This week I want to go back to the prayer Jesus was praying on his last night with his disciples. As you may recall He said this prayer was not only for them but others who would believe in him due to their testimony.
Jesus first prayed for himself and the begin praying for certain behaviors He wanted us to adapt. First He prayed that we would have the joy that comes from our relationship with him and not the joy the world offers. Then He prayed we would have the kind of holiness that would make us enemies of the world. He prayed that we would be salt, light, and a witness for him after He left us here. Then He prayed that we would discover the reality of God’s truth as found in the Bible.
His next prayer for us is found in John 17:18-19 “Just as you sent me into the world, I am sending them into the world. And I give myself as a holy sacrifice for them so they can be made holy by your truth.”
God sent his Son on a mission. In turn Jesus now sends us on a mission. It is the same mission. It has not changed in the last 2000 plus years. Jesus gave his life to empower to complete his mission while we are here in the world. It was his holy sacrifice that allowed the Holy Spirit to come dwell in us and empower us through him. It is through the revelation of God’s Word that we are made holy, set apart.
There is a funny story about a young American engineer named Billy was sent to Ireland by his company to work in a new electronics plant. It was a two-year assignment that he had accepted because it would enable him to earn enough to marry his long-time girlfriend, Irene. She had a job near her home in Tennessee, and their plan was to pool their resources and put a down payment on a house when he returned. They corresponded often, but as the lonely weeks went by, Irene began expressing doubts that he was being true to her, exposed as he was to lovely Irish lasses. Billy wrote back, declaring with some passion that he was paying absolutely no attention to the local girls. “I admit,” he wrote, “that sometimes I’m tempted. But I fight it. I’m keeping myself for you.”
In the next mail, Billy received a package. It contained a note from Irene and a harmonica. “I’m sending this to you,” she wrote, “so you can learn to play it and have something to take your mind off those girls.” Billy replied, “Thanks for the harmonica. I’m practicing on it every night and thinking of you.” At the end of his two-year stint, Billy was transferred back to company headquarters. He took the first plane to Tennessee to be reunited with his girl. Her whole family was with her, but as he rushed forward to embrace her, Irene held up a restraining hand and said sternly, “Just hold on there a minute, Billy. Before any serious kissin’ and huggin’ gets started here, let me hear you play that harmonica.
She wanted to test him to see if he had kept his word. One day we will stand before Jesus and give an account on how well we did in keeping our word about accomplishing his mission. So let’s begin understanding our assignment of reaching the world.
1) Our first assignment is to preach.
Mark 1:38 “But Jesus replied, “We must go on to other towns as well, and I will preach to them, too. That is why I came.” Jesus came to preach. We have been sent to preach.
Society has taken the roll of preaching and made it an office of the church. According to Ephesians 4:11 “Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.”
According to God’s Word the church body, not the local church necessarily, has at work within it ; apostles, those who dedicate their entire life to representing Jesus, much like full time missionaries ; prophets, those who have supernaturally inspired messages pertaining to a particular person, group, or situation; evangelists, a preacher of the gospel in the workplace and the market place much like you are called to be; and pastors and teachers, these being the same person, one who cares for a particular body and has the responsibility of instructing them, much like myself.
We are all called to a role. My title is not preacher. I am a pastor and teacher. You’re an evangelist. We both have the responsibility of preaching. Preaching consists of proclaiming, telling, urging, and warning others in the context of the Gospel.
And we are to do this everywhere. It’s easy to share the Gospel with each other. It can be difficult to travel to those “other towns” and share the Gospel in a hostile environment. But you will never know who you touch.
In his book, When God Whispers Your Name, Max Lucado tells the story of John Egglen, who had never preached a sermon in his life before the Sunday morning when it snowed and the pastor wasn’t able to make it to the church. In fact, he was the only deacon to show up. He was not a preacher, but he was faithful and that meant on that particular Sunday morning he preached. God rewarded his faithfulness, and at the end of his hesitant sermon, one young man invited God into his heart. No one there could appreciate the significance of what had taken place that morning. The young man who accepted Christ that snowy Sunday morning was non other than Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the man who has often been called, the "prince of preachers." God blessed his preaching and when he was still less than 30 years old he became the pastor of London’s Metropolitan Tabernacle. His sermons were so powerful that although the building could hold 5000 people, the crowds who came to hear him were so thick that they would line up outside trying to hear his sermons. That amazing life of faith all started on a cold Sunday morning with the faithfulness of a deacon who had never preached a sermon before that day.
2) Our second assignment is to fulfill.
Matthew 5:17 “Don’t misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose.”
Jesus came to fulfill the prophesies written about him. We have been sent to fulfill the prophesies written about us.
1 Peter 2:9 “But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people (God‘s elect) . You are royal (kingly) priests, a holy nation (set apart pagans), God’s very own possession (property). As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light.”
This is the prophetic church. A body filled with God’s elect who walks with a air of authority. A group of pagan Gentiles who have become the property of God. This is the church we are to live out, not one with our heads hanging down, beaten by the world and our circumstances.
God chose Jesus to fulfill a mission. He now chooses us to fulfill our mission. We are to be that royal church for the purpose of Showing others the goodness of God.
Our third assignment is to divide.
Luke 12:51 “Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I have come to divide people against each other!”
Jesus came to divide people. We are sent to divide people.
Christianity has the reputation of being intolerant and it is. We live in a world of “politically correct” being the only acceptable form of tolerance allowed.
The world teaches that we must be all-inclusive. We are forced to take “sensitivity” training so a not to offend anyone. The world teaches that there are no moral absolutes. That morality is relative to what you believe as an individual. The world teaches that all religions are acceptable. Christians claims that Jesus is the only way to heaven shows intolerance for others. The world teaches that there is no master creator that watches over us but rather natural events that control our destiny.
Tony Stout wrote in his commentary “The Church believes and follows te will of the Father over that of the world. There are ‘sins’ of the world that the church will not tolerate in principle. It is obligated to assist all persons in their efforts to reach heaven. As such, the Church is obligated to point out that serious sin will keep them out of heaven. The world misinterprets this as ‘intolerance.’
However, even though the Church points out the sins of the world. It loves all persons and treats them with the dignity due them as children of God. As children of God the church still accepts them, (not their sinful behavior), and serves them accordingly regardless of their sin.”
We have been called to be intolerant when it comes to sin. But we are to love sinners with dignity and serve them.
Our fourth assignment is to serve.
Matthew 20:28 “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Jesus came to serve. We are sent to serve.
The word “serve” means to wait on, to help, to attend to. When is the last time you have done this? Have you ever done this? Family don’t count. That’s an obligation. This type of serving is sacrificial. Nothing expected in return. Serving just for the purpose of serving. Opportunities abound. You can serve at Love Denver. You can serve at the Free Store in Charlotte. You can serve in your neighborhood. Do you want to do a community outreach? I will be glad to help.
Let me tell you the story of Angus McGillivray.
Angus was a Scottish prisoner in one of the camps filled with Americans, Australians, and Britons who had helped build the infamous Bridge over the River Kwai. The camp had become an ugly situation. A dog-eat-dog mentality had set in. Allies would literally steal from each other and cheat each other; men would sleep on their packs and yet have them stolen from under their heads. Survival was everything. The law of the jungle prevailed...until the news of Angus McGillivray’s death spread throughout the camp.
Rumors spread in the wake of his death. No one could believe big Angus had succumbed. He was strong, one of those whom they had expected to be the last to die. Actually, it wasn’t the fact of his death that shocked the men, but the reason he died. Finally they pieced together the true story.
The Argylls (Scottish soldiers) took their buddy system very seriously. Their buddy was called their “mucker,” and these Argylls believed that is was literally up to each of them to make sure their “mucker” survived. Angus’s mucker, though, was dying, and everyone had given up on him; everyone, of course, but Angus. He had made up his mind that his friend would not die.
Someone had stolen his mucker’s blanket. So Angus gave him his own, telling his mucker that he had “just come across an extra one.” Likewise, every mealtime, Angus would get his rations and take them to his friend, stand over him and force him to eat them, again stating that he was able to get “extra food.” Angus was going to do anything and everything to see that his buddy got what he needed to recover.
But as Angus’s mucker began to recover, Angus collapsed, slumped over, and died. The doctors discovered that he had died of starvation complicated by exhaustion. He had been giving of his own food and shelter. He had given everything he had—even his very life.
The ramifications of his acts of love and unselfishness had a startling impact on the compound. “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:12). As word circulated of the reason for Angus McGillivray’s death, the feel of the camp began to change. Suddenly, men began to focus on their mates, their friends, and humanity of living beyond survival, of giving oneself away. They began to pool their talents—one was a violinmaker, another an orchestra leader, another a cabinetmaker, another a professor. Soon the camp had an orchestra full of homemade instruments and a church called the “Church Without Walls” that was so powerful, so compelling, that even the Japanese guards attended. The men began a university, a hospital, and a library system. The place was transformed; an all but smothered love revived, all because one man named Angus gave all he had for his friend. For many of those men this turnaround meant survival. What happened is an awesome illustration of the potential unleashed when one person actually gives it all away.
5) Our fifth assignment is to save.
Luke 19:10 “For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.”
Jesus came to save. We are sent to save.
The United States of America has the largest Christian population in the world, followed by Brazil and Mexico. But with over 120 million unsaved people in the United States the US is the third largest mission field in the world behind only China and India. That means 38% of Americans confess to be unsaved. The percentage may be much higher due to those who will not admit to being lost.
The Greek word for lost is a lot different than the word of which we think. Lost in Greek meant to destroy, kill, perish. The word was one of violence and strife.
Jesus came to look for, strive for, to try to obtain with a desire to possess so that He could rescue and deliver those being destroyed, killed, perishing in the midst of spiritual violence and strife. Saving the lost is warfare. It’s not coercing someone to come to church in hopes they will turn their lives around. It is a very real battle with a very real enemy.
Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote this about our spiritual battle:
“A man who does not understand the nature of the problem he is confronting is a man who is already doomed to failure. Christian people are like first-year college students—they think at first that every subject is quite simple, there is no difficulty. Well, we know what is likely to happen to such when they face an examination! The first thing you have to do is to understand the nature and character of your problem. So we have to realize that we are called, in the Christian life, to a battle, not to a life of ease; to a battle, to a warfare, to a wrestle, to a struggle.”
6) Our sixth assignment is to shine.
John 12:46 “I have come as a light to shine in this dark world, so that all who put their trust in me will no longer remain in the dark.”
A little boy was asked in Sunday school, "What is a saint?" He replied, "A saint is a person who lets the light shine through." “ What do you mean?”, the teacher asked. He answered, “Like those people in the stained-glass windows.” He was certainly not far off base. A saint, or a person who is pure in heart, will let the light of God’s grace and mercy shine through. As that person’s heart remains pure, it remains transparent to God’s light.
We must show grace and mercy to those who do not deserve it, just as Jesus did. We must set aside our frustrations and anger with others and replace it with unconditional love.
7) Our seventh assignment is to testify.
John 18:37 “Pilate said, ‘So you are a king?’
Jesus responded, ‘You say I am a king. Actually, I was born and came into the world to testify to the truth. All who love the truth recognize that what I say is true.’”
Jesus came to testify to the truth. We are sent to testify to the truth.
We are sent to vouch for the truth of God’s Word and we do so by the way we live our lives. We are sent to speak well of God’s Word and we do so by the testimony of our lives. We are sent to commend God’s Word and we do so by inviting others to join us.
But as Dr. Robert Lundstrom said “What you are speaks so loudly, I can’t hear what you’re saying.” Remember your deeds are greater than your words.
