and through the last great conflict. To every soul will come the searching test, shall I obey God rather than men? The decisive hour is even now at hand. Are our feet planted on the rock of God's immutable word? Are we prepared to stand firm in defense of the commandments of God in the face of Jesus? Brothers and sisters, I had the opportunity to work in an independent ministry in the United States. And I started at a very low level position there. And for whatever reason, was allowed to end up as one of the leaders there. And during that time period, this message of Daniel 11, 40 to 45, started to go forth from that ministry. And I got invited to go to South America. And I met a brother there that came with us in order to translate my message into Spanish. And him and I, it was one of those things that we've all probably experienced, where overnight we were best friends. And this brother is closer than a brother now, even though he lives in Colombia. His name's Tico Restrepo. And I can tell you many things about Tico. But one of the things that was really hard for me at that point is he and his dad, who is a pastor, Pastor Restrepo, and his other brother, David, have two ministries in South America. Tico runs the one in Colombia. His brother, David, oversees the one in Venezuela. Pastor Restrepo is usually traveling and speaking. But I was pretty familiar with the two main ministries, self-supporting ministries in the United States, how they operated, at the top levels of how they operated. And I went down, and I met these poor South American brethren. And I seen how they operated their ministry. It was like night and day. They walked by faith. It was such a rebuke. Every time I go down there and spend time with them, it's a rebuke. Here I was from the United States, have all the Spirit of Prophecy books, have all the connections, have access to the money in the ministry that we're in. And in the ministry we're in, we decide if we're going to do a project. Then we decide how we're going to raise the money for the project. And then maybe we move forward. Down there, they just decide, is the project the Lord's will? Period. If it's the Lord's will, then they begin the project. And as you watch the project come together and the Lord bless, it's like night and day. And there's a brother in this room. Well, it was really hard for me to go down here and compare how the ministry I was in with how these poor, humble South Americans were working and then come back, because I was seeing things happen with them that you just don't normally see here. And I told this brother, Steve Dickey, about it. And for whatever reason, when we were working, he had opportunity to go down there, too. And he can give testimony to the same identical thing. These brethren down there walk by faith. And they're obedient, and they're consistent. And the Lord does things for them.