-
Who Will Go? Series
Contributed by Jason W. Lawson on Aug 17, 2012 (message contributor)
Summary: #2 in the series
- 1
- 2
- 3
- Next
OPENING
Last week we was in Isaiah 6:1-8 and we saw why we need to stop and look at who God is (Holy, Holy, Holy) and what we have become (sinful in need of cleansing from God) before we GO!. When Isaiah saw God’s greatness he recognized his own unworthiness before this Holy God and was very enthusiastic (like a child raising his hand for candy) to go on mission for God, without even knowing what the mission was first. God said, “who shall I send, who shall go for us” and Isaiah said, “Here am I send me”. I ended with saying God is saying the same to us, “who shall go for us” and I left the answer between you and God.
Missions , Evangelism, and Discipleship--- are all connected to each other. You can’t have one without the other. But before we continue on we need to know that the reason these 3 things exist is because proper worship of our God does not (Piper and Jonathan Edwards). True worship is eternal, but missions, evangelism, and discipleship is temperal. Meaning they will one day cease to exist, but true worship of our Majestic King will continue for all eternity.
When Jesus comes and makes all things new, there will be no need for missions, evangelism, discipleship because we will be with God giving Him our praise and true worship. SO, while we have the opportunity to serve our Holy God on this Earth, which is not our home BTW, let us be obedient to God’s plan to reach the world. TAKE YOUR BIBLES IF YOU WILL AND TURN TO…..
Psalm 126:6 (V6 is an explanation of Verse 5)
CMT: God’s plan has always been for His seed to be sown so that a harvest will come.
Proposal: If we do not sow the seed, you can believe that there will be no harvest. God’s plan is very simple.
Title: Simple truths of God’s plan to reach the world
I. TRUTH 1: God’s plan is for you to “GO”
a. To GO is to have an active faith not an inactive one. God never intended to call us on His team to warm the bench.
b. We must rediscover the “go” in Gospel.
i. Mark 16:15 "Go into all the world and preach the Gospel..."
ii. Luke 19:10 "For the Son of man has come to seek and to save the lost." The "seeking" has to come before the "saving."
c. QUOTE: John Wesley once said, "The church must go to the lost or go to oblivion." Someone else put it this way: "Any church which is satisfied to hold her own is on the way to the cemetery."
d. GO means that we have to learn how to be the church out there. NOT come to church, but BE THE CHURCH. Most people think that this here is church. We say things like, I’m going to church. NO! this is what the church does. This is fellowship. We are the church. The church is not a building, the church is the people. Living, breathing, thinking, loving, moving, active in the lives of others. We need to learn how to go and be the church out there. (Use Jason Dukes ill)
e. Let me ask you something. Let me test our Bible knowledge in this room. Does it say in the Bible that God has commanded all sinners to go to the church? Does it say that God commanded the church to go to the sinners? Then why don’t we go? Let’s call an orange and orange….it’s because we don’t look at lost people the way God does….with tears in our eyes.
II. TRUTH 2: God’s plan is for you to weep for the lost
a. V5 “those who sow in tears” and V6 “he who goes out weeping”
b. We don’t see many people weeping over the lost people around them, do we?
c. Here is a few that did care…
i. Jeremiah had compassion for the people---we wept (Jer. 9:1)
ii. Paul had compassion for the people---he wept (Rom. 9:1-3)
1. Rom. 9:1- I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit— I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people
2. Is that not the heart of Christ? Wow… look at Jesus…
iii. Jesus had compassion for the people---he looked at them as sheep w/out a shepherd and as He entered Jerusalem the week before He took the cross, He wept over the city (Luke 19:41)
d. ILLUSTRATION: How is it that we can cry and get all emotional over football game or a good chick flick, but we can’t get emotional over someone spending eternity in damnation separated from their creator? All because we don’t go….