The Mission of the Church

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Hey, everybody. I'm Pastor Jeff Durbin with Apologia Church. I want to thank you all so much for watching the content right here on Apologia Studios channel.

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So thank you again so much for watching these and sharing them. God bless you. All right.

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Welcome everyone to Apologia Kauai. This is actually my first time teaching here. Most of you know that.

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You don't know that, but I'm from Arizona, so I'm here for the next three weeks. And I'm actually really excited.

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I know Claudia's been teaching on the doctrine of Christ, and so I wanted to actually do,

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I'm going to be teaching the next three Sundays, and I'm going to do a three -part series on the mission of the church. So I've labeled it

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Missio Ecclesiae, which is just Latin for the mission of the church. So this is part one, and this one is what is the mission, is what

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I want to talk about today. And it's inspired by a book. It's a real short book I read not too long ago by Joe Boot, who's a good friend of ours up in Toronto.

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And that book is called For Mission, and it's subtitled The Need for Scriptural Cultural Theology.

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So that's kind of what I want to talk about today. So the verse I want to base today's message off of is

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Matthew 28, 18 through 20. We all know this. It's a great commission. So starting in verse 18, it said,

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And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

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Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the

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Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

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And so before I pray here, I'm going to leave a quote from Joe Boot, from this book. And he says,

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Just as genuine Christians are for justice, truth, and faithfulness, we are all for mission.

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But what is the mission? What are we on mission for? What is the goal? I would suggest that the mission of God's people is ultimately to the faithful worship of the triune

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God in every aspect and sphere of life, as individuals and as families, neighborhoods, cities, nations, and cultures.

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Human beings are made to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. The mission of God's people is thus intimately tied to the purpose for what we were created and therefore the biblical teaching of the kingdom of God.

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So before we get in the message, I'll go ahead and start with prayer. Lord, I'm so thankful for this opportunity to be here today to bring the word to my brothers and sisters on Kauai, Lord.

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And I just ask that you would get me out of the way, Lord, that you'd speak through me and that we just have a better understanding,

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Lord, of what exactly the mission, our mission as the church is, Lord. And ultimately, Lord, we ask that you'd be glorified in Christ's name, we pray.

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Amen. So first I want to define what mission actually means. And I went to dictionary .com,

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just a basic definition from a secular source. It says, any important task or duty that is assigned, allotted, or self -imposed, or an important goal or purpose that is accompanied by strong conviction, a calling, or vocation.

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So what about biblically then? How do we biblically define mission? So the Encyclopedia of Christianity defines mission as a systematic reflection on the work of mission, usually

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Christian mission, including the mission or sending of God, which is known as Missio Dei, of Jesus Christ, of the apostles, of the church, or of other mission organizations.

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In the broadest sense, it includes the study of the theology of mission, foundation, the goal, and the means.

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In particular, mission theories, mission principles and practice, and the social, cultural, or political aspects of mission.

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As an academic discipline, it includes research, writing, teaching, and publication related to the study of world or global mission.

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And then the Faith Life Study Bible defines mission as this. It says, mission is the reason the church exists, and the church joins

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Jesus on his mission. And the mission is from everywhere to everywhere. I love that.

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It's not excluded anywhere, it's everywhere to everywhere. Christians are to be both engaged in missions, which would include the international pursuit to preach the gospel to all corners of the earth, and be missional each and every day.

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Being missional conveys the idea of living on a purposeful biblical mission. So quickly, what's the difference between mission and co -mission?

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So we all know the Great Commission, I just read that in Matthew 28. Dictionary .com

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lists multiple definitions of commission. So quickly here, in light of the

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Great Commission, which we just read in Matthew 28, I want to examine several of these points that Dictionary .com

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defines as commission. So the first one is the act of committing or entrusting a person, group, etc.,

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with supervisory power or authority. So of course, this checks the box for the

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Great Commission. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Now take that authority and go therefore.

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So how much authority? All authority. And where is the authority located? In heaven and on earth.

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So what group has been entrusted? His disciples. The second definition is an authoritative order, charge, or direction.

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Again, this checks the box. So what's the order or what's the charge? Verse 19 in Matthew 28.

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Go therefore make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the

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Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. Teaching them what?

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To observe all that I have commanded. All means all, not some, not only in the

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New Testament, but also what was taught in the Old Testament. So go, make, teach.

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That's what I like to say with the Great Commission. We're to go, we're to make, and we're to teach. The third point then, or third definition, is authority granted for a particular action or function.

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Again, it checks the box. And again, we've already discussed this authority. We've already discussed the action and the function.

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The next one is a document granting such authority. God's word, there's your document. Number five, a group of persons authoritatively charged with particular functions.

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Again, it checks the box. Again, Christ's disciples and consequently any disciple thereafter, all

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Christians trace their spiritual roots ultimately back to this moment, the Great Commission. Then the sixth one

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I want to look at is the condition of being placed under special authoritative responsibility or charge.

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Again, this fits the bill. The Great Commission really is a condition. As Dr. White says, the gospel is not a suggestion, it is a command.

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It's an if -then statement. If you are a Christian, then you are to be a missionary by the special authority of your

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Savior. As believers in Christ, it is our responsibility then that we ultimately will be held accountable for.

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And then the last point here is a task or matter committed to one's charge, an official assignment.

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Again, go, make, teach. That's the task and this is our official assignment as Christians.

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So now to take this back to the faith life definition that I mentioned earlier of mission, there's four points here

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I want to examine. So mission is the reason the church exists. As we know from our catechism, which you guys do here, we do this at Mesa as well, we exist to glorify

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God and enjoy him forever. How do we glorify him? By loving him and loving others.

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Matthew 22, 36 -40 says, Teacher, which is the greatest commandment of the law? And he said to them,

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You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment, and a second is like it.

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You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.

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So how do we ultimately love others? By laying down our lives for the great commission, by sacrificing our good for the good of others, by preaching the gospel, by going therefore and making disciples.

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So this is the mission that has been given to us by Christ and for which ultimately we as a church exist.

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So the second point here is the church joins Jesus on his mission. So as Christ breathed his last breath on the cross,

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John 20, 21, he said, Peace be with you, as the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.

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So Christ's mission from the Father was to seek and save the lost, and we as Christians are to join

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Christ in that mission. We are the feet of the gospel. We all know this verse,

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I'm sure, from Romans 10, 14 -15. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?

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And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent?

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As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news.

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Then the third point here, the mission is from everywhere to everywhere. I mentioned that, I love that.

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So we are to go into all the world, making disciples of all the nations. This includes the jungles in Africa.

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This also includes your next door neighbor. It includes the jungles here in Kauai, or the desert on the other side of the island.

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That includes the surfing communities. That includes the homeless guys across the way here.

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Everywhere means everywhere. There is not one square inch of earth safe from our mission.

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Let me read that again. There is not one square inch of earth safe from our mission.

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Not even the gates of hell. Matthew 16, 18 says, and I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock

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I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Now, I know we hear this verse a lot, and as Christians, I think we think that that means that the gates of hell will not overcome us.

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But that's not what gates do. Gates are not offensive. They are defensive, right? So the gospel is going to overcome those gates.

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It's going to overcome hell. It's not the other way around. Fourth point, then, is we are to live missional lives.

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Spurgeon said this, reconciliation by the blood, by the substitutionary sacrifice of the infinite

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Son of God. This is the message of our ministry. If we do not testify this, it were better for us that we had never been born.

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For if we do not preach this constantly and incessantly, we have missed our main topic. We have failed in the great commission which our master sent us to execute.

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So every aspect of our lives should be defined by our mission. We are to be salt and light.

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Here, Matthew 5, 13 through 16, Christ said, you are the salt of the earth, but as salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?

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It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. You are the light of the world.

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A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket. But on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.

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In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your

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Father who is in heaven. We'll actually come back to this passage in a minute, but the point is that this is what a life of mission actually looks like.

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So Booth made a really good point here in the book I'm talking about. He said, and using the term mission, he is not simply referring to the practice of churches sending missionaries to other parts of the world.

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That's one aspect of the mission, but to the calling and purpose of God's people in the earth.

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And I'll tell you, I mean, that's, I grew up in the church thinking that that's what missions was, that you went somewhere.

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You went across the ocean to an island in the middle of nowhere to preach the gospel. Yes, that's mission, but it's not just that.

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This is clearly a broader and more foundational application of the term, one that includes a global missionary work, but which focuses on understanding the way that Christians, as God's vicegerants, live out the gospel in every area of life.

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This living out is our mission, our act of worship. It finds expression in every area of life, and the way we think about that mission says something important about our understanding both of the nature of worship and of God.

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So a vicegerant is a person exercising delegated power on behalf of a sovereign or ruler.

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And if you guys want to make your brain hurt, go home and try to figure the difference between vicegerant and vice -regent.

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Spend about 20 minutes and think, wait, what? I'm not gonna get into that right now. I'm just food for thought. But the point of the vicegerant, again, is we're exercising power, a delegated power on behalf of a sovereign, so on behalf of Christ.

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So in other words, we're Christ deputies operating under his delegated authority to us. So this mission, however, is not simply our commanded calling, but it is also worship.

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As Dr. White has famously said, theology matters. And so your view of God, and so does your view of God and your view of worship.

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And this greatly affects your view of this mission. And just like theology, we at Apologia will also contend that eschatology matters greatly.

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I mean, eschatology is just simply the study of last things. And this also significantly affects your view of the mission.

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So Joe Boot often says, people say I have an over -realized eschatology. My response is to say, no, you have an under -realized soteriology.

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We'll discuss this more a little bit, but what I want you to ask yourselves is this, just how encompassing is

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God's salvation? How far exactly does the gospel reach? The answers to these questions will affect your understanding of the mission.

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So the next point here I want to get into is how exactly has the church failed in its mission?

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So Boot says that the decline of a robust, full, vital, and applied Christianity in the

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West is clearly evidenced in our society's preponderance of ungodly laws, apostate educational practices, secular political outlook, and overtly neo -pagan arts and entertainment, to name just a few areas.

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Christians have allowed and sometimes even been instrumental in furthering this decline.

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An impoverished understanding of our mission has increasingly led us to either abandon these key areas of life and culture in the name of true piety, or to uncritically adopt or synthesize them with our faith in the name of relevance or even wisdom.

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In either case, we have tacitly accepted an unbelieving view of the world as normative, and once this has happened, we are in urgent need of fundamental redirection and reformation.

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In other words, the church has failed to be salt and light to the culture. We've retreated to our bunkers.

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And I use this analogy in Ireland. That's the first time I use it. But it's like we're pretending to tie our shoes while the culture goes to hell in a handbasket.

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You hear that term a lot. So it's almost as if we're like, oh, culture, you do your thing.

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I'm going to tie my shoe. Still, oh, nope, still got to tie. You know, it's like we just hang out down there tying our shoe for a long time waiting for Christ to return.

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Meanwhile, the culture has gone to hell in a handbasket. Reform tradition refers to the living and breathing church as the church militant, which we'll talk more about as well in these next three sermons.

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But the point is that the idea is that the church, what you see here, is living and breathing.

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And I like the term church militant because it's almost like we're supposed to be fighting, right?

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But in reality, there's nothing militant about the church in our culture. This does not mean that we are to take up arms and go to war looking for bloodshed, but it does mean that we are to be actively and vigorously involved in our mission.

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The opposite of that is nothing more than spiritualized cowardice. So my friend

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Andrew Sandlin calls this a pious goop of spineless religion. He just actually,

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I just saw the other day, he wrote that in an article I think called Make Christianity Great Again. So this group of Christians that retreat and they hide, he says, calls them a pious goop of spineless religion.

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And then he goes on to say, this appeasement reinforces the cultural irrelevance of Christianity and has become the unintentional ally of secularists and pagans.

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So this precisely is what the church has become, an overly pious spineless pile of goo, spiritual jello jigglers, if you will, that are impossible to nail down on anything.

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You guys have probably heard this, you ever tried to nail jello to the wall? It's impossible, but this accurately represents what it's like to hold many mainstream pastors to God's standard of truth.

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You can't nail them down on anything. As Bonson says, the salt has lost its saltiness.

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So our current culture does not have a pleasant taste. It does not taste salty.

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It tastes like blood. So you guys, have you ever been punched in the mouth or bit your lip?

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We all have, right? It tastes like the blood. It's gross, right? It tastes like iron. This is precisely the taste that our culture leaves in your mouth.

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We live in a culture of death and the flavor is that of bloodlust.

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We as a church have entirely failed to add this salty flavor of the gospel to the culture.

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Remember what we just read in Matthew 5 .13, you are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?

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It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. So as Bonson said, the salt has lost its saltiness, its flavor, and it's good for nothing except to be trampled under the feet of the culture.

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This, my friends, is absolutely what has happened. Think about that for a moment. Christianity, the gospel,

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God's word has become the laughingstock of our culture. Why is that?

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Because we've lost our flavor and we're now trampled underfoot of gross immorality and the love affair of death.

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And although the culture is culpable for their sins, for their desire for death, the church is also at fault for our lack of saltiness.

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Salt's primary purpose though is not to flavor your food, but it's actually to serve as a preservative.

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What does salt do? It preserves life. Before we had refrigerators, before we had ice, salt was used to preserve meat.

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It literally was used to extend the life of a slaughtered animal, right, before rot and decay took hold.

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So preservatives are added to food to extend its shelf life. Medicine is used to preserve human life.

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The church's mission is to preserve and to extend the life of the culture through the gospel.

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But because we failed to do so, the culture reeks of death and decay. So instead of extending life, the culture is literally shortening it.

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Think about this. The culture is literally shortening life through the means of homosexuality, abortion, and euthanasia.

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So what is the root cause of this failure? I believe we can trace this collapse back to one origin, and that is bad eschatology.

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I mentioned that earlier, the study of last things. I also mentioned that eschatology matters like theology, and this is specifically why.

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Very bad, unbiblical eschatology was birthed in the mid -1800s, and I'm not going to get into this real deep today, but just a brief overview.

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It became widely popular through the printing of the Schofield Reference Bible in 1909, just in time for World War I and then of course

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World War II. But again, without getting too deep into eschatology,

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I'm more interested in its effects. So instead of holding to the optimistic eschatology of Christians throughout the history of the church,

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Christians then began to fall for a pessimistic doomsday eschatology. Instead of believing in Christ's victorious kingdom,

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Christians began to prepare for the end times. Instead of thinking long -term, Christians slowly became consumed with the rapture.

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This directly resulted in Christian retreatism. Now instead of boldly proclaiming the gospel in hopes of fulfilling the

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Great Commission, the church retreated to inside the four walls of the church buildings, taking the gospel with them.

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And instead of speaking to the culture, the church hid from it. The longer the church has sat around waiting, the worse the culture has become.

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And the worse the culture has become, the more irrelevant the gospel has become. Proverbs 19 .18

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says, where there is no prophetic vision, the people cast off restraint, but blessed is he who keeps the law.

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Simply put, there has been no prophetic vision in our culture from the church, and the people have therefore cast off restraint.

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Again, back to Matthew, we are to be the light of the world, a city on a hill, in order to illuminate the way to Christ.

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We just went the other day and took the girls to the Calvary Lighthouse. There's a light on a hill.

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Everybody can see it. So you don't crash and die, right? That should be the mission of the church. We don't want you all to crash and die.

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So that's our mission. But in selfish fear, we've hidden that lamp under a basket.

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Shall we hide it under a bushel? Thank you, my wife who grew up in the church. No, we better not hide that lamp under a bushel.

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But this is what Jobu defines as churchianity, which I'm going to talk about here briefly. So to set this up,

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I want to discuss the two most dominant views of the church's mission in modern evangelicalism.

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So the first one is an overrated view of the institutional church, and the second is an overrated view of the state.

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We'll talk about that here in a second. Ultimately, both views have led to the failure of this mission. Pastors from each perspective have failed to provide adequate answers to the morally failing culture, and not just morally failing, but increasingly anti -Christian.

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Simply put, the church has not been properly equipped to engage the culture with the mission that we've been assigned.

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So the first one I mentioned was the overrated view of the institutional church. So first,

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I want to qualify. There's distinctions in the use of the term church. We'll discuss more next week.

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The second message I'm going to do is, what is the church? We'll get into that much more deeply. But briefly today, there's basically three or four terms when it comes to the church.

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So there's a universal church. This is the Catholic or universal Bride of Christ. I don't mean Roman Catholic.

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Catholic just means universal Bride of Christ. So that's past, present, and future Christians. All who have, all who will repent, and all who believe in Christ for salvation.

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The second one I mentioned already is the visible or the militant church. So that's the living, breathing, acting, or actively fighting church.

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It's who we presently see throughout the world. The opposite of that is the church triumphant, which

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I really like that term as well. So those are the church that's already in heaven. Those are the Christians that have triumphantly finished the race.

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And then the third one is the institutional church, which is the church as an entity or organism.

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So it'd be like here, Apologia Choir, Apologia Mesa, or Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. It's an actual institution.

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So in this scenario, again, we're talking about the overrated view of the institutional church. The institutional church is being conflated with the kingdom of God, and therefore radically church -centered.

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Simply put, they're being viewed as one and the same. So it's viewing the church institution and the kingdom of God as the same entity.

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In reality, they are not at all the same thing. Ultimately, the church is only part of the kingdom of God.

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So the institutional church, what we have here today, is just part of the kingdom of God. It's not the same thing. Christ is ruling and reigning now, again, both in heaven and on earth, and the universal church only makes up one portion of that kingdom.

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And the institutional church is an even smaller portion. I'm sorry, so the universal church makes up one portion of the kingdom, but then the institutional church is an even smaller portion of the universal church.

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So this camp typically does have a biblically orthodox soteriology or study of salvation.

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So they have the gospel, but a faulty missiology. So missiology, again, is a study of mission.

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So they have the gospel, but their mission is bad. As I've mentioned, they have become overly pietistic retreatists and have taken the mission with them inside the four walls of the church institution, resulting in little to no engagement with the culture.

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So at best, this group is greatly disinterested in Christ's lordship over all things, both in heaven and on earth, every sphere of life, every institution.

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So there's four spheres of life, right? There's the personal sphere, the family, the church, and then the civil.

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So essentially, this group would say that Christ is lord over your own personal sphere, maybe your family, maybe even the church, but certainly not the civil.

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So at worst, I mentioned at best, they're greatly disinterested in Christ's lordship.

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At worst, they're even hostile to it. So all conversation of redeeming the culture is poo -pooed or discouraged or even seen as contra -scripture.

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They say it's not even in God's word. So if there is any cultural engagement, its purpose is seen as strictly evangelical.

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In other words, any conflict with the culture only serves as a means to rescue them from hell, and it ends there.

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Boot says the gospel essentially refers to a narrow set of affirmations about the cross, the new birth, the justification of individuals, and their escape from hell.

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The immediate result is the truncation of the Christian mission to the task of getting more people saved and into the church so that they can go to heaven.

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The Christian life is radically reduced to personal evangelism, personal piety, personal growth, and personal blessing.

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This, however, is precisely the opposite of Christ's command in Matthew 6 .33, to seek ye first the kingdom of God.

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And Paul tells us in Colossians 1 that Christ not only created all things, but will also reconcile to himself all these things, both in heaven and on earth.

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All things has been replaced with some things. This full -orbit mission to not only make disciples of all nations, but also teach them all that he has commanded, has been either forgotten or even worse, it's flat -out ignored.

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So again, at this point, Boot says the pietistic but broadly theological conservative worldview produces immature believers attending churches where they can remain unchallenged week after week, calling on God for personal blessing or to increase their faith and obedience.

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But with little or no conception of the scope and grandeur of the gospel or the transforming power of the kingdom of God for all of life.

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As we've already discussed, eschatology greatly affects this. The parousia, which is the

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Greek word for the coming of Christ, is viewed as the ultimate goal, while redeeming the culture is viewed as a waste of time.

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Again, I mentioned earlier, why polish brass on a sinking ship? We hear that all the time. We are told that salvation is for the soul or for the inner life, while the kingdom of God is something yet to come.

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The result is that the church institution is viewed as the only place on earth where God's rule and Christ's lordship are expressed, leaving behind a blatant and radical sacred and secular divide.

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So quickly, brothers and sisters, this is modern -day Gnosticism. Gnosticism, we all know, was a theology deemed heretical in the

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New Testament. So all things Christian are seen as holy and good, while all things secular are seen as immoral and bad.

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Where it becomes problematic, however, is when Christians restrict the teaching of all things to only the sacred realm or the church.

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So we as a church have stopped holding the secular realm then accountable to the standards of Christ's kingdom.

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So the next thing I meant, the second thing I mentioned was the overrated view of the state. So I want to look at that quickly.

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So this is the other end of the spectrum, and it greatly overrates the view of the state, and thereby underrating the importance of the institutional church and its administration of the sacraments, the preaching of God's holy word, and church discipline, i .e.,

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accountability. So here Boot says, here respect for church confessions, historic teaching, and authority is dangerously minimized or set aside in favor of a freewheeling antinomian approach where the church's institutional role and government in the

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Christian life is seen as unnecessary or outmoded, a patriarchal religion of life and freedom -sapping formalism.

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This camp rightly views the mission as not being restricted to within the four walls of the local church, and that the gospel involves more than simply saving souls from hell.

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They rightly recognize that our mission must impact the culture, tangibly here and now.

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However, the tendency tends to shift the source of hope from the church to the state.

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So Christ's atoning death, his resurrection, and his salvific power is replaced with social justice or social gospel, and this results in the kingdom of God being identified by anything or anyone actively pursuing economic or social equality.

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The state then acts as the great high priest, or better yet the messiah, that will deliver mankind from all forms of oppression.

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Justification by faith alone in Christ alone is replaced with moralism or social action.

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Inward sanctification and the good works produced thereof are supplanted by external political coercion as the only acceptable route to the kingdom.

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So here Boot says the church institute, its preaching and sacraments, then become almost peripheral to the so -called main task of saving abstract political identity groups like the poor and any abstract social evils like inequality for the oppressed and other alleged victims of discrimination or exploitation, including the planet itself.

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Scripture is actually greatly concerned with oppression and injustice, and therefore so should the church.

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Spurgeon said, a church that does not exist to reclaim heathenism, to fight with evil, to destroy error, to put down falsehood, a church that does not exist to take the side of the poor, to denounce injustice, and to hold up righteousness, is a church that has no right to be.

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However, this philosophy behind this movement is vastly different from that of our assigned mission.

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The latter is rooted in scripture, the former is not. Neo -Marxist utopian humanization is substituted for the gospel.

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So those are the two extreme positions of view of the mission, right?

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So there's some commonly shared root problems he talks about, and I'm going to talk about those here. I think there's three or four.

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So clearly our mission should fall somewhere in between those two, right? But let's look at these common root issues.

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Three, there's three of them. So both extreme positions have the same three core concerns.

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The first one is a failure to correctly identify the foundation of our

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Christian hope. So it is neither the church institution nor the state, but is solely found in the salvation and lordship of Jesus Christ again over all things.

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The totality of life, not compartmentalized. He alone is the one mediator between man and God.

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Both the church and the state are divine institutions sovereignly placed to rule over us, but have limited roles and limited functions and limited power.

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They are designed to serve God and function to ultimately point back to him. So the second root problem is a mischaracterization of the nature of the church and state.

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So it's a false view of the church, it's a false view of the state, and they naturally lead to a false view of the mission then.

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So the church is not the kingdom of God and therefore cannot be limited to it. Our mission extends well outside of the doors of our local churches.

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Here Boot says, to limit the kingdom of God to the church is to surrender culture to the enemies of God.

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And read that again, to limit the kingdom of God to the church is to surrender culture to the enemies of God.

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So on the flip side then, the church institution is a very important part of the kingdom of God, but cannot become an irrelevant servant of the humanistic state.

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Instead, the church must speak prophetically to the state. We must boldly hold the state accountable to God's standards of ethics,

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God's standards of morality, and God's law. Here Boot says, when the church becomes a handmaiden of the state and an advocate of liberal progressivism or social justice, rather than biblical righteousness, it has forsaken its true character.

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So the third root problem then is the influence of implicit or destructive dualism.

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So I mentioned this a minute ago, right? Modern day Gnosticism, it's a dualistic view of the sacred and secular.

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So Boot describes this as an implicit and destructive dualism that slices up reality into matter and spirit, nature and grace, secular and sacred, natural and supernatural, time and eternity, higher and lower, with one area perceived as lesser or evil, and the other as higher and good.

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So again, the direct outworking of this system creates a radical separation of creation and redemption between the sacred and the secular.

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This also promotes a subservience of the Christian to the secular culture and a full -on abandonment of any

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Christian culture making whatsoever. So how does the mission affect the culture?

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There's a sentiment contrary to the mission that says the gospel does not change cultures, but it does change people, and people change the culture.

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Culture is nothing more than religion externalized. The flavor of your religion will flavor your culture.

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Remember we talked about being salt. Human beings are cultural creatures. This is how

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God designed us and intended us to function in community with one another. Everything we do in life ultimately is culture -making.

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So if we're not making a godly culture, then we are making a God -hating one, or at least allowing a

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God -hating culture to be made. There is no neutrality. That is a myth.

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In its high time, we stopped living like that, something that's true. Boot says the salvation of an individual and their subsequent faithfulness to God and their personal and family life does affect an immediate change in culture as they live in the world.

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The culture of the home is altered when a man surrenders his life to Christ. The culture of a business begins to change when its leader orients his heart towards God's work.

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The culture of a school begins to change when the head teacher turns to Christ and is directed by the scriptures.

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Indeed, everything in which the true believer is involved as they live out the truth in terms of God's word is powerfully impacted.

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So Christ's total lordship over all things is not simply a theological idea that we just sit around discussing over a hot cup of coffee.

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Brothers and sisters, it's much more than that. It is a lifestyle. He either gets to tell you how to live in every aspect of your life or none at all.

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His lordship does not exist only inside of the church building. It does not stop the moment you step foot out those doors.

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Our mission is not to get people to vote for Jesus for president.

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And I stole that from Doug Wilson. I just heard the other day. Let me say that again. So our mission is not to get people to vote for Jesus for the president, right?

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But to announce that he's already ruling and reigning. And that it would in the culture's best interest to bow before their king in humble submission.

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So hear me on this. This is absolutely critical. We cannot tell the world to believe it if we ourselves don't believe it.

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Let me say that again. We cannot tell the world to believe it if we ourselves do not believe it.

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That was also from Doug. Oh, here's an actual quote he said.

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What can be said of unfaithful emissaries who change the message? We are as full of unbelief as the people we preach to.

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You cannot divorce religion from culture and likewise you cannot divorce religion from politics.

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Politics are simply legislated morality. Even the way you vote is affected by your religion.

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Culture is driven and shaped by religion and if you are a Christian, the gospel should drive and shape you.

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Our mission should be fulfilled by the natural outpouring of Christ's lordship over all of life.

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So in conclusion, what should our response be? In light of everything

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I've just discussed, how should we approach the missio ecclesiae? So I got a quote here from George Grant.

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If you guys have, if you guys get a chance, Moscow or Christ Church in Moscow just did a missions conference and George Grant and Doug Wilson spoke at it.

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So some of this I got from them. Really great stuff if you get a chance to look it up. But George Grant said,

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I started to think to myself, maybe we shouldn't polish brass on a sinking ship. But then I read my

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Bible and I realized that we are not supposed to be polishing brass and we're not on a sinking ship.

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Instead, we are the emissaries of a glorious message that the world yearns to hear.

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For all of its rebellion against it, the word of the cross is powerful for the transformation of the nations.

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So do we really believe this though? Is the gospel really powerful enough to save the nations?

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So bear with me here. I'm going to, I'm going to blitz you guys with a bunch of verses. So if you get a chance to just write them down real quick, you can go back and look at them.

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Psalm 2, 7 through 12. I will tell of the decree. The Lord said to me, you are my son.

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Today I've begotten you. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession.

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You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them into pieces like a potter's vessel. Now therefore,

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O kings, be wise, be warned. O rulers of the earth, serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling.

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Kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled.

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Blessed are all who take refuge in him. Psalm 110, 1 through 2.

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The Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

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The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your enemies.

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Isaiah 9, 6 through 7. We know this one from Christmas, right? For to us a child is born, to us a son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called wonderful counsel or mighty

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God, everlasting father, prince of peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end.

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On the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forever more.

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The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. Then Daniel 4, 34 through 35.

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And at the end of the day's eye and Nebuchadnezzar lifted my eyes to heaven and my reason returned to me and I blessed the most high and praised and honored him who lives forever for his dominion is an everlasting dominion and his kingdom endures from generation to generation.

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All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing and he does according to his will among the hosts of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and none can stay his hand or say to him what have you done.

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Then Daniel 6, 25 to 27. So this is King Darius. He wrote to all the peoples, nations, and languages that dwell in all the earth.

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Peace be multiplied to you. I make a decree that in all my royal dominion people are to tremble and fear before the

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God of Daniel for he is a living God enduring forever. His kingdom shall never be destroyed and his dominion shall be to the end.

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He delivers and rescues. He works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth. He who has saved

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Daniel from the power of the lions. And then to the New Testament, Luke 13, 18 through 21.

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He said therefore what is the kingdom of God like and to what shall I compare it? This is Jesus talking.

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It is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his garden and it grew and became a tree and the what shall

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I compare the kingdom of God. It is like leaven that a woman took and hidden in three measures of flour until it was all leavened.

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Then Ephesians 1, 3 through 10. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

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Even as he chose us in him for the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him.

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In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of his will.

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To the praise of his glorious grace with which he has blessed us in the beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace which he lavished upon us and all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purposes which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him things in heaven and things on earth.

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And then lastly here first Corinthians 5, 16 through 21. From now on therefore we regard no one according to the flesh even though we once regarded

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Christ according to the flesh we regard him thus no longer therefore if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation the old has passed away the old the new has come all this is from God who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation that is in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself not counting their trespasses against him and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation therefore we are ambassadors for Christ God making his appeal through us we implore you on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God for our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

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So the point here I want you to see as those who have been reconciled to Christ we have also been granted the ministry of reconciliation so through Christ God is reconciling the world to himself that's the whole world not just believers.

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This message of reconciling the world to himself has been entrusted to us brothers and sisters this is our mission we're not simply trying to save souls from hell but also trying to reconcile the world back to God.

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The fall and sin's curse has separated the world from God and he has assigned to us the responsibility of repairing that damage of fusing the fissure of mending the seam.

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So lastly I want to end with a with a quote from Job he said the message of the gospel is therefore centered in the declaration that this

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Jesus Christ is Lord and King over all the earth over all cultures peoples and lands and that he is calling all people to repentance and joyful obedience to the coming kingdom of God.

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Let's pray Lord I'm just so thankful again for this opportunity to be here today

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Lord and to bring your word Lord I ask that as we think about this message

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Lord that you would just give us a better understanding of your message of the mission you've assigned to us

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Lord as as your emissaries Lord as your ambassadors as your deputies Lord to to reconcile the the world back to you and we're thankful for Christ Lord his his death for our sins and we ask that you would just use us for your glory in Christ let me pray amen.

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All right we're gonna go ahead and take communion so I'm gonna read something here

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I wrote for communion to tie this into the sermon and then

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I'll pray. Oh come let us recognize why we are here why we are gathered who we are and who we're here for the mission we have been assigned and the reason it has been given.

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Oh come let us not forget the sacrifice freely given on our behalf the blood bought redemption for our sins past present and future our private and public sins the sins that only our creator knows our failures our laziness our fear our worry and our pride they have all been paid for by the spotless flame of God we deserve nothing more than eternity in hell but God let us treasure this truth in our heart of hearts you see we are

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Christ's chosen bride his church we are his body we are gathered here today to celebrate and worship him he is not just our

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Lord and Savior but the ruling and reigning Lord of all both in heaven and on earth and he has assigned to us a very important mission to go forth into all the world and make disciples and teach them to obey all he has commanded he has all authority to reconcile all things to himself and he has entrusted us his emissaries with this authority this assignment this mission so this table we now partake of is to be done in remembrance of him the bread represents his flesh that was mutilated on our behalf and the wine represents his blood shed for our chosen sins this table is for baptized believers only but not restricted to members of apologia please take a moment to prepare your hearts before God as to not take communion in a sinful way and if you need to please if you need to reconcile with a brother or sister first please do so now oh come let us remember

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Lord again we're just thankful for this opportunity to take communion together Lord with one another and and to remember

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Christ's sacrifice for our sins Lord we're grateful and I'm just so thankful for this this church and this mission here

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Lord on Kauai I just love my brothers and sisters here so much

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Lord and we just ask that we would just leave here Lord every day just remembering