like no losses sister no she said do you have a bulletproof vest on or somebody somebody somebody somebody was on whatsapp saying that like I do you China you trying to get killed hey listen if it ain't in the word I'm I'm gonna understand here like Martin Luther look show me if they show me where I where I'm in error you know I'm saying I'm gonna go in that same vein and really just what I want to do this afternoon pastor if that's all right I want to we really have one of the reasons why what I said this morning for some people may be controversial is because we have a identity crisis in the seventy of in his church there are two there are about three or four different versions of Adventism there's like the real right-wing version then there's the real liberal version then there's a bunch of ones in between and most of us grew up with a certain version of what we were told is Adventism and this is the version or the caricature of Adventism that people are leaving so my personal way of dealing with this is to assume that if Jesus said if he is lifted up that he will draw all men unto Him and the Adventist Church right now is depopulating with young adults especially and that's not even including Generation Z is it why that's next is a generation why is that my kids my kids like there's Millennials and then the generation after that these are like the teenagers now I think it's Z right yeah yeah we don't even we haven't even gotten to them that's the Fortnight generation y'all know what fortnight is okay here's a I got a whole thing on fortnight seriously there's a total we thought it was hard with Millennials there's a whole new shift that's about to take with this new generation and if we are not careful we gonna have no more churches serious so my assumption is is if we're depopulating then the problem is not them the problem is us and I can say that because I got facts I'm about to give you all facts all right so this afternoon's presentation is designed to essentially give you the essence of what it means to be Adventists what it might do is it might fly in the face of what you have been taught but the majority of this presentation is based on history and spirit of prophecy so you might you might be shocked let's pray father help us this afternoon in this conversation Jesus name I pray amen let me just run through a few things I don't know if you guys noticed but USA Today in 2013 some of you may remember this adventism was considered to be the fastest-growing denomination in North America did anybody know that that the seventh-day Adventist Church was considered to be the fastest-growing denomination in North America in 2013 it was in USA Today now notice what it said I said membership most likely would be declining like most other Christian denominations if it was not for Adventists moving to our continent from other parts of the world establishing congregations to meet their cultural all right so I'm not gonna read all that basically mine is the reason why we are considered to be the fastest-growing denomination in North America can anybody guess what that man people are moving here from other countries immigration not for long though as long as number 45 is in charge so just factor that as well so even in anonymity to be very honest with you in a place like New York Connecticut where else is what else is in this on the seaboard New Jersey Washington DC Philly you know this is kind of where all this here's where I kind of where I grew up what we're seeing in a lot of our churches is we're seeing our churches shift culturally so for our Hispanic brothers and sisters is it's either first language second language first generation second generation one speaks English one doesn't Haitian brothers and sisters saying some folks who come from the Caribbean it's more of a cultural battle and all of them are losing we're all losing we're essentially trying to we're trying to take culture and call it Christianity and this is the only problem I have with it because we're not at all concerned that the culture around us is not the culture that we're trying to hold on to and so therefore then how do we then reach the mission of the church is to make disciples we all agree with that right so how we then going to reach these people if we're trying to sort desperately to hold on to what makes us feel comfortable when we listen I'll put like this if we were losing money the way that we are losing people then somebody would call a business meeting but we really don't even get our nothing gets our attention until dollars are leaving but when I'm telling you 7 out of 10 7 out of 10 70 % of a vanishing people are leaving the church why does that not disturb us to the place where we say as congregations we need to change the reason why I'm sharing this with you today is because you guys are in a unique position to do things differently and not fall into the cultural trap of trying to hold on to your unique culture whatever it is at the expense of losing your sons and daughters I'm gonna give you example of this what's the average age here 35 right there was a church in Huntsville Alabama that that most of you probably heard of Madison mission goodbye a herd of manna submission there's oak wood Kyle Oakland University right Oakland University was like the you know it's the University Church and they started losing people stopped coming so then a pastor by the name of James dog get started Madison mission and Madison mission started growing like crazy with people who started staying at Huntsville because the city was changing and people actually had a reason to live in Huntsville other than the University and so that church began to grow like crazy to like 1,200 members well let me tell you what happened to them the very same thing can happen to you guys if you're not careful what happened to them is over time that young group who wanted to see the church differently got older got married had kids and they began to settle into their own way and they have declined and started dying and growth every generation has the tendency I don't care how you can have drum this this does not necessarily mean new school this is just a brand new hell nor something that you like my question though is is when the next generation comes and they want to DJ in the worship service instead of a praise team are you gonna fight them the same way you're being fought right now we've got what's the name of this movie just came out infinity war Avengers right let's let's just take a moment just for a second I know y'all saw it so don't even do me let's go all right I ain't gonna spoil I'm not gonna spoil you ever don't worry it's not a spoiler moment but what I can't tell you is this the way that they ended the movie from what I heard from somebody right the the way that they ended that movie they set themselves up for more movies for the next 10 years now there's a texan loop the sixteenth chapter that says that the people of the world are wiser than the people of light Luke 16 I just preached it a few weeks ago one of the things we need to understand is this as a church we act dumb sometimes many of you are professionals on your jobs you're at constant trainings continuing education your jobs on the cusp of cutting edge they're doing things differently etc but when we come to church all of a sudden we just stop using our creative thinking we need to start thinking not just now we need to start thinking two or three generations ahead churches died because they stopped think they stop they stopped thinking about other people and only start thinking about themselves now I'm just gonna say see right now I know and I'm you know I'm like y'all stop even my hands lifted this right now this doesn't reach people no more from an evangelistic standpoint is plain listen to me this is a standard now you better have this since this is minimum requirement that you have a worship service that is good to this generation but this doesn't attract any more there's a shift that's happened my generation what we want it I'm 41 we wanted we wanted a worship service where we could praise the Lord we want we didn't want a white worship service we wanted to be able to our selves so we started coming back to church when there was a shift happening and worship your kings burrows you're pointing out back in that day I think it was like Queensboro there's other churches Mount Vernon you start seeing Generation X coming back to church because they shift to the service Millennials and the next generation ain't coming because your worship service they're not coming because your pastor can preach matter of fact they're not coming you know what you know what you know the shift is now you have to go Church can no longer be seen as an event Church now has to be seen as a group of people that's the way God set it up like if you really want me to say something offensive that like like I told much like this pulpit is not holy the communion table ain't holy then white gloves the Deaconess be wearing a holy it's Catholic you don't wash now this building is not holy you know why because the Word of God says that you are the temples of the Holy Spirit we are no longer listen to me everybody it is the most Catholic concept on the planet to revere objects as having any eternal value when we all know when Jesus comes back is gonna burn but we have been so we have been so indoctrinated by Catholic ideology that we now give more reverence to things and buildings than we actually do to people the shift that we have to make now is no longer seeing Church as an event that people have like saying we had Church is not biblical but saying I am the church is biblical and Church can happen anywhere the Bible says the apostles were daily in the temple and they worshiped in one another's homes and II see what I'm saying like you we have got some of our thinking has got a shift or else the same thing to happen to previous generations gonna happen to us let me just break in the sevens Church has 20 million members worldwide how many did I say everybody and United I'm sorry 11 million has left the church in the past 20 years and the majority of the 11 million that left are not new members they're second-generation Adventists oh whoa y'all just miss that y'all just totally miss what I just that's that's critical you know one of the main things you find in church is that we needed we need to indoctrinate these new members so they won't lead the new members ain't the ones leaving not according to the data the data is saying our kids are leaving at a faster rate than the new members are like if we lost 11 million dollars they would call like a special General Conference but as long as the money keeps coming in a nobody trippin I was at the North American division a few weeks ago for a meeting you know how much ty were brought into the North American division last year 1 billion billion billion she lose 11 million it's no big deal let the money flow 1 out of 3 young people's gonna leave Saturday typically yeah all right does if I know this number is it's a statistic what does this number represent some yes 36 is the average age in North America all right 59 is the average age and it's seventh-day Adventist Church you guys are anomaly back in the day it took one member to one member to bring one person to Christ now it takes one it takes 32 members to produce one person and it costs 98 thousand dollars just to create one that's how much money we spend otherwise now this whole setup was prophesied by Ellen White now some of y'all got a problem Ellen White is no problem cuz you might you might start liking her after this what's this these are all the statements they didn't want you to read I sound like DJ Khaled they didn't what they don't want you to know about this right here alright what's this she kind of tells us basically she's prophesying saying this is what's gonna Jack the church up like way back then watch this it's gonna blow your mind she says a spirit of what has been coming in upon the people who claim to believe the truth for these last days they are self-satisfied they have said we have the truth there is no more light for the people of God but watch this he says but we are not what when we take a position that we will not accept anything else than that upon which we have settled as truth we should take the Bible and investigate it closely for ourselves we should dig in the mind of God's Word for true I'll give it to you yo we shouldn't be walking around here saying we got the truth how many I'll grow up hearing that we got the truth you know what that kind of attitude does it makes you feel like you know more than you think you know and you can't learn from anybody else Adventist don't own truth God does I posted something the other day and Sunday preacher it said it and somebody got on my page timeout why are you posting these people who are not having this belong I'm like dude we don't have any monopoly on truth if what I don't care who it is if what they are saying is true it's true truth is truth so you're gonna disagree with a Muslim if they tell you don't jump off that bridge cuz the law of gravity says it if you jump off that bridge you gonna die like nah I can't receive this from no Muslim the Atheist stand ups and says look you should be vegan a lot of our atheist nowadays are vegan right like if they say look I mean come on how we go I'm not a vegan but I'm just saying it's the truth like we probably should eat better nobody go I don't care what your religion is truth is truth but when you walk around here saying you got the truth it brings an attitude with it that you can't grow and learn from anybody else right what's this other statement she made y'all I know she's talked like this she says some have had been bringing in false tests and have made their own ideas and notions and criterion magnifying matters of little importance into tests of Christian Fellowship in other words she's like yo people are coming into the church they're making a big deal out of small stuff they're making their own rules and they're making this the standard by which somebody can be a part of the church she then goes on to says and binding heavy burdens upon others thus a spirit of what fault-finding and decision had come in which had been a great injury to the church and please don't miss this is not gonna bore you I promise and the impression was given to unbelievers the sabbath-keeping adventist were a set of fanatics in an interesting of people use ellen white for their fanaticism and her whole thing was that y'all need to stop being weird or else people don't think we weird and we're not gonna be able to win anybody to Christ she said ego CSS fanatics and extremists and that their peculiar face rendered them unkind and uncourteous and really unchristian in character I'm still quoting thus the course of how many are a few extremists presented the influence of the truth from reaching the people like I'm in this our churches in the process we just bought a Kmart building we bought it came our building it's a amazing story we bought it came out our building and we bought this came our building basically we're gonna turn it into a nine through 14 high school 14 meaning junior college as well so that people leave they'll be able to graduate with degrees in technology and whatnot so that they can work and not be encumbered with a bunch of student loan debt and Cleveland right now you can get you can get a job making fifty seven thousand dollars a year with just an associate's degree so this is a path that some people want to take we want to offer that because we're trying to improve our community right so we bought this building and you know some of my members are trippin like you know how come how come we can't get money from this outside source in that outside source and I tell you why because for the most part seventh-day Adventist Church is not doing a whole other than our hospitals our churches are not doing a whole lot in their communities to where people are like ready to throw money at us now down the street around the corner from our church The Salvation Army just built this like 15 million dollar facility so it's incredible everything is there every day it's like this it's like a it's like the health message in a building they're like they're doing what we're supposed to be doing the gym the memberships people come in and hanging out food cafe all that stuff like that's the way we need to be going seven day a week ministry right yeah I know how they pay for that you think they're Church church members raise all that money no when people heard they were doing it they were throwing money out of them because they were like yo anything y'all are doing we're down to help you because you guys make such a difference in this community nobody you know for some Whitley Phipps some of y'all may know he has this thing called the Dream Academy it's an after-school program he started because his wife all of his wife's siblings are incarcerated so they have a passion for the children of the of the incarcerated so they started an after-school program called us Dream Academy and us Dream Academy is an after-school program for kids whose parents are incarcerated so every year he has a banquet that's ministry our churches should be doing that like we just own pathfinders for our kids your Pathfinder clubs should be at least 200 deep with kids from the hood how come our Pathfinder clubs not like evangelistic I all you got is your kids in there anyway that's so let me let me tell you what happened can I blow your mind real quick y'all ready for your minds be blown so he has this he told me every year they have to have this banquet at the end of the year Washington DC to raise money to be able to fund this after-school program that they host all over the country so I'm like okay he said man we got to raise three million dollars every year okay and he's like it's not a lot of money so I was like so how do you do it well he was telling a story you know but so basically he was short in his budget Oprah who's cool with Willie Phipps hears about what he's doing and so he says one day in the mail he got a little box in the mail it was for a check of 1.2 million dollars the next day he got another little box another check 1.2 million dollars and then the third day he got another box in the mail 1.2 million dollars some of his church members were like pastor can you ask Oprah to give some money to the church and he says you have to understand rich people don't like giving money to people who spend it on themselves in a part of this process of us building this we had to start a separate 501 c3 because you have a lot of people who have built foundations who are giving away millions of them you have a lot of rich people who feel guilty that they have so much money and they're trying to get rid of it and they're looking for some bright minded visionaries like you guys in here who came who came up with an amazing innovative ministry concept but they're not giving it to a church because their impression is is that churches essentially spend funds on themselves what would they go why are you gonna give us two million dollars to build a church so we can come in there on the weekend and enjoy ourselves when they could give it to I don't know I mean who's doing something in the neighborhood right I don't know let me do you I mean I have friends of mine they're not really church-going people but they have these programs they're running in the community recidivism programs keeping brothers out of prison gang violence etc feeding the homeless I mean providing housing and income for people floyd flake they're there in queens he's in Queens man this guy has built more houses in that part of New York then then then then HUD has you think he has to ask people for money because they're not seen as weird they're seen as nothing our problem is we lead with doctrine instead of demonstration our first thought process is is how can we get them to know the truth instead of how can we blow their minds well how much we love them I'm serious I saw my parents lives if you if you meet people's needs like you can teach the most nefarious doctrine on the planet they'll believe it because people are not interested in believing a doctrine they're interested in believing in a person am i talking again watch this it's another one she says it she says the message of the gospel of his what now watch this everybody thinks the Adventist message is some scare people like one person told me like if you're not preaching Daniel revelation hearing preaching having this message 90% of you in here don't even know what the Adventist message is and I'm not to prove it if I asked right now what is the evidence message I'd get a different answer for everybody that's in here lack of clarity she brought to tell you what the message is the message of the one of his what that's the Adventist message was to be given to the church in clear and distinct lines that the world should no longer say that the seventh-day Adventists taught the law the law the law but do not teach or believe Christ in other words she's saying like and I don't know how much time I don't have a lot of time but what I can tell you is there's been like a historical battle in our church and it kind of happened around 1888 where Ellen White and these two young adults were trying to be like yo y'all are too focused on the law you're too busy trying to scare people there's too much emphasis on keeping the commandments you're not talking about Jesus you know talking about grace you're not talking about this stuff so of course the church sent Ellen White down to Australia did y'all know that they banished her to Australia to shut her up the other two guys Jones and Waggoner they shall discourage these young adults that they ended up leaving the church so when Ellen White got sent down to Australia you know what books you start writing to counteract all this lalalalala steps to Christ like do you see the rete you see do you see the fight that's going on in our church and Ellen White was one of the main ones saying no we're too legalistic we don't talk enough about Jesus the law of the law the law the law the law I don't know if this is paradigm sitting for some of you but it is for me so let me give you another one what's this the Bible says what drives out fear the Bible says the second Timothy 1:7 for God has not given us a spirit of what I was when I was raised they the goal was to scare you into obedience and so you start with something like this the Lord is coming soon we need to get ourselves together that is false doctrine first of all you cannot get yourself together that is not the gospel you cannot obey your way into righteousness the Bible says by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified the Bible says for by grace you've been saved through faith that not of yourselves it's a gift of God lest any man should boast salvation is not through obedience salvation is through faith through grace did you just catch that like I just learned that experientially about seven years ago all my life I've just been trying to be good so I can go to heaven but good people are not going to heaven grace to people are watch this let me show you this how we try to scare people and then alight was like go stop doing that posture she says the shortness of time is urged as an incentive for us to seek righteousness and to make Christ our friend pause y'all get what she saying she's like we try to use the shortness of time hey y'all did y'all just see what happened the Pope just he just shook hands with Obama the Pope like all of these last day events and I ain't gonna call no names but there's some people on social media and that's all their ministry is about what Jews cool what Jesuit priest is here and all this kind of stuff it's like nothing but conspiracy theory and all of this is driven to tell you you see all this bad stuff happening you better get right but guess what it don't work let me give you an illustration twerk but I was in South Africa a little while back I wasn't because I'm not passing out before I preach cuz I wasn't taking care of myself physically right it was drinking a lot of water bla bla bla bla bla so I ended up in the emergency room I bow to the Lord I said I'm scared I don't wanna die I'm gonna drink water I drink water I'm gonna drink water i'ma drink water how many y'all made them commitments on the hospital room or when you're in trouble or was used in jail whatever it is anybody ever been in trouble and you're like I'm a I vow to the Lord you know you know what your motivation is is fear right man as soon as I got well I got back to my normal self I fell off you know why fear is not a motivator wants what she says she's like y'all using fear as a motivator I got something to say about that while she says this is not the great motive pause let me ask y'all a question what's not the great motive right the shortness of time we should not be using the shortness of time as a motivation for people to get right oh okay I see puzzled looks I'll go back should I go back all right what's this are we begin the shortness of time is what what has urged me pushed alright as an incentive what's an incentive a reason right a motivation for us to do what seek righteousness and to make Christ our friend so she's just making a statement we oftentimes use fear of the last days as an inspiration to get people to behave watch her next statement this is not the great motive is that clear it's savers of selfishness is it necessary that the terrors I love this woman auntie animal so cool glasses is it necessary that the terrors of the day of God be held before us to compel us through fear to write action question mark this ought not be Jesus is attractive to charge discuss what she just said it's not that a game changer like so what should what should we be using as an incentive for people to get right Jesus because Jesus is what he's a charlatan the Pope is it the Jesuit priests that joined the Adventist Church isn't like I've heard all this stuff I will get ready to end because I'm going to open up let me let me slide through this real quick I want y'all to see one thing so one of the things Ellen White is like saying is like yo y'all just so watch this he's like you not preach about Christ whilst he says he's like she's confused she's like the preaching of Christ has been strangely neglected by our people like rights to evangelistic meetings back in the day I don't even know if y'all have even seen for those in a long time like I would yeah like I'm talking where you would go like three weeks any old-school funk no now to talk about like advanced like a 10th meeting like when you lay out all the doctrines and try to get people to get baptized bro I would just I would preach all the doctrines and then I preached one sermon on the gospel one one about Jesus the rest of them will be try to prove that how right we are and everybody else is wrong so basically our whole methodology was is y'all are wrong rear right there's a baptism at the end of the thing so what we've done is we've we've essentially asked people to be converted by based on losing an argument instead of putting their faith in Jesus and Ellen White is tripping she's like why are we not preaching Christ let me let me ask you like one of my boys said when listen when you when you're not when you're in a hospital room and the doctor says you got six months to live do you say in the name of the Sabbath be healed when your when your child is acting crazy and they lost their minds and you begin to pray do you say in the name of the state of the Dead what's what's got power and if a doctrine is has been has been diluted of Jesus it has no power what's this I don't know how we missed this stuff are y'all bored there is one great central truth these are like when you make these kinds of statements how can there be cause for confusion there is one great some I tweet that but this needs to be tweeted like there is one great central truth to be kept ever before the mind in the searching of the scriptures the Sabbath Sabbath right State of the Dead spirit of prophecy health message Daniel - Daniel 7 revelation 12 revelation 13 now I would say yes to all of those but you better have Christ in what should we be keeping before other people constantly Christ and him what every other truth or doctrine is invested with influence and power corresponding to its relation to this thing how much are y'all really listening oh okay I'm just debating whether I wanted to this okay let me let me use this last part number one can I have 10 minutes and then we open up for questions okay all right so let's do this you need this historical piece because there's a reason why there's a reason why there's a struggle in our church now and it's not new alright so l my husband is named James white okay by the way they used to have a rocky marriage and it's one of the realest things ever but it's the coolest thing actually it shows how human she was well anyway James white who was sort of like can you imagine being married to a prophet like you James white and you're a preacher in your own right like you're like leading the church but your wife is a prophet how do you run your household when your wife is a prophet I don't all she has to do is say like honey which word should we move I think we need to move over there seems like no I was shown that we need to live over here what do you say to that right anyway so James White was mainly responsible for like the evangelistic style that we kind of are accustomed to now which is saying the people we're right you're wrong we could Ellen White call those argumentative discourses I just saw a preacher the other day who I'll leave nameless they did like a debate on Facebook about the Sabbath that's an argumentative discourse all right so this was there before the was PowerPoint before there was keynote before there was Apple TV they would take these pictures all over the United States and it was - this picture is called the way of life this was like high-tech stuff back then so they would take this picture they put it up on an easel and they would preach the picture so when the picture first was released from James White what is the most prominent thing that you see in the center of this picture huh the commandments Christ is off to the side but what is central is the law of God hanging from the tree of life all right James White that and this is where Ellen was like why are y'all doing this and so what so James was like we got to stop doing this he says I feel assured there is a crisis before us we should preserve our physical and mental powers for future service to us as he said the glourious subject of redemption should long ago have been presented more fully to the people in other words we've not been talk about salvation we've just been talking about the commandments he goes on to say but some there is an unutterable yearning of the what for what go figure like he's like people want Christ he says and the writer talking about himself is one of this class James White is struggling he's like man we've been preaching the lavalava long but man I need Jesus he says what some of us it has been business work and caregiving Christ's but little room in the mind and in the affections he says with others it has been nearly all theory dwelling upon the law and the prophets the nature and the destiny of man and the messages anybody know what the messages are three angels messages while destitute to an alarming degree of the indwelling Christ this is going on in 1881 even changed white he's getting ready to die he is not far from dying and he was like yo we have been going in a round rushon we've not talked about Christ he goes on to say he's getting ready he's on his deathbed he says our preachers need more encouragement they should preach Christ more and they should know more of him upon whom all our hopes of success here and heaven thereafter depend and notice what he says now he's prophesying he says I have workman that shall take ahold of this work what worked though the work of talking about Christ he says fear not talking to his wife be not discouraged it shall go forward he's telling his wife oh I know I'm I'll be ready to die but we have gone into the wrong direction we need to shift this thing so so just before he died he he commissioned them to do a new a new evangelistic picture and they and instead they changed the name to Christ the way of life are y'all seeing this so you can barely see it but but but but off off to the side somewhere here where you can barely see it are the commandments but what is central do you see how even they back in the day we're struggling with this but they made the right move they were like yo we were wrong we need to shift and it's crazy that in 2018 we still have whole churches that are offended if you talk too much about Jesus they'll say to you you're not preaching enough doctrine if Christ is my doctrine there nothing is doctrine so he ends up dying bla bla bla and like he said he says some people go on I'm sorry hey hands up hands up hands up dying the ends of dying and of course and then Ellen White moves to California and when she gets to California there are two young adult preachers pastor abdel young adult preacher George - Jones and Waggoner she listens to this young preacher under a tent at a camp meeting and he's talking about Jesus and she gets smitten with a vision and in the vision the Lord is like this is the message so here comes 1888 y'all still with me there's a big General Conference session that happens in 1888 Ellen White and these two young adults are trying to tell the big the big dogs were running the church we we got the wrong focus but they not trying to listen to a woman or young adults does this sound familiar so that goes back to what I told you earlier they so discouraged Jones and Waggoner both of those guys into believing the church and Ellen White they shipped her down to the bottom of the planet I maybe give you some some statements that she said so she's like so what's this this is really where we done she's like after all of this is going on she's like as Ellen White is getting ready to pass herself like she she was really like look Jesus Jesus Jesus she says but this I do know that our churches are dying for one on the teaching of the last day events why our church is dying righteousness by faith what's righteousness by faith the gospel God's grace that you can't save yourself that the only salvation is only through Jesus faith in Him she says we have left Christ out out Christ and his matchless love and brought in theories and reasonings and preached argumentative discourses we're right they're wrong all right I'm done a lot left but let's just open up for some dialogue here I think you get the point right you get the point okay all right oh you don't get the point ask ask a question then oh you want me to keep going I can depend on what the questions are this is positive yes go ahead my brother you want me to put the mic on him for the recording okay so good okay I'm not saying it yeah so you asked a very good question and I think this is a question that you know yes sure so the so understand there's a difference between recognizing what time you're living in and recognizing what your motivation for serving the God is that's the difference so our motivation should not be oh my goodness an earthquake just happened in California oh my goodness the Pope just said no he says lift up your heads for your Redemption draws nigh it's about a fact let me just throw this out here just because what you're referring to is Matthew 24 Matthew 24 actually only has really one sign that Jesus is coming I don't have time to break it down now but it starts off with the disciples saying what Jesus saying not one stone of this temple will be left upon another and this life wasn't like what is he talking about and so then he starts saying look I'm telling you right now you've been pray that your flight bitten be not in winter he's prophesying about the destruction of Jerusalem and then he makes a shift and start talking about Wars rumors of wars and so now it's a dual prophecy not only talking about then but also talking about now but then watch what he says he says in verse 14 and this gospel of the kingdom will be preached as a witness then the end will come did y'all catch that what is the surefire sign that Jesus is about to come the gospel being preached that's strange isn't it because that's not really something that you can look at on the news it's something that you have to do Jesus doesn't want us essentially running around here date checking he wants us out here spreading the gospel and the more the gospel is spread the soon Jesus will come does that make any sense no I'm I am one who is very much into endtime events but I am not absorbed in bad things happening as a motivation for me all that does is just create urgency for me to want to share more the gospel is that do you understand the difference there okay because here's the problem here's the problem with being too absorbed in signs not the gospel sign Jesus stay here yet when I was at Oakwood some stuff happened and folks was like and gonna be long I give Jesus a few years and he's coming and so what we begin to do is what Ellen White says she says that savers of selfishness typically when we become absorbed with I'm really trying to be careful here when we come to absorb with the evil things that are happening in the last days it does not empower us to want to give gospel it generally makes us want to hunker down and save ourselves okay so let it be known what do I leave here saying that the last days are not important that the signs are not important but the one you need to be focused on the most is preaching the gospel so that the end will come Jesus wants us he's not gonna come until everybody's have a chance so if we really want to see Jesus come stop looking at the news and start getting out there preaching I'm saying does that make sense okay all right any other yes good question good question so let me say this I actually believe in church organization I believe there's wisdom in the counsel of many however I do recognize that there's some organization in our church that actually impedes stuff getting done I'll say this and I know your pastor well enough to know this as well I don't know if you guys go this church either but let me say this let me say this though this is what I tell especially young adults all the time you could fight your boards and I would suggest you go as far as you can to try to persuade the entire body that hey we need to go in this direction if they just totally shut you down I will promise you this nobody is going to try to stop you from feeding the hungry from clothing the naked from tutoring kids from like nobody wants to fight about ministry outside the four walls of the church people mainly want to fight about protecting what happens in the four walls and mainly on one day I think we need to shift our focus from the programming of what happens in the church and start shifting our focus to start some parachurch ministries in our communities like it just blows my mind that we placed so much energy like a lot of our young adults waste so much energy trying to persuade mindsets nobody can stop you from having I don't know what you want to do like I mean you want to do a tutoring program an after-school program you want to minister to single-parent mothers who like stop trying to go through the bureaucracy of the church to do what God has called you to do you don't need a board vote to feed people you just need to get out there and do it I'll give you a thousand examples of this I've got a friend of mine right now he's a physical therapist doing very well ghosts which Adventist Church in Atlanta kind of felt like the church was moving a little slow to do ministry so what he started doing is he got all of his homies together in Atlanta is a lot of homeless people and these are all young adult professionals they got up on Sabbath morning at 6 7 a.m. they went under the bridges packed sandwiches turkey sandwiches chips apples and they fed guys and they've been doing this now for 15 years and it's blowing up so much so that people are giving them money to do it like you guys are creative enough with technology and all this other stuff to stop trying to take over what goes on in the building like go out here in these hoods and do something that makes a difference but you must be honest we're not set up to do that we're used to fighting over a position or a function or a service there's a new service that we need to start and I'm not talking about these service I'm timeouts real service anybody else oh yes there's a hand right here yes I agree with you and you said you know the church is dying and that the young people are dying out also we had they'd started Wednesday me and using the desire of Ages but they didn't use one written by yeah he actually put it in modern language I know what you talk about but I had a problem with it because I said if they use that book because I've gone through most of it and they take a like most of the scriptures and then I said then by the time my children come to read back they're just gonna get the top part they don't know how the root started it just knowing their leaves on the tree so that's the way I was looking at it and also I wanted to know why you use the New International Version instead of the King James Version good question let me let me answer the last question first and then I'll go back to the second one so actually I use multiple versions I wish everybody here could have gone to seminary at least to take a class on Bible manuscripts there was a lot of fake news out there about which version is the best now what I'm about to say right now might be offensive to some but it's just to make a point that the best version is not the King James Version but the best version of the Bible is the Greek and the Hebrew a version is simply a translation into English and the King James Version was commissioned by a homosexual king named King James there is nothing listen listen listen to me that's history brothers and sisters listen listen listen everyone listen this is history the man was not saved but God used him to put together a version of the Bible that all of us have quoted for the Lord is my shepherd I shall not want he maketh nobody talks like that that's Old English it is a translation of manuscripts there's Jay there's Q there's M and there's in am I talking good there are several different manuscripts and the versions are based off those manuscripts everybody heard the Dead Sea Scrolls that's real so King James Version is good but it ain't the best the best is can you read Greek or Hebrew so what I tell people all the time my students and everyone else and this is what they will tell you in any legitimate seminary such as the seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary they will tell you if you don't know Greek and Hebrew the best way to get the right interpretation of Scripture is to use multiple versions and the message Bible is not a version so paraphrase the clear word which was made by the seventh day of his church that added Ella white statements into the Bible is a paraphrase my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge the King James Version I'll just if y'all wanna know my favorite version is my favorite version it is ESV NIV in KJV in a ESV I got a bunch of them it just depends on the text yeah all right yes I see another hand but was there hey oh I'm saying before I come to you brother the other question okay two more hands we have to close the other question was about so let me say this I don't I don't know about that whole situation so I don't even I'm not even sure I'm I'm totally sure about what information was used desire of Ages the new version of whatever remember let's go back to what we've been teaching you what is the most important element of theology that people need to get Christ if they are not Paul says if they are not preaching this gospel let them be accursed I hear from pulpits people preaching a false gospel and they use a bunch of Scripture so everything must be tested against the word and by their fruits you shall know them all right well this hand then one more is that what you're saying pastor okay this hand then one more and that's gonna hand it back yes go ahead my brother all right certain takes our scriptures it shortens like sometimes you have 25 verses you over 24 23 no that's a part of like if it's saying like it's caught in the 25 but it stops our policy no migrate kids afterwards not even interested in the older version they will get check ok so let me say this just for clarity what I'm saying is is that the best way to interpret Scripture is to look at multiple versions to be sure for example what the NIV is doing is just being honest based on the manuscripts see that we would need a whole class on this I think people look at the King James Version they think if it's good enough for Paul's gonna for me the King James Version was commissioned by King James and was at 1611 all right the versions of Scripture were written thousands of years before that does that make sense to you so he's essentially translating in Old English from a manuscript now here's where this might go over your head there are four different manuscripts that are used for Bible translation King James uses this one another one uses this one and other ones use and if I told you the rest it might shake some of your faith so what I'll just leave it at this and say is is at the end of the day you need to read your word right I don't care what version you read read the word if you want to read King James read the King James but the best way to get the complete I wish I could even give you a example of this how one text and you know this when you study you read one text and if you have a parallel Bible you get more depth of meaning because you're using English words to represent Greek and Hebrew words and sometimes the King James Version gets it right and sometimes the King James Version gets it wrong sometimes NIV gets it right sometimes NIV gets it wrong because they're translations is the equivalent of me standing here preaching in Haiti right and as I'm preaching someone is translating right in Creole or French right I'm saying one thing and I've had this happen and they are doing the best they can to keep up with me and with it but they can't get all my slang they can't get all my nuances there we go on my meaning that's how Bible versions works so the best way to get the truth is to compare Scripture with Scripture and use all of the versions all right all right back one more hand one more hand go ahead brother the children are getting restless we have to one of the questions I have is and you presented this should as Adventist we avoid arguing about doctrine yes nobody has ever been converted because they lost the argument people are converted through relate all right Ellen White's statement all right ready I know this by heart this just so people know but I believe in this mean did you not see that today okay I'm Adventist now right I told you that ministry of healing page 143 what the world needs today is what it needed 2000 years ago a revelation of Christ Christ method alone will give true success in reaching the people pause y'all ready for this she's saying if you do a Christ's way that's gonna give you success in reaching the people show me where Jesus argued with anybody so she tells us how he reached people she said first the Savior mingled with men as one who desired their good he met their needs what I'm still quoting one their confidence then he bade them follow me so what Jesus did is he put a whole lot of weight on meeting needs building relationship winning trust you know hanging out with them connecting with being a friend to them and then after he established that kind of trust relationship he able to speak truth into people's lives but we're trying too hard to speak truth into people's lives than we earn the right to do so god bless you I love you guys [Applause] you

Channel: Breath of Life Fellowship

Views: 6,465

Rating: 4.7303371 out of 5

Keywords: BOLF, Adventist Message, Advent, Ellen G. White, MyRon Edmonds, 3ABN, SumTV, Amazing Facts, Secrets Unsealed, Hope Channel

Id: UvCQDamhXHs

Length: 67min 49sec (4069 seconds)

Published: Fri May 25 2018