God's Elect in Every Nation

God's Elect in Every Nation and the Mission to Unreached Peoples

So, she was born about 10 months ago. We got back into the country right before she was born, and then they started closing things down, and Indonesia is shut right now. So, we can't get back in. We were supposed to go back a couple months ago, but we're still able to continue on with our Bible translation.

Also, since last time we were here, we finished our New Testament translation. I mentioned, again, in Sunday school that we'd been working on this for about 16 years. We've been working in Indonesia for 17 years now with a language called the Tao language.

It's the Tao tribe. If you know anything about Indonesia, it's the world's most populous Muslim nation, and that's exactly why we went there. We were looking for places to spend our life that met the criteria of Romans 15, 20 through 22.

If you're not familiar with that passage, Paul says, the Apostle Paul, he says, the reason I go where I go with the gospel. He said, I'm looking for places that meet two criteria, and he says in verse 20 through 22, I want to go to the places where the name of Jesus has never been named, never been heard.

Number two, where the foundation, a foundation has never been laid. Other translations, they translate that where there is no church established, and so we thought, what better place to look for a place that isn't familiar with the name of Jesus and where there are not churches established than the world's most populous Muslim nation, right?

So that's why we went there. We ended up getting over there, and we found out that mixed in with all of those Muslim people groups, there's hundreds of languages in that nation, there are also many animistic people groups, and animistic meaning that they believe everything's controlled by spirits and so on.

We started talking, we first moved to Java to learn the Indonesian language, and as we were learning it, we began speaking with old veteran missionary pilots that had been flying around the country for a long time and asking them, where have you seen from the air places that you think meet those two criteria, where the name of Jesus maybe perhaps hasn't been heard, and where there are no churches established, and there was an old, old, old veteran pilot, his name was Tom Hans, and he's still alive.

Tom, he said to me, he said to me, Scotty, he said, there's this one place. He said, every time I fly over it with the helicopter, I look down, and all I see are thatched roof houses. He said, I look down, and he said, there's no signs of the outside world, there's no tin roofing, there's no airstrip, and he said, and then when I come in really close with the helicopter, he said, I come in close, and the people, they get scared, and they run from the aircraft, they run into their houses.

He said, I think maybe that's the place, that is a place where the name of Christ hasn't been named, and there's no churches established, and so we looked at a map together with Tom, and Tom, he was so old that when he went to fly that helicopter, his hands would shake like this, and it made us nervous to fly with him, but once he locked onto that joystick, man, he was a good pilot.

He could go in and out of anything, and a lot of pilots die over there, and the fact that he'd been there for years shows how good of a pilot he was, but he showed us on a map where this place was, and my wife and I, we didn't have kids at the time.

We hiked into that area after we took a dugout canoe multiple days up a river. We hired a guide that could speak a neighboring language, and we came around a corner in the river after we'd been traveling a couple days up this river, and there were three guys standing on the riverbank, and they had bows and arrows, and they were standing there, and we didn't know what to think at first because none of them were smiling.

None of them looked happy to see us, so we came within distance of them, told the guy running the boat to cut the engine, and then our guide that spoke the neighboring language that was our guide, he yelled over to them.

Iki mago ye, iki naka yo bage.

He yelled out to them, how many of you are there? Where are you from? What people are you? And they just looked at us. They didn't say anything, just stood there with their bows and arrows. He yelled it again, and eventually the head man of the three, the oldest man, he stuck one hand forward, and he motioned us over like this, and we thought, okay.

So we worked our way close to that riverbank, and we thought we need to show friendship in some way. We got out of the boat and started walking up, and the only thing we had to show friendship that we could think to give him what our backpacks were full of were ramen noodles.

Because they're lightweight, you can put a lot of them in there, and we were gonna be hiking for weeks, right? So we had to get a lot of food. So we bought all these ramen noodles. We pulled out a couple packs of ramen noodles, walked over there, and I handed them to him, and he looked up, and then he smiled.

And I thought, okay, this is good. And then he reached back into his own bag. It's made out of bark from string that they make from the bark of trees, and he reached in and he pulled out a colorful parrot, and he handed it back to us.

And then he motioned towards our boat. They became our introduction to the tribe. They led us into the rest of the tribe, and we began working with those people. We didn't know why they were so friendly to us.

We found out later on why, and I'm gonna talk about that in a few minutes. But that's where we've been working ever since. Now we're translating the Old Testament into their language. We're in Deuteronomy right now.

We're trying to finish up the Pentateuch for that language this next month, and then we're gonna keep on going. Lord willing, we'll finish translating the Old Testament for them as well. And we're also working on a solar audio Bible.

We've taken some over, and we hadn't taken enough. Half of them got confiscated by the government. The other half made it in, and they need more. So we're taking these back as soon as we can get back in.

John 10 and the Feast of Dedication

But I don't wanna just tell stories this morning. I wanna look at the Word, because I feel like the Lord has laid a very specific passage on my heart this morning for you guys, and I've never preached from it before in English.

I've preached it to the Tao people. But we can look at it together. John chapter 10, verses 22 through 31 is the passage that I wanna look at this morning, and I'm excited to talk about it with you. There's a number of reasons that I'm excited to share from this passage, and I mentioned in the Sunday school class that one of the reasons I'm excited to share here this morning is because theologically, I know that I am one with this church.

Through my conversations with Pastor Keith and Michael Collier and the different people I've talked to in this church, we have a common ground that partially comes out in this passage. So I'm excited to share this morning.

I share wherever will invite us, but there are many churches that we go to that have a very hard time with what was mentioned in this passage this morning, whether they will admit it or not. And so this is an amazing passage to look at together this morning.

But I'm gonna read John chapter 10. I'm gonna read verses 22 through 31, and then once again, just commit this time to the Lord and talk some more about what God's teaching me and also about the awesome things that he's doing in the Dow tribe.

So John chapter 10, verse 22, it goes like this. It says, at the time, the feast of dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple in the colonnade of Solomon. So the Jews, they gathered around him and said to him, how long will you keep us in suspense?

If you are the Christ, tell us plainly. Jesus answered them, I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not part of my flock.

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father who has given them to me is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand.

I and my Father are one. And then it says, the Jews picked up stones again to stone him. God, I thank you for your word. Man, I look at your word this morning, I'm just, I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful, Lord, that you've shown me who you are, that you're the Son of God, that you proved it over and over again, and you've changed my life, Lord.

You just, I can hardly take it in, thinking about it, Lord.

It's just amazing.

I'm undeserving, Lord. I don't deserve to be part of your family. None of us do. The Tao people didn't either. None of us do. But you work in our lives, and you open up our eyes. You do that work that only you can do, as Jesus said in John 6, 44.

He said, no one can come to me unless the Father draws them. Lord, thank you for drawing me. Thank you for opening up my eyes. I couldn't have opened them myself, and I know that, Lord. And I pray that you would do that this morning, Lord, that you would do that work that I can't do.

I can't draw people, but you can. Lord, do that work that only you can do. Change our hearts where they need to be changed. If there's anybody in here with blinded eyes this morning that does not realize who you are, Lord, I plead with you to open their eyes.

Thank you, Lord.

Amen.

The Feast of Dedication and Hanukkah

So this passage, man, I love it. I love it. I'm gonna get more into the later verses, but starting off with the setting here, it says, it was the time of the Feast of Dedication. They're having a feast, and it says the place was at Jerusalem.

I don't know if any of you guys know what the Feast of Dedication is called in modern times. It's called Hanukkah. Did you realize that? It's the same thing, the Feast of Dedication, as the Festival of Lights, as it's called today.

Hanukkah celebrating the Maccabean Revolt. If you know a little bit of history about it, the festival now called Hanukkah is celebrated in December. It commemorates the restoration of the temple in the time of Judas Maccabeus and the Jewish revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes.

And the way Hanukkah goes is they celebrate the eight nights, right? Because the miracle that apparently happened was that they didn't have enough oil for a few nights, but then it lasted for eight nights, and then God delivered the people.

I don't know if you guys have ever had the privilege of celebrating Hanukkah with Jewish people. We got to do it in Chattanooga recently, and it was amazing. Man, those people know how to feast. They know how to party.

It was wild.

It was a wild night. It really was, all in commemoration of God's deliverance. But one thing interesting is that according to this passage, Jesus also celebrated Hanukkah. I didn't know that until recently.

They call it the Feast of Dedication or the Festival of Lights. But as I got thinking about the setting for this passage, how Jesus, he attends this feast and he's celebrating it with them. And once again, he's saying very controversial things, getting people to think.

But one thing that struck me is that, you know, one thing, that's one thing that every people group has in common, every single people group. We all love to feast. We like to eat, right? We love to eat.

The Tao people, they have feasts, huge feasts. Now, when they have a feast, they don't have refrigeration and electricity. There's no electricity there. The way we get electricity is we have four solar panels we set up and a couple of deep cycle batteries.

And we use those through an inverter to charge our computers so we can do translation work when we're there. But the people, they don't have electricity. So if they want to have a feast, first they start hunting for weeks and weeks in advance.

And this is what they just got done doing for Christmas. They recently found out what Christmas was. They call it, Yesus me onedata nago, which means the day that Jesus' cord was cut. And they gather food for weeks and weeks, garden foods.

They shoot wild pigs. Again, they don't have refrigeration. So what they do is they get that wild pig meat and they dig holes and they bury it in the ground, in leaves, and it builds up a layer of mold.

And that mold somehow protects the meat. They dig it back up months later when it's finally time for the feast, scrape the mold off with bamboo knives, cook it on the fire, and then they eat it. That's their method of preservation.

But for Christmas, they do this and they have the kids decorate a meeting house with flowers because it's the special day that talks about their savior being introduced into the world, sent down from the father, the Yesus onedata nago and all these things.

And here we see again a feast. So Jesus, he's attending this feast. And as he's at this feast, some of the Jews, they walk up to him and they ask him, how long will you keep us in suspense? If you're the Christ, tell us plainly.

It's interesting what Jesus says here as I read it. It says, Jesus answered them, I already told you. I told you. That I am the Christ is what he's referring to. I told you and you do not believe. And then he says, the works that I do in my father's name bear witness about me.

Think about the different places where Jesus told them who he was. There's many places in the book of John. John 4, 26, Jesus told the Samaritan woman who he was. He made it very clear who he was. John 9, 37, he told the man that was born blind.

He affirmed to them, him, that he was the promised Messiah. He told him who he was. John 1, 49, earlier in this book, he accepted the disciples' confession that he was the son of God. Made it clear who he was.

And there's many other places that he affirmed that he was the son of God, the Messiah. He said it plainly. He said, I've told you plainly. But even beyond that, he says, my works, they bear witness about me.

Who in the world else could heal the blind? Who else could speak to the wind and the waves and command them to stop, and they stopped? Who else could tell a Samaritan woman everything she ever did? Who else could cast demons out and cause them to flee?

Who else could do these things? He proved he was the son of God, not only once, but over and over and over and over again. You know, when we taught the Tao people the first time, you know, they were hearing about Jesus for the first time, the very first time in the history of their people group.

So when they heard about the things that Jesus did, it blew them away, blew them away, absolutely blew them away, that Jesus could speak and heal people, that he could cast out demons, that he could do all these things.

At one point, they asked me, you know, what people in our country believe, if they believe this? And I said, there's some people that do and some people that don't. And they asked, well, what are the people that don't believe?

And I explained to them how some people believe we came from monkeys and so on, and they laughed their heads off. They thought that was insane, that someone would think that we came from monkeys, you know, from animals and so on.

It blew them away. But the root problem, when someone doesn't believe,.

What is it?

According to the words of Jesus, Jesus answered them, I told you and you do not believe the works that I do in my father's name. Bear witness about me, they show who I am. But you do not believe because why?

Because you are not part of my flock. Now, why didn't he say it the other way around? Why didn't he say it the other way around? How could the people of his day see him doing all these things and not believe that he was the son of God?

He says, the reason you don't believe is because you're not part of my flock. Why doesn't he say, you do not believe and therefore, you are not part of my flock? Because that's not what he said. He didn't say, you do not believe and therefore, you are not part of my flock.

He said, you are not part of my flock and therefore, you do not believe. There is a big difference. There is. The difference, boiled down, is what Jesus said in John 6, 44. No man can come to me unless the father draws them.

If the father doesn't first draw, you cannot believe, you can't. If God is not predestined from the foundation of the world, according to the scriptures, that you are part of his flock, you will not believe.

Salvation is a supernatural work of God. It's no less of a miracle than any of the miracles of Jesus where he looked at a man that had never walked, that was born lame and said, walk, and he walked and it was a miracle.

Casting out demons, healing the blind, they're all miracles and salvation is also a miracle. This is so important. This is so important. And for me, it's important also when it comes specifically to missions.

Because you know what it means for me as a missionary? It means that I can take my family to the other side of the world and we can move to that place and we can learn that language and we can preach and preach and preach and preach and tell them about Jesus over and over and over and over again until we have nothing left to give, until we die.

But if God does not do what only he can do, no one's gonna get saved.

No one.

And nothing will change in that place. And that's why God has to get the glory in missions. And not only in missions, but anytime anyone gets saved. Because if he didn't do what only he could do,.

Nobody would get saved.

Nobody.

It's all an act of his grace. Who is the first to move in the process of salvation? I'm telling you, it's not you. It's God. That's the way it was for me. I grew up in a Christian home. I heard my dad preach about Jesus every week.

I was in the church every time the doors were open. I didn't understand that it was the work of Jesus that saved till I was in college, 18, after hearing it my whole life. And I look back on that now and I say, you know what, the Lord had a pre-appointed day that he was gonna open my eyes.

That's the day he opened my eyes. God did that work that only he can do. But he does the same thing in missions. He prepares people. He gets that ground ready. And then when the time comes, his elect believe.

I've shared this story before and I even mentioned it in Sunday school, but one of the most amazing things that God did in the Dao tribe was the way that he was working there, preparing them before we ever got there.

And I shared how we got there and we started trying to learn their language and we went in with three families. The other two families quit because of the hardships involved and the malaria and all these things that we get over there.

And there came a point where we were ready to quit too. And I asked a guy that had built a house right next to ours after we built our house. His name was Apiawogi. And Apiawogi, one morning I looked at him at the point when we were about ready to give up and go back to the States ourself because we'd had malaria so many times.

And I asked him, I said, one morning, I said, friend, I said, I've noticed something about you. I said, you built a house right next to our house. I said, why? And the reason I asked him this is because they're semi-nomadic.

They're always moving. But he and his wife, Apiawogi and his wife, Wadamina and their two daughters had moved there and built a house right next to us and they weren't going anywhere. It was very strange for their culture.

And he said to me, he said, Degapia. They call me Degapia. Again, it means tall white tree. It's what they named me, Degapia. They named my wife, Ogedetawu. It means stream in a dry barren land, Ogedetawu.

I looked at him and I said, why? Why have you built a house next to us? And he said, Degapia. He said, I need to tell you a story about how, he said, when I was this high, he said, I woke up in the men's hut one morning and he said, my father, he was in the room.

He woke up last and he sat straight up. He said, I've had a strange dream. And we said, tell us your dream. And he said, it was a dream that there was these strange looking foreigners, these pale skinned people.

They hiked into our valley system. They carried with them a message that was greater than anything we'd heard before. They taught us this message. And then we became so close with these outsiders that we were like family.

He said, and then I woke up. And Apiawogi, he looked at me and he said, now look. He said, all of this time later, he said, here you are. You've got that strange look. He said, you've told us you're here to give us a great message.

He said, Degapia, tall white tree, the reason I've built a house next to yours, the reason I'm staying here is because I'm waiting for your message. And I couldn't believe it. And it turned out it wasn't only his father, it was multiple chiefs of multiple villages over two different valley systems, all had the same dream one generation before we got there.

And then when we taught for the first time, they listened. And the majority of our village turned to Christ. But again, I don't believe that that would have happened unless God prepared them the way that he did.

He did what only he can do. And then the people came. He is the first to work.

God is the first to work.

For me, that is amazing. And it's a source of confidence. And it's a source of courage.

Why?

Because the Bible tells us that there will one day be people from every tongue, tribe, and nation, Revelation chapter seven, that stand before him and worship his throne. Hebrews 6, 18 says this, we know about God.

He does not lie. So if God's told us there will be people from every tongue, tribe, and nation, and God is the one that moves in salvation to bring people to him, then we can go anywhere in the world with confidence and hope that God's gonna do something amazing.

Because we know he's not a liar. And we know that there will be people from every tongue, tribe, and nation that one day stand before him. I look at these words and I'm encouraged. Jesus said, you do not believe because you're not part of my flock.

But what we do know is that there are parts of his flock in every tongue, tribe, nation, and language. Every single one. They're there. Even the ones that haven't heard yet. They will hear. And when they do hear, they will come.

They will. They'll turn to him. Every last one. Verse 27, he goes farther and he explains this. Jesus, he says, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they will never perish and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

My sheep hear my voice. You know, something that was really interesting. When I was teaching this passage to the Tao people for the first time and a lot of the passages in the Bible, we had to figure out a way to explain to them what a sheep was.

They'd never seen a sheep.

Never.

They didn't even know what they were. What they have on their island is they have cassowaries, which is a large ostrich-like bird. It's got a bright blue head and this bone.

That sticks straight up.

Looks like a dinosaur bone or something. Look it up on Google. They're weird-looking animals, but they stand like four to six feet tall. Huge birds. And if they attack you, they swing their legs backwards and they try to disembowel people.

There's been stories of disemboweling humans that were trying to kill them. But there's these cassowaries and then there's wild pigs, lots of wild pigs. Those are the two largest animals in their territory and in their country.

They've got tree kangaroos. They've got something called a couscous. It's a marsupial, kind of like a possum. They've got all these different kinds. They got little kangaroos that hop around on the ground.

Snakes, all kinds of stuff. They've even got really large lizards related to the Komodo dragon that they eat. All these things, but they didn't have sheep. No sheep, no donkeys. So what do you do? We're translating the word into their language.

So we asked them what they would call a sheep. I was able to, I had a printer and I was able to power it from our solar panels and print a picture of a sheep and a donkey.

And I showed it to them.

I said, what would you call this in your language? Because they don't have a word for it in their language. And they looked at it. They looked at it and looked at it. What is that thing? They asked me, what is that?

They'd never seen anything like it. They say, it's got the body of a pig, but it looks kind of like a dog, fluffy hair. And they said, we don't know what to call that thing. Showed them a picture of a donkey.

They said, oh man, that one's big.

I said, yeah.

They said, well, it's got the ears of a tree kangaroo. They said again, it's got the body of a pig. It's got the tail of a couscous. Again, they didn't have any idea what they called it. We ended up having to make a phrase that describes what this is in their language.

And that's what we use. But they had no idea. So when I was teaching through these different passages, it was a challenge to explain to them what a sheep is and what it does. I was explaining to them the passage that talks about how we are like wild olive branches grafted in and so on.

And then I was explaining to them sheep and so on. I asked them what their take was on sheep and how we're like sheep and so on. Because the Bible talks about how we're wild olive branches. After teaching through these concepts, there was one day I was talking to them and they said, you know what?

They said, there's this thing we do. They said, every once in a while, we're out and we're hunting wild pigs. He said, and unknowingly, we'll shoot a mama wild pig. After we shoot this mama wild pig, we tie it up, we get it ready to take back to the village and then we'll hear in the jungle, baby pigs.

Amen.

Amen, baby pigs. And then we'll realize that we killed that pig's mama. So we'll get this mama pig's baby pigs, these wild pigs. They said, we'll take them back to our village. We'll put them in a string bag.

We'll put some leaves in the bottom of the string bag so it's real comfortable. We'll hang them on one of the rafters in our thatch roof huts and we'll just leave them there. And they said, those little baby pigs, they'll squeal and squeal and squeal and squeal.

They're so scared. He said, but eventually they'll get hungry. So what we'll do is we'll take sweet potatoes that we've cooked on the fire. We'll chew some up and then we'll spit it in our hand. He said, and then we'll walk over and we'll start feeding those baby wild pigs.

That are so scared of us.

He said, we feed them a little bit at a time, a little bit at a time, a little bit at a time every day. And then eventually they get a little bit more friendly. And then they said, not only that, they said, but there comes a point where we begin talking to those pigs, just like we talk to our pigs.

Did you know people talk to pigs? The people in Dao, they treat their pigs just like we treat dogs, pet dogs. You know, we call them. Come here, Fifi, Fufu, whatever you call your dog. Whistle at him, he comes running.

You know, their pigs are like this. They know their pigs by name. They're domesticated pigs. Each pig has a name. They can make a certain whistle or a certain noise and that little pig will just come running.

You can even scratch its belly and it'll fall over and go to sleep right next to you. Anyways, they said, we'll start teaching these wild pigs our calls. And they'll keep eating out of our hands for weeks and weeks.

And they said, and then eventually they get to the point where they've got wild pig tusks that are starting to come out. So we'll yank those pig tusks out. And he said, and then eventually there will come a point where they act just like our domesticated pigs.

They come when we call. They eat when we feed them. And he said, and then at one point, we'll look at those pigs and we'll say, you are no longer a wild pig. You're a domesticated pig. And they're part of our flock of pigs or whatever you want to say.

Think about this. Verse 27, my sheep, they hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. I will give them eternal life. They will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. One day they looked at me and they said, you know, Jesus has done for us something similar to what we do for those wild pigs.

They said, we don't have any right to be part of the family of God. We're not Jewish people. We don't have anything to offer God, but he goes and he finds us out in the jungle. He teaches us his voice to know it.

He feeds us by hand. He takes care of us and he makes us part of his own. Isn't that what God does for us? It's amazing to think about. As I think about the Dow people's understanding of the different sheep and the different animals and the conclusions they've come to, it's so beautiful to me.

You know, there's so many times we teach passages and I think, how in the world are they gonna understand this? How are they gonna get this? But every time, God's spirit is faithful to teach them and bring them to the truth, even when I can't.

But this passage, it's beautiful. God, he draws people. God draws people and he makes us acceptable to himself and the ones that he's set apart hear his voice and they follow him. Again, Jesus said, you do not believe because you are not part of my flock.

Those that are part of his flock will believe. There's no doubt about it. Verse 29, he goes on. He says, my father who's given these sheep to me, he's given them to me, he's greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of my father's hand.

I and my father are one. You think again about some of the other passages. Earlier in this book, in John 6, Jesus says a lot more about sheep also. John 6, 37 through 39, he says, everyone the father gives me will come to me and the one who comes to me, I will never drive away for I've come down from heaven not to do my own will but to do the will of him who sent me.

This is the will of him who sent me that I shall lose none of those that he's given to me. He won't lose a single one. There is nothing that can keep God from his bride. Nothing at all. Nothing is gonna keep him from his bride.

One of the most wonderful things I've ever seen happen in Dow, there was an epidemic that swept through the Dow tribe, much like there's an epidemic sweeping through America right now and everybody's freaking out over COVID and vaccines and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

I'm sure you're all sick of hearing about it, just like I am. But there was an epidemic coming through down there. You know, someone asked me after the Sunday school, have the Dow had any COVID yet? I asked them that.

I talked to them now on Messenger, these people that didn't even have a written alphabet 15 years ago. They know how to read and write and they talked to me on Messenger because there's been a cell tower set up on the outskirts of their territory this last year.

So now I can talk with my pastors, people that couldn't even read, right? And they're writing me in their own alphabet. But I asked him, hey, has anybody yet over there died of COVID? I asked him this last week and they said, not that we know of.

Nobody has it and nobody's even gotten sick. Nobody's died.

I said, oh, that's weird.