Voddie Baucham Q&A

we've got someone who we know very well now I think we've got to nobody baucom here with us he is honest of a tour throughout the u.s. at the moment if you don't know he is the Dean of African Christian University in lusca Zambia I think that is his home area is where his originated from better so he's sort of back home his wife's back there Bridget so he's here by himself and he's been a blessing to us in previous time and no doubt today as well don't forget Verde is not only a pastor conference speaker Dean father of many children husband of one wife but is also a author of many books so books are out there if you'd like to buy them I understand one is particular he's got a particular heart for Joseph he likes that so grab that before it gets sold out but buddy we are thankful to have you once again with us why don't you come brother and encourage us teachers that we might be fed thank you so much and just just like last time you know you buy those books the proceeds go to feed hungry children in Africa 7/7 every member oh yeah a couple of things that I just I wanted to address with you guys I I want to talk about the church the influence of the church the importance of the church wherever you are one of the things that's been very interesting for me I've always I've always had itinerant ministry and local church ministry and and been involved in both of those things and like I said this morning and the message you know I've had the privilege of you know preaching it in probably 30 different countries and and being in just about every state in the European in every state in the US and it's amazing to see and experience the church in different context and it's funny you know Barry now we're talking about this this morning a lot of times people will see me at a conference you know and there's you know ten thousand people or whatever at the conference and they'll assume that well you know you come to a place where you know is not thousands of people maybe it's a little disappointing it's absolutely not it is absolutely not because when you begin to understand that in different parts of this country the the local church takes on different expressions and different importance it becomes at times even more meaningful to be in a smaller what would be a smaller crowd you know to me because I understand that this is huge here right I understand that there are not a lot of churches around here I understand that you know where I was serving in in Houston it's not the real rolls okay I mean in in Houston there are pastors who you know they got you know 500 people to say yeah pastor a small church and you know whatever because we don't live in the real world in Houston there are what a dozen churches that run 10,000 or more I mean it's like you know churches that are a thousand to five thousand dozens and dozens and dozens of them around town right it's crazy it's absolutely crazy it's not the real world and so people there have no clue that the average Church in America is 74 members that's the average Church in America okay and so you know when when I come to a setting in a situation like this I understand the Northeast I mean I I preached you know you know up and down to England and and and been in places where you know Christians know each other all over the state right I mean just because you know and it's interesting because they'll ask me something to you know you know so-and-so in Texas like yes you know we're not Vermont sure we got churches the size of Vermont right so so so but oftentimes what happens is for you you don't get the privilege of doing well you know what I would have done and so this is kind of this is what you know right I want you guys to understand that a church like this in a setting like this is incredibly strategic and I don't know if you think about yourselves like that but you should you should recognize number one it's an incredible blessing in a context like this I get emails and letters from people all the time who just I mean they can't find a good church they there's part there's parts of this country America is incredibly blessed you know there are people who you know we move we've left the country and you know there are people who are well-meaning people and they're like man you know no it's what you're doing is important but boy we sure need you here in America and like no you don't know you don't know I mean really you don't the bench is so deep here when you go to other parts of the world you realize that 95 percent of all Christian books are published in America in English think about that the most influential churches on planet earth are in America and in America that the most the most influential and listen to pastors on earth in America you can't name to feel Logan's outside of America whose books people feel like they need to buy and read you can't name to most of you bread can't name one write it because it's just I but you don't think about that do you you know so we we need to be aware of that the other thing is this when you're in a situation like you are in a place that is as strategic as this I want to encourage you to begin to think really big about how God can use you right here in New Jersey I want you to start thinking about the fact that not very far from you there are people who don't have anything like this I want you to think about what that means in terms of the commission that God has given to this church I'm not saying this because you know I know about your evangelism strategy or your church planning strategy or your dis or your that I'm not saying this as a critique of anything I'm just saying this because I understand the strategic nature of this place and I want to encourage you to begin to think that same way because when you're in a strategic place like this it's not fair to think small and when I say that I don't mean yeah we need to bust out the walls this place needs to be bigger that's that's not what you're hearing from me what you're hearing from me is you've got friends and neighbors who are not hearing the gospel amen you've got friends and neighbors who are not in healthy churches you've got communities not too far from you that they may be too far for people to drive here regularly right but but they don't have healthy churches are you are you at least praying that this will multiply you know 80% of all new converts this is this is countrywide usy 80% of all new converts they come to faith in churches that are less than 10 years old right that's that's something y'all that's somethin so are you at least praying that you know in that community that's an hour away from here where people don't have that healthy Christian witness that that that God will raise them up and then maybe he'll start raising up men right here who will go plant those churches hmm are you at least thinking like that huh I hope you are right because what's what's really sad is when you have a situation like this and you had the kind of needs that are around you and we start you know having arguments over the color of the carpet instead of thinking strategically about how God can use this thing that he's doing so again this is not a critique okay this is not a critique I'm did I'm a church planter it's in my bones and I now live in a third world country and we what we have here is absolutely amazing and the more time I spend away from this country the more I realize what we have here right and it's kind of hard you can't see it when you're in it you get away from it man and you appreciate it you know yeah we are saying you know down Texas you'll miss your water - your well runs dry right and this this is true as well for us so you know on that note I'd like to do a couple things one just some sort of very practical encouragement for you in terms of gospel ministry and outreach and then to some time for you to ask me some questions one thing is this preaching the gospel to people sharing the gospel with people we have to stop thinking about it in terms of I have to be able to answer every potential and conceivable question before I started vandalizing because somebody might ask me something that I don't know stop it just have a clear grasp on the gospel just have a clear grasp on the gospel and having that clear grasp on the gospel learn how to initiate conversations and turn them toward that gospel not to the point where you're you know being a noxious with people or seeing people you know just as opportunities for you to you know speak your peace or whatever you don't want people to start you know turning going the other direction every time they say you coming amen but but we really do and let me give you a small example one of the things that I do and it can sort of become a habit but but it's a habit that at times leads to spiritual conversations people are always you know we see each other we greet each other and what do people say how you doing and I try to respond by saying better than I deserve and you'd be surprised how many times people you know go how about what don't really get you having a really good day you have an you know better than I deserve and oftentimes that will lead them to kind of ask me a question basically you know what do you mean by that well I mean what I mean by that is Here I am this wretched sinner who's been saved by God's grace and His mercies are new every morning and I just continue to be overwhelmed by that guess what they just invited me into a spiritual conversation now I baited them amen right I ain't no shame in my game right so I baited them into it but again a non non offensive you know non you know banging you over it you know but here we are and that conversation can go a little further or that you know might just be you know kind of seeds that we plant you know it may be I'm staying at a hotel for a couple of days you know and then I come down on the third day and they're like still better than you deserve yep still better than I deserve right so again that's just that's just a little thing sometimes when we go out to eat I may have share this with you before you know our server okay we're about to pray for our foods or anything in particular we can be praying for you about right yeah you'd be surprised how many times that one on one occasion we said that and the girl was like I'll be back okay when we kind of get ready now but yeah a little bit she comes back she sits down I listen here's what happened today then she had just had a crushing blow that day didn't want to be at work was overwhelmed and then somebody said to her how can we pray for you she's like oh wait a minute let let me tell you that let me answer and then she goes can you do it now and so we just you know is that every time no it's not every time but here's the deal folks for most of us what we end up doing is we go through life and we're not intentional or purposeful about trying to engage people so we never do but if there are some small things that we can do right to put ourselves in a position to be able and willing and ready to engage when the Lord uses whatever thing is to open up opportunities the next thing you know you know we're starting to walk in that more regularly okay so that that's just that's just a couple things so understand the gospel understand the good news understand you know creation fall Redemption consummation there's a God who made the world sin came into the world we're all sinners you're looking around and you see that we need redemption God has made a way for us to be redeemed you know God must punish sin you can either punish it by pouring out his wrath on his son or by pouring out his wrath on us we have to repent of our sin believe in Christ but you just understand the basics of the gospel so when the opportunities arise we can we can share those basics of the gospel have some things in your arsenal that that open up those opportunities right I've shared with you a couple of them there's others that that you can use that that open up those those opportunities and then finally I'll say this take advantage of and even seek out opportunities to actually have relationships with people who are not in your holy huddle okay I talked about this in my latest book expository apologetics but I am I am a martial artist I'm a competitive martial artist I compete in Brazilian jiu-jitsu and I started you know several years ago I was looking for something my oldest son and I could do together and wait I found this Brazilian jiu-jitsu stuff and I was like a fish who found water you know and I just I loved it for a number of reasons I loved it and I just happened to be good at it and and competed at it and was successful and and was at a school where there were some very competitive guys and even some professional MMA guys you know that I was able to train with but all of a sudden something happened I realized because this is what happens to pastors it's what happened to all of us as Christians we come to faith and then we get more and more involved in the church more and more involved in our Christian life and after a while you look up and the only people that you know well and have meaningful relationships with are Christians how are we going to evangelize right and most of us are not co-called evangelist right somebody I don't know sitting over there I'm going to walk up and I'm there people with that personality most of us not so much so if we're not intentional about creating avenues and opportunities then we'll end up not having contact these people so now here I am you know part of this this school this team you know which for me I've been an athlete my whole life and now all of a sudden I'm a part of a team again we're going to tournaments and we're competing together and we're no blood sweat and tears literally together and I've got friends who are lost for the first time in over a decade right and it's not man I hope somebody lost comes to church so they can hear the gospel is gonna be none I'm going to days a week to class and there's one other Christian and my whole little deal that I know of and all of a sudden you know there are people who are starting to have conversations with me about things off the mat that I would never have been involved in and not been involved in in this world in this circle I'm so so think about that right think about some ways that you can incorporate this in your own life all right and again all of this is in specially important when you understand the strategic nature of what it is that God is doing in this particular place all right all right okay time do we have left ask me your questions about this some of you may have questions to ask me about our work and I'd you know what a time for us to do that but go ahead ask me a question what does it go yes yeah yeah well that's a great question because this is one of those opportunities that we have to be involved with people who are not believers and there's a lot of different avenues that you know we can run in terms of with our children and I think you you basically you're you're kind of answering your question as you ask it right we have children we can't protect our children 100% our children are going to run into things we're going to have relationships with people those relationships are going to be messy by the way that's not just your neighborhood that's your extended family can't say Amen you ought to say ouch right yeah you don't have to just be worried yeah those people like those people out there that I don't know and I don't know what they had on the people I do know I'm related to them and I don't want my kids around them right but we got to do it okay and so what I think essentially what this leads us to is this idea of being parents and as parents you know everybody talks about well I don't want to shelter my kids well you're in sin because that's part of your job Amen somebody that's part of your job sheltering your children is part of your job okay and so that's number one get that in your head sheltering your children is part of your job don't fall prey to this grossly unbiblical mentality that basically says Christians can't fully disciple loss people have to complete the discipleship job essentially that's what we're saying I don't want to shelter my kids why well because discipleship requires that lost people handle part of their discipleship what you tell my will is that's that's not true that's not true the Bible is completely sufficient in all matters of faith and practice amen and all matters of faith in practice shelter your children as much as you possibly can okay and in sheltering your children prepare them here's what's interesting right how many military folks we got here okay so wait so we got military folks right how many of you military folks were involved in a training process where they said hey we're going to teach you a couple of things here for a couple of weeks but then we're going to send you out there in the battlefield so you can learn the rest of the stuff you need to learn huh no you are going to be completely sheltered from the battle we are going to do things to give you everything that you need to know based on our experience and the experience of others who have been where you're going we are going to simulate that increasingly as you get closer to the time where you are going to do it so that when we finally stop sheltering you and unleash you you are ready huh that's how we do it right but with our kids we get it into our heads that are you smell a little sniffing in okay so yeah that's that's a long way around to enter any question but the answer to your question really is more philosophical right because practically it's going to change from you know setting to setting it's going to change as they grow older but what we do is we shelter them as much as we can we protect them as much as we can we prepare them as much as we can you know we talk to them about things that we anticipate that they might run into okay as much as we can yeah and then we do the messy stuff and go back and fix it again go bet you know you're never done you're never done I you know my kids glad we have nine kids they go from 27 to three we're never done Amen somebody right we're never done you know as all folks used to say they get off your knee and in there on your heart amen we're never done okay all right next question yes yes yeah yeah yeah yeah so the question is dealing with people he says he deals with juvenile detention centers and trying to balance you know giving these people the gospel these practical skills having to help them understand think from an eternal perspective and the question is about you know kind of how we how we do this it's interesting that's African Christian University as well it used to be the way that we thought about education in general but the idea at ACU is we have these young people and they're coming and what what the mentality is is some in tality of education I'm going to school so I can learn skills and get a job no the first two years at ACU regardless of what your major is the first two years everybody does the same program and it's basically a biblical worldview curriculum so if you're doing agriculture chemistry physics theology education business first two years you're doing the exact same exact same courses okay because what we're trying to communicate is regardless of what you're going to end up doing your biblical worldview foundation is key now by the way this is what's wrong with education in America okay the second thing is everybody participates in a student labor program so they learn how to work how to think about work to have a theology of work and actually get some skills anybody here working in personnel trying to hire young people coming out of college today hmm anybody okay it's horrible it's horrible kids coming out of college today they don't know come here from Sikkim okay they don't they don't know anything and they believe that because they have a degree they're entitled to you know management level on day one right it to take a job where they actually have to do something and work their way up and whatever yeah but you don't know they have no practical skills no life skills they just don't so we have the student labor program so that these young people are actually learning how to work so you're learning how to work with your hands you're building a theology of what work is why it's important how it fits into the cultural mandate right be fruitful multiply subdue exercise Dominion there's a mandate there and it has to do with working so they're learning that first two years everybody's doing living a worldview curriculum because whatever it is that you're going to be learning it has to be built on this foundation and then as they finish within whatever their curriculum is every course is taught from a biblical foundational perspective okay so this is absolutely what we're doing which is exactly what you're talking about right so what we have to do first and foremost is we have to come to a place where we realize that this is what education which by the way is discipleship don't find the word education in the Bible right education is a discipleship okay but this is what discipleship is this is the essence of discipleship it is giving people I mean that's we turn the idea of discipleship into a class you know I'm gonna go through a discipleship class I'm gonna learn this and I'm gonna learn this I'm gonna get this information ah I've been disciple let me go to somebody else right no did I stop what Jesus did with those men he lived with him for three and a half years he gave them information and then applied it in life that's discipleship okay so it's probably more than you were asking for but got to get AC you plug in there man yes yeah yeah that's a great question the question is you know that all the demands of my schedule and all this other stuff how do we keep our home a place where basically we can do family and where our children can can can can feel that you know it's interesting when I was here a couple of things that I that I did I mean for me and it had to do with the fact that I've always had an itinerant ministry little interest ministry or whatever I always office at home the last I don't decade of my ministry of office at home maybe because we're homeschooling so the children are there and because I had this idea of ministry and I'm like okay if I'm away at the office all time then you know six days a month that's the other thing I limit always limited my travel and finally we say with a parrot down to about six days a month so limiting my travel often again at home and then having the things that we built in to our family like our regular family worship you know and every evening like you know some weekend things that we had that we do like on a regular basis other things that we sort of participating together and then things that we don't do so there are things that we that we don't do because of the demands that they have on the schedules of children and the way that they can divide up a family right so the things that we don't do because of that so we do all of those things to try to create an environment where our family becomes the hub and everything moves around that right it's it's the immovable object at the center of our life you know not baseball or soccer or you know whatever our family is the movable object at the center of our life and so all of us try to operate and function in a way that that we respect and I have to ask the lead in that you know all right yes yeah some more practical things to kind of bait people or to get into a conversation about so I think you know one thing is is the the the way that we the way the way that we greet people the way that we enter into conversations with people but you know other things can be for some people that's like things that they wear right I you know I had another ring with some Hebrew riding on it and it was from Ruth you know I'm not beloved than she is mine it was in Hebrew you know so that a lot of times people would see that maybe hey what is that well now all of a sudden we're talking about marriage and we're talking about the Bible and we're talking about you know so that's a that's a that's another way they're little things like that that people have you know just any any number of things you know that we can use things that may be particularly you that that you can use [Music] kind of hard to think of them just right up yeah yeah yeah having conversations about the news and and turning into yeah what do we what do we what do we do about this yeah those are those are things that we can do you know because there's always something going on in the news that we can you know we can talk about and if your type of person who can just naturally start up conversations like that and get into things like that use that right use that but even but even people who who don't have that right because there are some folks you know what do we say about them they never meet a stranger right there are those kind of folks and that's great but most of us are not like that so that's when we need some of these other maybe more subtle things that will will help us start conversations all right we got a few more minutes yes yeah she was saying how this is heartening it is how the media portrays our portrays our country yeah you you should listen to the media where I live when I first moved you know all we have is BBC where I live and they make CNN look conservative and I remember when I first got there and this was all I could listen to I'm a conservative talk radio listening right bible-thumping wingnut pipe you know and and so I've got over there listening to BBC and I'm just going well what are their sources especially when I just got in there I'm layout I just moved here this is not true this is not what's happening this is not what's going on this is not you know but hey that just that is what it is here's the great irony everybody still wants to come here everybody okay they still want to come here and and if you take you know I call it the magic Passport you know the US passport you know one things you learn traveling in other parts of the world and now living in another part of the world Zambians want to go anywhere anywhere outside of sub-saharan Africa man they've got to have a letter of recommendation they've got to fill out an application they've got to submit bank documents they've got to do all this stuff to get a visa to leave the country and basically prove that they're going to come back right man but we got the magic passport there are very few places in the world that we got to make reservations right I went to Russia a while back and yeah I had to go through a whole ordeal there and send off my passport and I was actually upset but basically that's the way most of the world operates because they don't have the magic passport we have the magic passport that gets us everywhere right and everybody wants the magic passport so as badly as people try to portray us and talk about us all over the world everybody still wants the magic Passport you know cuz they know yes yes yeah um yeah yeah yeah well in my view of Revelation the days of Revelation started at the time of Christ but so the talking about an article that posted about the childless leaders in Europe and and almost all not you know all of the major leaders of the European nations and almost all of the leaders of the EU nations don't have any children okay they don't have any children not Knut's all of one or two like almost all of them right they don't have any children so and and the essence of the article was you know here are people who are basically making these decisions for the future of you know their nation or whatever and they don't even have a reference point for future they've got no kids okay and you know essentially boy I mean our time is up but there's a there's a documentary called demographic winter and demographic winter is basically about the plummeting birth rates worldwide replacement rate is basically 2.1 children per couple right that means you're basically replacing yourself you're static you're not growing but you're not dying that's replacement rate point of no return somewhere around 1.4 and what that means is you get to one point four or below basically there is mathematically no way that your culture is going to survive past the next couple of generations there is no European nation at replacement rate and almost all of them are below the point of no return so when you get to that place especially when you have cradle-to-grave socialism you have what's called an aging population what that means is we have more pensioners than we have younger people to pay their pensions the only way you can answer that is through immigration which is why Angela Merkel was calling on all the EU nations to bring in as many Syrian refugees as possible but it's easy for her to do because for example Germany doesn't have birthright citizenship so Germany can bring these people in use them in their labor force and deny them citizenship unless of course they you know prove themselves worthy of it France on the other hand has birthright citizenship and many of their colonial nations right Nations that used to be colonies of theirs are now Islamic Republic's so France starts open up their doors to immigration and Muslims from their colonial countries are the ones who come in french-speaking and because they have birthright citizenship what that means is France right now is on a trajectory where the for too long France could be an Islamic Republic okay Wow but okay so I'm over my time and you already I can't believe you got me started on this is anyway Europe's in trouble okay um your europe's in trouble and and the muslims have a saying in europe europe is ours they just don't know it yet yeah so on that note we'll be dismissed until our to our next service [Applause]

Channel: Grace Bible Church

Views: 39,753

Keywords:

Id: gn4jZizQuYY

Length: 42min 21sec (2541 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 07 2017