Where are the Watchmen?

Welcome back to Ignite. I want to talk to you for a few moments on the subject of God is holding you accountable. And he is. There's a scripture in the Old Testament, Ezekiel. Actually, Ezekiel chapter three, that puts a pretty clear description on how he's holding us accountable. Now, granted it's the Old Testament. It's prophets. We're in the living in the New Testament. We're not prophets per se. But there's a connection. And God never changes, right? He's the Savior. Yesterday, today and forever. And so if that's the case, there must be some sort of connection there. And as you recall, back in those days, they would have watchmen on the walls. And they would be their 24-7. And their job was among others was to watch in the distance and see if the enemy was coming. And if the enemy was coming, they could see it from afar off. And they could warn their people. Get ready. The attack is coming, right? And he's saying, he said to the prophets, then. And I think he's saying a bit to us that we should be that for those around us. I mean, the churches aren't doing it much. I mean, there are some great churches. Thank God for so many great churches in America for the most part. I mean, Pugius did a study. So that only 10% of the sermons in America are even touching on salvation. So I'm not, I'm not commentating on churches out of my own understanding. I mean, this is what it is today. The church is not doing as well as we would love it to be. So who's going to warn the people? I mean, the scriptures say, how are they going to know? You have 90% of our population not going to church. They're lost. We get mad at them. We get really mad at them. We go out of them, particularly when there are politicians, right? But they're not necessarily bad people. They're lost people. And Jesus said that Satan will blame their eyes. And they'll see good as evil and evil is good. They'll see, right, I won't get into all the issue, but you know what I'm talking about. They actually see these things as good, right? And, and so people are lost. And how are they going to, how are they going to know unless somebody tells them? And, and how who's going to tell them unless they're sent? And our pastors aren't sending us. When's the last time you had your past year in your church say, I'm sending you the Ephesians for a love it is the role of the pastor to equip the church for ministry, equip the state's ministry. That's you. You're not, that's, you're not hearing that. So there's no expectation. You should be sharing your faith. And so we're sitting there. And when we sit there, we kind of just act to be down to where we're just paralyzed. And basically 80% of all Christians are living in fear today. This is not how it wants us to be. Obviously. And to me ask you a question, how many people do you know who are lost? Think about it in your own family. How many people do you know that if the rapture happened today, they'd be left behind? A follow-up question. How many of those that you just thought about have you warned? We're walking by people every day all around us. We're surrounded by people who were lost. And if you don't tell them who's going to tell them there is responsibility as we can get away from that. There is responsibility. And it's not like you're just trying to talk them into making sure you're not late to dinner. This is eternal. They'll be eternally lost. So easy to walk through. Be satisfied our own lives and see all these people hurting and feel like they're not our responsibility. They are our responsibility. Everybody comes under influence and our influence not just by the influence we have where we have directs because of responsibility influence because everything we say, everything we do, is influencing those around us to come closer further away from God. And it doesn't happen necessarily on schedule, certainly not going to our schedule. You know, I just I had this experience not too long back and again I put in my book Ignatio Life where I had a friend in Chicago called me Bill and he said, hey guess what? Our friend Jack and Oregon is dying. He's on his hostage in his hospice bed. And he turned to his wife and he said, I need to talk to Barry McGuire. So here's his number. So I called him and act like I didn't know what's going on. And he quickly told me he's in his hospice bed. He's dying. And I said, well, what can I do for you Jack? He says, boy, you've always been talking about God. I need to get more serious about God. I mean, I'm at that point. And in the next 10, 12 minutes, I led him to the Lord. It was great. In fact, to make sure I led the Lord. I said, let's do this one more time. I want you to pray the word. So you consciously understand what we're saying here. And he did. And we celebrated. And after that, I said, you know, guess what's going to happen now? We're going to spend eternity together. He says, what? It never even occurred. He never had those kind of thoughts. I said, Jack, you and I are going to spend eternity together. We may be separated for a couple of years. You get to start before me in that crazy. But we're going to spend eternity together. And he laughs. He says, yes, you're right. I said, yeah, we are. It took about 10, 12 minutes to do that. Great conversation. No, actually, it took me 50 years. It took me 50 years of what I call chumming. I use that term. But when you just, you just love on people and throw on things and leave it alone, you can't force feed Christianity. And when they're ready, they'll come. And I get calls not every day, but I get calls on a regular base field. And I've always been there. And finally, when they find out they have cancer or they have other sons, just commit suicide or their wife's leaving or whatever it is they call, I need help. That things are not necessarily bad things if they lead you to Jesus. So we have influence. There should be all the time everywhere we do it, everywhere we go. I had a dear friend who lives, who lived in Pennsylvania. And a car guy, they was chip. And I love chip. And I spent a lot of time with chip. He didn't buy a dear friend. And way too early in his 50s, he found out that he had a rare form of cancer. And he was in struggle for his life. And I knew immediately. I knew immediately, I need to get to chip and talk to him about the Lord because I knew there's nobody else around him who would do that that I knew of. So I kept putting it off and putting it off. I got the news in the fall. And now it's springtime. And I knew I should go. I kept praying for him. I want to get down there. I just headed out of time. I'm on the west coast. I have lots of things I'm doing. My ministry thing to do and speaking engagements. I mean, I just, I didn't get around to it. And finally I'm at the Amelia Island Concord in Florida in March. I get a call from his right hand guy who told me chip just died. I was devastated. I just devastated. I had responsibility for him. I don't know if anybody else did, but I had responsibility. And I let him down. I let God down. So what's the funeral? They went to the fairgrounds and lowered a bunch of us who were his closer car guy. But he's hunting old antique buss and we drove to the funeral in this bus and we pulled up. There were just cool cars. That's how I got my funeral. I want to see cool cars all over the parking lot. Although I don't think I'm going to have a funeral. I think I'm going to go up first. I think the ranch is going to have for us. That's another story. Anyway, I'm driving along and it happens. The guy beside me, I don't know. He was very good friend of chips. But I didn't know him. And he knew me, but not as a friend. And I brought the secretary of God and he's, well, ship of course did have anything to do with God. I just plunged inside. Just, so we get in the service. I'm a wreck. And then there's a lot of people wrecked because he was a greatly loved man. The pastor finally got out of the end. The service gave his message. A young pastor. He said, you know, most of you knew chip for a long time. I did not. I only met him after he got his cancer. But from then until now, we became really great friends. And I want you to know I led chip for the Lord. And he's in heaven today. Wow. I was so disappointed. I was bawling. No one could figure it out. They wouldn't, they didn't know. We just saw me in grief. My grief was tears of joy. And I said, God, you saved my bacon. You saved my bacon. And you rights to what I didn't reach it. You got there. You didn't hear my prayers. I prayed a lot of prayers, but I wasn't there for you. There's this entertainer in Vegas. We talk about the story a lot of Pendulate, who's an atheist, a fabulous entertainer. We're about atheists. And a guy came up and talked to him after one of his performances in Game of Bibles. Very nice to him. And in a nutshell, he said, you know what, if you rethought I was going to hell, how much would you have to hate me to not tell me? That's a heavy subject. Obviously with chip, I didn't hate him. I love chip. But the command is love your neighbor as yourself. And if you love your neighbors yourself, you're as concerned for their salvation as you are your own. I obviously, as much as I love chip, I must confess, I didn't love him as much as I love myself or I would have gone to him. I would have dropped everything into his gone to him. And I did not do that. And I should have. And I told God, you saved my bacon this time. I'm in now. And when I get that call or I find out something's going on, I'm running to those people. And I have. And a number of people are in heaven today because I follow that lead. I'm reminded of, remember Shinler's list? Terrible camps and all, Liam Neeson played their role. Remember that? The great line, there's a lot of great lines. But at the end he gave this line. When he got out, he felt something and reached it and he pulled out a fountain pin. Do you remember that? And he said, Oh, I could have gotten one more person out. And he's broken, not for all the ones that he got out, but he could have gotten one more. Let's finish our lives well. Let's resolve to move everybody every day, close to Jesus, barring none. Until we get that last person in heaven. And here God say, well done. Well done, that was good and faithful servant. Can't wait for that day. See you next time.