This morning I begin with what might be to some of us a loaded question that I am asking for you to verbally respond to: When you hear the words missionary or missions what do you think of?
(Allow for responses)
Thanks for your responses. Now can I ask you to think about the following statement during the sermon? Somewhere along the line of your family history someone who did not speak English or live in here America shared the gospel with a distant member of your family or someone who would get to know a distant member of your family.
This fall, we have been looking at ways we please God. (Overhead 1)
We please God by examining (and allowing the Holy Spirit to examine) our motives and standards against God’s standards. We looked at some churches in the opening chapters of Revelation who were in various states of spiritual growth or decay and who God was both pleased with and concerned about.
We also please God by following God’s plan of salvation. We preach Christ and the Gospel at our church not some current philosophy that changes tomorrow!
We please God by putting the Bible into practice. The Bible stands at the center of our congregational and personal lives. We teach and study the Bible, the true and infallible Word of God. It is the heart of our message and mission.
We please God by allowing Him to make us “new creatures in Christ.” We must be “born again.” We must be changed by the work of the Holy Spirit into people that are different and more like Jesus as the years go by.
We please God by cooperating with and proclaiming the work of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit works to filter out the impurities in our lives so that we are better able to serve God.
Finally this morning we will learn that we please God by doing our part in fulfilling the Great Commission. The Christian faith is a global faith and each of us has a role in fulfilling Christ’s command to “go and make disciples.”
As we continue this series I want to give credit where credit is due for this series as the idea for it originated in the writings of Dr. Gil Stafford one of the leading Church of God teachers and preachers. In his book, Vision For The Church of God at the Crossroads, he outlines a sermon series entitled, “The Church That Pleases God.”
I have used his suggested outline and personalized it because as each of one of us makes the decision to please God in these ways, we as the Church of God here in Kendallville are better able to please God.
Still thinking about that statement I gave you a few moments ago? Let’s look at some important ways fulfilling the Great Commission is a way we please God.
Rick Warren has written, “You were made for a mission. God is at work in the world, and he wants you to join him. This assignment is called your mission…”
“Your life mission,” he goes on to say “is both shared and specific. One part of it is a responsibility you share with every other Christian, and the other part is an assignment that is unique to you…”
The shared part is addressed in this sermon and the unique part will be addressed in the final sermon in this series. Let’s briefly look at our text for this morning.
Jesus is preparing to return to heaven to be with the Father. One chapter in the story of salvation was complete; a new one was about to be started.
And in this new chapter there were two key elements – the Disciples and the Holy Spirit. Our text deals with the disciples but we will briefly look at the role of the Spirit as well.
Jesus is standing before the remaining Disciples (Judas is dead) and He gives them a commission that is, He gives them an order to obey, which has been behind the movement of the Christian faith throughout the world in the 20 centuries since Jesus first gave it. It has been called “The Great Commission.”
This particular passage of scripture has been used by the Holy Spirit to call thousands of men and women, including some from this congregation, to go far from home and tell people of other cultures and languages that there is a God who loves and cares for them in a variety of different ways. Obeying then this commission is a very important way we please God.
Now I know that there are those who say, “There is so much need in this county why go to another country when there is so much work to be done here?” It is a fair question. Let me offer two responses.
First, let us acknowledge the geographical nature of our commission from Acts 1:8 where Jesus says to the remaining eleven during these final moments, “But when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, you will receive power and will tell people about me everywhere-in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Here is a modern translation of that final statement. “You will tell others about me everywhere – in Kendallville, throughout Indiana, in the United States, and to every nation on this earth.” Some who heard that sentence never left Jerusalem. Others who were given the commission never left Judea, still others who heard the command to “go” landed in Samaria and stayed there, but there were some who did go to the ends of the earth because God called them to go there.
Mission is not about a location, it is about an obedience to the command of God to help others come to Christ. And that command is based on the prerogative of God to call us where He wants us to go. Someone once wrote, “The only one among the twelve apostles who did not become a missionary became a traitor.”
Now some of you might be thinking, “Jim, I’m offended at being called a traitor for not going to another county. I’m serving God the best I can right here in the good old USA!”
That’s not the point I am trying to make. The point that I am trying to make is that the role of the apostles changed to that of being a missionary because God said, “GO!” We are all missionaries. The moment we accepted Christ we were given the commission to go and help others come to Christ. That takes place anywhere we go!
Christ’s commission calls His followers to Go everywhere to make disciples.
The second response to the “Why go” question is illustrated in a dinner conversation of a missionary from another time and place named Dr. Wilder and three naval officers one of whom asked this same question. Dr. Wilder asked the officer, “If your ship was ordered to action would you choose whether or not to obey?”
The officer replied, “If we are ordered to go, we must go, even if every ship is sunk and every sailor killed.” “Quite right,” said Wilder,” I have orders from the divine government:” Go and preach the gospel to every creature.”
To please God we must go where He sends us to serve Him. For some of us that is the factory in our community. For others of us at this stage in life it is the classroom. For others it is in Ft Wayne or the surrounding area. For others it is the home and neighborhood.
Your job site, your classroom, your backyard or side yard, is your mission field. Do you see it that way? God does!
The issue is obedience. The person and the church that pleases God is one that obeys God. Obedience to Christ is not an option. Obedience to Christ is a requirement, a necessity to please God. How well are you doing, how well are we doing in this aspect of pleasing God? That is where the Holy Spirit comes in.
First let us note the following in our text:
1. Jesus has been given complete authority in heaven and earth from the Father.
2. As a result of this authority, Jesus gives a commission to the eleven to
a. “Go and make disciples of all the nations,”
b. “Baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.”
c. “Teach them to obey all the commands I have given you.”
3. Jesus gives them an important statement of assurance, “And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
Working in and through all of this commission is the Holy Spirit and we need to tie together this passage with Acts 1:8 that I recently read to you because the Holy Spirit’s power is necessary to do the work that God has for us to do. We cannot please God in this way or any of the ways that we have been looking at this fall unless we have the power of the Holy Spirit working in our lives.
But that requires obedience and obedience requires waiting on the Spirit. What would have happened if those gathered in the upper room had jumped the gun and started telling the Good News before the Holy Spirit came or dug their heels in and refused to tell the story? Would there have been an Acts 2? Would there have been a Pentecost?
The Holy Spirit empowers us to “go and make disciples.” The Holy Spirit empowers us to be “witnesses.” The Holy Spirit empowers us to baptize and teach those who say yes to Christ. And the Holy Spirit assures us that Jesus is with us “always” as we go.
My work as your Pastor, your work as a follower of Christ, our work as a church must have this Holy Spirit power operating and guiding and directing all the time. If not, we are simply a social club and not a church.
To please God means that we must become missionaries. For most of us that means being a missionary around Kendallville. But, for some of us, for some of us, God has other plans.
Some of us are either being called or we are going to be called to serve God elsewhere. This could be as a pastor in another part of our state or nation. This could be as a teacher or doctor in another country. Will you obey God if He calls you?
I believe that God is calling some of this congregation to full-time Christian service and it will require them to leave Kendallville and Noble County and perhaps this country. I would also add “If He truly is calling you, you cannot run from it because you will be miserable and nothing else you do will bring you any peace.”
(Believe me, I know.)
I also believe that God calls some members of a local church to place of ministry as a layperson that is beyond a mere “volunteer” role. I think that there might be some of you in this category. God is calling you to a higher level of ministry in this church. Indiana Ministries of the Church of God recognizes this kind of calling through its Lay Minister licensing process.
The question in all of this is, “Will you obey or not?” We are all missionaries if we are born-again followers of Christ. All of us are called to help make disciples. For some of us however, it will become our life’s work because God wills it to be so.
We cannot quench the Spirit in this matter. As a church we cannot resist the Spirit because to do so will cause us to lose ground and be disobedient and I don’t want to be disobedient to the Lord, do you?
Remember the statement that I asked you to ponder? Somewhere along the line of your family history someone who did not speak English or live in here America shared the gospel with a distant member of your family or someone who would get to know a distant member of your family.
What if that person would have refused to tell the Good News? What if your family member would have said no to the Gospel? The point that I make is that the faith that has given us eternal life has been entrusted to human beings from all kinds of backgrounds and situations but who have obeyed the Spirit and told the good news wherever they were and you and I have benefited from that obedience.
Obey the Spirit. Obey the Lord. Obey. Amen.
Warren Quote from Purpose Driven Life
overheads are available for this sermon
please e-mail me at pastorjim46755@yahoo.com and ask for 102404svgs.
