Clay Hearn’s sermon during Send Conference at Emmanuel College

During the Wednesday night service of SEND Week 2010 at Emmanuel College, our good friend and fellow missionary, Clay Hearn, preached a powerful message that challenged every single person in the auditorium. We want to you have the chance to take part in this service also by providing you with his sermon notes. Get ready to be challenged by a word from God!

Introduction: Sudan – South Sudan

1. Largest country in Africa

a. Divided by north and south

b. 155 tribes and languages

i. Various levels of development

ii. The predominant tribe we work with is not developed at all

2. Devastated by war

a. 21 years of fighting

b. Peace treaty in 2005

c. In last 60 years only 15 years of peace

i. Peace is relative

ii. Violent clashes between ethnic groups fueled by the Islamic north trying to destabilize the region

d. Heading back to war

i. Tanks are beginning to appear

ii. Military build up

3. Very little infrastructure

a. Dirt roads, difficult to travel on

b. No electricity

c. No water

d. Healthcare is virtually nonexistent

i. Where I live there is one doctor for about 150,000 people

ii. In an emergency it usually means that your time is up, you’re checking out

e. 98% illiteracy rate in Southern Sudan

f. 34% of children don’t reach the age of 5

i. Malnutrition

ii. Malaria

iii. Typhoid

iv. Meningitis

v. Or many other diseases that you have probably never even heard of

g. What’s more is the AIDS/HIV pandemic

i. Preliminary studies are daunting

ii. Kenyan friends of mine have been researching all across Southern Sudan

iii. If their projections hold true, Southern Sudan will among one of the most infected countries with HIV/ AIDS in the world

iv. This means the clock is ticking, time is running out for many Sudanese. In three to five years we will begin seeing the effects of this pandemic, because unlike other places in the world, there is no treatment for AIDS or HIV. There are no Anti Retro Viral medications available, there isn’t even any support care. I mean they can’t even manage the symptoms properly. They will simply die.

h. Sudan has been labeled the largest Humanitarian Aid effort in world, Thousands of organizations have poured billions of dollars into rebuilding the infrastructure. (Schools, Clinics, Roads, Agricultural projects)

Yet there is no visible impact of all this aid. People are still hungry, they are still sick, and they are still without hope. What I’ve learned is…their only hope is a Savior.

4. My job has been to work with the IPHC

a. Planting churches

b. Building and administrating schools

c. Operating feeding programs

d. Running a medical clinic treating patients who would otherwise have no access to healthcare

e. Specifically I work with the Toposa tribe – they are 200 years behind

f. And with help from Hope4Sudan and countless supporters, the IPHC is establishing a foothold in Southern Sudan taking the Gospel to an unreached and hurting people group

You don’t have to go to Sudan to find lost and hurting people. They come in all forms all colors and from every part of the world. I want to take you on a quick journey across our planet to show what other people are doing.

First I want to take you to one the farthest places you can go from Franklin Springs…South East Asia. I want to take you to Cambodia... Cambodia is rated as the 103^rd poorest country by the IMF, World Bank, and CIA. The people are destitute and organized crime reigns supreme. According to the United Nations “In 2002, the average age for entering into commercial sex trade within the Svay Pak brothel district outside Phnom Penh, Cambodia was 12.9 years for girls and 12.3 years was the average age for the boys”

In the midst of it all you find Sammy Lamanilo. Among other ministries, Sammy is reaching out to single mothers and children. Sammy works with women who think their only choice to survive is to sell their children, often for just fifty dollars. He encourages the women to keep their children and helps them support and feed them, and provide the care they need. He is rescuing women and children in the name of Christ. But you won’t find anything about Sammy in a Google search or on the internet. Cambodia is a closed country and he’s not even allowed to be there as a missionary.

Now I want to bring you a little closer by a couple thousand miles. In Spain, artist and missionary Linwood Berry is reaching out in a different way. While most people in Spain at least have food on their table and their physical suffering isn’t nearly as severe, they are no less in danger of eternal suffering because they don’t know the message of Christ.Linwood, among other things, is operating coffee houses. In these coffee houses he displays own artwork. Elaborate paintings and drawings and in each piece of art is a hook. Something that begs the question, “What inspired this picture?” Suddenly he has opportunity to share what the Lord has done in his life and to communicate the message of the Gospel. Through his unconventional methods, he is winning hearts for the Lord and rescuing the lost from the enemy’s camp.

You’ve already heard about Sudan so Africa is covered and you heard about Latin America earlier from Matt talking about Haiti. Let’s come a little closer to home.

My good friend Charles Powell has started an organization called the Mercy Movement. He is seeking to expose human trafficking in the United States and rescue women from its clutches. He recently has been investigating various cities around the US and what he has found is unthinkable. You can read about it in detail in the latest issue in Experience Magazine. But I was talking to him this morning… And Charles is making a stand.

Finally, let’s come to our very own Northeast Georgia. As in EMT working through college, I witnessed another side of our community that most people are oblivious too. People are just as lost, and just as hurting as anyone because they don’t know the hope that we know about. They are trying to fill the holes in their hearts with worldly things that lead to pain, death, and destruction. Students at Emmanuel are reaching these people with the help of Chris Maxwell and Margaret Turner through Women’s outreach, after school mentoring programs and many others.

These things are just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much more I could tell you... Look, the reality is, a war is raging and it’s on a global scale. The enemy has come to steal, kill, and destroy. But our King has come to give life, abundant life. And our King is calling us into action, He’s calling us to fight, He is calling us to fight for Him, for the hurting people, for the lost people. It doesn’t require a ministry degree or call to preach, The world doesn’t need just another preacher. It doesn’t need just another doctor, or just another teacher. It needs the children of God to stand up and say I will fight for my King. I will fight for the broken and the hurting. And the Lord promises to be with us, that we never have to go alone.

The world needs preachers and doctors and teachers and businessmen and women , artists and musicians journalists and every other profession to say, “I will go Lord, whatever it takes, I will go” We must take the Gospel to the nations not with just our words but with our lives. Make no mistake, it will not be easy. It will not be quick. But the Lord promises to go with us, to never abandon us. And if you read the end of the book, then you already know how things are going to turn out…we win. So… our King is calling, its up to us. We are the next generation. Will you fight for Him? Will you go? What will you do?