In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of personal relationships in spreading the word of God. While mass media and other methods can be effective, they should not replace the personal connection between individuals. The speaker also discusses the balance between social work and evangelism, highlighting the need to reach out to others while staying true to biblical teachings. Additionally, the sermon touches on various tangents that can distract young believers from a Bible-based Christianity, such as the ego trip of success and the debate between teams and the local church.

I want to speak to you this morning, again on a somewhat practical area, the subject of balance, spiritual balance, especially in relationship to world mission. The booklet Extremism is required reading, I hope you have all read that. I don't want to have to go over that material. OM stands very firmly for what we have set forth in that booklet. And we are convinced, perhaps more than ever before, that this is God's way. And trust you know what it says. If you have read Revolution of Love and Balance, then you have read also Extremism. It is included in that book, together with four other important lectures that we would like you to read. As we think of the great task of world evangelization, many problems come into our mind. In OM, though we are activists, we believe in getting on with the job. We also believe in study, in research, in staying up to date on what God is doing around the world in many countries. We don't want to be some sort of closed-in work, where we just live in our own little cardboard box. What are some of the areas where we got to find the balance? And where some of you, I believe, in these days are trying to find the balance. First, we've got to find the balance between the call, being called to the mission field and making an objective decision. Some mission groups very strongly emphasize the call. They want to know when did you get your call to the mission field. Some even narrow it down to particular countries. We feel in a training movement that we do not want to overemphasize this. We've seen many people confused by this. We have not even found it that very much in the New Testament. Though we will not argue with someone who really feels he has a call. It brought confusion when there were so many people called to China, and they were all kicked out of China, and many of them never went back to the mission field. They became confused. Some, of course, did. Many great missionaries came out from China, working in many different places. We believe that God has given us a mind. He wants us to use our mind. We believe that we should function in fellowship with the body. Sometimes others can more objectively determine where we can make a vital contribution to world evangelism more than we can ourselves. And so there has to be the balance. We want to respect people's emotional guidance. Sometimes people get rather interesting visions and revelations and whatever else. But you won't mind if we're at times a little bit cautious. The old poser says if even an angel appeared and spoke forth something with a great shining light and beauty and splendor, and if it was contrary to the scriptures, he wouldn't believe it. And I believe what he has said carries a ring that is needed in our day. Also, a whole problem of guidance. We must be willing to understand God guides different people in different ways. We've often had our brother Buck Singh go through our camp, and he always gives us his message on guidance. And after he goes, we always have several little Buck Sings trying to pretend that they're Buck Singh and trying to get that type of guidance. Most of them end up really mixed up. Buck Singh is an unusual man of God. It's true in one way he's an ordinary man, subject to weakness like all people. But I mean this man, I tell you, is a powerhouse of prayer and faith. God has led him in a unique way. If there is such a thing as apostles today, another controversy we will avoid this morning, certainly he's one of them. And we just, of course, have learned much from him. At the same time, it's foolish to try to copy such men in terms of their total way of doing things. Spiritual balance is so important in this area. If you're not going to end up in a cul-de-sac, a dead end street. We need to study more of the facts like we have in the prayer cards. Some of these fantastic books we have in the bookshop on Islam. And on missions. And believe me, I'm embarrassed by our bookshop, but there's not much room here. And we really don't have so much money right now to invest in more books. But don't be frightened if some of your favorite books aren't on that shop. We just can't afford, at present, with our priority on Asia and the Middle East, and 400 production projects in 40 languages, to have everybody's favorite book. Many of my favorite books are not on the table. Of course, I have about 100 favorite books. We do change from time to time. A book we really want to be pushing this coming year is Destined for the Throne. A new book on the subject of intercession and prayer. And when you get to Europe, you'll get a whole new exposure on other books. That will help make up the goal mind of your little library. Spiritual balance in this area of the call, guidance, making an objective decision. Secondly, I have a lot to cover. In fact, I may try to cover two full messages, which is in fact 19 points. So please, if you can turn your mind on, or you're tired, that will be helpful. The need versus guidance from God. Does the need justify the call or going there? We hear about these tremendous needs. Some of you feel like going in 10 different directions after being here in four days. Somebody gets up for the Arab world, then somebody's up for India, then the ship, and pretty soon people start to talk to you personally. Wait till you get to Europe, where there's 900 people who've been on the year program, and they're all looking around for new recruits for their particular field. They're not 900 because some of those are out in Asia. But there's many. Don't let this confuse you. Praise the Lord for so much exposure. Don't feel you have to decide immediately after somebody talks to you. Be a little careful to commit yourself when some heavy-handed, hard-selling, dynamic leader tries to recruit you to your field and says he feels that you're one of the most potential young persons he's spoken to in the last 10 minutes and really feels that you're God's man for his field. You might want to feel a little awkward if no one tried to recruit you. We've had people like that as well. They felt really rejected. So it's hard to keep the balance in this. But really, the need does not totally justify going there. The need demands action first in prayer. The need demands prayer. Prayer will lead us to a strategy. In a God-given strategy, some will go, some will pray, some will give. Some will encourage others. When the war declaration is given and a nation goes on a war alert, what does everybody do? The men, the women, the children, they all drop everything, run into the house, find the nearest ship, the nearest airplane and ask the pilot to fly them to the front lines. No, there is such a thing as preparation. For some of you, that's going to mean Bible school. In OM, we are not against Bible schools. We have seen God use them. We are very linked to the Bible schools in Europe. Many go from OM into Bible school. What we are against is stereotyped preparation, thinking everybody has to go this way, everybody has to go that way. We've seen beautiful brothers, never been to Bible school, some never been to college. They've learned from this book, they've learned on their knees, they've learned through personal study that there must be one way or the other. And different people go different ways. And it bothers me when we find people attacking some of these institutions that were born in the Spirit of God. I'm grateful to this day, despite the many weaknesses I found there, which I also find in my own work, for my time at Moody Bible Institute. I'm glad it wasn't more than two years. I personally think that's a good period of time for my type of personality and for the burden God has put on my heart. There is a tremendous stress in the country today to not just get two or three years, people want you, and seven, eight years of formal training. I think many people are making the mistake in this. I think it's alright if every summer and every opportunity you throw yourself right into the battle and really stay red hot and really stay radical and really stay active so that you don't just dry up. I've seen so many people just dry up in their studies, whatever they're studying, even theology. I was just reading an article in Evangelical Newsletter about how many are drying up during their time of theological study. It's really amazing. I won't take time to read it, but it's significant. I believe we need to, one way or the other, get all the truth that goes into our minds translated into dynamic reality and action as quickly as possible if we are not to become another evangelical schizophrenic on the rocks. The need versus guidance from God. To go on OM, I believe you don't need a special call, you don't need an electric shock or a bolt of lightning in the night, somebody tickling your evangelical funny bone, but you need guidance. You need guidance from the Lord. How do we get guidance? There's no one simple way. There's no evangelical Ouija board I can sell you in the book room. You've got to get before God, waiting on God, His Word, get into His Word. Others, listening to counsel, thinking, praying, reading, letting God touch your heart through things you read. And then, of course, circumstances. Circumstances are one of God's greatest tools for guiding us. I am often guided by circumstance. I believe in the mystery of providence like the old Puritans. It's so beautiful the way God can use providence and lead us and guide us. Also, the push-the-door policy. God seems to be leading. All right, let's push the door. If it doesn't open after several pushes, maybe we better look around. There may be some kind of a tunnel we have to go through or something. And you'll read books on guidance, and perhaps some of you, the more books you read on guidance, the more messages you hear on guidance, the more confused you become. Because you find God's way with you is seemingly so different. Don't worry about being confused in some things. I am confused in a number of things. After studying for 22 years, that isn't much. No doubt after 44 years of study, I'll even be more confused. In this mysterious planet, in which God is working in so many different ways, let's not come up with all of our little easy, cookie-cut American answers. Some of you are going to really have some of your spark plugs reignited as you get into Europe and discover the European scene, as you mix with these 50 Singaporeans and Malaysians. We have the greatest cross-section of people from Singapore of any other country, even though it's the smallest country. It's the only country where the Bible Presbyterians, who in this country are spellbound to some degree by MacIntyre, though I think there's been a split now. But if you know anything about Mr. MacIntyre, you know they are relatively rigid and slightly conservative, to say the least. They certainly wouldn't touch O.M. with a thousand-foot pole. Maybe they don't even know about it. That's the best way to operate. But in Singapore, Timothy Tao, the great disciple of Carl MacIntyre, the great leader of the Bible Presbyterians, is an avid supporter of the ship, commending young people every year into O.M. And he and I sat down and talked about some of our differences, and yet he believes that God is in this. He, of course, wouldn't agree with everything, but he's committed. So we get these Bible Presbyterian young people. At the same time, we have young people from Singapore, even from some of the charismatic fellowships. The cathedral in Singapore has just exploded in some form of renewal. I spoke there twice on a Sunday morning, and it's mainly of a charismatic persuasion. Of course, these Bible Presbyterians, they've had no contact to any great degree with this side of the fence. And yet we've seen them functioning together in O.M., learning to understand one another, learning not to generalize. If you generalize about the fundamental conservative end of the church, and you lob them into all one box, you are only proving your ignorance, because that whole dimension of the Christian faith is very, very wide. You have to define today what you mean by fundamentalism. If we go back to the original meaning of what was once a very great word, it simply means, man, it really believes the Bible is the word of God. Now all kinds of different groups have all added things to it, so some people are a little hesitant to even use it. And if you lump all charismatic people, whatever in the world that means, into one box, you are proving that you have never studied neither church history nor what God is doing today. You maybe have been hurt by some extremists. There are extremists in both sides, from people like Carl MacIntyre, perhaps on the one side, I won't give names, people on the other side, who come out with every kind of ridiculous thing you can imagine, and would have us kissing the Pope's nose in Rome, if they could. Forgive me if that's a little bit unkindly, but it maybe communicates that in OM we have no plan to move near Rome. And if the dear Anglicans in England move closer to Rome, we are going to move further away from them, because it cannot be. If we are justified by faith according to the Word of God, if Martin Luther was anything other than a cockeyed idiot, and we know he wasn't that, then we are not moving back to Rome. And we're not saying there are not converted Catholics. There are converted Catholics, some of them maybe more converted than you, so don't get too puffed up. But that doesn't mean we can work together with a system that has false doctrines. Otherwise, what is my Bible? What can I believe and not believe? What was the Reformation? Why did thousands of people get nailed on the stake and burned to death for the sake of the cause of Jesus Christ, by Popish plans and all the rest? No, sir, we are not moving on that issue. We love all individual brethren. I was just with a Roman Catholic priest in Ceylon. I feel he must know Christ. Eighty percent of the priests in Ceylon are against him. He said two or three thousand people make some profession of faith. He's reading our books more than people I know ever reading our books. God is moving. Fine, I will pray for that. I will fan it. On the ship sometimes we get a whole load of priests and we preach the gospel to them. I had the bishop of Ceylon and all of his friends. And then two days later we had the nuns. We gave the word of God. We shared the new birth. And they brought evangelical books. But we don't mix and cooperate and mingle or compromise with error. And this is where we need discernment. We need wisdom. This is an area where also people spread false stories about OM. Simply because we're friendly sometimes to Roman Catholics. Don't hit them on the head with a mallet or tell them he's a pig. We're compromisers with the faith. That hinders the cause more than helps it. It's extremists who push people into the other camp. Have you ever noticed that? People can see this extremist is loony. And so it causes them to react against that and go into the other camp. So we must be loving at all times and gentle toward our individual Catholic friends. Despite our total disagreement with Roman error. And if you think that we're going to collaborate with Rome. I'm talking now about the church in general. And not get swallowed up. You know, I mean what is the little Anglican church in Britain next to Rome? Oh dear me. It's a drop. Oh Mr. Coggins who some people call an evangelical. It's just a drop in the ocean. Rome will just suck up with all of her tentacles that little Anglican thing. Unless there's very clear reformation first. When there's reformation within the Roman Catholic church. And there's a return to justification by faith alone. Salvation through the blood of Jesus Christ alone. We will talk about a cooperative effort. We would welcome more Luther's, Wingly's, Tyndale's. And a few others who are murdered at the stake. Quicker than you could ever know. We know it's controversial. But at least you know where we stand. Let's move on to the next area before I get on a tangent. Number three. The next area. The lostness of men versus the love of Christ. Some people react to any discussion at all about hell. They say we don't believe that hell should motivate us. We believe it should only be the love of Christ. Well wait a minute. We don't believe in playing one off against the other. Truly it is the love of Christ that constrains us. And in one sense because God's love has grown so great. Even if there was no hell it seems to me. We would still preach the gospel if God told us to preach the gospel to every creature. But the fact is there is a hell. And the fact is that it's difficult to have a mind and a heart. And not to be some degree motivated by the thought that men are lost. Whatever hell means to you. I don't fully understand it. I don't think man is meant to understand hell. I don't think our minds are capable of that. To any great degree. You can have an idea. That's enough. That's enough to really cause us to do some heavy praying. Some hard working. And so don't play one off against the other. We are motivated by the lostness of men. Jesus saw them as sheep without a shepherd. He was moved with compassion. And now the love of Christ does move us. But also the lostness of men moves us. We are moved at times even by people's physical needs. Should we feel guilty about that? Is that carnal or secondary? Woe to people who become callous to people's physical needs. Number four. Closed lands versus open lands. The big tendency today as we are being bombarded by the church growth people. And by other great men like MacGovern. Though he's adapted seemingly in some of his teaching in the past few years. Is that we must really go where people are responding. This is the big move today. Of course this is why many never leave America. People are responding here. There's so much to do. Every church needs five or six pastors. One or two music directors. Every church needs... I was in a church in California. Even the man who ran the slide projector was a paid worker. He got paid. He logged in every hour. He ran the slide projector. And he was drawing a little extra money. Of course no doubt to buy his yacht or something else. Through showing the slide projector. I wonder why I was so enthusiastic and wouldn't let me run my own slide projector. Professionalization is creeping into the church. Yet it has crept in. And I call it one of the most destructive factors in the present evangelical mode. If the affluency goes, a lot is going to cave in. A lot is going to cave in. I believe more of this work should be done by laymen. I believe there should be more laymen. I don't even like the term. Should be preaching from our pulpits. Should be in teaching ministries. And that there should not be such an over-dependence on all the full-time professional 10,000, 25,000 and 50,000 a year paid staff. That is my personal viewpoint. If you don't agree with it, I'll still love you. But we don't want you to think the only way you can serve Jesus Christ is become a so-called full-time worker. God may want some of you back in the office, back in the factory, back in who knows where. As a layman involved in a church taking your place in leadership. And of course when it comes to these closed lands, they are so blantantly neglected it's embarrassing almost to talk about it. Just look at the prayer cards that you now have. Unbelievable. Why aren't more people called to go to these countries? Do you know one of the greatest problems when I preach in America? People get stirred enough to work for Christ in America but not stirred enough to go out to the regions beyond and work for Christ. A lot of people want to work for Christ in our country. Christian work is now popular, let's face it. Our seminaries are full. Our Bible schools are full. It's now popular. But for 98% it's here. Because here you can get the best out of both worlds. Here you can have a nice home and a nice car and everything you want. Insurance policies, the cradle to the grave, retirement fund and still, quote, serve the Lord. But out there probably people will forget you even exist and you'll have to come back after four years to remind your church that you're still alive hoping that they'll still keep your $25 of support per month going for the next five years. And now good thinking people are rebelling against modern missions because they refuse to go around and visit 20 different churches as a beggar hoping each church will call for $25 a month for their support so that their picture can go on their bulletin board and they can be called their missionary for $25 a month. They spend the same amount when they give a tip at one of their big feasts on Sunday afternoon when they invite all their friends over to the local restaurant. Now I know that may upset some of you. It would certainly upset a few people who are not here. But I am burdened about this. And I believe we must speak out when God leads us to speak out. And we must believe that more of these people that feel they're going to be in the Lord's work will start thinking about Turkey and Afghanistan and North Africa and India. At least they should go out there and see if there's a possibility that they could fit in instead of just automatically they feel they must be a pastor. Automatically they're going to join anyone of 1 to 200 major mission organizations who one sole goal is the re-evangelization of the United States. And then people complain, why don't you ever come back to America? And I'm accused of being anti-American since we've gone 17 years ago. I moved away and have no intentions of coming back. And you know what I tell them? When you send the next 100,000 to the regions beyond, I'm coming back. When I see us going extreme and sending too many to the places I've had the privilege of working, then I'll come back to help bring the balance back. I believe in balance. We may think the number of missionaries from America is quite great and to keep it in balance, it is a great miracle that so many have gone, relatively speaking, compared to the total world situation, compared to what other countries are doing. In Britain I can tell you it's worse. But remember that out of those 35,000 American missionaries, one third of them are on furlough. I'm not against furlough. But it would be good if somehow we could replace those who go on furlough. One third are on furlough. Many, many, many are out there for their first term in which they're just learning that makes up a very big segment of people on the mission field and they never return. And yet while we're boasting, some people are boasting, all those who belong to the Optimist Club, which I'm an unofficial member as well, the Mormons have 24,000 men alone on the field. The one little rattlesnake, cockeyed band of nitwits that come out of Salt Lake City. Some people think that my words are hard on some of these groups. They obviously haven't read their Bibles and see what the Bible calls false prophets. And I'm just shaken by it. So we believe, yes, the work must continue in the open land. We don't want to neglect America. We know America has more alcoholics than almost all the nations of Europe put together. And we must not neglect the alcoholics. So we have more people working among alcoholics in America than we have evangelizing the entire Muslim world and throwing 15 other countries on top, if you wish. Just among alcoholics. The most evangelized group of people on earth that I've worked with alcoholics for two, three years. I don't despise that work. I don't feel worthy to tie the shoelaces of those who stick with alcoholics for 20 years. But the alcoholics I witnessed too in Chicago, they used to laugh at me. They took 20 gospel tracts out of their pocket. They received from the last 20 Moody Bible Institute students who were assigned to Skid Row to tell people about Jesus, who had already heard about Jesus, 55 times. I'm not against that. But where is the balance going to come? What about the hundreds and thousands of winos and drunks who walk the streets of Paris who've never had one soul talk to them about the saving faith of Jesus Christ? How many Skid Row missions among alcoholics do you think there are in the great metropolis of Paris? I've never heard of one. Paris, we compete in our cities. One Skid Row mission down the street from the next. You can go in some areas in Chicago, not just for Skid Row missions, but for churches in general, and you'll find 8 churches on one street within a few blocks. Can you believe it? Each one of them claiming to be the new final apostolic, Holy Spirit, etc. etc. church. All of them one against the other. Everyone, adamant. They'll all tell you, we preach only the Bible here. We don't believe in man-made arguments. We don't believe in the traditions of men. Only the Bible. I went into one of those churches once, I almost passed out. All women. Plenty of them dressed in white robes. And this guy with his organ, I tell you, this guy could do with an organ what you couldn't do with thick hypnotist. And he had everybody moving and swaying. All the girls started to go out of their minds. He got up there, you know, and boy, everybody was wooing him and cooing him. Then after the meeting, he went into this little private office, and one by one the ladies went in and had their personal time and fellowship with him. Then they went off praising the Lord. I couldn't believe that I was in a church. Yeah, there's a need here among the religious. That's for sure. And I praise God for dynamic ministries in this country. And I praise God for any of you who after exposure to World Evangelism and getting the vision for World Evangelism, God leads you for a dynamic missionary work here. I'll be right behind you. We believe in the open country. We believe in the closed country. Only 2% of the missionaries in the world are laboring among one-seventh of the world's population. And we've got to move on. The responsive and the non-responsive. This is mixed in. I really should have brought out, of course, that many people don't even think about going to closed countries. By the fact that they're closed, we don't believe that. We want to keep the balance and go to both. Many lands are wide open. The ship has been in some of those recently. Don't think the ship just goes to closed countries. That is a total misconception of the ship. We only go to a few closed countries. We go everywhere. Open, closed, responsive, non-responsive. The world is a field. The world is a field. Non-responsive lands, of course, are harder. And dear David Morris, oh, it's wonderful to have brothers like that in the work. He came up here and gave a list of the kind of people we need in the Muslim world. Well, I knew that wasn't for me. But I'm sure Dave would share with you and mix in what Dick Griffin said last night that it's weak people who want to learn these things. Yes, we've got high standards, but we don't expect them to take place overnight. And we don't just need some kind of spiritual Concord type super jet that are going to reach into the non-responsive land. Our burden should be to do the will of God, with or without response. God has told us to go. We must go. I love to see fruit. I love to see people coming to Christ. And I praise God for people willing to work in those Muslim lands without much fruit. It's got to be kept in balance. All these things have to be kept in balance. Six, teams versus the local church. We've already touched on this. I don't want to go over it again. Both are scriptural. Don't play one off against the other. God will not be pushed into some kind of theological test tube. You try to push God into a corner, and he'll push you right off the map. God is working in different ways. It is true, the local church is God's cornerstone. We see that in the word of God. Every true missionary movement, one way or the other, should lead from the local church back to the local church. What when you're working in countries where there is no local church? Well, those who go there, and this is basically true in O.M., few exceptions, they are sent out by your local churches. Boy, old Paul Tropers really got conservative over the years. I couldn't believe it. He told you... How many prayer partners did he say for the summer crusade? Five. That doesn't even get you out of your own family. We'll have a discussion on that. Where did he go? That doesn't get you out of your own family. Fifty. You aim for fifty if you hit five okay. You know what old Fred Jarvis... Have you ever heard Fred Jarvis speak? If you think I speak fast, he speaks twice as fast as I do. He's got six times as many ideas as I do. And when I'm around him, I'm scared to death. Anyway, he's a great brother. But you know what he says is a great sin in the church? It's not failure, it's low aim. You write that down. That's not original. It's not failure, it's low aim. You aim at five prayer partners, you probably get two. Aim at fifty. Your program, aim at two hundred. You know, there's a lot of people who love Jesus. I want some of you to write to Jimmy Carter and say, dear Jimmy, you tell him about me, I've been eating peanuts for years. Say, dear Jimmy, will you be a prayer partner for me? And he won't probably see the letter. Who knows, there's some other praying men around that White House. There better be or we're going to be in for trouble. There's lots of potential prayer partners all over. And you ought to write to them. I've been corresponding with all, what's his name, former Senator Harold Hughes. And he may be wandering over to the ship one of these days. He's a very dear brother. You talk about honesty. Oh, I had a beautiful time with him and about ten others down in Washington. We're all sitting around the table and everybody's sharing their spirits at work and what they're doing for God and this and that. And he just blurts out and just shares what a hassle it's been since he became a Christian. He doesn't understand Christians. He doesn't understand the terminology. He just poured out his heart. His life was really going all right until he got saved. And people were amazed. But God used the honesty of this man who has been through things that we'll never understand. Non-responsive and responsive teams in the local church, both are necessary. Let's find the balance. If so many people are emphasizing this, let's emphasize that. Seventh, the balance between personal work and mass media. Some people look very much down on it. This is mass evangelism. Superficial. It's canned evangelism. Have you had that? Campus Crusade, of course, they're supposedly the leaders. All the rest of us, we're just sort of following the leaders of canned evangelism. They are attacked. Old books are against them. But have you read the article recently in Eternity Magazine? One of the great opponents attacking canned evangelism decided to go around and make an objective study, an objective study of the kind of evangelism God was using. And he went to evangelism in depth in Latin America and he fellowshiped with Campus Crusade and he went to different places. He has now written a devastating article stating clearly whether we call it canned or not, God is mightily using these movements. Isn't that too bad for all of our sophisticated people who get paid good money to write articles against people about things they don't even know much about? And you wonder why some of these magazine articles come out? I'll tell you why. Because they pay a couple bucks a line. I can make a living just writing rubbish. Very rare rubbish. And there's people all over America who would read it. Money is behind a lot of things, beloved. And we need to learn that. And we need to learn not to believe everything we read. But get the balance. Read other articles. See what other people are saying. I know there is such a thing as canned evangelism. I actually have always attacked sort of canned evangelism. But that doesn't mean there's no room for methods. Maybe some are on extreme. But God in his mercy, God in his sovereignty, he can overrule that when he sees hungry hearts trusting him. He knows we are weak vessels of clay. He knows that the vast percentage of Christians don't go to six years of theological school to become sophisticated and get an answer to everything. The church is mainly consisted of ignorant men who have gone out filled with the Holy Ghost and shaken the world for Jesus Christ. And we've gone off balance into intellectualism that's dry, crusty, and it kills in many cases. I'm not against intelligence when it's on fire. But when it gets proud and it becomes to judge others and it writes so many books against others and criticizes others, it grieves me because it puts aside the sovereignty of God. I praise God even for groups I don't even agree with because God is bigger. God is working with us as human beings. Write that down and remember it. You are not an angel. God is working with us as humans, therefore he will not say to us, I will not work with you until you dehumanize. God would never work with George Burwer. And this has so helped me because I was so idealistic. Everybody was bothering me, including my wife. And it so helped me to realize that God is working with people where they are. God is going to work with you this summer where you are. You don't have to be where I am, wherever in the world that is. God is going to work with you where you are. If you're all, you know, just a babe in Christ, just popping out of the shell, barely looking, frightened, God is going to work there. And don't worry if somebody who thinks they're so intelligent thinks your prayer was superficial or your theology isn't quite total. God is working with you where you are. And you'll grow. And if that fellow's not careful, instead of growing, he will shrink. You know, as Christians, we can shrink. Have you ever seen them in some of the churches? Become more narrow and they have less contacts and they're more critical and more cynical and they just shrink. And though they may be 30 and they look very young, they're already becoming old and shrunken in their mentality. Pipsqueak, crocodile eye mentality. Frightens me. I tell you, if I had to belong to some of these churches, I would need an extra ton of grace just to get to the Sunday morning meeting. May God help me. I need more victory in that area. Oh, let God expand our horizons. Let's see the greatness of God. Let's see how He works in different ways in different people. He uses personal work, in-depth work, friendship evangelism, relating to people. Of course we believe in that. That is absolutely essential. No methodology will be a substitute for a person-to-person, heart-to-heart relationship. But that doesn't mean mass media, radio, television, blitzing a city is superficial or unscriptural. Not if God is God and we've got 4 billion people to reach. So it's not going to be all done by the tip-toe variety of friendship, relational evangelism, as much as we love that. The balance. The balance. The balance between social work and evangelism is a lot. Now in this area, a lot of social consciousness. Everybody is talking about social consciousness. Endless books are coming out about social consciousness. We're now all to stay in America and straighten out the government. This is the main goal. Why won't the blacks launch out? I can't tell you how hard we have tried to get blacks in this work. Not hard enough. May God forgive us for our failures. And we just praise God for every one of you, the few that are here. We'd do anything to get more of your brethren into this work. It's 6 times easier to recruit Africans than American blacks. 25 times. We have had to turn down 70 Nigerians at least from coming into OEM because their churches won't support them. They don't believe in them. That's another problem. But so many, even of our black leaders, Tom Skinner told me just right through my face, I love him, I've distributed more of his booklets than probably he has. But he said, look brother, our need is right here. We cannot think about these countries very much. The need is here in the ghettos. Look, the American so-called black ghetto, in comparison to the way people are living in South Africa and other parts of the world is like a palace. Most OEMers are living in conditions that are probably worse than some of these so-called ghettos. And I believe that is a tangent over emphasis. We need it, but we should not have gone to the point where we've said basically blacks cannot launch out as missionaries and black churches, though some of them are changing, hallelujah, some of them are changing, beginning slowly to send out. We have a leading black evangelist coming with us this summer for the month of August. Brother Lorette from Dallas. And he will be ministering in Britain and we will be fishing people as we call it in England, bringing people into his meetings. And we're just believing God to do greater things in that area. We want to be concerned about the social situation in our own country, but today that has gone extreme. We need more concern for evangelism, especially world evangelism. People like the little quote, how can you give the gospel to a hungry man? I will tell you how. You can sell it to him. Because people are so hungry for the word of God, in the poorest countries we work in, they'll forget about a meal to buy that gospel. Now you put that one in your cranium and stir it around a bit. You see, it's so easy to come up with cookie-cut answers, especially men who haven't gone out and lived in these countries. I love to talk to men who lived out there for five or ten years. They seem to have a lot more wisdom than the average guy who's turned out through our meat-grinding education system and have most of their knowledge from books, and oftentimes just the books of their group of their mentality. And I am so convinced that there is a present-day dangerous tangent that's overemphasizing social involvement with people, even to the point of taking us into communism, that is belittling evangelism and sapping strength we need to reach the world with the gospel of Christ, which is what we are told to do. Beware of people who twist the scriptures. And again, I would ask you to search these things out. Number nine, nationals versus missionaries. I can't believe what I've read about here in the States about nationals. It is disgusting. People telling us that the cheapest way to evangelize the world is support native workers. You can get them for $10 a month, $15 a month, $25 a month. It's like slave trade in Virginia about 300 years ago. This is crazy. First of all, today, we should not use the word native at all. That is a taboo, hopeless word. By the way, the word can also is out in Europe. The only can in England is the one you're sitting on. The ones you put your food in are tins. We call it tinned evangelism and I've never heard anyone use that term, though maybe we could start it. When Billy Graham came to England and started talking about evangelism among the bums, there was all kinds of mumbling and murmuring all over the audience because Britain only has one bum and you know where it is. I can tell you the linguistical battle and barrier is big. So don't worry, you will make a few mistakes in the process. We need nationals. I believe national works should try to be self-supporting within their own country. I believe too much money in the hands of nationals has caused endless confusion though I'm not totally against it. But these very nationals, many of the leading nationals will say there is still great scope for missionaries. We need missionaries. Why? Because the body of Christ is international. Different gifts, different people. A thousand million people. There is such an ignorance about what certain nationals are doing in certain countries. I haven't got time to go into it. They are begging many times O Emmers to come. Our stronger work is more with nationals than with missionaries. We get on generally better with nationals than missionaries though we have thousands of missionary friends all over the world. A few missionaries perhaps have it in for us in some places. But in most places God has given us a beautiful relationship with missionaries while at the same time even a deepened relationship many times with nationals. And then the balance between your talent, finding your niche and going anywhere for Jesus. That's hard isn't it? Americans are very conscious of their profession more than any nation I know. They always write their letter telling about their gifts. They taught Sunday school. They were the vice president of the Boy Scouts or they did this and they were the president and they graduated cum laude and they did this and they did that. We're very conscious. By the way Europeans tend to think Americans are boasters. I don't know if John brought that out. We give, if we're not boasters we give the appearance of being a boaster. Europeans, English especially are very quiet about anything they've sort of accomplished. And you're going to be looking at an Englishman over there and you know his hair will be a bit stringly and his clothes will look perhaps a little funny though there are many well-dressed Englishmen as well and you're going to think where did he come from? After a while he's got a PhD in biochemistry. I mean I tell you the English they're the most quiet deadly people in all the world. Don't think of them as all being shy. And I can't tell you how much I have just been infatuated and in love with this island of Britain. I almost, if it wouldn't be an offense to England, to America I would become British. I wish I could belong to both but my citizenship is already wrapped up in heaven. But I think it's exciting. And I think we have to realize we have a lot to learn from these people. Don't be so concerned that your friendship gets used this summer. It's basic training this summer. In God's timing your gift will be used. Don't go reverse. We get Americans they react from all these things and they go extreme and they never you know you're there crying, weeping for someone to go play the piano. Six piano players sitting there and no one moves. I mean that's not God's way. If there's a need and you have a gift offer it and give God the glory. Humble yourself. False humility is also a danger, isn't it? You say find the balance. That's what we're talking about. Balance. It takes a long time. You're a talent versus go anywhere. You know where the need is. Most Americans are not going to find their niche on the night mission field without a real heaven sent movement of the Holy Ghost. Because it's so easy to find your niche back here. We all tend to be more comfortable in our own environment. We feel like we're a fish out of water. In fact someone once said to me I was back in my hometown recently and it's such a feeling when I come back to my hometown. I was reared since childhood in one town Wyckoff, New Jersey and there's something about coming back there and someone said to me I think it was John Neal that everyone feels that they're a refugee if they're living anywhere outside of their own hometown. In a certain sense that's true. Of course we're all different. Some of you have been on the move all your life. But and God may use that to make it more easy for you to adapt to a mobile ministry. And we need both. We need to see the importance of using people's gifts. Very important. We've distributed books about it but it must be kept in balance to being flexible in the light of the task in the light of the complicated world we live in. And we need to see in the light of the fact that half the people in the world have never heard the gospel once we've got to have flexibility. We've got to be willing to learn other talents. We've got too many nurses. How many nurses do we have here? Look at all the nurses. Look at all the nurses and in Europe among the English we'll triple you. We've got so many nurses that we are in the process of converting nurses. We convert them into typists because the world has changed. There are not that many great needs for nurses. There are some. Many other complications in finding a fulfilled ministry in it. There is an endless need in God's work today for people who know how to type. Top Christian leaders. No secretaries. The whole work of OM is perpetually held up from lack of typists. My office, I never have a typist I need. Jim Rogers was my first and main secretary. I've got all kinds of things to give him. He's typing tape almost all day long here. He's doing other things as well because we don't have somebody else who's a red hot typist who's willing to sit down and type, type, type communication all over the world. What is this communication about? Moving into new countries. Getting literature. Getting recruits. Answering questions. Solving doctrinal problems. I have a backlog of 300 to 400 letters right now. I can't do anything with a nurse. Now, we're happy for nurses who come for a year and do a basic training and then go out to Saudi Arabia or go out to Yemen and go out to Bangladesh. But some who are nurses don't have what it takes for those places. So most of the nurses end up back in their own country. And in some countries they're even unemployed now. And so, though you may feel that you're nifty, you've got all this training, is a guy going to use all my training? Poor Dick Griffin. He was trained to be an agriculture man. He's got a degree in agriculture, Dick. What is he doing? Literature work, poor guy. He's a misfit. 20 years. He should be out plowing the fields. Why, he could be revolutionized in Mexico's agriculture. He could be developing a new brand of acorn. He could be discovering a new kind of seaweed. There he is, selling gospel books, seeing hundreds of people come to the Lord Jesus Christ. What an incredible sidetrack. Oh my. All right, next message. We've got ten minutes. This one's called Tangents. I'm glad Chopra isn't here. I think in Europe we will cover this again. But I don't want to risk it. There are nine major tangents that take keen young people away from really biblical and Bible-based Christianity. One, the ego trip of Mr. Success. The ego trip of Mr. Success. We become successful, we feel God has used us, then we slowly become unteachable. Watch out for success. Success is the backdoor to failure. Somebody wrote a book, Failure is the Backdoor to Success, and I'm going to write a sequel. Success is the backdoor to failure. In fact, it may be the front door. So beware of your successes. Take it cool. Take it calm. Humble yourself unto the mighty hand of God. Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought to think. That's what the Word of God says. Number two, the tangent of emotionalism. This is one of the most widespread tangents today. We're always looking for the new emotional trip. And we've gone, as we say, I think in England, bonkers, we've gone crazy about music. Look, you can turn unsaved people on with music, Christian music. You can. I mean, man, this music is groovy. I've got these two latest records of my friends from the Agape Force. That stuff turns me on. Now, I'm not against that because I'm a believer. I have the Holy Spirit. I can understand the words. But the Agape Force people were telling me that the unsaved really get sent by this music. They really love it. They don't necessarily get converted. Music is very important. You know, old D.L. Moody emphasized that. D.L. Moody was so fanatic about the Ministry of Music. You know what he did? He planned it so that George Burwell was about as much music gift as this electric wire had to study music at Moody Bible Institute. You should have seen the students laugh as I was trying to lead singing. I don't, to this day, know what a tune is and note is. The main thing, I can't even tell you what I did in that music course. But I fanatically in the steps of Moody believe in the Ministry of Music. One of the first things we did when we went to Mexico in 1957 was play music. And the next year we had our first music team in 1958. It was a major part of the thrust into Mexico. But we attract people with music ability like the moon attracts Greta Garbo. You know, we just don't draw these kind of people. And how we've ever gotten a hold of Frank Fortunato is a miracle. And I think through his disciplined wife we've got him for long term. Praise the Lord. Sorry about that, Frank. But that was a real fifth column operation. The Holy Spirit is beautiful. I had nothing to do with it. But I believe that we've got to have a Ministry of Music. And yet I am aware of the dangers of getting caught up just with music. And always thinking that the next tune, the next song. But more important than that that's a little tangent. More important than that is feelings which is the music of the Christian life. Tozer says with or without music we've got to keep on marching. With or without feelings we've got to keep on marching. Beware of emotionalism. Some of us love to be a little emotional. I keep most of my emotionalism try to keep it under control and a lot of it I just keep private. If I want to have a real sort of a more emotional time I go into the woods or I go somewhere alone because I find it stumbles people. Some of the prayer meetings years ago when I got more emotional the people even stopped praying and they started just looking at me when I was praying. And I tell you that God really hit me. I really thought once I was led of the Lord to stand on a table and shout hallelujah praise the Lord. I jumped up on the table and I was dancing on the table praising the Lord. This is in the good old days you know when we were straight laced about 15 years ago. Lo and behold I found out of prayer meeting later on other people were jumping up on the table. Yeah that's alright if you own the table but if you're in somebody else's house they move in and you're found jumping up on their brand new $500 table it could cause a rumor it could break the table as well. So I think that our emotions must be all the time under control. Under control. We always know the Lord is in control because we easily go out of control in emotion and one of the greatest problems in the church is that the religious emotion and the sex emotion they jump. That's happening all the time. You know the book The Devil and Mr. Smith don't read it it's too heavy. It tells about him being brought up as the son of a clergyman seeing all the hypocrisy in the church every time an evangelist came or every other time nine months later two or three girls pregnant. One of these real you know extreme emotionalism and of course girls just got turned on for Jesus turned on to evangelism everybody was getting turned on nine months later two or three babies. He got so fed up with the hypocrisy he saw in this kind of emotional jungle of uh of satanic really attack that he denied Jesus turned away from everything became a Satan worshipper he was in meetings where they were chopping fingers off and offering them up to the devil and then he sat drenched his own body with kerosene on the beaches of California and was going to give his body as a sacrifice to Satan and through intercessory prayer he was saved at that moment and came back to Jesus Christ. The religious emotion and the sex emotion can jump I'm not against good nice feelings I am a person very very very susceptible to feelings and at least 50% of them are good perhaps 80% but I've got to have control self-control God's control and the rest in subjection I think it's very important a big tangent Tozer brings it out three we get the signs wonders and miracles tangent people that think this kind of evangelism all I'm doing is literature just talking to people witnessing well this is this is nothing we need apostolic evangelism we need signs wonders and miracles then people are going to flock to Christ you're deceived if you believe that now some of you really you're really gunning back on me now wow boy I touched the holy one look I believe closer to you who yearn to see some of these things and you may know I believe that God heals we believe in OM as God leads in a careful and prayerful way to pray for the sick who can deny that you ever read the book of James people rebelling from extremism and healing and there's been plenty of it have gone to the other extreme no healing at all and we've got to watch both there certainly must be a balanced way that we can see the healing ministry of Jesus Christ in the 20th century and many many many non-healing types of people or non-charismatic believe in this and of course our charismatic friends believe in it as well some have gone extreme on both sides isn't there a balance? but avoid this tangent in thinking that this is the way we evangelize the world many of the greatest healers have come to India they've done all kinds of things some of it seemed to be real but it didn't lead to many conversions I was praying for the sick in a meeting in India you know when people come up to you after a meeting with all kinds of illnesses and difficulties what are you going to say to them I don't believe in that you can't people with leprosy people lame at least you should show some love I tell these people I have no great gift of faith I wish some of my other friends were here and I'm willing to pray for you I teach them what the word of God says and I pray and we've seen God work other cases somehow nothing happens but I've talked to a man because Fuxing has seen a lot of healing in his work and I've said look do many of these Hindus do many of these Hindus come to Christ after they're healed you know what he told me very few they get healed but they won't accept Christ they won't repent conversion in our day and age comes from the Holy Spirit it does not come from people being intellectually persuaded that you're greater than spiritists or you're greater than other groups that have healings all the groups have healings miraculous healings you say that's the devil that's right I have studied this I have wept over this subject for 22 years because I am one of those persons that want everything from God a natural extremist I do not believe there is an easy answer to the question of healing of all people that baby we prayed for last night may die what is that going to do to you is your God going to drop dead because of that and that's where Eugenia Price and other books have helped me I'll pray with all intensity but then I have to leave things in the hands of God and I must not become bitter against God as many people do many people become bitter when they are not healed and we may talk about someone who is healed but we don't talk much about the 10 who went to that great healing meeting and were not healed and go away bitter against Christ and bitter against the preacher and disillusion and throw the whole Christian thing because they have been presented with a false extreme brand we need balance in this area as in any area and yet there is a danger on both extremes we believe God can do the miraculous but we also believe God is in the ordinary and we believe the young people just beginning in the Christian walk maybe they ought to learn to specialize a little more in the ordinary before they start laying hands on one of the engines and believing that the pistons are going to be healed as one team from Holland did in 1963 and just about finished us off in that country and then there is the next tangent the only church crowd we have already gone into that so we will bypass it those who believe they are in the only church the witness Lee crowd and many others similar to them it frightens me it is a deadly tangent it is an ego trip with many people so I am sure there are some saved people who get sucked into it five the danger of legalism holiness gone astray becomes legalism and there is a danger that we will not understand the difference between the two and we think we are holy because we don't do this and we don't do that and our hearts are filled with pride and our minds are filled with jealousy and envy and bitterness isn't that more important I believe it is beware of legalism don't do this and don't do that don't confuse having a few rules and basic policies with legalism I don't believe that OM is basically legalistic at all if anything we may lean too far the other way we are extremely strong on the message of grace and ours is the message of grace but next to the legalism tangent is the grace tangent people that all they talk about is grace grace grace we are under grace we don't want any rules we don't want a sermon on the map that was for some other person dispensation and it's all grace and it leads to a subtle form of passivity it leads to a laziness it leads to a license it leads to divisiveness and confusion we like the grace like George Whitfield preached David Brainerd Hudson Taylor William Carey even Jonathan Edwards so all of those men had their weaknesses and some of the old saints had to acknowledge that they tended at times to be legalistic their view of marriage was often totally legalistic don't hold it against them and don't make the mistake as a whole new movement is doing in America today to think that now all truth is being restored have you ever met these types they think now we in 1977 we are living in the restoration of all truth and all these other people before us they really didn't have it I believe as some truths are restored to us we so easily lose other truths and that truth is so big that no one man gets it all no one God is too big and too great and often times even the greatest men of God will have some areas of error you watch out for Verwer's error and nail it all people of God have some error it may not be straight forward error it will only be tendencies and of course in a fellowship of people that are alive in Christ rebuking and exhorting the tendencies keep coming back let them alone let them get puffed up they will start a false cult you remember Brenneman Mr. Brenneman years ago considered the most Holy Spirit filled man in the whole of America the whole vast percentage of the Pentecostal community elevated this man they thought he was so great he flowed in the Spirit all nine gifts of the Spirit then once preaching a halo came over his head pictures of this halo he held hundreds of thousands spell bound in this nation he was lifted up as one of the great latter day apostles he wrote some very powerful books and then it happened started a false cult denied the Trinity and today we have to cope in Madras in Switzerland with Brennanites a fanatical little sect who are weird and almost impossible to deal with we need each other and we need to beware of that tangent which men become almost spiritual Hitler's spiritual dictators legalism runs with it and then the liberty cult the other extreme of it and then another tangent we are going to come to a close in a few minutes I have some questions extreme Calvinism this is an increase you are going to find people in O.M. who are basic modified healthy Calvinistic outlook I know there are of dedicated Christians of that particular theology I hope that doesn't frighten you Arminians and Methodists and whatever else but there are the extremists who even get to the point of saying if God wants to evangelize the world he will evangelize the world he will just choose who he will he hates some and loves the other and that's it of course reform theology as it is called Puritan theology is heavy it is deep it has many great truths but it is also complicated and we get too many Sunday school boys with two years of Bible study that decide that they are now a seven point Calvinist well bless their little tulips may they somehow see that God is working in many different ways and if they are Calvinist or not how can they deny what God has done through Wesley through Finney the arch enemy of Calvinism and through many many other mighty men of God and people always want to know what I am I was in a big pastors conference and pastors stood up obviously a Puritan type Martin Lloyd Jones of course is the great Puritan leader of our day we recommend his books beyond all telling tremendous spiritual depression I believe is the greatest book of the last 25 years the greatest Christian book that is my own personal viewpoint Martin Lloyd Jones this man stood up and said are you a Calvinist I said yes you can be comforted I am an Arminianized Calvinist right down the line he didn't know quite what to say neither do you watch out for extreme Calvinism it often becomes a cop out to minister to your own temperament to slack off to take away the sting and conviction about certain issues that upset you I believe too often it is the easy road out but beware also of extreme Arminianism westerly gone wild gone extreme where people think every time you sin or take a cigarette you have fallen from grace I have talked to people who have been saved fallen and saved 15 20 times something has gone screwy there something has gone screwy we need to keep this in balance how do we handle the eternal security problem says he believes that men are saved as long as they are saved well there is a problem but I believe there is a balance and God can keep us from the extremes and then there is the extreme of perfectionism which is deadly we have such a hunger for holiness we get so put off by people's problems and mistakes we withdraw into a shell and we somehow deceive ourselves into thinking we are perfect and oh that is a subtle enemy no time to talk about it and then ninth there is the tangent of liberalism probably still the most subtle of all the tangents universalism liberalism boy that really solves some of our problems hell no longer exists everyone eventually will be saved the bible contains the word of God existentialism Dr. Francis Schaeffer is a man that should be studied in our day and age we have had him speak at our conferences years ago we gave him three days straight to speak if you think I speak long when there are men giving out truth we want it we want to fill our hearts we want to fill our notebooks because it is so important and he is very good at standing against the subtle darts of universalism liberalism and the message of compromise in regard to the scriptures and takes the conservative view on bible inspiration and we very much lean in his direction we wish he was here well we have given you 19 points ways to be balanced and ways to stay off tangents you say why spend so much time on this do you know most of the epistles of the apostle Paul were corrective epistles do you know that we have to stand for the truth we have to defend the truth we yearn to be mainly positive I believe this kind of message is basically positive but we must not be ignorant of Satan's devices we're not just interested in having you prepared for this summer but also for the rest of your life let's close in prayer and go into our fellowship groups you can even discuss some of these things if you don't have something else I'm sure you do Lord we just thank you and praise you for this opportunity to have this time of teaching principle on principle line on line verse on verse Lord I believe the young people here are hungry for you and I believe many of these things have rung true in their own minds we are indebted to many teachers who have taught us for many things we have seen these two decades and we know we still have things to learn we know we have to find greater balance in some of these areas we know that we get on little tangents and we want your help Lord we know we failed you we hunger for truth but we want love with it we want reality we don't want cold frozen orthodoxy that does nothing but hinder your work we want to see people of different backgrounds working together in love and harmony and unity coming into the beauty of balance and Christ likeness by the power of your Holy Spirit we pray in Jesus name Amen.