What should be our first work in serving the Lord? How can we ensure our love for God is growing and thriving while sharing His love with others? If you have lost your first love while doing ministry or want to keep that love for God growing while working for Him, this seminar is for you.

ASI 2021: Into All the World

<p>What should be our first work in serving the Lord? How can we ensure our love for God is growing and thriving while sharing His love with others? If you have lost your first love while doing ministry or want to keep that love for God growing while working for Him, this seminar is for you.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Relating to God While Sharing the 3 Angels' Messages

Jill Morikone

Be Faithful

We'll start with prayer in just a moment.

I love the theme of sharing Christ in the marketplace.

And no matter who you are, no matter where you come from, no matter what you do, God calls us to ministry.

God calls us to serve him with other people.

This particular seminar, Be Faithful, they have 3 different tracks for ASI.

1 track is how we serve God, our relationship with God in light of the 3 Angels' messages.

Another track is how we relate to other people, our brothers and sisters, in light of the 3 Angels' messages.

Then another track is how we relate to government and authorities in light of the 3 Angels' messages.

But this particular track is about how we relate to God in light of the 3 Angels' Messages.

I want to tell you up front, we're not going to talk about a list of rules and regulations.

We're not going to talk about a list of do's and don'ts.

We're not going to talk about a list of haves and have nots or a list of requirements.

If you watch 3ABN at all and you watch Sabbath School panel, you know that I like lists.

And we're going to separate this session into 2 sections.

Who is the essence of our character, our calling, our commitment in Christ?

And how are we to be faithful practically?

We're gonna look at it and explore it through the life of Joseph.

And 3 keys or 3 principles that I see in the life of Joseph as he chose to be faithful.

Key number 1, your past does not define your present.

Faithfulness is not decided or dependent on our past.

Key number 2, Your present depends on His presence.

Faithfulness is dependent on whose we are or who we belong to.

In other words, faithfulness is dependent on our identity in Christ.

Faithfulness is determined by the choices that you and I make today.

Our opening scripture is Psalm 12 verse 1.

If you have your Bibles, you can turn there or you can jot down the reference.

It's a prayer of David and he says, help Lord.

He cries out with a, he starts with a cry for help.

Help Lord, for the godly man ceases, for the faithful disappear from among the sons of men.

Holy Father, we come before you in the name of Jesus.

We are grateful that you are our faithful God.

And right now, I ask that you would hide me, that your spirit would speak to us by the power of your word, and that our lives would be changed by the indwelling spirit and we thank you in Jesus name.

A man by the name of John Getty decided to go as a missionary to the South Sea Islands.

He lived in Canada with his wife and his 2 children and they sailed over 20, 000 miles from Canada all the way to the South Sea Islands.

Now the particular island that they went to was a cannibalistic island.

And in fact, just a couple months before they got there, there was a British ship that had sailed and 20 of the crew members had been eaten, killed and eaten by the cannibals.

This was the island to which Pastor John believed he was called to go and minister.

And he decided to be faithful to that call, to answer that call.

When he got there, he discovered they had no written language, and they were heathen.

And he won his first convert and his second.

And soon an entire church was planted and then 2 churches and then 5 and then 10.

And when he left this island, there were 25 churches that had been planted because of the faithfulness of 1 man who chose to follow God, 1 man who chose to leave behind creature comforts and the things that we would want in life and society, 1 man who chose to spend his life away from family, away from comfort, to be faithful to the call of God on his life.

When he left, there were the 25 churches.

He had also translated the Word of God, the entire Bible, into their native language.

And in 1 of the churches there was a plaque posted there and it said, when he landed in 1848, there were no Christians.

When he left in 1872, there were no heathen.

You know, when you look at the Word of God, and then we'll jump into the first part of our message, when you look at the Word of God, I'm always amazed as I see the faithfulness of Bible characters and the unfaithfulness of Bible characters.

You know, you don't have to look far to discover the first unfaithfulness with Adam and Eve, right?

They disobeyed And they ate of the forbidden fruit, plunging our entire world into chaos and ruin.

You come down a little ways and we come to Abraham, father of the faithful.

And he tried to pass his wife, Sarai, off as his sister.

I always thought, what if I were married to him?

And he thought, well, my life's pretty important to me.

And so I'll just say she's my sister because I care about my life.

Jacob, we come down a few more generations, he failed to wait on God for the birthright, which was naturally his.

And he took matters into his own hands, causing him to flee from his mother and father's house, and causing his brother to seek his life.

I think of David who lusted and acted on that and then had Bathsheba's husband killed because of his unfaithfulness to God.

He didn't fall too far from his father's tree, did he not?

I think of Solomon, another son of David, who allowed his wives, 700 of them, to turn his heart from God and to turn his faithful allegiance from God.

But on the flip side, I think of Noah who built a boat when it had never rained and he continued to build even though he was ridiculed and he was criticized.

I think of Abraham who left his home and he followed God and he didn't even know where he was going and yet he went out faithfully on the call of God.

I think of Joseph, we'll look at him a little later, how he resisted temptation and chose to trust God, even when he's falsely accused, even when he spent 3 years in prison for a crime he did not commit.

He left Egypt and sided with the people of God when it ended his career, and it could have caused his life.

And yet, he followed God even when It appeared for those 40 years that they were wandering in circles in the desert.

I think of Joshua who claimed that God could win the heathen lands for them when it looked like everything would be defeated.

I think of Elijah who trusted God all alone on the mountaintop, when everyone else was bowing down and worshipping Baal.

I think of Daniel who served God regardless of any threat, any coercion, any temptation that came his way.

I think of Paul, he served God in spite of shipwreck, in spite of stoning, in spite of beatings and imprisonment and ridicule and torture and even death.

I think of Timothy, who faithfully served God, what?

Have you ever told yourself that you're doing okay when you know you're not?

Have you ever tried to be in control when you felt like your life was falling apart?

Have you ever thought 1 thing inside while acting something entirely different on the outside?

You know, Jesus addressed the scribes and Pharisees.

Don MacLafferty

Wake Up!

So you know, it's an awesome thing to be alive now.

We could have been alive in any other era, and for some remarkable reason, Jesus Christ has handpicked you and me and every 1 of us here to live now for a holy purpose.

We like to think, tell me if you agree with this, we like to think it's because of what we can do for him.

But first of all, it's what he wants to do in us in this time.

He chose us to live now because of what he wants to do here first, and then secondly, he chose us to live now because he wants to send us out on something remarkable.

And I could hear her silently saying, uh-oh, because, So don't all look at her.

You just kind of just know that she's here.

She's my much better half, but she doesn't want me to give her too much attention in front of you.

It's very, very good for my soul to have her here.

In my travels where God sends me, many times she cannot come.

I go in very remote places and all kinds of places around the world, and so it's very special to be together as a team here with my prayer partner.

So some of you I know already, Some of you I don't.

That's my highest identity, is I'm a disciple of Jesus.

I don't know what your highest identity is, but I want you to think about what your highest identity is.

And secondly, I'm a husband to this precious woman right here, named April.

I'm a daddy to 3 children, and I am a pastor who has for 25 years been a paid pastor.

And then about 4 years ago, God called me to be, and my wife and I, to be full-time volunteer missionaries with a non-profit that we have been doing with the General Conference, with the North American Division and other divisions, every division of the World Church we've worked with and we have the joy of going wherever God calls, and we have joy in writing discipling books and giving them away as fast as God can grow our faith to give them away.

And to speak and to teach how to disciple the new generations for Jesus as fast as we can go, and praying that God will go ahead of us.

We do have a booth at 15, and we have nothing to sell you, and we have precious things to give you.

And it's just books to help you call for revival, and most of all, to make disciples and disciple-makers of the new generations.

We're living in a time where I can't speak for you, but I need Jesus to wake me up every single day and every single moment for the time I'm living in.

My danger is because I've been so, so blessed as a little kid to grow up in a beautiful Seventh-day Adventist home.

I don't know about your home, but not a perfect home.

But I grew up in a home that absolutely loves Jesus.

I was taught the love of my Heavenly Father, the love of Christ for me, and also, I'm gonna say this, watch the difference here, and also was taught growing up, not just my parents, but in that era, to believe in the Holy Spirit.

That's a whole other topic, but I now believe, not only believe in him, but I also believe that we can have such a precious relationship with the Holy Spirit just as much as God the Father and God the Son.

So that's just a quick testimony there for me.

My danger is that I can take all the above for granted because I have grown up in this amazing end time truth and I can take Jesus for granted.

I'm just being real here because we're not here to impress each other, right?

Aren't we just brothers and sisters in Christ?

So I'm not here to impress you, you're not here to impress me, but we are here to learn together and stretch together and grow together.

Because we've been trusted with so much as an end-time people, we can just kind of get casual about us in Christ.

But Christ is not just something good, or somebody good.

And he wants to be even more tomorrow than he is today in your life and my life.

But the danger is the more that we go to church and the more that we celebrate Sabbath and the more that we teach and preach in his name, Whether you are a pastor or a missionary or a business person or whatever you are, we can get casual about the most simple and precious things of Christ.

Some years ago, I'll move this here so if anybody needs to come up here on The first row, my wife's a teacher and they tell me that the first row you're supposed to get better grades.

And my friends from Ethiopia on the front row over here.

When I welcome somebody to the front row, then I forget.

But anyway, where I'm going with this is this.

Some years ago, I was in Jakarta, Indonesia.

And it was early 1 morning, it was about 8, 9 years ago, and I was there to speak for a children's ministry convention for several divisions of our world church, and I was just 1 of the speakers, and I was excited, and I had felt, I was just being impressed 8 or so years ago that I was quite ignorant about the Holy Spirit.

Have you ever been impressed that you're ignorant about the Holy Spirit?

Like really, I realized, like I really, really woke up to the fact that I had been so blessed to be raised with knowing so much, as we can as a human, about our Heavenly Father, and of course, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and definitely was raised to believe in the Holy Spirit, but I realized that I needed to know so much more about the Holy Spirit, and so I started, just started really praying for the Holy Spirit in a marked way, maybe 8 or 9 years ago, something like that.

And it was in that context that, on the top of a roof in Jakarta, early 1 morning, I had asked people from other countries to meet me up on the roof and to pray for the Holy Spirit.

Because it wasn't just a concept to pray for, I was realizing this is somebody who really wants to move in my life and change this guy and send me.

And so I was really under conviction, big time.

Now in that setting, you can imagine if you've been to, have any of you been to Indonesia?

So it's a fascinating place and you can hear the call of the imam, you know, as it floated out from, you know, across the city, you know, from the Muslims calling to prayer.

And in that setting, here I am calling for us to pray to our Heavenly Father for the gift of the Holy Spirit.

I had done a short devotional and the team from Communist China was to my left.

I had people from free countries around me And I was born and raised in Hawaii, and so as an American, you know, I have known lots of freedom.

I am so thankful for freedom, and I take it for granted, too, both.

And I know that those days are coming to a close rapidly, I believe, according to prophecy.

And so I invite everybody after a short devotional.

I said, let's pray for this incredible gift of the Holy Spirit.

And so I bowed my head and I began praying what I would say is a nice prayer.

You know, those of us who have been born and raised in free parts of the world, we tend to pray very nice prayers.

And I'm not making fun of myself or you, but look, it's not the way a lot of the world prays.

It's not the same way as a lot of the world prays.

A lot of the world prays desperate prayers And we pray, we pray very nice prayers.

And so I was praying my nice prayer, and it was sincere, okay, because that's what I know.

So I was praying my nice, sincere prayer, and then I heard something, and I thought, what's going on?

And I opened my eyes and I looked over here and here's this little lady from China and she has her little arms up like this and she's reaching up to the heavens and she's weeping before God.

Oh, maybe she just got news back home in China that some terrible thing happened to her family or something.

I was trying to imagine what it could be.

David Machado

Rekindle Your First Love

Thank you so much for coming to this seminar this morning on how to rekindle your first love with Jesus My name is David Machado.

I currently Am the speaker and director for the our ministry is called revelation of ministries Number of years ago in 2017.

You may have heard last night I was doing an evangelistic series at Kenneth Cox's church that he was a part of and he helped us establish the Revelation of Love Ministries.

Here's another picture of her because I got to talk a little bit about her.

She is Romanian so I call her my Romanian Rose.

We're about to celebrate 6 years of marriage this year.

And this is our newest member of our family Right there.

So he is adorable but he is extremely loud at night especially.

No, but he is just a joy and we've been learning so much and just having such a wonderful time learning how to be parents.

So, you didn't come here to hear all about me, you came here to hear about Jesus, and so I just want to thank you so much for coming here.

I put it all on PowerPoint or Keynote so that we could follow along together.

We have a lot to cover, so I figured that we would be able to do that satisfactorily through the keynote presentation.

Before we get started on how to rekindle your first love with Jesus Christ, I want to invite you to please bow your heads, but before you do that, sorry about that, I'm gonna have time for question and answers, at least I'm gonna try.

Now there's lots of stories and lots of experiences.

I've done 10 years of literature work, knocking on doors, canvassing.

I've done about 10 or more years of Bible working, and I've been an evangelist for a lot of years too.

And so lots of stories I would like to share with you, but I'm going to be looking at my time.

I definitely would like for us to have time to have questions and answers in respect to this topic or anything you may have.

But before we get started with today's presentation on rekindling your first love, I would like to invite you to please bow your heads.

I hear that there's a lot of fires out in Southern California.

That's where, or Northern California, that's where, I'm from Southern California, so I'm quite used to the dangers of the fires, but I think we should say a special prayer for those out there.

All right, let's bow our heads for a word of prayer.

Our Father which are in heaven, I want to thank you so much for the sweet privilege to be able to share your word.

Father, we've come here whether we need a revival experience in our own life Or we're seeking to keep that love burning Stronger and stronger for you and with you Whatever the reason is that we're here father.

I pray that you would teach us and that you would grow us closer to you and Father I want to pray in a very special way for the fires that are taking place in California.

I just pray that you would please keep those structures safe, people safe.

I know it's very close to Weimar and that area and I just pray Lord that you would please have mercy and And please help with this situation.

And Lord, we pray that you would please bring a fire in this place, that you would ignite a love for you that we've never had before, and that you would draw us closer in Jesus' name.

Alright, so we're going to cover 3 things in this presentation.

The first thing is our first, what is our first work in working for the Lord?

Many people think that if I just go into ministry, my love for God is just gonna grow incredibly.

But many people go into ministry for the wrong reasons And so what is our first work in working for the Lord?

That first point is what we're gonna talk about in the first portion of this presentation.

The second point we're gonna learn by God's grace is how can we make sure that our love for God is growing and thriving while sharing God with others?

And then the last point is how to rekindle your love for God.

If we don't even have it, how do we get it?

That's what we're gonna be talking about in this presentation today.

My mother's Puerto Rican and my father's Mexican and so anytime it's quiet, someone's getting in trouble.

And so I like interaction and so let's do this together.

Alright, so the first question I have for you all this morning is this 1.

Is there anyone in the Bible that lost their first love while doing the work for the Lord?

Is there anyone in the Bible who was serving the Lord but lost that first love experience with Jesus?

Ah, very good, yes, in Revelation chapter 2, excellent, that's right.

But there's someone else I believe, yes sir?

Oh, sorry about that, she said the people in the church of Ephesus, Revelation chapter 2, which was right on.

We'll get there and a little bit later in the presentation.

Is there anyone else who lost their first love experience while serving the Lord?

Oh King Saul, that's an excellent 1, that's for sure.

I'm going to tell you what my thought is.

And you're probably going to get it right away.

I think I would like to submit to you that Jonah had lost...

Alright, yeah, you guys are getting a little nervous.

Series

Relating to God While Sharing the 3 Angels' Messages

Rekindle Your First Love

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Financing Yourself

Financing Yourself- Part 3

1h 11m

Ministerial

Starting Bible Studies, Building Friendships and Gaining Decisions

1h 10m

Spark Training: Public Evangelism

Spark Training: Public Evangelism- Part 3

1h 18m

A Heart Reaching For Hearts

1h 17m

ASI 2010 Seminar: Evangelism

Truth Be Told

1h 20m

Sharing the Three Angels’ Messages in 30 Seconds

01 Sharing the Three Angels’ Messages in 30 Seconds

1h 4m

Presenting Persuasive Appeals During Keys to Revelation

04 Persuasive Questions that Appeal to the Heart

1h 1m

Plenary Sessions

Sabbath School

1h 34m

Seminar: Management

Develop an Effective Marketing Strategy

58m

ASI 2012 Seminar: Evangelism

Bible Studies Made Easy

1h 22m

OYC 2012 Seminars

In a Godless World: The Worldview of Atheism

1h

Grow Your Church- Part 1

2h 21m

Sound Doctrine