God's passionate interest in humanity is the central theme, as illustrated by Isaiah's vision in the throne room where he hears God asking, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" The sermon recounts numerous stories of individuals whose lives were transformed by hearing God's word, from a doctor in the Dominican Republic to a young girl in a rural setting, and a man named Crispiniano who learned to read to understand the Bible. These narratives highlight how God speaks through His Word, often to those who are marginalized or unable to read, leading to radical life changes and the spread of the gospel. The message concludes by emphasizing that God's desire to make His home in believers is contingent upon their joyful obedience to His Word, urging listeners to consider if they share God's passion for humanity and are willing to be sent.
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Dr. was caused by a rather amusing thing. He'd never seen this before in his life. When Mr. Peterkin stood up with his guest and introduced him, the guest asked him to read from one or two obscure portions in the Old Testament about the red heifer. Mr. Peterkin wasn't too pleased with the choice of readings for that particular audience, but he read them. Then the man from New York began a very complicated message on the sacrificial system of the Old Testament. And Mr. Peterkin translated the first two or three phrases, and then without blinking an eye, and just as if he was translating the message, he switched his theme and he spoke on John three sixteen.
And the young doctor who was bilingual was listening to two distinct messages as if they were presented as one, one on the red heifer and one on John three sixteen. He soon was able to settle down and wisely he concentrated on the message in Spanish on John three sixteen. And I think that was the beginning of that desire in his heart to become right with God. This went on for some weeks. It was not a dramatic conversion. but quietly in his own home, he received the Lord Jesus into his heart and into his life.
And a very beautiful thing happened. His wife joined him in that commitment to the Lord Jesus. Now they represented the better class in the city of La Vega. She came from a notable father. He came from a very important family. They were professionals. He was practicing medicine. And now they had become, in the language and in the eyes of the people in the community, Protestants. No one, of course, knew about it openly, but they knew they would have to face some very difficult moments in their town. One of the first things that he wanted to do was go and join the little community of Christians meeting in that chapel that Mr.
Peterkin built. He said to his wife by night, I'm going to go tonight. And so around seven-thirty he left his home, walked into that part of the city and stood at the corner of the street that led down to where the chapel was. And he saw the people coming, most of them from the poor classes of the city. But he stood there until he was sure there was no one anywhere around coming or going on the street. And then with a brisk pace, he walked down towards the chapel, but just before he got to the door, someone came around the corner at the other end, and he just quickened his pace and went right by the chapel as if he was going somewhere else.
You might find that difficult to understand, but he knew the day he stepped over that doorway and went into the chapel, it would be known all throughout the city. And I suppose naturally he was trying to avoid that by not letting anyone see him go in. I was not there in those years. I knew him afterwards very well, but he told me many times he went to that corner, determined to enter the church building and would get down there near the door, and for one reason or another, he simply kept walking.
But the day did come when he stepped into that building for the first time.Socially, he was out of place. He didn't belong to that class of the society, and yet he knew they loved the Lord Jesus, and he loved the Lord Jesus. They warmly welcomed him, and he would sit with them in the services, listening to Mr. Peterkin or others as they taught the Word of God. No one specifically spoke to him about baptism. But he had his literature at home and he had his Bible and he knew that Christians, they were baptized by immersion.
He had read about that. And he had this deep longing to make that commitment also to the Lord and do it publicly in a baptismal service. By that time, Mr. Ralph Carter was on the scene, another missionary, And he spoke to Ralph about this, and Ralph encouraged him, explained what it meant, and he said, No, that is what I want to do. So they set a date. Now, in those years, it was rather a difficult thing to fill that baptistry. It was dug down into the ground under the little floor of the chapel. They didn't have running water.
They brought it from the river with pails. But they filled up that baptistry. The date had been set, and Dr. Larsha said he would be there. Well, they waited until eight o'clock, and he wasn't there, and they sang a hymn, and then they sang another hymn, and then they read something from the Bible, and finally Ralph realized he's not coming tonight. And that is right. He did not come. Then it was done for another date. And again, there was earnest conversation about this. And they waited and waited.
But that night he did not come. And there was a reason why he did not come. And I'm going to tell you about that tomorrow night. Each day after the morning session, we go back to our room in the lodge, and I usually begin right away thinking about the evening session and making preparations. This morning was no exception. And when we went into our room, Grace said to me, Jim, would you like a cup of coffee?
I said, I would enjoy that very much. Thank you. So as I settled down, began to work, Grace was to make a cup of coffee. But she'd also told me, and I'm going to go just down the passageway and do the wash this morning. So I knew that she was going to be doing the laundry, but she'd promised to make a cup of coffee. So I got into my work. I don't even remember clearly when she left the room. But all of a sudden it came to me I had not received the cup of coffee that she promised. So I put down my books and left the computer and went back into the little room where the kettle was and the wash basin and I plugged in the kettle.
I noticed that it was warm. I thought that was unusual. And I came back really before I got seated. It began to whistle. It was boiling, so I got up and went back and I looked for my cup. And I couldn't find it. Now there are two cups in our room. One is more feminine than the other. One is grace and one is mine. And I'm looking for my cup and I couldn't find it anywhere. I looked up on the shelf, around the sink, on top of the fridge, on the desk, nowhere to be seen. And I thought that was very strange, what had happened to my cup. And then I looked over where the computer was near the window and I saw it on the ledge and I realized that I'd probably left it there from the morning.
And so I went over to get it to wash it out, and when I touched it, it was hot. And I looked in and it was full. And I realized that Grace had made the coffee, and she had brought it to me, and she probably said, Jim, here's the coffee you asked for, and I never heard her, and I don't even remember seeing her. Let me just add to that, and I was doing something very good. I was working with my Bible and my notes and my computer. I'm sure you have the lesson from that incident. We can be involved in so many good things, even in Christian service, and we never really hear the voice of the Lord.
He wants to speak to us. He speaks to us primarily through His Word. Sometimes he speaks to us through the wise counsel of friends. Sometimes he speaks to us through circumstances that surround us in our lives. But he does want to talk to us. But some of us can become so absorbed even in good things that this morning I didn't even hear the voice. of the person I love more than anyone else in the world. And of course, when you think of the Lord Jesus and His desire to talk to us, to communicate His message to us, you can make the application.
We desperately need to hear His voice fresh and powerful every day. I learned the lesson when I was a boy. My grandparents came from the kingdom of Fife. And we have a little paper about the time when they got married. And they left the Kingdom of Fife when they went to Scotland. Which simply means they crossed the river to Edinburgh. But they left the Kingdom to go to Scotland. And they were married. Well, they came over to Canada. And when I was a boy, I would go and spend the summer holidays with them. And I remember once I went to bed at the usual time. I always had my Bible. And I was reading.
The light was on beside the bed. And I went to sleep, and the Bible fell on my chest. And a little later, my grandmother looked in, and she saw what had happened, and she came in and carefully picked up the Bible and closed it and put it on the little table with the lamp. And then she tucked the blanket around me. I'd wakened up by then. And she said to me, Now, Jimmy, listen to me. It's not how much you read. She said, it's better to read just a few verses and meditate on them and receive from them the message that God has for you than to read two or three chapters and not even remember what you read about.
So the Lord does want to speak to us. He just wants us to listen and He'll come to us in His Word and He has messages for us. So we've read in Isaiah chapter six, and I take you back to the portion again this evening, and down in verse eight, you read the words, Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Now when you think of God's word, and again I emphasize, I cannot tell you whether this young man was really a Christian in our terminology, or just one of those professors, as we would call it today, I don't think I'm competent to make that judgment.
But I do know that when you listen to the Word of God, there is a message for those who are not Christians. And it is a powerful message. Most of us are here tonight because God spoke to us when we were not Christians through His Word. And He came right into our heart. and he touched our intellect and our emotions, and he spoke to us. I've seen it so many times in the Dominican Republic, and I've heard the stories of things that happened long before I went to that land. Going back about eighty years ago, there was a young girl twelve years of age, which at that time and in that society, she would be considered almost a young adult.
She was home in this rural house one day all by herself. And two men came and knocked in the door. The door was open. We're in the tropics. And the young lady went to the door and saw these men. And they said, Is there anyone else home? And she said, No, I'm here by myself. Well, they said, We'll just remain here outside of the house. We're Christians. And we're traveling through this area. And we just wanted to share with others what the Bible calls the gospel. And they stood there, and in a very simple way, they shared with her the message that God has for men and women.
She had never heard it before. And she was very much impressed. And then they said, no, we're going on in our journey. We'll be back this way one more time about a month from now. And then, of course, we probably will never be back in this area again. But we'll stop when we come back a month from now. Well, a month later, by that time the mother knew what had happened, and the father and the other members of the large family, and they came to the conclusion they're Protestants, and if they're talking about the Bible, they're heretics. And they were not happy with the daughter who had listened to them for a half an hour or so.
but she'd been impressed. They could not shake her. She was interested, and they came back a month later. The mother was home. She was out in the little kitchen, which is like a hut just behind the house. But from the kitchen, you could look through the back door, right through one of the rooms and into the living room and to the front door. And the men came. And the girl went to the door again. And they saw the girl. And behind her in the kitchen was the mother. The mother wouldn't come into the house. But she was pacing up and down and looking carefully towards the front door. Again, they stayed outside. And they talked to her some more about the gospel. And then they said, We want to leave you this little book.
It's called the New Testament. If you can read it or get some to help you read it, You'll find God's message in that book. And that young girl took it. The parents wanted to take it away from her, but she wouldn't let them. She could not read. One or two helped her with some elemental principles about reading. And she got down on her knees. She never prayed before. And she prayed to God that He would help her learn to read so she could read His book. She never learned to read the way you can read. But she was able eventually to read slowly the message of God.
And she read John's gospel, Mark's gospel, and carefully went down. And that young woman by herself in a rural, distant place from any city, she made her commitment to the Lord Jesus. She received him as her Savior. Again, the parents were furious. But in that book, the New Testament, God spoke to that young girl. I have to summarize the story. She eventually saw her father, then her mother, and her many brothers and sisters, all one to the Lord. When she married, she had fifteen children.
One died at birth. Fourteen grew to adulthood, and they all married. They were all Christians. And we were with them, that lady and her husband, for their sixtieth wedding anniversary. They had one hundred grandchildren and one hundred and six great grandchildren. I can't speak for all of them, but many of them are in the assemblies today in Santo Domingo. And it happened because God spoke to a young woman through His Word and brought her to the Lord Jesus. and into the kingdom of light and love. I could spend so much time telling you stories.
Here's one I must tell you of a man who came to my door. And he said to me, I need work. I'd seen him in the services. At that time we lived in the reeds home. They were home on furlough. There was quite a large yard. I said to the grace, maybe we can let him sleep and let him work in the yard and give him food. And so he began to work. And I said to him one day, are you a Christian? Oh, yes, he said. I said, how did you become a Christian? Well, he said, I was a prayer man. Now, he could not read or write, but he memorized the prayers for the dead. And whenever anyone died, they called for him.
His name was Crispiniano. And he would come and he would sit there for hours and hours reciting the prayers for the dead. His mother lived in another community. He heard something about her becoming a Christian. He did not understand it, and shortly afterwards she died. And he said to me one night, I had a dream. And in the dream, my mother said, there is a book you should read, and the book is the Bible. He said, I'd never heard about the Bible. But I began to make inquiries and eventually I obtained a Bible, and he could not read.
But he was determined to read, and he learned to read slowly the Word of God, and he became a bright Christian. I'm not sure what you think about dreams of that nature, but in my own experience, I've often found that God deals graciously with those who cannot read, and often in special ways, pumps them to read His Word. This man read His Word. The last time I saw him was in Santo Domingo, he was a very senior citizen. He never wavered in his commitment to the Lord Jesus. When he read that book, God spoke to him and radically changed him. There are so many things that remind us of the power that you find in the Word of God.
If you're a non-Christian, The first thing his word does usually is destroy you. Now don't be alarmed by that term. Think of Paul outside of Damascus. When he saw the Lord Jesus and the Lord Jesus spoke to him and identified himself, his whole world collapsed. The man was devastated and destroyed. And then God did a new and beautiful work. And he became the great apostle that evangelized the eastern end of the Mediterranean and really cracked the foundations of the Roman Empire. You can think of others.
I had a Dominican mother. Her name was Donia Hulia. She was a religious woman in her little house. She had a tremendous altar. I'm speaking kindly, filled with the pictures of the saints and also with the candles. Her neighbor next door took ill. And every day at four o'clock she noticed that a foreigner came and knocked on the door and went in. And she wondered who the foreigner was and what he was doing with her neighbor. Well, it's quite easy to find out when the partitions are made of cardboard. So she put her ear against the wall and she heard words she'd never heard before.
She became so curious that one day she picked up her chair, walked out, stepped into her neighbor's room and sat right beside him till the foreigner came. His name was Duncan Reed. And he came in and he read the Bible. And she heard it for the first time. I summarized the story. She made that decision. She received the Lord Jesus. And then she went. She didn't do it disrespectfully. She dismantled that whole altar. all her previous life was gone. And she became a pioneer missionary on the northern coast of the Dominican Republic, the founder of a beautiful church today in Rio San Juan.
God spoke to her, destroyed the previous life, and then did a very beautiful work. If you read Missions Magazine, some years ago there was the story I wrote as a tribute to George Wiseman from Angola. He told me the story of Sakuka. He was a diviner. He became ill. He couldn't help himself. Other diviners couldn't help him. He knew there was a medical station where he might receive help. It took a great deal of courage for a diviner to go to the evangelical mission, but he went and they helped him. They gave him a little hut where he could live on the compound. He was there for weeks and every morning he listened to the Word of God.
He never really had listened before. And one day in the hut, all by himself, he received Jesus into his life as Savior and Lord. He didn't tell a son, a soul, not one soul. He knew there are things I have to do before I talk to anyone. And when he was released, he walked back about ten kilometers to the village where he lived. And when he arrived, there was a commotion. The diviner was back. He was the honored citizen of that little community, and he went into his hut, and there in the hut he had the sacred basket. He knew everything that was in it.
The rabbit's tail, the chicken foot and comb, the leopard's tooth, the whisker from a line, the beads and the little idols was all there. And he was a master in his years. He would juggle that basket until the pieces fell the way he wanted them to fall, and then he would pronounce his judgment often against someone who was completely innocent. He was a master of juggling that basket. But that day he looked at them, and he took them all outside the hut, and he put them on the ground with sticks. and everyone in the little neighborhood was watching him wondering what in all the world was doing and he set it on fire and stood there where what represented his previous life went up in smoke they knew something radical had happened to that man and then the first Sunday he walked back to the mission compound and on Sunday morning there were three hundred people gathered together And he went in, and there was stunned silence when they saw him.
He just sat quietly, and at an appropriate moment that morning he stood up, and no one moved or said a word. And as he stood there, he said, I've come to tell you that I was a sinner deeply in need of salvation, and Jesus Christ has come into my life and cleansed me and saved me. Again, there was stunned silence, and then the joy of heaven descended on those three hundred people, and there was a great moment of rejoicing. How did it happen? God spoke to him. Through his word, he destroyed his past life, and then he created something beautiful.
Most of you are not in that situation. You are Christians tonight, but God speaks to us. He wants us to understand His character. We've sung about it tonight. He wants us to understand what He is doing. He wants the Word of His Son to dwell in us richly. Now, when you think about this, I'd like to ask the question, and it's based on the words of Judas, not Iscariot, the other disciple by the name of Judas. For He said to the Lord Jesus, Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us and not to the world. It's a very important question, and the Lord Jesus answered him and said, If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.
Now before we deal with that, what makes the difference between those who belong to the world and those who belong to God? Well, it's not because we wear a distinctive uniform. It's not because we live in isolation from the world. It's not because we refuse to have television in our homes. It's not because we faithfully attend all the church services. That's not what makes the difference. Rather, what makes the difference is to listen to the words of the Lord Jesus and joyfully be obedient to understand and to put it in practice and then marvel of all marvels, the triune God.
comes down and makes his home in your heart. Listen to what the Lord Jesus said. If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we, Father and Son, will come to him and make our home in him. The Lord Jesus spoke about the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom he would send, and he said the Spirit of truth. who proceeds from the Father, he will testify of me. And Paul adds to that, or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?
It staggers, it boggles the imagination. You stand in awe of the grace of God, that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have that desire, that passionate desire to make their homes in our hearts and in our minds. But it only happens when you hear His Word and you are joyfully obedient to His teachings. There's no doubt about Isaiah, I also heard the Word of the Lord. And you can tell by what follows, there was a very joyful response We've noticed on other occasions that the disciples were so slow to understand the Word of God.
The Lord Jesus began, and He so carefully and repeatedly told them what was God's will. They did not want to receive it. Well, here you have Isaiah, and He was there, and He's listening. He's listening to the Word of God. Now let me raise a question or two about this. He's in the throne room of God. This is the temple of God. His train fills the whole temple. There's glory, there's smoke, there's chance of praise and worship. And now you think about this and you read his response as he listens to the word of God.
And this is what he heard. Whom shall I send and who will go for us. Now my question is, what is this about? You read those few words in verse eight. Whom shall I send and who will go for us? And you're not sure what this is related to. You'd like to have more information. If that's all we have, then we're liable to begin to speculate on what this is all about. But fortunately, in the chapter, you have some indications. You go back to Isaiah. As he faced the glory of God, you read that he said, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.
He recognizes that in comparison, in contrast to the glory of God, This man is in a deplorable state. Then farther down in verse nine, there's a message that comes from God and it reads, and he said, Go and tell this people. Keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing, but do not perceive. A modern translation, and he said, Yes, go. But tell my people this. You will hear my words, but you will not understand. You will see what I do, but you will not perceive its meaning." Now, between those two verses and then the conversation that Isaiah hears, whom shall I send, who will go for us?
It seems to me there is absolutely no doubt that the subject here is the subject of human beings. You have Isaiah conscious of his need, you have the words of God, the people of Israel, and through Israel out to the whole world, are in a deplorable state also. And here you have this man standing in the presence of God like an invited guest. He's there, and he's listening to this conversation. And again, it startles the imagination. You're talking about the eternal transcendent God. And in a sense, You're in that inner sanctum where God dwells.
And what is God talking about? He's talking about human beings like us. You might think that God had so many things to do, so many great and important issues that He would never think of something like this, of human beings, especially in the condition in which we find ourselves today. But He's there. and he's thinking about this. Now I'm going to ask you a question. What he heard, whom shall I send, and who will go for us? My question is, who is this addressed to? Is God speaking to Isaiah?
Well, if he's speaking to Isaiah, then does that mean that the us, who will go for us, means who will go for God and Isaiah? I think most scholars would suggest, no, no, that's not the setting. If you've got a good imagination, let's just take for granted that for some special reason. You are invited to the Oval Office in the White House in Washington. You're not going to participate. You've just been invited and you are present. There's the president and the members of his cabinet, and they're dealing with important issues of state.
You're there. You're not participating, but you hear every word that is discussed. I think that's more like Isaiah six. Isaiah is there. He's been cleansed. His sins are forgiven and purged. He's right now in the presence of God. He stands there and he listens to this conversation. Whom shall I send and who will go for us? Now this is important to me and I would like to take a moment on this. In other words, here's a man listening to God and the subject is not directly linked to him even though it's linked to the human beings in general.
And from that, I would raise one or two questions. Could it be that we only listen to God if we are looking for an answer to our prayers? Then we listen. Do we only expect a word from God when we need to make a decision? Then we look to God and see if He has a word for us. But this last question is the most important question Do we have any interest in other matters that lie close to God's heart, that may not be directly related to you, but things in which God has a passionate interest?
It seems to me that Isaiah, who's now right with God, cleansed and purged, He stands there and he's listening to the conversation that's going on in the wonder of the Godhead. And he listens attentively. It's good to listen. I was one of four boys and I was brought up in a generation where children were seen and not heard. But we were never, never left out. Almost every Sunday, missionaries and preachers and guests from our local church would come to our home. And the four boys, we always had a place at the table.
We were not prohibited from speaking. But you wouldn't speak unless you had something really you wanted to say that was important. You spent most of the time listening. And so often the conversations dealt with issues that did not really touch us. But we listen, sometimes fascinated, and we heard about so many things from the Bible and about God and about Christian missions. Well, here's Isaiah in the presence of God, and he's listening to the great issues that fill his mind and heart. Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?
And in the general context, you have the failure of Israel. We've seen the failure of Isaiah, now restored to God. You look through this people called Israel, and you know that God wanted them to be a witness to the whole world. They also failed. And God is saying, now whom shall I send? And who will go for us? It is something of great importance. And I've jotted down these words. This is in the throne room of God. Human beings are not incidental. or accidental to God's great purposes. Human beings are central to the issues that lie close to the heart of God.
It may be difficult to understand this when you read your newspapers and you know what goes on in your nation and around the world But God has a passionate interest in human beings. This is one of the first lessons I think Isaiah learned, that close to God's heart is the whole world of human beings. There's no other way that I'm able to interpret or understand some of the great verses of the Bible. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. We don't have to be university graduates to ask the question, why would God do that for the world of human beings that we know, because He has a passionate interest in us.
What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us, He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, There are so many verses like that, and you sense that in God's mind and heart, in those very inner beautiful places where God dwells, He's thinking about human beings. Now we've noticed the chant of the seraphim. I go back to it again briefly tonight. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of His glory. I don't think for a moment this is the glory of creation.
You don't need to have messengers if you're talking about the glory of creation. Furthermore, Paul makes it very clear in Romans one, that message was rejected. What is the glory then that God wants to fill this world with? It's the glory of His character. It's the glory that tells us what He is like. It's the glory that shares with us His longings for human beings. This is the glory that He wants to fill the earth with. And in our generation, what a beautiful thing to realize that around the nations of the world today, even in some of the most inaccessible places, you're going to find men and women, many of them young, and they are witnessing to the love and the wonder and the grace of God.
This is the glory that God wants to see in our world, and those involved in missions today have a real part in taking that message. The voice then comes, first of all, about Israel. There's a warning, but in the warning there's a spark of hope. Farther down in the chapter, you're going to find that it's linked to a stump, and the stump will eventually burst out in life There's going to be renewal. It's all in chapter six. But we're going to close our meditation tonight, remembering that when he stood in the presence of God, Isaiah heard that foremost in God's mind was his interest in people like us.
And God does not change. And I think it's evident, we'll notice it tomorrow night, that Isaiah picked up that passion. And for the rest of his life, he's dedicated to the service of God. And he's reminding Israel, you were to be witnesses to the whole world. You failed, but God will send a special messenger. And he will be a light to the Gentiles. He will take salvation through the ends of the world. And this man caught that vision. It governed his life for the many years that he lived. Only God knows tonight if it has governed our lives if we feel that heartbeat have gone.
I've seen this. I've seen it so often in my country. Let me close with one or two illustrations. A young woman worked for us. A young man took a fancy to her. He was not a Christian. And the young woman said, don't come back here again because I'm a Christian and you're not a Christian. But every night around six o'clock, When we looked out the window, the young man was standing at the gate, and this went on and on. She said to him one day, well, if you want to walk with me, you can walk with me to the church, but you've got to stay for the service, and then you can walk me home. And that's how she got him to the services.
And that's where he received what we would call a gospel tract. But then he went to his church, and he came back with his literature, and there was an exchange of literature for weeks. from one to the other. I was there in the night when he sat in the audience and a friend of mine was preaching the gospel and this young man stood up and he came to the front and he received the Lord Jesus into his life. The young woman wasn't sure. She thought it might be a conversion of convenience. Some time went by until she was convinced and then they were married in our home. And we had a very beautiful moment with them.
Two years later he came to me, he said, Mr. Cochran, I've just resigned my position in the central bank. I said, what? He said, yes, I know it was a good job, but I turned in my resignation. And I said, what did you do that for? Well, he said, I came from that community up in the central part of the Republic. It's called Tenaris. That's where my family live. That's where all my friends are. and we're going to go back there and we're going to live there and we're going to preach the gospel in my hometown. He did that and we went to visit them within the first year they were there.
They had a small home. The largest room was the living room. It was set aside to be the chapel. That's where they had the meanings and that's where they began. It wasn't easy. But before the Lord called him home some years later, suddenly, two churches had been founded in that place. And how did it happen? Here was a man who heard the word of the Lord. The word of the Lord that highlights the importance of human beings and God's interest in them. And he left a good job. And he went there and he preached the gospel of the Lord Jesus. When I think of cases like that, even though I'm a missionary, I feel sometimes a little bit ashamed of what others have done in my country to take the gospel.
But every case I see like that, I know I'm looking at a modern Isaiah who heard the word of the Lord. And what is God talking about? Whom shall I send? Who will go for us? And here's a young man, and we'll see it tomorrow night. He jumps up, so to speak. Here am I. And he went and he did the will of God. Let's take our hymn books as we conclude our service, and we'll sing a verse or two of hymn number four hundred and thirty-one. Hymn number four hundred and thirty-one. Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart, not be all else to me save that thou art.
Thou my best thought, by day or by night, waking or sleeping, thy presence, my light, The second verse, Be thou my wisdom, and thou my true word. I ever with thee, and thou with me, Lord, thou my great Father, I thy true Son, thou in me dwelling, and I with thee one. Let's stand and sing the first two and the last verses of four hundred and thirty-one.