Opening of Bolton Bookshop 17.9.1994 — George Verwer

It's very special for me to be back in Bolton again. I lived here 30 years ago, been more or less around Britain and a few other places for the last 30 years. So I don't get back so much having now settled in London, a little closer to the international airports though my Manchester friends always remind me of their great airport as well.

The Printed Page and the Mission of Christian Bookshops

I'd like to read something from the Word of God together. That might be considered the bottom line as we consider this great challenge that God has given to us. The first bookshop I actually ever opened was in a little town called Saltillo, Mexico.

Then another one in Monterrey, Mexico. And then that was all done while we were going to Mexico as students and little did we know that what is known today as short-term missionary work was being born at that time.

In 1957, I was actually converted in 55 and did a very good job, the dates are a little mixed up due to whatever, doesn't matter much but it is interesting to just see how God uses the printed page. And I hope that you already are excited about literature and I'm praying that if you're not you'll become very excited tonight about the ministry you can have as a book agent or just loaning out books.

We now do not just sell books in Operation Mobilization, we give away vast numbers of books because many people will not buy at least certain books, the kind of books we want them to have, so we give it to them.

And we send books to men in prison, we send books as gifts to people like John Major, Jimmy Carter. I sent books to all the men of the South African cabinet a couple of years ago, had letters back from most of them.

It's amazing where a book can go. And you can go right down to Wesley Owen and choose a book specifically for a specific person or a specific need. Let's look at the Word of God first of all in John chapter 14, the Gospel of John chapter 14 and verse 6.

Jesus Christ as the Only Way to the Father

I call this the bottom line, Jesus answered, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. More and more pressure is going to be on the church to acknowledge all religion is equal.

And they'll want to include New Age, they'll want to include whatever is created out of the folly of man-made philosophy. The Word of God is clear that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life.

No man comes to the Father except by him. Amazing. Turn with me to Romans chapter 10. Again, great statements about salvation, believing on Jesus Christ. Verse 13, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Verse 14, Romans 10, 14, how then can they call on the one whom they have not believed? How can they believe in the one whom they have not heard? How can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent?

As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news. Let us pray. Living God, we thank you for your Word. We thank you for the power and the reality of your Holy Spirit. We want to know by your grace what it is to walk our talk and to talk our walk, to be your men, to be your women, to go where you want us to go and to do what you want us to do.

We want to know more about really being set free from the shackles of the self-life. And we thank you, O God, that you have not left us to wander in the dark in this sinful planet but you have given us a bright light.

And O God, we know you want to bless us tonight, you want to motivate us into greater exploits for you, both here and across the world. And God, we just present our bodies, as it says in Romans 12, 1, as a living sacrifice to you, even at this moment.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen. As Operation Mobilization and STL got bigger and bigger, I think a lot of people just gave up. We certainly never hear from them, so they must have just given up, thinking the thing just got too big.

A man wrote me a letter and he said, please take my name and address off your prayer letter list. Your organization has got very big and very complicated and I don't understand it anymore and I don't feel I'm able to pray anymore.

I don't know what he was praying all these years was that we would be unsuccessful and that we would fail and that we would not grow. I'm sure most of you have heard of the ministry of the ships, Lagos, then Lagos II and Doulos.

Operation Mobilization’s Ships and Global Reach

Just in that ministry alone are more people than in most mission societies. 500 people in the ship ministry. That has reached over 100 million people face to face. Doulos is now listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the oldest passenger ship in the world.

Right now in dry dock again in Malta, having just been refurbished in South Africa about one year ago. A ship that has a staff and crew of 300 people that sometimes has 40 ,000 visitors on a weekend going through almost all of them getting books, Bibles or literature of some kind.

We lost Lagos after 17 years of ministry and God gave us a much better ship. We should have sold Lagos long before that but we didn't have the courage so the Lord just took it gently, no one was injured and it's still sitting there on a rock in the Beagle Channel off the coast of Argentina and Chile.

Then he gave us this amazing ship Lagos II which some of you probably visited a few years ago. She's now in Trinidad and soon will be headed back to Gibraltar and then southern France and by next summer Lagos II will be here in the British Isles.

I'm sure you've heard about these ships. Did you know that the vision for these ships came in Bolton? How many knew that? Well that's good and the rest of you obviously don't read much. I went in the King's Arms pub this afternoon when we discovered it was the King's Arms.

We converted it into a Christian bookshop about 1964 -65 and it was there that the idea, I lived in that converted pub, it's still a bookshop but you just walk right by that one and go down to the left and you hit Wesley Owen, more to your taste, but you can go in there as well.

What do they call that other bookshop? It's a funny name. But I went up there this afternoon and I went up to the top room which is completely empty right now where my wife and I lived with our two children.

My daughter was born here in 19, gosh, she's 30, she's 30 and this is the 30th anniversary more or less of the bookshop and the book ministry from the shop. But as I went up to that room certainly my heart was filled with praise.

The Vision for Ministry in Israel and the Ships

I remember another decision we made in that room just before the vision of the ship came. Ray Lynch came back from Israel, we had no plan to have OM long term in Israel. Ray Lynch was a wildcat evangelist, he was leading hundreds to Christ.

He went to Israel, he got arrested and he came up to my little upper room there in Deansgate and he said, you know, we need to start a work in Israel and what he shared witnessed in my heart. We need to go to the Jews and we made the decision.

Decisions were real easy to make back then, all I had to do was make it and we decided to start OM in Israel. And then in that same room the idea came about an ocean going ship. A lot had to be done and it wasn't until 1970 that God gave us Lagos and 77 gave us Deulass.

So if there's any famous historical town in Britain for operation mobilization, STL and the ships, it's all part of the same family, it's Bolton, Lancashire. And we hope that you will spread the word around and get people to go down to Wesley Owen and find out more about it.

And we hope that the managers at Wesley Owen also will stay informed and be able to share this tremendous story. Because God uses stories, a lot of books are just stories, and God uses stories to stir people's faith.

George Verwer’s Conversion Through Christian Literature

Let's go back even further of how this thing was born in the first place. It wasn't me, I wasn't even a Christian. My whole life at 16 was business, women, pornography, money, and the fast lane of New York City.

So I wasn't about to start Christian bookshops, but a little godly woman put my name on her hit list and started praying for me. Not only did she pray that I'd become a Christian, she prayed that I'd become a missionary.

Fancy that, she didn't even discuss this with me. Just sort of a name it, claim it approach. And then this woman put feet onto her prayers like I'm hoping you will also do with the message tonight. For the word of God says that we should not be hearers of the word only, but doers.

This woman put feet on her prayers by sending me a gospel of John through the post. I noticed those same gospels of the pocket testament league in the pastor's office. And God used his word, God used his word to break my heart.

I'm amazed when I find people, really I'm just being honest, who say they love Jesus and don't engage in spreading the message. Even if you're mega shy and quiet. I remember one British gal telling about how she started to learn how to give out literature.

She was so scared that the first piece of literature she gave out, she just lost it. I think she left it in a telephone box. Just left it in the name of Jesus and she ran. But then she got a little more courage.

It is amazing how God uses a printed page. Actually, someone else left a tract in a toilet and a man went in there to, you know, do whatever he needed to do. And while he was sitting, he picked up this tract and was converted to Jesus before he got out of the toilet.

Some of you probably know the amazing story of the man who was going door to door, giving out literature. And he gave out a piece of literature to a man who seemed very unhappy. And later, weeks later, he went back to that home and the man said, come in, I want to tell you what's happened to me.

He took him up to the attic. In the attic was a box and a rope hanging from a beam. And he said, when you came to my door weeks ago, I was about to put this rope around my neck and take my own life. And out of curiosity, I answered the door, you gave me this tract, I knelt here by this box and surrendered my life to Jesus.

I want to know more about this great faith that I've now received. So this lady sent me the Gospel of John. I was then buying some literature in a newsstand and I came across a magazine about Billy Graham.

Just a secular magazine, but it was a point of communication. Some of the books in our shop are pre-evangelistic. They aren't all books, boom, just to punch you in the nose. They're pre-evangelistic, attempting to be a seeker sensitive, to reach the non-Christian with the Word of God.

So, because I had read about Billy Graham and he seemed a little bit normal, though I heard he was a hypnotist, so it certainly was not something my peers or friends were into. When Billy Graham came to New York City, it was actually just one night meeting, two years before the famous crusade, 1955, one night.

I went to that meeting, I sat as far away as I could because I heard he was a hypnotist and I watched him through my binoculars. And God just zapped me. And when he gave the invitation to repent and believe on Jesus, I was out of my seat to the front of this great Madison Square Garden fighting arena, trusted Jesus, and he came by a Spirit to live in me.

Persevering in Grace and Daily Discipleship

Things began to move like a tornado. From that day, that's 39 years ago, there has never been a day in which I've not experienced something of the power of God's grace and His Spirit. I've had miserable moments, sometimes up to a miserable hour.

I saw this verse, don't let the sun go down upon your anger. I did have an anger problem, so I made that a major target. Of course, you get a little extra time in the summer to deal with those things.

But as the winter comes, especially here in the north, you better keep short accounts with God. Don't let the sun go down upon any sin in your life. That's God's way. And if God could take a character like me and somehow work each day these 39 years, then I don't know who can give an excuse.

I'm not a natural Christian. Even today, I don't feel like a natural Christian. I don't feel naturally spiritual. Maybe you feel naturally spiritual. Maybe your testimony is every day with Jesus is sweeter than the day before, and you're just going higher and higher and higher in the things of Jesus each day.

Praise the Lord. I'd love to get your autograph at the end of the meeting. But that's not been my experience. Mine has been one of struggle, one of doubts, one of sometimes wondering if I could even go one more day, one more day.

Missions and Christianity Are Not Boring

It's amazing how many people, young people especially, think Christianity is boring. That's why we don't have that many young people here tonight. They think this kind of meeting, this is boring. Why would you go to this?

With the old kind of fashion, old fashioned Christian bookshops we've had for so many years, the average young person never go in them. They never go in them. They're boring. They're weird. What do these words mean?

All kinds of, you know, gospel book nook. That may have been in the States. I forget where I saw that. Gospel book nook. You know, what rock and roll 18-year-old teenager is going to go in the gospel book nook?

Not too many. Not too many. One thing we need to shout from the housetops to our young people, and I've had the privilege this summer of speaking to about 25 ,000 young people in every kind of crazy meeting you can imagine.

I've just come back from Stellenbosch University. Can you imagine? University, 2 ,000 every night at a missions conference. All university students. The final night, 3 ,000. 191 the final night made a commitment to go into world missions.

Christianity is not boring. Missionary work is not boring. How sad that young people today think that missions, that's also boring. We have this expression. Nothing more boring than a missionary speaker, except a missionary speaker with slides.

How can these things be? Could be partly our fault. Could be partly our fault. I have never had a fully boring day since my conversion. I mean, I'd like to have one. It would probably be quite exciting.

You know, a fully boring day. I've had boring hours. I've had boring minutes. I want to be honest. I've met a lot of boring people. Never had a boring day. Let me just tell you real honest, because I don't get to bolting so much anymore.

If you're not excited about Jesus, you're backslidden. That's it. I'm not saying you have to be as excited as me. We're all different. I'm a more excitable temperament. I got excited before I was converted.

Maybe before you were converted, you never got excited. When I first came to Britain, I was given this most ridiculous orientation. A man put me in a big black suit. And he said, you know, you Americans, you're very offensive.

You're outgoing. And the British people are all reserved. They're all shy. So, you know, be careful. Well, I'll tell you. A lot of the wildest people I've ever met come from Great Britain. That's right.

Especially when they leave the pubs and start drinking at the new wine bar. Then they really start to get wild. God works in different people in different ways. But I know this. Jesus Christ is alive.

And if Jesus Christ is in you, that is the greatest reality. You know, some Christians live from one meeting to the other. Which means, for some, it's just Sunday to Sunday. They have tremendous music.

And I love music. Now we've got Walkmans. We can listen to praise tapes, you know, all day long. It does tend to irritate the boss where we work. But the Lord Jesus is wanting us to realize we have to be excited about Him.

And live for Him, whether we feel it or not. Whether the music is playing or not. We are committed, as Jesus taught in all of the Gospels, to deny self, take up a cross every day, and follow Him. I hope we're all doing that.

Christian Books as Tools for Evangelism and Missions

I wanted to mention some of the books that we have at Wesley Owen. And some of them are on display here tonight. Because we like to strike while the iron is hot. You can get a book tonight. You'll get so excited about it.

Then you'll be down at Wesley Owen to get a dozen or two. And these books that we have brought along to the meeting tonight are very, very special. We are unashamed of declaring the power of the printed page.

Firstly, the Word of God. This week I was ministering to the leaders of the Christian Union Movement from all over the nation. 350 gathered at the Quinta down near Oswestry. Probably the same place where the OM office that was here in Bolton for so many years.

Do any of you remember when the office was above Mr. Baldwin's chemist shop? Any of you remember that? A few? He's in heaven. Mrs. Baldwin is up the road in an old folks home. And the famous OM office is near the Welsh border in Shropshire, which I can't pronounce, near Oswestry.

I was ministering there a couple of days ago. And 350 leaders of the Christian Union Movement, Cambridge, Oxford, Durham, Newcastle, Scotland, Ireland, were there. And they are now going to distribute hundreds of thousands of this Gospel of Luke to all the students, or as many students as they possibly can reach, in the whole of the nation.

Isn't that exciting? Things are happening. Things are happening. Let me mention a couple of these books that we've put on display tonight. One of the most significant is Grace Awakening, by a man named Charles Swindoll.

I believe this is probably, at least for me, one of the greatest books, if not the greatest Christian book I've ever read. The first three chapters is very basic, so I suggest you start reading in the middle, around chapter 5.

Squaring off against legalism, and then go right on. Chapter 6, being emancipated, guiding others to freedom, the grace to let others be. That is so powerful. Grace up close and personal, a marriage oiled by grace.

Oh, that was the hardest chapter in the book. My wife was extremely grateful for me reading that. Marriage oiled by grace. When you read this and get blessed, what is going to be the natural reaction if you really love Jesus?

It's going to be to get a dozen more and give them to your friends. Even a non-Christian will be blessed through this book, because it's so basic. It is a bit American, because Charles Swindoll is an American pastor, but it's a brilliant book.

Well, I don't have that much time to talk about all these books. There's a new one about the ship ministry, just basically stories, just published by Hodder and Stoughton a few weeks ago. There's the greatest missionary book of all times.

I just finished reading it through. I started in September and finished in September, because it's put in the form of a calendar. There's November 26th and 28th. When you get there, you'll be praying for Vietnam.

That is the most significant missionary book of all times. You can get a copy here or go down to the bookshop. Don't feel you have to read it right through, though that only takes two pages a day. And you'll have covered and prayed for every nation in the world.

And as the Spirit of God is living in you, this book will be exciting. I would encourage you. A book that goes with it is called Serving as Senders by Neil Parolo. I read Acts chapter 10, verse 15, because that says how will they preach, how will they go, unless they are sent.

There are more British young people that want to be missionaries right now than we have prayer and finance to get them out to the field. Isn't that amazing? We're not exactly the poorest nation in the world.

And as the Church goes, I've been in about 70 or 80 nations myself. OM now has a permanent base in 80 nations. But as we look out across the world, Britain is still in the top 10 nations in regard to potential for sending out missionaries.

Now we know the need here is also very, very great. But if the need here is great, where we do have churches, what can we say of the people's groups of the world where the Church in some cases doesn't even exist?

Did you realize that? How many of you have ever heard of the 10 -40 window? Something you do with double glazing. How many have ever heard of that? Just a few of you. Well, you can pick up this little paper free.

This was especially produced for the March for Jesus. And as I had a prayer walk around Bolton after tea tonight, I saw a big sign, March for Jesus, Bolton, next week. I thought all these marches took place in the beginning of the summer.

June 25th, the day to change the world, I was marching in New York City, even though I live in London. So the fact that your March for Jesus is coming next Saturday I think is so providential because this little paper was produced for the March for Jesus.

And we just happen to have a few thousand left over. So you can get one or a whole bundle free by meeting Kevin at our little OM 10 -40 window special display there. The other books are mainly in the back.

Reaching the Unreached Peoples in the 10/40 Window

What is the 10 -40 window? It's a geographical zone where 90 of the more unreached people of the world live. I can show it to you on my jacket. 10 degrees north of the equator to 40 degrees north of the equator, starting by Spain and North Africa.

That's the beginning of this window. It goes right across the Middle East, right on around to India, over to Japan. The back of this jacket, I made a mistake, it happens to be upside down. I didn't bother, I just dedicated it to Australia.

But that is the 10 -40 window. Listen, there are tens of millions in that zone that have never heard the gospel. One of the most exciting things about the Wesley Owen bookshops around the country and SDL, the wholesale operation, that started in a little army base in Chigwell, then Atherton.

That's how the bookshop was born in Bolton, because the wholesale base was in Atherton. And then we moved it back to Bromley for many years under the leadership of Jerry Davey, who's the man that opened the bookshop here.

And then it moved to Carlisle because the associate international leader of O .M. Peter Maiden is a complete Carlisle character. And so we ended up moving the warehouse there. If you've never seen the SDL new warehouse that burned down and then was rebuilt, don't miss it.

If you're driving to Scotland, it's not far from the motorway. And I'm sure at the Wesley Owen bookshop they'll tell you how to find that amazing literature warehouse. It is one of the largest Christian literature warehouses in the world, especially anywhere outside of the United States.

And it started partly right here in Bolton. I tell you, you should be so proud of this town. How many of you are proud of Bolton? You probably don't even come from Bolton. I was told when I came to Bolton, I preached in this Methodist church.

Mr. McKenzie was there, and I was told that night I was preaching that that pulpit, Wesley had preached from that pulpit. If anybody still has that pulpit, we sure would like to get a hold of it and put it on our ship.

We could take it all over the world, and thousands more would come to the ship to stand on Wesley's pulpit or to look at it or something else. Well, that probably won't happen. God is sovereign. God in his providence brought us here to Bolton way back in the mid -60s.

Prayer and Spiritual Warfare in Literature Ministry

And now here we are in 1994 to dedicate this bookshop, which may look like just a small thing. I mean, when you look at the other buildings around Bolton, I just went and looked at the town hall. I remember here when I went to give the mayor a Bible.

That was an interesting meeting in my life. A bit of mythology about that. I just heard about it today. But anyway, that bookshop doesn't look that ostentatious. But it's one of God's powerhouses here in this town.

And it will never be what God wants it to be unless the Lord's people here stand with it in prayer. We're involved in spiritual warfare. Spiritual warfare doesn't just take place Sunday morning in special church services.

Spiritual warfare starts the moment of your conversion and continues all of your life. We need your prayers. We want to see people coming to Christ because of that ministry. We want to see Christian literature go out to every person in this area through various channels.

We know we're just part of that. We'd like to see more book agents. We'd like to see people holding book parties in their homes. God's plan is not just for you and I to get a blessing from these tremendous books.

But God's plan is that we may bless others, not only here, but across the world through the power of the printed page. We're living in exciting, challenging days. We need to search our hearts and say, Lord, what would you have me do?

What would you have me do? Maybe invest a little more money in the printed page. Maybe become a missions mobilizer. Have you ever heard that term before? Actually, the word mobilization that God gave me, it wasn't the initial name.

The initial name of our work was Send the Light. The new name Operation Mobilization came because of a fiasco. As I went into the Soviet Union when I lived in Spain, when I first came to Europe, learned how to speak Spanish, I was learning Russian, and I went into the Soviet Union in the summer of 1961 before I came to England.

It was a fiasco. Have you ever heard of Brother Andrew, God's smuggler? How many of you have heard of him? We've got his book in the shop. Tonight you have Brother George. That's my name. I'm known too.

God's smuggler. Because I made a big mistake when I went into the Soviet Union. I was arrested by the Soviet secret police. They thought I was a spy. They were going to give me all the expenses paid holiday in Siberia.

I got two more days of interrogation. They discovered all this literature I had hidden in the cornflakes boxes and in the car, the printing press I had hidden in the car. They were very angry. Nationwide publicity in the Soviet press and photographs, and then a submachine gun escort to Austria.

It was there in a day of prayer, broken before God, realizing my efforts had been a bit foolish and premature, that I went into a mountain for a day of prayer. I went up the top of a tree. I was thinking about the war.

The word mobilization came to me. All the mobilization of the war. It originally was a military term. And God just gave me those two words, operation, mobilization, changed my life, changed the vision of our movement.

Then, before then, it was Muslims and communists and closed countries. That's all. Not Western Europe. From that moment on, Britain, Western Europe, the church, the local church, the key to world evangelism.

I moved from Spain to Britain. Within four months, God gave us 90 British people. Within another year, God gave us 900. And a mission society was airlifted called Operation Mobilization and its literature arm, STL.

And then Wesley Owen, and who knows what in the world will be birthed next. Somebody came to me and said, Oh, are you going to get a submarine for evangelism in depth? And I said, I don't think so. I don't think so.

A Call to Repentance, Vision, and Evangelistic Action

We are living in exciting days. And I want to close by asking you, Are you excited about Jesus? If not, why not just in a quiet way as we close, sing, or whatever else we do to complete this wonderful time together, just pray a simple prayer.

Lord, I turn from my lukewarmness. I turn from my lack of passion for souls. I turn from my prayerlessness. I turn from my lack of vision. The Bible says without a vision, the people perish. I'm overwhelmed by the lack of vision.

The average evangelical fish just sort of floating with the tide in the 20th century. We're supposed to be God's chosen people, not God's frozen people. And we need to take some of these powerful books and get involved in Operation Defrost before it's too late, as we see so many hundreds of thousands of people go out into eternity without a knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Let's not be afraid of old biblical words like repent. Let's seek the face of God and believe Him for an outpouring of His Spirit upon Bolton and Lancashire and the surrounding area, and that it will then push and guide men and women out to the ends of the earth where millions have never even heard.

Never even heard, how can it be? Brothers and sisters, we're not here by accident tonight. I was booked two years ago to speak tomorrow morning in Vere Street, London, and there are no more sleepers out of Manchester.

Do you know how I have to get to London? I'm going to stay with a friend who I just noticed came in, down in, what's the name of that place, Sandbatch, and then catch a train at five in the morning out of Crewe to get to my Sunday morning meeting.

I'm not here by accident, neither are you. What are we going to do about what we've heard tonight? Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for the power and the reality of your Holy Spirit. We again dedicate this book shot there in Deansgate to you, that somehow the impact may continue to flow to the ends of the earth, even as it did from thirty years ago, because you answer prayer, because you are sovereign, because you use ordinary people, and because it has been your plan all along to bless this town of Bolton and to use it for your glory, to touch even the ends of the earth.

We thank you for the printed page. We thank you for the materials we have at our fingertips. But help us, Lord, not just to bless or be blessed ourselves through these materials, but also to use them in ministry and to bless others.

We thank you, God, and we praise you in Jesus' precious name. Amen. And we hope that after the meeting you'll take a look at this tremendous literature display in the back with the books that I've mentioned.

We hope that you'll somehow order one of the cassettes of the ministry tonight and share this message with others, especially some young people, and that somehow some of you also might catch a vision to sign up as a prayer partner.

OM is now one of the largest British mission fellowships in the world in terms of British personnel serving Christ around the world. We need more prayer partners. And you can do that at our little display table before you go out.

Amen.

Honoring Kevin’s Vision for the Bolton Bookshop

Today, Kevin completes his last full week working here in Bolton before going to Bible college in preparation for mission work in Korea. I have to say that folks in Bolton owe a lot to Kevin. It was Kevin who had the vision for bringing the shop back into the centre of Bolton.

He found the site, and week after week he'd phone me and remind me to come up here to look at it, remind me to start negotiating with the YMCA, and without his persistence you would not now have this wonderful shop in the middle of Bolton.

I've only known Kevin for just under a year, and we've only been running the central region as it is now for just under a year, but during that time we've grown to respect, indeed to love Kevin for his commitment, for his enthusiasm, for his dry sense of humour, and above all, and you've obviously experienced that dry sense of humour, and above all, for that mission heart that he has.

And Kevin, it has been a privilege to know you, and the central management team just want to show you a small token of our appreciation for you. I really feel I've been part of a family occasion this evening, and we have a new manager coming to Bolton, John Watkins, and I do hope that you will welcome him and support him the way that you've done Kevin, and perhaps John, so you know who your new manager is, John could you just stand, maybe, I'm not quite sure where you are.