(South West Baptist Church 2008) Missions — Gerhard Du Toit

Missions Partnerships and Prayer for Unreached Countries

I want to say tonight it's been a real delight and a blessing to be able to be with you in these few days that we have been able to spend together, sharing God's Word. I'm delighted to know that you are praying for my dear friend, Jim Alley, and his wife.

I know Jim very, very well. And, you know, we are involved in about 30 to 40 different countries, and I've been working together with Jim. Being in his church when he was still at Timberlake Baptist Church, I got to know him one Sunday night.

I was speaking in Shenandoah Baptist Church in the city of Roanoke. And in... ah, these Baptist churches have got so many names. But there's another tremendous church not far from Timberlake Baptist Church where Dr. Jerry Crow is a very dear friend of mine.

He's the senior pastor. Just a tremendous church. I just can't get the name of it now. Anyway, we have had some great fellowship together through the years. And, you know, if you go to Lensbrook, Virginia, the place is saturated with churches.

Every few streets or corner you find, you find those churches. But pray for us because Jim and myself are working together on some countries that I would like us to go together. Asia, the country of Asia, the continent of Asia.

Some incredible opportunities that God has given unto us in Cambodia, Vietnam where Jim Elley is going to go to. Last time when he went, we were able just to help with information. You know, when you go into Vietnam or Cambodia, because it's really a communist country, you need unbelievable wisdom.

And if you take medical equipment through or any of those kind of things and it's not done right, you could land up in prison for a long, long, long time. But we want you to pray when it comes to that.

The Underground Church and Spiritual Hunger in China

China. I don't think you have any idea what God is doing in China. In the underground church, I just had an email a couple of weeks ago. You know, in the underground church in China, they reckon that it is possible that during last year, as many as 680 ,000 people could have come to Christ in that massive country.

My friend, Garth Hunt, who has been used of God in China immensely, was in the countryside of China some time ago. And he met with a Chinese pastor. An email I got a couple of weeks ago was a group of Chinese pastors that came together.

They have underground theological schools. And so you are in a country road and there's this little dirt road. And you go in there and it's a little Chinese house or whatever. And they have a tunnel that leads into an underground Bible college.

That's about 120 feet by about 40 feet. And so they've got lamps, lights. And when you go and spend the day with Chinese pastors, Brethren and sisters, don't you think it's this thing that we find in the countries where we live, where if you spend three hours with them, they think, you know, this is unbelievable.

Don't you think you're going to get away for 12 hours when you go with those people? I mean, they are so hungry. Theologically speaking, they're weak. You say, why are they weak? Because they don't have access to the material that we have.

Teaching Pastors a Personal Theology of Prayer

We are working on a program because I am involved in the theology of prayer and to help pastors to teach them to develop a personal prayer life. And so what we are doing, I've been collecting books on prayer for more than 30 years and was teaching in a seminary in the U .S. some time ago.

And there was a blind student. And one of the things I've been doing for more than 30 years is to read books onto audio, record them, and then listen to them. Because 75 of your growth as a Christian is depending upon what you read.

And so one of the projects that we are involved with, because when I dealt with this blind student, I said, how do you study? And he said, I study through what is referred to as optical voice recognition.

And he said, my wife, there's this program, computer program, where I can take a book on prayer and I scan this book onto my computer. And as I scan it on, it's changing it into voice. So you say, what are we trying to do?

I'm trying, and we're working on the permission through these different books, to be able to put three MP3 discs in the hands of a pastor that's going to give him 350 or 400 chapters by 400 different authors on the New Testament theology of prayer.

And when you give him those discs, he would say, what is it? I say, okay, here's the material. You can download it on your computer. You can read it. But you can also listen to it as you are traveling.

And so it's a tremendous source of information. You know, I love books. Whenever my wife has got her birthday, I buy her all kinds of little things for Janice's birthday. But one of the things that is a predominant, unbelievable importance for me to give her to her birthday every year is a set of commentaries.

You know, I could be a fool, but I'm not stupid, you know. And she just smiles and she writes there, stolen again, and then they land up in my library. But you know, it's tremendous, the literature that we have at our disposal.

The Prayerful Ministry of Muller and Spurgeon

I love to read Charles Adams Spurgeon. Spurgeon is the man that learned to pray on his own, being taught by George Muller of Bristol. People don't know this. I don't know if you know this, that George Muller of Bristol, when Hudson Taylor stepped out of the organization that he's with, with a thousand missionaries in China, and he wrote to George Muller of Bristol, and Muller said to him, what is it that you need?

And he said, I need 75 ,000 pounds a year for these missionaries. And people don't know this. Let me encourage you, if you love to read, which I trust that you do, there are two volumes of probably about 900 pages that has recently come out that gives you all the journals of Muller of Bristol.

And for two years, George Muller of Bristol financed, supported financially, J. Hudson Taylor. If you can get a hold of the life story of J. Hudson Taylor, the working of the life of God in Hudson Taylor, and the ministry that he has been in.

Another about 800 pages of material. It's a great, tremendous blessing. But you know, Muller of Bristol taught Charles Haddon Spurgeon to pray. And Charles Haddon Spurgeon was an amazing, amazing man.

He suffered from gout, you know. And Spurgeon, when he taught Spurgeon to pray, he had a church of more than 6 ,000 people. And there was Sunday mornings that Charles Haddon Spurgeon got up to preach.

And he would say, and he spoke about the unction of the Spirit of God. This is something that you cannot bring down. This is something that you cannot work up. The unction of the Spirit of God. And people say to me, how do you define it?

And I would say to them, I can't always define it, but I always know when it's not there. And Charles Haddon Spurgeon would make this observation. And this is what he would say, when I sense the wind of the Spirit of God in my wings, that meant when the sense of the consciousness of God comes, because there is no power without purity, and this passion, and this brokenness, and this transparency, and this vulnerability would come.

And when God would come upon Charles Haddon Spurgeon, brother and sister, 6 ,000 people would leap to their feet. And they would just kind of rose up. And when the service, after he preached, they would ask and say, why did you do that?

And these people turned and they would say, when we sense the unction of God's Spirit upon him, they said we rose to our feet, because we were afraid that we would miss one word that would come from the lips of Charles Haddon Spurgeon.

And Muller of Bristol taught Spurgeon how to pray. You know, someone came to Spurgeon one day, and asked him and said, what's the secret of your ministry? You know what Spurgeon said? The heating system in my church.

And they said, what do you mean? And he said, come and see on Sunday morning. And when they came on Sunday morning, he took them into the basement of the church and there were 400 people praying. That's the secret of his ministry.

And he was a brilliant preacher, you know, Charles Haddon Spurgeon. He was about, I need to remember correctly, I think he was about 16 or 17 years old. His father was a minister. And he was asked to come and preach for his father, and he was late.

And so his father got up and started the service, and the young Charles Haddon Spurgeon didn't come. And so when he didn't come, his father started to preach out of Ephesians 3, if I remember correctly.

And he was preaching away in Ephesians 3, and right in the middle of his sermon, the young Charles Haddon Spurgeon walked in and his dad turned to the congregation and said, my son was supposed to preach here this morning, and for one reason or another he's been late.

And he said to him, he said, son, this is the passage that I'm working on in biblical exposition. This has been my first point. This has been my second point. And he said, now this is going to be my third point.

And I want you to come and do the biblical exposition and exegesis on this text. And he got up and he did a marvelous work, you know. Some people, they said he had a golden hammer. When he struck the passage of Scripture, it fell just into place to be able to preach.

You know, Charles, I should stop about Charles Haddon Spurgeon. I love him so much, you know. And Charles Haddon Spurgeon, brother and sister, one night couldn't get his message. Never had difficulty finding a sermon.

One night he couldn't get his sermon together. And it was Saturday night. And he was in absolute agony. And he said to his wife, I can't get my sermon together. And his wife turned to him and she said, why don't you go to bed?

And I'll wake you up early tomorrow morning and you can work on your sermon. And so he listened to her and she said, I'll wake you up very early and you can do that. And you know what happened? The moment he went to bed and she got to bed, turned the lamp off.

And the moment when he fell asleep, you know what happened, brother and sister? He began to preach in his sleep. And as he was preaching in his sleep, his wife listened to him and recognized it was the passage.

It was the prophecy of Isaiah. And she recognized that's the passage that he's struggling with. She turned the lamp on and began to take notes from his preaching in his sleep. Never woke him up the next morning.

When he woke up, he said to his wife, why didn't you wake me up? I'm not ready. And she said, Charles, this is what you were preaching in your sleep. And he looked and he said, oh, that's exactly what I was looking for, you know.

Got up and preached a marvelous message in his life and ministry. Anyway, let me just tell you. China. My friend, Godfather, I was in the country area of China. And he said, I spitted over a pastor. And I turned to this pastor and I said to him, how can we pray for you?

Costly Discipleship and Conversion in China

What is the need in this specific village, in this area? And this Chinese pastor turned to him and he said, and brother and sister, I'm not kidding you. The Chinese pastor turned to him and he said, we only have one problem in this area.

And Godfather said to him, what is it? He said, there's no one else that needs to be converted. And he said, and what do you mean? He said, every single one of his people has been gloriously saved. He was with another pastor and this pastor was in a home Bible study group underground.

And as he was in this group, in this underground church, the secret police came to arrest him. And he was coming to the end of his Bible study and when the secret police came to arrest him, he said to them, because you know that 80 of the pastors in the underground church in China has been arrested at some point or another.

Do you know what's our problem in Australia and North America? It doesn't cost you anything to be a Christian. Absolutely nothing. And so he said, what happened? And so he said to them, I just need five minutes to close my Bible study and you can arrest me.

Do you know what happened? He came to the end of his Bible study and when they wanted to take him, he said to them, now you can arrest me, but last time when you arrested me, my church grew three times as fast as when I was with him.

Hunger for God in Romania

Do you know what he did? He just said to him, go home. Just go home. And ah, brother and sister, I tell you, God is doing wonderful things. We spoke about Romania this morning. Last year I had the joy of spending time with Emanuel Baptist Church in the city of Oradea.

It's a wonderful church with about 4 ,000 people and Emanuel Christian University. And the Romanians, if you get to know them, their famous statement is, there's been a change in the schedule. I had nine days with them.

We were supposed to lecture for 16 hours. Ended up speaking about 32 hours with these Romanians. And they're wonderful people in Romania. And do you know, the last weekend they gave me a group of students, a singing group and a translator.

And do you know, it's incredible, when we jumped into the theology of prayer, my first translator, I said, are you ready to go? I said, we're going to cover hours of material. And brother and sister, after the first day, he was so sick he couldn't do it anymore.

I went through six different translators. And you know, the last weekend, they gave me this translator, a driver of the bus and this group. And we went to the border of Yugoslavia. And the Saturday night, these people are so hungry.

I mean, so hungry for God. And the Saturday night we spoke in this Baptist church, a wonderful group of conservative Baptist Christians. And when the service was over, and they asked me to speak for an hour and a half, they said, we want to hear as much.

And I spoke for an hour and a half. And I went and I sat down. I was so tired. And the pastor, people refused to go home. And so my translator came and he said, we've got a problem. I said, what is the problem?

He said, the pastor said, the people don't want to go home. Well, I said, I want to go home. I mean, I'm tired. And they didn't want to. And brother and sister, I stayed in a house. I mean, this is going to blow every circuit in your mind.

But I stayed in the house. I didn't know this. And the lady of the house was the daughter of the first pastor of that Baptist church under the communist regime in Romania. And when she was three years old, the secret police came and arrested her.

And then they arrested her dad. And so they took her father away, took him to the other side of Romania, put him in prison. And 12 months later, they came to her mother and they said to her mother, your husband has died in prison.

And she said, in terrible shock, she said, what do you mean? They said, well, he was in labor camp and he died in prison. And here is a sheet of paper. This is his death certificate. She began to go through the grieving process of losing her husband.

Little girl was three years old. And three years later, she got married again to a single school teacher in that little Baptist church because her husband was dead. You say, what happened? Two years later, her husband wasn't dead.

They lied to her. Two years later, they released him out of prison. The other side of Romania, he went to prison when he was 160 pounds. When he came out of prison, I've got a picture of this dear man.

When he came out of prison, he was only 50 pounds. Skeleton of a man. When he found his way out of prison, he had only one passion and he said, I want to go back to my wife and my little girl. Didn't have any idea what was going on.

Worked his way back to the other side of Romania. Came to this little house. Those people are desperately poor. Came to this little house and knocked at the door of the house. He thought, I'm going to surprise her.

She came and she opened the door of the house about 11 o 'clock in the morning. And when she opened the door of the house, here he stood. And she turned as white as a sheet. And he said to her, I'm back.

And she just turned to him in absolute shock. And she said, no. She said, I was told that you were dead. And he said, no, they lied to you and I'm back. He was just a skeleton of a man. And she said to him, I told that you were dead and I got married to your best friend.

And as he stood there, two little children came around the corner. And he said, who are these children? And she said, these are my children. We have no idea, you know. Absolutely no idea. Dr. Paul McGrath, who is the president of the university, he said to me, under communism, he said, we had Christian music in our homes for 24 hours a day.

His daughter told me, just godly children. His daughter told me, you know, I trust that you're really feeding your children in the Word of God. God didn't give us children to populate hell, you know. And his daughter told me, she said, we never spoke in our houses.

We whispered. And that's what we did. And so, I would appreciate if you would pray. You know, we send out a prayer letter. And I will not ask you if you want to receive it, because your senior pastor is not here.

You know, I never go to church if the senior pastor is not there. And this is the first time ever, I can tell you. But when I got there, I really felt God wanted us to spend these days together. And it's quite possible that when you listen to this series, that he would say, never again, you know.

I hope not, but it's quite possible. But we send out a prayer letter, and all we do is to ask people to pray for us. We'll never ask you to support us financially. He says, because you don't need it, of course we need it.

But you know, it's never a question of money. It's always a question, is it the will of God? You do what God wants you to do, and God is going to take care of you. And if He doesn't take care of you, He's got something that He needs to tell you.

Spiritual Accountability and Dying to Self

So, it will be great if you... Before we pray together, if you've not been with us these evenings, we've had some tremendous times of prayer together. And we're going to do it in a moment. But before we do that, I want to mention to you that we've had some great material that we have made available over these days that we have been together.

One of those was a list of questions on accountability. If you meet with someone on accountability basis, we've put these 20 questions together. I have 12 men that are holding me accountable for the ministry that we are involved with.

Three of them are theologians, and four of them are theologians. Four of them are men with great spiritual depth. And four of them are doctors. And we meet, they are at my advisory board. And I've given them these 20 questions.

Where are you in your relationship with God? What areas of your relationship with God do you experience resistance? And they ask me these questions, and we discuss it. And you know, some of those men, I mean, I appreciate those men.

But some of them, you know, they put the knife in and they turn it. Say, why is it? Because they are Mennonites. I don't know if you know what's a Mennonite. The way that they found Mennonites is because they found, that's the way they found copper coin.

Because they found two Mennonites that were fighting over a copper coin. And that's how they found copper wire. And if you know those men. So, we've got all this material that we would like to put in your hands.

I've got something here that we call my spiritual checklist. My relationship with the world. My relationship to my house. My relationship to my quiet time. My relationship to my rights. And we would dearly love to put this in your hands.

We read material the other day about how do I know when I live a broken Christian life. And I really would like to encourage you to get one of those sheets. I want to read this to you. How do you know when you've died to yourself?

When you are forgotten or you are neglected. Or you are purposely set at naught. And you do not sting and hurt with the insult or oversight. But your heart is counted worthy to suffer for Christ. That's when you've died to yourself.

When your good is evil spoken of. When your wishes are crossed. Your advice is disregarded. Your opinions are ridiculed. And you refuse to let anger rise in your heart. Or even defend yourself as a Christian.

And you take it patient, loving and silence. That's when you've died to yourself. When you lovingly and patiently bear any disorder. Any irregularity. Any impunctuality. Any annoyance. When you stand face to face with waste.

Folly, extravagance. Spiritual insensitivity. And you endure as Jesus endured it. That's when you've died to yourself. When you never care to refer to yourself in conversation. Or to record any of your own things.

And when you can truly love to be unknown. That's when you've died to yourself. When you are content with any food. Any offering. Any raiment. Any climate. Any society. Any solitude. Any interruption by the will of God.

That's when you've died to yourself. When you see your brother prosper. You saw his needs being met. And you can honestly rejoice with him in spirit. And feel no envy nor question God. When your own needs are far greater.

And in desperate circumstances. That is when you've died to yourself. When you can receive criticism. Or correction and reproof. From one that is far less of a stature than yourself. And you can humbly submit.

Inwardly as well as outwardly. Finding no rebellion or any form of resentment. Rising within your heart. That's when you are dying to yourself. Are you dead in these last days? The spirit of God wants to bring us to the cross of Christ.

So we would like to make sure that you get some of this material. And that you would be able to be blessed by it. We're going to spend some time in prayer. I wish I can take you to some of these countries.

Where we bring sometimes five, six thousand people together. And most of the times in leadership. We break up in groups of four to five to six. Little groups of four or five or six people. And you've got a thousand little groups.

Praying at the same time seeking God together. Brethren and sisters, it's incredible to do that. So what I want us to do. We've been doing it every time except for last night and this morning. Let's break up and this is what I want you to do.

Find four or five people. Or six people. And a little group together. Now if you are here and through the evenings. You've prayed with a certain group of people. You go to them and say I don't want to pray with you.

I've prayed with you all these days. Find someone else. Now this is what I want you to do. When you form that little circle. I want you to look at the person and I want you to say to them. So how can I pray for you this evening?

And then you can share with them. Now I don't want you to share too long. Because then we all don't get an opportunity. And then we're going to pray. And then if you pray. I want you to focus on what we've discussed.

I don't want you to be like the two elderly men that prayed. And the one prayed all over the world. And the other man fell asleep. And when he came to the end of his prayer. And the other fellow woke up.

He said to him when did you fall asleep? And he said I think it's when you were in India. So we don't want you to do that. So we're going to pray together. So can you find five or six people? And form a little group now.

If you want to pray on your own we understand that. Or just if you're white. But why don't we do that together? Brother and sister it's a tremendous blessing. So that's what we're going to do. And then we have a few minutes to turn to the scriptures.

So let's turn to one another. We've got chairs. We can do that. And find five or six people.