Not a Vacationary

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Amen.
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If you'll take out your Bibles and turn with me to the 14th chapter of the book of Acts.
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It happens.
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We're in Acts chapter 14 and if you'll make your way to verse 19, when we read the Scripture, that will be where we begin.
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Today the title of the message is, Not a Vacationary.
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Now that may seem somewhat confusing, so I will hasten to give you an explanation as to why I have chosen such an obscure title.
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We often think of a foreign missionary as a person who's chosen to undergo an intense personal sacrifice for the sake of the Gospel.
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He's chosen to leave his homeland.
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He's chosen to leave the comforts of his family for the Gospel.
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He's chosen to devote his life to engaging a culture not his own for the truth of Christ.
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He's chosen to even die for the sake of making Christ known where He is not yet.
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His goal is to see men become disciples, and if time allows, to see churches planted.
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However, in recent generations, a new type of missionary has arisen.
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This is a person who goes into a remote area to do social work.
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Instead of sharing the Gospel, he goes to build mud huts or plant gardens or to dig wells.
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He's more excited about seeing the sights than he is about sharing the Gospel.
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He also likes the idea that when he returns home from this missions trip, he will be instantly among the rank of the missionaries and thus become the super sanctified of the church.
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This type of missionary has been derisively referred to as the vacationary.
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And I want to read to you from an article written by Larry Brown.
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Now you say, who is Larry Brown? I don't know Larry Brown.
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Well, you probably don't.
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Larry Brown is a minister in the Evangelical Presbyterian Church who serves as the professor of church history, history, hermeneutics and missions at the African Bible College in Lilongwe, Malawi.
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This is what Larry has to say.
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Quote, Here at African Bible College in Malawi, especially in the months of June, July and August, we get missions trips on top of one another.
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During the peak season, we almost need a cop to direct the traffic.
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Most missions trips I've seen reminded me of Billy Crystal in the movie City Slickers.
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If you've ever seen that movie, that's an obscure reference, but basically they go play cowboy for a week.
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He said these people kind of come play missionary for a week.
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I get negative feedback from the Malawians.
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One student told me that when vacationaries show up at his village and they start taking pictures, it makes them feel like animals in a zoo.
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He goes on to say, In a country with 80% unemployment, they may resent watching Americans do construction work that they might have been hired to do.
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They needed the work.
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They needed to buy airplane tickets.
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One group of 27 American teenagers came out and painted half a building on campus while surrounded by $60 a month Malawian workers.
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Then they got on a bus, went on a trip to view Lake Malawi.
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The Malawians finished painting the building and the teenagers had raised $3,500 a piece to paint half a building.
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The entire trip cost $94,500 to take a group of vacationaries to paint half a building.
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He goes on to say, Career missionaries struggle to raise and maintain the support they need for things like health insurance, retirement.
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When my late wife was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer, we had no health insurance.
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We had to drop it because we couldn't afford the premiums.
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I think about that when I see the vacationaries ride past my house in their chartered buses.
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Finally, he says this, I understand why missions trips are so popular.
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They give American lay people an opportunity to feel like they've done something to save the world without really leaving the comfort zone for very long.
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Upon their return, they acquire the status of heroes of the faith.
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Wow, you spent a week in Africa.
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You're so hardcore.
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I don't think that's what missions is all about, but that's what missions has become in a lot of ways.
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And hey, if you've been on one of these and I'm hurting your feelings today, okay.
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I'm not going to say I'm sorry.
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I'll let you be the one who repents.
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Tony Miano is an open air preacher in California.
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He's an evangelist with Grace Community Church.
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That's John MacArthur's church if you're unfamiliar with that.
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Recently, he posted a video of himself where he was doing open air preaching at the, I think it's called the Promenade.
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It's where people go shopping.
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And there's a bunch of shops and places there in California.
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And he's doing open air preaching there.
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Hundreds of people are surrounding him.
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And there's a small group of people who are deriding him for open air preaching.
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And he starts interacting with them, having a conversation with them.
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And he says to them, well, tell me, they're saying, we're Christians, we're on a missions trip.
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And he said, you're on a missions trip.
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That's great.
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Who have you shared the gospel with today? We don't do that.
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We show them Jesus.
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They were dressed like everybody else.
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They were acting like everybody else.
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And they were challenging the only man who was willing to share the gospel.
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They were telling him he shouldn't be doing it.
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We wouldn't even have known they were missionaries.
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The missionaries in quotations.
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Had Tony not forced it out of them.
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Well, we come to the end of Acts 14.
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And you say, why did I talk about this? Well, we come to the end of Acts 14.
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This is the end of Paul's first missions trip.
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This is the end of the first missionary journey.
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And one of the things we're going to note here, is Paul wasn't on vacation.
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He was invested.
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And he invested at great personal cost in the lives of the people to whom he preached.
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And my hope is that as we see this journey come to a conclusion, we get a better sense of what missions is all about.
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Because it has been perverted in our day.
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So let's read verses 19 to the end of the chapter.
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And I invite you to stand with me as we read.
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But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead.
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But when the disciples gathered about him, he rose up and entered the city, and on the next day he went on with Barnabas to Derbe.
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When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.
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And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed.
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Then they passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia.
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And when they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Atalia.
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And from there they sailed to Antioch, where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work that they had fulfilled.
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And when they arrived and gathered the church together, they declared all that God had done with them, and how He had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles, and they remained no little time with the disciples.
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Let's pray.
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Father, thank You for Your Word.
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I pray that You would keep me from error as I seek to preach Your Word.
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I pray that we would understand the purpose of missions and what it means to go and seek a people for the gospel who have never heard.
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May it be that we understand the value of the example of the Apostle Paul and Barnabas.
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And Father, ultimately, that You might raise up missionaries among us.
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Lord Father, we know that it's not the time spent in the mission field, but the purpose.
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Help us to understand that purpose today.
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And Father, ultimately, please glorify Yourself in the preaching.
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Keep me from error as I've asked so many times.
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Open the hearts of Your people to the truth.
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And Lord, if it be Your will, knowing always that there are unbelievers in the midst of us, if it be Your will to save someone through this message, Lord, we would be forever grateful.
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In Christ's name, amen.
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This past week as I was preparing for this message and I was sort of meditating on the concept of missions and what constitutes missionary work and missions trips in general, I decided to go to that great fountainhead of all knowledge, Google.
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And I googled mission trips.
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And I found something that I did not really realize, that it has become somewhat of a cottage industry in and of itself.
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It has become its own evangelical...
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It's part of the evangelical industrial complex, is what I call it.
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It's sort of become part of the machine.
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On Tuesday this week, I googled the word mission trips.
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And the second thing that popped up, big work projects and rocking bands.
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That was the ad.
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The second ad in Google.
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It may be different today.
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Google ads change every day.
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But on Tuesday of this week, that was the ad.
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Missionary work.
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Big service projects.
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And rocking bands.
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That immediately got my attention.
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So I clicked on the advertisement and I went to the Why Choose Us section of their website.
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Why choose this group? We're going to go on a missions trip.
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Four reasons.
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One, big work projects.
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This is what it says.
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No meaningless painting or raking leaves.
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Your students will work alongside our construction team and community members on meaningful projects such as full home builds, home additions, drywall, siding, flooring, and wheelchair ramps.
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Apparently we're making carpenters.
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That's our goal.
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Powerful worship.
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Mission trip meets camp atmosphere as our talented musicians, bands, and speakers lead high energy and Christ-centered worship each night.
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I might have a different opinion as to what is Christ-centered, but we'll leave that.
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Community development.
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Projects are determined by community leaders, not us.
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You will serve alongside and empower local community members, churches, and non-profits as we try to meet the greatest needs of the community together.
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What's the greatest needs? Well, apparently it's wheelchair ramps and drywall.
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Not the gospel.
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Because, by the way, I looked all over for the gospel.
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Not there.
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The fourth and final thing is year-round discipleship.
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When you get back, we're going to keep up with your kids.
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That was what it promised.
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Year-round discipleship.
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Why? Because we want you back next year.
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Again, the thing that's missing in this is the gospel.
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We have equated missionary work with going to camp.
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I wonder what would happen if I started a missions trip, and this was our motto.
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Four things.
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One, we're going to send you out in very small teams into areas where no one knows you're coming.
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Two, we're going to send you out with one purpose.
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Preach the gospel openly and have gospel conversations.
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That's it.
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You're not going to build a mud hut.
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You're not going to dig a well.
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You're just going to tell people about Jesus.
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That's it.
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You will be responsible for taking care of where you sleep and what you eat.
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We'll give you money, but you're going to be responsible for finding it when you get there.
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And four, we'll see you when you get back, if you get back.
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Now, how many would flock to my new missions organization? You know, I just absolutely described Paul's journey.
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To a tee.
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They went out with three guys, came back with two.
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One of them quit halfway.
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The church gave them money, I assume.
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It doesn't say in the text, but there's an assumption that when they sent them, they sent them with the means.
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But they had to figure out where they were going to sleep and what they were going to eat and where they were going to go.
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And they almost didn't make it back.
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At least Paul, which we see in the text today.
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But that was the missionary journey, and that's the zeal that we're missing.
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We've adopted the comfort of the world.
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And so too do all of our programs adopt the comfort of the world.
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And unless we have first class seating on the airline, we're not going.
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Beloved, these men were missionaries.
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We have a lot to learn from them.
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We see in them persecution, discipleship, and finally the bringing of a report back to the church.
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That's sort of the outline today.
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First as they were persecuted, Paul was stoned.
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Then from that he goes and disciples people, amazingly.
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And then he goes back to his home church, the church that sent him out, the place that he had been the pastor.
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And he goes back to their church and he gives them a report.
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So let's look at the text.
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It says in verse 19, it says, When Jews from Antioch and Iconium had persuaded the crowds...
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By the way, these are places that Paul had already been.
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Paul and Barnabas had already been to Iconium.
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They'd already been to Antioch.
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And so these Jews are following him.
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They already wanted to stone him in Iconium and he was able to make it out of there.
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Well now he's in Lystra and they have found their way to him and they're getting the crowds.
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Remember he's already kind of made a bad impression on the crowds because they tried to worship him.
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And he said, Please don't worship me.
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And he tore his clothes and said, Men, he condemned their worship and he rebuked their worship.
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And so they already have at odds with this guy.
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And now the Jews come in and say, Oh, this guy's a heretic.
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He needs to be stoned.
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And it says, Having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing he was dead.
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Now there is some debate here among theologians as to whether or not Paul was dead or whether he wasn't dead.
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And you say, Well, in the next verse he gets up and walks away.
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But I don't know if you know D.A.
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Wade.
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He's a theologian.
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He makes the argument that Paul did die and was resurrected.
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Now the text doesn't say that.
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But we know that he was stoned and we know there is a portion later where he says there was a time he was caught up to the third heaven and D.A.
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Wade makes that argument.
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We talked about this this week, Brother Mike, about the fact that that could have been.
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Maybe this was the time and God said, Nope, not yet.
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However we understand it, it's a miracle either way.
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Because whether he died and was resurrected because the disciples came and prayed around him, or whether or not he was just beat.
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The word I think kind of helps me.
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I kind of tend to think otherwise only because the word supposing here says supposing he was dead.
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The word supposing in the Greek, having looked at it this week and spent a little time with it, it does mean to regard something as presumably true but without certainty.
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So the word supposing there seems to indicate that even the people weren't certain.
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They stoned him.
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They dragged him out, assumingly to lay and die.
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To leave him for dead.
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And that could be.
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Either way, he's been pelted with stones.
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You guys know what stoning is.
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And you know how stoning works.
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Now there was sanctioned stoning and there was unsanctioned stoning.
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Sanctioned stoning was done by the magisterial government, whoever was the authorities in the area, and they did it a very specific way to make sure people died.
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They would take them to a cliff that was six or eight feet high, and they would throw them off just so that when they hit the ground, something would break and they couldn't move.
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They would throw them down on their back and basically they would then be laid out.
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And then everybody would gather up on top of that cliff and just throw stones down until the person quit wiggling.
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That was the way sanctioned stoning was done.
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This was written in the Talmud and other places that made sure that the guy couldn't run.
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You throw somebody off a cliff, they're usually stuck where they're at.
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Unsanctioned stoning, they surrounded the guy and started throwing stones at him until he quit wiggling.
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That was a different way of doing it.
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It was less specific and this is likely what happened to Paul.
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This is not the government coming in.
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This is mob rule.
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And the mob has come to kill Paul.
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And so they've gathered around him, they've stoned him until he quit wiggling, they dragged him out of the city and left him there.
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The disciples come out and they're probably weeping.
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They're surrounding him.
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It says in verse 20, when the disciples gathered around him, it doesn't say what they did, but I can just imagine, the person who's been preaching the gospel to you has been drug out in the street, pelted with stones until he quit moving and then drug out to be fed to the carnivorous birds.
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You probably figure that would be a rough day to have to watch that.
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We don't know what Barnabas is doing at this time, but likely the reason why it says Paul and not Barnabas is Paul is the mouthpiece.
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He's the one that they want to shut up.
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He's the one that they want to close his mouth, so they do so with a violent stoning.
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They drag him out of the city and they leave him for dead.
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The church comes out, surrounds him, prays for him.
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It doesn't say it in the text.
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I am making an assumption there.
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I'm assuming that they're praying and asking God, you know, why has this happened? People are grieving over the situation and the next sentence doesn't make any sense at all.
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He rose up and entered the city.
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Again, I don't know if you've ever seen a stoning, but most people don't get up and walk away.
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Even if they ain't dead, they're left for dead for a reason.
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Stuff gets broke.
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Stuff gets opened up.
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Stuff gets bloodied and bruised and beaten and he just gets up.
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That's a miracle from God.
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The fact that he gets up is a miracle.
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And there's a miracle of boldness because he gets up and entered the city.
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What city? The same one that just stoned him in the street.
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That's powerful boldness.
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He gets beaten within an inch of his life, drug out in the city, he stands up, knocks the dust off, goes right back in.
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To God be the glory.
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It's an amazing thing.
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And the next day, here's the next part that's kind of miraculous.
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The next day he went on with Barnabas to Derby.
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That's a 30 mile hike.
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I couldn't do a 30 mile hike tomorrow fully healthy.
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I'm just being honest.
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If you told me tomorrow we were going to get up and hike to St.
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Augustine, I would need an extra nap halfway through.
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He got up and made the hike 30 miles having been beaten the day before with stones.
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It's a miracle.
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I just can't stress to you enough that there's a miracle happening here.
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Whether he was raised from the dead, whether D.A.
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Wade or anybody believes that, that's fine.
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I wouldn't condemn that belief if you think that this is a miracle of resurrection, that's fine.
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But the miracle, even if it's not a resurrection, it's still a miracle.
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And so from this, verse 21, we see discipleship.
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It says, When they had preached the gospel to that city, that's Derby, and had made many disciples.
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By the way, that's the purpose of the gospel.
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The purpose of the gospel is not to make converts, it's to make disciples.
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Now, obviously you want people converted, but the idea is to make someone a follower of Jesus Christ.
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Converts change religions.
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Disciples change masters.
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You can change from one religion to the other and still have the same master, you.
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But when you come to Christ, you are getting a new master.
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So that's what they're seeking to make, to make disciples.
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And when they had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, the place where he was stoned.
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By the way, I wish I had a map.
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I could have put one on the screen, but I didn't get a chance to do this.
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Maybe I tried to do it with my hand.
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Alright, so Antioch is where they left.
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It would have been here.
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And then they would have went out to Cyprus, which was an island.
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Then they would have went north to Iconium.
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And then over to Lystra and Derbe.
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They are really close to Antioch, which is where they left.
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They could have hiked on and went back.
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But they didn't.
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They go back around.
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I know that's probably the worst illustration any pastor has ever given.
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My little old hand.
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Y'all can't see it.
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You get what I'm saying though? They were at Derbe.
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Not a stone throw or anything.
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It would have been a hike.
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But they could have hiked back to their church at Antioch.
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But they didn't.
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They went back to all the towns that had already tried to stone them.
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They went back to all the places that had already hated them, that had already created enemies.
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They go back.
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To do what? It says in verse 22.
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Strengthening the souls of the disciples.
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Encouraging them to continue in the faith.
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And saying that through many tribulations, and now Paul can talk about that firsthand.
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Through many tribulations, we must enter the Kingdom of God.
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And when they had appointed elders from every church, with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed.
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Now it's interesting here.
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There's some questions.
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There's a couple of theological issues that come up.
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The one big question is who are the elders in these churches because these are all newly formed churches? Later on in 1 Timothy, it tells us not to make elders out of new believers because they can get puffed up and become arrogant in their power without knowledge kind of situation.
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There is no real answer except to say this.
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Number one, the trip lasted two years.
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It wasn't like it lasted ten days.
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These guys were on a mission trip that lasted a couple of years.
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Some of these guys may have been believers now for months, maybe even over a year.
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Some of them may have come to a level of maturity that they could be in this position and not be really a brand new convert.
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People ask, well, what's a new convert? Somebody can be a new convert after ten years because they've not grown.
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And somebody can come to Christ and immediately become imbibing the Scripture, filling themselves with Scripture and become very knowledgeable in a matter of a very short amount of time.
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So really it speaks more of maturity than it does speaks of necessarily time.
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You know, someone who's mature, but also the reality is this is a transitional period in the history of the church.
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This is a time when things are not necessarily prescriptive for the future.
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They're descriptive of what's happening.
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The churches needed leadership.
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They needed people that were willing to go to the Word, study the Word, preach the Word, and so they appointed those men.
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It's interesting that the word here, the word appointed, kerataneho, means to raise the hand.
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So it seems as if there was a congregational portion in this that they were raising the hand toward these men, saying these are the men.
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And so we know they were chosen by the apostles, but it seems as if the congregation too affirmed them.
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I just think that's interesting to think about for today because later today we're having our one meeting of the year.
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And what are we going to do? We're going to affirm what the elders and the finance committee has brought together as a budget and the officers for next year.
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We want the congregation to affirm what's happening.
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We want to know that there's solidarity in the church.
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We want to know that you guys are going to support the budget.
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We want to know that you guys are going to support the elders and support the deacons and support this ministry.
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That's the goal.
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Because we don't want to be at odds.
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We want to be working together.
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And so it seems here in this text that we see the elders are being appointed by the apostles.
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The church members are approving of what is happening.
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And then they passed, verse 24, they passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia.
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Spoke the word in Perga.
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By the way, on their way home, they didn't say, oh, the mission trip's done.
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I'm just going to walk back home.
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As they went, they kept preaching.
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Even in places they had already preached, they kept preaching.
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And from there, they sailed to Antioch, verse 26, where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work that they had fulfilled.
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And when they arrived and gathered at the church together, they declared all that God had done with them and how He had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles.
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And there remained no little time there.
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When they came back to the church home, they brought a report.
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Again, I think this is valuable because all that had happened on their two-year journey was unknown to the church.
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See, we've been following this story as it unfolds because we're reading history.
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But there were no iPads in the first century.
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There was no Google in the first century.
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What little bit of knowledge may have been coming back to them, they probably got a pretty good bit of knowledge when Mark came back.
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Because you know, Mark left halfway through the journey and went home.
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They probably heard from him a lot that had happened.
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But think about what they didn't know.
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They might not even have known that Paul had been stoned.
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They didn't even probably know about these churches and elders that had been risen up and churches that had been planned.
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Think about the excitement of what's happening as they come home to give their report.
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This is why it's always valuable when, like, Walter Heaton comes to Jacksonville.
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I want him to come here.
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He's our missionary in Croatia.
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I want him to come here.
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I want him to tell you what he's doing because it's valuable for us to see what God is doing beyond our walls.
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It's valuable for us to know that when we put money in the offering plate and that money is being distributed out to this missionary, that it is being used to further the gospel of Jesus Christ and it helps us to desire to do more.
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So these reports are valuable.
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They're not just accountability.
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They're encouragement and edification to continue on in this ministry.
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And I imagine the church was anticipating everything that Paul and Barnabas had to tell them.
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So based on this, based on our understanding of the text, I want to now give you three points of application.
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If you have your notes on the back of your folder, I used to give you blanks to fill in.
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If you want me to start doing that again, just let me know, but I got to the point where I'm not doing that now, but it's not a big deal either way.
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But the first thing I'm drawing out of this text as an application is number one, the church needs bold missionaries, not sightseeing vacationaries.
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You know what it takes to be stoned and go right back to preaching? A supernatural boldness given by the Holy Spirit of God.
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And that is the boldness that we need to be asking for.
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Boldness to stand up for the truth.
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Boldness to speak when it is unpopular.
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Boldness to face hatred and persecution for the gospel.
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I recently heard a person give an account of a missions trip.
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I sat and just sort of listened.
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I didn't challenge the person or say anything negative, but I listened.
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I sort of just took it in.
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And again, it sounded like a vacation with chores.
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And I kept in my heart thinking, when are they going to get to the gospel? When are they going to get to when they gave the gospel? And they kept talking about how the poor people needed water and mud huts and these different things that they did.
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But not the gospel.
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And from what I gathered after the conversation was over, she didn't share the gospel one time with one person on the whole trip.
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We've replaced boldness with comfort and we've become unwilling to be discomforted for the gospel.
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Paul tells his people, he says that we must enter the kingdom of God through many tribulations.
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We won't even enter the kingdom of God through many discomforts.
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The church needs bold men and women who are willing to share the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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The church needs boldness, not comfort.
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We've had comfort too long.
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We've sucked up comfort.
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We've made comfort the premium.
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We have buildings that keep our air conditioned.
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We have seats that keep our rears conditioned.
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We have everything in the world to bring comfort.
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I remember recently I heard somebody talking about a missions trip and I wondered, I didn't ask and maybe I should have asked.
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I assumed and maybe, you know, assumption is not good.
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But I wondered, does this person share the gospel with their neighbors? Does this person share the gospel with the people they work with? Does this people share the gospel with their family? Well, why are they getting on a plane to go halfway around the world? Missions begins with boldness and we see that even here.
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Second thing, missions is about making disciples and planting churches.
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When we think about evangelism and discipleship, we usually have in mind the salvation of the soul.
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But when we send out a missionary, there's also the work of establishing Christians in a place where there's never been Christians possibly.
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And while it's good to seek to win disciples, there's also the idea of the church and I'm drawing this out of the text.
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The Apostle Paul didn't just create a whole bunch of individual Christians.
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He planted churches.
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The modern church treats missions as an opportunity for social improvement.
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They go and build these elaborate things for people to have water and food and all those things devoid of the gospel.
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That's not what we see in Acts.
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Paul is not going around building tents for people.
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Paul could have.
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That's not what he did.
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They were not social justice champions.
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They were champions for the gospel and that's the concern is they were seeking to see churches raised up in the gospel.
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And again, I keep talking about Walter Heaton, but that's why I found great value in his ministry.
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He is seeking to make converts and to plant a church.
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Later on during our annual meeting, I'm going to read the report that he sent me this week about people being baptized in his church.
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His son was saved.
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Praise the Lord.
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And his son will be baptized very soon.
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But not only that, the mother of one of the men that he baptized earlier this year is being baptized on profession of her faith.
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Praise the Lord.
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But you see, there's a church there.
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Walter's not just a missionary, he's their pastor.
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He's the one preaching the gospel to them.
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Is it in a home? Yes.
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Churches in homes are okay.
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They're good.
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That's what they have.
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They have a home church in Croatia in the midst of thousands of people who believe in false gods and false ways of worship.
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There's one little church at the Heaton's home.
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Do they have battles? Oh yeah.
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Do they have Satan coming against them? Oh yeah.
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He's used one of the most wicked, vile ways to come against them with his own daughter.
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But Walter still preaches the gospel and seeks to build the church.
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Some of you know Aaron is now in Kentucky doing ministry there or doing seminary there in Kentucky.
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But he didn't go there just to sit in a classroom.
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He's also now an elder at a church plant.
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Because there was a church that was being planted outside of Louisville and they needed men who cared about the gospel to help serve in that church.
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And they saw Aaron as one of those men and they reached out and they said, help us! And he said, you know, I can't do it.
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I'm too busy with school.
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That's not what he said.
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He did say, I will do all I can.
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I don't know how much I can do because I do have to provide for my family and the church can't pay my salary.
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I do have to do my school work.
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He said, but I will give everything I can to this church.
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My point is this, folks.
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We have to get out of this mindset that it's just about the one-to-one thing.
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We're also concerned with building the churches.
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Building the people to come together to be the church.
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Whether it's in Croatia, whether it's in Kentucky, whether it's here.
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We're building up the body.
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Every individual becomes part of the body.
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We're not making lone wolf Christians.
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We're making members of Christ's body.
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Finally, and I'll make this very brief.
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Churches need three things.
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This is a planted church and a continuing church.
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That's why I didn't put planted churches need or continuing churches need.
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But it's interesting.
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They need maintenance, organization, and accountability.
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What do I mean by maintenance? I don't mean somebody to clean.
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They need that too.
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Don't get me wrong.
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But by maintenance, what I mean is Paul went back to places where he had already preached.
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Why? To further the discipleship.
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To further the ministry.
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Your spirit, your soul needs maintenance.
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That's why you're here today.
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You're here today to fellowship, but you're also here to learn because you need to grow.
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The maintenance of the gospel is the preaching of the gospel continually.
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And Paul did that.
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And that's why I'd like to point out the fact that he didn't just go straight home.
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He went back to where he'd already been.
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Why? I hate the term follow-up because that's sort of been miscommunicated in the past.
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You know, follow-up, discipleship programs.
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That's not what I'm saying.
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But I am saying the maintenance of the soul is a concern of Paul's.
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It should be a concern of ours.
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We shouldn't just be willing to just sort of give the gospel to somebody and then not be willing to help them to grow.
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That's what the church is about is growth of the individual and of the body.
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Organization.
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He appoints elders.
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I hate when somebody says, oh, I hate organized religion.
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I say, what do you want? Disorganized? What do you want? Paul organizes churches and he puts leaders over the churches because it's necessary.
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It's important that those men be put in place.
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And accountability.
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He comes back to his church.
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He gives a report of what's been going on because accountability is important as well.
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When we examine this first missionary journey, there's so much that we can learn by way of example.
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It provides for us a template of what missions is supposed to be about.
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Missionary journeys are not vacations.
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They're gospel-focused endeavors.
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And this gives us a picture of what they're supposed to be.
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You know where the word missions comes from? Latin, missio, which means to shoot or to send.
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It's where you get the word missile.
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When you go to do missions, you go with a singular purpose.
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You are shot for one purpose, the gospel.
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Now, am I saying that you can't do good things while you're there? No.
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If you want to give the gospel while building a mud hut, get after it.
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If you want to give the gospel while digging a well, get after it.
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But don't do the good things without giving them the gospel because you're leaving out the best thing.
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I know that there are some of you who have been on some fantastic missions trips.
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There are a few of you in this room who went to London during the Olympics and preached and shared the gospel.
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There's at least one of you who went to Israel to backpack and share the gospel.
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And you weren't there to see the sights.
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I'm sure you saw them.
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But you had a singular mission to go and have Christ be known among those who He had not yet been.
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That's what missions is.
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It can be short term.
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I'm not up here condemning a two-week trip.
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I've had groups ask me about teaching at a seminary in South America.
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I had to forego last year because we had our new baby.
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But the idea is there.
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Short term.
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It's not length, guys.
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I'm not condemning the length of the trip.
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I'm talking about the purpose.
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We go to preach the gospel.
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We go to proclaim the gospel.
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You know why I would still want to go to that seminary in South America? Because I've had the benefit of seminary training which very few of them have ever had to give them something that I have been given for free by you all! You paid for my school! Well, not all of you were here then.
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But those who were at this church sent me to school.
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I want someone else to have that.
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So that that becomes men of God in churches preaching the gospel.
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That's what missions is.
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The purpose is the gospel.
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Do you have a desire in your heart to see people in other lands hear the gospel? Maybe you can't go.
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Maybe you are called to send them.
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Not everybody in Paul's church went.
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Only three went.
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But the whole church was involved.
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The whole church was praying, financing, and sending those missionaries.
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Where is our desire as a church? Do we desire comfort? Or do we desire Christ to be exalted among the nations? May it be that that is always our desire.
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Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, I thank you for the opportunity to examine the finality, the final verses of chapter 14, looking at the final steps of Paul's missionary journey.
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And as we, Lord, begin to draw to a close, I pray that you would just place into our hearts whatever desires you would have us to have.
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Maybe it is going on a journey to share the gospel.
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Or maybe there's a person at work that's been sitting next to us for years and we haven't shared the gospel with them because of fear.
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God, give us boldness.
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Give us boldness to speak the truth.
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Give us boldness to speak to our neighbors.
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Give us boldness to speak to the people that we come in contact with, our acquaintances, and even our family, God, that doesn't know the Lord.
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Give us boldness.
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As we look to this week of Thanksgiving, Father, as we see a time where we're probably going to be surrounding a table mixed with believers and unbelievers, God, give us a boldness to proclaim Christ.
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Not just expect people to see Christ in our behavior, but to hear Christ from our mouths.
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God, give us missionary spirits.
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Give us a desire to see Christ known where He's not yet known.
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Remind us always, Lord, of our responsibility as a church, both to go and to send, knowing that not everyone is called to go, but everyone is called to participate.
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Father, thank You again for the ministry of the gospel.
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Put it on our hearts, God.
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Give us confidence in Your truth.
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In Jesus' name we pray.
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Amen.