Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hey, I tell you what, the ladies on the creative team leave for one week and they got a boom chuck going on up here like it's a full on hoe down during worship. I gotta say I'm here for it. That's amazing.
[00:00:14] Praise God for that.
[00:00:16] If you haven't noticed, if the room looks a little light today, it's because our women's retreat is going on right now. They're finishing that up right now. And so actually, before we jump into it, I'd love for you guys, join me in just a real quick prayer. Let's pray God's blessing and the move of the Spirit over our ladies who are at the retreat right now, that God would speak and bring spiritual growth and breakthrough to those who need it as he ministers to us here in the space. Jesus, we thank you so much for the gift of brotherhood and sisterhood spiritual family, we thank you for our sisters who are on retreat this weekend. We pray that you would speak to each and every one of them individually as their heart needs, even today as they're finishing out their time. God, I pray that you would bring them conviction, you would bring them encouragement, you would bring them spiritual breakthrough to move them to the next steps in their faith of growth, of maturity, of dependence on you. God, we pray that there would actually be just a revival and vitality that pours out of that time spent dedicated to you and actually pours into the rest of our church and into our community. God, we love you, we trust you for these things. We pray in your name. Amen.
[00:01:25] Today we are continuing our series in Matthew. It's been a hot minute. If you don't remember, we're going through the Gospel of Matthew.
[00:01:35] We've been off for a month and a half, a little more than that, almost two months. While we took some time to do a couple short series on discipleship and then on prayer, and I don't think we could have picked almost like the Holy Spirit's in it, I don't think we could have picked a better couple little short topical series to help prep us and send us into this next section of Matthew. I am hyped for this. I think it's going to be really good. If you weren't here last weekend, by the way, I do want to say this bit. So last weekend, to kind of cap off our prayer series, we didn't do a normal Sunday gathering, we did just a prayer and worship gathering. And if you missed it, man, I'm sorry, it was just so stinking good. But I also want to encourage you to let you know, man, we just really saw God move in our midst, god moving our church through that. And we are going to make that a regular part of our practice on Sunday mornings several times a year to set aside time just for prayer, worship, celebration together as a church family. So if you missed last Sunday, you will get another chance to experience that aspect of life here at Emmanuel. So today, though, we're jumping back into Matthew. So if you don't have a Bible, you can grab a house Bible. They're around you under the rows. Feel free to snag one. If you don't own a physical copy of the Bible, by the way, I would strongly encourage you to just take that home or talk to one of our pastors and we'll get you a nicer one. But we're going to be in Matthew chapter ten today.
[00:03:02] Matthew chapter ten. While you guys turn there, I'm going to give us a quick reminder of what's going on in Matthew, what we're stepping back into. So, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. These are the four gospels in the New Testament. Each of these four books are focused on telling about the life, the message, the ministry and the work of Jesus. Each of the four Gospels tells the same story with different emphasis and different perspective. The life, the ministry, the work, the words of Jesus. Matthew is really unique. I mean, each of the four Gospels is unique, but what makes Matthew unique is the way he chooses to structure the story. Matthew is actually less concerned with a chronological telling of the story and more concerned with a thematic telling of the story. And so Matthew organizes his telling of the life of Jesus by going back and forth between these chunks of narrative of story and then these long discourses or these sermons from Jesus. And what you'll see is that even though Matthew is generally organized chronologically, he makes several chronological choices where he will group narratives together by theme based into what sermon he's about to go into. So we saw that Matthew opened with these narratives, talking about Jesus'miraculous birth, his childhood, his initial calling into ministry, the unique message Jesus was proclaiming, the Kingdom of God has come near. And that led into the first discourse, the Sermon on the Mount, jesus's most famous teaching, where he digs into, this is what the life of the kingdom looks like, this is what it looks like that the Kingdom of God has drawn near, that man is invited into God's kingdom. Then, after the Sermon on the Mount, we stepped into a series of miracle narratives that describe Jesus'early ministry in Galilee as he's traveling around this northern part of ancient Palestine, preaching in the villages. And these stories are almost universally concerned with a mixture of the practical work Jesus was doing, that he was healing the sick, casting out demons, cleansing, doing miraculous signs, and the teaching work he was doing because Jesus always partnered them together. He proclaimed, the kingdom of Heaven is drawn near, and then he would meet all the needs around him. This chunk of narratives came together in the end of chapter nine, the last Sunday we spent in Matthew. We closed out chapter nine. And in that chunk, there's this moment where Jesus'ministry has become well known enough that massive crowds are gathering around him. And there is this line where Jesus, he looks out and he sees all the people and he sees their immense need. He sees how needy the crowds are, not just physically, by the way, although there's lots of physical need, illness, poverty, injustice, but also their spiritual need, sees their lostness. He sees how the curse has affected these people he loves so dearly. These people he made in his own image, right? And it ignites compassion in him. In verse 36 of chapter nine, we read, when he, he being Jesus, when he saw the crowds, he felt compassion for them because they were distressed and dejected. They were like sheep without a shepherd.
[00:06:29] Jesus's ministry grows as he continues to do his work. As more and more and more and more and more and more people gather, jesus's compassion for the hurt, the need, the lostness around him is ignited. And chapter nine ends with him calling his disciples and saying, look, don't you see what I see? Don't you see all this hurt? Don't you see all this need?
[00:06:53] And he says, the harvest is plentiful. There's plenty of ministry to be done. It's the workers who are few.
[00:07:01] When chapter nine ends with this really striking line.
[00:07:06] This is verse 38.
[00:07:09] Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out more workers into the field.
[00:07:17] It's interesting that Jesus's call to his apostles isn't like he doesn't guilt them and slam them and go, don't you see all the work to be done? Get your butts out. No.
[00:07:26] He calls them to look upon the world as he looks upon it, to see the need, to see the hurt, to see the spiritual blindness. And he says, Pray to God. Pray that God would raise up people to meet this need. And that's where we paused in Matthew we're picking up today, starting in the beginning of chapter ten. And chapter ten is going to transition us out of a chunk of narrative and into another discourse, another teaching of Jesus. And this is often called the missionary discourse or the missional discourse. This is Jesus'sermon on what it means for his followers to be missionaries, to preach the Gospel, to seek the lost, to join him in the ministry of loving and seeking those who desperately need the Gospel. And he's going to begin this discourse with this really short narrative where he's going to call together the apostles, the twelve apostles, and commission them to join him in his practical ministry around Galilee. What we're going to see over the course of the next several weeks in Matthew is just this continual theme about mission. It's going to be the same theme, beloved, Jesus has called you if you were in Christ, and not just called you, he has, by His Holy Spirit, empowered you to join him in the work of the kingdom. This is what we're going to be continually challenged with for the next several weeks as we work through chapters 1011 and twelve.
[00:09:08] Jesus has called all of his children and he's empowered them by his spirit to join Him in the work of the kingdom. See, one of the things you see, Matthew doesn't focus on it as much. But if you go and you read this section of the narrative through Mark's lens, mark does a really good job of focusing in on how overwhelming the work was for Jesus. Now that's a phrase that probably doesn't sit super well with a lot of us, but you have to remember, Jesus chose to do his ministry in the form of a human being with human limitations. He lived as a man in human history, right? And he had a human man's limitations. And Mark really focuses in on that idea that as his ministry grew, the crowds grew so immense that Jesus could not keep up with the ministry. He couldn't keep up with it. There was too much need, too many people crowding in. There's this interesting progression, the way Mark tells it, because Jesus sets up his home base in the city of Capernaum, in this house, that's where they go back and they break. And as Mark starts, they go to that house and they sit and they chat. And at first a few people from the community come and sit and listen. But it gets to this point where Mark says, actually the next time they came to the house, they had to pick up all the furniture and take it out of the house because there wasn't enough room for everyone to fit in. And then he goes, actually, the next time they came to the house, the people gathered so much, they squished in so much, they were standing outside and filling the windows. That a couple guys who wanted Jesus to do. A miracle for them. They climbed up on the roof and cut a hole in the roof of the house and lowered their friend down to kind of force Jesus to engage. And then the next time they came to the house, there were so many people and they wouldn't leave so much. So the apostles, they never even were able to sit down and eat a meal because there was just so much need, they just had to skip eating for a day.
[00:10:59] The ministry gets to the point, the need gets to the point where Jesus can't keep up with it. And you see in our text in chapter nine, it breaks his heart, his compassion for these people. They are distressed and dejected. They're sheep without a shepherd. They desperately need the kingdom of God. They desperately need the ministry of Yahweh to his people.
[00:11:21] But there's just one Jesus.
[00:11:24] So he says, pray to the Lord of the harvest. Pray to the Lord of the harvest. But what we're going to see as we step into chapter ten and as we progress through this discourse is a little bit of a dangerous thing, a little bit of a dangerous proposition, but I think a beautiful one. And that's this beloved, as Christ pours into you, he pours out of you.
[00:11:44] We say that every time we gather together as a church, but it's so true.
[00:11:49] The amazing gift of the gospel must not terminate on you.
[00:11:56] It must not and it cannot.
[00:11:59] There is too much grace, there is too much love, there is too much goodness in the heart of Christ for you, for one soul to hold it in. It demands to be shared, it demands to be given freely to all who hunger and thirst for life. You can't contain it. There is too much goodness in the Gospel for you to hoard it unto yourself.
[00:12:27] You're incapable of doing so.
[00:12:30] And as you experience Christ, as you genuinely experience the gospel, as Christ comes in and not just forgives you of your sins, but sanctifies you and replaces your sinfulness with his righteousness and grows you in his likeness and grows you in holiness, and you begin to find real life and real freedom and real movement and real purpose in the gospel. You will find that you can't keep it to yourself.
[00:12:53] It's just too good. It's just too good.
[00:12:58] So when Jesus ends chapter nine, and when we spend a whole series talking about prayer and how we should pray to the Lord of the harvest to send workers in the harvest, how we should pray for the lost you got to be careful when you say yes to that, beloved.
[00:13:12] Because when you begin praying for the real gospel need in the planet within which you live, if you begin praying for the Lord of the harvest to send workers into the field to seek and save the lost. When you begin praying for others to receive the grace you have received, you are going to find that Christ calls and empowers you to meet that need.
[00:13:34] You are going to find as you continue in prayer that you are the one Christ is calling and empowering to join Him into the work, to invite more folk into the amazing grace of the Gospel that saved you. It's a wonderful thing. It's also a scary thing. That's what we're going to talk about for the next several weeks. So Matthew, chapter ten, starting in the first verse, read with me beloved.
[00:13:59] Summoning his twelve disciples. He gave them authority over unclean spirits to drive them out and to heal every disease and sickness. These are the names of the twelve apostles. First, Simon, who was called Peter and Andrew, his brother James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother Philip and Bartholomew, thomas and Matthew, the tax collector, james, the son of Alphaeus and Thaddeus. Simon, the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him. Jesus sent out these twelve after giving them instructions.
[00:14:30] Don't take the road that leads to the Gentiles, and don't enter any Samaritan town. Instead, go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel as you go proclaim. The kingdom of heaven has come near. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse them from leprosy. Drive out demons. Freely you received, and freely you shall give. Don't acquire gold, silver or copper for your money belts. Don't take a traveling bag for the road or an extra shirt, sandals or a staff for the worker is worthy of his food. When you enter any town or village, find out who is worthy. Stay there until you leave. Greet a household when you enter it, and if the household is unworthy is worthy, let your peace be on it. But if it is unworthy, let your peace return to you. If anyone does not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that house or that town. Truly, I tell you, it will be more tolerable on the Day of Judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town. And this, beloved, is the word of the Lord for us today. Pray with me, church.
[00:15:32] Jesus, we ask this morning as we take a few minutes to begin to think about and consider Your Word, specifically in regards to what it means to join you in your mission. God, I pray that you would give each and every one of us tender hearts to hear from you today.
[00:15:49] Lord, I fear that so many of us have allowed ourselves to grow cold and complacent and content in hoarding up the Gospel for ourselves.
[00:16:03] It is so easy to simply enjoy the benefits of Christian life, to build our friendships and our connections simply amongst each other, to enjoy the fellowship of the church, to enjoy the gift of the Gospel, and to just live a sheltered life.
[00:16:22] Lord, I pray that you would challenge us afresh today.
[00:16:26] Give us your eyes to see the world, to see the need around us, to see the reality of lostness and hurt. And God arouse our compassion, just as yours is brought up by this need.
[00:16:40] God, call us into the work. Challenge us into the work. Send us into the work with you.
[00:16:46] God. We love you, we trust you for these things. We pray them in Your name. Amen.
[00:16:52] So the missional discourse starts with Jesus commissioning the Twelve Apostles to join him in the work.
[00:17:02] You notice this is a direct continuation of the need that Jesus identifies and prays over at the end of chapter nine, right, we just looked at 937. The harvest is plentiful. Pray to the Lord of the harvest to send more workers into the harvest. What we see here immediately is that missional prayer. Prayer for the lost births, missional movement, going and seeking the lost beloved.
[00:17:29] When you pray for the lost in your life, when you dedicate yourself to considering those who you long to come to know Christ, whether that is kids and grandkids and spouses and family members or friends and neighbors and coworkers and classmates. When you give yourself over to praying for the lost, do not be surprised when Jesus sends you to minister to them. When Jesus begins to give you opportunities, non awkward opportunities, beautiful, supernaturally created opportunities to join Him in the work, to proclaim His Gospel boldly to those in desperate need of Him.
[00:18:09] Pray for the people you love. Pray for the people you long to see come to know Christ, and then get ready, because Christ will use you in those prayers. He will use you in that ministry.
[00:18:21] This text, by the way, reminds us of the importance of understanding the difference between a descriptive and a prescriptive text. That's a little bit of kind of a seminary kind of phrase, but it's an important one for us, and it can create a lot of confusion with texts like this. Talking about whether a text in the Scripture is descriptive or prescriptive is asking the question, is this text describing something that happened in history where we saw God move? Or is this text prescribing something that we as Christians right now should do? That's a really important question, right? Some who claim to follow Christ would say every single word of the Bible is prescriptive. If you read it in there, you should do it. That's a little problematic when you read stuff like, oh, I don't know, that guy broke Sabbath, so kill him. That's stuff where we instead go, no, I think that was describing a unique moment in Redemptive history, right? We're not going to go kill our neighbors because they were gathering firewood on Saturday morning.
[00:19:15] It's an important question to ask, is the text prescriptive or is it descriptive? And I think what you're going to see as we look at the missional discourse as a whole is that Jesus'teaching over the next couple chapters is very prescriptive. He's speaking pretty bluntly and directly to his church. This is what I want you to do, church. But he opens, matthew opens with this narrative describing Jesus'first commissioning and calling and sending of his followers to do the work. And what I would argue today is that this text is descriptive. We're seeing an example, a contextual, historical example of what it looks like for followers of Jesus to be commissioned, empowered, and called into the work of going and seeking and saving the lost. And we're not meant to copy and paste Matthew ten one through 15 directly into our lives, but that doesn't mean it's not instructive. I think we're actually going to see some really important principles for how we engage mission in this text. I'm going to point out four specific things. What we're going to do is I'm going to walk through this text, we'll look at kind of the historical picture of it, kind of put together the narrative of what's actually going on. And then I think that'll point us to four really specific and important principles for how we engage in mission. And what I think you'll actually see in the coming weeks is that these four principles are going to play out very specifically in Jesus's teaching as he moves into the actual sermon here. So let's work our way through this and see what we actually see. So what's actually happening in this text? Well, closing out chapter nine, jesus has identified this immense spiritual need in Israel, right? The harvest is plentiful, the workers are few, and he has called upon all of his disciples, not just the twelve, all of his followers to join him in prayer to the Lord of the harvest. Our text opens as Christ calls out twelve of his disciples to be apostles. If you've heard that term before, the term apostle and disciple are not interchangeable terms, although we use them that way sometimes. The disciples were all the people who followed Christ. There were a lot more than twelve people who followed Christ. The apostles. The word apostle means sent one, commissioned one. These are the twelve men Jesus specifically chose to send into a specific work. And they bore out pastoral Elder authority in the early church immediately following Jesus's resurrection. This is a special thing Jesus called these guys to, but it's still a good example of what we understand of us to be called into the work. So Jesus calls twelve of his larger group of disciples to be his apostles and they are to go and do the work that they've all been praying for God to accomplish, right? Pray the Lord of the harvest, send more workers in the field. Jesus is like, okay, we've all been praying, hey you twelve, let's do this. And he sends them notice what Jesus commissions them to.
[00:22:09] They're directly continuing Jesus's work and ministry. If you go back and you read these narratives in seven, eight and nine, and then you look at what Jesus is calling these twelve guys to do, they are directly continuing his work, his ministry, not just the work he does, not just the ministry or the message he proclaims, but both of them. They're to stay in Galilee, right? They're not supposed to go into Gentile communities or Samaritan communities. He restricts their ministry at this point just to that region in Galilee, around the Sea of Galilee, around Capernaum, where Jesus has been ministering. They're to do exactly what Jesus was doing.
[00:22:54] They're being called essentially to be emissaries of this rabbi Jesus. They're to proclaim his message, repent and believe, for the Kingdom of Heaven is drawn near and they're to do his ministry. What has Jesus been doing? Well, he's been healing the sick, he's been casting out demons, he's been performing miracles. He sends them out in pairs. And these pairs are direct emissaries of Christ. They're operating in the authority of Jesus doing the ministry of Jesus and proclaiming the message of Jesus, right? And look at the specific instructions he gives them on how they're to travel. This is where it gets a little weird for us, because a lot of this stuff just doesn't make a huge amount of cultural sense to us. They're not supposed to charge anything for their ministry. They've received freely from Jesus, so they give freely. Now, it's important to note here in ancient Palestine, traveling exorcists and traveling faith healers were surprisingly common, was a normative practice within Jewish culture for folks to roll into town claiming to be rabbis who had the ability to cast out demons or heal the sick, and they charged for their services, right? There's actually a story in the Book of Acts where a group of these traveling exorcists hear how successful the church is in casting out demons. So they try to do their ministry in the name of Jesus, even though they don't know him, and the demon calls them out. It's super creepy. It's like something out of a horror movie. The demon's like, I know Jesus, and I've heard of Paul, but who are you? Right? And then he beats him up. It's nuts. But this kind of thing was normal in that day. Normal for traveling exorcists and traveling faith healers to go town to town and claim they could do miraculous things, and they charged money for it. And so Jesus says, that's not what we're doing. You receive the gospel freely, and so you will give the gospel freely. You will not charge any money. You won't collect any money. And then they're not supposed to pack any extra supplies, right? Don't pack your bag and take it with you. Don't worry about taking an extra pair of shoes or a change of clothes. Instead, trust that God will give you what you need to do for this specific work. Trust that God will provide for your needs.
[00:25:13] This is a really interesting thing to consider, especially when you think about how we consider, like, mission trips and mission work now, right? That's not how we tell our Columbia. We don't tell our Columbia team, hey, guys, you don't need to fundraise and you don't need to pack any bags. Just show up at the airport. God will take care of it. We don't do it that way. Right?
[00:25:35] We do things a little differently. We fundraise. We actually plan out the trip. Very specifically, we give them a two pack list, right? We need to remember there's a different kind of ministry, a different time. Our short term mission trip isn't for ten people to go walk around St. Louis county and proclaim the gospel to people in public and sleep in their living rooms. If it were, we might do it a little different, right? We're calling people to get on an airplane and go to Colombia or go to Malawi or whatever. And so it looks different.
[00:26:06] Notice this whole bit about seeking out hospitality, staying in the community as long as you're welcome to stay in the community. This is an interesting bit. You have to remember, ancient Palestine was an honor based culture. And in honor based cultures, hospitality is generally held as a deeply ethical necessity as a chief good. And this is true in almost all communities. If you showed up in a community where you were a stranger, people who had the means would open their home and open their resources to take care of you. They give you a place to sleep, they'd give you food to eat. Hospitality was a deeply important part of ancient Palestinian culture. Now, obviously, someone can outstay they're welcome, right? They can stay long if the person's like, hey, it's been great, it's been real, but you keep eating my food and you don't do anything, so you need to leave. And so Jesus gives some really specific instructions here. He says, when you travel, don't go where you're not welcome.
[00:27:03] Use wisdom, use discernment, trust the spirit. Stay at the place God opens up to you and stay there as long as it makes sense. Don't overstay your welcome, but stay there as long as God opens the door for you and preach the gospel as long as God opens the door for you, and as soon as it stops making sense, get out of town, right? And then he even gives them this kind of bit. He ends by assuring them. They don't need to know or worry if their message or their person is rejected. They don't need to worry about that because the people they're ministering to, they'll bear their own responsibility for accepting or denying the gospel message of the kingdom, right? He says, don't worry about that. If it goes bad, if they don't want to welcome you, if they don't like you there, just shake the dust off your feet and move on. God is good. It'll work out. And that's basically it. It's a relatively simple story Matthew is telling of the commissioning and sending of the twelve. And it's interesting, right, because Matthew spends the least amount of time on this narrative of any of the four gospel writers. He's actually much more concerned with using this narrative to transition into this larger teaching on mission and evangelism. So he kind of moves through this part of the story pretty quickly, significantly quicker than Mark or Luke does. But there's still some really cool challenges in this narrative that I think we need to explore, not just because they're going to be good for us, but because it's really going to set the stage. It's kind of like he's giving us an outline of Jesus's teaching over the rest of this sermon. And so I want to walk us through four aspects of this narrative that I think are really instructive for us as believers today, seeking to be obedient to Christ, to join with. Him in the work. But before we do that, can we just take a moment to celebrate the actual gospel message that Jesus and his church proclaims?
[00:28:59] A text like this can be really mechanical. It can kind of push us into strategic thinking of like, well, how do we best get out there and preach the Word? And that's good and beautiful and right there's definitely a place for that's what we're going to talk a lot about. But we can't do that and move past the beauty of the actual gospel that's being proclaimed. I mean, look at the message that Jesus gives them to give. The kingdom of heaven has drawn near.
[00:29:29] What a beautiful phrase. Beloved, we could spend our whole time discussing and considering the amazing grace of that sentence.
[00:29:37] We sinners cannot approach the King on our own.
[00:29:42] Our rebellion, our sin, our brokenness, removes us from Him. But the love of God is such that Christ Himself approaches us.
[00:29:53] He comes down in human form. He steps into human flesh. The holy and righteous God of the universe brings the kingdom of God down into the monk and mire near to us.
[00:30:06] He makes a way for us. He approaches us truly. The love of our God is amazing, beloved. He gives to us so freely. The very grace of God is poured out to us freely with no cost.
[00:30:22] All who thirst for the well of the holiness of God are invited to come and drink deep. Can we amen that truth.
[00:30:32] What a gospel. Beloved, this is why you can't help but share the gospel.
[00:30:39] This is why we say as Christ pours into us, he pours out of us because it's that good.
[00:30:45] Because God is so good to us. The gospel is too wonderful to terminate on us. There's too much grace for us to hold it in and keep it to ourselves. If you are being filled with the gospel, love and grace of Jesus, if you are finding your life, your freedom, your growth, your purpose in Him, it will pour out of you.
[00:31:10] You will share it. In fact, if you're here today and you're struggling with some guilt, some conviction because you're like, man, I don't want to share the gospel. That's not really something I think about day to day. The first question you should ask yourself is, if you're actually finding your life in Christ, is Christ actually pouring into you? Are you actually increasing in love and affection and experience of the gospel and dependence upon him? Because if you are, you will share experiencing the gospel of Jesus begets mission. Period.
[00:31:46] It's that good.
[00:31:48] It's that wonderful. Guys, we know this.
[00:31:53] But you talk about the stuff you love.
[00:31:57] You do.
[00:31:58] You may not go out and cold call sale and knock on the doors of your neighbors and be like, hey, let me tell you about this awesome new video game I've been playing. But in the context of your circle of influence in your family, in your friendships, with your coworkers, with your neighbors, with the people you hang out with, you will talk about the things you love, period.
[00:32:20] It's how humans are designed. We're communal creatures. Our circle may be small, it may be big, but we love to talk about the things we love.
[00:32:29] And if you're increasing in your affection for Christ and increasing in your experience of the Gospel, you will share it.
[00:32:36] So what does that actually look like? What can we learn about mission from this text? Let me land us by walking through four principles for everyday mission that I really see in this text.
[00:32:51] The first one is this beloved, God has called you and empowered you to this work, pure and simple. If you are in Christ, you've been called to mission. You've been empowered for mission. Matthew ends in one of the most famous texts in the Bible, matthew 28. The Great Commission says this all authority has been given to me in heaven on earth. Go therefore, and make disciples of all nations. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I've commanded you, and remember, I am with you always to the end of the age.
[00:33:21] Beloved, this Great Commission is for all believers, all of us.
[00:33:26] We're not the apostles, we're not those twelve, but God has called and equipped all of us to join him in the work of the kingdom.
[00:33:37] It's so important to remember this. You don't have to achieve some special level of spiritual maturity to join in the work. You don't have to show up to a certain number of discipleship classes so you can sign your membership agreement and okay, cool. Now I've hit it. Now I can go on a mission trip. Now I can be on mission. No. If you are saved, if you have received the grace of Jesus and had your sins forgiven and had the righteousness of Christ poured into you, then you have been anointed by the Holy Spirit and you have the calling to do the work.
[00:34:08] Period.
[00:34:10] Throughout the whole of the New Testament, we see how as soon as people meet Jesus, they begin to talk about Jesus.
[00:34:17] They receive the ministry of the Gospel and they see how good it is, and they go and they talk about it. Because, beloved, that is how we're wired.
[00:34:27] We talk about what we love. If you're passionate about Jesus, you'll talk about Jesus. And beloved, you can I know even as I say this, many of you are like, that sounds awesome, but I have no clue what I would say. That sounds too awkward. I don't understand theology. I don't know the Bible well enough. What the heck would I even say to a lost person? Beloved, I have good news for you. You have the Holy Spirit. If you're in Christ, you've been anointed by the Holy Spirit. If you're in Christ. He dwells within you. The Spirit that rose Christ from the dead dwells within you as the believer. The Spirit of God can raise dead bodies.
[00:35:10] I think he can guide your conversations.
[00:35:14] In fact, Jesus tells us that tells us the Spirit will remind us of things we've forgotten, will put new thoughts and ideas and convictions and challenges, will teach us more about Christ. The ministry of the Spirit helps guide you on mission.
[00:35:30] Absolutely. Point number two, if you're going to be on mission, you have to engage whole people, which means you have to meet real needs.
[00:35:41] James 215 and 16 has this passage, this stark warning for us as believers that I think is helpful says, if a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, go in peace, stay warm, be well fed. But you don't give them what the body needs, what good is it?
[00:36:00] It is the same way with your faith. If there are no works to back it up, it is dead by itself.
[00:36:07] Praying, right? Oh, be well fed, be blessed, but not seeking to meet the immediate physical need. Hear this, beloved, is an insult to the prayer given.
[00:36:21] Praying for the needs around you, considering the lostness, the hurt, the neediness of the impoverished, the injustice, those suffering from illness, those suffering from wrongs done to them, those under the weight of traumas, praying for those things, but doing nothing to physically meet the need to engage and help the hurting and the lost. Beloved, it is an insult to the prayer given.
[00:36:48] Because people are whole people.
[00:36:52] They're real, they're complex. If you are joining in the Gospel work, you will work with real people who have really been affected by the curse, their own sin and the sin of others. The brokenness of the world will leave them in deep need. Beloved, you must know that we worship a God who created whole people and cares for whole people.
[00:37:16] We worship a God who doesn't just spend his energy saving souls, he's in the business of saving his creation.
[00:37:26] Body, mind, soul, whole people.
[00:37:30] Look at our narrative. The apostles were sent to meet real needs. Now, you very likely won't be called to go cast out demons and miraculously heal the sick like they did. Although, hey, the Spirit leads, who am I to question his work? You should still give him your radical yes, if he tells you to do something crazy, right?
[00:37:51] But even if that's not what your ministry looks like, if you're joining with Christ to seek and save the lost, you will face real needs.
[00:38:03] You will build relationship with people who are struggling with their mental health, who are crushed by anxiety, fear, depression, broken relationships, broken marriages, rebellious kids, poverty, addiction, sickness, injustice. These are real and present effects of the curse.
[00:38:23] And beloved, God will use you.
[00:38:28] God will use his church. God will use you to speak gospel life into these real areas of darkness, real areas of need. If you go throughout church history, is this something so easy for us to forget as modern Westerners? Because what we've done in modern Western society is we've taken the ethics of Christianity and said, these are pretty good. We just need to get rid of all that Christ stuff. And we've built secular societies based on Biblical ethics without any of the authority of Christ to back them up. And so we think things like social safety nets are good and right and moral in and of themselves.
[00:39:07] But if you become a student of history and you explore world history and Western history and church history, what you will find is that charity as we know it was birthed from Christian conviction.
[00:39:20] And guys, that's not me. Like trying to say, look how awesome the church is. That's just true.
[00:39:26] Christian conviction is what invented things like orphanages.
[00:39:31] Christian conviction is what invented things like work week limits and child labor laws and voting rights and soup kitchens.
[00:39:42] Christian conviction has sought to change the world, to make it better, to alleviate the effects of the curse, to fight the reality of the curse in the way evil and injustice and sin destroy lives that are precious to Christ.
[00:39:58] That's Christian conviction that has created those things that we assume are normal, and we assume they're secular ideals, but they're not. They're not.
[00:40:08] You can't justify those things apart from Biblical ethics. And I'm dead serious. Do the work and try, try and use a totally atheistic ethic and justify the existence of an orphanage. You won't be able to. You won't be able to. It is Christian ethics that push human beings to help the hurting. And the reason that is true is because God cares about whole people.
[00:40:35] He's not detached from your real physical need. Guys, heaven is not going to be some detached, ethereal, spiritual reality.
[00:40:43] Heaven will be real and physical.
[00:40:47] It'll have places of plants and tastes and smells and textures and bodies.
[00:40:55] God designed those things, and he designed them good, and he's redeeming all of them.
[00:41:01] And if you join Him in the work, yes, you will proclaim the Gospel to lost souls in desperate need of Him. But you will also join Him in fighting the effects of the curse and meeting real and present needs in front of you. Third, you got to trust God's provision for the mission.
[00:41:17] Luke 1211 and twelve verse this text where Jesus is encouraging his followers to not lose heart when they face persecution. But he says something that's important for us today says this whenever they bring you before synagogues and rulers and authorities, don't worry about how you should defend yourselves or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that very hour what must be said.
[00:41:36] Beloved, you are empowered by the Holy Spirit, which means the Spirit will give you the words, the Spirit will make a way for you. The apostles were know don't pack money, don't pack extra clothes, right? And we already said that looks different for us because we're not doing the same kind of missions, right? But what it tells us is this there's a principle here that's really important if you were doing God's work, you can trust for God's provision.
[00:42:00] If God has called you to the work, he will make a way for the work.
[00:42:05] God will give you opportunities to share the Gospel as you pray and seek Him. God will give you words of wisdom as you boldly choose to speak out when you pray for the lost around you. Don't be surprised when all of a sudden you start noticing opportunities for casual conversation about important things. And guys, when you finally make that jump and you choose to be brave and you go this may destroy this friendship, but I'm going to tell this person how much Jesus loves them. And you make that bold move. Don't be surprised when the Holy Spirit empowers your words and anoints and speaks through you and you go I don't know where the heck that came from. That was beautiful.
[00:42:41] You can trust the Lord's provision for the Lord's work. The Lord will give you connections and resources as you seek to meet real needs. The Lord will make a way for you to actually obey Him and to be on mission. You can trust God, it's his work. Beloved, he is the one who is seeking and saving the lost.
[00:43:01] You are simply giving an obedient yes to join him in the work he's already doing. And lastly, here's what we'll land out today. Because don't try and make people believe the Gospel. You can't you can't do that work. Two Corinthians four has one of the starkest warnings for believers in the New Testament so important for us says this therefore, since we have this ministry talking about being joining God in the work, because we have this ministry, because we were shown mercy, we don't give up. Instead we have renounced secret and shameful things. We don't act deceitfully, distorting the word of God, but have commended ourselves before God to but commending ourselves before God to everyone's conscience by an open display of the truth.
[00:43:49] Verse three. This is really good. But if our gospel is veiled, people who here don't understand it, it's veiled to those who are perishing because in their case the God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the Gospel, the glory of Christ who is the image of God. We are not proclaiming ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your servants for Jesus'sake. For God who said let light shine out in the darkness, has shown in our hearts to give the light of knowledge of God's glory in the face of Jesus Christ.
[00:44:24] Guys, spiritual blindness is a reality to those who are perishing. The gospel is foolishness.
[00:44:32] Without the intervention of the Holy Spirit, spiritually dead people stay dead.
[00:44:40] Dead bodies do not intervene for their own benefit.
[00:44:45] They don't. They're unable to.
[00:44:48] The blind do not understand what they look at.
[00:44:52] They're not able to.
[00:44:54] Apart from the intervention of the Holy Spirit, the spiritually dead, the spiritually blind will remain spiritually dead and spiritually blind. You do not have the ability to convince someone to love Jesus.
[00:45:10] You can't do it. You're not strong enough. You're not wise enough. You're not powerful enough. And when you think about the people you love, when you think about your kids and your grandkids, when you think about your neighbors, when you think about your extended family, when you think about your spouse, that truth is heart wrenching because you want something so desperately for someone and you lack the ability to make it happen.
[00:45:38] Guys, it's true. It's true.
[00:45:41] It's why Christ instructs them and says, hey, if they don't want the Gospel, don't worry about it. Move on.
[00:45:48] Shake the dust from your feet and move on. Because everyone bears their own responsibility for how they engage the Gospel. You can't make it happen, but here's what you can do.
[00:45:59] You can be faithful.
[00:46:01] You can never cease to pray.
[00:46:04] You can never cease to faithfully proclaim when the opportunity presents itself. But beloved, you must trust the outcome to the Spirit of God Himself.
[00:46:13] He is the one who must intervene, who must rapture their heart, who must open their eyes and put breath in their lungs. He is the one who can give them the gift of faith to hear the Gospel and understand and choose. And apart from his intervention, you are powerless to bring about that outcome. You just are.
[00:46:32] Which goes back to a really beautiful thing.
[00:46:36] God's really good and he's trustworthy. And you can trust Him to empower the work. Chris, you want to come back up? I'm going to invite us to Land with a really simple idea.
[00:46:47] Jesus closes out this text by telling them to expect hardship, expect rejection, expect that not everyone will hear the Gospel and accept it and receive you. It'll be rough. People you love and care about will reject the message, and you will be treated poorly for your choice to be bold and to proclaim it. I know that's not a great sales tactic to get you, like, involved in the mission, but it's true. And you guys all have access to Google.
[00:47:19] You can go read about the lives of the twelve apostles and we read this narrative and it's this beautiful moment, and you see Jesus naming them by name and sending them to the work. And when they come back from the work, they're like, oh my gosh, Jesus, this is nuts. Demons obey us and people are getting healed and people are coming to you and it's like high fives all around. And it's amazing. It's kind of this highlight, but you got to know it actually goes pretty bad for the apostles later.
[00:47:48] They all died terrible death.
[00:47:51] Terrible death.
[00:47:53] Even the Apostle John, who wasn't martyred, who lived old age, spent time in solitary confinement, spent time exile, was tortured multiple times.
[00:48:04] It didn't go good for the apostles in a physical, earthly sense.
[00:48:11] Each and every one of them died for the sake of the Gospel, persecuted by governments, publicly executed, killed by people in the wilderness.
[00:48:20] We only know the fate we actually only know the fate of twelve of the 13 apostles. It's weird. There were 13, but you know, Judas and then they replaced him.
[00:48:31] One of them went off to Thaddeus, went off to preach the Gospel and just I don't know, he died somewhere in India.
[00:48:40] They don't know what happened.
[00:48:43] It's rough.
[00:48:46] These guys paid a big price for the sake of the Gospel in an earthly sense.
[00:48:51] And it's important to hear that guys, because what I'm going to challenge us with today as we start off this time in Matthew, thinking about what it means to be on mission. All I'm going to ask you to consider today is this what does it look like for you to pray for the lost?
[00:49:05] I'm actually going to challenge you to something really specific in just a minute. We're going to take a few minutes to pray like we always do before we go into communion. And I'm going to ask you guys at your seat to very specifically consider lost people in your life, to name them. Heck, if you want to grab one of those prayer cards from the back and you want to write their names down, if you want to open up your Bible and write their names on the inside cover, I want you to put pen to paper or your finger to your phone for your notes app, right? And I want you to consider lostness.
[00:49:42] Consider what it might look like for you to commit to pray for those in your life who need Jesus to make that a part of your normal spiritual rhythm, to bring those names up and say, lord, the harvest is plentiful. Send workers, proclaim the Gospel to my daughter, proclaim the Gospel to my cousin, proclaim the Gospel to my neighbor. Lord, do that work, save them, please.
[00:50:05] I want you to genuinely consider that.
[00:50:08] I'm going to ask you to do it actually, but I end by telling you about the kind of rough fate of the apostles because I want you to count the cost if you join with Christ in the work, if you begin praying for the lost. It's like the spiritual version of if you give a mouse a cookie.
[00:50:30] Don't be surprised when Christ gives you opportunities to proclaim the Gospel to the lost in your life.
[00:50:37] Don't be surprised when the Holy Spirit empowers and anoints your words and you proclaim the Gospel so clearly and so beautifully that you actually see lives changed.
[00:50:48] Don't be surprised when he calls you to newer and bolder expressions of the faith. And you get on an airplane and you fly to a different country and you pray, walk, and preach the gospel. Don't be surprised when the Holy Spirit builds in you an actual passion for the lost.
[00:51:05] Your compassion rises up and you care and you weep in your prayers for those who you love and long to see them. Come to be Christ, come to know Christ.
[00:51:14] And don't be surprised when it's difficult and it costs you and it actually affects your comfort in an earthly sense.
[00:51:26] But beloved, I promise you, it's worth it.
[00:51:32] The gospel is worth it. So take a few minutes.
[00:51:36] Join with me in prayer. Consider the loss in your life, and I want to encourage you. Before you leave this space today, write down some names.
[00:51:45] Put them in a note in your phone. Write them in the margin of your Bible, grab a card in the back and write them down. Write down some names kids, grandkids, family members, coworkers, neighbors.
[00:51:56] Join me in praying for them.
[00:51:59] Love it. Let's take a few minutes to hear from the Lord and then we'll continue on worship you. It's.
