Pastor Paul Chappell: Perilous Times and Punctual People

take your bibles tonight and turn to second timothy chapter three and for those of you who've been around a while you may have figured out that ii timothy is one of my very favorite books of the bible and we have this sunday night and next sunday night for special messages and then starting two weeks from tonight we're beginning a brand new series entitled blessed assurance and i'm going to be preaching verse by verse through the books of first second and third john and i'm looking forward to the series wonderful books of the bible blessed assurance that's what we'll be studying but tonight i have something for this hour and next sunday as i said dr david gibbs from the christian law association will be with us and we're looking forward to that so let's take our bibles now and stand please and turn to second timothy chapter three we're going to read beginning in verse number 12. and do pray for the students we had several call just this afternoon in fact we had several make application this afternoon and many will be driving in tomorrow and the next day pray for their safety as they travel continue to pray for our church family for protection with this covid the numbers are going down very rapidly although some would like to it seems like maintain a bit of a phobia about it but we ought to be thankful that it's going down then we ought to do our part to help keep it that way i understand that but let's just continue to pray about these situations that god will have his will in his way tonight i want you to follow with me as i read verses one and then i'll read verses 12 through 14. kind of a different title i told my wife this afternoon she usually goes over my sermons and corrects them before i preach them and and i said that's kind of a little bit of a different title maybe a little trite i've entitled the message perilous times and punctual people and the premise of the message is this that no matter what's going on around us we must be punctual to do that which we know to be right in the midst of perilous times in fact this really is the time when true characters tested when commitment is seen when purging takes place and so we want to learn how to be punctual christians in a perilous time and so follow with me as i read some of these verses verse 1 says this know also that in the last days perilous times shall come now i'll not read every verse there we've read them many times describing the perilous times but when we come to verse 12 we read these words yea and all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution but evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse deceiving and being deceived but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and has been assured of knowing of whom thou hast learned them let us pray father thank you for the joy of opening your word and thank you for the privilege of being here in your midst and with these wonderful people blessed tonight our time in your word help us to learn how we can be a punctual people in perilous times and i pray this in jesus name amen you may be seated i always enjoyed going to the farm in colorado and my grandfather really took over the farm that his father had homesteaded and my granddad whose name was paul b chapel he would burn off a space and get his old johnny popper john deere tractor and clear it off with this plow and then maybe a few more acres and a few more acres and over the years he developed the farm there in colorado and over the years i would spend most summers there and i think one of the great characteristics i learned from my grandfather and from the farming life was just the simple disciplines of farming there were just certain things that you did no matter what else was going on it might have been world war ii but when it was time to plant you still planted when it was time to harvest you still harvested when it was time to cultivate you still cultivated when it was time to pray for the rain you prayed for the rain it didn't matter what was going on in japan korea vietnam washington dc there were just certain things that had to be done there were great flus and pandemics even through his lifetime and still the farmer would plant and cultivate and work on the equipment bring in the harvest and i remember those seasons and boy when it was harvest time my job was to drive the big truck out and uh they'd load that uh that truck full of pinot beans or wheat and i'd drive it in uh to the uh to the bins and then back out to the field and you just had to stay on schedule you didn't allow things going on in other places or things that were happening in the news necessarily to keep you from doing those things which must be done and oftentimes my grandfather would seemingly just do the normal when everything else in the world was so abnormal during the perilous times he'd still remain punctual he still found time to read the bible and have his devotions it didn't matter what the weather was it didn't matter what was going on on the world scene or who was picketing where or who was upset about what he had his disciplines his disciplines with god in the word of god and his disciplines as a farmer to bring in the harvest and i see this characteristic in the apostle paul who said to the young preacher to be instant in season and out of season to be faithful no matter what all else was going on to be faithful in the truth and in the things that god had given to him paul the apostle was in his last days here encouraging timothy to be punctual amidst the perilous he was challenging him to do the right thing no matter what else was going on now folks all of us are subject to mood swings and many of us are affected emotionally by the news or by apprehension or by phobias and we allow pandemics and phobia and difficulties sometimes to push us away from that which we know to be our christian responsibility we allow the perilous to remove us from doing the punctual things of the christian life now there is no doubt that the first century church experienced perilous times in fact as paul wrote to timothy you know he was in the prison cell there in rome about to become a martyr for the cause of jesus christ and he was to experience the very thing he's writing to timothy about here a few years prior to this in 64 a.d nero the emperor had ordered the torching of his own capital city of rome and then he blamed the torching on the christians and subsequent persecution came upon them the roman historian tacica said nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most torturous uh tortures on a class of hated for their abominations called christians by the populous and so the apostle paul is prophetically writing under the spirit's leading and he's reminding these first century christians and one in particular by the name of timothy and he says timothy i want to remind you that perilous times shall come now i've been saying to lancaster baptist church that perilous times will come and i've said you've got to determine now if you're going to stand for jesus christ because it's not going to be easy always to stand for jesus christ and while we believe in the pre-tribulation rapture that does not mean that there would not come trials and difficulties and persecutions prior to the calling away of the saints and i've been trying to warn the church for years and just simply say make up your mind because there may be discrimination against a christian and by the way there are many causes that people talk about in the world today and i believe in the freedom of speech but around here the number one cause and the thing that unites us is the cause of jesus christ and if you intend to live for that cause uh then i've been saying to the church we need to be ready to take a stand and so the bible says in verse number 1 of chapter 3 this know that in the last days perilous times shall come now the word perilous is an interesting word the word perilous means unraveling let's say that together unraveling and we are living in a time of unraveling sadly i saw on the news this afternoon a man says he's a part of some prayer ministry i have no idea who he was i'm not saying he was totally in the right or whatever the case may be but in portland he was shot in the chest and killed uh he was killed as a part of this prayer thing he was out marching and praying i'm not saying whether i know all about what he was doing i'm just saying he was killed and you can look it up on the news apps yourself tonight there were people saying with curse words that they were glad someone like that was laying dead in the streets these are not pejorative terms that i'm using that's why i say if these students cannot come in a difficult time and go through some difficult things how are they going to stand in this culture for the gospel of jesus christ perilous times there's an unraveling there's an unraveling of our uh of our freedom there's an unraveling of those people who will stand in faith and an unraveling of one nation under god there are many that would unravel it and some might wonder well what do we do and some might have doubts how can we get through this or why would god bring this and by the way great christians have doubted peter doubted thomas doubted john the baptist even wondered about was this really the christ while he was in prison awaiting his beheading it's not a sin to doubt but it's a sin to remain in that doubt when god has given us the answers in his word and tonight i want to share with you three characteristics that i believe are vitally needed by those who will be punctual during the perilous and i believe tonight god is looking for us to follow the pattern of our savior in living out these three characteristics i want you to notice first of all call paul is calling timothy to live a life of courage the bible says in verse number 12 yea in all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution he says there's going to come persecution he said to timothy i want you to be strong in the grace of our lord jesus christ he said timothy you need to have courage in a day of difficulty and we see that difficulty he says all those who live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution there will come difficulty in their life and i say this to you again jesus did not say take up your pillow and follow me he said take up your cross and follow me he said put your hand to the plow and come after me he said in the world ye shall have tribulation but be of good cheer for i have overcome the world sometimes when i have challenges difficulties or burdens of various types and maybe i feel a little bit of self-pity welling up and oftentimes the holy spirit will convict me and will say why do you feel this way i told you in the bible this was going to happen this is a part of being a christian that all those who will live godly in christ jesus shall have the perilous times the question is will we be punctual in the perilous times will we be faithful in the perilous times he says you're going to suffer persecution acts 14 and 22 confirming the souls of the disciples and exhorting them to continue in the faith and that we through much tribulation much must enter into the kingdom of god oh we said this morning there's much in the way of anarchy and atheism and much in the way of god hating in the land and yet the fact of the matter is that this is prophesied here that we are to be courageous in a day of difficulty i think back a few years and there was some kind of a political rally and hillary clinton was advocating uh late term abortion and now it's even moved to infanticide that is to say whoops the abortion didn't work let's just kill the child do it really neatly and give as much comfort as you can and the governor of virginia was advocating the same not many months ago but hillary clinton in the conference said and i quote she said there are deep-seated cultural codes religious beliefs and structural biases which have to be changed in other words people like you and i who believe the bible when it says that life begins it at conception that we must change for all of this that's happening and that there must be a change in other words all those that are godly in christ jesus who hold to the teachings of the bible must change and for those who will not change the bible says there may come persecution and difficulty into their lives now i'm not a glutton for it i've not been preaching against our state or governmental officials not heard that for me the last six months and and i know who the enemy is and and and it's not a person by the way it's satan none of us should be out trying to rebel arouse or create a problem but the fact is that if you intend to stand for christ you can read it right here in the bible all that will live godly in christ jesus shall suffer persecution there will be those that want to change your deep-seated religious beliefs by the way i really do feel the constitution itself gives us the liberty to believe according to the dictates of our own conscience from the bible some will try to change that there's a day of difficulty and also we must have courage in this day of deception notice in verse 13 it says but evil men and seducers shall wax and worse deceiving and being deceived there are so many people today who are being drawn into causes and they are simple christians they are non-discerning they are emotional they are soul-ish the soul is the seed of our emotion we are to be spiritual that is that we are to be spirit-led christians right how many of you have ever had your emotions get you in trouble i have i often say never make a major decision during a down time in your a down time is not a time to make a decision but oftentimes today we see those that are being deceived and this is this is what the bible says seducers shall wax worse and worse and satan is is amazingly clever he doesn't say i'm about to trick you he doesn't say uh here's what i'm going to do he just subtly brings the change and and before you know it even words have a different meaning and before you know it the culture is shifting he is very much influencing and deceiving the world even today and it says that this influence will wax worse and worse there will be a continual deception until today we have even churches that are denying the gospel's power that are denying the revelation of the word of god entire denominations are under deception and they are more interested in a social gospel than a saving gospel they are more interested in cleaning up this world than in getting people to the next world they are more interested in saving a whale than in saving a life they are more interested in having discussion than preaching repentance i'm saying this world today and the churches of this world so many of them have been drawn into this deceitful time that is prophesied in this passage smooth talking liberal preachers and non-believers drawing them away turn if you would to first timothy just go back a little bit chapter four first timothy chapter four and notice what the bible says here in verse number one first peter 4 1 now the spirit capital s the spirit speaketh expressly now help me out here tonight how many of you in this room believe that all the bible is given by the inspiration of the holy spirit of god we believe the bible is inspired infallible preserved but this verse says the spirit speaketh expressly it's a double emphasis it's something as if god is saying wake up here i want you to hear this the spirit speaketh expressly that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils speaking lies in hypocrisy having their conscience seared with a hot iron this is what is often referred to as apostasy a falling away from the truth and they become emotionally drawn into this cause or that cause or this club or that club and before they know it they are drawn away from their relationship with the lord jesus christ and sometimes even embracing false philosophy doctrine and lifestyle and oh we see it today we see young people falling into agnosticism we see young people that want to live the life of sin and yet claim that they're still a good christian and they believe the bible and we're just too judgmental and we're not woke enough and we don't understand the situation i understand this situation let god be true and every man a liar but that's how sneaky the devil is i've had men look me right in the eye as they were involved in a in an affair and cheating on their wife and tell me i just feel closer to god right now than i've ever felt before well let me help you understand something if you are living in open rebellion to god you had better first check to see if you've ever truly been saved and secondly if you were saved there is no way that you are right with god while you cheat on your wife and yet there are people that get that messed up in the head and that deceived in their head and this is what the bible says that they will speak lies in hypocrisy notice verse two having their conscience seared with a hot iron brother if you can live an open sin day after day after week after week there's something wrong with that conscience turn to second thessalonians chapter two and verse two second thessalonians chapter 2 and verse 2. we're simply noticing from the scripture that there's a deception that comes in the last days it says here that ye be not soon shaken in mind or be troubled neither by spirit nor by word nor by letter as from us as that the day of christ is at hand let no man deceive deceive you by any means for that day shall not come now this is speaking of the day of the revelation of the antichrist that day shall not come except there come a falling away first and that man of sin be revealed the son of perdition before the coming of the lord before even the knowledge of the antichrist there will be a falling away first let's say that together a now we don't want to think of that we just want to think of a gathering in we want to think of a moral majority we want to think of everybody for god and everyone coming together and by the way i believe there's still great works to happen for the lord i believe there's still great days ahead great crowds great revivals there's still opportunity to see great things for god but there will be those who will fall away in those last days the bible says and in the midst of all of this we need to pray that god would give us courage to stand we need to pray that we would be like the three hebrew children of old shadrach meshach and abednego in daniel 3 and verse 17 who said if it be so our god whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace and and he will deliver us out of thine hand o king but if not be it known unto thee o king that we will not serve thy gods nor worship the golden image which thou has set up and that ought to be our spirit our god is able to deliver us but if not we're going to stand and we're going to love god and worship god and serve god and be faithful to god in this hour there must be courage to do the right priorities in the midst of the perilous times we must be courageously punctual in our bible reading and in our church attendance and in our giving and in our faithfulness to god in the midst of the perilous we must be punctual notice secondly not only must we be punctual in our courage but secondly with our convictions now may i say to you tonight church member don't be shaken in mind i've had many opportunity in my mind in my life when people that i revered walked away from the things of god i don't bring the names up to the pulpit i've seen things this week in the news people that i've known just amazingly tragic that's why you must always keep your eyes on jesus christ and you say i don't like purging i don't like i don't like that talk i don't like to hear about uh the the difficulty or they were they went out from us and so forth those are hard things but i say to you that you must not let any outward circumstance or hurt change who you are for christ you must say lord help me to maintain my convictions help me to keep believing what you have given to me help me never to doubt in the night what you gave me in the light our kent hughes wrote the modern church is lacking in its ability to remain uncontaminated by the unchristian thinking and morality of contemporary culture a lot of times there's a moving away from conviction during perilous times you see the men and women who have moved the world are the men and women the world could not move these are people who stood with courageous convictions in the midst of difficult time years ago i read a book entitled mission drift and it described all of the christian ministries who had drifted away from their mission let me tell you sometimes some of you might want to be a monday afternoon quarterback let me just tell you something first of all you ought to try being a pastor for just one day in california and secondly you ought to know that there is a pastor here with his hand to the plow holding on to the fundamentals of the faith holding on to our mission for soul winning which normally those who want to question something haven't been out doing much lately i'm saying i'm holding on to the supporting of our missionaries holding on to righteousness and worship and keeping the standard high for the teenagers and doing all that i can to keep the doors open let me just tell you something tonight we're going to hold on to the convictions that i had when i came here in 1986 with courageous conviction we must move on for the lord jesus christ you can find a little pup tent somewhere to hide but the fact of the matter is we've got to stand true to our convictions tonight one of the stories told in the book mission drift was of harvard the divinity school which was at at one time established to train preachers to preach the gospel of jesus christ today their home page simply reads in their divinity school exploring all religions while aligned to none we have a pluralistic multinational multi-religious global context and let me say that he who would fall for everything will stand for nothing and we want to stand for the lord jesus christ in this place and so we must have convictions of doctrine the bible says in verse 14 but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and been assured of you say but the sky is falling but on the news there's people shooting each other and there's this problem and there's that problem but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and been assured of but pastor the stock market's up but the stock market's down but 14 people have kovit but 15 people have coveted but my my son has this and i i have this but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and been assured of in the midst of the perilous be punctual in the midst of the perilous be punctual be in our place doing what god has called us to do but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned i learned lots of things when i was just a little boy i learned that i was a sinner that needed christ as my savior i learned that church is where god's people gather around to sing and to worship and to grow i learned that upon the first day of the week if i had one dollar i gave at least 10 cents of that to the lord jesus christ i learned that when i was upset with someone i was to forgive them and seek reconciliation i learned the spirit of god was in me and that i was to walk in this in the matter of the spirit and in the in the mind of the spirit and and so as i have learned these things the bible says in the perilous times we must continue to do what we know to be right it is the trick of the devil to cause us to move away from being punctual he wants to use the perilous he wants to use the media to get us to just sit around and wait until all that's over and then we'll get back to serving god and what i want to challenge you with tonight is continue in the things that you know to be right i don't care if it rains i don't care if it snows tomorrow in august i i don't care if the roads are slippery or if it's 110 or if it's 10 whatever it is in the midst of the perilous we must be punctual say it with me punctual we must be punctual continue thou oh we must continue in the doctrine of the word of god first timothy 4 16 take heed unto thyself and unto the doctrine continue in them for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself and them that hear thee i think of the doctrine of christ first timothy 1 15 this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that christ jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom i am chief and i'll not preach the doctrinal statement of our church tonight but let me simply say we believe in the deity of christ we believe in the depravity of man we believe in the blood atonement of jesus christ we believe in the true work of christ on the cross of calvary we believe in heaven sweet and hell hot and we believe that jesus christ is coming again and that is coming is imminent and i'm saying this is no time to throw your convictions out the back with the trash this is the time with courage to hold on to your convictions be punctual in the perilous oh hold to the doctrine of christ hold to the doctrine of his church first timothy 3 and 15 but if i tarry long that thou mayest know how to behave thyself in the house of god which is the church of the living god the pillar and the ground of the truth be convicted in your heart to hold on to that which you know to be right oh you ought to invite a friend next week someone that's wondering about about creation or life or the existence of god or is the bible true or where did this all come from and we ought to be saying look at this is not the time to wait and then later witness people have questions now and god's word has the answers my friend convictions of doctrine notice convictions of discipleship verse 14 says but continue thou on the things which thou hast learned and been assured of notice this knowing of whom thou hast learned them i remember one time someone said to me well i'll tell you this i don't follow no man and boy that just sounded so spiritual didn't it i just don't follow no man and certainly we should follow christ but you know the apostle paul said three times follow me as i what's next follow christ now here's the point in your life and mine god has used human instrumentality some of you had christian parents some of you had a youth pastor here by the way you may have had a pastor or youth pastor that fell away from christ but listen what they taught you is still true that's the test of your faith do you see what it says there and notice this verse 14 knowing of whom thou hast learn them in other words paul says continue remember when you learn that in sunday school remember when you learn that in bible class go back in your mind and continue in those things and and find someone else that you can share those things with so that the gospel will continue along i think of second timothy chapter one and verse five which says uh when i call to remembrance the unfaint faith that is in the which dwelt first and thy grandmother lois and my mother eunice and i am persuaded that it is in you also paul said paul said hey timothy remember what your mom taught you by the way how many of you had a christian mom just curious let me see how many of you i did i do how many of you right how many how many of you are thankful for that christian mom i'm glad i remember my mom just about every night that i was in high school she'd come to the foot of my bed and she talked to me about the day and she was gentle and she'd pray with me every single night every night oh i thank the lord for that and we'd talk about things we talk about doctrine and having the right spirit she guided me and helped me paul said remember those lessons never doubt in the night the perilous times what god gave you in the light hold on to those things don't forget what you learned and remember to have courage in the perilous times remember to have convictions in the perilous times i'm convinced that there are those that would be happy if every church was continuously closed from now until the rest of this year i'm convinced that there are those that would be happy if we just let our convictions go and kind of just let our hair down a little bit here and just kind of wait it on out and there are entire churches i know of one pastor in atlanta georgia he recently stated that he did not believe the old testament to be needful relevant or even question whether it was the authoritative word of god and his church is not having services all the way until january and i thought to myself i thought you know if i didn't believe half the bible was true it might not matter if i canceled church for six months let me tell you something we ought to be thankful tonight for the word of god and that we're gathering around the word of god don't lose your convictions during covid in the perilous times be punctual notice not only our courage not only our conviction but there's a third thing that we must have and that is confidence we must maintain confidence in god's word verse 15 and that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures and that from a child that has known the holy scriptures i've enjoyed some time this summer trying to teach my grandchildren from the holy scriptures and sometimes they ask questions chandler asked me a few weeks ago he said papa before god made the light was he scared of the dark he was thinking about those things but aren't you glad that he knows who made the light god says i want you to have confidence remember what you learned as a child timothy hold on to your confidence in the scriptures i'm thankful that god's word is a rock that never changes i'm thankful that this prophecy came not an old time by the will of man ii peter 1 but holy men of god spake as they were moved by the holy ghost this is not man's book this is god's book those men spoke as they were moved by the holy ghost and god didn't just give them some thoughts and they added in some of their own thoughts but every word of god is pure and purified and preserved and was given by the holy spirit of god hebrews 4 12 for the word of god is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart there's something about this book there's something about getting under the preaching of this book it just has a way of like a needle coming in and doing surgery or like a scalpel coming in and making those adjustments that are needed the word of god is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword and friend if you're at lbclive.tv stay tuned that don't miss a service and get fed and for those of us that can get out when there's the opportunity let's not take it for granted because i'm going to tell you right now i don't care who you are you take several months and never hear the preached word of god and never allow the holy spirit to pierce into your heart there's a good chance that you might lose confidence you might not be punctual in the perilous time unless you hear the word of god oh keep confidence in the scripture oh do you understand more powerful than counseling more powerful than politics we must have a revival of obedience to the word of god we must have a confidence in the word of god we must continue trusting in his word day by day and let me just say church and hear me out tonight it's been difficult for other eras of christianity as well for some of us who did not fight world war ii or even in vietnam this just seems like a terrible inconvenience to wear a mask my soul i think of the roman empire which is in context of first and second timothy christianity was not legal in the roman empire for 300 years during that period of time there were 10 seasons of persecution upon the christians they were severely persecuted martyred at the end of this time christians had gone though from a tiny handful to somewhere around 20 of the population around the mediterranean region in other words during the difficult time you're going to find who has real faith you're going to find who can be punctual in the midst of the perilous and they found it out in that early century and there were christians in the end of the 10th persecution still standing still singing still serving the lord jesus christ i think of the dark ages the roman catholic church repressed the word of god they burned it in the streets of europe they attacked the anabaptist and the other baptist groups and others that were a part of that early lineage whether the waldensians or the french huguenots or some other groups and and yet god used that terrible time that difficult time to raise up some great preachers and i do not know what our enrollment will be at west coast baptist college but here's how i will approach my class whether it's a class of 200 100 one and whether it's a class of 10 here's how i will approach it i may be teaching the next dl moody i may be teaching the next hudson taylor i do not know in the midst of covet who god will raise up but i'm believing that he'll raise someone up for his glory and i'm believing that our student body is coming with faith and fire and a desire to be used of god and oh i look back and study those dark ages during that time when when roman catholicism tried to stamp out anyone that had a bible and anyone that believed in justification by faith and yet during that time peter waldow rose up in the late 1100s and 1200s and many thousands came to christ and john wycliffe rose up and many thousands came to christ and john huss came out of the catholic church and and was burned at the stake in constant germany in 1417 and yet his followers went on and you can go even today to prague czechoslovakia and see the large hussite churches as they're called they were churches preaching the gospel of jesus christ william tyndale said i will not let this persecution stop me and the bible was given to us because of men and women who were willing to burn for their faith i'm telling you there are worse things than wearing a mask early america there's so much revisionist history today that we must do all we can to preserve the truth of how this country was founded the pilgrims were forced to holland by the repression of the church of england and by the persecution that they were feeling even in switzerland i've stood at the riverside of the lamont river where zwingli threw a baptist into the river by the name of felix mans he came to zwingli and said i've been studying the bible in the bible the only people that got baptized were people that first had been saved he said this wingley the reformer of the friend of john calvin he said we shouldn't be baptizing these babies and what did they do with this man who believed in believers baptism they threw him in the river took his life his followers went to holland others from england had made their way to holland but they were appalled by the negative influence of the culture in holland and they would really be appalled today they made their way to america they founded the plymouth foundation within a hundred years the church had become somewhat apathetic and carnal through compromise things like the halfway covenant but then god brought an awakening through a man by the name of jonathan edwards who preached a message entitled sinners in the hands of an angry god it would not be heard probably on tbn today it might not be real popular in christian circles today it was kind of a hellfire damnation but the first great awakening came from that and then there was the second great awakening then there were men like dale moody and others through the civil war period and what i'm saying is that from those early difficult moments in europe god brought christianity to our shores and they were not coming primarily for the almighty dollar they were coming for their faith and for freedom of worship and we ought to thank god that they came i think of china mao zedong forced ten thousand missionaries to leave the country when he took power many missionaries were murdered on that chinese soil many men during that particular era lost their lives as they were simply trying to share the gospel the cultural revolution of the 60s destroyed most of the churches the iron fist pounding down the christian churches destroying the buildings and that is still happening today and yet as i preached to you tonight there are around 250 to 300 million born-again believers in china meeting in houses meeting in private places i remember preaching in a conference room there's a dining table in a room that would hold maybe a hundred or so and i remember watching them come in and they had their mask and they had their backpacks and they came and they sat in the chairs and they looked around and they were looking for cameras and they were looking for anyone that might resemble the police and they were fearful and slowly then as they felt comfortable they reached in the bottoms of their backpacks and they pulled out their bible i remember being there outside of beijing preaching to this group of maybe 80 christians after the message they said now we here we have questions and answers i remember answering questions for two to three hours of these people who were hungry for the word of god by the way most of them had walked miles and miles with their backpack no it was not convenient to get there yes they were frightened to be there yes they could face persecution and one man in fact told me that his father had just been taken away to prison just days prior they understood all of that and yet because of their faith there are millions of believers worshiping christ in china tonight i think of the philippines i love the philippines the filipino people ferdinand magellan the spanish explorer arrived in the philippines in 1521. i've been to the church erected to his memory in that church there's a large piece of wood which they say is a piece of the cross of jesus christ brought to the philippines by ferdinand magellan i have seen so many pieces of the cross around the world that that cross might be 7 to 12 miles tall i'm not exactly sure i'm not sure how they got it up on golgotha for all of the fallacies promoted by the roman catholic church about the cross magellan arrived to the philippines with his sword he demanded that every citizen of the philippines would become catholic he would be true to his spanish heritage and to the documents given to him by the catholic church people's lives were taken who resisted but today in the philippines there are between three and five million born-again bible-believing people in baptist churches and bible preaching churches worshiping the lord jesus christ and what i'm trying to tell you is simply this you cannot stamp out the gospel there have been difficult times for christians in the past but somehow through it all god raises strong leaders up god raises strong christians up god propagates the gospel and what we ought to be saying tonight is i don't know what god's about to do but it's going to be good and as for me i don't want to be on the sideline wondering what it's going to be like i want to be punctual in the perilous time i want to be in my place to see what god's going to do i want to be able to see the miracles and the souls and the work that god is going to do and i know the world thinks it's foolish and unsaved friends would even think well what in the world why do they even want to come and hear the preaching like this and the bible says in first corinthians 1 18 for the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness but unto us which are saved it is the power of god i'm sure joshua looked foolish marching around jericho i'm sure noah looked foolish building an ark in the desert i'm sure sarah looked foolish buying maternity clothes at age 90. moses looked foolish asking pharaoh to let the slaves go and david looked foolish as he stood before goliath and the wise men looked foolish following a star and peter looked foolish stepping out on the boat in the middle of the lake in the middle of the night and someone might say that you look foolish and if all you care about is what you look like then you'll probably miss the miracle but if all you care about is being diligent and being punctual in the midst of the perilous you might see some miracles from god amen you and i might see something that we never thought we'd see in our lifetime god working in our hearts in a great way keep your confidence in the scriptures my friend keep your confidence in the gospel the bible says in verse 15 as i close tonight notice if you would hear and that from a child that has known the holy scriptures notice this which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith that is in christ jesus i'm so glad tonight that the gospel still saves let the lord use you this week oh someone say well i don't want to talk to somebody because it's coveted i don't want to give them covet i don't want to get coveted i went out this week my wife and i out soul winning thursday walked up to a home just a new move-in visit walked up to the driveway of this young man and i kept my distance i said hey i'm pastor chapel from lancaster baptist church you know we had the most wonderful visit they had relatives we didn't get all the way through the gospel but tell you a little secret i'm going back and i'm going to keep going back to that young family comes to christ or tells me to drop dead one or the other but i felt like the lord worked in his heart and they were actually happy that somebody came by to say hello i want to be punctual in the perilous time anybody can be punctual when it's easy when their money filled up in the bank account when you've got great health when you don't have to wear a mask when things are going our way it's easy to serve god isn't it but how about being punctual in the perilous time god says i want you to continue in the things that you have learned and been assured of god says i want you to have courage i want you to have confidence i want you to have convictions i remember when we were endeavoring to build our first building and that's before that's back when i had hair back in those days some of you remember that and we needed to get that building up we're meeting downtown we had about 30 parking spots and i had no idea what i was doing and i knew not one city leader i didn't know anything about the planning desk i thought everybody was against christians in california and if you keep that attitude they'll stay against you if you pray with them when they're going through trials and if you lead them to christ and if you try to encourage their police officers and workers sometimes they appreciate that but i went in there i think i was about maybe 28 and they said to us now you need to make a master plan and at that time brother dan hartzel had joined the church i said what is that he said well that's where you put on a piece of paper everything you could dream of some people say brother chapel did you envision all of this when you first came are you kidding i remember telling my wife maybe someday we'll have 100 in church sweetheart wouldn't that be something i put down everything i could dream of i put down a little building here a little building there football field baseball field american flag and and lots of park kind of grassy areas we went into the we went into the city hall and and it was time for what they called our conditional use permit and you have to go before the planning commission to get the conditional use permit before it can then be approved at the council level and i walked in i took a few of our church family with us i said this will be exciting you'll want to take pictures of this this is going to be great it had been a hot summer sort of like this hot we hadn't had any rain we were in the midst of a drought season and and i didn't realize the impact of all that until i got in there and had several projects and the first three or four projects they um they they had five lights and if you got green that was good i figured this out if he got red that was bad i was young i just graduated from bible college but i knew green and red i knew that much and all the projects before us were red red red denied and they would say we're sorry with the drought we're not giving permits now we've had time for public hearing there was always this one lady she sat over on this side she had her cowboy boots and jeans she had a hat and they would have the cup number they'd open it up for public comment she'd come up and she'd say i'm against any building my horses have rights too they need water and my horses die i'm going to come back here and hold you accountable for it every time that's what she did every time boom five red lights they disapproved every project well that was my turn i remember the night and you had to have a big picture on the side screen and there was lancaster baptist church i remember the number cup 90-02 there was the picture of the north auditorium a couple small buildings but what i mostly remember was the color green all over the screen for those of you that are just visiting us we don't have anything green here unless we water the daylights out of it and when that slide went up there nearly everybody in that room went and they said who's here to speak for the project i didn't know a lot but i figured that would be me and i walked up and i looked at the council i said i'm new here and i said i'll admit i didn't even know we were having a drought but i said if you people would be so kind to approve this project our church is going to start praying for rain we're going to pray that god brings rain down here and i'd really like to ask you to prove this because our church is growing and we need some place to go anybody else to speak for no anyone else to speak against every eye went to the lady in the hat she just tipped that right down her head like this like john wayne just tipped it right down like this they conferred amongst themselves they came back out a few minutes later five green lights five green lights we started the project boy it was so exciting we got those graters out and out here we have silty loom soil so we had to dig 16 feet down into the soil we had to go 16 feet down then we had to over excavate it and bring it up and compact soil so that we could get the foundation and i'm learning all this as we go and it was fun oh we got that huge over here the north building is that huge 16 foot hole in there and i came out and looked at it with terry one night and i said look at that we got an olympic-sized swimming pool lancaster baptist church little did i know what was about to happen we were praying for rain the day after i said that the thunder heads moved in by the end of that day we literally had an olympic-sized swimming pool at lancaster baptist church it rained and it rained i kid you not it rained so that you could not get across certain streets in our city without a row boat or without a raft or something and it rained like that for four consecutive days i remember at that time some of you remember the antelope valley inn i remember going there often have breakfast remember having lee robertson for breakfast there several times i went in the antelope valley inn i looked across the restaurant there was the mayor and the city council having breakfast i couldn't help myself i walked over and i looked at him i said do you all want us to stop praying for rain anytime soon i remember one of them said aw pastor the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much that's the god we serve this is not the time to get defensive this is not the time to withdraw this is the time to say god give me courage god help me to hold to my convictions god help me to be a christian with confidence god help me to be punctual in the midst of the perilous time to continue doing what you've called me to do

Channel: Lancaster Baptist Church

Views: 2,313

Rating: 4.8400002 out of 5

Keywords: lancaster baptist church, lancaster baptist, baptist church, paul, chappell, paul chappell, pastor paul chappell

Id: AqnoI8IH_MU

Length: 51min 44sec (3104 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 31 2020