Sammy Tippit
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First Person is produced in cooperation with the Far East Broadcasting Company, who rejoice in the stories of changed lives through the power of Jesus Christ. Learn more at febc.org. When people say, I'm going to follow Jesus no matter what, I think God will do something great. When you have that on a national scale, a church scale, or a community scale, then you see revival take place. ♪

And he knows more than a little about what a spiritual revival looks like because he's been seeing it happen in multiple countries of the world.

You'll meet Sammy Tippett on this edition of First Person. Welcome, I'm Wayne Shepherd. Glad to have you tuned in for this interview. We bring you a new one each week with the goal of introducing you to people who are following God's call on their life. Every person has a story to tell, and we get to highlight many of them here on the program. To review any past program, just go to FirstPersonInterview.com, click on the red listen button, and choose from hundreds of past programs. That's FirstPersonInterview.com.

Also look for us at facebook.com slash firstpersoninterview. Sammy Tippett and his wife Tex founded what is now known as Sammy Tippett Ministries in 1970. Now having worked in over 80 countries as an evangelist, teacher, counselor, and pastoral trainer, Sammy has had a front row seat to what God is doing in the world.

We spoke online recently, and I asked him to tell us his first-person story. Well, you know, my ministry began in Monroe, Louisiana, where we experienced my wife and I had just been newlyweds, just been married for a year and a half. And we experienced a great revival and issued a call for revival and walked across America and

And we pushed a wheelbarrow and went to many of the SEC universities and call for revival on those university campuses. And we saw God move in a mighty way and ended up in D.C. And then we said, you know, we want to go somewhere in the U.S. where

Uh, we can make a difference in lives of people. And there were people doing things on the West coast. David Wilkerson was doing thing with people on the streets in New York city. And Chicago was a place that I didn't know anything about it, but the Lord just put Chicago on my heart. Didn't know anyone there. Yeah. Wait a minute. A guy from Louisiana ends up in Chicago. Yeah.

Yeah. Just through prayer, you know, I just praying and thinking about the country and saying, Lord, we're,

what can we do? And the Lord just, you know, Chicago just kept coming. The only thing I knew about Chicago, you know, I became a Christian in 1965 and this was 1970. And I knew that there was this famous evangelist named D.L. Moody who had started a church and a Bible institute there in Chicago. And that's about,

the extent of what I knew. And, and so, uh, I, I went with a friend one day, we just drove to Chicago and the only place we knew was Moody church to go to. And we went to Moody church and I met some students from Moody Bible Institute and told them what was on my heart. And they, it was in the summer, the end of the summer, and they were renting this big house and the highest crime rate area of Chicago. And they were getting ready to go back to school and,

And so they were doing ministry there. And so they left that and said, you can take over the house and rent it. So my wife and I moved into this big, it was an apartment complex, rented this thing out and started going on the streets and sharing Jesus with young people who were on drugs, who were in gangs, who were, you know, runaways, you know, all sorts of people that were in trouble.

dire need. And we started sharing the gospel and we saw God just work in a tremendous way during those days. We need you back in Chicago now. Yeah. Well, I arrived in Chicago around 74 to work at Moody, Moody Radio, and became aware of you, but

I became aware that you were plying around this place, this mysterious place called Eastern Europe. And it was also mysterious to us at the time and close to us at the time. But somehow you found your way there. And how did that all come about? I have to say, and I'm not just saying this, but really everything has come through prayer.

When we were in Chicago, the ministry grew. We ended up with a staff of about 13 people full-time working with us. And every morning we would have a staff meeting and we would start our staff meeting with a prayer meeting. And we had a big map of the world and we would just take one country and we would pray for that country. And we were praying for West Germany at the time. And we were praying for God to move and work there. And as we prayed,

It was just like this burden came on me for Germany. And I didn't, again, didn't know anyone in Germany, didn't speak German. And one of the other staff members had the same thing. So when everybody went about their business to do the work and ministry and all, we stayed behind and just prayed all day, just praying and talking and praying and talking and dreaming about, could we go to Germany?

And finally, I found a list of English speaking pastor of missionaries, basically in West Germany and their phone numbers. And I call one of them and I told him, I said, you know, I'm in Chicago. This is who I am. This is what we're doing. But I just have a burden to come to Germany and preach there.

And he asked me, he said, well, do you speak German? I said, no. He says, do you know anyone here? I said, no. He said, well, you know, probably it's not a good thing to do. And I said, well, okay. You know, just trying to follow this burden on my heart. Well, two weeks later,

Uh, I received a letter from him in the mail and he said, right after I had called him that there was an article that came out in the German newspapers about our ministry in Chicago. And, and he read it and he said, would you come speak at a pastor's conference here? All right. So, so I ended up going there and, and this was an incredible story because our son had just been born. He was two months old and we flew to Frankfurt changing planes to go to Munich.

And as we were changing planes, my wife said, Sammy, take the baby. And this German voice says, Sammy, Sammy, tip it. And we just landed. I said, what? And I said, yes. And he says, I said, who are you? And he says, my name is Volker Spitzer. And I said, okay, who is Volker Spitzer? So he began to tell me that he was a pastor in West Berlin.

And that, uh, a guy had come through, actually a guy from Chicago had come through, uh, West Berlin and gone to his church and told him about our ministry in Chicago and asked the church to pray for us in their church.

for had been praying for, for our ministry in Chicago. And he heard this American girl say, Sammy, take the baby. And he says, I just wondered if it might be Sammy Tippett. So there we were on the plane. He invited me to come to West Berlin. And of course, when I went there, you know, I, my wife and I would go to the Berlin wall, you know, that, that surrounded East Berlin. And, uh, it was like a giant prison cell and we would go there every day and we would pray.

And say, God, let us somehow reach these people. And finally, through one of the church members of Vocart,

they told me of an old Lutheran pastor that they knew. And so they said, you can go visit him. I went to visit him. He couldn't preach because he had been arrested by the Nazis and the communists wouldn't allow him to preach. And I went and sat down and he began to tell me, he said, next year, there's going to be a hundred thousand communist youth from around the world gathered here to be trained to reach the world for atheism and communism.

And I want you to pray about coming and telling them about Jesus. Wait a minute. He's in East Germany. Yeah. He's in East Germany. Oh, okay. And he's telling me this. And I said, that would be impossible. And he said, with men, it is impossible, but with God, all things are possible. You pray about it. And he said, I believe because it's going to be this international thing that they're going to try to show freedom, showcase freedom, which no one has. So this may be the only moment in which,

The gospel can be preached freely. And he says, you pray about it. So I went back. I prayed about it. Two friends of mine and I ended up coming back to East Berlin. We went to West Berlin, stayed at a retreat center and would go daily, get a 24-hour visa and go there and share the gospel. And we ended up leading about 200 hardcore atheist young people from around Eastern Europe to Christ. Well, we begin to follow them up.

And as we followed them up, they had gotten involved in churches, and the churches began to invite us to preach. And at that time, the only thing that people did was smuggle Bibles. But we were actually doing evangelism. And so it became an adventure for the next, well, until today. And it spread throughout Eastern Europe, not just East Germany. Right.

That's correct. We went to Poland, Czechoslovakia. We ended up in Romania, which is where we walked into a situation where God was sending revival. I mean, it was like what you read in the history books of just this great move of the Spirit of God, but great persecutions.

that was taking place. Christians lost their jobs, went to prison. There were a number of people who had gone to prison. Some even were killed. And so we really developed a close relationship with the Romanian church. Yeah, I remember some of those stories, sure. Yeah, and we did incredible things during the days of communism. And then when

Everything began to collapse because we had gone in for so many years. We were trusted by the believers. And so during the days of communism, I would go in and there weren't churches that would hold the people. People would be flowing out into the streets.

But when we went back after freedom came, there were not stadiums that would hold the people. And so it was just, it was amazing to see what God did. So God just really thrust us throughout all of Eastern Europe. And then as the freedoms came, that was, you know, the doors opened into other countries and brought us internationally. We'll continue talking with Sammy Tippett to learn what God is doing around the world coming up here on First Person.

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My guest is Sammy Tippett. Sammy has spent his life in service to Christ as an evangelist, a teacher, a counselor around the world. As a matter of fact, when we're done with this interview, you have a broadcast interview where? In Iran. And I've been broadcasting into Iran for a number of years, but we have a live broadcast now that we're doing in Iran. We started about a year ago.

And at the very beginning, we had about 30,000, 30 to 40,000 viewers. And our last report that we got just last week was we now have over 1 million viewers. We have reports about the growth of the church in Iran. You're validating that, right? That's correct. I mean, the church is the fastest growing church in the world right now. God is moving in a tremendous way. Great suffering, great persecution.

but great revival. One of the things that I have noticed is that where there's great persecution, there's great revival. Yeah, true. And I think part of it goes back to the cost of discipleship. The Western world, oh, do you want to follow Jesus? It's not a big deal, although it's becoming a bigger deal. But in those places, if you decide to follow Jesus, you know you may go to prison or

You may lose your life. You may be beaten. I actually have a discipleship group that I meet with on a weekly basis in Afghanistan. And the guys in that discipleship group, one is on a walker right now because he was beaten and left for dead.

And the other is in hiding. Another one of the guys is in hiding with his family right now because of the thing. But to follow Jesus, it costs. It costs to follow Jesus. And I think when people say, I'm going to follow Jesus no matter what.

I think God will bless and God will do something great. And when we make that decision to follow Jesus, and when you have that on a national scale or church scale or community scale, then you see revival take place. You've always been sensitive to go where God wants you to go. And Henry Blackbee used to say, find out where God is working and join him.

And you've been the embodiment of that, Sammy. We're going to take you a different part of the world now. What's happening in the church in South America, the growth of the church there? Well, you know, we have been working for a number of years. We've had a partnership with Brazilians and the multiplying church movement there and also the Brazilian Baptist Convention.

I'm telling you, it's just really exciting to see the vision and the growth that they have. And their multiplying church movement there has been just incredible. And I've been able to mentor a number of their leaders there.

And to see what's happening among them, they're experiencing church growth. They're seeing people come to Christ. They're seeing churches that were dying being renewed and rejuvenated. And it's just really exciting. And behind the U.S., Brazil...

is now the largest mission sending agency, maybe South Korea, you know, and, and Brazil have become the, the, the, the largest missionary sending agencies in the world. That's amazing. Because as, as God is moving and working, the church is not only growing numerically, but it's growing, I think spiritually and with depth as well. And, uh, as, as a result of that, uh, you know, they're taking great responsibility and, and,

and everything. I had a couple of Brazilians in my office yesterday who came through here, and they joined me in my India discipleship group, and they were telling the Indians about some of their friends who were in India as missionaries. Wow, we're getting whiplash around the world here. Well, this has been going on in your life for what, well over 50 years now, probably more like 60 years, right? And do you ever get tired of

Oh, I'm getting more rejuvenated as the time passes because the opportunities are greater and the...

to be able, you know, what I was doing when I started in Chicago and now I'm able to do, you know, like I was mentioned, I have four discipleship groups, one with Chinese, one with Afghans, one with Brazilians and one with Indians. And this is every week I'm talking about that I'm meeting with people where before, you know, I couldn't do anything like it. Plus I'm preaching evangelistic meetings online. So technology has enabled me

me to do more than ever before. Before, if I did an evangelistic event in India, I would have to fly there for a week or two weeks, and then it'd take me a week of getting over jet lag, come back home, then I've got another week or two to get over jet lag, and then I can start up again. But now, I can preach like I did last week, preach an evangelistic event in India, and the next day, do it

speak to one million people in Afghanistan. Wow. As you connect with these groups, I would imagine you draw energy from them. They encourage you with their own stories of faith and discipleship. That's got to empower you as well. It works both ways, doesn't it? Yes, it does. And that's what I mean by being rejuvenated myself because, and each one of the groups are different. They have different personalities, different circumstances. You know, my Afghan guys, you know,

The guy who is on a walker, he didn't show up for our discipleship meeting for a couple of weeks, and we were concerned. What happened? I'm online, and he wasn't doing his discipleship lessons, and we didn't know what had happened. And finally, he shows up.

And he says, oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't get my lessons. I couldn't attend. He said, I was in ICU. You know, I was beaten and left for dead. And I was in ICU. And man, you're just going, oh, my goodness. You know, and you're just.

inspired by his life to follow Jesus and to grow in Jesus. And then I get with the Brazilian guys and they're just all excited, you know, and going great guns. And then I yesterday meet with my Indian guys and, and they're, they're, uh, they're, they're very reserved, but they're each one are telling about people that they've led to Christ. And, and, you know, and it's just, uh, it's just, uh,

a blessing, each one with a different type circumstance and personality, but all with the same common love for Jesus. And so four days a week, I get to be revived through these guys. Yep.

You're not getting frequent flyer miles, but you're getting a lot of satisfaction, aren't you? Take us to Scripture, Sammy. What's on your heart? What's the Lord been teaching you personally these last few days and years? Well, in the last three years, 2 Timothy 2.2, the things that you've heard from me in the presence of many witnesses and trust of faithful men,

who will be able to teach others also. And this spiritual multiplication through discipleship has really gripped my heart. When I was a pastor in Germany, I pastored for eight years and I was a pastor in Germany. God burned that into me. And we saw him work through just personal small group discipleship. We saw God work in a mighty way. And as I went back into evangelism, um,

I saw one of the great needs in the church around the world was for discipleship. And there has always been this conflict between

between evangelism and discipleship. You know, the guys who are evangelistic say, Hey, you know, you guys who are discipleship, you're missing it. You're not reaching people. The guys who are discipleship say, well, you're just reaching people and you're losing them because you're not discipling them, you know, and, and this lack of balance and the Lord really laid it on my heart to create something that would be balanced. And so, um,

I was asked actually by the Romanians and the Iranians to create some kind of discipleship platform for them. And so prayed about that. And so that's what we began to do about two years ago. I shared it with our board and for a year we worked on it. And actually what was pretty cool about it was we built this platform. It was built by Romanians.

in the town where the revival started. And, uh, so anyway, Romanian engineers there and, uh, when it facts, the CEO of the company, uh, what had interpreted for me at one time. So anyway, we, we built this platform in multiple languages. We now have it in 10 languages and it's in, um, uh,

It's a discipleship platform, and it's built for new believers. You know, Moody Bible Institute, and I've thought so much about my ties with Moody over the years, but Moody Bible Institute, D.L. Moody, when he started that, it was started for men in the gap, for laymen to be able to minister to these new believers. And I think in the heart of an evangelist, which I am,

You see this need that you have this professional clergy that it's good and it's needed. That's ministering to the whole body of Christ. But there is this gap where people who are new believers that don't understand everything that we talk about, what we're talking about right now, that they need something to help them to grow. And so the Lord put it on my heart.

to create this digital format where we could cross borders, we could cross language barriers, and we could make disciples of the nations. And so we've done that. And that's the big thing on my heart right now. We started it a year ago. There were four of us. We now have right at a thousand leaders now.

And it's not built for leaders. It's built for the new believer. But before we can get to the new believer, we have to create leaders to lead those new believers. So anyway, we have right about 1,000 believers.

And when I talk about these discipleship groups, that's what I'm talking about is these are all pastors and leaders that we're discipling. And then they're going to, we've got the system built to where then they can take everyone through what we brought them through and then it can multiply out. And it will no doubt multiply, sparked in part by today's first person guest, Sammy Tippett.

To learn more about Sammy and the ministry God has called him to, please visit FirstPersonInterview.com. We'll place a link there to a very helpful website explaining the vision Sammy has to train the next generation of Christian leaders all over the world.

There's another group of young Christian leaders that is being trained for ministry. The Far East Broadcasting Company has identified young in-country leaders who are poised to make a difference for the kingdom and is investing in them with special training. You can learn more about this program and much more that FEBC is doing to reach the world for Christ by visiting febc.org and click on Stories. You'll be able to listen to the podcast until all have heard when you visit febc.org.

Now, with thanks to my friend and producer, Joe Carlson, I'm Wayne Shepherd. Thanks for listening to First Person.