School Of Evangelism Session #1

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Sunday School School Of Evangelism Session # 1 Date: 02/20/2022 Teacher: Pastor Brian Garcia

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You know, as we were talking to different pastors to partner with and bring out here to help us with things, of course, we want to find someone that's all around qualified and gifted.
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But we were especially looking for someone who had a real zeal and heart for evangelism to really help us in this.
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And Pastor Brian, head and shoulders above the vast majority of people we talked to, and his heart and his love for sharing the word of God.
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So, yeah, I'm hoping that that zeal and passion will rub off onto me and rub off onto all of us as he teaches us everything the
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Bible has to say, or at least a lot of things that the Bible has to say about evangelism. And this is going to set the trajectory for our church as we move on with evangelism efforts this year.
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This is going to set the tone and the, I don't want to overuse the word heart here, but the
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M .O. for our modus operandi, for zoperandi or operandi,
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I'm not sure. Anyway, our M .O. for how we move forward with sharing the word of God.
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If you could turn in your hymnal to 477, we're going to sing
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Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus. And you can stand once you have that.
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♪ Stand up, stand up for Jesus, ye souls of God.
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♪ ♪ Soldiers of the cross, lift high his royal banner.
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♪ ♪ It must not suffer loss. From victory unto victory, ♪ ♪
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His army he shall lead. Till every foe is vanquished, ♪ ♪
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He is Lord indeed. Stand up, stand up for Jesus.
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♪ ♪ The trumpet call obey. Forth to the mighty conflict, ♪ ♪
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In this his glorious day. Ye that are men, now serve him.
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♪ ♪ Let courage rise with danger, and strength to strength oppose.
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♪ ♪ Stand up, stand up for Jesus. Stand in his strength alone.
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♪ ♪ The arm of flesh will fail you. Ye dare not trust your own.
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♪ ♪ Put on the gospel armor. Each piece put on with prayer.
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♪ ♪ Where duty calls, oh danger, be never wanting there.
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♪ ♪ Stand up, stand up for Jesus. The strife will not be long.
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♪ ♪ The day of noise, of battle, the next, the victor's song.
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♪ ♪ To him that overcometh, a crown of life shall be.
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♪ ♪ Here with the King of glory shall reign eternally.
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♪ All right, let me pray for us.
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You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day. We thank you for this Sunday School class. I pray that you would help
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Pastor Brian as he presents this material and that you would show us from your word what you would have us to learn.
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In Jesus' name, amen. All right, who doesn't have one of these, raise your hands.
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Okay. We'll make more for next week.
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Thank you. Yeah. Praise God. Well, welcome to our
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Biblical School of Evangelism. And I want to give you kind of a lay of the land of what we're going to be doing over the next several weeks.
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And kind of do an introduction to our class today. But also we will be going forth through the first chapter.
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And so, now the theme of this class is real simple.
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It's evangelism. And it's not just evangelism. Because throughout
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Christendom, throughout Evangelicalism, there's a lot of forms in which folks have done evangelism in.
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And I want to point to you to some. And I want you to tell me, okay, that's evangelism, but is it
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Biblical evangelism? Okay. And so this is a class that is, I ask for your response.
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I ask for your input. This ain't going to be one of those classes where everyone's sitting down looking down in their laps.
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I want you participating with me here. And so I'm going to give you a couple of examples of evangelism.
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You tell me, is it Biblical or is it not Biblical? So the first example of evangelism.
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There was a church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that decided that they were going to do a huge mass outreach.
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And the crux of the outreach was going to be that they're going to have a petting zoo for everyone.
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And that through the nice animals, maybe by osmosis, the folks would get to know
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Jesus through petting animals. Is that Biblical evangelism or is it un -Biblical evangelism?
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I would go as far to agree with you, Pastor. I don't even think that's evangelism. First of all, maybe we should define our terms.
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What is evangelism? What does that word evangelize or evangel mean?
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What does it mean? Say it again.
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Okay, yeah, it has a connotation of sending, but... Say again. To bring good news.
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It's a declaration of good news. Now, I like petting animals as much as the next guy, but is that good news?
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No? Because you can pet animals all day and still go to hell. So it's not good news.
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It might be nice, but it's not good news. Let me give you another example of evangelism or so -called evangelism.
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And you tell me, is it Biblical or not? Another example is, and again, this is not trick questions, outdoor preaching through open -air methods.
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So I've gone to churches and been part of ministries where we go outside and we're in front of a crowd and we just start preaching the gospel.
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Is that Biblical or unbiblical? That would be a Biblical methodology, right?
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So that means that if we're actually opening our mouths and declaring this word, we are engaging in evangelism.
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Now, why do you think it's important for us to engage in evangelism? Why do you think that's important for us as Christians?
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Jesus commanded it. That's pretty good. Ken? Amen. You know what verse that is?
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Romans 10. Romans 10, 17. Very good. Excellent.
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Jesus, you wanted to add something? Yeah. You know, we're commanded to evangelize, to share this good news.
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And so with that in mind, there's a lot of ways in which Christian churches today evangelize or think that they're evangelizing.
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I grew up as one of Jehovah's Witnesses, as you know, and they have pretty strict methodologies to their evangelism.
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Basically, it's very hands -on. But the
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Christian church over the last hundred years has been very hands -off in their approach to evangelism, which has given the cults, especially in this country,
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Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, and others, a great foothold in our mission field. Friends, don't be mistaken.
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This world is our mission field. And we are to go out there as plowers and sowers of the kingdom of God to declare the majesty by which
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Christ has called you to. And so it's an exciting time for the life of our church today that we're going to begin our course on biblical evangelism.
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And so I want you to turn to page three of your new book. And I know this isn't as fancy as we would normally do it.
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We didn't have the time to produce a nice, beautiful, bounded book. But this should serve us well for the next several weeks.
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Maybe in future sessions we can print them or something. And typically what
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I'd like for us to do is I'd like for you to read in advance the chapter.
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And so for next week, you know, read chapter two. And at the end of the chapters, there's a section for a recap.
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And usually the homework isn't given until after the class. So you don't have to worry about doing the homework in advance.
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But there is a recap that you can do before the class. Now, if you don't get to do it before class, it's not the end of the world.
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We won't shun you or anything of that means. But it is encouraged. And if you have to do it here while we're doing it together, that's totally fine as well.
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But the idea is that we get to know the material and we're studying it. Because there's a lot of scripture verses that come along with the things that are being taught.
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And so we want you to go deep into God's word so that you can be edified and also have a right and biblical perspective on what it is that we're teaching.
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So for today's purposes, we're going to read together this chapter. And I'd like to see if we can get some readers.
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And so I'll read the very first line, which is very simple. So first of all,
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Chapter 1, Why Making Disciples Matter. And the first line is,
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Jesus Christ is Lord. So after we read, I'm going to kind of just give you a quick synopsis of what we just read and a little bit of a discussion.
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The fact that Jesus Christ is Lord, I mean, I've often thought about what
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I want to be engraved on my headstone when I die. And there's two lines that I want, and my wife can add anything else after that.
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But it's going to be this, Jesus Christ is Lord, and I've been raised up with him.
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And so that's the hope of the Christian, is to acknowledge that Jesus Christ is
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Lord and that we're joined to him as our Lord. So can someone read the next paragraph?
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Who'd like to read the first paragraph? Just raise your hand. Fah. This is the most important statement in the history of Jesus Christ, that the
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Lord gives to the first of His disciples. Amen. You know,
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I tried looking through commentaries, because I didn't want to be wrong on this when I make kind of a bold statement, that this is the most important statement in all of human history, that Jesus Christ is
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Lord. And I found a good amount of support for it from the church fathers and also from the reformers.
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So I was comfortable making that statement. Why do you think that statement is true? Why do you think that that statement, that Jesus Christ is
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Lord, is one of the most important things that can be said or declared by human lips?
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Why do you think that is? Think about what it means for Jesus to be Lord. What does it mean?
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That's right. Amen. That's right.
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That's right. Anyone else? Why do you think that matters? Yeah, Acts 2.
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Acts 2, 36. Yeah.
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That's right. That's right. That's right. Amen. That's right.
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Go ahead. That's right.
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That's right. Think of that word Lord for a moment. It's not a title that we usually use in English vernacular, at least in this side of the pond, outside of a religious context.
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And even from a social context, if you go to England, someone who's called
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Lord. Who are allowed to be called Lords in England? Do you know? Say again?
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That's right. And so if you have land, you're called a Lord. So, you know, they have these really cool things now where you can basically buy like a little plot of land and they'll plant a tree for you, and they'll send you a certificate saying that you are now a
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Lord. And a Lord basically is someone who has authority over a given space.
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Now, Jesus Christ has authority over all things, on heaven and on earth and underneath the earth.
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Jesus Christ is the sovereign Lord of history. That's why it's so important, guys, that we understand that the basis for what we do as Christians in evangelism and our home life and our worship centers around the
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Lordship of Jesus. It's the foundation by which we do all things onto the glory of God.
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And so with that being said, we'd like to read the next paragraph. It's very simple. Yes. Amen.
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So you guys are familiar with our Lord's Prayer, Matthew 6, verse 9 to 13.
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We are commanded to pray like this. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom, what?
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Come. Where? On earth as it is in heaven.
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You know, the Lord is asking us to pray for the breaking in or the in -breaking of His kingdom into this world.
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A brilliant Old Testament scholar named Bruce Waltke, he says that the theme of biblical theology is just that, the breaking in or the in -breaking of God's kingdom.
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He uses the term the eruption. It's like a volcano erupting. It's the eruption of God's kingdom into this world.
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And so Jesus Christ is not only Lord, but He's King. So not only does
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He have dominion as Lord, but He has the kingly right to give decrees.
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Isn't that right? He's our King. And as our King, He's the King of God's kingdom.
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The kingdom that you and I truly belong to. Now, I'm not sure what your passport says, what citizenship your country is.
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I'm American. Two of my kids are Canadian and American. But ultimately, the citizenship that we belong to is that of this world, isn't it?
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It's where? It's heaven. That's our citizenship. And truly, we are ambassadors of Jesus.
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You know, I read a comment on social media, I'm not sure when it was, but I loved it, where it said someone was mentioning church.
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And they said that instead of naming a church, it's like, well, tomorrow we get to go to the embassy of our true country, which is
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God's kingdom. And I love that idea that when we come together, we're living in a foreign land, and we truly belong to God's kingdom.
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And so knowing our identity in the King is crucial to understanding biblical evangelism.
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Can someone read the next paragraph, please? We'd like to read that. Pastor? So there the question is raised, what are the
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King's marching orders? What does He ask of us? What does He command us? He commands certain things in Scripture.
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And so what are some of the things that He commands of us? Yeah. Now, what's that called?
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The great commission. Commission to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them, name the
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Father and of the Son of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age.
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That is the promise and the commission that the Lord gave His people. But He gave us other commandments as well.
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Can we name any of the other ones that He gives us? I'm thinking of John 16. What new commandment did
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He give? To love one another. Now, why do we do what we do as Christians?
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Why do we meet on Sunday, on the Lord's Day, with the saints out of love for God and love for the brotherhood?
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Why do we go out and preach the good news of Jesus Christ? Love of God, love of neighbor.
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Love is a great commandment that the Lord has given His people. It's a privilege that it's ours to know
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God, to be loved by Him, but also then to love others and be a blessing to them for the kingdom's sake.
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We'd like to read the next paragraph. Go ahead.
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Amen. Now, the Lord's authority has what scope?
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What's the scope of His authority? Everywhere. Is it just restricted to Jerusalem?
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Israel? Middle East? The earth? It keeps going.
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One of the great promises of Scripture of the Messiah is that He shall have dominion.
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He shall have dominion. He shall reign forever and ever. And the
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Lord Jesus Christ sits enthroned right now. You know, this is one of the things that many evangelicals struggle with this concept because there's the idea of the now but not yet in eschatology.
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And I think what most of them really mean by that is now but not really. Where I think that Jesus Christ is now currently reigning
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King of Kings, Lord of Lords. We're not waiting for a future enthronement of our King. We're not waiting for Him to sit on a throne in Jerusalem and then
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He's coronated as King. He's King because He's sitting at God's right hand, interceding for you and I.
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And because He's been raised from the dead, He's been ascended on high, He now has authority in heaven and on earth.
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And what has He commanded us to do? Go. Not sit, not stay in our churches, not just fill pews.
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Go and make disciples. One of the tragedies of our modern missions and methodologies is that we focus as Christians, especially in America, on the building and facilities as the end goal for Christian missions.
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We want to get people into these seats and we want people to put money in the coffers and that's the mentality for most people's desire for growth in the church.
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But can I tell you, that's not what this is about. Christian evangelism isn't about filling the pulpit,
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I mean the pews, although that's going to be a fruit of that, God willing. It isn't about getting more funds for the church to do more interesting or fun things.
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The purpose of Christian evangelism is simply one thing.
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Obedience. Obedience. Notice what the Lord Jesus says in that text in Matthew 28.
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He says in verse 20, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.
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We are to go out to the nations and teach them the obedience of the faith in Jesus Christ.
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And in turn, we are obeying our Master. Because did not
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Jesus say, if you love me you will what? You will keep or obey my commandments.
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And what a joy it is. One of the things, hopefully after this is all said and done, is the joy that comes with evangelism.
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It's a joyful thing. It's a powerful thing. The fact that Jesus Christ has saved you and you can share that with the world, there's nothing better.
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There's nothing better to do under heaven than this work. I'll read the next paragraph for us in page 4.
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Why does making disciples matter? Because it is a divine command. It also matters because it is the way
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God is accomplishing His will on the earth today. The main focus of Jesus' teaching while on earth was the good news of the kingdom of God.
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Can someone, while I'm still reading this out loud, get Luke 4, verse 43 ready for reading?
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Is that going to be you, Fa? Are you going to do that for me? Thank you. Every time a person comes to saving faith in Jesus, God's kingdom grows and we step closer to a world where God's will is done on earth as it is in heaven.
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Through the Great Commission, Jesus gives us a vision of a new world that is within our sight and grasp, a world where He is reigning in the midst of His enemies, vanquishing
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His foes through the gospel proclamation of His church. In this commission, our
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Lord is directing the church to subdue the world with His good news and win people everywhere for the kingdom of God.
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Fa, can you read Luke 4, verse 43? Wow. That's Jesus speaking.
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And He says that the purpose for which He was sent was the proclamation of the good news of God's kingdom.
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Now, if that was our Lord's commission, if that was our Lord's work and purpose, what do you think should be ours?
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It ought to be the same, to see God's kingdom preached and proclaimed faithfully.
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Now, there's a theological statement that I make here that's of great implication that I've already alluded to, and it's in Psalm 110.
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I want you to turn there to Psalm 110. A great verse many of you are familiar with, and it is the most quoted and alluded to text of the
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New Testament, in the New Testament, of the Old. Psalm 110 says in verse 1, the
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Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter.
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Rule in the midst of your enemies. Notice that the
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Lord, Yahweh, Jehovah, said unto my Lord, Jesus Christ identifies
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Himself as that Lord. I believe it's in Matthew chapter 22, when He's contending with the
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Pharisees, He says that He is that Lord of which David was proclaiming. And so the
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Lord God Almighty, Yahweh, says to my Lord, the Lord Jesus, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.
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We see throughout Scripture the testimony that Jesus Christ is now at the right hand of God the Father, and the rule, the word that comes forth from Zion is this, to the
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Messiah, rule in the midst of your enemies. You know that that's what's happening right now?
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We're living in this time of history, where the Lord Jesus is enthroned, He's reigning and ruling today in the midst of His enemies.
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Now who are His enemies? Who are His enemies? Unbelievers?
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More specifically in Psalm 2, we see who the enemies of God are, and that's the nations who conspire against the
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Lord and His anointed. The nations are the enemies, are the enemy of God.
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In that, they are filled with unregenerate individuals who are in need of the life -saving gospel of Jesus Christ.
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And so the word that goes out of Zion is for Christ to rule in the midst of His enemies. And how is He doing that?
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How is He ruling in the midst of His enemies? Verse 3 tells us how. Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power, in holy garments.
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From the womb of the morning, the dew of your youth will be yours. And so how will
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God subdue the nations? Through His people who will offer themselves freely on the day of His power, which is now.
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We're living the day of the Lord's power. He's reigning and ruling today. We are clothed in holy garments, not the righteousness of our own, but the righteousness that comes through knowing
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Jesus Christ. We are clothed with His majesty, with His power, with His Holy Spirit.
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And so as a church, we have to freely give ourselves over to this great commission work, so that God's kingdom and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
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I'll read the next paragraph as well. It says, When Jesus was on earth, His disciples once urged
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Him to slow down from sharing the good news and to eat some food. Jesus responded with a sense of urgency and declared,
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Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are ripe for harvest.
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In other words, Jesus is saying the fruit is ripe for the taking. The nations are ready to hear and receive the word of God.
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The only question that remains is, are you ready to be obedient to the Lord's marching order?
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Now, for the purpose of the recap here, what is or I guess, what is the harvest?
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What is the harvest? Jesus says that the fields are ripe for harvest.
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What's the souls? In the world, you know, Jesus says that the field represents the world.
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The world that we just read about in Psalm 110, that the Lord is ruling in the midst of and subduing.
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And so God, through His Son Jesus, is saying the world is ready to hear the word of God.
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What a contrast to what it was before that time, when really only one nation had the peculiar, distinctive pleasure of hearing
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God's word through the prophets, and that was Israel. But now the invitation was for the world to hear, and Jesus said it's ready.
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Go and take it. Go and subdue the world to the gospel of Jesus. Now this may sound to you kind of post -millennial, and I assure you
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I'm all millennial, but what I like is I like to take the optimism of post -millennialists, and I like to apply it to Christian missions, because in that respect, those brothers are right.
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The gospel will go forth in power. The gospel will have success. The gospel will not return to the
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Lord null and void. It will have success in this world, and we have to believe it, because if we don't believe the gospel's going to have success, how can we preach it?
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How can we declare it if we think it has no success? Clearly, the gospel is going to have success in the world.
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Now, to what degree that is, I am not as optimistic as the post -millennialists, but one of the reasons for my optimism is the fact that I do believe that this country either will have revival, or will be destroyed.
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But a nation that does not know the Lord will not last very long, and so one of those two things will happen, and it's incumbent on the church to declare the gospel, to be faithful, and to share the gospel with the nations.
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That's right. Amen. Amen. We'd like to read the next paragraph.
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Many churchgoers neglect. Miriam? So here's the model that I see predominantly amongst churches across America.
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The model is come to church, okay, you've made a profession of faith in Jesus, great, you're part of the club.
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You're a disciple. We'll give you the little, you'll put your name tag and a little cubby hole in the back, and you're part of the club.
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You'll be on the mailing address and all that good stuff. Is that, is that discipleship?
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Because remember what we're being called to. We're being called not just to proclaim, but to make disciples.
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Now, what is a disciple? What is a disciple? We'll learn more in depth on these terms later on, but just to get that out the way now, let's define the term.
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Anyone know what the word disciple means? Pastor? Yeah. Literally it means like a pupil, a student, someone who sits at the feet of a teacher.
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And we're called to be disciples of whom? Jesus. He's the great rabbi of his people, and we sit at his feet.
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But we then in turn have to encourage and share the gospel so that others would come and be disciples of Jesus.
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To be pupils, to be learners, to be students of the word of God. But that's not what we see in most churches.
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Most churches are very much content with just having a service once or twice a week, and that's the extent of the disciple making work.
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What's encouraging to me is that one of the reasons why I knew this church would be a good fit was because that's not what you guys are doing.
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You guys have a far more intentional structure for discipleship making, and you guys are meeting together more than just once or twice a week.
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And part of being a disciple is that you have to walk alongside people in their life.
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Not just come to church on Sunday and then you go to your different corners of the city for six days, no interaction, no accountability, and then you come back on Sunday and you say, well, how are you doing today, brother?
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Well, I'm doing great, even though that person's marriage may be falling apart, or I'm real blessed, and they're having issues at home with their finances or their children.
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You see, Christianity is not meant to be done in a void or once a week ritual.
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It is meant to be done in the context of other believers who you are living and walking alongside with.
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Clearly, in the New Testament, we see that the disciples sold everything they had and held all things in common. And so it's a great discussion that I have with folks when
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I'm talking to them about giving or tithing. As I said, well, we can do it one of two ways. We can do the Old Testament route and do the 10%, or we can get rid of everything and share all things in common.
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By then, they usually pick the first option of the Old Covenant, but there is a freedom there that we have, of course.
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But the idea is that we hold all things in common. When my first church in Edmonton, what was really neat about that church was that we would have a time in the service where if someone had a prayer request or a need, they would be able to bring it forward.
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There are so many times where individuals are saying, I just moved to the area, I don't have a couch. And someone would stand up and say,
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I have a couch for you. Or, I have a need here, and this is where I'm at, and someone would meet that need.
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And it's just amazing how the people of God, when we come together and we're family, we're able to bless each other and meet each other's needs in that way.
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And that's the heart of discipleship. It's walking alongside each other, doing life together for the glory of God.
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So I'm going to read the next paragraph. Far from it. So is this what Jesus had in mind? Far from it. During Jesus' earthly ministry,
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He often grew great crowds who could come to hear Him speak. Unlike the seeker -sensitive preachers that fill the pulpits of many
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North American churches, our Lord emphasized genuine repentance and discipleship over mere attendance.
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Often, during His teachings to the masses, He would share parables that would confound and frustrate the masses.
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Jesus did this because He was weeding out the crowd in order to find and produce true disciples who had ears to hear.
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Attendance did not make one a disciple in Jesus' day. Neither does attendance alone produce true disciples of Jesus Christ today in the church.
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A true disciple of Jesus is one who learns from the Master and applies His teachings. Jesus said many will come to Him on that day of judgment professing
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His name by saying, Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven but the one doing the will of my
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Father who is in heaven. What was the purpose of the parables of Jesus, to some extent at least?
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What was the purpose of the parables? Because Jesus didn't often preach a very clear message, especially in front of the crowds.
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It would only be afterwards when His disciples are scratching their heads and saying, Okay, Jesus, what did you mean by that?
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That's when He explains. He usually always gives this instruction of this word.
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He says, He who has ears, let him hear. Let him hear. What do you think the purpose of the parables served for the masses?
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To separate, to cause a distinction between those who have ears to hear and those who do not.
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In other words, to minister to the elect and also bring a word, often leading to judgment, to the lost.
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Part of our job is to, by God's working in His Holy Spirit, is to help the elect come to those whom
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God has chosen for eternal life to receive that word so they may believe.
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Now, Charles Spurgeon put it this way, if every elect had an E stamped on their forehead, we'd only speak to those individuals, but since that's not the way it is, we preach unto all creation and some unto the gospel of life and others.
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A gospel is a word of condemnation. It's a stumbling block. But we preach it to all creatures, nonetheless, because we don't know.
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We're not the Lord. We don't know who is saved or elect. That's why the words that Jesus Christ gives us in Matthew 7, 21 is really important.
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Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven. Did you know that in this country, even though it's incredibly more secular, 71 % of individuals will consider themselves some form of Christian.
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So that means 7 out of 10 folks that you meet, I'm not sure what the demographics would be here in the
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Bay Area, but if you go to any town in America and you talk to 10 folks, 7 of them would say,
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I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian. Do you know what they mean by that? If you dig a little deeper, do you say, well, do you go to church?
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Well, no, I don't really go to church because I haven't found a church that I like or they're just after your money.
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Or then you go even deeper and say, well, did you ever make a confession of faith and were you ever baptized?
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Well, I was baptized as a baby or no, I've never actually done that. And the more that you dig, the more that you find out that these are not
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Christians, but they're cultural Christians. Maybe their grandparents took them to church one
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Easter morning and they identified with that to a degree, but they're not converted.
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And so the reality is the great, vast majority of Americans are under a great delusion.
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Did you know that even out of those, about 71 % of folks believe that they're Christian in America.
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Only about 51 % of them go to church once every eight weeks.
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So that's what the Barnard Group's criteria was. One out of eight go to church, or was it one out of five that go to church more than eight times.
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Well, it's 51 % that go to church about one time every eight weeks. So they get the big events.
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You know, they'll get the church service every once in a while. Now it's even worse through the pandemic because now it's so easy to just say,
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I'm just watching church from home. I don't have to go to church anymore. It's all live stream. I can pick any flavor of church.
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I can pick any flavor of preacher. It's all online. And then they consider that being church.
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Is that church? By no means. Friends, remember the world is under a delusion.
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Many who will say to Him, Lord, Lord, will not enter the kingdom of God because it is the one who does the will of the
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Father who enters. I'll read the next paragraph. And what is the
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Father's will? Jesus said, this is the work, will of God, that you believe in Him whom
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He has sent. How then will this work be fulfilled? The Apostle Paul said, how then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed?
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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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So what is the work or will of God? What's the work or will of God?
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Preach the good news, but even more specifically, it's from John 6 29. Believe on the one whom
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God has sent, Jesus Christ. That's the work. That's the work that you believe on Him whom
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God has sent. And Romans 10 says, how will they believe unless they, what?
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Hear. How will they hear if there's no one there to preach?
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How will someone preach if they're not sent out? And that's what we are doing here today.
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And what we will continue to do for the next several weeks together in this class, prepare you, dear saint, to be sent out into the world.
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I'll read the last paragraph as well, and then we'll go through the recap. Surely this work will be done by everyday disciples of Jesus who know their testimony of the good news that saved them in the
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Word of God, and share it with the world. There is no greater work under heaven right now that any one of us could join than the work of the great commission of making disciples for Jesus Christ and baptizing the nations into the name of the
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Triune God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. What a privilege our Lord has given us to join and partner with Him in obedience.
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And what a promise He left us that as we go, teaching and observing all that He commanded, that He Himself would be with us even on to the end of the age.
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I love that the Lord promises to be with us during this great commission work.
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So He won't leave you out there, and sometimes I know that there's a lot of folks who feel like, man,
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I'm just not called to share the gospel in that way. I'm not called to knock on doors.
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I'm not called to speak to my neighbor. I don't know if I'm qualified, and this instruction that will be given to you over the next several weeks hopefully will begin to erode that false narrative.
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Because every single one of us have been charged with this great commission work. Every single one of us.
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And so we all have a part to play in it. And we all have a grand task ahead of us. There's no work greater under heaven than this work here.
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So we're privileged as then to be equipped to go out and do it. Before we do the recap, are there any questions or thoughts so far on the material?
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Yes, Pastor. That's right.
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That's right. Yeah. Amen.
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Amen. You know, one of the things that hopefully comes out through this teaching is that there's nothing earth -shattering about the material.
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This is actually really basic stuff. This is not difficult material at all. It's not very expansive.
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It's not cumbersome. It's really directing to the point because I really believe that Christian evangelism is simple.
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It's not super complex. We don't have to reinvent the wheel. We just do something radical, which is this.
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Do what the Word says. That's all there is to it. Is do what has been laid out before us in Holy Scripture.
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This is not going to be an exhaustive, difficult teaching or material.
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I designed this purposely so that this could fit and be applicable to someone who is new to the faith or someone who is 60 years in the faith and that there are very tangible, applicable things for us to do through this material here for evangelism.
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It's going to be quite surprising maybe to some of you just how simple this material is and it's purposely done that way because this is not a hard thing.
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The only hard aspect to it is we have to obey and sometimes that's difficult, but we don't have to,
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Nehemiah, we don't have to wreck our brains trying to figure out how do we do this.
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It's very simple. It's very simple. So let's go to the recap real quick and we'll go over these recap questions and if you have a pen or a pencil
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I'd love for you to fill these in while we're going through it together as a class. And what
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I ask in the top here is in the class exercise, read the question, discuss and write the answer with scriptural reference.
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And so I'd like for you, when you're writing something or you're giving an answer, that there should be a biblical basis for what it is that we are answering with.
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And so what is the most important truth that we must acknowledge? What is the most important truth?
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He's Lord. Hallelujah. Jesus Christ is Lord. What scriptural reference can we give to something like that?
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Philippians chapter 2, 9 through 11 where it says that God has highly exalted
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Jesus and given him the name that is above every name so that the name of Jesus every knee shall bow and heaven on earth, underneath the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is
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Lord unto the glory of God the Father. It's a marvelous text.
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This is the most important truth that we must acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord. And then a great text for that would be like Romans 10 9.
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If thou confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thy heart that God has raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
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Now what work has our Lord commanded us to take to the nations? What work?
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To make disciples of all nations. That's the great commission. So the work that the
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Lord has commanded us to take to the nations, both in Matthew chapter 28,
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Acts chapter 1, is to take this gospel, this good news,
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Matthew 24, 14 as well, to all the nations. In Acts chapter 1, verse 8,
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Jesus says, but you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
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So I like to tell folks, listen, I used to be a Jehovah Witness, but I'm still a JW. I'm just a different kind of JW.
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I'm a Jesus Witness. And you can be a Jesus Witness too. So the work our
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Lord commanded us to take to the nations is to make disciples. Great commission work. And you can have a scriptural reference in Matthew 24, 14,
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Matthew 28, Acts chapter 1, verse 8. So many great verses that could be used.
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And this is an exercise as well that's going to help you memorize some important scriptures for when you're witnessing the folks.
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Because one of the exercises that we want to get to know our Bibles a little bit better so we can share it.
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Now why should the great commission be important to the Christian? Why is it important to us?
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Or why should it be important to us? Say it again?
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Yeah. Yes. You know,
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Jesus says in Luke 4, 43, for this purpose I was sent forth to preach the good news.
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So why should it matter to us? Because this is the purpose for which our
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Lord and that means for us also that we've been sent forth. It's our purpose.
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Great answer. It's our purpose. And again we can look at a text like Luke 4, 43 to answer that.
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Say again? Yeah. What does it say in Ephesians?
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Amen. That's a good word.
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Now what does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus? What does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus?
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What is a disciple again? It's to be a student. It's to be a student of Christ, of His Word, of His teachings, applying it to our lives.
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And that too finds its definition in Matthew 28, 20 where we are taught that the
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Great Commission work is to teach, to observe all that He commanded. That's what a disciple is.
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Someone who is receiving the teaching and observing or fulfilling or doing all that He commanded.
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And what is the work or will of God? What is the work or will of God?
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We're going to talk a little bit about the will of God during today's message. But what is the work or will of God according to let's say
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Matthew or John 6, 29? Amen.
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And so the work of God is that we believe on Christ. We believe in the Father. Remember the discipleship work is to baptize into the name of the
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Triune God. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Interestingly enough, it's one name, singular, the name of the
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Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. It's the one Triune and true God. So what is the work or the will of God?
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It's to know Christ or to know the Triune God of Scripture. And this is a fun question in the next page.
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Who can participate in the work of God? Just pastors, right?
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Just trained pastors. If you don't have a seminary degree, you're out of the picture. Is that what the
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Scriptures teach? No, not at all.
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The Scripture teaches clearly who can participate in this work? Every believer.
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Every believer. This work is for you and I. Again, the model that we have in America where you know, we come to church, there's a preacher or pastor, you listen to him, he does all the preaching.
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I almost think of it like a bird feeding its chicks where the bird will chew everything and then regurgitate into the mouth of the bird.
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And that's what a lot of Christian churches look like where the pastor is doing all the chewing, the pastor is just regurgitating onto the people of God and they've had their fill for the rest of the week.
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Which is why we have so many weak and anemic Christians in America. There's so many weak and anemic
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Christians because you're not being fed. Because you're not doing the work of a disciple. And so this work is for you and I.
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It's for every believer in Jesus. And are you willing, now the question, now the last question just requires a yes or a no.
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Are you willing to be part of this great commission work? What is your response?
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Alright, let's do it again. What's your response? Yes. Let's stand up.
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And stand up for Jesus. Amen.
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Great text. Now here is what we're going to do now. We're coming to the end of our class.
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There's going to be homework for you. And so this homework is to be expected to be done by next
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Sunday. Now the homework is simple but it might be a little bit intimidating.
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So let me walk you through it. We desire for you this week for your homework to pair up with someone in the group.
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In this group. Someone that's not your spouse. Someone not in your immediate family. And I want you to share your salvation testimony with them.
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Now one of the things I love about this church is that we get to hear our testimonies when we come for membership.
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And that's a wonderful thing. You know most churches don't even do that. Most churches don't have a testimony time during membership.
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And so that's a great thing. But I want you to do it individually now. With someone here. Share your testimony with them before the next class.
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And once you've shared your testimony with each other, have your classmates sign at the bottom of this page with the date.
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Just to demonstrate that you've faithfully done so. And then for the next Sunday I will be checking your homework.
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And also I'll be in the coming weeks this is going to be an important aspect of fulfilling and doing because you may be required or asked, not required, but some of you may be asked to share your testimony during the class.
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So that we can be edified but also tactfully learn how to share our testimonies in different settings.
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Any thoughts or questions so far? Simple enough.
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Let me pray. Lord Jesus, you're truly the great shepherd of the sheep.
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There is no name greater nor authority higher than yours.
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Our blessed king and savior, our redeemer. Fill us with your spirit this morning so that we may love to obey thy command.
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That we may take not lightly but seriously and weighty these words to make disciples of you in all nations.
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Making disciples that would be baptized in the name of the one true and triune god. The father, the son, and the holy spirit.
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Lord Jesus, bless us as we endeavor to learn about this Christian art of evangelism. That our hearts and minds would be set on you, the author and perfecter of our faith.
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As we await for you to be revealed in glory. In Jesus name we do pray. Amen. Okay. We will see you guys in a bit then.