The Goal Of Ministry - [Colossians 1:9-14]

Good morning. I'm very thankful to be here to bring you greetings from Berlin, Germany from the

Evangeliumschristengemeinde in Hellersdorf. Long name, but it's a church.

It's a Russian -German church. We attend since quite a few years, and that's where our training center, the

EBTC, the European Bible Training Center, is at home presently. And we are very grateful for it.

Something you probably don't know is that in Germany there are lots of Russian Germans who have returned from Russia over the last 30 years.

And presently it's the biggest evangelical church in Germany are the

Russian -German churches. They count about 100 ,000, anywhere between 500 ,000 to 1 ,000 churches.

So we are very grateful to be part of one church that has already started other three churches in Berlin itself.

But today I want to talk to you about something what is on my heart, and that is how do we do spiritually.

That's questions we need to ask ourselves all the time. And I ask myself in Germany, how is the church doing spiritually?

Where is the church? What is the state of the church? And if we would look to a letter from Paul to the

Colossians he wrote, and he prays there in the first chapter to the

Colossians really. And he's focusing on five areas of their life and is thankful when he thinks about them, especially for their faith they have in Christ, for their love they have, the sacrificial love which he's talking about, for Christ and the church, the brethren.

For the fruit they produce, real spiritual fruit. And it's not only just one time that they produce fruit, but it's an increasing spiritual fruit they produce.

And the comprehension of the spiritual truth, so the word of God. When I think about that prayer, what he prayed there in chapter 1, verses 3 to 8, then

I'm thinking, could we pray this prayer today? Would we pray that prayer today?

And of course we should pray like this because we should be thankful for other believers. But the truth is that the state of the church is different very often in today's time.

And if I would look at the church in Germany, I'd say, well, the state of the church is so weak that it's really shocking.

It's shocking how the spiritual temperature of the church has been steadily going down and nobody has done anything about it.

It is shocking because on the one hand, when you read about Germany, I don't know how much you know about Europe, but when you read about Germany, you would think about Germany usually what

I hear, well, great country because produces great cars, economy is doing well.

I mean, that's basically, it holds up Europe right now with the euro, which is seemingly going down.

And Germany is doing well, and it's true, it is doing economically really well.

We had never had such a strong economy in the last, whatever, 20 years, I believe, or more.

But when we see that and then you think about the Second World War, after 67 years, they have rebuilt that country to such a state when it was totally in rebels, destroyed.

And today, many people think about, hey, they produce good cars, they produce good chocolate, they produce good soccer players.

Well, they're not bad and they have the Bavarians, they do this yodeling and stuff like this, good stuff.

But when you look on the other hand, what did happen since, and now

I'm going far back, 500 years ago in 1517, Luther pinned the 95

Caesars to the door of Wittenberg to do one thing, and that is to really go against the trend of the

Catholic Church and start the reformation by giving the Germans a few years later the

New Testament in that local, in that German language. So the common people were able to read the

Bible. We have, probably all of us have a few Bibles at home, right? At that time, it was in Latin or in whatever other language, but not in German and not in English too.

So he brought the reformation about, at least it started. But today, the same country is the most godless society on earth, according to research done by Thomas Smith from the

University of Chicago. The title of his research was,

Believe About God Across Times and Countries, April 18, 2012 published.

East Germany being the most godless society among all countries questioned with 52 % atheist and only 2 .5

% who have a strong belief in a god, not the god of the Bible, in a god. So what happened?

What does all the world praise Germany for? Its economy and its achievement, but spiritually, they are nearly dead.

Let's understand, Germany is much worse, spiritually speaking, than Africa, Asia, or any

Slavic country, and of course America. If you want to praise

Germany for anything, it's for its godlessness. They do not believe in God.

Their temperature is bad. It's really down. What have they produced?

What did Germany produce in the last 500 years? Well, I don't need to go so far back, just a few hundred years.

Humanistic philosophy, Kant, Hegel, Karl Marx, and you can name it. Psychology, Sigmund Freud and others, very known.

Liberal theology, Tübingen, from the University of Tübingen, from the University of Göttingen.

That's really, it has destroyed any biblical theology. Anti -authoritative education after the

Second World War, which basically trained the children in the school not to obey their parents.

Germany invented the cruelest system of human persecution in the modern times.

It was the Nazis under Hitler, and everybody knows about that, but it continued. The Stasi system in the

DDR, in the East German part. Until the day before the unification, October 1990, they interrogated people in the most cruel way you ever can imagine.

We visited those places. We heard the testimonies of the people. We knew how many people died.

Today, the unborn are systematically killed through abortion. And it's so bad that the young mothers don't understand why can they abort a child maybe a day before it should be delivered.

But why can't I kill my child when it's born? It's cruel when I say that, right?

You're shocking, but every week, seemingly, or every two weeks, you hear a testimony, you find a child somewhere.

In the fridge, in the trash can, or whatever. Why? Because it makes no sense for them, for the young mothers.

They don't know any ethics. They don't know God. Why? Why should I not? It's my life.

I don't want kids. And it is strange because Germany wants to grow.

They want to have more people. They want to have a growing society, but it's in a decrease because humanistically, they are on the top, but godly, they are totally ungodly.

Mercy killing of the hurting and the old is on the rise without consideration of any sanctity of life from God's perspective.

The European Constitution has no mention about God of the Bible at all. My wife and I and some other friends, we went into the

Reichstag, which is the main government building, and visited that. We had a tour, and we went there.

There's a chapel there. And you would find a cross or find the Bible there.

You don't find it. You find every other religion there. There's a cross on the table, a small wooden cross put on the table so they have an alibi.

And somewhere you will find maybe a looser Bible stacked away. But every other religion you find, everything from the

Muslims, the Buddhists, and every other religion, you find in that chapel, but not the Christian religion.

And instead, there's a big, huge sign on the floor. It's by a humanist, but not by the god or by any biblical message.

Do we need to wonder that the German people reject

God if the mind of the Germans has been corrupted by the philosophies of man?

We don't. That's what we have to expect. The world's achievements come with a high price, a lost and damned society deceived by their own philosophies.

Yes, they are, in the eyes of the world, successful. But by God's standards, they are lost and need the truth more than ever.

The sad part with this development is that the church has not kept a strong footing in the truth like the reformers when they called out for the five solas, sola scriptura, sola gratia, sola fide, sola

Christi, sola deo gloria. That's not—nobody would even know what that means today.

If you ask about Luther, they think about Martin Luther King, but not about Martin Luther. If we went to the university to do an interview, they didn't even know what

Luther achieved. They don't know that the university is basically based upon what Luther achieved.

Education came out of the church. So when Cheryl and I came back to Germany in 1997,

I was asked to write an article. The article was that—I named it that the church lost its identity.

The church doesn't know why they exist and for what they exist. And every year when our church—our classes start at the

European Bible Training Center in the three locations, I'm teaching most of the practical theology classes or also other classes.

And then I usually start with what is the function, what is the role of the church today? And I always try to find out what do they think the church should do?

What is the goal of the church? And I hardly ever get a biblical philosophy or understanding what the church should be.

Very often they say, yeah, they agree with the focus of the church. That it should be spiritual, the believers should grow, that they should be taught to maturity in God, to worship

God, and also to proclaim the gospel. But they also agree and they say, well, what are you really doing?

You know that's what's right, but what are you doing? What is your church doing? Well, they say, we are more concerned to fit into the

German culture and the society. And that's how the programs look. The problem is we as a church, and that includes the church here, should not fit in.

At least that is what we read when we look at what the scripture says. We should not fit in.

Jesus himself expected us not to fit in. And in the

Gospel of John, Chapter 17, you might want to open your Bibles to the Gospel of John, Chapter 17.

Jesus prayed the Lord's Prayer or the Disciples' Prayer, however you want to call it.

But he says in verse 14 and following, the following, I have given them your word,

Jesus prayed to God, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

Verse 15, I do not ask you to take them out of the world, but to keep them in the world, to keep them from the evil ones, sorry, they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

Sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth. As you have sent them into the world,

I also have sent them into the world. For their sake

I sanctify myself, and they themselves also may be sanctified in truth.

So Jesus knew and expected there will be confrontation and that they won't fit in.

Now the question is, how are we doing? How are we doing in a hostile world?

How are we doing spiritually? Our focus as a training center is really that men, that they grow spiritually.

And for that, in order to even reach the world, the hostile world, we need an army of believers who reach out and share the gospel, who share their life in Christ with us.

The goal is to grow everyone spiritually, every believer spiritually.

And that's even as a church and the training centers we are involved with. In Colossians 2, a very known verse, a passage that is very dear to my heart, is when

Paul writes to the Colossians the following, and he says, Him we proclaim, warning everyone.

It's chapter 1, verse 28 and 29. Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom that we may present everyone mature in Christ.

For this I toil, struggling with all his energy, that he powerfully works within me.

Paul's desire was the growth of every believer in the church.

So it's not only our desire to mature men or leaders in their ministry, but everyone, no matter what age group they are, no matter what social background they are, no matter what education they received, our goal is to mature them in Christ.

And that is exactly what Paul wants. Paul wants every believer to grow spiritually at all times, at all times.

And that is a challenge. So let's read the passage this morning,

Colossians 1, verses 3 to 8. This is his prayer.

This is what Paul prayed. We give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love which you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven, of which you previously heard in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you just as in all the world, also it is constantly bearing fruit and increasing, even as it has been doing in you also since the day you heard of it, and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned from Epaphras, our beloved fellow born servant, who is a faithful servant of Christ on our behalf, and he also informed us of your love in the

Spirit. So Paul praises, or prays basically for them, and he is kind of doing, he's just excited about their growth in God.

He says about their, he prays about their faith, their love, their fruit, their increasing of fruit, and their comprehension of spiritual truth.

And he was thankful to God for what God was accomplishing in the lives of these growing and multiplying

Christians. He was excited about that. He focused on that.

He basically did kind of a somersault and said, I'm just grateful for their growth.

And he's excited because they continuously grow. And that is something that we need to also focus on.

It doesn't just happen. Growth doesn't just happen. And it's not just one time when you come to know the

Lord, and that's it. When I first became a believer, I thought, you know, why do I need to go to Bible school?

I mean, why should I? I mean, I can read the Bible, and I know everything, right? And I realized fast that there are a lot of things

I don't understand in the Bible because my whole life I was thinking totally wrong.

My mind had to be changed. And by the Spirit and the Word of God, it could be changed and was changed step at a time, and I'm still growing and trying to understand things.

But this is something what the Bible teaches all together. In 2 Peter, verse 3, 18,

Peter says, But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Let us to him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. And it was something

God wanted. You see, from biblical perspective, spiritual growth is not an option. It's not like choosing a

Mac or whatever, going to a salad bar and choosing whatever you like. Spiritual fruit is an absolute command by God.

He expects us to grow spiritually. So the question we could ask, okay, last year, how did my life look?

Have I grown in the love for the believer? Have I grown in patience? Have I grown in long -suffering?

Have I been growing in all those aspects of spiritual fruit?

Spiritual growth for every Christian was the very heart of Paul's ministry.

He wanted them to be complete, and he wanted them fully mature. As a parent, that's what

I want my children. I'm not seeing my children as children. I always said, you know, for young parents, I always say to them, we are totally excited about your baby, that you have a new child, and so on and so on and so on.

And they're always, in the beginning, you know, the most important thing is to dress them right, that they look cute and all that stuff, you know, and everybody gets excited until we realize they are sinners and rebels, and we have to train them, and it's not just giving them everything they want.

And very often parents don't see their children as adults later. They see them as children, and we have to learn that they are adults.

They become another adult who is responsible to share the gospel and to come to Christ and share the gospel.

I mean, those people, we need to bring them up into maturity, and that's what we want every believer who comes to the church, who comes to Christ.

And Paul had that in mind when he said, for instance, in Ephesians 1, verse 18 and 19, having the eyes of your heart enlightened, he said, that you may know what is the hope to which you have been called, what are the riches of glory and inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of the power toward us who believe.

He wanted them to grow. Or the Great Commission, what is the Great Commission teaching, Matthew 28?

Well, yeah, make disciples. We all agree with that. But teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

And then Jesus didn't stop there. He said, behold, I'm with you always even to the end of the age.

He said, you know, I'm with you. I mean, I want you to do this because I'm on your side.

This is why the church must be in the business of both evangelization, evangelizing those outside the church that they might be saved and preaching biblical theology to those who know

Christ as their Lord, that they might grow in the knowledge of God.

And that's the only way to do it. There's no zapping in the spirit and you become a mature believer.

That's not happening. You know, I tried it all the time. It doesn't work. It just doesn't work.

It's hard work. It's the same thing when you're hungry, you have to eat, right? It's not that somebody injects you or makes you.

It's just the normal thing. A child, you need to feed. You need to do all these things. I mean, it's so natural.

Everywhere else we see that, but sometimes I think the Christians want to revert it and change things.

And it's not talking about mere academia. It's not like fill your word, read the

Bible, memorize it. That's not the issue. The purpose to study

God's word is to grow in the understanding of God. To know who the

God is who gave us eternal life and whose children we have become.

God wants us to have a big picture of him. Why? Because the picture of God is big.

Because the picture of God is big. There is no small God. There is a big God. And in order to understand him, we need to understand the whole counsel of God.

Put another word, don't cheat yourself by not knowing God. Don't cheat yourself by not knowing the

Bible. Don't go for the second best. Go for the best. The majority of believers sometimes cheat themselves just by not spending the time with God and the word of God.

They are not committed to grow in the knowledge of God. There are three things

I want us to do today and to just be reminded hopefully about that.

It's a priority of spiritual growth. It's a priority. We all should. Then there's a path to spiritual growth and there's a purpose of spiritual growth.

The priority of spiritual growth is God's. It is God's priority for us to grow spiritually.

And we read that in the verses 9 and following. Chapter 1, verses 9 and following,

For this reason also since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

And then he goes on. So that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord to please him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.

Strengthen with all the power according to his glorious might for the attaining of all the steadfastness and patience joyously, giving thanks to the

Father who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints and the light.

For he rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved

Son in whom we have redemption and forgiveness of sin. He made it very clear,

Paul. He wanted us to grow spiritually, every one believer to grow spiritually, and the

Colossians too. The priority is to grow spiritually. And he prayed for that.

He was so encouraged by that and he asked for that specifically that they would grow spiritually.

And then he said he understood that it was his job to do that. It was his job to pray for them.

He wanted that dearly. You see,

Paul was not content to see the Colossians or anybody to stop at the first base just to become believers and that's it.

No, he wanted them to have an adding score that continuously they grow.

There's a, you know, if I would just talk to you about your life as a

Christian, there should be a story. There should be a story of continuous growth and it's not about how many classes you visited or how often you went to church.

No, it is how you dealt in your life with suffering maybe, with patience, with problem people, relationships you have.

You thought they should divert from this relationship. Maybe it's your brother, your sister, you're always fighting.

Well, maybe God gave you the brother and sister to learn patience and loving somebody who maybe not loving you, loves you.

But that is spiritual growth. It is when you endure the things which are difficult. What did Jesus do? He had to endure.

He wanted to endure. He gave us an example. So what do you think?

If Paul saw spiritual growth as such a priority, shouldn't you make it your priority to walk with the

Lord and grow with him and make the knowledge of God your priority? What are you doing about it?

What are you doing about the growth? Are you about when you sin against somebody because you were not unpatient or you were unloving, do you go and ask for forgiveness and repent and change your life?

Do you pray about it? Okay, there are three suggestions I give. They're very simple. They are probably already practiced, but it's still a good reminder.

Develop a regular time of daily Bible study and reading. Develop a regular time of daily

Bible study and reading. Make sure that you spend time in the Word of God systematically.

I found out that people read here and there and there and there and then hopefully they understand what

God wants and what the counsel of God is in the Bible. Well, we have learned that it's very important to go really systematically through the

Bible because very often we leave out the things which are maybe heavy to read or difficult to read because we don't understand the background, but that's why you have training and Bible schools or church

Sunday schools and other things here that will help you to understand. Secondly, be in the fellowship with believers so they can encourage you to love and good deeds or admonish you and correct you when you need correction.

Hebrews 10, 24 and 25 really calls us to do that.

And it's not only the Sunday when we come together. The church is seen as a big family, as a body.

It's a functioning organism. I was just in another church two weeks ago.

Yeah, it was probably two weeks or three weeks ago. And then somebody talked about what the church is and he said it's an institution.

And I said, no, it's not an institution. It's not like any kind of worldly institution.

Maybe you think about the church that way and you could if you would be in Germany, in Europe.

But no, it's an organism. It's a living organism. It's a body that needs to be fed and grow.

So it's different. And make a commitment to get involved in the church, in the

Lord's work, not to just be busy, but to serve people, strive, do the one another's amongst you.

That the world needs to see that you love one another. They need to see it by doing it.

Okay, the second point is a key understanding to spiritual growth is that we understand the path to spiritual growth.

A deep knowledge of God's word. And that is very important, a deep knowledge of God's word.

To be filled with God's truth. And I mentioned that already or we read it in John 17, 17.

Thy word is truth. Matthew 5, 18 is another scripture which mentioned that not even the little tiniest point in the

Bible will go away before heaven and earth will go away. Meaning that the word of God is constant.

It's true. It stands. Psalm 19, I love this psalm because it talks about the creation of God's creation and then the supernatural, the special creation of God's word and how that has impact on the world and everybody.

And Psalm 119 which really praises the word of God and shows it how it's part of our life.

Paul wanted the Colossians to be filled with the knowledge of his will. He wanted them to understand, to be filled with him.

And he prayed for that. And you know what he did not pray for? Isn't that interesting? He did not pray that they would prosper in their business ventures.

Nothing like that. He did not pray that they would be free from trouble, free from persecution.

No. He didn't pray that. And that's important. To often make a mistake of praying for good things while failing to pray for the excellent.

For the excellent. He prayed that they would be filled with the knowledge of God's will.

This is the path to spiritual growth. Here another couple of observations.

Paul knew that such knowledge must be granted by God himself and it's not a product of human philosophy.

Be filled is a passive voice. So they will be filled. It's not something they could do.

God is an agent who fills the people with the knowledge of his will. When they seek it through the source he has revealed.

So, through God's word. Apart from God's word, there is no real growth happening.

You can hear about it obviously through tapes and something, but it's always based upon the word of God.

God is still the agent. You cannot get it by obtaining any science or philosophy.

It doesn't happen through that. And we know that from Germany. I mean you have the biggest known names from history and yet Germany is the most godless society today.

And the same will be true probably from every other country you will investigate. Truth is made known by God and given to us when we humble ourselves to ask him for it and seek it where he has given it to us in the word of God.

Secondly, he says, with all wisdom. It is full. He says he wants us to be filled with a wisdom that we are aware of.

And he continuously repeats this in the letter to the Colossians. He mentions this over and over again that he wants that they will, in verse 28, he says, teaching everyone with all wisdom.

In verse 2, 3, he says, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

In chapter 3, verse 16, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom.

And then later on in chapter 4, he says, walk in wisdom and toward outsiders.

Make the best use out of the time. So that's it.

He wants them to understand it and he wants them to understand the truth of God. Make known to them.

And God never reveals himself to human brilliance at all.

It is always through the wisdom to the word of God. And we read that in 1 Corinthians where he said to the

Corinthians that actually the wisdom of the world is foolishness in God's eye.

God's wisdom is foolishness to the world. So we understand it needs to be spiritually minded.

It's a product God wants and it comes through the work of the

Holy Spirit and the word of God. Seek him and he will let you find him.

Seek him and he will let you find him. Second observation, he wants them, the believers, to be filled with a full knowledge.

Not just some of it, but with a full knowledge. He used the intense form here.

He mentioned that over and over in the epistle. He said, full, fullness, filling, constantly.

He wants them to know it all. He just didn't want them to know a little bit, but know it all. And why did

Paul want them to have the full knowledge? The answer is because truth is the best weapon against a lie.

Truth is the best weapon against lie. The worldly philosophies and human reasoning and man -made religion need to be dismantled by the truth.

If you know the truth, you will not fall into the hands of the wrong teacher or the hypocrite or whatever.

You will be able to detect it. He says it even,

Ephesians 4 verse 18, Do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And he wants us to know the will of the

Lord. He wants us to be full of this. So, in chapter 2 verse 8, he warns the

Colossians about the danger of false teaching. And he says, see to it that no one takes you captive through philosophies and empty deception, according to the tradition of man, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ.

He warns them. And we need to be warned. We need to understand that we do not go that way.

That we really understand that the philosophies of man are not even good in a little bit.

And that's what I always have in the classes when we talk about psychology versus biblical counseling.

And we unmentionably say, well, but there are so many good ideas in psychology.

You say, well, but what is this based on? Well, they might make right observations, but their outgoing point is always human.

There's something good in man. And they don't see the man as what he really is from the

Bible. And they don't want to please God. They want to please themselves. And so the outcome is that people are misled.

And they turn around themselves and want to see how they do better. They want to get rid of the problem.

They just don't want to change. So the top priority is that we grow spiritually.

And the way to grow is through the knowledge of his will through the word of God.

The purpose of spiritual growth is to live a life that is fully pleasing to our

Lord. The purpose is to please the Lord. It's not just know the word of God.

It is to know him that you might walk in a manner worthy of the

Lord. That you might walk in the manner worthy of the Lord. Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ so that whether I come and see you, he says, or I'm absent,

I may hear of you that you are standing firm in the spirit with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.

Paul wanted always the believers to strive together for the truth and stand firm to please the

Lord, to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord. There's so much more to say how you can walk in a manner worthy of the

Lord, but it's based upon what you learn from the scripture. Paul wanted us to walk and walk worthy, and that needs to take place in our own life.

Walk right and be careful and wise when you walk to please

God himself. That is actually exactly what we want to do at the

EBTC, at the training center. That's what we want to do in Germany. That's what we want to do in every church. We want to build up mature

Christians, and that's why it's so important to pray. Pray for your own church. Pray for your own church that everyone, each individually, will grow spiritually and grow in the knowledge of Jesus Christ, grow in the knowledge of God, understand the whole counsel of God.

As such, I would challenge you as a church to continue to pray for us in Germany, to pray for the training center, to pray for us personally, and for the men who work with me.

Pray for us that our church would be a church known that will continually grow spiritually by walking worthy.

That means that we do every good work for Jesus Christ, not for ourselves, that our attitude is an attitude of worship to God, that we are seen by our

Lord as people who love the brethren, that we are testimony outside of the church because for our love amongst each other.

Another very important prayer is that we keep an eternal perspective on the life and ministry because it is so easy to become complacent and satisfied with the things of this world.

It's so easy even as a Christian. You get into a routine and a road and you forget why you are there.

It doesn't matter how much ministry you do. We want to keep the eternal perspective.

And, yeah, if you just remember that, and I want to also just be thankful for your church who has stood behind us in the years in the past and supported us financially with prayer.

God has given us a lot of fruit, which we really didn't expect that God would do that.

As I mentioned in the previous hours, that we have started 10 or 11 years ago with 20 people, yeah, 20 men and women at that time, also with the training.

But only after three or four years was it when we graduated three guys of the whole group.

The rest never really went through the whole training. Later on, one more finished his training.

Last June we were able to graduate 140 people, and that is a huge change.

The hunger for the Word of God is there, but it's still a drop on the hot stone, we say, when you think about 80 million people and not even a percent of believers.

There's a lot more to be done, and it starts with reaching out to everyone.

Let me pray. Let's stand for prayer, please. Father God, we are reminded about your goodness and your kindness.

You have revealed yourself through your Son Jesus Christ, the Word of God, and have built the

Church on the foundation of your Son and have given us the tools and the means to grow the

Church, and that is through the abiding Word and the truth that you have given us and the

Holy Spirit that indwells us. We ask that you will protect this Church, grow it in such a way that it's known throughout the area here and beyond the borders and that men and women will be changed and trained and new churches will be built.

God, we thank you for your goodness and your protection so far, and we ask really,

Lord, that we also honor you with our lives and men and women that are spiritually minded and are concerned about spiritual growth for ourselves and for others.