For The Sake Of The Call Series

FOR THE SAKE OF THE CALL

Text: Eph. 1:1-2

Introduction

1. Illustration: We will abandon it all for the sake of the call

No other reason at all but the sake of the call

Wholly devoted to live and to die for the sake of the call

Nobody stood and applauded them

So they knew from the start

This road would not lead to fame

All they really knew for sure

Was Jesus had called to them

He said "come follow Me" and they came

With reckless abandon, they came

Empty nets lying there at the water's edge

Told a story that few could believe

And none could explain

How some crazy fisherman agreed to go where Jesus went

With no thought to what they would gain

For Jesus had called them by name

And they answered

We will abandon it all for the sake of the call

No other reason at all but the sake of the call

Wholly devoted to live and to die for the sake of the call

The sake of the call

2. We are going to take a walk-through Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. During this walk we will learn who we are in Christ.

3. The first thing we learn about our identity in Christ is that we are called.

a. Usually when we think of a calling, we think about those called to fulltime ministry like Pastor’s or Missionaries.

b. But the reality is that we have all been called by God, and he has a plan and a job for us to do.

4. From Paul’s introduction in this letter, we learn…

a. We are called to be sent.

b. We are called to be holy.

5. Read Eph. 1:1-2

Proposition: God has called us to be his representatives in the world.

Transition: First, Paul tells us we are…

I. WE ARE CALLED TO BE SENT (1a).

A. Apostle

1. Paul begins his letter with, “This letter is from Paul, chosen by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus.”

a. In general, you will find that all of Paul’s letters followed the classical Greco-Roman style of letter writing.

b. First, he indicated who he was, and then described who he was writing to, and then spoke a greeting or a blessing of some kind.

c. The first thing that he says about himself is that he was chosen by the will of God.

d. The will of God is an important theme in this letter and appears more often in the letter than in other of Paul’s letters.

e. The concern here is less upon our finding out what the will of God is, and more about God’s purpose for us.

f. Paul’s point here is that he was an Apostle because God wanted him to be..1 Snodgrass, K. (1996). Ephesians (p. 37).

2. Ok, so we know that God wanted Paul to be an apostle, but what’s an apostle?

a. Well, the word comes from the Greek word apostello and means “sent one.”

b. Now there is a specific sense of the word and a general sense of the word.

1) In the specific sense, an apostle had to be an eyewitness of the risen Jesus and had to be personally commissioned by Jesus.

2) They served as both evangelists and church planters. Paul met all of those qualifications to the letter.

3) He was saved on the road to Emmaus where he had a personal encounter with the risen Jesus who told him he had a mission for him.

3. So, that should cause to ask the question, “what does that have to do with me?”

a. Well, in the specific sense nothing, for the most part no one today can be considered an apostle in the specific sense because, as far as I know, none of us has seen the risen Jesus.

b. However, in the general sense, an apostle is anyone who is sent on a mission to preach the Good News of Jesus!

c. In that sense, all of us are apostles because we have all been called to be “sent ones” right here in Rome, GA.

d. You see, we too have been sent into our little corner of NW Georgia to be ambassador’s of the Gospel.

e. And then he told them, “Go into all the world and preach the Good News to everyone (Mark 16:15, NLT).

f. So, we all have a mission to reach the lost for Jesus. If you think it is my job to fill these seats you are sadly mistaken, because it is all of our jobs to reach out to people that need Jesus!

g. We encounter people every day that need Jesus. It might be at the grocery store, or the gas station, or at work. But every day God brings people into our lives that need us to speak the truth about Jesus into their lives because we have been sent.