9 26 2021 Our Role in this World — 1 Peter 2

0:01 Good morning everyone. It's a real privilege to be back with you again physically this time. I was just telling my brother during the break this morning that this is just... And I just have to say this is so much better than doing it on Zoom. And I think you'll have to forgive me if the last time when I was on Zoom, my eyes were wandering away from the screen as I was speaking, I usually had my notes right on my laptop screen right in front of me, and so sometimes you feel like you're just talking to yourself.

0:39 But it's really good to be back with you, and I think when you think of the biblical idea of fellowship, I think in person is more of what it had in mind there. Of course, you do what you have to do when you need to, but it's just so good to be here physically. So some of you may know back at the end of last year, we took a trip out to Zambia. This was end of November or so, we arrived back in The States in March. And we went back for several reasons, for a visit.

1:23 You know, you might know, remember that Chichi and I came to The States in 2018 and that was her first time here in The States and first time being away from Zambia for a really long significant period of time. And so it was just really good for her and for me as well just to go back and visit family and friends again. And also, the last time we were here physically, our daughter Natalie there was just born, I believe. And so Chi Chi's side of the family hadn't met her yet and we wanted to do that. We wanted to go last year in the summer, but due to obvious reasons, we were unable to.

2:09 But we thank the Lord that the airlines started resuming their flights again and so we went in November and the good thing was it was super cheap because no one was flying and they wanted to attract customers. That was good for us. So yeah, we flew out of Chicago. We had to wear masks basically the whole flight out there. We flew from Chicago to Dubai.

2:42 That was about thirteen hours with masks on the whole time. Dubai, a nine hour layover and then seven hours to Nusaka, Zambia. So that was quite an experience, but yeah, we're glad we did that. Jonathan had so much fun going through the airports. We'd go on the movable walkways and right at the end, he'd want to run back to the beginning and just go around in circles over and over again while we were during the nine hour layover especially.

3:14 Nothing else much to do. Then when we arrived in Zambia, oops, sorry about that, Chi Chi's brother picked us up at the airport and they got to meet, spend time with their cousin there. It was really interesting. When we booked our tickets, the airline sent us all the requirements for Zambia, COVID requirements, so we had to get tested and stuff and it said that all passengers had to be tested but it didn't really specify whether kids needed to be tested and we showed up at the airport in Chicago and they said, oh, well this country requires that kids need to be tested as well, which was I was quite surprised about and we didn't even know that people did testing for kids. And so we had to go all around Chicago trying to find a place and finally we found one and at least they rebooked our tickets for no extra cost.

4:12 But the moment we arrived in Zambia, her brother picked us up, we had showed all our papers and stuff in the airport, negative test results, etc. And her brother picked us up and took us out to a restaurant in town there and on the restaurant they had all these signs saying no entry without a mask and social distancing, except we go inside and basically no one is doing it at all because they didn't really care about it or whatever. At that time, there weren't as many cases there, but there's a bit more now with the Delta variant. But anyways, the kids had lots of fun playing with her cousin and just exploring Zambia, climbing trees and stuff, having fun with her cousin. It was really good.

5:06 We got to meet some old and dear friends. On the left hand picture, the two guys in the front on either side, either wall, they are very close friends of mine. We've been good friends. We went to elementary boarding school together. That's a Keiji school, some of you might...

5:27 That name might be familiar to you. So really good to see them and their family and Chi Chi's grandparents on the left there, we got to visit them and it's really a good thing we did because he passed away just last month. Not due to COVID or anything, but just wasn't doing well health wise. So really good we did that. Got to see another friend of mine.

5:59 We've been friends since we were eight years old. Kids enjoyed their grandfather, that's Chi Chi's father, and he really enjoyed having them, and we arrived right in time for mango season there. She's the best. And Natalie, as you can see, is really enjoying that. The thing about mango season in Zambia, they're all over the place and they just fall and there's so many you can't eat them all, they just sit and rot on the ground.

6:33 It's real mangoes, exactly right. No chemicals added to them to preserve them or whatever. Exactly right. We also got to enjoy some good Zambian food. This is Cod enshima.

6:51 So the white stuff that looks kind of like mashed potatoes, it's Codenshima. There are two varieties. One is made out of like corn flour, not the sweet corn, but just regular corn flour and the other type is made out of cassava flour which is like a type of root there and you just... You take some in your hand and roll it into a ball and put a little dip in there you can use to scoop whatever condiments you have. Here we have some vegetables like kale type stuff on the left and some...

7:28 That's actually bush meat, some game meat there, think it's dyker, I believe, which is so good. So good. It's technically illegal to hunt for game meat, game and then... But people there have been doing it for hundreds of years and nothing is going to stop that right now. It's really more the poachers that you have to be concerned about.

7:56 So rainy season, this is a river near Chi Chi's parents house which over flooded and some animals. These are some Impala. There. Her brother her brother is a construction worker or he owns a construction company in Zambia and he actually took us around Zambia just... He wanted to show us some of the projects that he was working on and took us to some of these sites.

8:25 I don't know if you can tell, but behind us is a lake there and it's called Lake Bangueulu, which means where the sky touches the water. And it so still on that lake, it's virtually a mirror. Can't in the distance, you can't even tell that there's water there, it just looks like the sky. And you only tell if rain is falling down on the water. These are Chichi's siblings, her two sisters on the left and two of her brothers on the right there.

9:03 The guy in the white is the one who picked us up, he owns the construction company. So he took us around showing us and gave us a real tour of Zambia to places we'd never even been before. He built this hotel there. He just started the company last year and it's one of the fastest growing businesses in Zambia. He thinks it will be the biggest construction company in Zambia in like five years or so.

10:18 Actually, the guy in the yellow shirt, had the privilege to lead to Christ back in the day and and and work with him and disciple all three of them and it's... It was so cool going back there and seeing that they had continued on the work that that we had started. They continued discipling these other young people there and bringing them up in the Lord, which is so encouraging. So many times missionaries will go and they'll teach, but then the missionary leaves and the work just dies out. And we didn't want that to happen and I think quite often the problem is that missionaries teach them what, but not really the why or how do you go about studying the Bible type of thing.

11:04 And that's what me and this other Zambian doctor who I worked with wanted to work on and focus and it's really cool to see them now using what they learned and teaching these others as well. So this is actually near where my parents used to live when they were in Zambia. This is another guy, his name is Kennedy, whom I disciple as well. He he is very bold with the gospel, very outgoing. He's he's currently a nurse, but back when he was in nursing school, he he used to so you have to understand that Zambia is...

11:47 There's not very many atheists in Zambia. Most of the problem you have is like with false religion and false Christianity there. So like in Zambia, I'd say that the prosperity gospel is like the face of Zambia and then you have lots of cults in Zambia and stuff as well. And so at these nursing schools, they allow different churches to come and do a devotion type thing which is great for us but then you also have these other groups coming in. So sometimes these prosperity gospel preachers would come in and do their thing like, know, if you just have enough faith in God, you're gonna ace that test type of a thing.

12:26 But he he was really bold, he would get up and he would just show from the scriptures, look, what they're teaching is is not correct. And and he led quite a few of his fellow students to trusting the Lord. When just actually earlier this year, he was out in a village doing some preaching and preaching different things like Christ is the only way of salvation, all these prophets can't help you, etcetera. And there was a certain prophet who lived nearby, who had a large church and some of his members were listening to him. They ended up getting saved and left that church.

13:09 So then, this prophet called him and his buddy who was preaching with him and had a talk with him. Said, why are you stealing our our congress? And like, well, we're just going through scripture to showing what the bible teaches and they went through the scriptures with him and he couldn't refute them at all. And so, they left and he ended up calling the elders at his assembly saying that if these guys don't go back to the same village and recant what they told people there, I'm gonna take them to court. And I just love his attitude because his attitude was like, great, I'll go and preach Christ in court as well.

13:51 The prophet ended up not doing that at all. I don't think he would have won, he had no case or anything. But just a really, really great brother. So Chris Schroeder last year, he, before we went to Zambia, he asked, is there anyone in Zambia that you know of who could use one of the paint boards to help preach the gospel, and I immediately thought of Kennedy here. And so Chris gave us a paint board, we took it with us and Kennedy came to visit us where we were staying, and we showed him how to use the paint board and taught him how to do it, and he went back to his home and the very next day he was out with a paint board in the villages sharing the gospel there.

14:38 So yeah, please pray for him, pray for those other guys as well. We're actually, we were hoping that we would love for him to be able to come here to Tepsy to just get further training and stuff and we we're that's something that we're praying for. We we actually wanted him to come this year but because the US Embassy in Zambia is closed because COVID cases are on the rise in Zambia supposedly. So, we weren't able to do it but maybe next year we'll see. Something to pray about anyways.

15:18 So just some more pictures. This using the paint board that, it means basically who is the gate to go into heaven, basically. And he's just given different... Some say Mary, some say money, whoever, but all of those are wrong and then it goes into the Gospel on the right there. We translated it all into Lunda which is the local language there.

15:52 Zombie is God, Enu is you. I don't know if you can read that, but Nshidi is sin. So he he got creative and he... I don't know. I think you probably know the Two Roads, Two Destinies chart and he he put that on the left with the the broad road on the left, all is going to destruction and the narrow road which goes up to...

16:19 Leads to eternal life. Very creative. These are two other guys that I I got to disciple and they're doing well also and this this guy and this girl. This couple here, their names are Bruce and Alice Mukwatu, they were very instrumental when I was back in Zambia, just encouraging me to go out into the local communities to interact with the people and to get the language down. It can be really easy for missionaries to just stay put on a mission station and you kind of have your own Western cultural bubble zone type of thing, which but to really be an influence and promote the gospel, you gotta go where the people are.

17:10 You gotta interact with the people and and he was very instrumental in that and knows the word really well, just very dear. Chi Chi was also involved with some of the ladies there, doing some discipleship and stuff. We actually... This is Chi Chi's parents' home assembly there and the youth group, they asked if I would come and do some teaching with them on Sunday afternoons. And so I agreed to that and said, well, why don't we teach, let's go through how to study the Bible for yourself.

17:48 And and it it was so amazing because they they didn't know anything like that. They didn't know that, oh, you have to study in context and and and look at, you know, you you can't just pick a verse out and just ignore the verses around it and make it mean whatever you said. They were so excited that they're now able to learn how to study scripture for themselves instead of always relying on whoever happened to be preaching that day. So yeah, just very cool and pray for them that they would continue in those skills that they learned. So that's a brief basic summary of our trip there.

18:35 We wanted to come back to The States in February, then Chi Chi's father actually came down with COVID and had it quite severely. He was even in the hospital with oxygen connected to him and so we extended our time in Zambia by three weeks so that we could be with him and Chichi went... He was actually in a different part of the country at the time and Chichi went to be with him to help take care of him during that time and yeah, it was really good that we were there and extended our time there. You know, something that I thought about when I was travelling to Zambia and even just growing up as an MK, you travel a lot with your parents and your family and I thought of the idea that this is kind of like a pilgrim. If you know what a pilgrim is, a pilgrim is basically someone who is on a long journey with a specific destination in mind.

19:41 They may stop in certain places now and then for a temporary period of time, maybe even a significantly temporary period of time, but their goal is the one destination. And I just thought, I couldn't help by thinking of like, this is the idea presented of believers throughout all of scripture That we are just pilgrims here in this earth and as an MK, maybe you've heard this before, but as an MK, you don't always... You can adapt almost anywhere you go because you're used to different cultures, know how... Even if you are going into a new culture, you know how to adapt yourself there, but in a sense you don't really feel completely at home in any one place because you have ties to so many places. But that's how it is with the pilgrim in the New Testament.

20:33 This earth is just a temporary place for us. No matter what country you live in, what culture, this is just a temporary place for us and heaven is our ultimate home. And I love Jim Elliot's quote which I think really encapsulates this that he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. I want to just look at a passage in one Peter, one Peter chapter two. First Peter chapter two starting in verse verse nine.

21:31 H. Broadbent in the early nineteen hundreds. So one thing, when you look at look at secular history, especially secular history concerning the church, they overwhelmingly overwhelmingly focus on the Roman Catholic church, especially during the dominance of the Catholic church in the middle ages. And even a lot of seminaries and bible colleges, when you go to when you take their history course, they always focus on the Roman Catholic church as if it's the, it was the only church at that time. But what this guy does in the Pilgrim church, he traveled all around Europe, Eastern Asia, North Africa, doing research on the history of the church.

22:18 And he found all these groups of different believers, different churches during that dominance of the Roman Catholic church that simply followed scripture and that preached the gospel. And he he he wrote it in this book and he titled it the Pilgrim Church. And the... This church... These were churches that were never part of the Roman Catholic church.

22:41 They weren't Protestants, if you will, who left the Catholic church. They simply were bible believing Christians who sought to meet according to scripture and preach the gospel. And the Roman Catholic church actually went in to places like the Southern part of France and did campaigns against them. We always know about the campaigns or or sorry, not campaigns, crusades in The Middle East against the Muslims and Jews, but they did it against Christians as well. And many of these Christians were burnt at the stake, etcetera and their communities devastated during that time.

23:20 But I always found it interesting, why the focus on the Catholic church as if it was the only one that existed, especially when Christ said in Matthew chapter 16, I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. And yet you have, if the Catholic church is the only one there, which preaches a false gospel, Christ's promise is useless. But that's not the case. All these other bible believing Christians were there and were victorious, victorious Christian lives in Christ. And so, let me just read this passage to you.

24:59 For this is the will of God, that by doing good, you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men as free yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice but as bond servants of God. Honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, honor the king. Servants be submissive to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the harsh. For this is commendable if because of conscience toward God, one endures grief, suffering wrongfully. For what credit is it if when you are beaten for your faults, you take it patiently.

25:37 But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you are called because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow his steps, who committed no sin, nor was deceit found in his mouth, who when he was reviled, did not revile in return. And when he suffered, he did not threaten, but committed himself to him who judges righteously, who himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree. That we having died to sins might live for righteousness, by whose stripes you are healed. For you are like sheep going astray, but have now returned to the shepherd and overseer of of your souls.

26:25 So in this passage, Peter shows us two roles in which we are to conduct ourselves as as pilgrims in this world. You know the idea of a pilgrim, it's the idea of someone, especially if a pilgrim in certain location where he's just passing through, he is considered to be a foreigner, someone new to the area. And many times, you know, you travel to a new country, a new culture and stuff, you don't know all the customs, all the... How they do things there and and you can stick out like a sore thumb. People know, okay, this guy is different.

27:08 He does things differently. And this is the idea of the pilgrim as the believer. We are different from the world. We are to be different. We are in the world but not of the world.

27:23 And so so how are we to behave as pilgrims in this world? What is to be our our mode of conduct or our role in the world? Well, believers are first of all to conduct themselves or sorry, to proclaim his praises, the praises of god. Why didn't God just take you and I to be with him in heaven the moment we were saved? Peter answers that in verse...

27:54 Well, in verse nine, he says, you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people. If we're so special to God, why didn't he just take us home right away, instead he left us to suffer in this evil world? Well, he answers that, that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light. And that's the purpose, to share his praises, to share his glory with other people, to share the way of salvation with others so that they too may be called his own special people. So that they too may be brought out of darkness and into his marvelous light that they too may obtain mercy.

28:41 We have obtained tremendous mercy. Why? So that we can show and share that mercy with other people. But we're also as believers, are to conduct ourselves honorably in this world. In verse 11 he says, But I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, again that word for sojourners means like literally aliens or foreigners.

29:40 Even when the world calls us to be evil for doing what is right. And that's what it does so often. It twists... The world twists things around, calls what is evil to be good and good to be evil, and I think we see that more and more in our own culture here. A couple of years ago in 2019, went to University of Michigan as a Tepsy, the school.

30:08 We went to go do an outreach there, gospel outreach and I noticed a sign on a billboard and it was put out by one of the local churches in Ann Arbor and the sign said, love the sinner, hate the sin and it had it crossed out and it said, just love with the homosexual flag on the bottom there. And I understand what they are trying to say, you know, yes we are to love them, but that does not mean we have to agree with everything that they say. And the world has twisted love to mean not just unconditional love for someone, but total acceptance of even the things that they do. And this was put out by one of the churches there. And just think about that, take it to its logical conclusion.

31:02 If just pure love and with the implication that you are agreeing with whatever someone does, apply that to say murder for example. Love the murderer but also love the murderer itself. Or child abuse. Are we to love child abuse as well? Do we love the homosexual?

31:24 Yes, absolutely. God loves them. Just like he loves all of us who are sinners as well, but he hates our sin. He hates my sin and yours sin and he wants to rescue us from that. Putting up signs like that will do nothing for a person's eternal destination.

31:46 It just commends them in in their own sin. But we are to conduct ourselves honorably before the world. Why? So that by your good works which they observe, they may glorify God in the day of visitation. I was curious what does the day of visitation meant?

32:04 What day is it exactly talking about? And in my research, it seems that the day of visitation refers to when God visits you. And that could be either in judgment or in grace. One day God is gonna visit every single person in this world who has ever existed And it's on... It's either gonna be a welcome home my my child or it's gonna be a be total judgment.

32:36 Every soul is gonna glorify God one day. Philippians chapter two is so clear about this. In fact, let me let me just turn and read that quickly. Philippians chapter chapter two, therefore God has highly exalted him. This is verse nine, and given him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow of those in heaven and of those on earth and those under the earth.

33:11 That every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Every tongue is going to glorify God one day. So it's either going to be in judgment or in adoration as as his child. And so we are to conduct ourselves honorably, but we are also to submit to authority. Verse 13, back in one Peter chapter two, Therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake.

34:15 This is a guy who would take Christians and burn them at the stake to light up his garden parties. Not a nice government to have, but Peter says, therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake. The Lord is the one who instituted whom human government. He gave it there and the primary purpose for human government is as it says, for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of those who do good. When government fulfills that promise, they're they're doing what they're supposed to do.

34:56 And and we... Because it's instituted of the Lord, we as believers are to honor them, to submit to them, to respect them. But the question comes, well, what happens when the government becomes evil? Like the Roman government was, purely evil, what do you do then? You still submit to them, you still respect them, but you do not do what they command you to do when it contradicts God's word.

35:29 I think of I think of what what did the apostles do in Acts chapter four, I believe. When when the authorities called them in, they beat them for preaching the gospel and commanded them, don't ever preach in the name of Christ again. And they responded, we must obey God rather than men. And yes, we respect the authorities. Yes, we submit to them when they are doing, asking us to do things in line or not contradictory to God's word.

35:59 But when it contradicts God's word, we have to follow God rather than men. And and Peter knew this when he was writing to these believers. These believers were going through persecution. And then he says, for this is the will of God that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men, as free yet not using liberty as a cloak of vice, but as bond servants of God. As believers, we are free, we have liberty in Christ, But we are not to use that liberty to liberally go against the government or to do things that are wrong, that you could be put in prison for.

36:40 Verse 17 he says, Honour all people, love their brotherhood, fear God, honor the king, honor Nero is what he's saying there because even though he's wicked and tyrant, he's still, he he was still the the head of the government at that time. Servants, be submissive to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle but also to the harsh. So we are to submit to those in authority, we are also to endure persecution for doing good. In verse 19, he says, for this is commendable if because of conscience towards God one endures grief, suffering wrongfully. For what credit is it if when you're beaten for your faults, you take it patiently?

37:24 So if you are doing something wrong, something that is a crime and you get taken to prison for it and you suffer patiently for it, okay, that's good, that's a good thing to do, but I understand that, you know, you shouldn't have done that in the first place, that wrong thing. And, you know, you're you're suffering... You deserve what's happening to you, and that's why God put government in place. But if you suffer for doing what is right, for if you do good, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. So when the government turns against Christians as it has in so many countries of the world, and we're so lucky in this country to have the freedom that we have.

38:12 I don't know how much longer it's gonna last, but we do have such tremendous freedom here. But if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. How do you react? And I know you probably won't get put in prison for preaching the gospel or something or anything like that, But how do you act when people revile you for doing what is right? How do you react when people come against you for standing up for the truth and standing up for for for righteousness sake?

38:48 I think of... I think you probably know him or heard of him. Oops. Richard Wormbrand. He was a Lutheran pastor in communist Romania.

39:02 When the communist took over Romania, they didn't first of all start by actively coming for the church. They started, first of all, by seducing the church. They gathered all the church leaders up in one building and they had each church leader coming up singing the praises of communism and acting as if it is comparable to Christianity, which it is absolutely not, it's absolutely contradictory. And Richard Wormbrand got up and he exposed communism for what it was, and he preached the gospel, and he exposed how the communists had tortured Christians in the Soviet Union and other places. And he preached the gospel and it was put on radio to the whole nation.

39:47 And because of that, he was put in prison. Spent seven years in prison, was released for a short amount of time, went back to preaching the gospel and they put him in prison for another seven years. In there, was tortured, he was beaten. Finally, at the end of fourteen years, Christians here in The US and Western Europe, they petitioned to to have him released and he came to The US, even stood before the Senate, took off his bat, his clothes and and revealed the scars from from the beatings he had received. But he said this, it was in prison that we found hope of salvation for the communist.

40:30 It was there that we developed a sense of responsibility towards them. It was in being tortured by them that we will learn to love them. He still respected the communist government even after all it did to them. And his main desire was that they, the communist should be saved as well. He...

40:54 Later on, after he was released, one of the communist guards came to trust Christ as his savior and he met up with Richard Wormbrand and he told them, those times I was beating you, your your face was in pain, but yet when I'd look in your eyes, I'd see the love of Christ you shining through for me. And it's it's absolutely amazing. So how do we conduct ourselves before the world even when the world might come against us? So secondly, and I will try to go through this quickly, is our role in Christ. Our role in the world and our role as pilgrims in Christ.

42:15 Putting him on the cross. And yet the the scripture is so clear. When they reviled, he didn't revile back. When he... When they threatened him, he didn't threaten them back.

42:29 He loved them, he died for their sins there. Who himself bore our sins, verse 24, who himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we having died to sins might live for righteousness by whose stripes you were healed. So our job, our role in Christ is to follow his example and it's to also live for for righteousness sake. Verse 24, he says that we having died to sin might live for righteousness. God did not only save us or die on the cross for us so that we could have a home in heaven, which is tremendous in and of itself.

43:17 And we have such amazing hope in that. But he died that we should live for righteousness as well. I I think of what Paul said in second Corinthians chapter five. I'll just read it for you quickly here. Second Corinthians chapter five verse 14, for the love of Christ compels us because we judged us.

43:41 That if one died for all, then all died. And he died for all that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and rose again. Are you living for the Lord? That's why he bought you. It's one of the reasons why he bought you, to live for him.

44:03 And we are to follow follow Christ's example in this. We are to follow Christ's example so that even those who may come against us, that they might be saved as well. And so seeing our roles in the world and in Christ, may we as believers conduct ourselves accordingly. May we as pilgrims in this world conduct ourselves accordingly. Accordingly.

44:58 Yes, we might become wealthy, you know, if we're honest, hardworking, etcetera. There's nothing wrong with that. But Christ did not die so that we could be healthy and wealthy. He died for our sins. Though, I mean ultimately, yes, we'll have glorified bodies, we'll never have to worry about sin and sickness ever again, but he primarily died for our sins.

45:22 And I think the prosperity gospel, they get totally wrong, it places its hope in this world, they do not follow Christ's example to endure and they teach a definite physical healing in this world and ignore a healing from sin. So seeing how we are to conduct ourselves this way, may we as believers seek to live by the example of Christ. Ruth Hunt, was the wife of Dave Hunt, founder of the Berean Call, she she told him one day about her ancestors. Her ancestors were Anabaptists in Europe, which means Anabaptist simply means baptized again. They they lived in Holland, in The Netherlands, they were believers and they trusted Christ as their savior and they got baptized again because they realized baptism isn't for infants, it's for people who have trusted Christ.

46:26 And the Catholic church persecuted them and they fled from from Holland, they fled east towards Russia to escape that persecution. Later on when the communist took over the Soviet Union, they came after the Anabaptists as well and they fled west again back to back to Holland, The Netherlands. This is the Pilgrim Church. This is the way most of believers have lived during the past two thousand years, lights and we've been blessed in this country and in countries like Zambia to have the freedom that we have and I wonder, are we using that freedom while we still have it to promote the gospel? And and even if it was taken away from us, that would still be our duty, that would still be our responsibility in Christ.

47:19 Let's pray. Father, I just thank you so much for Peter and for our brothers and sisters in Christ who he was writing towards and we thank you so much for their boldness for you. We thank you that they stood up for the gospel, they stood up for truth and and they they suffered as a result, But yet now they are living in tremendous hope and glory with you and we we look forward to joining them one day. We we thank you for what you have taught us, for your word. We pray you would continue to teach us how we are to live for you in this world.

48:02 How we are to be lights for you. And to stand up for your truth. We think of also our brothers and sisters over in Zambia. Think of Kennedy and George and Veruso and all of them. You would bless them and minister to them and use them as lights for you over there.

48:21 Thank you also for this assembly, Westlake, and for each one here. Pray you would continue to to bless this assembly, that it will maybe a light for you in this area. And most of all, we just pray that your gospel would continue to go forth. In your name we pray. Amen.