October, 12 2025, Message by P. Kevin Clancey

Transcribed by Beluga AI.

Again. Anybody? Bueller? Anybody?

How does it feel to have your sin atoned for? Yeah. How’s it feel to have your sin being eradicated and defeated? Sin, Satan, and death have been defeated, and so you are people of great victory. You are people of great victory.

In this world, you will have troubles. I wish I could say otherwise. I wish I could say, “Come to Jesus and everything will be both hunky and dory.” But no, not the case. In this world, you have troubles. But take heart, dear ones. That’s why you’re here tonight, to encourage one another. We want to encourage one another to take heart, for He has overcome the world. Christ is the victor.

I’ve told this story before, so this is all rambling before the sermon, so… blessed are you. You’re getting freebies tonight. All right, here you go. Corrie ten Boom, who wrote The Hiding Place. And, you know, you talk about suffering in this world, being shipped off to a Nazi prison camp. And her father was a godly man, and they were doing a Bible study through the Book of Revelation at the time that the Nazis arrested her family. Her and her sister were being taken to one concentration camp where her sister would die and she would live. Her father was being taken to another where he would die. And these two girls would never see their beloved father again. This was the last time they saw him.

And they’re being taken off in this most horrible of all situations. The girls are crying, and their father is being separated from them. He’s an older man, and he doesn’t move fast enough for the Nazis. One of the thugs takes the butt of his rifle and hits this older man in the back to make him move faster. Their father crumples to the ground, and the girls scream, aghast. He gets up, and this is so powerful. Talk about a legacy as a dad. He’s reading through the book of Revelation, so this is fresh on their hearts. He turns to his daughters, and the last word on this planet, this man speaks to his daughters before he goes off to die in a camp, as he looks at his daughters and he smiles and he says, “Christ is the victor.” Christ is the victor.

So that’s why we sing these songs, people. That’s why we sing these songs. We need reminders in this broken world that Christ is the victor. All right? We need reminders in the midst of our pain or in the midst of other people’s pain that Christ is the victor.

We’re looking at the Book of Isaiah, and actually the second half of Isaiah, chapters 40 through 66, sometimes called the fifth gospel. Isaiah turns at the end of chapter 39, and all of a sudden Isaiah becomes a prophet.

Most of the prophets are prophets of doom and gloom. And at the very end of their prophetic utterances, they give some kind of messianic hope, some kind of hope that “well, you know, it’s going to be really bad for a while, but better days are coming.” Isaiah spends more time on the “better days are coming” than any other prophet. And he talks about the servant of the Lord. And he talks about it in Isaiah 42, which we looked at a couple weeks ago, and Isaiah 49, and Isaiah 50, and Isaiah 52 and 53. He talks about this servant of the Lord who ultimately gets identified as the Messiah.

Israel, certainly in the Old Testament, is a servant of the Lord. Israel is a limping servant of the Lord. It’s not an irony that Jacob, Israel, had a limp, because as we read through the Old Testament, Israel had a limp. Israel had a limp. And they were often a hard-hearted and rebellious people.

And there was always the minority, almost always it was the minority of Israel, who really sought after Yahweh. The majority, you know, would give lip service to Yahweh and then go off and worship the Baals and the Asherahs, etc.

And so Israel walks with a limp and they’re a less than perfect servant of God. And then there appears on the scene the perfect Israel in one man, Jesus Christ. He is fully God, fully man. He is the perfect Israel. And therefore in Him He fulfills the law. He fulfills everything that Israel is meant to be. He fulfills the promise that God gave to Abraham at the very beginning, that “through you all the nations of the earth will be blessed.” Through Jesus, all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

18 Abraham is to become a great and powerful nation, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed through him. (Genesis 18:18, CSB)

And then so it’s kind of like this wide opening—Israel, but that gets narrowed down to the prophets, the remnant, the faithful, and then it gets narrowed down to this point, and this point is Jesus.

But then from Jesus, now it launches out again into this broad spectrum, and then that is the Church. The Church then becomes the bearers, the carriers, as Israel is the carriers of the old covenant and the promise to come. The Church now becomes the carriers of the New Covenant and the promise fulfilled. And then we become the servant of the Lord.

And so these servant passages, they speak very specifically, to my mind, of Jesus. But then there is application for us today as we model Jesus in the world. And so we’re talking about revival. And we’re talking about revival revealed in the Old Testament. And so I want to talk about the crazy way that revival happens. The crazy, and the kind of the craziness, the anti-“the way the world sees things”. God doesn’t work things that way.

And we see it in Jesus. In Isaiah 49:1-7, the hidden Messiah. I’m going to read the first seven verses.

1 Coasts and islands, listen to me; distant peoples, pay attention. The Lord called me before I was born. He named me while I was in my mother’s womb. 2 He made my words like a sharp sword; he hid me in the shadow of his hand. He made me like a sharpened arrow; he hid me in his quiver. 3 He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.” 4 But I myself said: I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and futility; yet my vindication is with the Lord, and my reward is with my God. 5 And now, says the Lord, who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him so that Israel might be gathered to him; for I am honored in the sight of the Lord, and my God is my strength— 6 he says, “It is not enough for you to be my servant raising up the tribes of Jacob and restoring the protected ones of Israel. I will also make you a light for the nations, to be my salvation to the ends of the earth.” 7 This is what the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel, his Holy One, says to one who is despised, to one abhorred by people, to a servant of rulers: “Kings will see, princes will stand up, and they will all bow down because of the Lord, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel —and he has chosen you.” (Isaiah 49:1-7, CSB)

God, may the words of my mouth, the meditation of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight. Lord, you are our Rock, our Strength, and our Redeemer.

So six characteristics of the Messiah in Isaiah 49.

He is called and named from the womb. He is called and He’s named from the womb.

And the angel comes to Mary and says, “You will conceive by the Holy Spirit, and the one I bring will be the Savior of the world.” In her belly, in her womb, the light of the world, the incarnation came.

We often talk about the virgin birth. Actually, you know, if you like to be literal and accurate, it’s the virgin conception, all right? And so Mary conceives without knowing a man, and then God gives the name. You shall call his name, He tells Joseph, “You shall call his name Jesus.” He will be, and Jesus means God saves, He will be the Savior of the world.

From the womb He was called. From the womb He had a destiny. From the womb He had a purpose. And His words, Isaiah 49 says, will be piercing. They’ll be like a sword. They’ll be like an arrow. His words will carry power.

Words, words, words, and more words. We live in a culture of words, and yet there are very few—

You ever try to argue with somebody on social media? You can use all the best words. It doesn’t work. They use all their best words. We just throw words back and forth. But here are words spoken by a man and recorded by His disciples, so that 2,000 years later, in Poulsbo, Washington, a group of people gather and are shaped and are seeking to have their lives shaped by His word.

Thomas Holland wrote the book Dominion, and he’s a Greco-Roman scholar, and I think he’s still an atheist, though he may be a Christian by now. He’s definitely on that path. As a Greco-Roman scholar, he came to realize that Western civilization, which he also recognized for all its faults and foibles and cruelties and errors, is the greatest civilization ever known to human beings—the most just, the most equitable, the most fair, the most righteous, and not, you know, people argue, “Well, what about this? What about—” Yeah, I said all the foibles.

But match it up against anybody else. You don’t like Western civilization. All right, go back to ancient Rome. See how you like that.

Listen, you don’t like Western civilization because you don’t feel embraced and encouraged as a queer, as a homosexual, and you’re now a queer for Palestine? Yeah, try that in Palestine. See how that flies. You’re much better off here. Much better off here.

And Thomas Holland says that those values that have created this great civilization do not come from the Romans and the Greeks. He says, amazingly and almost inconceivably, they come from a crucified Jewish carpenter and a converted Jewish Pharisee. And those two men, this man and His most articulate disciple, have shaped the world we live in today.

His words are piercing. His words are piercing. And dear ones, my guess is they have pierced you. His words have pierced you. Right? You’ve gone to church and people like me have stood up in front of you and said, what? “Read your Bible. Read your Bible. It’s good to read your Bible.”

And so you’ve read your Bible, and you’ve read your Bible, and you’ve had a couple different experiences. One of the experiences you’ve had reading your Bible is, “I must not be a Christian. I don’t understand this.” No, you’re fine. It’s a hard book to understand in many parts, you know, and sometimes we preachers do people a disservice. Say “You read your Bible, and God will make everything clear to you.” Not always. There are some things really clear.

I love what Jack Deere says, talking about Bible translations. And, you know, I’m a nerd, so I get wrapped up in this, you know, different Bible translations and all this kind of thing. But I agree 100% with this. Somebody, you know, people will ask me, as a pastor, “Pastor, what’s the best Bible I can get?” And Jack Deere’s got a great answer to that. He says, “The one that tells you to love your enemy.” By the way, that’s the Bible Donald Trump should get. The one that tells you to love your enemy.

And so you’ve read the Bible, you’ve had three experiences, right? You’ve read the Bible, you didn’t understand it, but you’ve read the Bible for a long time, and what happens? It begins to shape your life and form your worldview. Like a river carving its way through a canyon, God begins to form you. And all of a sudden you begin to see the world differently. And you begin to go, “Yeah, that’s the way it should be. That’s nuts. And that’s the way…” And the rest of the world says, “No, this is the way to go.” And you go, “No, that’s nuts.” Why do you see it as nuts when you didn’t see it as nuts before? Because you’re having a new worldview shaped and formed inside of you. And worldview is important.

But then you’ve had a third experience. Most people have, most Christians I know have had a third experience. You’re reading the Bible, you’re getting your worldview shaped, you’re not understanding stuff, and all of a sudden, boom. These words, this black ink on white paper, lift off the page and, and like a branding iron, sear themselves on your heart and in your mind.

Sometimes you ask people, “What’s your life verse?” And they’ll say, “Oh, that one’s seared, that one’s tattooed, that one’s marked me.” I got more than one. I got a bunch of them. I’ve had this experience many times.

For me, surprisingly, it happens most in the Psalms. That doesn’t have to be-, not exclusively it happens, but it happens most in the Psalms. And you’ve heard me say that, you know, you’ve heard me quote several Psalms, but fairly regularly, Psalm 27:13. And of course, the one I quote probably the most—and I’ve told this story before, but as a young Methodist pastor on the staff, we would go in and pray every morning at 8:30 in the sanctuary as a staff. And one morning I was the first person there, which is quite rare for me on morning meetings, to be the first person there.

How many people here are morning people? Yeah, you’re weirdos.

All right, so, Karen, let’s stick together against the weirdos. Yeah, that’s fine. That’s fine. But you’re taking notes; you’re good.

All right, so I love you weirdos, but, yeah, I’m not a morning person. You know, people say “Mornings are so great.” Yeah, because I’m usually sleeping. That’s what’s great about it.

So anyway, but I was the first person there. Big pulpit Bible, you know, big ornate church. And on the altar they’ll put a big ornate, you know, $500 Bible up there. And that morning I walked up and I just thought, “I’ll just look at the Scriptures.” And there it was, open to Psalm 73. And all of a sudden, branding iron, man. “Who have I in heaven but you? And besides you, I desire nothing on earth. My heart and my flesh may fail, but God, you are the strength of my life and my portion forever.”

That was over 40 years ago. And that… right? I say it all the time. I wake up in the morning, and I say it more mornings than not. Seared.

His words are piercing. His words are piercing.

All right. Second or third: His life seems hidden. Palestine, now the center of the world, but back then, a dusty outskirt of the Roman Empire that the Romans couldn’t understand, these obstinate people who wouldn’t submit in the middle of the desert, completely defeated, impoverished, subjected.

And then a carpenter, not a philosopher, not a, you know, never had a title, you know, His disciples called him rabbi, but He never went to any school to become a rabbi. He never wrote a book, never traveled more than 30 miles from His hometown, never raised an army. He was just one Jew amongst millions of Jews, subjected amongst millions of people in the Roman Empire, amongst millions of people or thousands of people at least, that the Roman Empire crucified.

And why are we talking about him in Poulsbo, Washington? His life seemed hidden. There was no social media back then. Nothing went viral. There’s, you know, it just…

But all of a sudden, in His context, He started going viral. It’s amazing, you know. You start raising people from the dead, and paralyzed people start walking. It’s like, “Hey, let’s go listen to this guy.”

But His life was hidden. He wasn’t born in a castle; He was born in an animal barn. And His mission seems unsuccessful, right? He ends on the cross. He tried, another noble spokesperson doing their best to serve humanity and speak, and the bad guys win again. And the leaders conspire against Him, though He had committed no crime. And the political power who tried to practice justice on some occasions, and yet political expediency was more important than justice, and so Pilate caves in, His friends run away and hide. The people who He had loved and cared to and spoke, and because He didn’t look like the Messiah they were waiting for, now turned on Him and shouted out, “Crucify him.”

And everything about Good Friday doesn’t seem good. Everything about Good Friday seems “this guy failed.” It was a noble attempt. He made it as far as a noble person could. But ah, the forces of gravity of evil just pulled Him back down. And He died on the cross, and even His friends ran away from Him. Even His disciples denied Him. Everything seems lost that Friday evening. Everything seems lost that Friday evening.

But if the composer John Williams had been there and he had known what was about to happen, he would have begun to play the theme song from “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” You know the song, right? Old movie, old movie illustrations. That’s all the movie illustrations I have. I go to one movie a year nowadays, so I only got old movie illustrations.

But he’d begin to play—you remember, though, if you’ve seen it, you remember the theme song. The Nazis are winning. Indy is trying with all his noble efforts to defeat the Nazis and to save the ark and blah, blah, blah. And he gets the ark, and he finally finds it, and he fools the Nazis, and he gets it. And they’re waiting for him, and they take it back from him, and they throw it on a truck, and they’re going to take it to Germany. And because they have the ark, they’re going to rule the world. And everything seems lost. And you think, in the movie, all is lost.

But thank goodness for movie scores because they will tell you before the action happens that all is not lost. The music will tell you, right? Because the Nazis are driving this ark off in these trucks surrounded by armed guards. And very kind of biblically, a white horse shows up, and Indy mounts the white horse. You remember the scene, right? And all of a sudden the music comes on, right? You know that, you know it.

And oh, what’s going to happen now? Those Nazis are in trouble when that music plays.

Jesus is dead on the cross, and they put Him in the grave. And all of a sudden, all of a sudden, this mission that seems unsuccessful, God makes His mission larger and more successful. Instead of an itinerant Palestinian preacher who does miracles, He now becomes the Savior of the world who kills and destroys by His own death, sin, Satan, and death. And He rises from the grave victorious.

And that’s what Isaiah 49 is talking about. It looked like the Lord had abandoned me. It looked like all was lost. But my vindication is in God’s hands.

Oh, how much trouble, Christians, we would prevent, we would protect our lives from if we just allowed our vindication to be in God’s hands instead of getting in fights to prove we’re right, instead of going and putting those people in their place, doggone it. “They hurt me. I’m gonna, I’m gonna show them.” They crucified me; I’ll let them. But watch what the Lord does. Watch what the Lord does.

You know what? If you’re in Christ, let me tell you what disappointments are. Disappointments are made for resurrections. You will have disappointments. You will have Dark Fridays. But because of the Easter Sunday that’s coming, they will become Good Fridays.

God makes His mission larger and more successful, even to the point, and we already talked about this. Now, 12 disciples run away. One comes back, John. But 12 disciples run away and hide. He dies on the cross. And today 2 billion people in a world of 8 billion people serve him gladly. Two billion people are, in a world of 8 billion people, one fourth of the world’s population. There’s no movement on Earth like it. And it’s growing. And the conversion rate is outstripping the birth rate daily.

“Well, not in Pacific Northwest.” Have faith, child. Have faith. I have prayed. Not that it counts on that, but God uses prayers of little portly pastors. God uses prayers of mothers and grandmothers. God uses prayers of godly men. Have faith. We will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, and this wet wood will burn. Have faith.

God will make His mission larger and more successful. Nations are changed by Him, and rulers bow down to worship Him.

In the Middle Ages, at the height of Christendom, which wasn’t all glorious and good, King Charlemagne was the most powerful king during that time. Anybody got Charlemagne’s dates down anyway? You know, four or five hundred, six hundred, somewhere in there, powerful king, the Holy Roman Empire is now spreading throughout the world. He was rich. He was not a good man. He was like all kings and rulers. He was a warrior. He was a despot. He was selfish. He was greedy. He wasn’t a godly king. And yet at his death, he said, “When I’m buried, put me on my throne”—very pompous, you know, king—”I want to be buried sitting on my throne.”

But here was the twist. He said, “And I want an open Bible before me, and I want it open to this passage. And I want you to put my bony finger on this passage: what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?”

Kings will bow to Him. Nations will be changed. This nation was formed upon His piercing words, and it grew upon His words. Evangelists, Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyterians moved west along the frontier. The Methodists moved west to spread what? Scriptural holiness across the land.

So that’s what Isaiah 49 says. And when we read back in Isaiah 49, we go, “That’s Jesus. That’s Jesus.” But guess what? God will use you and me to bring revival in that same pattern, in that same way. Why? Because you have been chosen to bear fruit.

Jesus says that. “I chose you to bear fruit.” You have been chosen to be a contagious carrier of the life and kingdom of Jesus Christ, your King and your life. You are a Christ carrier into the world. You’ve been chosen to do that. That’s your assignment.

Your destiny is heaven, but your job description is to bring heaven to earth. That is who you are. “I’m a teacher.” Great. That’s your vocation. You’re a teacher for Jesus. “I’m in the Navy.” Great. That’s your vocation. You’re in the Navy for Jesus. “I’m a homemaker.” Great. That’s your vocation. You’re a homemaker for Jesus. And by the way, you better take your job seriously, Mama, because you and your husband beget original sinners, and we all want to be protected from them. So do your job and teach them Jesus.

Listen, I love each of your kids, but I don’t want to know them without Jesus.

And so that’s who we are. You’re chosen. You’ve been called out.

And listen, I believe—people say, “Well, you’re not a Calvinist. You don’t believe in predestination.” Of course, I believe in predestination. That’s a biblical word. And you have a predestiny. Your destiny is to be a child of God and to serve Him in this world. There are people—and every human being, that’s their destiny. There are people who don’t step into their destiny. But you have been predestined, so step into it. Do it. You’ve been called. You’ve been chosen. From the time you were in your mother’s womb, God desired for you to be in His forever family and to serve Him joyfully.

The words He speaks to you and through you are piercing. I already talked about the words He spoke to me through His Scriptures. They’re piercing. They’re piercing.

Sometimes those words are the Bible. Sometimes those words are just words that you hear in your head. I tell you, God convicts me. And He’s not mean and He’s not shaming, but His words are piercing. I remember I went to the Brownsville revival, and as I went to the revival, it was the first time I was really, like, slain in the Spirit. And God convicted me twice in one night.

As I’m lying there on the ground, I go, “Huh? I can’t lift my head. I can’t open my eyes.” And I’m analyzing the whole experience. And I hear this voice in my head, “Kevin, why do you analyze everything?” And I argued with the voice, which is always fun to do, but you always lose. And I said—and I blamed God; I was like Adam in the garden—I said, “Because that’s the way you made me.” And then there was silence.

And in the silence, I felt like God was saying, “Hey, I did make you that way, but I also made you to experience my grace and my power and my love. Just rest here and enjoy it. You don’t have to figure everything out.” And so I did.

And then I got up, and I walked back. I was hanging out with my friends, and I saw these people. They would get in line, somebody would pray for them, and they would fall. Then they’d get up, and they’d get back in line, and somebody would pray for them, and they would fall. Then they would get up, and they would get back in line, and somebody would pray for them, and they would fall.

And I judged them. I said, “Oh, they’re just spiritual experience junkies.” I know nothing about these people. I know nothing about what God’s doing with them. But I knew in my high place of seminary-trained skepticism, “Oh, they’re just experience junkies.”

And I heard the voice again, and this, this voice pierced me. And it wasn’t mean, but it was the longing of His heart. He said, “Kevin, would it be that you were that hungry.” Ouch. “Would it be that you wanted me as much as those people did.” That was God’s judgment on them.

And so ever since then, I’ve been a pew jumper. I’ll go to some conference, and they say, “Anybody want prayer?” Yep. “This prayer is for one-armed pregnant women with a limp.” Close enough. I’m coming. I think I fit kind of that description.

I’ll tell you what. There’s a woman, she reached out to me several years ago on Facebook. I pastored her over 30 years ago. Her and her husband started coming to the Methodist church. They were a troubled couple trying to follow Jesus, but struggling with drugs and alcohol and other things that I didn’t know about at the time. But I liked them. I became friends with them. The husband seemed like a really sweet, peaceful, calm guy.

And I remember they went on a trip, and she came back and her collarbone was broken. And she said, “Yeah, I slipped playing ping pong.” “Oh, okay, slipped playing ping pong, yada, yada, yada.” And then she tries to kill herself. And I find out the reason she tries to kill herself is this calm, peaceful, nice guy would beat the heck out of her on a regular basis.

Anyway, I visited her. Jill and I went and visited her in the hospital. And now I knew why she had a broken collarbone and why she tried to kill herself. And the Lord gave me these words. He said, “Tell her she can’t do this because one day I am going to use her life to help other women who are in the same situation.” And I spoke those words to her. That was 30 years ago.

A few years ago, she reached out to me on Facebook. She saw my name, reached out to me, and she shared her story. I helped her leave her husband. She had to pack, you know, all her clothes, and she wanted somebody there. Actually, the sheriff came. The sheriff—back in the time, the sheriff of Stanislaus County would help a woman leave. They’d stay for 15 minutes. Get everything you can in 15 minutes. I’ll stand guard so, you know, he doesn’t come and beat you up. But she asked me to be there, too, for emotional support. So I was there for 15 minutes.

She packed her daughter up, enough clothes, threw them in the car, and drove off. I never saw her again. I still haven’t ever seen her again.

But she reached out to me on Facebook several years ago and said, “Hey, remember me?” And she said, “I’m now in Arizona with my new husband, and I’m going to a Calvary chapel. And I’m a part of a ministry. I lead a ministry in our church that helps battered women.” And she said, “I will never forget those words you spoke to me in the hospital.” His Words are piercing. And guess what? God can use you to deliver them.

She just was on a radio broadcast or podcast or what. I don’t even know what people do now, but, you know, some kind of cast. And she sent me the link and I listened to it the other night, and it’s her story in two parts. It’s about 50 minutes, two 25-minute segments. In the first segment, she says this pastor, and she used my first name, says “Pastor Kevin came to the hospital and said, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.”

And now guess what? God can use you in revival. Did I speak those words to her? Well, yes, they came out of my vocal cord. But who inspired those words? The one whose words are piercing. Balaam’s donkey. Right here. Balaam’s donkey. You get to be Balaam’s donkey. You get to be Balaam’s donkey. His words speak to you, and they speak through you, and they change lives. You won’t always know when they do. Do it anyway. Sometimes God will give you reminders.

Another story. I went to Cal State University, Chico. How many of you are from California? Chico State. Known as what? Just say it. Party school, right? You’re down in LA, everybody’s like, “You’re going to Chico? Party!” Every kid from Bay Area and LA goes to Chico State to party. Every kid from Chico wants to go to UCLA and get out of the tiny town of Chico and go to the big city.

And so. But, you know, I always have considered Chico State the Harvard of the West Coast. And so there I went, I went to Chico State and I worked at Round Table Pizza. Worked at Round Table Pizza, and Round Table Pizza was a group of college students and high school students. I was 21, so I got a job serving beer and wine. Then, you know, they taught me the kitchen. I worked everywhere, and there was a young man there, a lot of young men there.

But anyway, years later, I’ve left Chico, and I’ve gone down to Pasadena to go to Fuller Seminary, and I’m eating at Bob’s Big Boy.

Anybody remember Bob’s Big Boy? Okay, let me tell you a story about the one who says I have it so good, because what would one of my sermons be without a story about her? So, old movie reference again in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, a beautiful British accent. I mean, she was stunningly beautiful in my estimation. Her name was Jacqueline Bisset. Anybody know Jacqueline Bisset? Yeah, beautiful, beautiful, right, Karen, you know, Google her. Unless you have trouble with stuff like that, then don’t, but you know, Jacqueline Bisset. Don’t Google her now because she’s like 80 something, but, you know, Google her back then.

And so I told Jill one time, I looked at Jill one time and listen, I’m a romantic guy, right? Said, “You know, you look like Jacqueline Bisset.” You know what she said to me? This is true. “You remind me of Bob’s Big Boy.” How is that? Like a good, you know, I don’t get like, you know, back in the day, Burt Reynolds or somebody like that. Quit laughing, Aiko. “You remind me of Bob’s Big Boy.” That’s… but you know what? I have it so good. I have it so good.

So anyway, I’m at Bob’s Big Boy, Southern California. This kid walks up to the table and goes, “Kevin, Kevin, is that you?” You know what happens? You know, somebody comes, you know, “Is that you, Brian?” And your brain starts going, okay, I recognize the face. Now what’s the context? Work? High school? You know, my brain’s doing that.

He goes, “It’s me, Mike. Mike, Roundtable, Chico.” Ah, got it. Thank you, Mike.

And this guy was a little high schooler while I was a college student, worked at Roundtable with me. He was a stoner. You know, he’s a typical high school worker, trying to get away with as much as he could. And anyway, he goes, “Man, I gotta tell you, I gave my life to Jesus.” I go, “Mike, that’s awesome.” And then he looks at my friends and he goes, “This guy was telling me about Jesus all the time.” What did I tell this guy about Jesus? I’m thinking, “I don’t ever remember talking to this guy about Jesus,” but I guess I did it all the time.

But isn’t that great? I maybe did it once or twice. I don’t even remember. But God will use—He’ll put His words in you and use your words to change lives.

My friends are all looking at me, “Man, you’re a cool evangelist.” I’m like, “Yeah…” I don’t even remember talking about Jesus to this guy.

You may feel small and hidden, but God has a bigger picture. Christianity is filled with stories of great evangelists and great leaders. If you read church history, you read about the John Wesleys and all this. What you don’t read about are all the quiet heroes.

Billy Graham. I always remember Billy Graham’s great, his autobiography and his story about his conversion. There are three people I remember specifically in the story about his conversion. One is his cousin. His cousin was a Christian and desperately wanted Billy Graham to know the Lord. Billy Graham just wanted to drive. He was 16 years old, he wanted to drive. So his cousin said, “If you will come with me, I’ll let you drive my car. We’re going to pick up a few friends and go to the revival.”

Billy Graham goes, “I get to drive?” “Yep.” “All right, I’ll do it.”

The other is the town tailor. I think his autobiography shares the town tailor’s name. I don’t remember. I certainly don’t remember his name. Nobody remembers his name. Nobody knows who the town tailor was back in that North Carolina town. But that town tailor heard that the evangelist was coming to town, and so he trained to be an altar worker. And when the evangelist finished speaking, Billy Graham went forward, and that town tailor said the prayer that led Billy Graham to the Lord.

How would you like to be that guy in heaven? “Hey, Billy Graham, and Tom here, led thousands and thousands of people to Christ.” And who else? The people who were praying for him, his cousin who was praying for him. How about Tom’s grandma who prayed for him, that made him a Christian town tailor? We’re so interconnected.

Then there was the evangelist, and I do remember his name. He was a semi-famous evangelist back then. He had a great name for a southern evangelist, Mordecai Ham. Mordecai Ham, what a name. And Mordecai Ham preached the gospel when Billy Graham responded.

There’s a great story about Mordecai Ham in the book Firefall, a book on revival. And Mordecai Ham would travel the South and go into towns and lead revivals. And he went to one town, one small town in the South that was run by a family of thugs. You know, back, you know, that happens, right? Small town, you know, they’re a mini mob. They’re a mob unto themselves, you know, going around to the businesses and terrorizing them and collecting protection money and doing all that kind of stuff, and just running the politics and running the town and liquorin’ up and just a bully and a reprobate.

And Mordecai Ham comes and he learns about this. And the father of this family, let’s say his name’s Fred—I don’t know what his name was—but the father of this family, Mordecai Ham, says, “Bring me so-and-so.” Mordecai Ham’s going to preach to him. He’s going to, you know, he’s going to… And the guy gets scared. This town bully. That’s what happens when bullies are confronted, right? He gets scared and he runs away.

And Mordecai Ham chases him, and he runs into a cornfield, and he hides, and Mordecai Ham can’t find him. And so in the middle of the cornfield, Mordecai Ham says, “Fred, you come out here right now. I got the word of the Lord for you.”

He doesn’t hear nothin’. He says, “Fred, all right, if you’re not coming out, I’m gonna pray to God right now that He kills you.”

And all of a sudden he hears, “Don’t do it, Pastor!”

“Why not? you’re leading your kids to hell. You’re leading this town to hell. You’re going to hell yourself. Why shouldn’t I ask God to kill a person like you and get you off the face of the earth?”

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Comes out Mordecai and preaches to him. And Fred gives his life to Jesus in the cornfield. That’s a good evangelist right there. Yeah, I should try that one time. “All right then, pray God to kill you!” It works.

All right, you may feel small and hidden, but God has a bigger picture for your life. Let me tell you the definition of success in the kingdom of God. You may feel unsuccessful. Here’s the definition of success: obedience equals success. Obedience equals success.

Isaiah 49. It seems like it didn’t work, but Jesus was obedient even to the point of death. Philippians 2, right? “Although he existed in the form of God, he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped. But he emptied himself, taking the form of a man, even a servant, and he became obedient”—what?—”even to death on the cross.”

And then John Williams starts to play in that passage. Somebody’s got to find out if John Williams is the composer of “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” I could be mistaken on that. But anyway.

And all of a sudden the passage changes and says, “Therefore God has highly exalted him and given him the name that is above all names, that at the Name of Jesus, every knee will bow and tongue confess in heaven and on earth and below the earth, that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

6 who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. 7 Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, 8 he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross. 9 For this reason God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow — in heaven and on earth and under the earth — 11 and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:6-11, CSB)

You may feel like you’ve been unsuccessful, but if you have been obedient, you have been successful. And God will multiply. Always. Always. Listen to this. Whether you see it or not, whether some guy in Bob’s Big Boy comes up and confirms it to you, God will always multiply your obedience. Just do it and move on and trust Him.

We are nation changers and history makers. We change the world. Why are there two billion people following Jesus? Because of town tailors. And because of people like you who are obedient in your context.

There are missionaries who are sent to other cultures, and we call them missionaries. But there are missionaries sent to your neighborhood, your household, your workplace, and the places you frequent for business, and they’re called church people. But you are God’s plan for the world. And I’ve read the book. There is no plan B. It’s the church or nothing. This happens to me all the time. I’m Bible trained, educated, I got a title, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And people will come to me with their problems, and I’ll think, “Man, you need a Christian in your life.” This happens less often than it used to because I’ve used this story enough, I recognize it when it shows up in my head. But, “Man, you need, you need Jesus. You need a Christian to help you.”

And I’ve actually done this. I don’t do it anymore, but I’ve done it in the past. “God, send a Christian into your life, into their life.” You know, they’re telling me their problems, and I’m praying, “God, send a Christian.” And you know, I’ve learned. God always says, “I have.” And I mean, early on, a couple times I said, “Who?” And it’s like, then the light bulb goes on, right? “Oh, oh, oh, oh.” And then my next prayer is, “No, send a better one. Send a better one.” No, you’re it. Tag, you’re it. You’re it. You’re God’s person at the shipyard. You’re God’s person on your block. You’re God’s person in your family. You’re it, Tag.

Simply be obedient and your mission will bear fruit, and it will change one life at a time. And in that, nations will change, and history will be formed. And you are the carrier of that.

I remember once we were talking about a bunch of us Methodists were talking about turning the denomination around. Somebody said, “Oh, that edifice, that institution is so big, you’re nothing more than a mosquito on a water buffalo’s butt trying to change that.” And the guy—I loved his answer—he says, “Yeah, but what if we can recruit a million mosquitoes? That’ll get the water buffalo’s attention. That’ll get the water buffalo’s attention.”

God, I’m a nobody… filled with the King of the universe. Filled with the King of the universe.

And so, dear ones, I’ll say to you what Jesus said to His early disciples. This simple word: “Go.” I mean, we’re having communion, not right now, but pretty soon, go.

I mean, I love churches, you know, where they put a sign up at the exit and they say, “You are now entering the mission field.” You are now entering the mission field. And do it joyfully. Why? Because I got great news for you. As somebody who has been used, I can tell you times, more than the two I shared tonight, I can tell you times where God has used my words, the words that came out of my mouth, to pierce people’s hearts for His kingdom.

I can tell you that God uses knuckleheads. So you can feel like a knucklehead—you’re an earthen vessel, but you are filled with the oil of heaven. So just go, trust God, and change the world.

Jesus, thank you for your life that fills us and nourishes us. And so tonight, as you invite us to this table, this holy table, let us consume this bread and this cup and be filled, refilled, refreshed by the life of Jesus and the Holy Spirit to the mission and ministry to which we are called, from which we have been chosen from our birth to be the contagious carriers of Jesus Christ into the world.

Revival will happen when a million of us mosquitoes land on this culture. Oh, there will be a tension. There will be a tension.

Come, King Jesus, in your little church here in Poulsbo. And from this place we sing the song, “Let your glory fill this room, and let it go forth from here to the nations.” As the Kagawa family go to Japan, Jesus, fill them and go with them. As the Miller family goes to Silverdale, Jesus, go with them and fill them. As the Johnson family hangs out here in Poulsbo, Jesus, go with them and fill them. As I go back to Bremerton and Port Orchard, Jesus, go with me and fill me.

And tonight, as we come to your table, do that for us, as we eat this holy bread and this holy cup of the New Covenant. In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.

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