Discipleship - The Heart Of Outreach Ministry

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Good morning. It really has been a great time these last couple days getting to fellowship with many of you.
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And we're looking forward to another couple days of that. I know we probably won't be able to spend time fellowshipping with everyone.
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But just let me say, since I have pretty much the whole church in front of me, thank you so much.
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We love you for your partnership in the ministry we have. It's exciting to be serving the
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Lord together, isn't it? Your prayers are important to us. Your financial support is important to us.
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And we couldn't do it without you. So thank you so much for your partnership with us in that ministry over in India.
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I'd love to talk to everyone, so please come up to me and my wife,
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Andrea. I don't know if she's here right now. She's out in the hall with Nathaniel. But we would just love if she can poke her head in and you can see her.
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My precious wife, Andrea. Thank you, dear. But we just very honestly want to say we love you.
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Thank you for your fellowship with us in the ministry. You know, the gospel is powerful, as Mike said.
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And the gospel is great because our Lord is great. The gospel is the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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Like Paul said in Romans 1, I am not ashamed of the gospel. Why? The gospel of Christ because it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.
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To the Jew first and also to the Greek. What was
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Paul saying there? He was saying the gospel is powerful to change lives. To all people.
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And the big cultural difference in those days was Jews and the
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Gentiles, the Greeks. The gospel is for all people, for all men. And so it's exciting to be just a vessel of that powerful word of truth about Christ to the world, isn't it?
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It's a wonderful ministry to be a part of. But you know, as you look at a country like India, like Mike said, a billion people.
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One billion people on that small piece of land in Southeast Asia called
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India. Do you know that the land mass of India is about one -third the size of the U .S.?
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It's about one -third the size. But the population of India is three times that of what we have in the
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United States. India contains a mass of humanity. And when you think about that country, that one -fifth of the world's population, and then when you think of the fact that less than 1 % of those people know and love and honor and worship the true
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God, it's mind -blowing. You know, I can tell you very honestly, as I have gone to India to minister there, our desire is to impact that nation for Christ, to bring the gospel to them.
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But you think, I'm one person, or our team is three people, six people, eight people.
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Our church is 50 people in a nation of a billion, most of which who don't know
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Christ. There is a temptation very often to start thinking in terms of, you know, what are we doing here?
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What impact can we really have? The PTI, you know, we have a few students.
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We're teaching them the Bible. We want them to go out and proclaim the gospel and to plant churches. But what can we really accomplish of significance for Christ in that nation?
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And I don't know, maybe sometimes you would feel the same way in your sphere of influence.
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In the pastor's graveyard, right? In a place, in a part of the world that largely does not know and love and honor
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Christ. We can feel very discouraged, very small, very insignificant.
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What are we going to do? You know, very often, we may be tempted to think, okay, we need a plan.
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We need a strategy. We need some method to reach out to the world.
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We need some method, some five -step plan. And we think that we need to conjure up some strategy, some really intelligent design in order to reach this mass of humanity.
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But you know, our Lord, right after His resurrection from the dead, right before His ascension into heaven,
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He gave us the plan, right? He gave us the ultimate plan on how to reach out to a lost and dying world that largely rejects and has no interest in the truth.
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And He said that plan is discipleship. Our Lord's plan for reaching the lost masses of this world, whether it's in India or whether it's in the
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United States of America, is discipleship. Now, when you say that, you think, okay, big deal.
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Is that really going to do the job? Is that what's really going to work? It is.
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It's the plan the Lord intended to give us when He came. And that's what I want us to look at this morning, is the keystone, the foundation, the most important strategy and plan for reaching a lost world, the powerful plan that God has ordained to reach out to a lost world, whether it's here in your community or to the millions of people in India, is biblical,
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God -ordained discipleship. And we're going to learn about what that means today, both from the command of our
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Lord as well as from the example of our Lord. You know, the essence of discipleship, the foundation of discipleship is transmission.
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It's a passing on of a spiritual heritage from one spiritual generation to another.
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And that's what Jesus said is our plan of attack for reaching this world for Him, for the building of the church in this world.
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It's that spiritual task of making disciples. You think about Jesus' ministry, right?
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He came to save us, to die on the cross, to begin the church.
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And what did He do when He came to earth? Yes, He preached to the crowds, to the multitudes, but where was
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His focused ministry placed during His lifetime?
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It was on 12 normal, common, everyday men, wasn't it?
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He poured His life into them. He loved them. And then
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He commissioned them to go out and to plant churches and to preach the gospel and to do ministry.
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So we see in the life of our Lord Himself both the command to do discipleship as well as the example in His own ministry.
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And that's what I want us to see today, that not only did Christ command us to make disciples, and that was
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His plan for reaching the world, but He Himself did it. And as we follow the
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Lord in both His command and His example, the church will be built up.
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The community will be affected. God, most importantly, will be glorified as we follow His strategy and plan for outreach into this world.
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So why don't you turn in your Bibles to Matthew 28? This is the classic passage on missions,
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I suppose you could say. But we're going to look at the last two verses of Matthew's gospel.
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Matthew 28, verses 19 and 20. And here we will see the command of our Lord. He preached,
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He taught, He died on the cross, He rose again for our salvation, He's about to ascend into heaven, and He says to His disciples, this is what you need to be about.
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And He gives us the plan. He gives us the strategy for carrying on His ministry in this world.
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And it's all about discipleship. Let's read this text, and then we'll talk about its implications for us.
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Matthew 28, verses 19 and 20. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the
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Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you, and lo,
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I am with you always, even to the end of the age. I want us to look at this passage just briefly that gives the command of our
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Lord in three parts. First, I want to look at the great command. Secondly, we'll look at the great means to fulfilling the command.
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And thirdly, we'll look at the great encouragement. And this will explain to us what the
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Lord wants us to be about right now in ministry. The first thing He says we want to look at is the great command.
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See what He says there in verse 19. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations.
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You know, there's only one command in this verse. Many often the translations will give the impression that there are two commands, right?
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But if you look at the grammar, the way Jesus said it, the language that He used,
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He only has one main command. And the command is not go.
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The command is what? Make disciples. Now, I don't want to bore you with grammar or language, but that word, make disciples or disciples, is a verb.
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It's an action word. It's the only verb in the verse. So what Jesus is saying is, above all else, this is what
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I want you to do while I am gone in heaven. Before I come for you again, do this.
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Make disciples. You could say, go disciple people.
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That's what Jesus intended to say. Now, discipleship involves many things. We'll just talk about what that word means just for a minute.
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But basically, the word itself means to teach or to learn. It's communication.
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It's a passing on. It's a transmission, like I said, of a spiritual heritage. But you know, it's not intellectual teaching or only intellectual learning.
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That's involved. But it's more than that. It's the kind of transmission of knowledge that comes when life bumps up against life.
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When two people come together in relationship, in loving Christian fellowship, and they build into one another's lives.
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That's the kind of learning. That's the kind of transmission that Jesus is talking about here when he uses this word.
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He says, make disciples. He says, with life on life, in Christian fellowship and love, pass on the truth of the gospel and of God.
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That's the kind of teaching that discipleship means. So that's the command. We're commanded to be involved in relationships with other people so that we can pass on to them the truth about Christ and the gospel.
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Now, how are we to do that? Jesus gives us in these verses, really in just summary form, the means to fulfill that command.
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We saw the great command. We are to make disciples. But then he also gives us the means to fulfill that command.
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And there's three things he gives us here. Now, the three words, go, baptizing, and teaching are all descriptive words.
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In Greek grammar, you'd call those a participle. And each one, the job of those participles that Jesus used is to describe how the action, the command is to be done.
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So Jesus says, disciple people. That's the main point. And now let me, in brief, in summary form, tell you how to do it.
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And the first descriptive word he gives us there is what? It's go.
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Go and make disciples. Now, some people will wonder, you know, why does the translation we have treat that first descriptive word as a command?
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In most translations you have, it'll say go, like Jesus is commanding us to go.
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And there's a couple reasons for that. The main reason is that in the original language, Jesus spoke that word in a way that was very, very emphatic.
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Just like you have in your Bibles, so also in the Greek, that word came number one in the sentence.
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It's the very first word. So Jesus is saying, this is key. This is important.
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Also, he used a form of the word that is very emphatic, different from the other two words, baptizing and teaching.
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And the form of that word is placing emphasis on that particular way in which you are to make disciples.
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So we know Jesus placed a very strong emphasis on that word. He says, go.
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This is how you make disciples. First thing you've got to know, the first thing you've got to do, you have got to go.
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Now, I believe Jesus emphasized that word for this reason. He knew that to make disciples, to do that ministry of life -on -life training and interaction would take a lot of work.
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It was going to take effort. It was going to be difficult. It would be much, much easier to sit back and go through the motions of Christianity, of our relationship with the
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Lord, and to enjoy the blessings of God and our salvation, but to step out of the comfort zone, to take the initiative, to make the effort to build into another person's life, that's difficult.
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That's hard. Have you ever tried to do that? Maybe to reach out to an unbeliever at your work?
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Or to try to take the steps to build into your children's lives? It's tough to get involved with people's lives, right?
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To get down and dirty, to get your hands into the ups and downs of another person's issues.
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Relationships are hard, right? And intimate relationships, close relationships are difficult.
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But that's what discipleship is all about. It's loving people. It's weeping when they weep.
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It's rejoicing when they rejoice. Discipleship is all about relationships, and that takes effort.
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It takes initiative. It takes a plan. And that's what Jesus is saying. He's saying, you need to make disciples.
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That's the plan for reaching the world. But you know what? You're going to have to get your lives in close proximity with other people's lives.
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You need to work for those relationships. So go. Do it. Take initiative.
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Be proactive. Take action. Persevere in this task. Jesus says, go and make disciples.
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The second way, the second key action that we can do to fulfill this command of discipleship is, of course, baptizing.
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Jesus says there, go therefore make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the
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Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This is the second way in which we are to make disciples.
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Now what does baptism mean? The essence of baptism is a declaration. It's a proclamation of my commitment to Jesus Christ alone.
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The Lord told us to do this because it was a symbol of rejection of everything in my life in the past and a singular devotion to Jesus Christ.
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I will follow Him alone. That's the statement. That's what baptism signifies.
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And Jesus said part of your disciple -making ministry must be calling people to singular devotion to Jesus Christ.
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We don't call people to try Jesus. We call people to love
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Jesus alone and worship Him alone. You know, in India, that is a very difficult thing.
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In America, we're fairly open, right? You can believe what you want. The culture says that.
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You can do what you want. You know, you grow up in a family that is of some particular religion.
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You choose another religion. Well, okay, that's fine. Very often it's that way.
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In India, it's not that way at all. What you are raised in, what your family is devoted to, if you leave that, it's extremely difficult for the family.
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They feel that wound very, very personally. And so for a person to come to Christ and to be baptized by turning their back on everything they else believed in their family and their background is a major decision for them.
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And that's what Jesus intends. He says when you make disciples, call people to that, to that kind of commitment, to that kind of devotion.
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It was neat. Right before we came on furlough, a few months back, one of our students, his name was
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Jayesh, was baptized. And Jayesh had grown up in a Christian family.
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Their family had gone to a Christian church in Pune for a number of years. But it was a very eclectic kind of a church,
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Anglican in many ways, very traditional, kind of believing whatever they want.
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And he came as a teenager to know Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. And he went to his father and said,
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I want to be baptized as a believer, as a follower of Christ.
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He was sprinkled as a baby, but he said I didn't know Christ then. I want to follow him alone and show that through my baptism.
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And his father was angry. He was upset. He said, you know, how can you do this?
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How can you imply that what we believe and the church we've been involved in is not the true gospel, is not the true faith?
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And he was angry, and he threatened his son, even threatening to do harm to himself in order to keep
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Jayesh from being baptized. And it was neat. Just last year, Jayesh was filling the call to ministry.
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He was following the Lord. He had not yet been baptized, but he came to PTI. He was being trained for ministry to the
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Lord, and he made the decision just a few months before we left, I will declare my devotion to Christ alone.
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And we were there right a few days before we left to see him be baptized in the church with his father standing there, his mother standing there.
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Pastor Chris Williams, the pastor of the church we're connected with, preached the gospel, and he took that decision to follow
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Christ totally, purely. It was wonderful to see the Lord work in his heart.
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And that's what Christ wants us to do when we disciple people, when we bring them to him. Call them to that commitment, that decision to stand against all others, but stand with Christ alone.
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So Jesus says, this is how you make disciples. You go to them.
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You take the initiative. You get involved in people's lives. You call them to an intimate relationship with Christ.
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And then we see the third summarizing principle here on how to make disciples. He says, teaching them, in verse 20, look at it in your
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Bibles, please. Teaching them to observe all that I commanded you. Teaching them to observe all that I commanded you.
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Essential to the ministry of disciple making is teaching. It's communication of the truth.
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It's leading someone to the truth of the Gospel, the truth of God's Word. And notice that Jesus says here, it's not just education.
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Again, it's not just academic. It's teaching them to what? To do all that I commanded you.
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It's practical. It's showing someone how to follow Christ, how to love him, how to worship
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God. Teaching them. I can tell you in PTI, in the institute that we've had the privilege to be a part of, these are the most wonderful times that we spend with these men, day in and day out, hour after hour, discussing the
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Word of God. As I'm learning, and the students are learning, and we're learning together what
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God's Word says and how that applies to life. It's a wonderful experience. I'm sure you experience it as well in Bible studies as you fellowship around the
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Word of God. That's what Jesus is talking about here. Essential to the ministry of discipleship is that teaching, that education, that growing of our knowledge of Christ and his
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Word. So this is, in brief, how we are to do discipleship.
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I want us to look at the life of Christ in a few minutes about how to do discipleship. But this, in brief,
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Jesus says this is what you must be about. Disciple people. Be disciples of men.
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This is how we are to reach the world for him with the Gospel. But there's one more aspect, a third key truth about discipleship which
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Jesus gives here. We saw the command. We saw the means to fulfill that command. But let's look at the third aspect of these verses.
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We can call this the great encouragement. The great encouragement. Look what Jesus says at the end of verse 20.
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It's wonderful. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.
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You could translate this phrase literally. I like the way it comes out literally. Jesus says,
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And look, I am with you all the days until the consummation of the age, or the end of the age.
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Jesus says here, I am with you all the days. And he makes it very, very particular.
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I like that. Because he's saying every day, at every moment, every single day, all the way to my second coming,
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I will be with you. You know, our Lord Jesus is concerned about the buildup and the growth of his church.
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Do you believe that? I believe our Lord Jesus is more concerned, he's more zealous, he's more passionate about the growing up of his church than you and I are.
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It's his plan. It's his strategy. It's his desire to see people come to him and for the church to grow up into maturity.
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We mentioned before Matthew 16, 18 in Sunday School this morning. Jesus said, I will build my church.
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Jesus takes it personally. When it comes to reaching out to the world, to the community, to the buildup of saints in the church, it's not just our plan.
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We don't have to stand alone. It's not our power. It's the Lord's plan.
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It's the Lord's power. And he will do it through us for his glory.
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So Jesus says, I will be with you. Do you ever feel intimidated? You say, I don't feel equipped to go.
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I don't know how to teach. I'm not going to baptize anyone. But the
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Lord is with us. He says, I will be with you even to the end. Go.
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Make disciples. Baptize them. Teach them. Bring them into the fold. So that's the great command.
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We see that Jesus has commanded us. We don't have an option. The Great Commission applies to you and to me.
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Whether we're ministering in India, whether you're ministering here in your communities, you are to be disciple makers.
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Now, let's look at the second part that I want to look at today is that we see that discipleship is the heart of evangelism, of outreach from the example of our
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Lord himself. When Jesus came to earth, he poured his life and loving relationship into these men.
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He placed all of his strategy, pinned all of his hopes, if you can say that about the
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Lord, on 12 men who would be empowered by the Spirit to preach the gospel and to begin the church.
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And so Jesus himself was a disciple maker. And so he leads us not only by command, but also by example.
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And I just want to survey six key actions this morning from the gospels that show us what our
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Lord was like as a disciple maker. Six pictures of his disciple making ministry.
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Now, before we do that, I want to direct your attention to one verse in Mark 3, which really in a nutshell summarizes the discipleship ministry of our
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Lord. Turn to Mark 3 and verse 14. Jesus said this, or the gospel says this about Jesus.
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He says, And he appointed 12 so that they would be with him and that he would send them out to preach and to have authority to cast out the demons and to continue their ministry.
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Don't you love the way it says that? It doesn't say Jesus appointed 12 to be in his seminary.
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Alright? Jesus appointed 12 to be the directors of his ministry strategy.
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Alright? What did Jesus do? Jesus appointed 12 so that they would be what?
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With him. This is discipleship. That he would love them.
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That he would have a relationship with them. That he would teach them as a loving teacher. And that they would go out and spread the gospel and do the same to others and disciple others.
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Jesus was a disciple maker. That was his plan. That was his strategy. And how did he do that?
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Let's look at these six key actions of discipleship. There are more we could look at, but I think these are really key.
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Turn first of all to John chapter 15. John chapter 15. And I'm going to be looking at several passages and reading through them quickly.
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I want us just to get a picture in our minds of what discipleship is like in the life of our
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Lord. So turn to John 15 and let me read verses 12 -17.
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Jesus is teaching his disciples. He says, This is my commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.
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Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.
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You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do
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I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing. But I have called you friends.
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For all things that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you.
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And I appointed you that you would go and bear fruit and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the
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Father in my name He may give to you. This I command you, that you love one another.
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The key trait we see about our Lord in His disciple -making ministry, firstly, is that He was focused on people.
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Our Lord was people -focused in His ministry. Did you notice what
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He said there in verses 15 and 16? Jesus, the Teacher, the Master, the Miracle Worker, the
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One who will raise from the dead? What did
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He say? He says, I don't call you slaves. I don't lord my authority over you.
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I call you friends. I love you. You are my friends.
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I am with you. And why does He call them that? He says in v.
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16, I chose you, yes. I appointed you, yes. I was in the position of authority.
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Authority, why? What does it say in v. 16? So that you would go and what? Bear fruit.
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My ministry to you, my teaching of you, my authority over you as a teacher and a master is so that you would be fruitful.
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See, for our Lord, the ministry was not about how many people are coming to my ministry.
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It wasn't what is the bottom line, how are we doing financially. It wasn't about are people respecting me and appreciating what
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I'm doing. Right? That wasn't our Lord's focus. He says,
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I don't call you slaves. I don't have to keep you under my control. Our Lord says,
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I love you and the reason I chose you and appointed you is so you would be fruitful, so that you would grow and so that you would have joy in the
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Lord and in serving Him. And this is the first principle I want us to see from the ministry of our
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Lord and His relationship and ministry with His disciples. He did it with their best interests in mind.
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He was people focused, not things focused or programs focused or money focused or authority focused, however you want to say it.
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He was focused on people and their fruitfulness. And that's what a discipler must be.
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First and foremost, concerned about the fruitfulness and the growth of that person. Let's look at the second characteristic we see of our
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Lord and we see that He was also a teaching discipler.
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He would teach. And we see this throughout the Gospels, but I want to point your attention to Mark chapter 9.
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Look at Mark chapter 9 and we'll read verses 30 to 37.
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It says, From there they went out and began to go through Galilee. That's Jesus and His disciples.
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And He did not want anyone to know about it. For He was teaching
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His disciples and telling them, The Son of Man is to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill
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Him. And when He has been killed, He will raise three days later. So Jesus is traveling with His disciples.
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He's teaching them along the way about important truths, about what was going to happen to Him. But notice what it says in verse 32.
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It says, But they did not understand this statement, and they were afraid to ask
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Him. They came to Capernaum, and when He was in the house, He began to question them,
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What were you discussing on the way? But they kept silent.
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For on the way, they had discussed with one another which of them was the greatest. And sitting down,
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He called the twelve and said to them, If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all and servant of all.
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Taking the child, He set him before them, and taking him in His arms, He said to them, Whoever receives one child like this in My name receives
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Me. And whoever receives Me does not receive Me, but Him who sent
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Me. Do you see the picture of what's going on here in this relationship between Christ and His disciples?
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Jesus is about to die. He's about to go give His life for the sins of the world. And He's communicating these important truths to His key disciples.
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And number one, they aren't getting it. They're not understanding what He's saying. And more than that, they're too proud to ask
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Him. It says they're afraid to ask and to admit that they didn't understand.
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And beyond that, what were they discussing on the road right after Jesus teaches them these things? What are they discussing about?
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Who's the greatest? Who's better? Who does the Lord like the most? Who's the highest up?
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Who's the most spiritual in the group? These disciples are really missing the mark.
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I think if I was the teacher there, I'd be, Yo, stupid guys, what are you doing?
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You're way off here. I'd feel frustrated, right? But what does our Lord do?
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In His gentleness, as the Master Discipler, He sits them down and asks them a question.
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What are you guys discussing? He knew what they were discussing. But He wants them to learn.
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He wants to teach them. He doesn't hammer them. He understands that they are still a long way off from where they ought to be.
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So He questions them. He gently gathers them together and He teaches them. He brings a object lesson, right?
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He brings a little child over and says, let me show you. Let me show you where you were wrong.
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Our Lord was a Master Teacher in gentleness, in patience. This is what discipleship is about.
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It's patient instruction. I love 2 Timothy 4 .2. You know what that verse says, right?
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Preach the word in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with what? Much patience and instruction.
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That's the heart of our Lord. That's how He disciples. That's how you and I must disciple.
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To understand that we're not where we ought to be. These brothers and sisters in Christ in my church are not where they ought to be.
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But I am going to patiently help them to get there. That was the heart of our
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Lord. He was a teacher. He brought people along to the truth. So He was focused on people.
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He was a teacher. Let's look at a third aspect of our Lord's discipleship ministry. And we see it in Mark 8.
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Not only did He gently teach, but He confronted. He corrected. He rebuked.
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Mark 8 .31 -33 is a well -known passage. It says,
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And He began to teach them, the disciples, that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and after three days rise again.
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And He was stating the matter plainly. And Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke
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Him. But turning around and seeing His disciples, He rebuked Peter and said,
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Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on God's interests but man's.
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Our Lord is discipling His men, right? He was gentle. He was patient.
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But at appropriate times, out of love, He rebuked them. He confronted them. How would you like to have been,
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Peter, there? How would you have felt? Jesus Christ, the
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Lord and Master, turns to you and says, You're thinking like Satan, Peter. Man, what a rebuke.
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How painful that would have been. One of the key aspects of disciple -making is speaking the truth in love.
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Ephesians 4 .15 Speak the truth in love so that the church is built up and grows.
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So when a pastor stands in the pulpit and he hammers away on you, why is he doing that?
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It's because he loves you. And he knows to walk down the path of wrong, unbiblical thinking will hurt you.
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It will lead you astray. And just like our Lord who rebukes, who in His zeal and passion for the life of the people
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He loves, He will turn and He will rebuke. That's part of discipleship.
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It's telling the truth even when it hurts. Out of love.
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Now think about how this, just for a minute, how does this apply to your life? What does it mean perhaps in your relationship as you think about disciple -making and evangelism, perhaps with an unbeliever?
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When you need to say the truth even though you know it's going to hurt and it's not going to be accepted.
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Very often we're afraid to talk about the hard issues, the hard spiritual issues with believers particularly.
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The fact of sin and that God is holy and will bring judgment.
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But when Jesus said in Matthew 28, go, make disciples, He meant that that would include confronting people with the truth of the
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Gospel and the truth of sin and of God's holiness. So we see in the life of our
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Lord here also disciple -making will involve confrontation, correction, setting people straight.
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Why? Out of love. Out of love for their soul. That's the hardest thing to do.
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I know in PTI I'm still learning to do this. I hate it. When someone is lazy, they're not doing their work, they've spoken angrily against another student, we have to sit them down and say you have sinned.
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It's uncomfortable. Right? But the only thing that will keep me from doing that because of the discomfort is my lack of love for that person.
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If I love like my Lord loves, I will confront for their ultimate good.
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So discipleship also includes this third aspect of confrontation and correction.
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Let's look at a fourth. We see that discipleship involves these things as well as modeling.
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Modeling. And we see this wonderfully in John 13. Turn there in your Bibles. John 13.
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We're going to read verses 3 -17. It's a little bit long passage, but I want you to get the picture. I want you to feel the heart of our
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Lord as He does this. So just notice the heart of our Lord and how He disciples in this short story that we see here.
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John 13, verses 3 -17. Jesus, knowing that the
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Father had given all things into His hands and that He had come forth from God and was going back to God, got up from supper, laid aside
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His garments, and taking a towel, He girded Himself. Then He poured water into the basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel with which
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He was girded. So He came to Simon Peter and He said to him,
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Lord, do you wash My feet? Jesus answered and said to him, What I do you do not realize now, but you will understand hereafter.
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Peter said to Him, Never shall you wash my feet. And Jesus answered him, If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.
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Simon Peter said to Him, Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.
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Jesus said to him, He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean.
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And you are clean, but not all of you. For He knew the one who was betraying
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Him. For this reason, He said, not all of you are clean. So when
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He had washed their feet and taken His garments and reclined at the table, He said to them,
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Do you know what I have done to you? You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am.
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If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, wash your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.
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For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you.
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Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him.
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If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. How did our
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Lord disciple these men in this situation?
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He showed them an example. He lived the life that He intended for them to live before their eyes.
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You know, you could say Jesus did this as an illustration, but could it be also that Jesus did this because somebody needed to wash the feet?
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Nobody else wanted to do it. The disciples were sitting there, I'm not going to do it. Who didn't schedule the foot washer?
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It must have been your fault, right? I'm not going to do it. And our Lord takes
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His garments off, puts on the towel, and He does the job, what nobody else wanted to do.
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He humbled Himself. He served. He loved. And I believe we see in this example of our
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Lord, in this passage, a key aspect of what it means to be a disciple maker.
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It's to be a model. It's to be the one who takes the initiative to serve when no one else wants to serve.
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It's the one to take up the responsibility to obey the Lord when nobody else wants to.
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It's to be a model. It's to be an example to others. How can you have a lasting spiritual impact on others?
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Live a godly life. Be the person, the man, the woman, the young person that God wants you to be.
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And your brothers and sisters will look at you and say, yes, that's what a believer is to be like.
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And you will encourage and build them up to be the kind of man or woman or young person that God wants them to be.
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That's discipleship. And our Lord is showing us we lead by example. We disciple by modeling a godly life.
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Let's look at a fifth aspect of discipleship. What does it mean to disciple? It involves also praying.
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If we were to look throughout the Gospels, we see our Lord again and again and again kneeling before His Father to pray.
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To pray for His disciples. To pray that they would be built up. To pray that they would have unity.
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Just a couple of examples to look at. Look at Luke 22, verses 31 and 32. Luke 22, verses 31 and 32.
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Jesus is talking to Simon Peter again. He says, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat.
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But I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail.
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And you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.
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Jesus prayed for His disciples. He labored in prayer that they would be successful spiritually. That's what it means to disciple people as well.
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To care so much about your brother or your sister's spiritual well -being that you are willing to spend time on your knees before the
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Father, begging Him to build them up and to strengthen them.
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And I love also John 17, particularly verses 9 through 11.
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You can look at it. He prays for all believers, you and I as well, that they would be one, that they would be unified.
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Prayer is another essential component to a discipleship, disciple -making ministry.
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Let's look at the last principle then, the sixth principle we want to look at today. I believe this one is the governing principle which governs all other principles we've looked at today.
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And it's one that dominates the life of our Lord also. And we see that in John 13 again and verse 1.
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John 13 and verse 1. And in this context, where Jesus is focusing on His disciples before His crucifixion, as He's pouring
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His life for the one last time during His ministry on earth into these men, this is what the text of Scripture says about our
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Lord. It says, Now, before the feast of the Passover, Jesus, knowing that His hour had come, that He would depart out of this world to the
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Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.
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What is the last key principle of disciple -making that we need to remember today? Shown in the example of our
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Lord? It's love. If disciple -making or outreach ministry, whether to unbelievers and drawing them to the
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Savior or in the church, drawing people closer to the Lord and their relationship with Him and that kind of discipleship, it all must be done in love.
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Our Lord is the wonderful example of that. Notice what it says. Having loved
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His own who were in the world, He loved them. They were His own. He loved them to the end, to the utmost, to the nth degree, completely, totally, with all
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His heart, with all His mind. He loved them. He poured
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His life into them. He held nothing back. That's what John is saying. Jesus loved
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His disciples. He loved them completely. He loved them eternally. There was nothing He would not do for them.
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And we saw later in this chapter, Jesus said, You know what? Just as I have loved you, you love one another.
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That's the heart of our Lord, the Master Disciple Maker. That's how we must function in our ministry of discipleship, both in the church and in bringing unbelievers to Him.
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It must be done out of love. You remember what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13, right?
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If I have all kinds of amazing ministry and moving mountains and thousands of people coming and all these wonderful things and I make huge sacrifices for the
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Lord, but I have not love, what benefit does that ministry have?
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Nothing. And we see in the life of our Lord that love, love of the disciples is essential.
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It is everything in disciple making. So we've seen from the command of the
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Lord and the great command, the great commission, you must be about making disciples, right?
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And we see not only did He command you and I those things, but He gave us a wonderful example. Even in His own life and ministry,
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He discipled men. He poured His life into them. And you may be thinking, you know,
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I can't do that. I'm insignificant. I don't know how to be a disciple maker. But you know what?
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Inasmuch as you and I are coming into conformity to the image of Christ, as we grow in our love for Him, you can be a disciple maker.
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It's the Lord's plan. It's His strategy. Every single one of us. The Lord wants us to be involved in that great plan of outreach to this world.
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Loving the unbeliever, speaking the truth to him, loving him, getting into a relationship with that person and drawing them to the greatness of our
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Lord. That's the Lord's plan for outreach. And He will equip us.
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Can you speak the truth to someone? Can you live a holy life before them?
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Can you love them? Can you pray for them? That's what disciple making is all about.
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That's what the Lord has shown us, even in His ministry on earth. And by God's grace, we can do it.
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We can make disciples. So let's get with the Lord's program. Let's focus our efforts and our ministries and our hearts and minds on disciple making, both in the church, in this church, as well as with those unbelievers who the
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Lord has brought into our lives. And when we do that, when we follow His plan, trusting that He will make the change in people's lives,
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He will build His church. Amen? Let's pray. Father, I just want to express again that we are insignificant.
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That shouldn't be a surprise to us, Lord. But Lord, we are little.
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We can do so little. But Lord, we do trust in Your power, in Your gospel.
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And Father, we do want to follow Your plan. I thank You, Father, for the discipleship that is going on in this church.
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I rejoice to see it. And Lord, rejoice in the glory that it is bringing to You in this community.
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I pray, Lord, that this church would increase in that. That, Lord, more and more of this kind of ministry would take place.
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Bind them together, Lord, in unity, in love. And Lord, may this church and this body of believers be a beacon to Your glory.
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We pray this in Jesus' name.