- [Narrator] We are called by God to share the whole gospel with the whole world. Rockpoint Reaching is each of us. It requires action from us and the need for belief to exist in us, belief in the power of the gospel, and the high calling to share. We are Rockpoint Reaching, providing clean water in Kenya, working for better healthcare opportunities in the Philippines, building new church steeples in New Orleans, volunteering time to see hundreds of children learn about Jesus through Vacation Bible School, or donating funds to help support missionaries as they bring the gospel to restricted places and a in new languages. New hearts become a part of the kingdom of God. We reach outside our walls as a church family, for the purpose of bringing God glory, as he changes the hearts and lives of those in this world forever. Let's not slow down, let's look up, look out, and ask God today, what next? - Well, it's good to be here with all of you, God has been working in the midst of us as a church over the next, or last three weeks, and this is our third one, as we have been learning together how God is on the move, working in and through Rockpoint: Around the Corner and Across the Globe, and he is indeed doing some amazing things. We've heard from some wonderful speakers today, we got more than we can handle up here in front, but you're gonna hear from them in just a minute, and God has been moving in your heart and in your life. I would encourage you to please go into the gathering area after this service, continue to pray for how God wants you to go, really, the great commission is go and make disciples. Some of you are gonna be able to go somewhere, you're gonna be able to give more, we all can start praying for opportunities to reach those within our neighborhood, our spheres of influence, and share the hope that we have found through Christ. Out in the gathering area today, we have a couple of tables that we want you to move into, and talk with those ministry partners, East Immanuel, you'll hear from Chris in just a minute, and Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Vince Miller with Resolute, also the Bridges Center, we partnered with them over in Nairobi, Camp Shamineau on Compassion International, each of you have been given this brochure, and in there is just a ton of information you can access, along with some next steps. We've also kinda given you this little sticker, which is a Summer's Here parties, those begin today, so if you were not able to RSVP to have a Chicago hot dog with me and lovely Lynette, you know how much I love those things, you can do so, you can join us today 12 o'clock after the third service, hopefully outside in our courtyard area, we want you to join us for that. But God has been moving in a powerful way, and today, we've got some wonderful friends, partners in ministry, and an opportunity to hear from them, and so, we're gonna kinda go around the horn here, and I want you to hear a little bit about each of them, as they share about their ministry and what God's doing, but also their wonderful family. Sammy Watkins to my right, Chris Monson and Terrell Walters, so let's start with you. - Well, my name is Samuel Watkins, I live on the upper east side of St. Paul with my beautiful wife Coleen or 14 years, and my daughter Shalimar, who is 14. I'm currently at Union Gospel Mission as a chaplain of the Transitional Housing Program, and thank God, tomorrow I'll start a new position as director of chaplains there in Union Gospel Mission Twin Cities, where every day. Where every day we get to come alongside men coming out of prison, their addictions, and chronic homelessness, have an awesome ministry there. Just a short plug, if you think about the mission, we would love your support. - Yeah, my name is Chris Munson, I have been the pastor at East Immanuel Church for 14 years. My lovely wife Tracy, I've been married for 16, she wears many, many hats in the ministry, and is juggling lots of things there. I have a son, Micah, who's almost 14, and then Molly, who is 11. Been down there in the east side for 14 years, got to work with these guys for most of that time, then I've been spending part of my time as a police chaplain for the last eight years with St. Paul, and so that's been interesting to kinda see it from inside the police department, and then also through the police department, and then during some of the times that are going on now, it's been enlightening. - Okay. My name is Terrell Walter, I'm the pastor of Beacon of Hope Church in North Minneapolis. Been a pastor there for 12 years, and my beautiful wife Marquita, we've been married for. Let me say that again, my beautiful, oh she here, my beautiful wife Marquita, we've been married. Amen, come on, come on. Amen. Well, we've been married for 10 going on 11 years. We have eight children between the both of us, and 10 grandchildren. Yeah, yeah. Amen, right ? Been working with pastor Chris, Sammy, and truthfully, truthfully love Pastor Roy, and it's been beautiful, it has. Been some struggles in my life, I don't wanna call them struggles. God has been awakening me in my life, so, and I thank him for that. I'm just a fighter for Christ, period, I love Jesus. - Amen. - That's it. - And we wanna keep praying for Terrell, he's got cancer, and God has had him on a journey, and so many of us who've been doing that and continue to ask for your prayers for him and for God to perform his will in and through them in so many different ways. You know, I wanna frame our time this morning with the time that we have, believe me, each of these guys could talk to you for an hour, so, when I get four preachers up here, it's tough to stay within the zone here that they tell me I need to stay in, I ain't gonna do it on a Sunday anyway, but this one's in particular important. I wanna frame it this way, I've been going through the book of Acts personally, we're gonna launch into that series starting in the fall, and I got to chapter 18, and within chapter 18, just so I can set the context here, Paul is in Corinth, and he is experiencing opposition 'cause he's in a city, I mean, this city, I don't wanna go into too much, 'cause I want you to come back into the fall, but this city was crazy. And he was wondering, you know, I'm sure doubting, as many of us have done, "Lord, why am I here "in this situation, and can I take a back door "and get out of here?" And, it was Jesus who appeared to him and actually said, "I want you to stay put," these are my words by the way, this is not in the original text, but, "I want you to stay put, because I've got many in this city "that I am reaching out to," and he wanted them to hear the message of hope that's found through the cross and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, so he said, "Paul, I want you to stay put, and I want you to continue "to communicate that hope to that city." And in many ways, each of us have a mission field, you're a missionary, I'm a missionary, we're all servants of Jesus with the great commission, and whether it's in the city of St. Paul, or Minneapolis, or wherever it might be, we have a calling to be missionaries, and so this morning what I want us to do is really, I've got a two-fold purpose, the first is, to hear from them how God is moving, because God is moving and hear the stories of what he's doing, but then also, they're gonna challenge us, 'cause they have a lot to teach us about reaching people in our neighborhood, about reaching around the corner, and noticing the needs around us, and then asking God, "Where are you moving," so I can join him, so, that's gonna be part of what we go through. Now, let me frame this first question, and I'm gonna cut these guys loose. The first question is this, I really do believe that if you are seeing conflict, if you're seeing opposition in some way, if you are seeing people hurting, I believe that is a sign that God is at work. Now, let me, I always bring everything back to biblical principles, and also in a theological framework, 'cause it's my biblical worldview, okay? I really do believe, if there is herds, if there's opposition, if there's conflict, I believe God is at work, where do I get that from? Well, if you haven't figured it out yet, sinners sin, right? So, we live in a messed up world where people are struggling. They don't need condemnation, they need love, because I shouldn't expect them to be any different if they don't follow Jesus Christ, right, so I come with a message of hope. So, what happened, I'm living in this sinful world, what did Jesus do, he came to me 'cause I can't go to him. And that's our responsibility to take the hope that we have, the gospel, the good news, the transformational message of Jesus Christ in word, in deed, into that zone, that world where people are suffering, they're living in sin, and now I have a message of transformation and hope that can only be found through Christ. So, with that framework you all are where God has placed you, how are you beginning to see, especially in this messed up world, we'll get a little deeper into that in a minute, but how are you guys seeing God at work? Share some stories. - Well, as a chaplain at Union Gospel Mission, I get a unique opportunity to partner with guys, and come alongside them, and I have the privilege of taking a guy who has never been church, knows nothing about the Bible, in three to six months, with the help of the Holy Spirit, watching the lights come on, right? And so, I have that kind of perspective, I see God going to work. I also see the Lord at work in a broader community, and that this George Floyd incident has really brought the church back into a unified position, at least to really start looking at, "Man, we got some work to do." And so, I think about "Pray Minnesota," March 7, before the trial started going down to the government center and just seeing all of these ethnicities of people, from different backgrounds and churches praying, somebody just said after the first service, "Sammy, "you got a taste of heaven." That's what heaven must be like, just to see people that unified in the church, no differences, no, "I don't like what color the carpet is," everybody just sitting there looking and praising, and thinking about "How Lord can we move, "and be about your business." And, so I've seen the Lord move in that unique way, Roy. - Hmm. That was great. - I think you just see a lot more diversity in the city, and it's just a matter of fact that you see a lot more backgrounds and complete people coming from all around the world, and so you see that in the cities, one of the beautiful things with that is you're seeing multicultural churches coming together more so in the last year and a half than any other time that II can think of in our ministries. And so to see that brothers and sisters are saying, "You know what, we are about the kingdom of God." The world needs Jesus, you need Jesus, I need Jesus, Stillwater needs Jesus, Saint Paul needs Jesus, Chicago, I know Chicago needs Jesus. North Minneapolis needs, right, I mean, that's what we're about and by the power of the Holy Spirit, the spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is a spirit that God has given to us, and now he's called us to go and do that. So, when you see in the book of Acts, you see they're under the evil Roman empire, but you have people coming from Africa, and the Middle East, from Turkey, in Acts 6 and Acts 13, they come together, and some are called to stay, and then others are called to go, and somewhere to go there, and then the next ring, and then. And I don't know when I'm gonna see you again, so I'm going to love on you, you're gonna love on me, and we get back together, man that's gonna be fellowship. That's fellowships, so they did then, it just transcended what they were dealing with. They knew the Roman empire was evil, but are they there to try to overthrow the Roman empire? No, they're called to be, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And that was the problem that they had with Jesus, people wanted Jesus to overthrow Rome, and Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world," right? You have a one-year plan, a five-year plan, Jesus has got a 50 billion year plan, and it's a whole lot better, so I'm gonna get on board with that one. - Amen. - Well, you know, when myself, and please give my voice, I usually get excited but my excitement is more based in the word now, so I thank God for that. Well myself it's been kinda hard for me to kinda get out, so I've been kinda directing other pastors and other conferences in this time. For me and my church, Beacon of Hope, the church has to regroup. Why do I say that? I say it because, it's no way we shouldn't know what to do right now. We the body of Christ, right? There's no way, this isn't new. It's been played out before, right? So, there's no way we should be at a loss of words, this is a great time, the harvest is ripe, right? But, now the church has to come together. When I've stated church I'm talking about myself as well, right, so what I'm doing with Beacon of Hope, is, we're coming together. I was a busy pastor, to be honest. I was so busy, I didn't spend time on my first ministry, my family, and I lost focus of that, until my wife corrected me in it. So I had, now I got to get busy with my church, teaching them that they could get busy. We have the same gift. God gave each of us talents, right? And Matthew 25 it tells about those different talents, but this is a word, "According to our ability." You're able, we are able, and I see that now, and God let me know, which is very hard for me to sit down. It's very hard for me not to get out, you know, but he's telling me, "You sit still, "tell the church what to do. "Give them opportunity to be the body." So I failed in that area, but I'll be honest Roy, I failed in that area as a pastor, because I was doing everything. I'm not boasting, I just loved it, right? But now, we're allowing our congregation to do, it's a gifting, right? It says, one was given five talents, one was given two, and one was given one, according to their ability. We able church. We able to reach people and things, but you know, where it starts with, us. We have to know each other in order to know somebody else. Me and Sammy had to get to know Chris and Roy, why? Because, we haven't been brought up the same way. I wanna get to know my brother, why? So I can know what I can do and what I can't do, and you know what that make me do, it make me love him move. - Amen. - Awesome. You know, and as you can tell, I could just give them the mic and we're done for the next three days. You know, great words, and I think as we look at reaching into one another's lives, I think we live in such a polarized society today, I mean, I could go on and on about this particular issue, and you all know and are aware of, you can have a conversation with someone and all of a sudden you find out they're over here, and then somebody else is over here, and I've had to watch what I say, even from the front in ways I've never had to do before. So every time I talk about issues, I have to think in my head, and we all do right, when you have conversations, especially if we're pastors and leading in all kinds of stuff, "Boy, if I say this, "this might trip us up or might push me away," and having to watch that more than I've ever done before. How do you guys navigate into that zone in your communities, in the world, as we try and share Christ, and not let those barriers come up? - I said in the first service, as a chaplain at the mission I had an opportunity after the Derek Chauvin verdict, to bring the body of Christ together by way of students and staff, it would be a time of reflection, a time to repent if you needed to do that, had the wrong heart, and so me and another chaplain penned some words. I kind of vacillated back and forth, because as an African-American, I didn't wanna celebrate that, but at the same time, it felt like justice, but I needed to have a kingdom agenda. And, so I caught the Lord speaking to me and I penned the words, and when I got there, we had most of the staff and students, and one of my coworkers walked up and he said, "Before you talk, I just want you to know "that there are 600,000 law enforcement, "and their families are under duress "and being threatened, and this." And it was almost to say, "Man I want you "to strike a balance. "I don't want you to say anything or make this "a celebratory moment." And so, I assured him that the Lord had spoken to me about what I was gonna say, I penned it, I wanted to be really intentional. And so what I'm saying to you Roy, and I'm saying to Rockpoint is that I had a kingdom agenda. God spoke to me, so there were no winners in the verdict, right, George Floyd lost his life, his family lost a loved one, Derek Chauvin is sitting in the cell 23 hours a day, I've been to prison twice, I know what that feels like. And so, if you haven't been there yet, you can rah, rah, rah, but at the end of the day, as believers we are not to pick a side. We ought to have a kingdom agenda, and so as I spoke to the brothers and sisters there, I really reminded them that, you know what, we are to pick a side, we are the church, we are the body of Christ, and so if you here, you need to reflect upon that verdict, and what it means for you, you need to try to process that. If you are a brother or sister who had a wrong heart in that maybe you need to repent right now. Maybe you just need to sit and be present with the Lord, and allow him to speak into your heart, but saying the wrong thing in this climate, and like you say Roy, coming up here, I believe that if it's in your heart, right, to serve Jesus, and he's your primary focus, right, you have a kingdom agenda, then it's really hard to mess up, right? Because you're gonna say those things that please the Lord, your mind is gonna be set on the things that please the Lord. Out of the heart, the mouth speaks. And so, I wanted to assure them that that was so, and I've met with that individual four times, three times right now, meeting with them again on Wednesday, and so, that ignited a relationship. - That's awesome. - Absolutely. - That's cool. Yeah, God has always called his people to be about his business, so it could be an Old Testament prophet, it could be the early church that was persecuted, it could be the Christians that are persecuted now, I mean, more Christians are persecuted now than any other time in history, we just don't see it in this part of the world, and we don't see it on the news. So, and this is nothing new, God is in control, he is sovereign, and he has worked through his people in difficult, and weird, and hard circumstances. So, it could be the prophet Jeremiah who's by himself, he's called the weeping prophet, because everybody was speaking something different than him, and he had to be that voice of reason. It could be called the early church that's called to go out and to reach the very ends of the earth, not knowing when they're gonna come back together. One of the opportunities for us was we had a Korean Church, so these are people coming out of Burma, who spent at least two years, if not several years in a refugee camp in Thailand, and then in hopes to get to this country here. Now what's happened in the last year, to the people who are here, is they found out back in Burma, over 10,000 of their people are literally hiding in the jungle. They're cooking over open fires, they are having school in the jungle, the pastor from the Korean church who meets at our building, he came to our service about a month ago, and he's talking about his blood relatives who he has not heard of, or heard from, because they are in the jungle hiding. That's what they're living with right there. So, that's the world that's around us, and so, for that first century church, they didn't focus on Rome, they focused on the kingdom of God. 21st century America, let's not focus on the racial problem, let's transcend it because what a great opportunity to shine that light when it's that dark. So, man, it's not that hard to get together with Sammy and a police officer and let's go have lunch and let's talk. Or, yeah man, come and use our building, we'll figure this out later, I don't know how that works, but you guys need a place to worship, all right, cool. You don't speak the same language, we'll try to figure that out, I don't know, it's not my building, right? - That's a good question to ponder on, And I've been pondering on it kind of since the last year, and what I see is it starts with the church. Could I be honest with you all? The church is segregated. It is. We got black church here, white church here, Spanish church here, Mung church there, and we all know Jesus, but it's hard for us to get together and say what we feel about each other, because of the offense. How could I offend my brother? Only way I could offend you, if you don't know me. Let me say that again, it starts with the church, because, I'mma tell you something, pastor Chris could say anything to me. He can say, "Hey boy," and I don't be offended. Now I can say something to him, and he won't be offended. I believe in my heart, I could say what's on my mind to Roy, or Sammy, and not be offended, why? Because we have a relationship. They know my heart, right? And if I do offend them, they can say it back to me, without me getting offended, right? In this world, you can say, "Hey." "Don't you call me, 'Hey,' I ain't no horse." Come on, but see, it starts off with us, and when they see us coming together as a church, have a relationship and jiving and juking and junking, you understand that lingo, right? See, see? My . A lot of people know me, and I have to be myself, and I need you to be yourself, and you know what that do, that allows us to come closer, and allows the world to see what the body of Christ looks like. And that's attractive, 'cause the world don't look like us. So, when me, pastor Roy, we have to, it starts off with us, and that's why I'm here today. It starts off with us knowing each other. - Let's, how have, and I wanna deal with it this way, how have the racial tensions that we've all been aware of, it's kind of the issue, one of the issues, but it's the stuff that we've kinda already been talking about a little bit, but how has the racial tension surface needs, and the way I wanna frame this though, is opened opportunities for us to build bridges. I think that's the key, 'cause based on what we've all just said, it's that community, it's that relationship, how has that happen, even to have relationships with those who may not always say the right thing back, and what does that look like? And then, I guess the end goal here though, is to build a bridge in order to share the message of Christ, because it is about finding solutions in him, so share just a little bit, I know we've talked off, you know, about this in the past, so open up, let you guys share. - I'll piggyback off the story that I was just sharing with the individual who says, "Samuel, I want you to be kinda balanced in your approach," right before I spoke. And, you talk about bridge building, I've had lunch with that individual again three times, and planning to meet with him again. Now, this gentleman is an older guy, he is in law enforcement, or was, right, is a psychologist for law enforcement right now. I'm 51 years old, he came to the police force in Mahtomedi in 1972, I was two years old, right? And so, after we did that time of reflection, he says, "Sammy, one I wanna tell you, "I think you did a phenomenal job, and two, "I wanna let you know that the Lord gave me "a paradigm shift, there are some things that "as I reflected, I need to deal with," and thus, we began to sit down and have these lunches, and it's been really rich for me, right? And I told him, about two weeks ago, "Man I really appreciate you brother, and I really." He said, "You really like meeting with me, I said, "Man, I do," he said, "Why?" I said, "Because you, 100% unapologetically you. "You're authentic, it's real." He said, "Well man, I'm too old to be trying "to impress anybody right now I done did," right? And so, when we think about that Roy, what I would say in this climate is that, man, we gotta get uncomfortable, right? The church has lost ground with this pandemic, and the story can be, we come back man, and lick our wounds and try to figure out an approach, we need to hit the ground running. And so, if it's uncomfortable, if I don't know, I'll share in a minute the story of where pastor Chris put me in an uncomfortable position, but turned out to really be a blessing. I just think we need to step out of our comfort zones right now, we really need to engage people, right? It's not about me, as Terrell just pointed out, it's about trying to establish those relationships, and the Lord has been a bridge builder to share the gospel, this climate that we're in allows us to do that. - Yeah. - Amen. - Amen. - Don't forget to come back to that story. - I'm gonna come back to that story. - Okay. All right. - I make people uncomfortable that's my. - My job is to keep track of you guys. - Right. - So. - The story that I wanna share is, we do a crosswalk on Good Friday every year, or almost every year, we didn't do it last year, and this year we had a better turnout than we've had in the last, as long as I've been at east Emmanuel and the variety of brothers and sisters within the kingdom of God with different experiences and backgrounds, it was so cool to see so many different, and so we walked at both sides of the road in Good Friday. Obviously it's a somber day of reflection, you stop, and you read Bible verses, but we met as one big group at one of the corners, and as we were praying, and we were singing "Amazing Grace," this young girl walked past, and she didn't even break stride, but she said it loud enough to, she said, "I just got out of jail, pray for me," and she kept walking. And fortunately there was enough sensitive young ladies in that ministry who heard her, who caught up with her, surrounded her very lovingly, but they said, "I've been exactly where you are. Here's my number. "Take out your phone, punch in my digits, here, "I want you to know we're right up the street." And was able to relate to them in a way that we can't. And so, when I can't relate to somebody guess who I call? Guess who they call, right? Guess how I made him uncomfortable, man, I took him to a lunch with a white police officer from the East Side. And now that, I'll let you share that story later, but that's just how it is, because why, this is my brother. This is my brother. That's it. - Amen. What I do and what I've always done, Roy, even from my past life, I brought it into my new life. You know, most of you know that I was a gang leader in Chicago, which I leave that back there, so I knew how to relate to people, I knew how to watch the body language, I kinda listed to them, and kinda seen how could I get in? And it may have started off with, "Hey, how you doing?" You ain't even gotta say anything to me, but if I keep on getting on your nerves every time I see you, paying attention. I just want that to resonate for a minute. Paying attention to you, more than likely, you're gonna either get tired of me or fall into me, right? Fall into Christ. So now what I do, I watch, I got a friendship with. My best friend is a retired FBI agent. You gotta know me in order to see, like, "Wow, what?" Matter of fact, he'll be here in the next service, right? So, he's just watching people, paying attention to them, and understanding them, and now with his new thing going on, me and my wife just went through an incident, what was that, Wednesday? We was going to get our kids from the youth group, and we were stopped and my wife was driving, and she kind of blocked the intersection of a turn, and a white guy came, and he went around her, and he said "Get the F out the way you f'ing nigger." I had to stay that pastor, so they could get it. Do you hear me? Now, the old me, I probably would've chased his car, even though I couldn't catch it, but I had to make sure my wife was okay, 'cause believe it or not, I haven't been encountered with racism like that. I haven't, you know, my mind story tell that, but my wife was kinda upset, and I wanted her to get mad, but you know what God told me? "What is he going through?" He may be going through something more important than me, and you know what we did, later on. Later on, not right then. We prayed for him, and I wanna, hopefully I'll see him again and just stay hi. So, I think it's taking time out. I gotta go back, especially with the church, we need to get to know each other, so it will be no offenses. - What a story, and I think it just transitions into how, and you know, God has just done the work in all of our lives, and that's just an obvious, if we had time this morning for Terrell and, you know, all of us and Sammy too to unpack their story, you'd see the incredible power of what Jesus Christ has done in their heart and life, and how he's changed them, 'cause that's Jesus. And, you're gonna have a story now that we all keep wanting to bring up, so, you know, but it's when there's context, how can we be the church? Not just your church and my church, but the church, and begin that partnership stuff, 'cause that's really where we wanna go. - So, I will start by saying I was in pastor Chris's church for eight years, he was my pastor, I was on the elder board, I recently transitioned out. I met with pastor Chris, there was some discussion, there was no hostility, there was no issues, and so I needed to address the body, right? I needed to be accountable to the church, I have a high view of the church. And so you ask, how can we be the church, and not just our little microorganism that we know, come in and get our coffee, run back out the door, it's bigger than that, right, and so when he called me and said, "Hey, pastor Roy wants to talk to Rockpoint, "it's an opportunity to share," I'm there for him. And so, I gotta stop thinking about the four walls of a little building that I'm in and kinda expand, right, my horizon, when I think about the church. I trust this brother, and the story that they're getting at is pastor Chris called me and was like, "Hey Sammy," right after the George Floyd incident, "I wanna sit down and introduce you "to a St. Paul police officer, his name is Josh, "and we're gonna do lunch." And I'm thinking "Man, I don't wanna meet this guy," right? Not because I hate the police, but I was thinking he gonna show up with a uniform on, his gun gonna be hanging, and he gonna think he know everything, and this is just gonna be, you know, I don't wanna do it. And so, because I respect him, because I love my brother in Christ and I trust him, I showed up. And I show up and we, it was awkward for about three minutes and I'm sitting across the table and I'm looking at him, and we begin to talk, and man, after a few minutes I really realized genuinely I like this guy, because he was real. He was sharing some of his struggles with being in law enforcement, and some of the anger issues, and talking about his family, and I remember at one point in the conversation, pastor Chris asked me, "What do you think some of your buddies "that used to gang bang would say if they rolled past "and saw you sitting out here with a police officer "right now?" Really don't matter man, 'cause I'm in Christ right now, I love Jesus, right? I ain't got none, I not even trying to impress them. So, I liked this guy, and so we walked away and I said, "Man, I want to meet up with him," and unfortunately we haven't done that, but I was at Cups about a month ago, and I'm sitting in my truck and waiting on my wife to come out of the door, and I look over, and I see a couple of police officers, they got a guy, and they dealing with him, and I'm thinking, ain't none of my business, so I'm just gonna get my wife when she come out the door, and I pull up to get her, and I looked at my rear view and he comes to the police running up behind my truck. And I'm like, "Okay, let me get my hands on the wheel man, "find out what this is all about," right? Man, I ain't did anything, right? And lo and behold, when I look out it's Josh, it's the police officer that he connected me with. And so, that's the church, this is my brother in Christ, I jumped out, gave him a big hug, was glad to see him, and so what I'm getting at in this story is, in order to be the church, we gotta get out of our comfort zones, we gotta stop looking at these four walls and thinking this is my little silo right here, and I need to broaden my horizon, because the church is big. I'm your brother, some of you I've never seen in my life, but I am your brother, you are my brother, you are my sisters, amen? - Amen. - Amen. - Yeah, in the city, you you just see a lot more, just, you see the diversity, and so there are opportunities for that to happen, and I think the last year and a half has made opportunities within the city for the church to come together, whatever it is, so if it's a another ethnic group that doesn't have a church building, letting them meet in the place. There's another ministry on the east side, to the homeless community and to addicts, they have a whole, just a whole avenue that we don't have, and they use our buildings just for like an hour, you know, and that's the kind of thing we do, and then we go and we would get together as a group of pastors at an east side pizza place. And, the conversations that have happened there and the people that we've prayed for there, and you get all types, you get white, black, Hispanic, male, female, charismatic, Pentecostal, we got a couple of Catholics, I mean, just who showed up because the true brothers and sisters get together, and when you do that, you feel it, you understand that, and now you understand, "Man, we wanna be about the kingdom, "because I need Jesus, you need Jesus, "the world needs Jesus, Stillwater needs Jesus, "Saint Paul needs Jesus, Minneapolis needs Jesus." - Well, you know, you done some good questions too Roy. You know where me, and I'mma just use the present, when pastor Chris had asked me, far as me and Sammy come in to support Roy and Rockpoint, I've been going through a rough situation with cancer. You know, I'm not looking for any pats on the back, or Oh. God got me, but it's just been rough, you know, stage four, no cure, and now I'm going back through chemo right now. I'm doing chemo right now, I just took off because my blood count, I'm getting there somewhere too pastor, my blood counts are low. So my wife is, this is my go-to right here, right? She had to stop me from doing a lot of things I desire to do, meaning ministry, but I talked to her about this one. You know, she said, "Well, as long as you don't do nothing "before we go," because of my energy. This is important to me. This is really important to me. Let me tell you why, the church as a body, not Beacon of Hope, not East Immanuel, not Rockpoint, but Jesus Christ's church is important. We got to get it right church. We do. Do you know who we represent? We represent the one and only true God, so would I let cancer stop this opportunity? Absolutely not. I couldn't. And I thank God for my wife allowing me, 'cause I missed a lot of my brothers and sisters that I know, and though they don't know of me. I need this, I wanna get to know you, so you could get to know me, so you can start relating to people that look like me. And I can start relating more to people that act like you. Right? That ain't bad, that ain't bad . That ain't bad, right? The reason I say that is, I know a lot of white people, I know I , and I just use that 'cause people know me as blacks right? So, but we don't all act the same. I wanna know what it looks like if I do come into the person I came in contact with before with me and my wife, and what to say. So, this is, I need to be here, and it ain't gonna stop, I need to be here, not, you need to be in north Minneapolis. I'm done. - No you're not, 'cause I got more questions. So, I think that really points out and you know, In Terrell, it's just a great illustration. There's a cost to doing this, and it's a personal cost. There's a setting aside of self and agendas, and evaluating where we are and really saying, "Lord, I'm yours, I surrender to yours, "how do I enter into this, "and how do I begin to build these relationships?" Stick to the truth of the gospel, I think you've heard that periodically throughout our time, it's about the gospel, it's about what Christ can do and we all need to surrender, and then we learn from him what he wants to do, and where he's already at work. Now, we all serve and work in different ways, and we can partner with one another, we can get to that, The Church, 'cause the church is designed by God not to have walls that divide us, but unite us. But we still all serve in our individual cities and communities, and we wanna reach our community, and our church in many ways will reflect the needs that are there, but you have a lot to teach us, so that's where I wanna spend just the moments that we now don't have left, but, and share with us, just as, you know, as brief as you can, but also hear from you how do we reach the people right here, because that's what we wanna do, we're ministry, we have a mission field right here in our sphere of influence, how can you encourage us to do that? - Right, so I'm a storyteller, right? And when I think of this, and I know that when you start talking about reaching people in this community, and calling people to look for needs in evangelism, that that kind of strikes a little bit of fear maybe. And I get it, right, because about 20 years ago when I got saved, about six months into my walk with the Lord, I got a phone call from the pastor saying, "Sammy, we're about to launch an evangelism outreach plan "in the Midway Frogtown area, and we have prayed, "and you're supposed to lead a small group of people "to do street evangelism from five o'clock "on Friday evenings to nine o'clock at night." I'm like, "Okay pastor, I'mma pray about that," no. And so, as briefly as I could share this, right? When I hung up the phone, the answer was no, I was gonna call the pastor back, "Man, I'm not going out "to the streets, I've been in gangs, people know me, "I done sold drugs, I can't, no, no, no, no, no, "I'll stay in the church, right?" And so the Lord says, "Sammy, I've saved you. "I've taken your life from the pit, two stints in prison, "eight years of doing heroin, six kids "five different women, your life was a hot mess, "heroin addict for about. "Why wouldn't you wanna go and tell somebody "what I've done for you? "Why wouldn't you wanna go and share the hope of glory "with somebody, have I not saved you?" Oh man, are you serious? That's you Lord. - Yes. - So I go out to the block and I'm sharing, and I'm not really sharing, I'm scared, and I have this brochure, and each week I'm leading these people and they following me, and they ain't going any further than I'm going in, and then finally I look at the flyer, and it says, "Come join the Lord "in what he is already doing," not even a Bible verse. It changed my life because what the Lord was saying to me is "Sammy, I've already done some work over here, "I've already tilled the ground, I've already set the stage, "people are already receptive, all you need to do "is go and open your mouth." All you gotta do is go and see the needs. And so I said, "If this is true then it shouldn't be hard." So I go and I started to talk with people, they get saved, they come into church, I'm writing down names and conversations, so when I see them again, and this thing just blew up. It's like, man, I would woke up and it'd be 15 guys smoking marijuana, hanging on cars, and I walk up with my Bible, "Hey brother I need to talk to you," "Man, who are you," the music go down, and the next thing you know I'm sharing Jesus with all of them. I don't say that because I'm that bold, but the Holy Spirit emboldened me to do it, and showed me how natural this thing could be. And so, I don't shrink back to their church, you got needs out here and Lake Elmo, Stillwater, Mahtomedi, you have needs, and all you have to do is look, you have people who are receptive all you need to do is open your mouth, my daughter's playing ultimate Frisbee, I'm coming in contact with families who don't know the Lord, I'm sitting and they using all kinda language when they playing Frisbee, and I'm saying, "Man, I need to get away from them, "'cause I work at the mission, I minister everyday, all day, "this is my day off," and the Lord is saying, "No, you don't move your chair, you stay right there, "next week you go right back," because at some point I'm gonna be able to saturate them with the word of God, not in a weird way, right? Not with beating them down with the gospel, but through a relationship, through just hanging in there, and so you have the same things that you can do, amen? - [Group] Amen. - Anything briefly you guys can add to that, or is that kinda the grand slam? - That's good, I don't wanna follow that, but. I mean, there are some tangible things, if people wanna come down and do this, inner city ministry is different, we can't charge for different events, like when we do Vacation Bible School, we can't charge for that, so that's a cost that the church will eat. For hot dog outreaches, we have a lot of food traffic, so you just come and set up, we have a table there, you just come down and serve a hot dog. Some of it will be awkward, some will be confusing, but you just sit there and you hand out stuff, we're gonna have plenty of other believers there with you to do that kind of thing, you can come down and do that with us, but I shared this in the earlier service, I wanna share it again, we had a 30 day prayer and fasting where people signed up for one of those days, and they would pray and fast for that day, and one of the people in our congregation shared that on her day of prayer and fasting, she's a believer and she works in education, and she'd looked for opportunities for years to try to share with two of her coworkers about her faith, she was looking for this big opportunity to evangelize, and take them through the Roman Road and these five points, and all that, but got to this day of prayer and fasting, and she went to these two ladies separately and said, "You know, our church is doing this, today is my day "of prayer and fasting, how can I pray for you today? "How can I care for you?" And these two women just shared in a very intimate and very sensitive way. So, that's not something that you have to come down to the city to do, we do this everywhere, but we are stuck in this world now with COVID, and now we're all stuck in like this, and we go, we drive to this spot and then I drive back and then I'm, this is my world. But if I look up and I see taste and see what the Lord has done, and look at what he's called us to do, so. - Well, I'm gonna make it quick, Roy, 'cause you and my wife say, "Be short," so I'mma be short. I think it starts with the church, iron sharpens iron. We really got to know each other other than Saturdays and Wednesdays. We really do, and then just like in the old time, we go out, you're more comfortable with going out with somebody that could encourage and you just spend time together already. I'm talking about go out right in your areas, and then get build up to go elsewhere. Meaning, get with somebody you like that's different, in a different area and learn them, you'll learn the area, but right now, we gotta come together as a church. We got to really get to know each other, that's it. That's it. - Well, I'm gonna pray for us, and then you're gonna watch one of the songs that we've been singing over the past couple of weeks on the screen, and I want you to pray about what God is speaking into your heart and life, and then I'll come back up and send us into our world, but let me pray for these guys. Father we thank you for the time you've given to us today, to unpack just briefly what you're doing. Father, we pray for Terrell and his ministry, and God if it would be your will, that you would heal him, but Lord, we submit to your plan and your purpose in his life, we know you're using him in so many different ways. Lord, you're growing your kingdom, you're growing your church, he's being the gospel in word indeed, so we bless, we ask for your blessing to be on his heart and life. And father for Chris and his ministry and what he's been doing as a labor of love and serving you in so many ways, and Lord as we continue to hear of stories, bless him, his family, and for Sammy guide him in his new role with Union Gospel Mission, may he really continue to pull that nonprofit back to the truth of the gospel, and focus on the hope? May you bless all of us as we seek to live out this incredible thing called the church in what an opportunistic world right now. It is an opportunity before us Lord, that we've never seen before, and so we wanna follow your lead, and now Lord, as we listen to these words, speak your truth in our hearts, it's in Christ's name, amen.