In the sermon 'Burning in the Soul' by Jeffrey D. Johnson, the speaker emphasizes the power of prayer in catalyzing missionary work and evangelism. He recounts a personal story of how a prayer request for El Salvador led to an unexpected opportunity to preach in one of the world's most notorious prisons. Johnson describes his experience of addressing 5,040 inmates, highlighting the grace of God in reaching out to the marginalized and forgotten. He stresses the importance of prayer as a means through which God builds His kingdom and calls for more laborers to join the mission. Despite the vastness of the task within the prison, Johnson underscores the potential impact of even a single committed individual willing to dedicate their life to ministry. The sermon concludes with a call to action, urging listeners to either pray earnestly for or participate in mission work.

I don't know why they let the Charismatics in this place. I've got two objectives out of this little talk and I pray that I'm successful. One, I want everyone to be, If you'll just, at the end of the session, just pray. If this leads you to pray for this request, I'll be successful. And then perhaps by God's good grace and providence, maybe there's a young man or young woman, young person that will be willing to be a missionary.

I want you to know about prayer that it works. You know it works. And the Lord told us to pray that to raise up laborers, the harvest is plantable. And there is more work to be done than there are laborers to sin. And we know that they can't hear without a preacher and they can't preach without being sent.

And we have to pray. The beginning of sending out men to plant churches, to witness, to evangelize, to reach the world, it begins with prayer And that begins with you. Well, a year ago I get a phone call from a friend of my father who says, Jeff, we have to pray for El Salvador. And if you know the history of El Salvador, it was the most dangerous place, five years ago, most dangerous place in the world. And they begin to arrest all the gang members and put them in prison.

He says, we gotta pray for these prisons. He says, I believe God's gonna do a work in these prisons. His father's El Salvadorian, so he has a heart for El Salvador. I'm praying every day for a revival in El Salvador. Will you join me in prayer?

Because he knows, this man knows I love revival and pray for a revival. He says, will you join me in prayer to pray for El Salvador? Well, how do I say no to that request? I said, yes. He goes, now also see if you can get into the prisons in El Salvador.

I'm like, how am I supposed to get in the prison in El Salvador? But I'll pray with you. But I happen to know someone who knows someone who knows someone in El Salvador. And so I get on the phone and call the coordinator to Latin America that works at HeartCry, who's co-elder with me. And he says, well, I'll call a pastor in El Salvador.

And that pastor told my co-elder, Dr. Bush, no, we cannot get into the prison system. This particular prison is the most notorious prison in the world until they built the super maxi prison. The, all of the M M six 13 or whatever that gang is, who's ran out of that prison. I knew you know I got it wrong, but.

But no, we can't get in. This prison, you go in, there's no communications, there's no emails, there's no visitations, there's no phone calls. You get in, you don't know if your parents pass away or not. But I'll try one more time. We've tried for years to get in.

It's impossible, but because you're calling, I will try. Remember the chain of events. There's a man praying in Batesville, Arkansas, in the middle of nowhere praying for El Salvador. That led for me, calling someone, led to some of that one, calling someone. The pastor in San Salvador says, okay, I'll try one more time.

He goes and here's a Metropolitan city of millions of people he goes into the prison and he knows he's gonna get rejected and he sees a childhood friend And the childhood friend says hey, what are you doing here? Well, I'm trying to get in and, well, let me see what I can do. A week later, I get a phone call. Jeff, come and preach. Come to El Salvador and preach.

Well, I didn't know what I was getting into. I had no idea. In fact, I was like, okay, I've been praying for El Salvador, we've been praying for these prisoners. What do I do? This was two weeks ago, by the way.

Let's go, I'll go. Get a plane, we get in a plane, we fly down there. Like last second, we're flying down. I'm thinking I'm going to have 500, like I think this would be a good crowd to preach to. I'm thinking 500 men would be wonderful.

200 men, I don't know, but I'm happy to go. We go down in there and I come in and I will never forget it was a sea of men in white shorts, white shirts, t-shirts, and white crocs. And the imagery you have to see, we were in this big courtroom, not courtroom, but the courtyard surrounded by the cells about five stories high on all around us, dirt courtyard. And they're all sitting in front of me and they said, okay, now we're going to make sure they go to the bathroom so they're not interrupted during your preaching. In five minutes, 5, 000 men went to the bathroom.

And they went because they ran in order, single file, and found a wall at the back of the courtyard where a ditch is. And they relieved themselves and ran orderly back to their seats. I had no idea that I would be preaching to 5, 040 men plus guards. So I preached And it gave me an understanding of the grace of God. Here are these men, they're rapists, they're gangsters, they're murderers, drug traffickers, sex offenders.

If you had a wedding for your daughter, and you're having a feast to invite a party, who do you want to invite? Who would you invite to the wedding feast? I promise you you would not travel to El Salvador and go into the prison system and say come, come. You rapists, sex offenders, murderers, you in the byways and the highways and the low, you low life, these are not the ones you invite to the party. You skip over them and you go into the important halls of society and you invite the leaders of society, the rich, the wealthy, the prestigious.

You don't go into the highways and the byways into the prison systems and say, come murderers, come. And it allowed me to see just how deep the grace of God in reaching sinners like you and me. And so we are to pray. And then the fact that they're all in their whites, it's like, yes, the harvest is white. It's white.

And now you've got this mission field. You know how many people's in that prison? 35, 000 people in that prison. And I just got to preach to one sector. And now that door is open.

And I was able to preach my heart out. I preached a sermon on how to be set free from prison while you're in prison, how to be released from the eternal chains of darkness that is about to come upon you where there's no parole and you can't get out on good behavior. The only way to get out of prison is to turn yourself in and plead for mercy. And I was able to preach the gospel to 5, 000 young men of various ages actually. And it was the most amazing preaching opportunity in my life because I don't believe 95% of these people have ever heard the gospel in their life.

And here the good news is breaking into this prison and inviting the worst of the worst to come to Christ. And afterwards you could hear nothing but silence. We were able to hand out tracts. We were able to personally evangelize for a while. And I left with my heart broken.

I left like this could be one of my sons. It was the saddest thing in my life to experience, but one of the most glorious opportunities in my life. I had no idea that I would be preaching to that many people that have never heard the gospel before. And here's the takeaways. And this is what's, I guess, burning in my soul.

It started with a man in a small town in Arkansas praying. He said, well, prayer doesn't, I mean, he said, what can I do? What can you do? What can I do about world missions? What can I do to blaze ahead and advance the kingdom of God?

What can I do? You can do something. What I love about the book of Revelation is Christ is on the throne and he's ruling through the judgments being poured out upon the wicked. But part of those judgments include these bowls of incense, which is the prayers of the saints. That God works, Christ works in building his kingdom and he works in cooperation with the means of your prayers.

And so here you have one man praying for El Salvador and now a door that no one thought would ever be open has been swung open. And now that door is open, that church in San Salvador, a church of 40 people have the opportunity to go into that prison weekly. And the pastor is saying, and this is my last comment, I can't do it. The work is too vast. Seven sectors of 5, 000 men.

They could go every day if they wanted to, but they can't. They don't have the laborers to get in there and to preach. And he's praying that someone will come and help them. And I'm thinking, well, what do we pray for? We pray that God would send someone.

Maybe it's you. Or you. If we could have five men, or two men, one man, if I could get one man to say, I don't care where it is, I don't care how much the pay is, I'll put my marriage on, I mean, if you're single, I'll put my getting married on hold, I'll put my career on hold, but I'll go, I'll go to El Salvador, I'll go into the prison system, I'll preach daily to these men. If I could find someone like that, I would run through the highways and say, hey, let's raise up support for that man. Let's get him on the field.

You understand that that is a great need. And so let's pray, let's pray that there are men that are being raised up that say, I'll go, send me, send me. And if you can't go, and I know a lot of you can't, you're already in your field, you're already where God's planted you, you need to foster your homes and foster your responsibilities. I know that's where I'm supposed to be, I'm not supposed to be in El Salvador, I'm supposed to be in Conway, Arkansas. But even if we're where we're planted, we still can pray.

We have a role to play in this mission field, and so either we're praying or going, but I believe God can work and is working. So join me, and hopefully I've been successful by in this prayer of the burnings,