(The Glory of God) in Missions — Paul Washer

The Certainty of God’s Glory Among the Nations

The book of Malachi. Talking about the glory of God in missions. The book of Malachi. 1 .11, For from the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles.

And in every place incense shall be offered unto my name in a pure offering, for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts.". Now, this is one of the most tremendous statements in the Bible with regard to missions and the sovereignty of God.

A tremendous, tremendous statement. Now, this is a bold statement. This is a statement of certainty. This is God declaring something that shall be done. His name shall be great among the nations. Now, look at the context in which he is saying this.

If we look in the first chapter of Malachi, we see the horrible, horrifying, apostate condition of Israel, of the people of God. Some old preacher told me one time, he says, you know that God was angry in Malachi, because after He spoke in Malachi, He didn't talk to anybody for 400 years.

He was angry. He was angry with an apostate people. Now, were these people concerned about missions? They weren't even concerned about God. They could care less about His worship in the temple to the point where God says, oh, that someone would come and just.

Shut the doors of the temple.

I mean, everything was, let's just close this church down. They were not responding to anything. But in the midst of the apostasy of the people of God, in the midst of their deadness of heart, in the midst of their lack of love or passion, in the midst of pure self-centeredness and God-hatred, God says, I will make My name great among the nations.

I hear in missions conferences, I hear men who try to promote evangelism in our churches saying things like this, oh, God, He wants to do so much. He wants to reach the nations. He wants to evangelize our city.

He wants to do so many things, but we just won't cooperate as though God were up there moaning and groaning and weeping and wringing His hand saying, I want to do so much, but they are My feet and they will not move.

If I want to do so much, but they are My hands and they will not serve. That is absolute stupidity. I want you to know something. Men can disobey the call of God, but God will get the work done. I want you to know the plan of the Great Commission, the work of the Great Commission does not depend on any man or any group of men on the face of the earth.

It is not our problem to see it done. God will see it done. It is our privilege to participate. You have been called to participate in the Great Commission. If you do, you will experience great joy. If you do not, you will be the one who loses, but God will raise up a people to do it.

You and I cannot stall His work. We cannot stall His work. We cannot ruin His work because His work is His work and He will see to it. He will. That is the greatest confidence for a missionary. This statement of security is so great because a missionary can take to heart this, if God has called me to a place, if I stay there long enough and I preach true enough, no matter what happens, no matter what my eyes see, sooner or later, someone is coming out of this place saved because God said out of every tribe, out of every people group, out of every language, He is going to call forth a people.

He has ordained it. It will happen. And so what is missions? Missions is a can't-lose thing. Invest your life in missions and it is the only sure thing going. That is why William Carey, because of his doctrine, William Carey could struggle for years and years in India and never see a convert.

That's why in Peru when I went down there, I participated in a great harvest of souls. Why? I'll tell you why. Because of 80 years of missionaries who saw nothing. Men and women of whom I am not worthy to carry their sandals.

And then a snotty-nosed boy goes down with a whole new other group of missionaries from all kinds of different mission organizations and we see a harvest. Why? Because of people who labored and labored and labored and did not see a harvest, but they knew this promise to be true.

God is going to call forth a people for Himself that He has ordained before the foundation of the world and He will do it. So let's go. Let's go. Let's do missions. Now, as I said briefly last night, when I go to mission conferences, I'm always hearing people speak about the motivation to missions.

The Glory of God as the Chief Motive for Missions

And it is always the same thing. We must do missions because people are dying without Christ. My dear friend, that is a motivation for doing missions. People are dying without Christ, but that is not the chief motivation to doing missions.

I think you remember the verse that says, whether you eat or drink, it's the glory of God. And I think that you need to see here, look at what God is saying. From the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same, My name shall be great among the Gentiles.

Notice, He doesn't say, from the rising of the sun to its setting, I'm going to save Gentiles. That's not the number one thing. He says from the rising of the sun to its setting, I'm going to make My name great among them.

What does this mean? I'll tell you what it means. It all goes back to the two great commandments and getting them in priority. The first great commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

And the second is to love your neighbor as yourself. Everything in the divine human relationship must be founded upon these two commands. And in these two commands, know this, that God has preeminence.

HeartCry, our missionary society, in our statement of purpose, you will see there that our chief motivation is not the needs of men. Our chief motivation is the glory. And although we should be burdened about the lostness of men, I find it strange that I have never gone to a missions conference.

I have never gone to an evangelism conference where it is stated that the great burden on our heart is that God deserves all worship and praise and there are places on the face of the earth where He is not being worshiped and not being praised as He ought to be praised.

Our concern is always manward, manward, manward. And that is good in a sense, but it has consumed us. We've lost our direction. Let me tell you something. You go out as a new missionary. You are so idealistic.

You think you're going to take your little pulpit and your little tracks and your little portable microphone and you're going to walk into that plaza and you're going to begin to preach. And pretty soon, you know, angels are going to descend.

People are going to break forth in the hallelujah chorus. There's going to be massive conversions. Then they're all going to lift you up on their shoulders and carry you around the city. You know what happens?

You walk in there and you begin to preach and things seem to be going well. And then all of a sudden, someone with the face of a demon begins to scream out, heretic, liar. This man is speaking against our religion.

And they take you and your tracks and your pulpit and your little microphone and all your little Bibles that you brought and they throw you out in the street cursing your name. My dear friend, it's going to take a lot more than a love for men to pull you back up again and make you walk right back into that plaza and preach again.

It is going to take the glory of God and a passion for that glory. We can say the same here. My dear friend, if you're a pastor, you don't always love those sheep. As a matter of fact, a lot of times, you would just as soon have mutton for dinner.

Now you can deny that, but then you'd have to come up here and confess for being a liar. There are some times man gives you no reason to stay. Sometimes I know of pastors who have suffered so much at the hand of unconverted church people that in their hearts they're crying out, I just wish they'd all go to hell.

Why do you stay? Why do you stay? Love for man is an inconstant thing because man's return on your love is not a constant thing. You stay because the glory of God does not change. You stay because God is always worthy.

You stay because not once has God failed you or given you reason to retreat. That's why you stay. The glory of God in missions. The glory of God in missions. Now, he says, from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same.

Well, that just about takes every place on earth, doesn't it? Every place. Oh, my dear friend, I was sitting in a church. I was getting ready to preach in a church in New Hampshire when Saddam Hussein was captured.

The church broke forth in applause. There was a sense of, yes, it's appropriate. But there was glee. I suppose maybe the applause would have been more proper if someone had announced that Saddam Hussein had been converted.

Converted. I don't care who they are. I don't care what kind of people group. I don't care the color of their skin. I don't care anything about them. My Lord says He shed His blood for a people from every group.

Every group. And mark my words, God will begin to work. God works most in the most despised groups. Not much going on in Europe except among the most despised people group in Europe, the gypsies. As a matter of fact, in the very place where the communists of Romania were going to send all the gypsies to exterminate them is now the largest gypsy church in Europe.

You don't know this. Not only 6 million Jews, my friend, died in concentration camps. 1 .5 million gypsies were slaughtered in concentration camps. God has seen fit. Oh, I have sat at the table of many a gypsy.

Wild at heart they are. Wild at heart. You'd be uncomfortable with them. You'd be uncomfortable in their worship service. Wild at heart. Saved to the bone. God is doing a work and He says everywhere, everyone, every person you meet is a potential brother or sister in Christ.

That man in the bondage of homosexuality is a potential, is a possible brother. When I go to the mission field, I don't go after the lost. I go after my family. Got brothers and sisters in there and they don't know about their father.

They don't know that before the foundation of the world a decree was made to save men. They don't know that 2 ,000 years ago blood was shed on a tree. I feel sometimes like God says, Paul, go get my people and bring them home.

Oh, if you could see the people I have seen.

All over this world to see the proud Messiah, black as ebony, all of them dressed in red and purple. They look like chest pieces on a board. Oh, and when they worship and they jump up and down, up and down and cry out to the Lord, that might not fit into your narrow little world, but oh, it fits into God.

To see the Fulani come out of the bush, the bowls of milk on their head and the large cattle that they drive and the painted and tattooed faces and everything. And then to hear of conversions among them.

To work among the Agwaruna Indians. We were holding a Bible conference. Men so poor that a river rat ran through the conference when we were preaching and the men jumped out of their pews, ran after it, followed it into the water, clubbed it to death and brought it back with joy because there was meat for the conference.

And yet God has seen fit to call them and give them an inheritance that cannot be measured. To be there and see the Russian people that have been so beaten down around a small little table in a kitchen, snow outside three feet deep, huddled around a small piece of pork, bowing their head and worshiping the Christ.

To walk with men who have yea been beaten for the cause of Christ. Men who are outcasts for the cause of Christ. Men who cut up truck tires and make sandals out of them so that they can walk from hill to hill preaching the gospel in the Andes Mountains.

Oh, God is doing a work. God is doing a work in the world. Oh, we look around at America and we see, we see so much, so much bad. But oh, if you could see what my eyes have seen. This is not a small thing God is doing.

Not something in a corner. It is not a small work. In every tribe, every nation, every language, God is doing a magnificent thing. And if your ears could hear it, they would burn and tingle. This God of ours is fulfilling everything He said in Scripture.

He says, I will make my name. Do you desire to participate? Do you want to be a part of that? From the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles. Do you know what shuddered in the heart of those people when they heard the prophet declare that?

They hated the Gentiles. The Gentiles hated them. The Gentiles had hurt them. The Gentiles had persecuted them. The world was divided up in Jews and Gentiles. People of God and dogs. It would be like you watching a nationwide conference of homosexuals gather together and God speaking to you and say, I will make my name great among them.

And you'd go, oh, I'd rather see them judged rather than converted. God says, I'll make my name great among them. I'll convert them. I'll change them. We're like Jonah. I think sometimes we don't want to see some people saved.

You know, we talk about caring for people. I got news for you. God cares more about livestock than you care for people. I'll tell you that right now. It's true. And I've got a Bible verse to back it up.

Jonah wanted the Nineveh destroyed. God said, no, I have so many people and livestock in that city. Judgment was spared even because of livestock. God cares more about cattle than we care about people.

He says among the Gentiles, among the worst of the worst, among those that not only hate the people of God, but hate God. But then again, have you forgotten the doctrine of depravity or have you ever believed it?

You were born a God hater yourself. You were born hating God. And even if you're homeschooled, you hate God until you're converted. We need to realize something. Those of us who care for our children and want to raise them properly, homeschooling, lectures, and parental examples will not change their heart.

They are God hating. They are radically depraved. No matter if there are manifestations of religion, manifestations of morality, they are still God hating creatures that would just as soon storm the throne of God, knock Him off the throne and slaughter Him if they could.

That's the way they feel in their heart of hearts whether they know it or not until they be regenerated by the power of the Holy Spirit. That's one of our problems in evangelism today. We don't understand how wicked people are.

But He said great among the Gentiles and in every place, every place. You know what this tells me? This tells me the Middle East is not off limits to me. This tells me that God is going to get glory for Himself there.

He already is. When the regime in Iraq fell, Christians started coming forward who had been hiding, who had been chased, who had been hunted. When the Communists came through and the Maoists came through and kicked out all the missionaries out of China, they said they would eliminate the church.

And even the missionaries left with dread and despair thinking all our work is done. But now that the bamboo curtain has lifted just a little, we understand there's more Christians there than any other place on the face of the earth.

Why? This is God's doing. This is God's doing. God will make His name great. Do you want to participate? An incense shall be offered unto My name. This is a rebuke to us. Now, some of you maybe get mad at this, but don't ever come around me and say God saved us to serve because I'll get mad.

That's like me telling my little boy, your mother gave birth to you to serve. Now, my little boy's got to learn service, but that's not the statement that should be told him. We willingly accept to be servants of the Most High God, but because He saved us for sonship and He saved us to worship Him.

He's not served by hands or have you forgotten the book of Acts? He needs nothing and is not served by human hands. God is going to call forth a people to worship Him and out of that worship and out of that sonship, they will gladly serve.

This is not just semantics, my friend. There are so many people who think that they're just saved to serve. They're saved to be sons who worship and out of that worship comes glorious and joyful service.

There's a big difference. One is slavery. The other is sonship. In every place incense shall be offered unto My name. He's talking about praise. What is the end of missions? Praise to God. More praise to God.

What are you going to do? I'm going to go to that country. Why? I'm going to get some praise for God. Our goal is to lead men to worship. The end. Preaching is not. Preaching is not the end. Preaching is the means to what?

Worship. Worship. Worship. And He says, for My name shall be great among the heathen. The Bible is filled, especially if you want examples of this, go to the book of Proverbs, also poetic literature, with what we call Hebrew parallelisms.

Hebrew parallelisms are very, very important. When you and I want to emphasize something in literature, we either underline it or we'll put it in bold letters. If we're speaking, we'll raise our voice.

For a Jew to emphasize something is to create a Hebrew parallelism, a repetition. I'll just make one up for you. The wicked shall not live in the land. The wicked shall be destroyed. I've said the same thing twice.

I've changed it just a little bit in the second phrase to add emphasis or either define what I'm saying in the first phrase. But the idea is this. Repetition is used. Verily, verily, I say unto you. When it talks about God, it says He is holy, holy, holy.

There's the repetition. And here He repeats Himself again. For My name shall be great among the heathen, says the Lord of hosts. Who says this? The Lord of hosts. The One who can make it happen. Now, do you want to participate?

Every Christian’s Calling in the Great Commission

You say, well, how do we participate in the Great Commission? Well, let me give you a few simple things. The Great Commission, every Christian on the face of the earth is to be equally dedicated and devoted to the Great Commission.

Now, period. Every Christian on the face of the earth, if you're called to be a pastor, no matter what you're called to be, song director, doesn't matter, deacon, teacher in your local church, whatever it is, every Christian is under the command of the Great Commission.

And everyone is to live as dedicated for the Great Commission as the missionary in Zimbabwe. It's just that there's two different manifestations of that devotion. There's two different callings within that same devotion.

And what are they? I'm going to make missions very simple for you right now. You are either called to go down in the well or you are called to hold the rope for those who go down. Now, which one are you doing?

Not which one is your church doing. Which one are you doing? Sir, right now, actively, what are you actively involved in doing in the Great Commission? Have you gone down in the well? Obviously not. You're here.

You're not a foreign missionary. You're here. You haven't gone down in the well. So if you haven't gone down in the well, then the other side of that is you're called to hold the rope for those who have gone down.

Are you doing that? Yes. Okay, let me see your hands. When you hold a rope long enough, there's going to be scars on your hands. What's it cost you to hold that rope? What's it cost you? Show me where you have held the rope.

What have you lost? What have you given away? What does it cost you? You can either deal with this now or deal with this later before the throne of God. I would recommend you deal with this now. And I do not say church.

I say individual. Why? There are churches that are very mission-minded churches. But the problem is when a person becomes a member of that church, the church might even be converted and he believes that the work of the church is also his, when what it might be, it might be the work of a few select individuals who are devoted to missions in the church and really, he's not doing anything.

Just because your church is doing something doesn't mean you're doing something. Just because your denomination is doing something doesn't mean you're doing something. Just because some mission board you're identified with is doing something doesn't mean you're doing something.

What are you personally doing to hold the rope for the people who have gone down in the well? Are you praying specifically for people who have gone down? Do you even know? Do you have any lists of names?

Anybody you're identified with, are you praying for the people who have gone down in the well? Are you giving? Are you giving? And by the way, because it has nothing to do with my mission organization, if you want a really good missionary to support, Brother Allie Good here has the most wonderful daughter I've just about ever met.

And she's working in Peru. And if you want to bless somebody, bless her and her husband. Why can I say that? Because I'm up here. That's why I can say that. Because she's worthy. She's gone and she lives in a place I don't know any other American would live in or any other American missionary would live in.

And they're about ready to have another child. Hint, hint. I thought you didn't raise money, Brother Paul. Not for my organization. This has to do with her. I'm always telling people give to missions, just not mine.

What are you doing? Do you realize? Do you realize that three men who work, let's say three men who work in a factory, those three men could make a covenant together to put a dollar a day in a bucket.

Each one of those men, a dollar a day, and have enough money to support an indigenous missionary on a foreign field. We can do so much because little is so much when it's brought together and united. It's unbelievable.

You can take your candy bar money and put men on the field. Or bless a missionary. Find out what their needs are. What are you doing? You see, I'm not saying this to condemn you. I'm saying this because I want to impart joy to you.

There is nothing that brings more joy. There's a church down here, some of you might know him, Lake Park, Georgia, south of Valdosta. Carlton Allen. He was a fundamentalist Baptist missionary down in Peru.

Now he's back here. He has a little church of about 100 people. There's not a doctor or a lawyer among them. All blue collar workers down there in south Georgia near Stockton or somewhere. They give like 120, one year, $140 ,000 to missions.

And I said, Carlton, how do you do this? I'm not preaching churches of 3 ,000 people. How do you do this? He said, well, Brother Paul, I figured out a long time ago. I take care of missionaries. God takes care of my church.

He said, by the way, Brother Paul, my church is not in debt. Did I sound like a Georgian? Sort of? Okay. What I'm trying to tell you is there is this, you know, missions isn't a drudgery. Missions isn't something, oh, we've got to do.

I want to tell you something. My life has been so filled with joy.

And the people who get involved directly in the Great Commission, especially those who get involved in giving, giving, giving. Do you realize you can clean out your garage of stuff you never use.

And sell it at a yard sale.

And put a man on a field for six months? See, we always think Satan puts it into our mind that, well, you know, I can only do this much and that's not anything, so why even try? And you don't realize.

You don't realize the power of what one person can do. And what a couple of people together can do. It's just not enough to have missionaries hanging on the wall. I praise God that you've got. I walk in here and I see missionaries.

Praise God. Praise the Lord. And in your church, you know, if you've got that, that's wonderful. But it goes down to not the church as a whole, but the individual, getting to the individual and saying, individual Christian, what are you doing?

What are you giving? What does it cost you? Oh, my dear friend, I've met missionaries on the field. Not many of them. I know some missionaries on the field that are, oh, wow, they're worth their weight in gold.

I've known some older missionaries on the field that a young, new missionary would start and be working in his area. He'd get some mad. He'd try to go against the young man, try to stop him, try to do all the, you know, he's coming into my territory and everything else.

I'm thinking, what an old fool. Man, when someone comes into my territory, and not because I'm humble, it's because I'm ambitious. I'm smart. I'm shrewd as a serpent. Here's a new kid. Comes in on the block.

He's got a thousand times more energy than me. I've got 22 years of being worn out. This kid's going to work. This kid's going to do some stuff. I want in on his action. I want interest in what he's doing.

I'm going to help him. Because if I help him, and I help him a lot, and I invest in him as much as I can, then it's kind of like what he'd say, it's kind of like Amway. Whatever he sells, I get part of it.

I'm building a spiritual pyramid. But don't you see? It's like these young men. I was out there in the back. They want to talk about hunting and they want to talk about big guns and all kinds of things.

I'm sure going to do it. Why? Because now they're sitting here listening to me because they know I care about them because I believe that one day God will use you. You see, everything in your life. The Bible says you give a cup of cold water to a disciple.

You'll not lose your reward. Man, you ought to be standing out in this church with like bottles of water like this, handing them out to people. Look at what's been given to you. Nothing done in His name will be lost.

You cannot out-bless God. You cannot be more concerned for Him than He is concerned for you. You honor Him. You honor His Son. He'll honor you. He'll honor you. Get involved in missions. Go down in the well or find a way to hold the rope for someone going down.

And just do it. Just do it. Just do it. Now, let me say quickly this. Another thing that breaks my heart, and this is what I spend, I go to a church, this is all I do, what I'm about to tell you now. Evangelism in the United States and missions in America and missions in the world is impotent because of the Gospel we are not preaching.

The Gospel Must Be More Than a Repeated Prayer

Let me tell you something. I might have shared this earlier, but I'm going to share it again. And get ready. You can call yourself a fundamentalist and be as liberal as a German higher critic. And I want to tell you something.

I listen to a lot of fundamentalist preaching, a lot of conservative preaching, a lot of reform preaching, and a lot of just flat out Baptist and evangelical preaching of men who would fight you to the core about how they believe the Bible and they slap it around and say, this is the Word of God.

But when you listen to them preach the Gospel and give an invitation, you realize they're just as liberal as a man who studies higher criticism in Germany. We have taken the powerful, almighty Gospel of God and reduced it down to nothing more than repeating a superstitious prayer.

And that's not biblical. It's not. Let me give you an example of one evangelist. First of all, they learn all sorts of ways to manipulate people to come forward. And then they get them forward. This one evangelist, he told this man, sir, do you want to go to heaven?

How many people have ever said, no, I'd rather go to hell? That's not the question. Do you want to go to heaven, sir? Well, yeah, yeah. Well, then pray to the Lord and ask Jesus to come into your heart.

Then he does the revelation through prayer. And that's not biblical. It's not. Let me give you an example of one evangelist. First of all, they learn all sorts of ways to manipulate people to come forward.

And then they get them forward. Which, by the way, is taking that passage out of context. This one evangelist, he told this man, sir, do you want to go to heaven? How many people have ever said, no, I'd rather go to hell?

That's not the question. Do you want to go to heaven, sir? Well, yeah, yeah. Well, then pray to the Lord and ask Jesus to come into your heart. Then he does the revelation 320 thing, which, by the way, is taking that passage out of context.

And the guy says, well, I don't know how to do that. I mean, I don't feel comfortable. And then the evangelist says, well, then I tell you what, I'll pray and you repeat after me. The guy goes out loud.

Well, you don't have to do it out loud. I mean, you can do it silently. Just you and God. Well, I don't know. Well, I'll tell you what, I'll pray the prayer to God. And if that's what you want to say to God, then squeeze my hand.

Behold the power of conversion. Our evangelism in fundamentalist churches, Southern Baptist churches, and some reformed churches is nothing more than a six flags over Jesus. You might not like what I'm saying, but if you stand toe to toe with me theologically, you will not be able to prove me wrong.

And the silly little proud evangelist in his white shoes goes down to the next church and brags about how a hundred people got saved in your church, but none of them show up on Sunday. And the whole charade just keeps going on and on and on and on.

And it sickens me. And why does it sicken me? Because my Lord is worthy of a greater gospel than what is being preached. And I just want to run through a few things with you. Please let me, allow me. Some of the problems in our evangelism, first of all, we're not talking about sin.

We're not talking about sin. Not only are we not talking about sin on the mission field and in America, not only are we not talking about sin, I don't believe most preachers believe in the depravity of men.

My dear friend, if a man is depraved, if a man is born God-hating, if a man is born spiritually dead, as the Bible says, no spiritual gymnastics that you can throw at him, no clown suits, party hats, or pizza parties are going to be able to pull him out of that grave.

All our use of mechanisms and gimmicks and Wall Street stuff is not going to save anybody. The only one who can save that man is God by His power. And that power is unleashed when a man stands up and simply preaches the gospel.

It is the gospel that is the power of God under salvation. The gospel. Martin Lloyd-Jones was speaking and I wish I had, a friend just gave it to me and I wasn't able to get the full quote. But he was speaking with another man who was a great secular scholar who had supposedly been converted.

And this great secular scholar who had supposedly been converted gets up and basically preaches this. He says basically what I hear in every church in America. Now, I am a scholar. There are many scholars out there who do not know Christ, do not believe in Christ.

In order to reach these men, we need to have men who are also scholars who can speak to them on their level and reach them for Christ. Sound familiar? You hear that in your own churches. Martin Lloyd-Jones gets up and says, most certainly not.

As a matter of fact, the way I read the Bible, a great scholar is more likely to be converted by a farmer preaching a simple Gospel than by another scholar. He says John Wesley was a scholar's scholar with Oxford education and preached to miners and farmers and the poor.

And they were converted. Dwight L. Moody could not even speak English well for an American and yet goes to England and much of the hierarchy, the aristocrats and the rich and the educated were converted under his ministry because the power is in the Gospel and God will do everything in His power and He has power to confuse the wisdom of the wise.

Do you want a powerful Gospel? Then strip away all the gimmicks. Strip away all the demographic studies that tell you just how you're supposed to approach a certain person because they're from a certain class.

Someone asked me one time, how do you preach the Gospel to Aguadunas? I said, I don't preach the Gospel to Aguadunas. I preach the Gospel to men and they're all the same. It is a rare bone to give me a man.