Good morning. Today, we are continuing our series on discipleship. And as we continue to emphasize that discipleship is ordinary people learning to live everyday life like Jesus. By now, you should know that to become a disciple here at Bellevue Christian Church is quite simple. You simply have to gather, train, and go. For the last six weeks, we have been keying on these concepts of gathering and training. As important as those two concepts are really they are not an end in themselves. In other words, they are simply just a means to the end. The end being to take the good news of Jesus Christ and to go into the world and make new disciples. It is about carrying out what we collectively refer to as the Great Commission, which is spelled out in Matthew 28:18-20 where it says “Then Jesus came to them and said, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.’” This little command go is probably one of the clearest commands in the gospel from Jesus. It is a command that has over the past 2,000 years or so has mobilized Christians to go out into the world and really to go out to all four corners of the world and to begin to share the good news about Jesus Christ and his kingdom. What we want to do over the next three weeks starting today is to begin to focus on this concept of going and really look at why we go and how we go in very real and practical ways.
Today, what I would like to do before diving into that is to just go briefly back over where we have been and specifically the biblical basis for these three concepts of gathering, training, and go. You may recall when I introduced this series I introduced it with a passage out of the gospel of Mark that says “After John was arrested, Jesus went to Galilea preaching the message of God. ‘Time’s up! God’s kingdom is here. Change your life and believe the message.’” This translation is from The Message translation, which is a paraphrase of the original passage. I think it gets to the point. You may recall that when I spoke about the kingdom I reminded us that the kingdom was not believed to be a truly physical kingdom but was a spiritual kingdom. The kingdom of God that really speaks of God’s effective will and reign in the world. When we say the Lord’s Prayer, we say “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed by thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done” what we are really doing is equating kingdom and God’s will. It is God’s effective will coming into the world. It is his will and his desire. Basically says what he wants done will be done. When Jesus says in this particular passage “Time’s up! The kingdom of God is here” he is not suggesting that the kingdom is some far off kingdom in some distant galaxy in some future time and space. He is suggesting that by his incarnation and his miracles, especially the casting out of demons, he is suggesting that the kingdom of God is happening right now. In other words, the kingdom of God is beginning to expand, and the kingdom of Satan is beginning to shrink. This was the proclamation of Jesus. It wasn’t only just a proclamation. It was an invitation. As you can tell from this passage, it was an invitation to a changed life. For people to rethink how they are living and consider following Jesus into this kingdom that is rapidly unfolding.
Now as we know from the gospels, people did follow Jesus. Ordinary people began to follow him, including the 12 disciples. People who left their fishing business, their tax collecting business, and all sorts of other businesses and really attached themselves to Jesus. What some suggest is they were like his apprentices or what we would call the disciples and attached on to him so they could learn how to live their everyday life in the kingdom of God. Consistent with what I have been saying is that when he first met them he began to gather them together in a variety of settings. We don’t have time to go through the gospel settings there, but even a cursory review of the gospels reveals all sorts of places where he gathered with the disciples, starting with a wedding in the city of Cana. He gathered together at a wedding feast. We also see him gather together at the side of a mountain near the sea of Galilea. We see him gather on the sea of Galilea in a boat with the disciples. Of course, we have seen him gather in the home of Zacchaeus or the home of Martha and Mary. Now those gatherings, although they were meant to strengthen relationship with is followers, they really weren’t just meant for that. They were meant to be opportunities for training to occur. Training that would come in a variety of ways. Jesus was into asking good questions or experiential type learning. He was trying to teach them about the Father. Really teach them about his kingdom ways. Teach them about his will. He was trying to demonstrate the things that they have inside of them that need to be worked on, their character flaws so to speak. He would teach them his pattern of living, what we refer to as the spiritual disciplines. All again really to prepare them to live in the kingdom of God that is rapidly expanding.
So without too much work, we can see that the concept of gathering and training were really a good part of discipleship in that first century. As important as it was to have the early followers be with Jesus and gather with him and be trained by him, really what was important was that this was for preparation. This is preparation to go. That they would take all the stuff that they are learning in the various gatherings and begin to try to apply them in the very different situations in the world. They were to go into the nations and begin to teach the things that Jesus had been teaching them. We saw that in the Great Commission passage out of Matthew. We see it in a few other verses. We see it in Mark 3 where it says “Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted and they came to him. He appointed twelve – designating them apostles – that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach and have authority to drive out demons.” So here again we see that they were with him and they learned from him and they were to go out and proclaim the gospel and demonstrate it in very real ways. We also see it in Matthew 10:7-8 where it says “As you go, preach this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven is near. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons.’” Again, they are to go and they are going to proclaim the kingdom of God, the good news, and demonstrate it in real ways by real acts of power.
So that is a brief summary of where we have been. A biblical basis for these three concepts of gather, train, and go. Hopefully, you understand that this stuff does have a pretty strong biblical basis, but more importantly my desire is that you begin to practice these things. The good news is that as we went into fall this year, we had a lot of opportunities to gather together. We had a number of men’s classes, women’s classes, home groups, workshops, and those types of things. People really did engage in them pretty well. As a side note, if you didn’t get involved in any small group in the fall, there is still one small group that is pretty much open and meets every Monday. It is led by Lanny Wilson, and it is called Doubting Faith and Finding God. This week’s topic is going to be on the resurrection. Did the resurrection really occur? So if you haven’t been to a class or haven’t been in a workshop, I invite you to join them. That is 7 o’clock on Monday night taught by Lanny Wilson. Again, we know that it was important for the disciples to gather and to train but also to go. Likewise, it is important for us not just to simply gather together and to train but to go into the world. The plan is in 2016, we will begin to provide a variety of opportunities to go. Starting right here in service to your local church and then expanding out into the local community, into the region, and even into the world. We are hoping to have at least one short-term mission trip going on this year. I don’t want to delve too much into that aspect of it.
What I would like to do in the remaining minutes is talk again about this command go. Specifically, I would like to talk about three bad responses to that command and one good response. The three bad responses are these: cocooning, combating, and conforming. Let’s think first about this idea of cocooning. Most of you know what a cocoon is. It is a silky like casing that forms around an insect in its early stages of life to protect it from the harmful elements of nature. Christians sometimes tend to cocoon. They tend to protect themselves with some sort of a casing that protects them from the world and keeps them really from engaging the world. It protects them from what they consider the dangerous elements. They are fearful of going into an environment where a lot of nonbelievers might be because they are fearful of maybe being tempted. They don’t have a lot of non-Christian friends because somehow they feel that maybe they will be contaminated by these friendships. Or they don’t share the gospel with anybody or even talk about God for fear that they would be rejected. What this really accomplishes is it simply serves the purpose of removing them from the world and putting them back into the church. The safety of the church. There is merit for some of this, so it is not totally wrong, but what happens if they stay in that cocoon too long they will begin to really have no connection with the world. It will not only stunt their own spiritual growth but the growth of those around them. Also, it is very inconsistent with Jesus’ own prayer that he prayed to the Father at one point. He said “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.” I was thinking today about how when God sent Jesus into the world, he didn’t send him in a cocoon. If he did send him in a cocoon, none of us would be here. He would never have any contact with any of us. But he didn’t send him in a cocoon. He sent him into the very midst of the messy and ugly humanity. In fact, I like the way The Message puts it in John 1:14. He says “The Word (being Jesus) became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood.” Became flesh and blood and moved into the messy neighborhood of humanity. So a bad response to the command go is cocooning.
Another bad response to the command go is combating. Unfortunately, many Christians and many churches see non-believers as the enemy. They see people as the enemy. When we know that people aren’t the enemy. The real enemy is the enemy of our souls: Satan. That is alluded to here in this passage out of Ephesians 6 where it says “For your struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” There is a power, there is an evil that is the real enemy. So when we see people as the enemy what happens is we often engage in these silly little battles that not only alienate the people from us, but they make us look like fools sometimes. There is a guy named David Kinnaman who writes in a book called Unchurched “The church has set itself up purely in an us vs. them mentality. Outsiders believe Christians do not like them because of what they do, how they look, or what they believe. They feel minimized, or worse, demonized.” I think it is true. Sometimes we get into an us vs. them mentality, which is not healthy at all. The funny thing is it seems to happen often around the most holy time of year, Christmas. A few years ago there was a big stink about the fact that retailers would not say Merry Christmas. They would say Happy Holidays. The latest thing has to do with Starbucks red cup controversy. A few of you have probably seen it. They did these festive looking cups around Christmas time that would include things like snowmen and icicles and snowflakes and carolers and that sort of thing. I guess in an attempt to be politically correct, they decided to take those holiday graphics off the cup and just simply have a red cup with their standard logo. As you expected, many Christians were totally up in arms about this. Social media was lit up by it. In the mind of many Christians, this is one more attempt by corporate America to take Christ out of Christmas. Think about it. This is silly. Extremely silly. Because if you haven’t figured out by now, Christ has been out of Christmas for a long, long time. If you don’t believe me, go to Black Friday or look under your own Christmas tree. See Christ has been replaced by consumerism a long time ago. You can’t blame Starbucks. It is a silly battle and makes us look foolish. It alienates people from Christians. Even if we could put the holiday graphics back on a Starbucks cup, it is not going to put Christ back in Christmas. The only thing that is going to put Christ back in Christmas is by Christians going out in the world and demonstrating the love of Christ with real acts of kindness and goodness and love. It was Christ himself who said I did not come to judge the world, I did not come to judge Starbucks, but to save the world. That is what he came for. We have to understand that. The people are not the enemy. So a bad response to the command go is combat.
The third negative response to the word go is what we call conforming. Romans 12:2 says “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” To be conformed is to act in accordance to the standards and the beliefs of the world views of the time. Really it is the opposite of combating. When you are combating, you take up arms. When you conform, you put down the arms and you pretty much surrender. Whatever you want, go ahead. It is fine. What happens is we become not distinct from culture. We become a mirror image of culture. I talked about before the idea that we begin to look like culture so much that statistics prove we are not that much different at all. Especially when it comes to divorce rates and addictions and all those types of things. We have lost our distinctive Christian identity. If you look at Christ in the gospels, if you just follow his interactions, his walking around in the world, he was able to go into all these environments, but he never lost his distinct identity as the son of God. How did he do that? Likewise, we need to make sure when we are going into the world that we do not compromise our identity as Christians because, if we do, we have basically lost the appeal to even become Christian. The appeal is gone. And we have definitely lost the ability to invite people into the kingdom because they are saying what is the point. What is the difference? What is the value of life in the kingdom?
Anyway, those are three negative responses to the command go. But as I mentioned at the beginning, although there are three bad responses, there is really one very good response to the word go. I would say it is the best response. The best response to go is to remain. The best response to going is remaining. I suspect some of you are thinking I am being a little bit inconsistent here. You told me we are not supposed to cocoon. We are not supposed to remain. But keep in mind, I am not saying remain in the church. I am not suggesting that you cocoon in the church. What I am suggesting is that you remain in the vine. John 15:5 says “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” Here is Jesus again using figurative language and agriculture-type imagery to get the point across to his disciples that they need to stay connected to Christ. They needed to stay connected with Christ because when they are not connected with Christ, we have seen especially through Peter that things go really badly. They make a lot of bad choices. This was especially important because he was about to send them out into the world. He was about to give them the command to go into the world. The way that they would stay connected is through the spirit. In the absence of the physical presence of Jesus, he promised that he would send the Holy Spirit. That he would send his spirit to them that they might be able to go into the world with a sense of confidence and a sense of power. We don’t have time to go back and look at it, but in Matthew 28 the last line says “I will be with you always.” That is reference to the spirit. He is with us. He is with the disciples. He is with us through the spirit always. What is true of the disciples back then is true for us today. If you are a born-again believer, we believe that you have received the spirit of the living Christ within you that has become for you the power of living and not only the power of living but the power to be able to go into the world with boldness and confidence. Boldness and confidence because you know that you do not go alone. You go with Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ goes with you. So when you go into the world, you are going with Christ. That means that everything you touch will somehow have the quality of Christ and the endurance of Christ with it. As he says later in the passage, he talks about you will produce fruit, and this fruit will last. Anything that Christ touches is going to have a lasting, enduring quality to it. What is the fruit that he is talking about? Actually we are not sure. Some people do think it is just simply the harvest of the souls. But at a minimum, the fruit is the fruit of your life. In other words, it is the marks of discipleship that basically you carry the character of Christ. The character that we see in the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, patience, kindness, goodness, self-control, all the fruits of the spirit. You carry the very character of Christ. And not only that, but also the fruit would be that people recognize that you are on mission with Christ. You are determined to share about the death, burial, resurrection of Jesus Christ and the forgiveness of sins that comes through it, and the invitation to live life in the kingdom that he offers.
In closing, as you see this verse, it is kind of a conditional statement. The passage says “If a man remains in me and I in him.” That is a big If. The part about Jesus remaining in us, once we have accepted Christ as Lord, it is a given. We have been given the Holy Spirit. The other side is we have to do our part, which is to remain in him. As I alluded to as I went through the series on training, remaining with Christ does not mean just hanging out with Christ two minutes in the morning as you rush out the door and not seeing him until the next day. That is not remaining with Christ. Remaining with Christ means to constantly seek to live in his presence 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, which means to have a constant awareness of his presence in your life. If you are going into the world, you know that you need this because Christ becomes your life source. The source of all the nourishment and grace that comes from God. A passage that I love that alludes to it. Jesus got up at the end of a festival one day and he says “’Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.’ By this he meant the spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.” People, just as a vine or branch in order to produce good fruits needs to stay connected to the vine because the vine is connected the life source, the nutrients in the water, likewise, if you are going to go out in the world and you want to produce good fruit, what you need to do is you need to stay connected to the vine. You need to stay connected to the life source. In doing so, you will go out and you won’t just bear everyday ordinary fruit. You are going to bear good quality fruit that carries the mark of Jesus Christ. Fruit that will last. Let us pray.
