Blessings for the Evangelist (Matt. 10:40-42)

We will share the Word of God today titled, Blessings for the Evangelist. The gospel is very valuable. Because the gospel solves the problems that no humans can solve. And everything in our life is hidden within the gospel. Then if we are relaying the gospel of the greatest value, then that is the greatest blessing. Even if we give a piece of bread to a hungry person, that person will remember the favor. However, if you give someone this gospel that solves this eternal problem that they can’t solve on their own, that’s an incredible blessing. Don’t you think? Then the person who relays this blessing has the greatest blessing. 

Intro- Evidence 

God is invisible to our eyes

But how can I experience this invisible god in my eyes as if I can see him? We need to have evidence in order to have some kind of flavor of faith. I believe in God but what is the evidence of my faith? 

1. Word – Fulfill

First and foremost is the fulfillment of God’s word through me. The fulfillment of God’s word doesn’t mean I’m just staying still and God’s word is fulfilled through me. It sounds right but it’s slightly off. God is controlling all of creation with his word. Then I have to go into his word. That’s when I see the blessings of word fulfillment. God gives me the word of the week. You have to hold onto that and go into your life to see the evidence of word fulfillment. 

2. Prayer- Answers 

The 2nd way we can know  invisible God is through prayer. I can see the evidence of God being alive because he reacts to my prayers by answering them. There are some times when we receive no answers but the lack of answers itself is the answer. God not giving an answer is the answer. Because we are praying for something unnecessary. God works according to what is necessary. He does not work for something that is not needed. Human beings have the greed of Satan so we keep seeking things that are unnecessary but God is perfect and complete so he only works according to what’s needed. And when I pray for what’s needed, God gives answers to prayers and that is the evidence by which we know God is alive. 

Evangelism- With

Finally, when I am evangelizing. I can see God’s presence within my evangelism fields. Because when you go evangelize, you will see the works of the person before you accept Jesus Christ. Or within the process of evangelizing you can see God being with me. Our church does trainings. But what must we train for? We are training with the center point of word, prayer, and evangelism. 

We are training with the evidence that God is working right now to fulfill His word and every time we worship, He is giving us his word. And we are training with the answers we received throughout the week according to our prayers and with our prayers. 

And we can know God and train people with the works God does with us when we are evangelizing in the fields. Because this is the way that the Triune God is working even now. Then all our life must be centered on this. Then as more time pases, we can see more evidence of God’s presence. However, there’s the word of God, prayer, and evangelism that is outside of the center. 

It means right now God is working in these 3 ways. And whenever I go into the way the triune God is working, then I can see His works. Then every week, the person who holds onto the word of God is the witness. There are a lot of words. At first we have to understand the Word because God Himself is the Word, then what is God doing right now? He is giving us His Word and fulfilling His Word right now. 

Yes, it is important for us to know a lot of the Word of God but what’s more important is to stand as a witness of the Word that God is fulfilling in my life, and the word God has fulfilled in my life, as a witness of answered prayers and witness of evangelism. because this is what God does until the end of the age. 

What does “70 workers” mean? It means someone who can do word, prayer, and evangelism every day. This is not just by theory or knowing the words. You need to actually hold onto God’s word in order to see the word fulfillment to other people. The one who actually prays receives answers. And the one who actually evanelizes in their meetings sees the works of God being with them. 

The people who can do these 3 things every single day are the 70 workers. These are the 3 todays. For these people, even if you leave them alone, they have the 3 todays. They are the same as pastors. Because everyday they have word of god, prayer, and evangelism every day in their fields. The person thensled is important. Numbers don’t matter. Because even if one person has this, God will attach other people to them. Then naturally things come to light. We’re not trying to create anything. 

1.Privileges 

There are the privileges that God gives to evangelists. 

1)Authority to drive out evil spirits 

2)The authority to heal all diseases 

3)The authority to strengthen the weak 

Matthew 10:1 Jesus called His 10 disciples and gave them the authority to drive out impure spirits. God only gave this to the evangelists. God gave this privilege to drive out impure spirits and heal people to evangelists. People in the field are possessed by demons right now and you have to cast them out and that’s why God gave you this authority. And God gave you the authority to heal every disease and sickness. People in the world right now are suffering with diseases. That’s why God gave this authority to evangelists. It’s the authority you utilize in the name of Jesus Christ, because Jesus Christ does this work. In the name of Jesus Christ, all impure spirits and diseases flee. 

Isaiah 53 says when Jesus Christ died upon the cross, He took upon himself all of our transgressions and weaknesses. You know all our mental weaknesses. People are completely lost in mental weaknesses. They have mental illnesses like depression, and we have been given the authority to heal them. It doesn’t matter if you know this or not, someone needs to believe this in order to be broken down. because these are incidents that have already been finished by Jesus Christ. For the one who believes in this and goes forward, they receive these 3 authorities. Can I really heal disease? That person can never cure disease. Can I really cast out this demon? That demon will never be casted out then.  Can I heal this mental illness? If you think this way, you will never be able to. 

This problem has already been resolved in the name of Jesus Christ and I am only using this authority. That is the witness who receives the evidence. It says in Mark 16:15-20, to those who evangelize, God confirmed that He was with them through the works. You have to believe this. After you know this, you have to believe it. If you don’t believe it, the demons do not flee. If you just know it, the demons will not flee. You have to believe. 

The sons of the Sceva cast out the demons in the name of Jesus Christ because they knew it,  but the demons didn’t flee. Only when you believe in the authority of the name of Jesus Christ will the demons flee. So it’s important who goes. It’s not enough to just know the Bible because the demons do not flee from that knowledge. The devil works utilizing knowledge of the Bible. You have to be those who believe.

2. Qualifications 

Second, we have the qualifications of an evangelist. Who can have the qualifications of an evangelist? 

1) The selected ones 

2) The weak 

If you look in Matthew chapter 10:3-4 it lists a bunch of people and these are honestly people with no background. But you must be selected first. It’s not about us doing anything well but the one who is selected can be an evangelist. When they are first called they are weak. People who are a little stronger do not follow because they rely on their own strength. Does that mean that no strong people follow, later on they will follow. They are only people who acknowledge, I am strong, but I’m weak. 

3) The poor 

The 3rd qualification is the poor. So yes, they can be poor materialistically, but they are poor in the heart. Does that mean that wealthy people cannot go to heaven? No, that’s not the case. They must be poor in heart. They must confess i Have everything but I have nothing. 

4) The faithful 

And 4th is the faithful. The one who can be faithful to Christ. The one who can be very faithful  to the work of the Lord. That is the one who is qualified to be an evangelist. Someone who reveals their own righteousness can never be qualified to be an evangelist. So something we need to be very careful about in our walk of faith. We have God’s Word and we have spiritual things. However, if someone uses those things to reveal their own righteousness, that person will fail. because the one who knows that is the devil. That’s why someone must be faithful. The church must be centered on people who are faithful. If someone is always trying to reveal themselves that person cannot do it. 

3. Methods

1) Find the lost 

Third, there jaremthods to proclaiming the gospel. If you look in Matthew 10:5-6, it says, first find those who are lost. There are those who are very depressed and discouraged. There are people who used to go to church and have fallen away. And there are a lot of people like that especially during this time of corona pandemic. And that includes jall churches. People who always had weaker faith cannot keep going because their faith was always weak and this is the case for all churches. So in situations like this, it reveals how people live their everyday faith. These are the people we need to find first. 

2)Proclaim the kingdom  

And in verse 7 it says go proclaim the Kingdom of Heaven because it is near. The fact that the  kingdom of heaven is near, means that Jesus Christ is near. What do you think it means when the kingdom of God is near? Is it closer to earth? No it means that Jesus Christ is the kingdom of heaven, and this is in mAtthew before Jesus Christ died on the cross, so they are saying the moment of Christ is near. 

3) Free the depressed

And in verse 8, Jesus Christ says heal the sick , raise the dead, drive out demons, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons, in other words, raise those who are oppressed, all those people are oppressed by their diseases. Leprosy it’s all the same. 

4) Do not worry about the concerns of your daily life 

Verse 9 says do not take any gold, silver, or copper with you. It means do not worry about money. Evangelists do not have to worry about their living because God takes care of them. because this is the work of God of course He has to take responsibility for you. 

There are some evangelism  groups that don’t give you anything except an airplane ticket when you go to South America so you can experience this firsthand. Then the only thing that they send the missionaries there with is the airplane ticket there and the airplane ticket back, and they do  fine. Because the moment they begin their missionary trip, they have to receive the guidance of the Holy Spirit. These were how the disciples were trained. because they’re not just going haphazardly to evangelize. They actually have to be led . Let’s say they get out to the airport, where do they have to go next? They have to be led. 

And then at lunchtime they have to eat, then they have to be led by the Holy SPirit again. Then what will happen? You completely have to rely on prayer and the guidance of the Holy Spirit. I’m saying, you don’t have to do it like this but there are some organizations that do that with your lifestyle. 

When I went to Korea to study to take some tests, all I took were two books with me, thinking that I was just going to take this test and come back. I took those 2 books because I wanted to read those books on the ride there because that was the content of the test. And for 10 years I couldn’t leave korea. Then how could I live there? I survived. Did anyone help me? No one could help me? I lived there for 10 years on my own. I didn’t receive any help from my parents. And in the evangelism field, I didn’t have any money. I had nothing to buy food with. However, God guided me. 

So God actually put me through incredible training. If someone just goes back and forth to training with the money their parents wire from home, that’s not really training. And hi spelt, the money we get from our parents might be an answer as well. But around that time I was going around with a few other students with me and put all together we only had about 10 bucks. And that was just enough for one meal. So one person would go there and get a meal. And we’d eat that. And then if someone took that tray and asked for more food, they’d give us more. And we’d take the same tray and about 4-5 guys would eat that way because we had no money. And that’s how we evangelized. 

And the same thing with my marriage lifestyle because I got married with nothing. And then all the money we did get from our relatives as favors for the wedding, it was all spent up after maybe about a month. And the church was not giving me any living wages at the time. because there were so many assistant pastors at that other church and I wasn’t even an official pastor. I was just a teacher in the college department. So I didn’t have any money, but I got married. How did I eat? Did someone feed me? No one gave me handouts. And I had to pay for my electricity bill. And I had to pay for my loan for my house every month. Who gives me that money? This was my job to serve the church but they weren’t giving me any money for it. So the only thing I had to rely on was God. and that’s how God trained me. 

And we’re talking about this as we talk about our daily lifestyle. This is our basics. God raises His evangelists in a very detailed way. If someone is living their walk of faith for the sake of their daily life, that’s a problem. They lose hold of all of the real blessings, especially for the servant of the Lord. This is basic but you need faith to live like this. If you don’t have faith then you’ll go crazy without money. And it’s not just one or two days, it’s every day. Every day my debt was piling up, my electricity bills, rent, food bills. But God’s word is so accurate. 

I’m explaining this so briefly now but at that time, there was this nature that I had. And the difference between my faith and my nature was driving me crazy. This is the training that God gives to his evangelists a lot. And for you guys it’s the same. If you are believing for the sake of your daily life, we don’t even give sermons about that. If you want to believe that you can go to another church that makes you believe in Jesus Christ for the sake of bettering your daily life. However, the God that I”m imprinted in is not that God so you’re going to think of this God as a little difficult. “I wish you’d tell me about an easier God.” But the things of the other churches is that they tell you about half a God, that’s demonic, half-god.  

5) Blessing

From Matthew 10:12-15 – they say give them your blessings and your peace. Asking if they had peace was the content of their evangelism.  If you talk to them about anything else, they’ll say they already know, so ask them first if they have peace. If they don’t receive it, then that peace will be returned to you. And that peace is not a peace that the world can give you. It is a peace given directly to you by God in heaven. 

You have no idea how great of a blessing the evangelist has. If that person does not receive the peace, then it’s given to me. If that person receives the peace, then they will be blesse.c but the evangelists have their own evangelist’s reward. So no matter how much you try to calculate and logic your way through this, there’s no greater blessing than being an evangelist. But there are people who don’t want to be evangelists. “Pastor, I really don’t want to be an evangelist. I ‘d rather just forsake my blessings and live this way and go.” 

4.Warning about persecution

1)The conduct of evangelist  

There is definitely a warning about persecution. If you evangelize, you will be persecuted. Of course, Satan who has authority will not leave you alone. That’s why Jesus Christ said in Matthew 10:16, “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.” He never tells us to be brave, because if a sheep is going out to a pack of wolves, it’s not enough for the sheep to just be brave. 

Satan is holding onto the field and he has the power that is insurmountable to us, so Jesus tells us to be shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves. It means that, when you evangelize, stop calculating and manipulating. You need wisdom, and be innocent. Don’t calculate. Don’t have your own motives because the devil knows that so well. And Satan works upon that. So without a doubt, evangelists will receive persecution, but be shrewd and innocent. 

2) Warning about persecution 

Starting from Matthew 10:17 he starts talking about how you will be flogged in a synagogue and tells you to be strong. But some people say, “Oh can I actually not go through that and can’t I have a faith that doesn’t get me beaten up?” All you have to do is not evangelize. If you don’t evangelize, then you won’t be persecuted for Christ, but what’s going to happen instead? You’re going to be a slave to Satan. You’ll be dragged around wherever Satan takes you. So there are only 2 options, will you be dragged around by Satan or will you be persecuted for the sake of Christ while you convey blessings? 

3) Word – 

And part 3, from Matthew 10:19 on you have to say something. But don’t worry about it. I have never received evangelism training from anyone. I always went into the field alone. When I first received Jesus Christ, I went with the pastor who evangelized to me to interpret for him a few times, but other than that, I always went alone. There were no systems that were set up either, I only went alone on the ground transportation. 

And it took me about 10 minutes to go through public transport and to walk to a school. And while I was on my way there, I was always oppressed by the thought of what I was going to talk about with the students today.  I can’t talk about the gospel letters with them because I didn’t know who I would run into. The students there are studying. What should I talk to them about? So I was very oppressed while I was walking to school. Once I get here, it will be crawling with students, and I’m a little older than these students, so they might mistake me for some crazy old man on campus. And I was really oppressed by that. 

At that time the Word God gave me was the word Moses said, when he said, “I cannot go to Egypt because my tongue is so slow,” and God says, “I will raise Aaron and he will go with you.” From that moment on, I began to enjoy the evangelism field and look forward to how God would work that day. These are the ways that God personally trained me in the evangelism field through these experiences. 

I never had a moment when I had another minister teaching me saying, “don’t worry about it because God will put the words in your mouth” these are all things I’ve heard from God’s word and experienced in the  field. Then that’s real faith. So I can peacefully talk to this person. And I can apply it to this person because God said He’d bput the words in my mouth. So in reality that became a blessing where I can enjoy God constantly being with me. So even the feeling of being oppressed or frustrated is good because it’s a chance for God to show you the real blessings. All of the disciples were like this at the beginning too. 

“Do not be afraid of persecution,” He says. Matthew 10:26 says, “For there there is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.  Everything will be revealed so do not be afraid.  Every lie will be revealed later on; there’s nothing for the evangelist to be afraid of. 

And especially in Matthew 10:28 it says do not be afraid because the One Who can destroy both soul and body is with you. These are all the things you should enjoy in the evangelism field. If you’re not an evangelist, these words do not apply to you. If the field is full of fear, then you’ll be full of fear. But these are the blessings of an evangelist. 

Matthew 10:29 says, even the sparrows will not fall without the Lord’s care. And in Matthew 10:32-33, he says God even knows how many hairs are on your head, and it says that God will acknowledge us if we live the life of an evangelist, but if I’m ashamed of the gospel, then God will disown me. However, when I boldly acknowledge the Gospel, God will do the same for me. 

So it turns out that the evangelism field is a great blessing. An evangelism that doesn’t have a field is not evangelism. That person is just using evangelism as a means of Bible study.  Without a doubt, evangelism takes place in the field. So all of these works are works that take place in the field. Whenever you evangelize, without a doubt there is a field 

5. The blessing of preaching the gospel

The final and 5th point is there is a blessing of preaching the gospel. What is that blessing? Matthew 10:34-36. Matthew 10:34 Jesus says, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace on this earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword,” and He says He did not come to bring peace. He says that He has come to turn man against each other, and a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household. 

In order for you to receive the gospel and testify of the gospel, the first people to stand against you are your family. If you have the gospel, and people in your family have not received the gospel, then honestly speaking, you guys are the enemies. Of course, because spiritually you guys are on opposite sides. You are on God’s side and they are on the side of the devil. Before that point, you might have had a great relationship, because your family can have a great unity with the standards of the world. But once the gospel goes in, the family is spiritually divided. That’s why Jesus Christ says he came with a sword. Later on your family will all receive the gospel but these are the things that take place for an evangelist. 

Matthew 10:39 says whoever finds his life will lose it, and those who lose their lives for the gospel will find it. It means stake your life for the proclamation of the gospel. But if you are proclaiming the gospel for the sake of living life, then you will lose your life because the Bible tells you to give your life for the gospel. 

Matthew 13 tells us of someone who buys a piece of land. The reason he does this is because of valuable treasure buried underneath. That person goes to the owner of the land and gives a lot of money to buy that property, and the master doesn’t know about the treasure and sells the land for that great sum of money. Then that person honestly gave their entire life savings to buy that property. What does this mean? It means that’s us receiving the gospel. Because of the great value of the gospel, we can give everything of our life to the Lord. But we keep trying to receive. That’s the opposite of the Bible. 

The Bible says we discover the value of the gospel, so we give our entire lives, but instead we keep trying to receive. But if you try to receive, then you will lose. But when you give your entire life for the gospel, then you will receive everything. The Bible tells you the things that are opposite of the world. People who are smart will not understand, people who are fast at calculating will have a harder time understanding. Does that mean if you are foolish, you’ll understand?  Then no, you have to be at least a little bit intelligent to realize this is true. It means you need to have God’s grace.  Otherwise, you’ll try to race towards this using the methods of the world. 

You have to discover the value. This gospel, heaven, how great is the value of salvation? Paul regarded everything as rubbish for this gospel. Because this gospel is everything, evangelization is everything. You’re not trying to gain things from evangelism but for evangelism, you pour everything of yourself out. That is the person who gains everything. But someone who is trying to gain something you can’t have continuation because the devil knows. We’re talking about proper evangelism. The true evangelist. We need to have the true evangelist come out for them to be the model. 

Matthew 10:45 says that the Lord will be with you. “Anyone who welcomes you, welcomes Me.” It means that the Lord Jesus will be with them, because the Lord God is with the evangelist. The people who accept us are not really accepting us, they are accepting the Lord. If you believe this, there’s nothing for you to be afraid of. 

Mark 16 says that the Lord Who was seated at the throne was directly working upon those disciples who were evangelizing, with them. This is how the remnants must go into their fields as the evangelist. This world is formidable. Do you think you can survive with the little that you’ve studied?  Your studies are just one of the bascs. You need to know what this evangelist is, and then go out into the world, to have works of conquering. That’s why students have to go into the field after having received evangelism training. 

If they have not received evangelism training, then they will be afraid of the world and the field. They will always be afraid, “What if I get fired?” because even if they go back and forth from worship, they haven’t received evangelism training. Evangelism training is training in God’s Word as an evangelist. They only received word training as a child of God. They never received Word training as an evangelist. That’s why we have a separate training in the afternoon on Sunday’s the officer training, where we go through the evangelist’s lifestyle. Because we have to arm ourselves with the blessings of the evangelists and the word of God before we go out into the world. 

And we have a sure reward, and we will never lose our reward. How great of a blessing is evangelism? We talked about this last week, but the devil has dropped evangelism to the ground. And just by myself I’m hypothesizing that most churches are like this. They need to have separate evangelism training. 

For you guys who are seated here, you should not be confused. Sunday messages are just messages, but there’s a separate message that is given to the evangelists who are trained to save their fields, that’s why the Lord calls the disciples and evangelists out separately, and gives them His Word. They need to take that Word into the field to overcome it. That’s what today’s Word is about.

Jesus gave all of this healing to His disciples and then they received the filling of the Holy Spirit, and then works took place. Today, it’s the blessings for the evangelist. May you be the main figure of these blessings. 

Prayer

God we thank you, allow me to enjoy and testify of the blessings of an evangelist. In the name of Jesus Christ we pray, amen.