Note: This sermon is written by Daniel Kirkendall, prepared for July 3, 2022.
Honduras Sunday
As I share about my experience in Honduras and the opportunities that are available to us here at Forsythe, there are a few questions I want us to think about moving forward.
John just wrapped up a series on the “chief-of-sinners” who went on to become the standard for mission work. The first known Christian missionary, who discarded every important thing in his life apart from preaching and teaching that Jesus is the messiah. As we followed the journey of Saul of Tarsus, this verse I am about to read to you surfaced in my mind. See Paul was more than converted, he was transformed. He was devoted, and religious, but what he accepted as truth was not truth. He saw the same things that everyone else saw, but closed his eyes to the truth of King Jesus. So Jesus blinded him a few days, and when his eyes were opened by Ananias, he was completely consumed by this need to be a witness of the love and the grace of God through Jesus of Nazareth. This is the parable that is appropriate for Paul’s epitaph.
Matt 13:44 “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
This is a good parable, and the simple and practical words of Jesus guide the Christian of today not just in what they do but also in the way they think. This hypothetical man somehow finds a treasure that nobody else knows is there and goes and sells ALL HE HAS, everything. Not just enough to buy the field, but everything he owns.
It says a lot about this man’s priorities, and one of the biggest lessons that I learned from the chief-of-sinners has a lot to do with priorities in our life.
As we talk about this today, I am not going to ask you for anything. This is not going to be a sermon on materialism. Instead I want to help frame the idea of “mission work” in a way that includes opportunities for Christians and the church. We will do that by bringing up 3 questions:
-What does it mean to follow Jesus?
-Who is my neighbor?
-Am I in or out?
These questions are about the mission of the church, the purpose of Christians. I don’t believe that “missions” make up a small part of Christianity, or even a large part of Christianity. I believe that mission work is Christianity. What I mean by that is you cannot say that you have been saved without feeling compelled to minister to your neighbor.
So let’s talk about the first question, What does it mean to follow Jesus?
While in Honduras, one of our team members talked about a long bike race in Spain he watched on tv. The commentary was in Spanish and he had a pretty thorough knowledge of the language, but noticed that the word for “follow” that was being used to describe the 2nd place racer as he was attempting to catch up to the race leader was not the one that he had learned was translated to the word “follow”. So he had to look it up and the verb “seguir” that he was using did mean to follow but the true meaning was to pursue and to persist, not to “vigilar” which means to follow, or walk behind. So he opened his Spanish Bible and in Luke 9:23 when Jesus if anyone would follow me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me, both translations are used. The Spanish translation, to paraphrase, says that if anyone wants to walk behind me, they must deny themselves, take up their cross and chase after me with persistence and resilience. This simple linguistic shift in the way I read this verse drastically changed the ramifications of what Jesus is saying. It also helps us make sense of Jesus’s response later in that same chapter when three different men come to him and say they are ready to follow him, I’ll let you read those on your own, Luke Chapter 9. This is the challenge.
This is the spiritual battle going on in my life right now between the cross of Jesus and my quest for comfort. You are all experiencing that same battle. This idea is difficult to talk about because it certainly is uncomfortable, but hang in there, persist and pursue, and let’s see what Jesus says, We are going to run through a few Jesus quotes kind of quickly.
Luke 9:23 If anyone would follow me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.
Where are we going Jesus? Well, you are carrying a cross that you chose to pick up and carry…
Luke 9:48 …whoever is least among you all is the one who is great
Luke 10:3 I am sending you out as lambs into the midst of wolves
Luke 10:4 Carry no moneybag, no knapsack, no sandals…
We are barely through a full chapter and we see that the initial step in following Jesus is one of repentance. The willingness to deny comforts and luxuries of this world in exchange for the life on earth and the life after death that Jesus is offering.
A few verses later in Luke 10:27, Jesus responds to a lawyer who approached him and asked What must I do to inherit eternal life. Jesus responds with: Love God with all your heart soul mind strength and LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF. Right after that is the famous parable of the Good Samaritan in which the listeners were challenged with the question “who is your neighbor?
The idea of neighbor here is such a neat idea because it promotes the idea of empathy instead of judgment. The lines and barriers that have been constructed by the world to divide are broken down by showing love and mercy. Race, names, nationalities, social status, political stance, the past, even religion… none of that separates a follower of Jesus from following Jesus.
Love your neighbor as yourself. Could you imagine the world we could live in if we loved our neighbor as ourselves. Let me ask it this way, what if we loved our neighbor in a way in which we sought to provide comfort to others with the same measures that we use to provide comfort to ourselves. What if we made sure that our neighbor had the resources, the supplies, the clothes, the access, and the opportunities that we have… What if we loved our neighbor as ourself in that way.
Do you see what Jesus is saying in these verses here, you are to carry a cross, not just once, but once a day. This cross is an image of death, Romans 12:1 says to offer your body as a living sacrifice, 1 Peter 2:21 says that Christ suffered for you as an example. Romans 8:17 says that we are fellow heirs with Christ provided we suffer with him.
I understand that life can be hard and tough times occur in everyone’s life, but the love of Christ that binds us is AGAPE love, unconditional love, sacrificial love.
The crazy part of this- is that it’s just step 1 of following Christ, and Jesus makes that clear all throughout his teachings. Step 1 is repent and die to yourself, and then repeat step one everyday. All the other Christian stuff will open up and you won’t have to do a checklist, growing in wisdom, cleaning up your behavior and your language, praying to God with gratitude in all circumstances, forgiving and loving others, reaching the lost, serving others, all that comes through practice and refinement, but step 1 is to CHOOSE to pick up your cross. It is the choice followers of Jesus must make, it is the choice that you and I must make, and the step that we must repeat every day.
I know this is not a huge revelation for many of you who are seasoned churchgoers, and almost all these verses are ingrained in our memory, but it is refreshing to be reminded of what it is to follow Jesus and to love your neighbor.
Another quote by Jesus in Matthew 22:37-39 when asked what the greatest command is to love the Lord with ALL your heart soul mind strength and to Love your neighbor as yourself. So the last question is Are you in or out? It’s kind of a trick question, because if our response to Jesus is yes, then our focus becomes outward. That’s what it is to have the same mind as that of Christ. This is mission work, opportunities to share with others the love that has so freely and generously been shown to us, a transfer of the hope that we abide in because Jesus saved us from our sins, a chance for us to practice what God calls pure religion, looking after orphans and widows and not neglecting the justice and the love of God.
David Platt - president of the International Missions Board said this - “If you can trust Jesus to save you for the eternity, then surely you can trust Him to lead you on this earth. And not just to lead you, but to satisfy you in every step of the way.”
As Christians today, priests who serve under the authority of the great high priest, princes and princesses who are joint heirs with Christ with the promise of a glorious inheritance obtained in HIM that can never be destroyed,, the body of Christ on the earth today empowered and equipped with the Holy spirit to continue the work set before us by Jesus of Nazareth, the promised messiah, we now find ourselves compelled to go into all the world and preach the gospel, baptize believers, and pursue justice in the lives of the oppressed, unfortunate, and mistreated.
I think it’s interesting, the man who stumbled onto the treasure in the field, he never asked what it would cost. When we value something, there are no boundaries, especially when we can afford it. And to follow Jesus, if we view it as valuable enough in our lives, we can be certain that we can afford it.
The issue with what we know as church today is that the one hour that we spend together on Sunday mornings is the extent of discipleship for many people.
Luke 14:26 If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own family, he cannot be my disciple.
That’s what the Bible says, and we don’t have time to unpack that one today, but it’s there-
I don’t mean exclusively at Forsythe, I’m talking about the churches that meet around the world, especially the churches in the U.S.
11:42- Woe to you For you tithe mint and rue and herb, and neglect justice and the love of God.
Now, does that mean your life is going to be a boring, miserable, lonely, uneventful life? Absolutely not. As we looked at the life of Paul, I encourage to go back and look at his experiences. If you take away all of the church stuff in Acts and his letters, it sounds almost like an Indiana Jones movie. Being snuck out of city walls, making friends and being welcomed into a strange community, encountering Kings, Chief’s, Magicians, Fortune tellers, Governor’s, angels, he traveled the known world, survived a shipwreck, an earthquake while in prison, a snake bite, and several other assassination attempts, on and on, what a full life Paul had. Yet through all that, the book of Acts closes with him teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with boldness and without hindrance.
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Video of this lesson will be available on our YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/c/ForsytheChurchofChrist
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LifeGroup Questions
1. Talk about a group mission trip you have experienced?
2. Daniel talked about the spiritual battle in our lives being contention between the cross and comfort. Do you agree with that? Why or why not?
3. Read Luke 9:57-62 and discuss Jesus response to each of those men, and how you would have reacted.
4. In Thom Rainer’s Scrappy Church, Rainer says that “the outward focus is the Biblical response to the great commission and the great commandment”
5. Which type of neighbor is easy to love as yourself and what neighbors are difficult to “love as yourself”?
6. In Matthew 25:40 Jesus says”whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me”. How can we (the church) be more effective in serving the suffering and marginalized?
7. George Hunsberger defined the role of the church as community, messenger, and servant of the kingdom of God. What are the differences and similarities between those three labels?
8. What are some ways you see yourself being involved in mission work, now and/or in the future?
