At this luncheon, some of our speakers shared what was “burning in their souls.”

Well, probably the thing that burns in my soul the most, and what I feel to be my greatest calling in life, is to promote what I call Reformed experiential preaching. That means experiential or experimental as the old divines used to say is the importance of experiencing beyond the mind also in the soul and the whole life the truths of God which is related to this conferences theme on unholyness. It's not enough just to believe the confessions and to be conservative and have an outward demeanor of a godly walk. We need to know God in Jesus Christ, whom he has sent. In our library of 100, 000 books at Puritan Reform Seminary, the most common text preached on by the Reformers and the Puritans and all those forefathers we hold dear is John 17 verse 3.

This is life eternal to know God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent. Number one text preached on. And the word to know as you know in Greek means intimate knowledge that Jesus becomes more real to you than the chairs you're sitting on right now. Well that's my passion, my passion in life. I grew up in that tradition and I feel even stronger now than I ever did before.

2002 I was in an Eastern European country. I was assaulted when I came back to my room after teaching systematic theology. I was struck down by a guy who, when I went to shut my door, they came in, They shouted they were the mafia. And they laid me down and bound me, hand and feet, and gagged me and eyes. And I couldn't understand anything they were saying, but I knew I was a dead man.

Because they had told me, if you're ever in the hands of the mafia you are a dead man. I never even prayed that I would live I just started praying when I was laying there on the ground for my wife, my children and so on but comes to find out they really weren't the mafia and they took my keys and went over to the seminary, they stripped it of all the computers, they took everything I owned and so on, but they left. And I, after 15 minutes, was able to unloosen myself and I stood up and I had one of those aha moments in my spiritual life where I rededicated my life to the Lord to promote his truth known in the soul and I vowed to God I would spend every waking moment I had to promote Reformed experiential preaching and teaching. This past September I got COVID, and I had a flip experience. As much as God helped me when I was laying on the floor 20 years ago, I felt deserted by God at the initial time of COVID.

I actually got sick in church, went out of church, felt I was going to faint, and I did faint. Took me to the hospital. I was there a couple days. When I woke up actually they were cutting my brand new suit pants from the bottom up and I thought, what are you doing destroying a $300 pair of suit? And then I suddenly realized, wow this must be serious.

And the first days after I was home, it was like I could not pray. I mean, I prayed, but it didn't go beyond the ceiling. It was just no contact with God. It was frightening. It was the worst part of COVID for me.

But after about three days, the cloud lifted, and I felt a burning love to God and to His people, more than ever before. And I re-vowed my life, re-dedicated my life once more to this grand theme of bringing God's truth to the whole man, head and heart, as well as hands and feet. So that's my personal emphasis. That's how I feel about my wife and my children and my seven new grandchildren Five years ago, and I stood before you I had zero grandchildren today. We have five or seven so in five years That's not too bad But they're wonderful, But I have the same passion for them.

They need to know the Lord in truth. I have the same passion for my church. Every time I get up to preach, from Lord's Day to Lord's Day, I want them to know the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity and to love Him in sincerity. But that's also my passion in my other work, my two other main tasks. First, in the seminary, pure to Reformed Seminary, Paul Washer actually did our commencement address a week ago and it was wonderful.

And we had 23 graduates going to 13 countries and our first PhD graduates as well. So we have five degrees and the PhD degree we began about six years ago to implement because our goal is to get PhDs back with this reformed experiential emphasis back into their own countries, become presidents of seminaries, is our grandest goal, and that those presidents of seminaries can then select, with the help of their boards, all really godly, reformed, solid men who have an experiential flavor to teach in those seminaries. The grand goal, it's a goal of decades, is that in every country with a significant reformed presence, there will be at least one seminary that those men can go to from that country where they can trust every professor to bring them the whole council of God in the whole inspired Word of God to the whole man of God. That's our passion. So they don't all have to fly to America to a few seminaries that are still sound in this way, but they can get trained in their own countries.

To that end, we're expanding our programs. We're opening up a homiletics degree. That's a preaching degree, a PhD degree, and a D-men degree this fall. We're opening up a counseling degree. There's a great need for counseling also in churches.

Women counseling women and men counseling men, and we're hoping to promote that. That's burning in our soul as well. But again, that's a Reformed experiential kind of counseling where you speak to the heart as well as to the mind. So it's all of one piece, you see. It's one passion, one dream, promoting God's glory through this Reformed experiential emphasis.

And the last thing I want to say is that We want to carry out that dream also at Reformation Heritage Books. That's been a passion of mine for 27 years with the book ministry. And God has been opening up new doors. During the COVID time, We reorganized RHB and the seminary in such a way that if something happens to me in the future, both ministries will go on. David Wolin, who is with me now here today, is a CEO of RHB.

And so, he's got a lot of energy, vision, drive, along the same lines that we feel convicted by. And so, we just purchased a new building, two and a half million dollar building, actually 44, 000 square feet. And thank the Lord that donors took care of that expense because we're a non-profit. And that's opening up to be the largest reformed experiential bookstore in the world, in Grand Rapids, Michigan, next month. And still most of our orders will be mail orders, but we have a passion to bring this truth around the globe and to expand it more and more.

Good news is that every single year in the last four years, RHB is selling about another $500, 000 worth of books each year. It's growing. COVID time was off the charts. So it's wonderful to see that more people are loving to read sound truth around the world than I can remember in my lifetime. And some of My passion here is invested in the complete works of William Perkins, the father of Puritanism.

We have just published the last volume of a ten-volume set. For the first time, his works are available since the 1600s. How would you like to not have Calvin's Institutes or Calvin's Commentary?" He said, it would be crazy. Well, it's crazy that we have these hundreds and hundreds of Puritan books that feed the soul and we don't have the father of the whole movement print it. So now they are finally available.

So that's one dream done. A second dream is that Samuel Rutherford, who many of you know, I love him dearly, as a man of God, not only, but as a preacher of Christ. He's the most Christ-centered writer I know in all of church history. Well, we are doing the complete works of Samuel Rutherford, also a systematic theology which is still in Latin. We're doing the complete works in 13 volumes.

Chad Van Dixhorn from Westminster is the head of a team of us, five editors. We've got about 50 writers involved. It's a nine-year project, God willing, and we want to bring out this great Scottish writer in his complete writings. Again, Reformed experiential preaching and teaching. Jonathan Edwards said that Patris Jonathan Edwards said that Patrisus van Maastricht had a seven-volume set of theology that was the best thing ever written in the history of mankind beside the Bible.

That has never been translated to English as well. We're just putting the finishing touches right now on volume 3. It's one of my passions. If the Lord spares me to complete that work with a number of other men who are translating. I serve as editor of it in the next five to six years.

But that will be a work that will impact scholars and pastors all over the globe. Patris van Maastricht, his seven-volume work on systematic theology. At the same time, this is my last point, I'm leaving behind, let me get over and get this here, I'm leaving behind my own life's legacy of teaching for 30 years in Reform Systematic Theology in four volumes with my TA, Paul Smalley. Crossway is printing this. The first two volumes are done.

The third volume is at the printer, all typeset and done, but will come out in November. And then we're working on the fourth volume. What we aim to do, which is consistent with all these goals, is we take each doctrine of the Bible, say what the Bible says about it, then secondly what church history says about it, pro and con, thirdly, how do you experience this doctrine in the inner man, and then fourthly, practical takeaways from this doctrine, and fifthly, we end every chapter with a poem or a hymn because we want you to end in doxological praise for every doctrine of the Bible. Don't you ever dare say to me that doctrine is boring. Doctrine is exciting.

Martin Luther said doctrine is heaven because by these things men live. Well, that's what we're trying to do in this legacy I'm trying to leave behind. And at the same time, we just came out with Puritan Reform Theology, Historical, Experiential, Practical Studies for the Whole of Life. This was for our 25th anniversary of our seminary and I've tried to collect various articles I wrote on the experiential end of the teaching of the Puritans so that you can learn in a whole variety of areas of life how they brought doctrine and truth home to your heart and life. So that's Burning in My Soul, Reformed Experiential Preaching and Teaching.

Thank you very much. I'm Tom Askel. I'm Tom Askel. I'm the pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Cape Coral, Florida, President of Founders Ministries and President of the Institute of Public Theology. And when Scott asked me to do this, I immediately had my mind go to the doctrine of God.

Because what has been weighing heavily on me the last four years and especially from December 2019 to this very moment is the reality that God seems to be pretty light in our world today. He seems to rest rather lightly even in our churches today and certainly on our governmental institutions today. I've been drawn to Psalm 50, where God causes people together, and then He admonishes them. And He goes over the litany of their sins. He says, why do you take My covenant upon your lips when in reality you're far from Me?

And He describes the various sins of which they are guilty, Basically just playing along with the role of religion while forgetting God. And he says this to them, These things you have done and I have kept silent, And you thought I was one like yourself, But now I rebuke you and lay the charge before you. Mark this then, you who forget God, lest I tear you apart, and there be none to deliver." In 1983, when Alexander Solzhenitsyn was receiving the Templeton Award, in his speech he said that when he was a young boy, in the wake of the Bolshevik Revolution, he listened to the elders of his city, his town, talk about what all was going on and why Russia had fallen so far. And he said they always came to this same conclusion, we have forgotten God. That's why all this has happened to us.

And he said at that time, he said, I've now spent the last 50 years of my life studying that question. And I've written eight volumes so far contributing to try to understand what happened in Russia through this horrible revolution. And he said, I have no better explanation than that. We have forgotten God. That's why all this has happened.

But last year, as I watched our cities burn, And I saw our evangelical leaders, one after another, offer up horrific excuses and explanations when they would dare to speak at all about these things. My heart continued to just burn and weep within me. I thought about my own life and how I've come to this stage of life, 64 years old, and I've let these things happen under my own watch in so many of the circles of influence and responsibilities and fellowship that I have. My own heart has burned with a sense of, God have mercy on me, forgive me, don't let me live the rest of my life without calling your people and all people to deal with the God that is. There is a God in Heaven.

We are His creatures. We exist for Him, by Him. The spheres of authority that He has ordained in this world are by His design and accountable to Him. Magistrates, civil magistrates, are accountable to God as His deacons. Fathers and mothers are accountable to how we relate to each other and to our children and bringing them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord because He created us to be in those spheres of responsibility.

Our churches, our churches of Jesus Christ, We don't have the option to sit around and decide whether or not we're going to speak for Christ, stand for Christ, defend the gospel of Christ. God has spoken. We have a book. God help us when we neglect this book. God help us when we forget that we've been created in His image and that one day we will stand to give an account before Him.

God help us if we fail to fear Him and we start or continue to fear people. I'm grieved. I'm deeply grieved at what I see going on in our nation and Western civilization with these ideologies that have been so easily insinuated into our various institutions and even into our own churches in many places. While God's people and the shepherds of God's people have either stood by silently or even worse, opened the door and welcomed them in. Sometimes people tell me I'm on a fool's errand, or like Don Quixote, tilting at windmills.

And I've lost friends over the last few years, over these issues. But late at night when I'm trying to go to sleep, and I try to understand where we are as a culture and where we are as churches, I can't help but think about my grandchildren. I want them to have God-honoring churches to grow up in. And if the onslaught continues and God casts America on the ash heap of human history, I at least want to leave some markers for them as they dig through the rubble that they can say, oh, look, grandpa thought this that will take them back to the word of God. Brothers and sisters, how can we live in this day without having deep burden in our souls for the honor of our God who has been forgotten.

Forgotten in our society, forgotten in our civil authorities. And we need to admit it too often. Forgotten in our churches. We who profess faith in Jesus Christ, who are staking our lives on His life, death, and resurrection to make us right with God, How can we think honestly about the cross without bowing in wonder, in awe, in reverence, in joy that is beyond imagination, and in imagination and in fear. That's what our sin deserves.

Our sin is so wicked It took the death of God's own Son in order to redeem us from it. How can we think of God who did not spare His own Son but delivered Him up for us all? How can we think that He will treat our sin and spiritual apathy and indifference in a nonchalant way. How can we think that we can go on living these God-forgetful ways and believe that in heaven no notice is taken of it. Brothers and sisters, if I could just say one thing to us today, and I include myself in the church, I serve in this, and founders in the institute, all that I want to say can be boiled down to this.

We need to come back to remember the God who is and fear Him and Him alone. If God will help us to do that, then we won't be easily swayed by the culture. We won't be intimidated when the civil magistrates tell us, oh, you must do this, and we know better how you can lead your churches than the way that you've been doing it. We won't be so easily duped by those religious leaders who tell us, listen, Romans 13, therefore do what the civil magistrate says. We won't be easily taken captive by these worldly philosophies that are according to the elemental spirits of this age, that are according to mere human tradition and not according to Christ.

Because we will realize that we have been purchased at too great a price. Our Lord has given up his own Son for us. Because of that we are his people, we are free, and we have everything we need to stand against the tide that is rising against Christ and His church. We have every reason to be full of hope and full of joy and full of the power that comes from the Spirit in order to say to this world, the God who created you, the God before whom you will stand before too long and give an account, is the God who gave up his Son for sinners just like you. So kiss the Son, be reconciled to your God, and come to know the Lord Jesus Christ in whom alone there is life everlasting.

That's what's burning in my soul. Hello, my name is Paul Washer and I'm a member of Christ Church Radford and I also am one of the staff workers for the HeartCry Missionary Society. What's burning on my on my heart? Then the year the king, Isaiah, died, I saw also the Lord high and lifted up the train of his robe filled the temple above him, stood the seraphim. Each having six wings with two, they covered their face and with two, they covered their feet, with two they did fly.

One cried unto the other, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. The post, the door moved at the voice of him who cried. And the same magnificent person is described this way. And he went a little beyond them and fell on his face.

And prayed, saying. My father, if it is possible. Let this cup pass for me. Yet not as I will. But as you will.

And this same. Magnificent person. Magnificent person. About the ninth hour, cried out. With a loud voice saying, Eli Eli Lama tabakthani.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? I am not a great expositor nor a academic. I have been called a one hit wonder. The man only preaches about one thing. Does he study nothing else?

From the day as a young Christian. That I read. And it pleased the Lord to crush him. I have very few thoughts. That stray far from that.

That this magnificent God. This magnificent son, everything the father has ever done is done for him. He created the world for the sun and through the sun, he sustains the world for the sun and through the sun, He reveals himself through the sun, He redeems through the sun. He will judge through the sun. He will give all honor, glory and praise to the sun.

But this one place. In our history. This one place in the cosmos, this one moment in time. When the land became dark. And I do not believe it was cloudy or just rainy or just thunderbolts filling the sky.

I believe that you couldn't have seen your face, your hand in front of your face, a darkness like that covered Egypt. Engulfed the son of God. On that tree. Because, you see, he had to be locked up, shut up. He couldn't even look out at the mourners and find compassion from them.

He had to be shut up entirely as billow after billow after billow of the wrath of Almighty God. Crushed him and crushed him. Reformers and Puritans were quick to point out evidence of his deity for who can withstand the wrath of Almighty God. And yet beware the statements true. But it wasn't that his deity acted as a dome protecting him, his deity strengthened his humanity so he could suffer that as a man, What would pulverize worlds in a fraction of a second?

He suffered as a lone man for three hours upon that tree. That. Is what drives. From where do we find passion, where do we find motivation, what engine is strong enough? To burn within, to cause us to cause a man, a woman to spend their life.

It is that magnificent person of Jesus Christ. He is everything, He is everything in the mind of God. And when he is everything in your mind, you have the mind of God. And it is to take this message to the world. We work in so many countries, so many places where people cannot go.

So many deep and dark jungles and high mountains. I want to see those people gathered. For Christ. But I don't want just a. Elemental or primitive.

Basic, I don't want them to have just this basic little understanding, I want the tribesmen. To understand who this person truly is. And to revel. I want his heart to be so captivated that he can't sleep at night. That he takes the night watch, but with gladness in his heart.

I want Especially for you young people. There is. A time coming, it appears that the Lord has decreed for you to suffer. There is only one thing to drive you through that storm. And that is an awareness of who this marvelous person, Jesus Christ, truly is and what he did for you on Calvary.

As I've said. I say it so many times. But I'm just following in the footsteps of my father's when I say it. Whether it's Flaval, or Owen, or Spurgeon, or Octavius Winslow, or Philpott, Hugh Martin. William Bates.

All of the men who wrote much and thought much of Christ, they always felt the need almost in every chapter to offer an apology. And then to walk away from what they had written with disgust, because we're talking about such a glorious person. That I suppose that. You would have to be supernaturally strengthened. Just to catch the tiniest glimpse of him, lest it kill you, lest it fracture your mind.

Exaggerate your heart. Put an end to you, pulverize you. This is Christ, and this is what We as Christians come from, but this is also as Christians what we are going to. This is a fraction of a moment that we live. I agree so much with the Wesley brothers.

Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing. Oh, for a thousand lives to lay down. Oh, anathema to every wasted moment that's not given to him. It becomes barbaric and foolish. Christ, Christ, Christ.

That you young people would see him. Study Calvary. Study his pre-incarnate glory, study his humiliation. Study his death, study his perfect life, study his resurrection and power. Study as he cries out to the parapets of heaven for the doors to be opened and that he might walk through as a man by his own virtue, by his own merit, the conqueror.

I am a weak and pitiful man. It's Martin Lloyd-Jones says at the end of his life, everyone who visited him, he said, I am a great sinner, but oh, Christ is a great savior. Think much on him. Buy books on him, study him, pray to him, cry out to him just to know him More. Just to know him more.

Philippians chapter 3 verses 7 through 11 the apostle Paul writes, but what things were gained to me these I've counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things lost for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having my own righteousness which is from the law but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death, if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. A number of years ago, we hosted a couples dinner, the married couples in our church. And I titled my remarks that night Dome Incorporated. My last name is dome.

And I wanted to talk about sort of the business aspects of marriage. And when you think about marriage, you think in terms of business aspects, that sounds cold, sterile, unattractive, but the truth is without business aspects, without some machinery, marriage can be monstrous. Marriage actually does need structure, patterns, disciplines. But if it's all and only structures and patterns and disciplines, machinery, then that is what is truly, truly monstrous. This morning, or this afternoon, I want to talk about Jesus incorporated.

I want to talk about the machinery of our faith. I want to talk about things that are necessary, that they're actually God's ideas like the local church, like scripture reading, like prayer, like taking the Lord's Supper. These things, it might sound cold, mechanical, but they are necessary. They are God's ideas, but they are means and not the end. It is monstrous when the machinery becomes the end And not the means that God is taking us to.

Last week, last Sunday, our congregation sang what is fast becoming, one of my favorite hymns, All That Thrills My Soul. Let me read to you the chorus. All that thrills my soul is Jesus. He is more than life to me and the fairest of 10, 000 in my blessed Lord." I see. That chorus is taking up Song of Solomon chapter 5 verse 10 where the beloved is called the chief of ten thousand.

What's happening there in Song of Solomon chapter 5 is that the bride can't find the beloved and she's lovesick so she entreats her friends, she recruits her friends to help her find the beloved, but her friends react. They essentially ask what's so urgent about her finding her loved one that their help should be sought. And she responds by saying that he is the chief of 10, 000. That is why this line in the chorus, and the fairest of 10, 000 in my blessed Lord I see. In other words, If you lined up 10, 000 clamoring for her affection, she could immediately identify and dismiss the other suitors because he is the fairest of the 10, 000.

Her soul is thrilled by one in ten thousand. Let me say this. There are people in this room who are wonderfully orthodox. I could pass a baptismal interview with flying colors. They fit seamlessly into Jesus Incorporated, into the machinery of our faith, but they have no frame of reference for that.

They have no frame of reference for it. Ten thousand side by side, He's the one! He's the Pharise of ten thousand! It's Him that thrills my soul! Their soul has never been thrilled by Jesus, even though they're wonderfully orthodox and they fit seamlessly into Jesus Incorporated.

Oh friends, let me either call you to it, if you have not a frame of reference for that. Jesus has never thrilled your soul, no matter your relationship to Jesus, Incorporated. Or let me call you back to it, maybe have a frame of reference for it. This is bringing you back to the days when you were first saved and it was all fresh and it was all sweet. Not the machinery which is necessary, but the presence of being near the chief of 10, 000, the fairest of 10, 000, just to be with him.

Being lovesick. Does that language belong in your theology? Being lovesick to go and to be with him. You say, well what do I do? I have no frame of reference for that.

Or how do I get back to that? You cry out like Jacob. Cried out, Lord, I will not let you go until you bless me. Show me yourself. I'll linger until you do.

I'll wait on you until you do. I'll walk away from the trinkets that I've been so easily satisfied with. I don't want that anymore. I want the fairest of 10, 000. I know me, I know I haven't been what I should have been.

I know my progress has been slow. But this much I know. He thrills my soul. He's the fairest of 10, 000. He's the chief of 10, 000.

Of all the suitors that have clamored for my affection, When you line them up, I say it's Him. God, give us this. I thank you for the means of grace. I need the means of grace. But there are means to the end of knowing the fairest of 10, 000.

Oh God, let us linger. Let us linger and not be satisfied until He has thrilled our souls. I pray in Jesus' name, amen. Who have I in heaven but thee? And there is none on earth beside thee, though my flesh and my heart might fail, still thou art my strength and my portion forever.

About 10 years ago-ish, I stood at this podium, a little overwhelmed at what I had seen. It was my first time at the, what was then the NCFIC. And given my background and where I'd come from, I was amazed to see so many families, so many fathers, so many intact households. And it resonated with me because I, my wife and I, and Our team began our church in 1997 with a desire to reach young people and young families with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And here I walk into this place on the mountainside, and it was this vision that I had never seen walked out before me before.

That burden for family reformation remains and it is hard to look around and not see the destruction of the household. Most of us are well acquainted with the bad news. Most of us have some understanding of the reasons why. But as I stand here today, a decade or so later, after having fellowship with this body of believers now for quite a while. What burns in my soul still is a desire for widespread family reformation.

And I desire this for all families, but if I'm honest before you today, I particularly yearn for this amongst the hardest hit, the most impacted families to be touched by the power of God's word. Families where children are consistently born without fathers in the home. Families where there's no strong man to lead them. Families who, for whatever reason, have a disconnect between the faith that they profess and the lives that they live. Families who are trapped by the damage cycle of an unbiblical worldview, poisoned by the fruit of secular education, families who are being systematically taught that godly virtues are uniquely the space of one ethnicity or one culture, families that have lost their hope or looking for hope in all the wrong places.

In May of last year, COVID was in full swing. I had the honor to preach five messages at our church in Chesapeake, Virginia, Calvary Reformation Church, laying out what I believed were characteristics of a biblically healthy household. And they were simple thoughts. All the cookies were on the shelf where everybody could reach them. I simply declared to our church that a healthy household, a biblically healthy household is built on the rock of Christ.

That such a family honors and esteems fathers and mothers. Such a family joyfully accepts their God-defined roles, practices spiritual disciplines, and has a unified purpose, just very simple thoughts. Well, for whatever reason, by the grace of God, that series of messages was well received by our church and it went beyond our church. It was an unusual thing for me as brother Paul said, I'm just you know, it's the intimate. I'm just kind of a nobody.

They're not a very good, you know, speaker and just a sinner trying to or as Scott said in the singles conference, just a dad hacking away in an ungodly culture, trying to apply the Bible. But this series of messages was well received at our church, but also it prompted, because of COVID, One of the unintended blessings that if you're streaming your services, who knows, someone in another state might see it, and so families in other states were getting in contact saying this whole conversation has started with our family as a result of what you said. And one major homeschool conference actually even used a series of messages as their keynotes because their conference was shut down. And so the series was really built around Matthew 7, verses 24 through 27. Therefore, whosoever heareth these things of mine and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock and the rain descended and the floods came, the wind blew and beat upon that house and it fell not for it was founded upon a rock.

And everyone that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand and the rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell and great was the fall of it. And as I began to think about this burden that we have at our church for the family reformation and as I said, particularly families who've not heard it before, not experienced it before, and for whatever reason aren't exposed to the wealth of resources that some of us are, we laid it out as clearly as we possibly could. We said that for a family to be built on the rock of Christ, that family must experience his person and work, and those things must be foundational, that Christ is the chief cornerstone of the family, even as it's built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. We said that Christ's gospel is a primary household motivator as, again, going back to what Brother Paul said, what else could possibly motivate us than that the Son of God and God the Son died for our sins.

It oughta cause us to jump out of bed in the morning ready to attack the day because Christ is that good and is that worthy. We said that Christ should be worshiped and discussed and preached in every family, in every household, and he should be the main topic of conversation, that his full joy is sought after and growing, that Christ's warnings are heeded and accepted, that Christ's church is vital in the life of the household, that Christ's service is seen as reasonable, and that's just the first area. And there's this vodibakum v'seib, but wait, there's more. We said that honor and esteeming fathers and mothers includes the principle of honor. And again, understanding where I'm coming from, we're teaching these things now in areas where it may seem mundane to you, it's not a mundane thing.

That the principle of honor is in every single household, that biblical manhood, which I call the need of the hour, is being held up, Men are being respected, and there's a list of things that men must do in order to glorify God. That biblical womanhood comes to the forefront, and we do our best to fight against the feminist tendencies of our day. That the dignity of motherhood and the esteem that we must give to women and mothers is held up. They're treated a certain way with honor, with deference, and with respect. We said that we must joyfully accept our God to find roles in family and for us at our church, that meant that we must see scripture as sufficient, that we must ensure that our family identity flows from the word of God, that loving order and obedience undergirds such a household and these marriages are strong, resisting the lure of divorce in our day, that singles can greatly impact the kingdom of God as many of you have found out here just recently, according to the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 7, so much available to you to do and we need you, quite frankly, and that children and old generations are loved and valued in such a household.

And my burden is to take some of this information and take it into places that some of them are harder to reach places if you get my meaning. That this household practices spiritual disciplines, that we spend time in prayer, we gather our families up in prayer and in family worship, that we read and memorize scripture, that we work to develop a worldview that honors our Lord. We call that a biblical worldview, that we walk in honesty and integrity, grow in an attitude toward sin, wherein we pluck it out, cast it away, cut it off and kill it. A household wherein we repent quickly and speak kind and loving words one to another. And then finally, that this household has a unified purpose.

It understands the power of unity. It knows that it's in a cosmic war, a great and vicious one, where Satan wars against the sea. So it develops family mission statements and covenants and it makes sure that it sticks together, that it rallies around the head of that household, that it ensures purpose is connected to the local church so that we resist family idolatry and that we're under submission to good and godly elders. That we work on growing household wealth, that we might pass on something to our children's children and that we might pursue multi-generational faithfulness. Well, what I just basically did was, and I take a page from Dr.

Beekie, we put all that in a book. And it's dedicated to my mother, it's called The Biblically Healthy Household, I have about 20 here with me. And it's a lot of what I've learned over the last 10 years of fellowshiping with church and family life. And you won't find many Puritan quotes in it. You won't find many historical quotes in it because in the circles in which I travel, sometimes those things are a barrier.

But it's just absolutely jammed with scripture, just absolutely packed with the Bible. And so the burden on my heart is to see what's happening in this organization and many others translate into other ethnicities and to do so in the power of Jesus Christ and my prayer is that you all will keep your eyes open for those in your sphere of influence. They may not look like you but they need the same word as you. How many of you, how many of you glad we got the same Jesus? Amen.

We worship a great God and he is able and capable. And I believe, as many have said, I believe this is a time for this. This is a season wherein we're bold. And so, what's burning in my soul is to see a lot more families that look like me cry out solely, deo, gloria. Thank you.

Well, my name is Gavin Beers. I'm originally from Northern Ireland, now a pastor in North Carolina, not too far from here in American terms anyway. And what I want to share with you this afternoon really follows on the back of a number of things that the brothers have already mentioned. What Dr. Beekie shared is his passion will serve you and me and the wider church in pursuing what I want to share with you as what's burning in my soul.

Indeed, I wish it were burning more deeply than it is. It's also very much associated to what Mr. Washer was speaking about. And when he began, I thought, isn't that interesting? We are focusing upon the same thing, indeed the same text.

The issue is the vision of God compelling our Christian service. In the 1950s, there was a Puritan conference started in England. Men like J.I. Packer, Martin Lloyd-Jones got together and they presented Puritan Reformed experiential preaching. Then there was a division because Packer and others refused to come out of the Anglican Church and Lloyd-Jones had a problem in conscience continuing to fellowship with them.

And so there was a parting of the ways for many years. And before Packer died, he was asked a question, who was the greatest preacher you ever heard? I don't particularly like the question, but I do like the answer. He said, that's easy. Martin Lloyd-Jones, you could not have been present under his preaching and have a small view of God.

I had a privilege of serving for 12 years in Scotland and an old retired minister served with me on my session throughout those years and he'd been brought up and knew Martin Lloyd-Jones and he kept quietly encouraging me in my ministry, you need to preach the glory of God. You need to preach the glory of God. I have another colleague in the ministry in Scotland, now over 80 years of age, and he speaks of his experience as a young man having been brought up in Methodism and then somebody handing him Calvin's institutes. And he said when he read them, he wept because he did not know that God was so glorious. Our culture has no consciousness of God.

Much of the wider Church has very little consciousness of God. Everything's light. But even in Reformed, Evangelical, confessional churches, we have lost the vision of God. That's why we don't settle down before worship. We're more interested in talking to the person beside us.

That's why we're taken up with the melody and we think we're having an experience, but we're not conscious of the God that we sing to. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple." This vision compelled the prophet Isaiah's ministry. The chapter tells us when it happened in the year that King Uzziah died, after a long period of stable government, when everything was thrown into chaos, when there was an obvious threat from the north in the Assyrian Empire, and many of the people in Israel were terribly unsettled and afraid. Isaiah saw the Lord. We're told that he saw Jehovah enthroned as a kind of king and judge in his temple.

And John 10 tells us, of course, that that was the Lord Jesus Christ. And then we're told what he heard, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The cry of angels who are perfectly holy themselves as created beings. Yet, when they consider the holy otherness and infinite purity of God who is light, They veil their eyes, they cover their feet, and they cry, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy. That's the sense of the Hebrew.

Repetitive, intense awareness of the holiness of God. The beginning of the prophet's ministry because he's going to need this vision to continue in it. And when we see what's on the horizon as a culture. We need as the church to have this vision of God. It will be the only thing that holds us.

Well then Isaiah hears a voice, whom shall I send and who will go for us? And when he responds to this cry, holy, holy, holy, he is undone and unclean. Mr. Washer described that this vision would pulverize a man. That's literally what's going on in Isaiah's experience.

The word means I cease, I disintegrate, I'm coming apart at the seams. And there he is undone and unclean, hearing this voice, whom shall I send and who will go for us? You think the last person in the room who's going to put up his hand is the man who says, I am undone and I am unclean. But what else can he do? What else can he do?

He brings himself to the feet of this glorious God and says, here am I, send me. The same vision that crushed him now constrains Him. God says very well, I'll send you, but you need to know something about your mission. When you speak to people, they will not hear. In fact, verse 10, I'm going to use you to make them deaf.

I'm going to use you to make them blind. The fruit of your ministry is going to be hardening, blinding, deafening. Isaiah asks a very obvious question, how long is this going to go on for? And the Lord speaks about a remnant. He will preserve that remnant and call them to himself.

Well as I said I think this is something that we really need to catch a vision of in the 21st century. And when we do, it will help us in a number of ways. I want to leave six briefly with you. It'll be very brief. The first is, it's going to draw you to worship.

All this lightness that pervades the modern church cannot exist with this vision of God. It should be nauseating to us. Light, informal, irreverent worship is a contradiction to the worship that this draws us to. The second thing is it will compel your labor because you are called to the task by the greatest of all kings and you serve one who is absolutely worthy of all that you are. And there will be times in your Christian service, in the home, if any of you are pastors, where this is the only thing that will hold you.

There are many other motives, and the Lord presses those upon you, but He will take you to the place where the only thing that will keep you putting one foot in front of the other because there is no encouragement anywhere else is the vision of the glory of God. Thirdly it will keep you encouraged. It will keep you encouraged. Oftentimes we desire fruit. We come together here and there are hundreds of people, hundreds of people, and it seems encouraging.

And then we all disperse to our own localities, and many of our churches are small. And we preach looking for fruit, and fruit doesn't come. This vision enables you to embrace a negative ministry. God says, Isaiah, you're going to go, and people are going to become deaf and blind and fat and stupid under your ministry and Isaiah says so be it because the thing that compels me is not success, but Your glory. It enables us to stay encouraged.

In fact, God is like the infinite shadow behind everything that we experience in this world. Any discouragement has this infinite shadow of the glory of God behind us that keeps us going forward. It will also help to keep you faithful. It will deal with your temptation to massage the message. It will enable you in a day where we are facing new things as a church, not new in the history of the church but new to us, to say you will need to prize the rights of Jesus Christ out of the hand of my dead body, because those rights are not mine to give you.

You'll have to say that to the church when it comes to worship. You'll have to say that to the civil magistrate when he invades the prerogatives of Christ. And men like Samuel Rutherford that we heard of earlier did this and many in church history because they had this vision of the glory of God. It will also encourage you to preach salvation. God says to Isaiah, go and you're going to make people blind and deaf and fat.

You're going to have a negative ministry. But it didn't stop him preaching the gospel. Of all the prophets in the Old Testament, he is the one people have called the fifth gospel. And he goes forth preaching, He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.

Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters. He's the one that predicts in Isaiah chapter 61, I rise and shine for thy light is come and the glory of the Lord is risen upon you and the Gentiles shall come to your light and the kings to the brightness of thy rising." Even though he knew he would have this negative ministry, he throws the doors of the Gospel wide open at any opportunity he can and he beseeches men to come to the knowledge of Israel's Messiah. So we keep preaching the gospel because we're motivated by the glory of God and it will keep you from pride because your Christian life and your Christian ministry is not about you. It's about Him. You are the sinful man, undone, unclean, forgiven, and commissioned to serve this glorious God in the midst of a sinful world.

We as the church need to recover that vision and keep it before us at all times, compelled to Christian ministry and service by a vision of the glory of God. Well, greetings to you in the name of our blessed Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I hope you're enjoying your time at the conference. It's been a wonderful time so far. As I thought about what I would say to you today, it's I think just a truism that all pastors go around all the time with many different burdens that they carry.

It's sort of hard to pick just one particular thing. We're all the time struggling with different things. We're fired up about our Sunday sermon or we have something going on in our heart as we're dealing with things that are taking place in the church. And so As I thought about what I would say, I thought about something I hoped that would be fitting for the particular theme here of the conference. And I want to read a couple verses to you here in Proverbs chapter number four, verses one through four.

Here, O sons of fathers, instruction and be attentive that you may gain insight. For I give you good precepts. Do not forsake my teaching. When I was a son with my father, Tender, the only one in the sight of my mother, he taught me and said to me, let your heart hold fast to my words, keep my commandments and live." If you think about the book of Proverbs and particularly chapters one through nine, you see that the Father is very zealous and very anxious To pass the faith on to his son. You see in the very opening section where he talks about the fear of the Lord being the beginning of knowledge, this father wants his son to be a God-fearer instead of someone who is a fool.

He contrasts the one who is wise with the one who is foolish. And so he's wanting his son to get this God-fearing worldview, but beyond that, he wants the son to come into a genuine relationship with God. He wants the son to have knowledge of God, not just intellectual knowledge of God, but he wants him to have that relational knowledge, that experiential knowledge that we've even heard about this afternoon. I got to thinking about this passage, and in my own story growing up, I was so blessed to have Christian parents. Both of my parents are still alive and they're two of the godliest people that I know.

It was an amazing time growing up just to see the godly lives of my parents. In many respects, I still look at my parents and I feel like I'm still chasing their coattails to catch up to where they're at. And I can remember growing up and thinking of my father as he would teach us, me and my other two brothers in the home. And my father was very zealous about passing to us the family heritage as it was. The faith passed down to his sons.

And I can remember during times of family devotion and family worship my father sitting in the living room and telling me and my brothers about his own conversion. And I can remember my mom telling me about her conversion many, many times. I could stand before you this afternoon and I could tell my parents' conversions to you just as well as I could tell you my own. And that always stuck with me and I always remember that. And as I think about this passage, this father seeking to pass on the heritage, my parents, their lives demonstrated that day in and day out.

I've never even heard my father, I've never heard my father say a curse word, I've never heard him even say a slang word. It's an amazing thing. My Father always exemplified the faith that He would tell us about. It was real. It was vibrant.

I could see it in their eyes. I could see it in their life. I could see it in the way that they dealt with people and the way they worshiped the Lord and the way they shared the gospel with us in the home. A tremendous, tremendous blessing. And so as I think about that today and think about the burden that's on my heart for you, I can look at this from two different ways.

On the one hand, maybe I could exhort you, those of you who are parents and you have children, many children still living in the home perhaps. How often are you like this father in Proverbs, where it's as if he's pleading with his son? Here, here, O sons of father's instruction. It's more than just teaching his children how to clean their rooms and how to grow a life of, a disciplined life. It's far beyond that.

It's not just bossing them around, telling them what to do in the home, but this is the pleading of a father that's getting down on the level with his children and almost grabbing them by the face saying, son, I have something that I need to communicate to you, something that's so very serious, the most important thing that I could ever say to you. I want you to listen to me. I remember my father doing that. In my exhortation to those of you who are parents and you know the Lord and you're raising those children. Make sure that you're taking time in family worship, in family devotions, trying to live the Deuteronomy 6 life, to make sure you're having those moments where you sit down and where you're pleading with your children that they would come to know the Lord relationally like you know the Lord relationally.

You wouldn't just take it for granted because they go to church week after week or because they have Christian friends that they hang out with, that everything is just going to work out. That you wouldn't just presume upon God because you live in a Christian environment and whatnot, but that you're actually taking time to come down on their level and say, son, daughter, let me tell you about when the Lord converted me. Let me tell you about the time that the Holy Spirit got ahold of me and brought me under conviction and worked in my life and showed me the glories and the truths of the Lord Jesus Christ. I can remember one night, it wasn't long ago, In our own family devotions at home, I have three little girls at home. And we were sitting in the living room and doing our devotions and it just came back to my mind, one of those times that my father bore his heart with his sons, Just pleading with us to understand the gospel and to know what it meant to know the Lord.

And I remember the Spirit got ahold of me in the living room and I just began to plead with my children. And I began to tell them my own testimony and they were captivated. They were listening intently like they had never listened to a lecture from their father before. And then I finished and they said, Mom, tell us about when you were converted. Tell us about your story.

So my mom began to, or Bethany began to share with the girls about her story. And it wasn't long, I don't know, 30 minutes perhaps, that little exchange. And my two oldest girls at that time, I guess about 9 and 7, they went back into our bedroom and they climbed up on the bed and they began to weep and they began to pray and we as a family began to just seek the Lord. And they even had some very godly people, We have some Godly people in our church that have influenced them tremendously. And they said, we want to call and we want to talk to, they named the names of some of these people.

And we got on the phone and they even began to exhort and to love on them. And you know, It wasn't long after that, about a year later, with about a distance of three to six months between my two oldest children, that they were both converted and are now walking with the Lord. And we see fruits in their life of walking with the Lord. So parents, let me just say to you, make the most of those opportunities. Pass the family heritage.

You say, well, you know, I didn't come up with a family heritage. I didn't have people in my life, family members that taught me the faith. Then tell them your story about the happy feet that brought you the gospel. Tell them about those persons that shared. Tell them about what happened to you and pass that on to your children.

Now real quickly before I finish, that's my exhortation to you as parents, but there are those that are in here today that are still living at home, children still living in the house. I know some of these themes have already overlapped a little bit this afternoon, but let me just say to you as well, you need to come to know the Lord yourself. You see your parents in their home and you can say about your parents That the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob is their God? But my question to you today is the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the God of your parents, is He your God? Do you know Him?

Do you know Him personally? Have you come into that experiential knowledge of knowing God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lord Jesus in John chapter number five, he said these words and they're really searching. They should cause us to give pause today. You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.

Children, are you seeking the Lord? Do you know the God that your parents know? Have you had those times of secret prayer in which you have sought the Lord? Scripture tells us to seek the Lord while He may be found and to call upon Him while He is near. Come to know the Lord.

Get the family heritage. That's my burden for the conference for the weekend is that you would come to know the Lord and that parents that you would plead with your children that they would in fact come to know the Lord. I'm going to go ahead and take a few minutes to say a few words. My name is Josh Bice. I serve as pastor of Praisemeal Baptist Church on the west side of Atlanta, Georgia.

It is a true privilege to be with you for this occasion, for this conference. What's burning in my soul today is something that is a continuous flame, you might say, and a passion that I consistently come back to time and time again. And we find it in the New Testament in Matthew chapter 16 verse 18 when Jesus makes a definitive statement and he says to Peter, he says, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. It was a number of years ago we were busy as a church preparing for the G3 conference and a young man walked in the door and he sat at a table nearby and he he came to speak to me after we closed and he said listen when the conference is finished he said I would love to speak with you maybe over coffee at some point. He says, I live locally here in the Atlanta area and I would love to just sit down and have coffee.

So, after the dust settled from the conference, he contacted the church. We got together for coffee at a coffee shop and he started to just bear his soul over that table that day. I sat and I listened patiently as he described his life journey as a young man who had been sent out from his local church in the Atlanta area. He had been serving on the mission field for two years. He had become, he stated in his own language, reformed while he was on the mission field.

And when he came home, he said, I did not feel that I could go back to my home church because we did not share the same doctrinal positions. As he continued to talk he said, but I find myself discouraged. He said I'm sitting at a coffee shop on the Lord's Day. I'm watching YouTube sermons. He said some of the best preachers that we might agree upon as far as Reformed theology.

And he said, I sit alone at a table. I drink my coffee. I watch these sermons. And he said, I find myself consistently battling with sin. And he said, now, if I'm honest with you, he said, I struggle with whether or not I'm a Christian at all.

I'm struggling with whether or not I should be serving in any sort of mission endeavor in the future. And he said, what do you think? And I looked at this man across the the table, this young man, and I said, well, I believe what you've stated is very normal under these conditions. And one of two things is at play here. Either you are not a Christian and you need to repent and you need to trust Jesus Christ as your Lord.

Or you are so isolated from the context of the local church that it's no wonder that you're struggling with sin. It's no wonder that you're wondering whether or not you are a true believer or not. And so as we continued to talk, I encouraged him to to examine himself, to see if he was in the faith, and then to give himself wholly and fully to the context of a local church. And so one of the most tragic things that I've seen over these last say 10 years of my own personal ministry and as I look at the evangelical culture is this de-churching of the evangelical church. We see it with this idea of the coffee shop church and and here recently with COVID-19 with this quote unquote digital church which there's no such thing as the digital church.

Several years ago, I was invited to speak at a conference for open air evangelists for open air preachers And I went and I stood before these men and I encouraged them in the Word. And I've had that privilege now numerous times in various settings with this specific community of open-air evangelists. And each time that I go, I start off by saying this. I want to ask a few questions. First of all, how many of you men are actually engaged in the life of your local church, training others in the work of evangelism?

Raise your hand. A few might raise their hand. Okay, next question. How many of you are currently using your teaching gift within the life of your local church teaching small groups on some level raise your hand and a few raise their hand I say how many of you are actually elders within your local church? Hardly any raised their hand.

Then I ask this question, how many of you are sent out from your local church to go to these sporting events, Wimbledon, the Super Bowl, other places, sent out from your church to go out and to preach the gospel there raise your hand and only a few raise their hand and I came to learn after a few of these conferences that an awful lot of these men who are in these open-air preaching circles, although bold in the faith and stand on the street corner and proclaim the gospel, many of them are isolated from the context of a local church. From a local church. I find that tragic. I remember several years ago, we were talking with a specific couple by email. They were looking for a place to stay for the G3 conference and they wanted to know if we would host them in our home because they couldn't afford lodging, so we agreed and they came in, we met them, they were just a sweet family.

It was a husband and wife and the wife's sister. And after the conference was over, we sat in my living room over coffee and we talked about their life journey and we talked about all sorts of things. And when I asked this brother, I said, tell me what church you're a member of. He kind of looked down at the floor and shook his head and he said, well that's the thing. He said, I can't find a local church.

I said, what do you mean? He said, well... And then he went on to describe this specific doctrinal conviction that he holds to, which is a secondary issue that he and his wife have elevated to a primary issue. And he said, so I'm going to these conferences. And he said, I'm seeking to be fed the Word of God through these different conferences.

He said, but I can't really find a local church for us to join that believes exactly what we believe. And so I encouraged him over coffee that evening until the late hours of the night to find a church to submit himself into the very context of that church for for the glory of God and for the good of his soul and so we would part ways and about four years later I went to another conference and I walked in and and just within a few minutes he made his way through and he grabbed me and he hugged me and we greeted one another and after a small talk I said, well brother you know the question that I'm going to ask you. And he looked at the floor and I said, what church are you a member of? And he said, well that's the thing, He said, we're still searching. We're still searching.

You see, when Jesus said, I will build my church, he's speaking there in the universal, ekklesia, in the universal, the church from from all geographic locations on planet Earth, but the primary usage of that term in the New Testament is in the local. The local church matters, And it is God's will for our lives to give ourselves to the context of a local, tangible, visible New Testament church. As we consider the words of Hebrews chapter 10, Hebrews chapter 10 verses 23 to 25, let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for he who promised is faithful and let us consider how to stir up, how to stimulate one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together as is the habit of some but encouraging one another all the more as you see the day drawing near you see what's burning in my soul today is this idea that we need the local church and not just that we need it but that it's good for us. It is good for our soul, the local church is. Isolation, it creates distance from the church body.

It kills community. It opens up individuals and families to the attack and to the attacks of the wicked one. When we consider the reality that the world, the flesh, and the devil, the constant temptations are ever before us, We need the local church. We need the local church. We are called to stimulate one another, to encourage one another.

When we look at the sermon that Peter preached at Pentecost and after the 3, 000 souls believed they were baptized and as we look at that text we see the very next verse in verse 42 of Acts chapter 2 we find the church gathering together they were a together body They were together for the ordinary means of grace, and they were together for the purpose of Christian koinonia, fellowship, which by the way transcends hello in the hallway and a slap on the back on Sunday morning. It communicates the idea of depth, sharing that association through the bond of King Jesus. And so it is that we must put emphasis on these very matters within the life of the local church. By the way, how do fishermen and businessmen and Jews and Greeks and bond and free and male and female and rich and poor, young and old, how do all of these individuals come together and how do they find this great, wonderful bond in Koinonia? It's because of something that transcends the social issues of life.

It is based upon the bond of Jesus Christ. We come and we worship together, serve together, evangelize together, engage in missions together, encourage one another. We stir up one another. So this is God's will for our lives. Mount Everest is some 29, 000 feet above sea level.

It's the highest point on planet Earth, some 8, 848 meters high. If you're going to climb Mount Everest, I'm told it will cost you about $25, 000. You say, well, what's the cost? Well, because of all of the equipment, the training, and most importantly, the team. You see, no one goes to the top of the world without a team.

It's mandated, in fact. And many people have actually climbed to the top of Mount Everest. It's documented that some 8, 000 people have actually made it to the top of the world to stand on the very summit. But if you were to travel there today and you were to go through the proper training and get all of the equipment necessary and make your journey to the top of the world somewhere along the journey. After you leave the last base camp before you make it to the very pinnacle of the mountainside, You will find all sorts of equipment there.

Off in the distance, in the deep crevices of the ice, you will see picks. You will see helmets. You will see glasses. And buried beneath the snow and the ice, you will find the bodies of those who lie there who never made it home. And you see, God's will for us in the journey of faith is that we would not journey alone, that we would not sit at a coffee shop, or that we would isolate ourselves from the context of a local church.

And so we must never underestimate the value, the blessing of a local church as we gather together under the banner of the gospel. Jesus Christ presented the ordinary means of grace and us growing in grace and maturity. You see, with such evil ideologies and the winds of doctrine that are continuously blowing in our culture, the safest place for you to be is not isolated but right at the center of the context of a local church where you have pastors who are committed to shepherding your soul, warning you, helping you along the journey of faith. So brothers and sisters in the Lord let us remember these words that we often sing. Oh to grace how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be, Let thy goodness like a fetter bind my wondering heart to thee.

Prone to wonder, Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. Here's my heart. O take and seal it. Seal it for thy courts above.

Martin Luther once speaking to a group of ministers in his day said this, he said, brothers, now is not the hour for sleeping and snoring. I would encourage us to remember that it's not the hour for us to be negligent. You see, we must understand that when Jesus made this statement, when he said, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. He did not say, I will build my parachurch ministry. I will build my G3 conference ministry.

I will build my Samaritan's Purse ministry. I will build some other whatever it might be, fill in the blank, ministry. You see, there's some 100, 000 parachurch ministries in the US alone. And right now, every last one of them could drop dead and go bankrupt, and Jesus would still be seated upon his throne. He has called us to serve through the context of a local church for his glory.

This is what's burning in my soul. You need the church. It is God's blessing for your soul, for your family. Don't neglect it. Don't be a conference junkie going from one conference to the next to the next and isolating yourself from a local body.

You need the church. Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord knowing that your labor is not in vain in Christ Jesus. May God bless you. I've been very grateful to hear so many speak of God's glory, His holy glory and the oncoming lightness of God as we've heard spoken of. I've been reading Psalm 63 regularly in the morning and what's burning in my soul is really revealed there.

Psalm 63 Verse 1, oh God you are my God Early will I seek you my soul thirsts for you My flesh longs for you in a dry and thirsty land Where there is no water, but then he says something so remarkable So I have looked for you in the sanctuary to see your power and your glory. And He's speaking of the glory of God in the sanctuary among the gathered people of God and this is such a sacred trust that we have been given in the local church as we've just been speaking of here. And I want to continue this theme and end this time with this matter of God's holy glory, particularly in the local church. Now, in 2020, the world experienced a massive earthquake, but it wasn't like any other earthquake the world has ever known. This earthquake was global, and it shook the entire world and the tectonic plates shifted and they and they shifted hard and out of it something new emerged something we'd never seen before and it was the state-sanctioned church.

The church bowed down to Caesar in 2020. You understand that? The church took her cues, her directions, her instructions from Caesar And all over America there were thousands of state-sanctioned churches for the first time in our lifetime. This is so intimately connected with glory. So I have looked for you in the sanctuary to see your power and your glory.

And Millions of people who call themselves Christians thought they could get this, experience this glory over a live stream. It was profane. It was the essence of the likeness of God that Tom Askell spoke of at the very beginning and my appeal to all of us here is to with all of our hearts seek the Lord's glory in his sanctuary run to the sanctuary run to your local churches Don't let anything keep you out of them. Give your whole life to the prosperity of your local church. It's there where the glory of God is displayed.

What's burning in my soul is what God is doing to strengthen His church. All of these things have been very good for the church. The church has been winnowed. The church has been filtered. And those who will be the state sanctioned church have already told us who they are.

And it should take your breath away. No one knows how this will progress in time to come. But Be grateful that God is strengthening his church. There are more bold men than I've ever known across this land. Things are clearer to them, and they are even more doggedly committed to their local churches and the preservation of the worship of God so that the people of God would see his glory in the sanctuary And so I want I want us to understand just how glorious the Church of Jesus Christ is.

And I want to just close by reading the Apostle Paul's words to the Ephesian elders. And in this section of Acts chapter 20 beginning in verse 28, the apostle Paul gives the most stunning illustration of the value of the local church. Therefore, take heed to yourselves and to all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to shepherd the Church of God which he purchased with his own blood. The church is of such glory, the church is of such importance that Jesus Christ shed his blood for her. And I pray that all of us in this room will assume the disposition of Jesus Christ toward his church that we too in our own ways would give to the local church that we would spend and be spent for our brethren in the local church and that we would give our blood for the Church of Jesus Christ.

And that's what's burning in my soul. It's the glory of God in the sanctuary and the preservation of the sweetness of all of these ordinary means of grace for his precious people who need them so desperately. Let not any government change that in your life. So as always these have been very helpful messages to all of us. I pray that you'll depart from here and consider what the Lord has been impressing you with in these times.

You have seen God's glory in the sanctuary, I think. And so we're gonna conclude this segment of this conference and we'll begin at 6.30, is that correct? I think we begin at 6.30 in Spillman Auditorium, which is the main hall, and we will introduce this conference. I'll introduce the conference. Tom Askell is gonna come and take the first section, and then Paul Washer is going to take the final message this evening.

So I hope to see you there. God bless you.